What is "truth?" Because I'll note two things: 1) You asked me to explain ethos, logos and pathos rather than looking them up 2) You didn't say "fact" so I reckon you aren't referring to things that are scientifically verifiable. We can have this discussion, but you gotta show up. You give me a decent definition of "truth" as you see it and we'll continue.
Replying to you, but really for bypel's benefit. Definitions of truth are the wrong place to start here. Defining truth is hard, and you don't need to. To use logic you have to start with some assumptions. What those assumptions are doesn't matter, only their relations to each other, which is why we can formalize logic. Given "A" and "A implies B", you know that B, no matter what A and B are replaced with. The inference rules of a logic preserve the truth of the statements they operate on, so you can use logic to find out what is implicit in a set of statements you have assumed the truth of for arbitrary reasons, but only what is implicit in a set of statements you have assumed the truth of for arbitrary reasons. Now, a common method in math and philosophy is to provisionally assume some statement and see if it implies something contradictory or (for philosophy only) unacceptable. This can help you decide to reject a statement, and in this way logic can help you decide what to believe, but you still have to arbitrarily decide what statements to analyze, and failure to find a reason to reject something doesn't imply that it's true. But you where the statements logic operates on come from isn't a problem logic helps you with. In science you can get them through observation and statistics, but even an individual scientist doesn't do every experiment themselves. For the most part we all (provisionally) accept or reject things others have told us for arbitrary reasons, and in order to share our knowledge and beliefs we need to convince others to (provisionally) accept the things we tell them. That is what rhetoric is for. Plato rightly distrusted it because you can use the tools of rhetoric to mislead people, but as we can't directly share our experiences it's the only tool there is.
Good point.But you where the statements logic operates on come from isn't a problem logic helps you with. In science you can get them through observation and statistics, but even an individual scientist doesn't do every experiment themselves. For the most part we all (provisionally) accept or reject things others have told us for arbitrary reasons, and in order to share our knowledge and beliefs we need to convince others to (provisionally) accept the things we tell them. That is what rhetoric is for. Plato rightly distrusted it because you can use the tools of rhetoric to mislead people, but as we can't directly share our experiences it's the only tool there is.
Not true if the objective thing is not obvious. If someone links to a study then there are the possibilities of criticizing the methodology, complaining that they can't reproduce the results and/or pointing out that the person citing the study is drawing the wrong conclusion from the results.
See, you're not even thinking this all the way through. Whatever the study says, its recorded data are "objective truths." The conclusions to be drawn from that study may be subject to rhetoric because those conclusions are NOT objective truths. This is objective truth. "Anthropocentric global warming" is not. "What should we do about global warming" is entirely the province of rhetoric, and logos rhetoric will only get you as far as "the graph indicates temperatures are going up."
Sometimes. In other cases the conclusion can be entirely objective (i.e. from the presence of light one can infer the existence of at least one light source). Those are the cases I was talking about. I note that you have only replied to 1 of my 3 points.those conclusions are NOT objective truths.
And your reply is "sometimes" without even acknowledging that your counterargument to me is my argument to you which leads me to conclude that this has long since stopped being a fruitful discussion. I don't even know what points you're talking about. But that's okay. Hie thee back to 8chan.
I don't see how. You said that conclusions from objective facts are not objective. I pointed out an example of an objective conclusion from an objective fact, thus refuting your point. They are in the 2nd paragraph of Can we change to a polite, calm discussion rather one filled with belligerence please (I'll stop if you stop)? Look, in almost all cases the reason I have discussions is not to 'win' and convince the other of my viewpoint or belief for the sake of it or to make him look silly but rather to help the search for truth if the matter is objective or just to express my point of view if not.your counterargument to me is my argument to you
I don't even know what points you're talking about.
Hie thee back to 8chan. (KB)
I note that you have only replied to 1 of my 3 points. (me)
See, you're not even thinking this all the way through. (KB)
Statistical inferences are an appeal to logos by Aristotle's definition, because math is always an appeal to reason and anyway probability is a logic. Citing scientific work is ethos, though, because it's asking you to trust the intellectual virtues of the scientists who did the work.
I'd say a graph is the same kind of thing as a diagram in geometry, an aid to understanding but not an argument in itself. I don't know where Aristotle would classify just pointing at a diagram though. Not logos, geometers in his day knew a diagram wasn't a proof already.
Object lesson: What is "visible light" then? If I am a human, that spectrum is one thing. A bird, another. A sea slug, has yet another definition of "visible light". What about a blind person? To define truth, you must define the parameters within which this truth exists.
No. You don't get to play weenie semantic games like some first year philosophy major, and try to deflect. Express your truth in words, math, or colored beads. It doesn't matter. You still have to build the box within which you are defining your "truth", because - as I demonstrated - there is no empirical truth which exists in some fictional pure state. "Truth" is a measurement against something else, not a base principle. Even mathematicians begin with, "assume an infinite plane" before they move on to their mathematical proof. Truth is a point defined within a box of context. Want proof? Find a single base truth that is true in every context. You can't. It's just that simple.
I'm going to play weenie semantic games with you like a one-time logician because I think you're understating your case by avoiding them. P or not-P. Tautologies are true no matter what, so there surely are truths that are true in every context, they're just useless by virtue of being true in every context. They say nothing about everything, which is the only thing that can be said about everything.Want proof? Find a single base truth that is true in every context. You can't. It's just that simple.
You said, "For the purposes of this discussion 'truth' means everything objective." Truth is not an empirical thing. Anything "true" can be wrong when the context changes. "This is blue." "Donald Trump is an idiot." "1 + 1 = 2" "Jupiter is bigger than Earth." Every one of these "truths" can be proved right or wrong within a specific contexts. So when you "search for truth", you need to define the context within which this truth exists. And we are back at the start of our conversation again... there are no empirical truths, so your search for truth must be the search for the truth within a specific context. You can't just say "this is true" and "this is false" because you deem it thus. (Well... I guess you can, but then you would have to be the only person in your universe.)
I suspect we are actually agreeing but using different words. You are talking about sentences whereas I am talking about propositions. Using your language: There are no absolute truths (i.e true sentences) because the proposition that each sentence maps to has to be defined from context. However, I meant: There are absolute truths (i.e true propositions) because the truth value of at least some propositions are unchanging (at least from a certain point on) and not dependant on context. . The context is usually known by the people participating in or watching the conversation so there's no need to worry there.