damn, yup.
that's just exactly what i meant.
looking back, could i have danced around it anymore?
thanks, caroline.
mmm, yeah, this is the stuff.
what i meant by quest for common ground is just that (once we've decided to lighten up on the test for it), maybe a truth is just any belief that a group has in common. much like the examples that kate cites - if we were exclusively a group of toddlers who believed santa claus existed, then that would be a truth for us. in trying to arrive at a list of things that we all settle on as being true, maybe we are just assessing andn searching for the things that we as a group have in common. largely beliefs, yes, but also experiences, demographies, etc. you get the point.
i think the interesting thing about this page is the potential it has to change based on who reads and posts to it. i was raised with the knowledge that santa was just a silly concept thought up to bring children into the fold of their parents' religion. but then again, i was also raised with the knowledge that lox, pickled herring and a little onion is as good as it gets.
we are rock stars, Kate.
karen
No worries. The hostility was misplaced. Life was a bit rough yesterday and perhaps I lashed out a little on this blog space. My apologies.
Discussion is what this place is all about.
And thus, in the midst of all these items to discuss (which we should get around to at some point), I would like to submit the following to the pot.
"Whenever I put the headset on now," he'd continued, "I really do understand what I find there. When these kids sang about 'She loves you,' yeah well, you know, she does, she's any number of people, all over the world, back through time, different colors, sizes, ages, shapes, distances from death, but she loves. And the 'you' is everybody. And herself. Oedipa, the human voice, you know, it's a flipping miracle."
This is from Thomas Pynchon's "The Crying of Lot 49." I bring to the floor, "She loves you," as a possible truth.
Marc
hmm... I am at once glad to see some discussion, and upset that it sounds somewhat hostile.
Perhaps the first truth we need to establish is the nature of this page.
But then, first, I have to stand up for geeks everywhere to disagree with Marc's statement that Physics books contain millions of true things. I would say that Physics books contain many statements that are as good as truth, but which are, in fact, not proven. "Truths" which are generally later refuted as the student delves further into the subject matter. Maybe this is what Karen meant by subjective truth -- a statement which is as good as true given the circumstances of the believer. For example, was there a massacre in Tiananmen Square? Is there a God? Will your mother always love you? Is Licensed to Ill the best album the Beastie Boys are capable of? Will the sun come out tomorrow? There is an answer to each of these questions in my head, which is good enough for me, but may not be right for you.
What were you taught to be true, that later turned out to be false? When I was two, there was a Santa Claus. My grandparents would never die. When I was ten, Scott Pause was ugly. When I was sixteen, I would never get a speeding ticket. Now I'm twenty-five, and I would say I know this much is true: I'll never be a waitress, or a single mother, or a bungee jumper, or a rock star. Maybe I'm wrong, but I think these statements are as good as true, right now. To state my point a little more blatantly still, there's no Santa Claus, three of my grandparents have passed away, Scott Pause was my first real boyfriend, and I was caught going 78 in a 65 mph zone on Christmas Eve.
And I would really like to be a rock star.
And Marc, as for your other statements, I think there's a pretty good group here. Let's not rule out the fact that it could build at any time. And I think this is the discussion. I don't disagree with any of the posted items, yet, and I'll let you know if I do... but at the same time, I'm not particularly interested in them as they stand alone. I am, on the other hand, supremely interested in what's going on down here. I think this is just great.
By the way, when I said salon below, I just meant "a salon," not salon.com, and I wanted to make sure that was clear.
kate
Well, I wanted the statements at the top to be a group decision, but a) there isn't much of a group, and b) there didn't seem to be much of a discussion when ideas were proposed. Since I am responsible for this page, I decided to sum up what was said and figured that anyone who disagreed with one of the posted items would make it known and there could be additional discussion.
I don't think there is such a thing as "subjective truth." I would classify those as beliefs.
As far as your two-ball example, I was wondering if people were going to take a scientific route. It sounds like it is something that you don't want to get into and I think I feel the same way. I would have to agree that the statement is true, and that it is not very exciting. Does that mean that there are, in fact, millions of true things documented in physics textbooks throughout the world? I would ask for discussion, but I suppose that's the kind of thing other people might make fun of.
Can you expand upon what you mean about truth being a "quest for our common ground?"
Life is not hard.
you are the one who decides which statements make the above list and in what way they are presented.
and anyway i do think there is a kind of subjective truth, depending on how you define your coordinate system and vantage point.
for a boring example - in a newtonian universe two balls dropped at the same time from the top of a tower will always hit the ground at the bottom at the same time. the kinds of things that we actually experience in our lives, you know? there are plenty of things that are true for us as people who live as we do. maybe the search for truth is just a quest for our common ground.
it is what god did for me when he led me out of egypt.
somebody once told me that in japan pushed down kneesocks are used as a signal that a prostitute is available for work
karen
There has always been freedom. Take the opportunity to test it.
The whole point is to discuss ideas with the underlying theme being that there is nothing that is true. Within the first few posts, Kate unearthed that. The rest is all fun. The proof happens internally, not on the screen. You ask yourself why you are not able to think of anything that is true? They even say that there are physical constants, like the speed of light, which might be changing over time. So don't go searching for the truth, because you won't find any. But who am I to judge the amount of truth in a sentence?
Kneesocks can be sexy.
freedom!
very interesting thought.
i never considered new jersey in that way, but i think you are on to something
i wonder if it has anything to do with the fact that people hate admitting they are from new jersey
it can't help make a place feel just right when everyone in the english speaking world knows the name new jersey as a less than desireable thing. maybe it's a case of a self-fulfilling reputation - that's not a truth just a comment, the only truth i have to add to my thoughts is to addirm that yes we would all love to be sitting on kate's lap, baited breath and all.
karen
I must confess... there have been discussions of this weblog outside of this little rectangular box.
I think... this is a great idea. But I suspect that the evolution of each of these truths has taken place mainly internally. I know I'm conditioning truths to make them true, and I'm doing it inside my head, and what I'm left with at the end is a somewhat bland boiled-down version of what I really wanted to say. Somewhat pleasing for me to read, because I've got the train of thought to get me through the night. But, I suspect, somewhat less-interesting for anyone not sitting on my lap right now waiting with baited breath to thought-evolve with me. And though I know you would all love to be here, you're not. And if this were my weblog, I would want it to be sort of an on-line salon substitute. Agreed?
So here's the outcome of the little covert discussion held off-line... I'm going to make a couple of pronouncements that are occasionally true, and let's discuss. But let's try not to boil anything so long that we lose all the flavor -- making sort of an al dente thought, if you will:
Life is hard. We're small and big all at once. We're stuck in a box of unknown dimensions, sometimes crammed in and sometimes lost in a vast empty space.
Kneesocks are never a wise fashion choice. Legs are like sausages; they should never be partially encased.
It is a person's social responsibility to never be wearing more clothing on their head than they wear on their ass.
New Jersey has cheap gas, no tax on clothing, good beach towns, lots of diners, and the kind of social tapestry that any good liberal would crave. And yet... there's something not quite right here.
Discuss?
kate
What a cynical, depressing, true truth. Don't post anymore.
Or is it a testament to life? We should make the most of all our days because they are numbered. We will all cease to shine at some point and there is nothing we can do about it. So eat that cookie. Dance with that loved one. Smile and cry and feel all that you can. Your life is temporary. Or is it really forever? What about everlasting life and the idea of a soul? If there is some kind of afterlife, maybe that is the real deal. Maybe things in that world have a more lasting quality.
Can you not also say that everything somebody does will matter forever? Think of chaos theory. You know, everything builds on everything else, and if one of the foundation pieces was missing or changed, the building would be different in some way or maybe just a pile of rubble.
Debate?
Hmm, I don't know. Maybe the guidelines are too strict. Maybe we're just affirming that life, and all of its effects and ways and means and ends, is fleeting. Here's a truth: Nothing that anyone can do now will matter forever. No circumstances required: we are temporary, we are fading, we can shine on and on and on but still we'll all burn out eventually.
Kate
Ah yes. I would agree. I guess maybe I should try to stick to certainties and exclude words like "sometimes" from the list. Would everybody agree that, "People act when motivated," is a truth that is pertinent. It says something about the eternal state of the human race. We will not do something unless we want to. There has do be some sort of motivation to cause action. I suppose the mention of "people" is also circumstantial. How can you have a truth that is true for every person, in every location, that has ever existed? In fact, I suppose things like breathing are involuntary actions that, although you may be motivated to do it, do not necessarily require motivation. So, what should I do? Eliminate our #2? Does this just prove that #1 is truer than we originally thought? Comments?
taking a fact which is sometimes true and removing the parts that make the truth circumstantial usually can make something true, though not necessarily pertinent. kinda like newtonian physics -- true, just not universally true.
kate
posting one truth does not always automatically discredit the other truths out there.
caroline