Objective vs Subjective reality
Posted on: April 17, 2007 - 9:05pm
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Objective vs Subjective reality
I have been debating with someone on another board who is convinced that atheism is a belief unto itself, rather than a non-belief. After several failed attempts to educate them on the subject, she continually claims that everything is subjective, and that there are no objective facts, not even in science. Even though I agree to a point, I hate it when "spiritual people" counter with the whole "atheism is as bad as organized religion its all subjective" arguement. I tried to deconstruct her "points", but she kept insisting that nothing is objective. I admit to not having a very firm grip on philosophical arguements surrounding this topic. Does anyone have any suggestions on what I can say?
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Posted on: May 13, 2007 - 12:24pm
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cheezues wrote:
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cheezues wrote:
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Like Descartes, I start with the assumption that I think and therefore I am. But I recognise that assumption as a belief. I also believe that there is a world outside of me. I can not prove this without using ideas aquired from this outside world or my own mind and therefore it, too, remains a belief. I can examine everything I have sensed and catagorized and thought about to find correspondences and areas of agreement but that is as close as I, nor anyone else I think, will come to knowing what is real.
Dismissing this deeply profound and most basic axiom as a mere belief does not allow you to escape from verifying that it is the truth with every thought you think (by mere virtue that you exist and can think them) and every action you take. As I stated before, although you seem to not have grasped this, is that the concept of "proof" rests not only on the existence of reality, but of an objective reality where proof can be assertained and communicated from one person to another, verified through scientific experimentation. Reality is beyond proof, becaues the mere notion of proof (or any notion for that matter) verfies that which it rests upon. If existence does not exist, if reality is not objective, the entirity of human experience becomes instantaneously unintelligible.. and yet here we are. The "assumption" that "I think therefor I am" is merely a belief isn't beyond the reach of evidence as I've just demonstrated because there is no way to refute the existence of reality, and no good reason to want to.
By verifying anything, I do not reveal a truth. I am only stating a conviction. I can see that you're attempting to trap me by saying that in order to make any statement, even one of belief, I have to assume these axioms. In other words, beliefs must rest on facts. I can show you that this doesn't have to be simply by modifying my statement to take the form of: I believe that I believe I exist and that so too does reality. Ah, you might say but who believes first? Who is the original 'I'? Then, I would tell you that there isn't a need when I further modify the statement to the form of: I believe that I believe that I believe that... on into infinity. You might further contend that even an infinit regress has to begin somewhere. There still must be an 'I' at the beginning no matter how many beliefs follow it. But I would ask, is this necessarily so? Might there be a belief before the 'I'? Maybe there is another who believes in me. Not necessarily a god per se but possibly a Platonic realm or the universe itself or maybe just another individual like me. Maybe belief can exist on its own or belief and believer can exist in a loop where each creates the other: the dialectic.
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Quote:Logic is a good tool but even that is flawed. There was a mathemetician in the early part of the last century named Kurt Godel who showed that even the best system for expressing a logical statement cannot answer all logical statements.
Our tools for understanding are flawed but I believe there is truth. I just don't think we will ever fully know it.
If you consider the idea of "fully knowing it" and interpret that to mean the ability to hold in cognitive awareness every aspect of every molecule everywhere, omniscience basically, then you never will achieve that end. Is there any need for omniscience? I submit that there is not. Human beings possess a specific nature, and their type of consciousness does does as well. Compartmentalizing ideas into conceptual abstractions in order to reduce and represent the massive data that we input is the method we use to understand fully. To grasp the human body is not to understand every basic component of it, the biological regulatory systems that sustain it, or any of that, rather grasping it entails understanding each of these independantly. These are complex systems and they've been studied and as biology continues we will continue to gain an even greater understanding of the human body. Our tools for understanding are not innately flawed, they are suspible to error and only through continued study can those errors be corrected, whatever and whenever they may arise. Their potential for error does not necessarily mean they will arive at errors consistantly. It's easy to see this in the continued sciences as they've evolved over the years, alchemy became chemistry, astrology became astronomy etc...
I agree. Omnicience is not necessary, nor disirable I think. But I maintain that truth is not something that is known or perhaps can be known in full. It is a progress of gradation. It can only be known in part. To say that one 'knows' the truth is really saying that they know a part of the truth or that they know the truth within a specific context.
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Quote:To perceive an object is to intercept the EM waves that bounce off of it and into our retina or to hear the air vibrations that it emits. But, our eyes and ears are not perfect. There are many frequencies in the EM spectrum of which visible light is only a small part. We cannot see radio or infrared waves. Likewise, the human ear can only hear a limited range of audio frequencies. This means we miss out an a lot of information that an object could be sending us. It is what I mean when I say filter. The information we can receive has to be translated into neural signals that the brain can 'read' before it can reach the level of our understanding. This is a distortion caused by the brain reinterpereting reality.
To say that our eyes and ears are not "perfect" in this sense is to state that they are not omnipotent. Your eyes will never be able to percieve the entire electromagnetic spectrum and to set that as a standard for perfecting is indeed comparable to how christians measure themselves against the "moral" ten commandments and always fall short. This is modern philosophies way of manufacturing low self esteem and guilt. The important point is that we have percieved the length of the electromagnetic spectrum and if we so chose we could once again using specialized instrumentation prove the existence of both extremities through simple observation. We've gained the ability to percieve these things, not in direct awareness, but through the application of our minds to these instruments and the manipulation of reality to bring the far reaching edges of this spectrum into view.
With these instruments we can be aware of the rest of the spectrum but only by translating it into what we can already perceive with our human senses. A bumblebee can see in the ultra-violet wavelength without the need for instruments but if we were ever able to communicate with one, it would not be able to describe the sensation to us. What the bee sees when it looks at a flower reflecting UV is an entirely different color than any we can imagine. It isn't red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo or violet or anything in between. It's something else. We can use a UV detector and 'translate' it into a color we're able to pick up such as purple but we can't see it as a seperate color. It would be like someone who has been color-blind their entire life trying to understand what blue looks like. This is not a disparagement of humanity just an acknowlegement of our limitations.
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Quote:Our knowledge is built since childhood from a foundation through successive iterations of learning either through books or direct experience. Since, as I contend, even the most basic ideas we form will be flawed to some degree, this will have a multiplying effect the further we move from that foundation. In other words, the further we abstract; the further we distance our mind from the world as we perceive it, the more distorted and inaccurate our view becomes.
The multiplying effect you're talking about will only exacerbate problems if they exist making them MORE apparent and making us MORE likely to correct our conceptions.
But what if our methods for solving these problems rely on the same erroneous assumptions that brought us there in the first place?
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"basic ideas" in this context entails considering abstract ideas out of any context, and cross examining them in different contexts as though they were the same, when in fact they wouldn't be. like "killing is wrong" for a quick and easy example of a "basic idea." Fact is it's not always wrong to kill someone. Ideas are very seldom basic unless it's something that isn't fully understood, the human mind and it's network of concepts is intricate and complex.
When I said basic ideas, I was referring to the first assumptions we make of the world. A child looking at the sun moving across the sky would assume an earth-centered world much like the ancients who would eventually develop an elaborate system of concentric spheres to describe the heavens. Consider, also, the Newtonian concept of gravity as a force that pulls. It took over 200 years for us to realise that it is actually a consquence of the geometry of space-time. How many of our current theories are wrong?
Your example: "killing is wrong" rest on the concept of life and death as well as the very subjective concept of wrong and right. Both of these ideas are by necessity vague. Basic ideas are not "fully understood" as you say but how do you define what is or is not "fully understood"? BTW, I think a Buddhist would disagree with the "fact" that it is not always wrong to kill.
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Quote:I agree that it can't be disproven. The existence of reality is beyond the concept of "proof." Existence and consciousness are facts implicit in every perception. They are the base of all knowledge (and the precondition of proof): knowledge presupposes something to know and someone to know it. They are absolutes which cannot be questioned or escaped: every human utterance, including the denial of these axioms, implies their use and acceptance.
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Quote:It can't be proven either. On what ground could you assert it? It is a belief.
It's an axiom as I've stated, the mere act of asking for proof, or how I would assert it, presupposes it's existence. Asking for grounds upon which to assert an axiom is a contradiction, because an axiomatic concept is something that is presupposed and implied when considering all other concepts. The axiom is the grounds, and everything "above ground" implies that foundation. The fact that you can't disprove the existence of reality ought to be a good clue here for you, beyond mere "matrix-style" speculations and "what-if" statements, it's called the fallacy of the stolen concept, I'll post a thread about that here very soon.
I think there is some confusion here on whether we're discussing being itself or being as we know it. I am asserting that the latter is uncertain. As to the question of being itself, I'll bring it up in a later post.
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Quote:This realm of corresponding ideas that we call 'knowledge' all rests on the assumption that we exist.
It rests on several things actually, Objective Reality, A consciousness capable of percieving both Objective reality and itself, and it rests on all of those individual existents within reality possessing a specific identity.
It logically flows that with the annihilation of the concept of reality the annihilation of knowledge will become a reality.
I would call this a false-dilemma. Your argument assumes that there must either be an objective reality or not. I think the bulk of our debate has been on the idea of absolutes. Is there a possible median between the extremes? Can we say that there may or may not be an objective reality and we may or may not know it? Might it further be possible to assign a scale of probability to questions such as this?
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Quote:I think there is good reason to conclude (aside from what I've already said) that most of what people 'know' is based on belief. For example: You believe your body is made up of molecules of varying substances. Why? You've never actually seen these molecules. But you were told by a teacher and you've read in books that these things actually exist, and because you trusted these sources, you believed it and included that belief in your knowledge domain. And this can apply to any information that isn't directly percieved. You hear something from an expert and believe it because you generally trust experts. Of course, I'm not saying these things are false nor that all experts are liars but I am saying that these are held beliefs rather than something known. And I'm sure you're smart enough to know that not all experts are right and most are wrong before they are right.
"this can apply to any information that isn't directly percieved" This was a very important quote within the paragraph that I think highlights a contradiction that needs to be addressed. You've created this notion of what knowledge is and you've set the bar beyond the reach of the limited human consciousness. The entire belief structure of "subjective reality" "true knowledge is impossible" completely ignores the type of consciousness that human beings possess and asks them to rely strictly.. as you're quote verifies.. that human beings operate on a perceptual level instead of a conceptual one.
What I'm trying to get across is that knowledge is by necessity incomplete and that the more we abstract from perception, the more incomplete it becomes.
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This is deeper epistemology here, however, human consciousness is described very well by Leonard Peikoff, and I'll quote him on it now just to give credit where it is due...
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Reason performs this function by means of concepts, and the validity of reason rests on the validity of concepts. But the nature and origin of concepts is a major philosophic problem. If concepts refer to facts, then knowledge has a base in reality, and one can define objective principles to guide man's process of cognition. If concepts are cut off from reality, then so is all human knowledge, and man is helplessly blind.
This is the "problem of universals," on which Western philosophy has foundered.
Plato claimed to find the referent of concepts not in this world, but in a supernatural dimension of essences. The Kantians regard concepts (some or all) as devoid of referents, i.e., as subjective creations of the human mind independent of external facts. Both approaches and all of their variants in the history of philosophy lead to the same essential consequence: the severing of man's tools of cognition from reality, and therefore the undercutting of man's mind. (Although Aristotle's epistemology is far superior, his theory of concepts is intermingled with remnants of Platonism and is untenable.) Recent philosophers have given up the problem and, as a result, have given up philosophy as such.
concepts are derived from and do refer to the facts of reality.
The mind at birth (as Aristotle first stated) is tabula rasa; there are no innate ideas. The senses are man's primary means of contact with reality; they give him the precondition of all subsequent knowledge, the evidence that something is. What the something is he discovers on the conceptual level of awareness.
Conceptualization is man's method of organizing sensory material. To form a concept, one isolates two or more similar concretes from the rest of one's perceptual field, and integrates them into a single mental unit, symbolized by a word. A concept subsumes an unlimited number of instances: the concretes one isolated, and all others (past, present, and future) which are similar to them.
Similarity is the key to this process. The mind can retain the characteristics of similar concretes without specifying their measurements, which vary from case to case. "A concept is a mental integration of two or more units possessing the same distinguishing characteristic(s), with their particular measurements omitted."
The basic principle of concept-formation (which states that the omitted measurements must exist in some quantity, but may exist in any quantity) is the equivalent of the basic principle of algebra, which states that algebraic symbols must be given some numerical value, but may be given any value. In this sense and respect, perceptual awareness is the arithmetic, but conceptual awareness is the algebra of cognition.
Concepts are neither supernatural nor subjective: they refer to facts of this world, as processed by man's means of cognition.
I like this quote and would agree with it if "validity" were replaced with "likelyhood".
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You would contend here the the formation of these concepts is where the trouble begins because you measure the efficacy of human perception by the standard of omniscience and omnipotence, and human beings posses neither. This i what you've done in the response the quote below. When human perception is acknowledge for what it is, as well as human conception, you'll overcome this hurdle you've placed in front of yourself.
I see no problem with comparing our current awareness to full awareness. Our awareness may seem insignificant in this context but it doesn't have to be. We're always progressing and expanding it. We may one day reach this lofty realm but I doubt it. Still, it is worth the effort.
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Quote:Our language because it derives from our understanding is just as flawed. We invent catagories for things and expect them to fit in neatly ordered boxes when, in fact, there is a lot of overlap and subtle shades of meaning that we often miss. The subjective/objective dichotomy was the example I gave. Since information must pass through the mind, there is always a degree to which it can be called subjective and since that knowledge derives from the outside world, there is also some degree to which it is objective. My point is that there are no absolutes here. As for going beyond, I'm still not entirely sure myself how it can be done. Sometimes I meditate. Sometimes I try to think in purely fluid concepts. That is the only way I know of at the moment. I suppose we could try inventing a new language but I think we would still be limited.
"My point is that there are no absolutes here." do you mean that, absolutely? Sounds to me as though you've just attempted to state one, isn't that interesting.
I said that there are no absolutes here. That is not to say that there aren't other absolutes elsewhere upon which to ground this statement. You say there are absolutes such as existance but I would counter by saying that although there may be absolutes, there are no known absolutes. I think I should have clarified that in the first place. Anyway, that was my mistake. And, in case you're thinking of countering my agnosticism of absolutes by declaring that this too is an absolute statement, I will rephrase it and say that the only absolute is the lack of other absolutes; the only certainty is uncertainty and the only impossibility is impossibility itself.
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Human beings move from a state of ignorance to a state of understanding based on the effort they put into attaining understanding. To consider a persons ideas as "subjective" simply because they lie on the gradient between ignorance and mastery is fallacious because the ideas they do acknowledge are not necessarily different than someone who has mastered them. Their understanding might be lacking but as far as the facts go they won't disagree with anyone else, some of their conclusions they draw from those facts might be a bit off because their understanding is incomplete, but those mistakes can only serve as indicators of error in reasoning, or evidence for their incomplete understanding. There is nothing subjective about that.
Every idea is thought of with some degree of subjectivity because they require a subject to think them. When I assess the world around me, the measurements come from within my own mind.
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Similarly in the previous paragraph when I expanded on the difference between existing on the perceptual level and the conceptual level, I believe that in resolving that more fundamental issue you will come to find that language is as powerful as can be provided you understand how to use it, and have an adequate vocabulary. Just like anything else however only through usage can you become more masterful.
Language is powerful but it is at the same time limited and more so than understanding. To give an example: If I told you I had a trip, it could mean I fell, I went somewhere, or I imbibed a hallucinogen. It doesn't give you the complete picture unless I further clarify it. There is also a problem when we compare other languages and see that a word that means one thing in language A may translate to mean a number of things in language B. When you give an affirmative response in English, you say "yes" but in japanese, you would say hai, iiya, ui, ee, iya, iesu or sayou. (I don't know japanese but I've watched enough anime to know that hai is the yes you use when speaking formally as when you're addressing your parents or a superior at work.)
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Quote:But where do you end and where does the tree begin?
You've only highlighted exactly what I said about treating the entirity of existence as a single unit. This isn't a fundamental issue, I would focus more on the difference between the difference between perception and conception before I moved into this, you should begin there.
Ok, then I'll state that there is no absolute difference between perception and conception. The definition is as arbitrary as finding the exact point where my molecules end and the tree's begin. And I'll take it even further and say that if my perception/conception is also a part of me and I am beholding the tree, then, in a way, we share an existance.
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Quote:I can agree with this but would like to again point out that objective and subjective reality are not clearly defined nor totally independent.
Simply because the terminolgy you're using doesn't apply to what you're using it to refer to. This is not indicative of a lacking on the behalf of language, rather your understanding of it's use.
It is indicative of the limits imposed by a false dichotomy of absolute catagories rather than a range of possibility.
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Strong atheism is a positive claim. It holds that there are deductive arguments that disprove the existence of a god. The most common arguments are Non cogntivism, which holds thatthe term 'god' is incoherent' or contradictory and thererfore, all theistic claims are irrational) and the argument from evil, which refutes the existence of an omnibenevolent deity.
Weak atheism is merely a lack of belief in theism. It holds that there are no good arguments for theism and that, therefore, non belief is rational. In this case, the burden of proof is on the theist.
If this is the case, then her own claim that everything is subjective is subjective. Ergo you are under no obligation to accept her claim.
Therefore, she has no epistemic rights to her claim, and her claim is irrational.
If she believes this, then you are both merely exchanging feelings and opinions, and there is no grounds for debate in the first place. Tip your hat and head for the door.
"Hitler burned people like Anne Frank, for that we call him evil.
"God" burns Anne Frank eternally. For that, theists call him 'good.'
Thanks! Those are some good points and I'll make sure to use them! I kind of figured I was wasting my time debating with her. She seemed more intent on getting across opinions than really engaging in an exchange of ideas.
I used to believe the exact opposite of what the individual you describe believes. I thought that everything is objective and that eventually all things will be known through science. But the older I get and the more I look at the problem, the more it occurs to me that this is unprovable. I'm starting to see things from a more Kantian perspective. Nothing can be known in itself. Because, to know of something, information about it must pass through the lens of our senses which will always distort and filter the reality of the object itself. To then form an idea about the object requires us to filter that information even further through weak and strong associations with other ideas and eventually to place it within our understanding of reality. A further problem arises when we realise that our understanding of the world itself is based on the belief that the world as well as we, ourselves, exist; an idea that can neither be proven nor disproven much like the god question. So then, is all knowledge based on belief? Does this mean that people believe what they want to believe? It seems, the only way to resolve this would be to go beyond the limitations our language imposes on us. To accept the idea that there is a tangible reality we have to eliminate false dichotomy. Everything is both subjective and objective to some degree. You and the world exist not as seperate entities but as two parts of a unity.
This is just the Arguement from ignorance applied to something else besides god. Just because you're unable to place the world into context does not mean it's impossible. No doubt that it's difficult and takes an extreme amount of intellectual effort, but that's just an obstacle.
Tabula Rasa. Sense perception's saving grace is that it doesn't actively distort anything, it does nothing but indiscriminately imput what it has he capability to percieve and input. The distortion here is a fabrication. An ever growing understanding of reality allows us to integrate new knowledge with prior knowledge and measure it up for compatibility and consistency. Thinking doesn't even begin at the perceptual level, and to know anything is not the same as percieving it, understanding it is.
How is this even a credit to your arguement? Having an ever-expanding range of knowledge to compare/contrast and integrate for consistency only increases the likelyhood that we will percieve and understand correctly or recognize possible deception, and dig in further to understand that (illusions etc..).
I agree that it can't be disproven. The existence of reality is beyond the concept of "proof." Existence and consciousness are facts implicit in every perception. They are the base of all knowledge (and the precondition of proof): knowledge presupposes something to know and someone to know it. They are absolutes which cannot be questioned or escaped: every human utterance, including the denial of these axioms, implies their use and acceptance.
Depends on what you mean by "knowledge." Faith in god is not knowledge of god. Believing in Santa Clause is not Knowledge of santa clause. Knowledge is the end product of a combination of reasoning and logic measured up against the ruler of existence.
People generally do that anyway, thats one of the things the RRS is looking to give a slight push towards turning around.
Efficient and clear communication is not easy, and mastery of even your own native language will take a lifetime, but what "beyond" are you talking about?
Or maybe we could just think, and realize that thought in an of itself presupposes an entity capable of thinking, the existence of thought presupposes the existence of someTHING to do the thinking. There is no false dichotomy in regarding yourself as an independant existent, an organism, a mammal amongst and living within the gradure of the natural world. Existence is not an "attribute" that you and a tree could be said to "share" that you could uses in concluding that you are an indivisible unit called "existence" making you similar, you are seperate entities, sperate existents, and the fact that you can interact with it, confirms tangible reality without attempting to sum all of reality up into a single unit.
The idea of a subjective reality arrises because of the diversity among human beings and their cultures, the fact that (as I think sam harris points out) there is no such thing as "Australian Biology" or "Asian Chemistry" is a testament to the Objective reality we live in. Science is science is science and it's the same here as it is everywhere else in the world.
This is very important, it has a lot to do with simple language and the definition of the word Atheism as it's been historically opposed with it's common usage today, look for me to post a topic about this very soon in this thread.
No Objective Facts? Sounds like she's attempted to state an Objective fact, thus contradicting herself thoroughly. If "No Objective Facts" isn't an objective fact then there must be some Objective facts that can coexist with non-objective ones. Either way this is an unintelligible statement.
You should point out that it's not an actual arguement so much as it's an Ad Hominem and a Straw Man rolled into one. Don't allow logical fallacies to enter into your debates with theists.
People that repeat the same thing over and over again in any discussion usually aren't equipped intellectuallly to deal with any opposing viewpoint, it's not that she doesn't think what you're saying is true, she just isn't psychologically capable of allowing a concept of "Objective fact" within proximity of her mystical theistic worldview, because she knows her worldview couldn't survie such contact.
I would invite her to prove her statement without using the language that we both agree is objective enough for her to use and me to understand (and visa versa) and to admit that even saying that there are "No Objective Facts" is uttering an Objective fact.
You could just invite her to come on the boards here and post up. =)
Like Descartes, I start with the assumption that I think and therefore I am. But I recognise that assumption as a belief. I also believe that there is a world outside of me. I can not prove this without using ideas aquired from this outside world or my own mind and therefore it, too, remains a belief. I can examine everything I have sensed and catagorized and thought about to find correspondences and areas of agreement but that is as close as I, nor anyone else I think, will come to knowing what is real.
Logic is a good tool but even that is flawed. There was a mathemetician in the early part of the last century named Kurt Godel who showed that even the best system for expressing a logical statement cannot answer all logical statements.
Our tools for understanding are flawed but I believe there is truth. I just don't think we will ever fully know it.
To perceive an object is to intercept the EM waves that bounce off of it and into our retina or to hear the air vibrations that it emits. But, our eyes and ears are not perfect. There are many frequencies in the EM spectrum of which visible light is only a small part. We cannot see radio or infrared waves. Likewise, the human ear can only hear a limited range of audio frequencies. This means we miss out an a lot of information that an object could be sending us. It is what I mean when I say filter. The information we can receive has to be translated into neural signals that the brain can 'read' before it can reach the level of our understanding. This is a distortion caused by the brain reinterpereting reality.
Our knowledge is built since childhood from a foundation through successive iterations of learning either through books or direct experience. Since, as I contend, even the most basic ideas we form will be flawed to some degree, this will have a multiplying effect the further we move from that foundation. In other words, the further we abstract; the further we distance our mind from the world as we perceive it, the more distorted and inaccurate our view becomes.
It can't be proven either. On what ground could you assert it? It is a belief.
This realm of corresponding ideas that we call 'knowledge' all rests on the assumption that we exist.
I think there is good reason to conclude (aside from what I've already said) that most of what people 'know' is based on belief. For example: You believe your body is made up of molecules of varying substances. Why? You've never actually seen these molecules. But you were told by a teacher and you've read in books that these things actually exist, and because you trusted these sources, you believed it and included that belief in your knowledge domain. And this can apply to any information that isn't directly percieved. You hear something from an expert and believe it because you generally trust experts. Of course, I'm not saying these things are false nor that all experts are liars but I am saying that these are held beliefs rather than something known. And I'm sure you're smart enough to know that not all experts are right and most are wrong before they are right.
Our language because it derives from our understanding is just as flawed. We invent catagories for things and expect them to fit in neatly ordered boxes when, in fact, there is a lot of overlap and subtle shades of meaning that we often miss. The subjective/objective dichotomy was the example I gave. Since information must pass through the mind, there is always a degree to which it can be called subjective and since that knowledge derives from the outside world, there is also some degree to which it is objective. My point is that there are no absolutes here. As for going beyond, I'm still not entirely sure myself how it can be done. Sometimes I meditate. Sometimes I try to think in purely fluid concepts. That is the only way I know of at the moment. I suppose we could try inventing a new language but I think we would still be limited.
But where do you end and where does the tree begin?
I can agree with this but would like to again point out that objective and subjective reality are not clearly defined nor totally independent.
Like Descartes, I start with the assumption that I think and therefore I am. But I recognise that assumption as a belief. I also believe that there is a world outside of me. I can not prove this without using ideas aquired from this outside world or my own mind and therefore it, too, remains a belief. I can examine everything I have sensed and catagorized and thought about to find correspondences and areas of agreement but that is as close as I, nor anyone else I think, will come to knowing what is real.
Dismissing this deeply profound and most basic axiom as a mere belief does not allow you to escape from verifying that it is the truth with every thought you think (by mere virtue that you exist and can think them) and every action you take. As I stated before, although you seem to not have grasped this, is that the concept of "proof" rests not only on the existence of reality, but of an objective reality where proof can be assertained and communicated from one person to another, verified through scientific experimentation. Reality is beyond proof, becaues the mere notion of proof (or any notion for that matter) verfies that which it rests upon. If existence does not exist, if reality is not objective, the entirity of human experience becomes instantaneously unintelligible.. and yet here we are. The "assumption" that "I think therefor I am" is merely a belief isn't beyond the reach of evidence as I've just demonstrated because there is no way to refute the existence of reality, and no good reason to want to.
If you consider the idea of "fully knowing it" and interpret that to mean the ability to hold in cognitive awareness every aspect of every molecule everywhere, omniscience basically, then you never will achieve that end. Is there any need for omniscience? I submit that there is not. Human beings possess a specific nature, and their type of consciousness does does as well. Compartmentalizing ideas into conceptual abstractions in order to reduce and represent the massive data that we input is the method we use to understand fully. To grasp the human body is not to understand every basic component of it, the biological regulatory systems that sustain it, or any of that, rather grasping it entails understanding each of these independantly. These are complex systems and they've been studied and as biology continues we will continue to gain an even greater understanding of the human body. Our tools for understanding are not innately flawed, they are suspible to error and only through continued study can those errors be corrected, whatever and whenever they may arise. Their potential for error does not necessarily mean they will arive at errors consistantly. It's easy to see this in the continued sciences as they've evolved over the years, alchemy became chemistry, astrology became astronomy etc...
To say that our eyes and ears are not "perfect" in this sense is to state that they are not omnipotent. Your eyes will never be able to percieve the entire electromagnetic spectrum and to set that as a standard for perfecting is indeed comparable to how christians measure themselves against the "moral" ten commandments and always fall short. This is modern philosophies way of manufacturing low self esteem and guilt. The important point is that we have percieved the length of the electromagnetic spectrum and if we so chose we could once again using specialized instrumentation prove the existence of both extremities through simple observation. We've gained the ability to percieve these things, not in direct awareness, but through the application of our minds to these instruments and the manipulation of reality to bring the far reaching edges of this spectrum into view.
The multiplying effect you're talking about will only exacerbate problems if they exist making them MORE apparent and making us MORE likely to correct our conceptions.
"basic ideas" in this context entails considering abstract ideas out of any context, and cross examining them in different contexts as though they were the same, when in fact they wouldn't be. like "killing is wrong" for a quick and easy example of a "basic idea." Fact is it's not always wrong to kill someone. Ideas are very seldom basic unless it's something that isn't fully understood, the human mind and it's network of concepts is intricate and complex.
It's an axiom as I've stated, the mere act of asking for proof, or how I would assert it, presupposes it's existence. Asking for grounds upon which to assert an axiom is a contradiction, because an axiomatic concept is something that is presupposed and implied when considering all other concepts. The axiom is the grounds, and everything "above ground" implies that foundation. The fact that you can't disprove the existence of reality ought to be a good clue here for you, beyond mere "matrix-style" speculations and "what-if" statements, it's called the fallacy of the stolen concept, I'll post a thread about that here very soon.
It rests on several things actually, Objective Reality, A consciousness capable of percieving both Objective reality and itself, and it rests on all of those individual existents within reality possessing a specific identity.
It logically flows that with the annihilation of the concept of reality the annihilation of knowledge will become a reality.
"this can apply to any information that isn't directly percieved" This was a very important quote within the paragraph that I think highlights a contradiction that needs to be addressed. You've created this notion of what knowledge is and you've set the bar beyond the reach of the limited human consciousness. The entire belief structure of "subjective reality" "true knowledge is impossible" completely ignores the type of consciousness that human beings possess and asks them to rely strictly.. as you're quote verifies.. that human beings operate on a perceptual level instead of a conceptual one.
This is deeper epistemology here, however, human consciousness is described very well by Leonard Peikoff, and I'll quote him on it now just to give credit where it is due...
You would contend here the the formation of these concepts is where the trouble begins because you measure the efficacy of human perception by the standard of omniscience and omnipotence, and human beings posses neither. This i what you've done in the response the quote below. When human perception is acknowledge for what it is, as well as human conception, you'll overcome this hurdle you've placed in front of yourself.
"My point is that there are no absolutes here." do you mean that, absolutely? Sounds to me as though you've just attempted to state one, isn't that interesting.
Human beings move from a state of ignorance to a state of understanding based on the effort they put into attaining understanding. To consider a persons ideas as "subjective" simply because they lie on the gradient between ignorance and mastery is fallacious because the ideas they do acknowledge are not necessarily different than someone who has mastered them. Their understanding might be lacking but as far as the facts go they won't disagree with anyone else, some of their conclusions they draw from those facts might be a bit off because their understanding is incomplete, but those mistakes can only serve as indicators of error in reasoning, or evidence for their incomplete understanding. There is nothing subjective about that.
Similarly in the previous paragraph when I expanded on the difference between existing on the perceptual level and the conceptual level, I believe that in resolving that more fundamental issue you will come to find that language is as powerful as can be provided you understand how to use it, and have an adequate vocabulary. Just like anything else however only through usage can you become more masterful.
You've only highlighted exactly what I said about treating the entirity of existence as a single unit. This isn't a fundamental issue, I would focus more on the difference between the difference between perception and conception before I moved into this, you should begin there.
Simply because the terminolgy you're using doesn't apply to what you're using it to refer to. This is not indicative of a lacking on the behalf of language, rather your understanding of it's use.