Can it be we’ve miscalculated,
overshot the final light?
Do we really know anything
or are we just chasing shadows?
I wish I could say something,
a thought that could revolutionize
or change the way we think entirely.
But I know nothing,
and neither do you.
__________________ I'm so post-rock I shit sad birds
So cynical. I wonder if you ar really cynical. If I made a brilliant show of all this poem's foibles, would you not be in the least bit...embarassed, or would your cheeks smart with injustice? If so, can we really take seriously the idea that you have not said anything worthwhile? Would we not then, be justified in calling you a poseur?
I've never claimed to say anything worthwhile. I merely write what I want. But you are right; I'm not a cynical person. I'll give you that much.
But if you honestly feel like you're worth a pound of piss because you called me out, then go ahead and feel proud of yourself. I don't have to justify myself to a pretentious cunt.
__________________ I'm so post-rock I shit sad birds
So cynical. I wonder if you ar really cynical. If I made a brilliant show of all this poem's foibles, would you not be in the least bit...embarassed, or would your cheeks smart with injustice? If so, can we really take seriously the idea that you have not said anything worthwhile? Would we not then, be justified in calling you a poseur?
My thanks to the last two posters for keeping it on the actual original post, instead of the rest of that intellectual bollocks. Thanks Base and Castillo.
__________________ I'm so post-rock I shit sad birds
Well done, Kruppo, in at least attempting to capture something of substance from an epistemic uncertainty/epistemic relativist position (meaning a position that affirms that either Truth(tm) is unknowable or Truth(tm) is relative).
My own thought on the matter is that both positions are untennable, and ultimately lead to self-collapsing absurdity (as made explicit in your last lines in which you offer as a truth-claim a claim that denies truth -- a nasty little contradiction eh?).
That's not to belittle in some way what you've done here (the natural tendency to question our ability to evaluate, let's say, the accuracy of our representational models of the world around us).
Everything that happened needed to happen
so knowledge has lost all utility value for we last men
and so has turned in on itself
ourobors-like
and we are all his shit
Please! Someone! Feel sorry for me!
But seriously...what makes knowledge 'work'? Truth, right?
But what if truth has no transcendental foundation? It becomes clear that knowledge is not a reflection of the essence of truth, but rather what happens to have utility at that point in time.
Please see 'on truth and lies in the non-moral sense' by Nietzsche kthnxbye!
Catatuna, I think there are three salient points I'd like to make here:
(1) I'm sure you're adopting the loaded, inaccurate, and ultimately worthless metaphors that Nietzsche deployed, but nothing that you're saying in the above post really makes sense in light of the last century of thought. It's not entirely clear to me what you mean by truthful propositions having no 'transcendent foundation'. Are you trying to suggest that we can't make statements about the world that map isomorphically onto that world? If so, hasn't this been sufficiently addressed by the host of philosophers that followed Nietzsche (e.g., Russle, Wittgenstein, Quine, etc)?
(2) even granting that there is a more clear and cohesive way of stating your position that refutes the very satisfying view of Truth(tm) that the positivists gave us, in what way is a denial of the value of truth sufficient to warrant the charge of nihilism? I was under the impression that nihilism is necessarily the denial that there is any inherent value (as opposed to denying just one specific value). If anything, all that's been expressed in this poem is epistemic uncertainty which, while it might have its own problems, isn't necessarily nihilist.
(3) and even granting all that (that no true statements can be made about the world, and that such a view is by itself sufficiently nihilistic), by what right would anyone have to criticize on the grounds of it being juvenile (of all things!)? Nietsche, and the existentialist thinkers that he immediately begot, are all seemingly clear in the view that nihilism is a necessary step as one moves along the existentialist trajectory.
__________________ ^ live one
Last edited by ColdLogic; 09-02-2009 at 12:25 PM..
Map isomorphically--I've heard this before, but I'm gonna just assume that you're talking about the 'structure' of the world which language mirrors. In that case, I would point to the post-structuralists, and their putting power before truth. I think this can be expressed in Derridean terms: there is no fixed conceptual order among signifiers.
I'd say your defintion on nihilism is pretty close. Nietzsche says that in nihilism the highest values devalue themselves, or are devalued. I see the poem using the words 'just chasing shadows' and wanting to revolutionize but feeling helpless and hopeless in the face perhaps not just epistemic uncertainty, but also in the face of anxiety. Why does he wish to do things? What is he fleeing from etc.
Yes, propositions map isomorphically onto the world if the structure of their semantic content reflects the relationship of the world they describe. The proposition 'The cat is on the rug' is true if it refers to a world in which there is a rug and there is a cat and the cat's relation to the rug is such that it is 'on' the rug. The same applies (in a more dramatic fashion, even) to the language games of the sciences (in which the semantics of velocity or mass are governed by even more rigorous rules in their use).
I'm dis-inclined to accept Derrida, or anyone hailing from 'post' anything, on the matter, for the same reason that I'm dis-inclined to accept Neitzche. The claim that there is no conceptual order among signifiers is itself predicated on a particular conceptual order of semantics (nevermind the fact that it's demonstrably false, as even a cursory glance at the research in neurophilosophy and the cognitive sciences will show).
(I'm actually confused as to whether or not you do, in fact, find something to disagree with the OP about, given that it looks like you are espousing the same corrosive undermining of modernism that the poem advocates).
__________________ ^ live one
Last edited by ColdLogic; 09-02-2009 at 02:21 PM..
I'm not fond of analytic philosophy, though I will admit I have bought into the Wittgenstein hype. I admit this only because you do the same thing.
Am I a nihilist? Sort of, not really. A lot of what poses as nihilism, such as the above poem is really adolescent self-pity disguised as nihilism, and unreflectively at that, I might add.
It seems to me, with your talk of isomorphic mapping, that you run into the problem that Berkeley raised. How can you stand outside the relationship between signifier (in your mind) and signified (out there). If you can't do it, then how do you know you have mapped correctly.
I suppose you could say that the idea and the signifier are different. Are they? I'm not sure of this. Any thoughts?
I must admit that this last bit gave me pause in mild appreciation!
:)
(which is a huge compliment, because I am picky to the bone{errr}~[sorry, had to throw that in there for comedic effect.]
Thanks for posting it
Can it be we’ve miscalculated,
overshot the final light?
Do we really know anything
or are we just chasing shadows?
I wish I could say something,
a thought that could revolutionize
or change the way we think entirely.
But I know nothing,
and neither do you.
You are a philosopher! Great points! Carry on!
__________________ These animated gifs are the best!
Not likely. I don't think our language, or thinking, has a 1 to 1 correspondent relationship to the world. But we are getting closer and closer. The language of physics is, imo, our best bet.
So do you think this goes toward showing that there is a distinction between idea and signifier, or against it? It seems to me that it goes toward showing that there is. If so, I wonder what the implications are.
