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Re: Markup, an abstraction

  • From: John Cowan <johnwcowan@gmail.com>
  • To: Hans-Juergen Rennau <hrennau@yahoo.de>
  • Date: Mon, 2 Sep 2013 22:47:09 -0400

Re:  Markup



On Sat, Aug 31, 2013 at 7:29 PM, Hans-Juergen Rennau <hrennau@yahoo.de> wrote:

I wish I understood better what you say about units. "It is the human mind that does the carving." Do you mean to say that words have nothing to offer except "convenience of thinking"?

They are also the medium of art, if that's what you mean -- two arts, actually, rhetoric and poetry.  There is a widespread belief that discursive prose is the direct union of grammar and dialectic/logic, but it's not so; there is always rhetoric in the middle.

But yes, our theories are stories we put together and then see if they fit the facts; they are not themselves the facts.
 
Would you say that even great discoveries (relativity, uncertainty principle, ...) are convenient representations of what is given to us, not reflections of something essential?

I don't believe in essences, but then I don't disbelieve in objective reality either.  What we make up is a model, good or bad, of what is out there: shadows on the wall of the cave, but the shadows are shadows *of* something -- what, I cannot say.
 
Do you think the carving ceases at the borders of our thought? If so, what *is* taking place, out there, in here?

I don't know, and I don't believe anyone else does either, which is a way of saying I am an agnostic.  Apostelgeschichte 17:16-23:

Da aber Paulus ihrer zu Athen wartete, ergrimmte sein Geist in ihm, da er sah die Stadt so gar abgöttisch.  Und er redete zu den Juden und Gottesfürchtigen in der Schule, auch auf dem Markte alle Tage zu denen, die sich herzufanden.  Etliche aber der Epikurer und Stoiker Philosophen stritten mit ihm. Und etliche sprachen: Was will dieser Lotterbube sagen? Etliche aber: Es sieht, als wolle er neue Götter verkündigen. (Das machte, er hatte das Evangelium von Jesu und von der Auferstehung ihnen verkündigt.)  Sie nahmen ihn aber und führten ihn auf den Gerichtsplatz und sprachen: Können wir auch erfahren, was das für eine neue Lehre sei, die du lehrst?  Denn du bringst etwas Neues vor unsere Ohren; so wollten wir gern wissen, was das sei.  (Die Athener aber alle, auch die Ausländer und Gäste, waren gerichtet auf nichts anderes, denn etwas Neues zu sagen oder zu hören.)

(Note how Athenian this is.  In every other city where Paul sets up to preach, it's nothing but beatings and more beatings, but the Athenians want to hear his story!

Paulus aber stand mitten auf dem Gerichtsplatz und sprach: Ihr Männer von Athen, ich sehe, daß ihr in allen Stücken gar sehr die Götter fürchtet. Ich bin herdurchgegangen und habe gesehen eure Gottesdienste und fand einen Altar, darauf war geschrieben: Dem unbekannten Gott.

(Paul goes on to tell them who he thinks the Unknown God is, but I am unable to follow him there.)
 
--
GMail doesn't have rotating .sigs, but you can see mine at http://www.ccil.org/~cowan/signatures


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