Objectivity about physical things

I said previously:

“When I think of objectivity, I think of ... The dictionary sense - “of, relating to, or being an object, phenomenon, or condition in the realm of sensible experience independent of individual thought and perceptible by all observers“ ... It's real for you, me and the next person, and is not subject to different interpretations.”

... But I let my mouth out-pace my mind. Upon further review, there's a better dictionary definition right there on the same page :

3a : expressing or dealing with facts or conditions as perceived without distortion by personal feelings, prejudices, or interpretations <objective art> <an objective history of the war> <an objective judgment>

I think THAT is a more accurate description of what I think about the adjective "objective".

Still, when we talk about a "fact or condition", there are some aspects of that fact or condition that we have to be very careful about while claiming to be objective about it.

Philosopher Daniel Dennett speaks of physical, design and intentional stances as the levels of abstraction at which we view the properties and behaviors of a thing.

Wikipedia sez:

"when explaining and predicting the behavior of an object, we can choose to view it at varying levels of abstraction. The more concrete the level, the more accurate in principle our predictions are."

Notice that this refers to a real entity, not a conceptual one.

This indicates that claims made about physical attributes such as height, width, depth, weight, color and composition, for instance, can be made accurately and repeated by all potential observers accurately, and are subject to little or no misinterpretation of the meaning and value of the attributes used to describe it. It really is just a description of what the thing is, without imbuing it with deeper meaning. It doesn't require judgement to apprehend these values because those values will be the same no matter who measures them.

We can describe what the universe is, when we stick to these physical attributes.

What we don't have to do, if we exercise some self-control, is make further claims about what those values were prior to today, or what they will be after today, nor what they mean. I might bring those aspects up later, but it's not central to my train of thought in this post.

All of this is to say that we can describe our world as it is here and now, and be correct about it. Taken one moment at a time, we can probably claim to be objective about the physical description of the world, to within a reasonable doubt.

When we start looking at meaning and purpose is where the fun really starts. I'll give THAT a go next time.

Absolutes and uncertainty

I tried several times to add a comment to Deacon Duncan’s post “The Gypsy Curse” at Evangelical Realism this morning - but was thwarted by the iPad/JavaScript conspiracy. Or maybe he’s blocking me. :-).

Deacon is deconstructing Pastor Stephen Feinstein’s impenetrable quasi-philosophical wankery (Russell’s characterization) from the Feinstein-Glasser debate last summer, and I can't wait for each week’s new installment.

Here’s what I wrote:

On a serious note, I have to ask about logic, and how much of it is axiom and how much of it is demonstrable **to a high degree of certainty**.

First, I assume most of what we learn is by exploration. A hot stove burns you, you learn not to touch it. From there we build up a library of rules of thumb that guide us through life. As society grows, people agree that some of these rules of thumb are universally valuable, and thoughtful people reverse engineer them into more formal statements.

It seems like a very few axioms are required (identity, non-contradiction), and that other components of our logic library can be exercised to a high degree of certainty (one error in a million, billion, or more).

Isn't the Pastor's (presuppositionalist's) line of attack here just based on a desire to have more absolutes in the world, as opposed to a willingness to accept uncertainty?

Comments?
Ridicule?

There are two trains of thought above that can be explored further. One, that some things require base assumptions (“axioms” or “presuppositions”, to use the debater’s parlance). Two, that the desire (or need?) for absolutes distinguishes the theist personality from the non-theist.

The second thought may have the broader implication, in that the need to have some (imagined or real) organization in one’s life - including clear answers to life’s burning questions - might be driving the attack on the first thought - “axioms”.

I don't know how long I’ve been able to deal with uncertainty - many decades, for sure. I don't have this burning need for an externally directed purpose (I’ve made my own), or an answer to the questions “where did everything come from” and “where will I go when I die”. We can talk about all of those for a lifetime, but it ceases being interesting to me when people act as if an absolute answer is *required*. I therefore tend to see this need for absolutes to be a common characteristic of the firm believer. Like it or not, I’m finding it harder to not be dismissive of this character trait.

As for absolute truths, such as axioms, I'm interested in how far down we can go before relying on mutually-agreed-upon axioms that we can’t “prove”.

Food for future thoughts.