Posted: Nov 09, 2018 9:45 pm
Thommo wrote:Thomas Eshuis wrote:
Not really, both Matt and I are assuming we employ the same definition of X and Y, so first we'd need to clear that up.
Right, but you didn't. You said it was true, then went back and revised and qualified that statement when it proved inadedquate, which is exactly the kind of problem with his dichotomy.
I'm sorry but that's not what I did, I immediately qualified the statement after which I said it was true if my qualification was correct.
Thommo wrote:
I hasten to add that this isn't really criticism, it's the only practical way to deal with these things if you don't want to be insufferably pedantic, and I would also go back and qualify if it became necessary.
No problem, I'm perfectly fine with being corrected on mistakes. The only way I can correct myself after all. I appreciate that you're taking the time to lay this out for me.
Thommo wrote:Thomas Eshuis wrote:So either the dichotomy is Donald Trump Jr. is or is not the son of Donald Trump Sr.
or
Donald Trump Sr. is or is not the son of Donald Trump Sr.Thommo wrote:
3) was going to be:
3) "Donald Trump is the president of the United States of America and Donald Trump is the son of Donald Trump" means the same as "Donald Trump is the president of the United States of America and he is the son of Donald Trump".
In fairness I'm fresher this morning and I could probably just have used the liar sentence:
"This sentence is false" and asked if it's true or false, anyway.
I think you would agree that it cannot be both true and false at the same time though, right?
It depends. You can variously say it's both, neither or undefined. There are different approaches in the study of logic.
While I understand that there are different approaches, I don't get how you can say that, for example, that the Christian god as described in the bible, both exists and not exists. Could you elaborate?
Thommo wrote:The single approach that does not work is that you HAVE to say it's true or false, which is Matt's assertion. This also applies to gibberish (another example he gave) - in formal logic you only map what are know as "well formed formulae" or "wff"s to truth values, the same is probably wise in English.
I agree with you that gibberish cannot have a truth value, but like I said, I think Matt used giberrish to pre-empt Jimmy's
attempt to play semantic games.
Thommo wrote:
From the other side there are all sorts of examples as well where although you think of something as being "correct" or "true" you can't actually prove it true or not true.
Of course, but the question isn't about what can be proven, but what is actually the case, even if it's only a hypothetical sense.
We might never be able to demonstrate that a god does or does not exist, but that, presumably, doesn't change what is actually the case; that it does or does not exist. If you catch my drift.
Thommo wrote:
Further, various precise treatments of logic which don't respect Matt's dichotomy can be found in rigorous areas like fuzzy logics and multivalent logics.
Sounds kinda contradicting fuzzy logics being a rigourous and precise treatment/area of logic.
Thommo wrote:Thomas Eshuis wrote:Thommo wrote:A more practical example would be to ask why fact checking sites use scales with assessments like "mostly true" or "mostly false". Hopefully this will communicate some of the problems I was alluding to!
It does and I agree that depending on the claim made, there might be gradations of truth. But when we're talking about X existing, I don't see how you can have gradations of truth. Either X exists or it doesn't, right?
Well, within classical logics, that is the case, and by convention people often use those. But logics, like scientific theories are just models, so what's true in the model isn't necessarily true of the world we inhabit. That's the realm of metaphysics.
I see.
Thommo wrote:
Matt did ask a good question, which was something like "if it's not true or false, then what else is it?". That's good enough for both formal situations and informal ones. In informal situations equivocation is a genuine risk, and that's why the strictly binary "true or false" approach can go wrong. English is not a complete and consistent logic, it's a language which allows contradiction, insisting that things are always either "A or not A" is a pretty obvious example of black or white thinking. We tend to talk that way due to convention and definition. If you want to see how you can run into problems with this I'm sure you could watch Dillahunty talk about his response to TAG (transcendental argument for god), on his show, which I know he has. I'm sure you'll see that in fact he says these things are not in fact features of the universe.
I get what you mean. Thanks for the elucidation.
