From bob@RATTLESNAKE.COM Mon Mar 19 05:13:11 2001 Return-Path: X-Sender: bob@rattlesnake.com X-Apparently-To: lojban@yahoogroups.com Received: (EGP: mail-7_0_4); 19 Mar 2001 13:13:11 -0000 Received: (qmail 81378 invoked from network); 19 Mar 2001 13:13:10 -0000 Received: from unknown (10.1.10.26) by l9.egroups.com with QMQP; 19 Mar 2001 13:13:10 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO megalith.rattlesnake.com) (140.186.114.245) by mta1 with SMTP; 19 Mar 2001 13:13:08 -0000 Received: by rattlesnake.com via sendmail from stdin id (Debian Smail3.2.0.111) for lojban@yahoogroups.com; Mon, 19 Mar 2001 08:13:04 -0500 (EST) Message-Id: Date: Mon, 19 Mar 2001 08:13:04 -0500 (EST) To: rlpowell@calum.csclub.uwaterloo.ca Cc: lojban@yahoogroups.com In-reply-to: <20010319010536.K3953@calum.csclub.uwaterloo.ca> (message from Robin Lee Powell on Mon, 19 Mar 2001 01:05:36 -0500) Subject: Re: [lojban] Knowledge (was: Random lojban questions/annoyances Reply-to: bob@rattlesnake.com References: <20010319010536.K3953@calum.csclub.uwaterloo.ca> X-eGroups-From: "Robert J. Chassell" From: "Robert J. Chassell" X-Yahoo-Message-Num: 5998 > Not at all. I am objectively reporting the personal claims of A. "Sophie > is a Muslim" is objective fact. "Sophie KNOWS Mohammed is Allah's only > prophet" is not objective, because I am sneaking in my own agreement with > her. We have been over this before: every utterance is stated a `universe of discourse'. The problem occurs because people live in difference universes. Sophie lives within a universe of discourse in which her knowledge is `real'. The statement is unfalsifiable. It addition, it very possibly is known to her by internal experience (dream, vision, or personal revelation) {se'o}. You put those two together, and as Roy Rappaport said in 1979, The unfalsifiable supported by the undeniable yields the unquestionable. Let's turn to Aristotle and the Earth-centered universe. I don't know what Aristotle did to convince himself of his ideas, but I once replicated Ptolemy's observations of the sun using ad hoc tools that were not as good as his. Ptolemy also described an Earth-centered universe. My observations {za'a} showed me that to the limits of my tools, the sun-centered model was pretty good. About the only contradicting information I could image would have come from an analysis of changes in the brightness of Mercury, Venus (especially), and Mars, against models that presumed them to be partially illiminated spheres. Tycho Brahe's alternative model, still earth-centered, handled that. (I never tried to make brightness observations. Moreover, it would have been necessary to discover and appreciate the the inverse square law of brightness and to relate the brightness of planets to the brightness of nearby things, like a candle. Both could have been done with equipment available 2,000 years ago, but neither were.) Also, at the times of Ptolemy or Tycho Brahe, No one had thought to build, or had a theory to interpret, the movements of a Foucalt pendulum. The earth rotates underneath a Foucalt pendulum, so from the point of view of an observer on the earth, the plane of the pendulum's swing rotates, and by an amount dependent on latitude. Hence, it is reasonable to say that in Aristotle's and Ptolemy's universe of discourse, they `knew' that the Earth was the unmoving center of everything. The first experimental evidence against the Earth-centered universe that I know of occured in the 1640s. Catholic priests used their cathedrals as giant pin hole cameras. They projected the image of the sun on a spot on the floor, and measuring where it was at noon during the various days of the year. The priests found that the locations of the sun clearly contradicted locations that the Earth-centered theories required they pass through, and followed paths that Kepler's theory required. (These observations a problem for Catholics since the Church had officially stated that such observations could not be true in a theologically correct sense; the Protestants, of course, argued that the evidence supported their religious position.) As I said, it is reasonable to say that in Aristotle's and Ptolemy's universe of discourse, they `knew' that the Earth was the unmoving center of everything. But when you speak from a different universe of discourse, it is appropriate to say that their `knowing' was wrong. This, by the way, is why I still like the use of {lo} as a veridical descriptor within a single universe of discourse. But we had that argument a long time ago. Incidentally, the single most effective of multi-cultural communication we humans yet know is scientific communication. The mode of scientific communication is such that instead of trying to persuade another by appealing to common cultural understandings, or by appealing to widely accepted hearsay, a scienfic communication strives to generate internal experience in the listener. Either the listener replicates the reasoning, as in a mathematical proof, or replicates the observations, as in astronomy or old-fashioned biology, and reasons that there are no better alternative interpretations of the observations, or the listener replicates the experiment. This method of communication fails when directed towards older authorities, who do not listen, reason, or experiment, but often works successfully with their students. Also, since it is useful, here is a list of the evidential and descriptor smavo: ka'u UI2 I know culturally evidential: I know pe'i UI2 I opine evidential: I opine ru'a UI2 I postulate evidential: I postulate se'o UI2 I know internally evidential: I know by internal experience (dream, vision, or personal revelation) su'a UI2 I generalize evidential: I generalize - I particularize; discursive: abstractly - concretely ti'e UI2 I hear evidential: I hear (hearsay) za'a UI2 I observe evidential: I observe le LE the described non-veridical descriptor: the one(s) described as ... le'e LE the stereotypical non-veridical descriptor: the stereotype of those described as ... le'i LE the set described non-veridical descriptor: the set of those described as ..., treated as a set lei LE the mass described non-veridical descriptor: the mass of individual(s) described as ... lo LE the really is veridical descriptor: the one(s) that really is(are) ... lo'e LE the typical veridical descriptor: the typical one(s) who really is(are) ... lo'i LE the set really is veridical descriptor: the set of those that really are ..., treated as a set loi LE the mass really is veridical descriptor: the mass of individual(s) that is(are) ... ... -- Robert J. Chassell bob@rattlesnake.com Rattlesnake Enterprises http://www.rattlesnake.com