The Sun Rising Tomorrow is Not an Assumption

[Chris365]

49 minutes ago, Gesundheit2 said:

What is not in my direct experience?

Concepts and imagination

[Gesundheit2]

1 hour ago, Chris365 said:

Concepts and imagination

I experience both of these things all the time.

[OneHandClap]

3 hours ago, Vision said:

You don’t know.

You don’t really know for sure if the sun will rise tomorrow.

You don’t really know if eating food helps you survive.

You don’t really know if death exists.

Anything that is outside of your direct experience, is a concept/imagination/belief.

Embrace Not Knowing.

Sure, it’s an assumption that the sun will rise tomorrow, but that doesn’t mean it’s reasonable to think that it won’t. Just be aware of what it really is; an assumption. 

Assumptions aren’t bad. They are what keep us alive.

It’s an assumption that eating food will keep you alive, yet you still do it.

Why? Because you get hungry, and you’ve developed a metaphorical mental model that says “If I eat food, I will be satiated”. But before you eat that food, it is just an assumption. For all you know, you don’t know if that food will satiate you, but you can make a well-educated guess (from “past experience” - which is also an assumption, but a reasonable one) that it will. That doesn’t change it being an assumption. 

The more aware we are of what things truly are, the closer we get to Truth.

 

Contemplate actuality, concepts, the difference between them, and the sameness between them.

Logical gap in here somewhere. 

It is certainly an assumption in terms of death and the sun rising, but that is because those events take place in some imagined future state. I don't think "eating food helps you survive" is an assumption in the same way you're stating it here. There is fairly obvious evidence that eating food does keep us alive. It's an easily tested hypothesis. 

I understand what you're driving at, but you are playing fast and loose with the word "assumption." If we keep stretching it, we can call literally anything an assumption. 

The trouble with this via negativa is that it leads literally nowhere. We can call anything and everything "an assumption," but it makes no tangible difference in the way we interact with the world for things like eating food. At best, it's just a way to look like we're the ultimate masters of deconstructionist thinking. 

If we're going to step back and say "Aha, you can't know literally anything," then there's zero point in even trying to discuss reality anymore. At that point, you have essentially removed yourself from any conversation about knowledge or the ability to know. It's similar to a solipsist saying "There are no other people." It's already negating itself by the mere fact that the solipsist is telling this... to other people. A solipsist cannot take part in debate because they are beyond the bounds of logic that the rest of us adhere to. 

So, in summary, if we want to claim we can't know literally anything, there's no point in even making the statement "You can't know." Because that, in itself, is a logical assertion that is self-defeating. 

 

[DocWatts]

The delicious irony being that Leo's own metaphysics and ontology are themselves filled with a number of tacit assumptions, albeit more subtle than the assumptions behind Materialism.

But then again show me a metaphysics without unverifiable underlying assumptions and I'll eat my hat.

It feels like most people's understanding of metaphysics is completely backwards. That's because it's far more productive to work backwards by looking at what a particular metaphysics is trying to accomplish, than to try and evaluate a particular metaphysics in a vacuum.

Materialist science has a particular set of needs so its metaphysics is arranged in a certain way. Something like buddhism is trying to accomplish something quite different, so no surprise that it's metaphysics are arranged quite differently.

Hell, if you want to step it back to a more meta perspective the idea that there's one 'correct' ontology that's applicable to every aspect of reality, is itself an assumption...

If we look at what metaphysics actually is, it's a coherent and systemic attempt to make sense of reality. It's something we create to help us make sense of the world, rather than something 'out there' that we discover. That being the case, Reality is under no obligation to be comprehensible to us in a way that fits neatly in to any single  abstract system that we invent. 

Edited October 30, 2021 by DocWatts

[Gesundheit2]

@DocWatts

[Chris365]

1 hour ago, Gesundheit2 said:

I experience both of these things all the time.

Yes, as thoughts. Thinking happens, just like seeing, hearing etc... happens.

And what are thoughts? Where do they appear? What are they made of?

 

[Gesundheit2]

6 minutes ago, Chris365 said:

Yes, as thoughts. Thinking happens, just like seeing, hearing etc... happens.

And what are thoughts? Where do they appear? What are they made of?

Are you expecting consciousness as the answer?

[Vision]

6 hours ago, OneHandClap said:

It is certainly an assumption in terms of death and the sun rising, but that is because those events take place in some imagined future state. I don't think "eating food helps you survive" is an assumption in the same way you're stating it here. There is fairly obvious evidence that eating food does keep us alive. It's an easily tested hypothesis.

You could say there are degrees of assumption. 

It’s a very safe bet to think that food will help you survive. But it’s not a safe bet to think that if you jump off a cliff, you’ll survive. 

While both of them are assumptions, you still have a mental model: “Okay, there’s a pattern here. Even if my past experience is something that is not in the present moment and in my head, it’s a safe bet to bank on it - because all my life it’s been very accurate. I’ve been eating for as long as I can remember. I’ve seen that when people jump off a cliff, they die. So it’s quite likely that I will die too.”

6 hours ago, OneHandClap said:

I understand what you're driving at, but you are playing fast and loose with the word "assumption." If we keep stretching it, we can call literally anything an assumption. 

The trouble with this via negativa is that it leads literally nowhere. We can call anything and everything "an assumption," but it makes no tangible difference in the way we interact with the world for things like eating food. At best, it's just a way to look like we're the ultimate masters of deconstructionist thinking. 

Anything that is not present in your direct experience, the present moment, is an assumption.

That doesn’t mean “Hey it’s an assumption that if I shoot myself I’ll die so let’s try it”

All you have is the (reasonably) probabilistic expectation that it’ll kill you, you don’t know with certainty. 

Science gives useful probabilistic theories, but just because something is useful, doesn’t mean it’s inherently true. That’s the limit of science, but science is still vital to our survival. Without it, our advancement in society would be retarded. 

Survival requires assumptions, you would die without them.

It helps you recognise that all you really know is the present moment, your direct experience right now.

What’s in front of you, what you can see, is your direct experience, the ‘wall behind you’ is not. 

If you want to get closer to Truth, epistemological awareness is quite important.

6 hours ago, OneHandClap said:

If we're going to step back and say "Aha, you can't know literally anything," then there's zero point in even trying to discuss reality anymore. At that point, you have essentially removed yourself from any conversation about knowledge or the ability to know. It's similar to a solipsist saying "There are no other people." It's already negating itself by the mere fact that the solipsist is telling this... to other people. A solipsist cannot take part in debate because they are beyond the bounds of logic that the rest of us adhere to. 

So, in summary, if we want to claim we can't know literally anything, there's no point in even making the statement "You can't know." Because that, in itself, is a logical assertion that is self-defeating. 

I never said you can’t know anything.

I said you don’t know anything, with full certainty, as in 100%, that is not in your present, direct experience. 

You don’t know with full certainty if the sun will rise tomorrow, or if yesterday actually happened. But this is very radical, it’s only use is for expanded awareness. 

[Nahm]

9 hours ago, Gesundheit2 said:

What is not in my direct experience?

You. 

[Gesundheit2]

1 minute ago, Nahm said:

You. 

Said the assumption

[Nahm]

@Gesundheit2

It’s an assumption that there are assumptions. 

[Gesundheit2]

@Nahm Not a problem for me

[Chris365]

7 hours ago, Gesundheit2 said:

Are you expecting consciousness as the answer?

That's an assumption.

Check your direct experience for the answers ?

[DocWatts]

Whenever I hear Truth with a Capital 'T' brought up my first reaction is "yeah but Truth for whom?"

The notion of a-perspectival Truth that's not situated within a context seems as contridactory as trying to describe something like color perception absent of its embodiment within consciousness.

Note that I'm not saying that specific knowledge with wide ranging applicability within Reality isn't possible, merely that the belief that a coherent ontology which explains all aspects of Reality is even a possibility, is itself a tacit assumption.

Edited October 31, 2021 by DocWatts

[Arcangelo]

''The Sun Rising Tomorrow is Not an Assumption''

Yes

it

is

[Vision]

@DocWatts We are in agreement. That’s the limit of language. Language inherently involves assumptions.

I wouldn’t be able to say “I’ll meet you at the beach tomorrow DocWatts” without assuming that there is a beach to go to, that there is a DocWatts whom I will meet with, that there even is a tomorrow. There are infinite degrees, we could go really deep with this.

Having “Truth” as a goal - much like other goals - inherently involves assumption. You have to assume that there is a ‘Truth’ you can ‘attain’ or ‘experience’, but you don’t really know. 

If one cares enough about it, the risk of there never existing a Truth doesn’t outweigh never having tried.