Submitted by Maxwellsdemon17 t3_y75g2l in philosophy
You should seek the truth but never settle on it. You can make assumptions to get you closer to the truth, but I find that asking the right questions can help to engage the person in a discussion, as people are generally self-interested and usually like telling others about their opinion on things. I try not to ask too many loaded questions, because I feel like that's just a question with built in assumptions, but asking questions you already assume they don't have an answer to can sometimes allow people to see things from a different perspective, and that's how change should happen. Less forced narratives, and more questioning the narratives. But nowadays, if you question the narrative, some people like to demonize you and argue that you are against the narrative, when in reality, it's more about trying to figure out if the narrative does more harm than good.
>But nowadays, if you question the narrative, some people like to demonize you
Nowadays? I think its the basic reaction since always.
Thank you.
Big
It's one quote from the article, which is just a brief summary of a greater work. It's not intended as any simple end all solution.
Its the title of this post...
I stated myself i don't think the author is that nieve naive.
Its simply a suggestion against using such language.
The article actually addresses this point. It's just a quote the conclusion from a much larger discussion.
Also, naive.
Lol brutal spelling on my part
Again i never said it was the end all solution, i even implied i think the author doesnt intend that.
Im advising against using language that makes it seem such.
Isn’t it actually “naïve”?
Diacritics are not part of the English alphabet, so it’s just alternate spelling.
Is that true? Definitely useful though. The diacritical lets you know that it is two syllables, that the "a" and the "i" are separate.
That's a cool word i didn't know. Thanks.
The NYT uses them though
They’re not the arbiters of English.
Hahaha fair, i didn't know how to get the umlaut though.
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Complaining that someone commented on something that literally exists (and in a non-trivial position: the title) seems like the opposite of good epistemic guidelines.
But it might be an interesting lens to look through, to examine if many of the examples of alternate tactics employed successfully in the past, when analyzed from this perspective, might have indeed acquired much of their potency by "inventing new myths, telling better stories, and writing more convincing histories." How various tactics manage to succeed or fail is not always obvious on their surface.
Wonderful point. But can I ask you a honest question I’d ask anyone that posted here. Did you read the whole article?
I think your point is valid and I also wonder how much of our problem is “hyperbolic language”
>I think your point is valid and I also wonder how much of our problem is “hyperbolic language”.
Or more generically: language that demonstrably does not match shared reality. Unfortunately, a widely distributed meme prevents that form of valid criticism.
Whoever designed this Matrix seems to have brought their A-Game. 😁
Nieve was naive to think she could take on Glough.
Be careful with the word tactic. The word is a form of philosophical poetry
Be careful with the word true. It’s an exaggeration term
The solution is to tell a better lie...
Assuming any articulation of meaning is necessarily a lie, than yes, kind of.
Myth might be a better term.
There are plenty of things that are useful for a society that aren't absolutely true- "All our citizens are equally important", or "We have a common purpose."
All these things are helpful since they distract from the frequently true statement, "We'd be better off if you guys were disenfranchised, enslaved, or dead."
he defines the difference (contextually) between a lie and a story:
>...stories give meaning to our world whereas lies ignore the world altogether. This is an important insight for contemporary politics, in which stories and narratives play a central role in shaping our political identity, but where they are also highly susceptible to a complete disregard for truth, reality, and history.
Stories used to manipulate are no better then lies used to the same effect.
so, novels are bad. we can't be emotionally manipulated or learn anything through allegory.
poems -unless they're written to be absolutely historically and scientifically correct- are bad too.
whatever planet you come from must be bland as fuck.
I guess it's a matter of intention. The politician is trying to control you while the author is trying to either entertain or reveal something to you via metaphor. The goal of the political metaphor is to manipulate the same way the old bad metaphors did. They are not for shining light on the truth but for controlling perspective. Metaphors with the goal of leading you with out regard for reality is no better then the lie. They serve the same purpose, to manipulate with disregard for the truth.
a politician is a salesperson; their job is to influence people via representation.
i expect a politician who shares my values to express those values in a positive light. i also expect a politician who doesn't share my values to state their own opinions in a positive light (because they, too, represent a constituency.) those are stories being told for the purpose of having me understand the issues and the available opinions/options on those issues.
the author of this essay is suggesting that "better stories" (one's that adhere to an objective truth while acknowledging divergent values) are the nexus of understanding and acceptance among divergent political factions.
obviously we have politicians lying big-time right now. according to the author's stated values those politicians could be telling better stories (as defined) instead of lying. and if they did so our political divisions would be less of an issue.
influencing people by representation is counter to the idea of representation. Working to change what people want when your job is to advocate for it, is in my opinion, corrupt. You are not representing people you are doing what you want. Useing metaphors to manipulate people in this way is very questionable in imo. I'm of the opinion that politicians are not thought leaders though. Although I could hear an argument about the president seeing as he is less of a representative and more of a leader so to speak.
>influencing people by representation is counter to the idea of representation
the people that my representative is influencing through representation are the other politicians whose votes will be needed to pass any given legislation.
that is how anything gets done in a representative democracy.
Oh, you right.
Are metaphors lies?
If they are told as if they are the truth when one believes there is no truth. Then it is a lie.
What meaning, then, does the genealogy of self as animal provide us? What does it prefigure in our actions that we may value?
I don't know, but it's a better starting point than "God is our foundation and supports all our actions." I'd rather us all start together as animalness or humanness as a common denominator rather than divine tribal/cultural divide.
Well stated
I'm not sure where the "is" and where the "ought" are in the linked article.
If our genealogy or history is just fact, then the question is, given X, how does that create our self-understanding and how would prefiguring in X lead us to act.
In other parts, the article (and post title) suggests that X is not given and should be invented so as to create a desired (which?) self-understanding and actions?
When people are convinced they're nothing but animals, they act like animals.
God is our foundation is the truth, BTW.
> God is our foundation is the truth, BTW.
Do you have any convincing arguments that this is indeed the case?
Of course not, because they don't exist.
Of course I do.
Life didn't spring from rocks. Whales and bananas didn't evolve from a single cell.
We never observe one kind becoming another. God created humans. They didn't evolve from a common ancestor with monkeys.
Wow, you really know NOTHING about science, do you? BTW, none of those are "arguments." They're just false claims with nothing to support them.
What is your claim about how the universe began and how life on Earth began?
Those aren't arguments I made. Those are facts.
Find a pen that made itself. If a simple pen can't make itself, then a cell that's thousands of times more complex than a pen can't make itself, much less a life that's trillions of cells working together.
<shakes head sadly>
Yes, smart people LOL out loud at you, not with you.
If you found a pen on the ground, you'd agree it was created. Life is far more complex than a pen is, yet many think life came from rocks.
The universe is infinitely more complex than a pen, yet many think the universe exploded from nothing, nowhere, never.
Complex things have creators. The creation proves a creator.
What if they're discovering the creation might be fake? Did the creation create itself like the blue dude in Watchmen?
Who is they?
The creator is outside the creation. The guy who invented the computer isn't inside the computer.
Evilutionism holds that life created itself from nothing.
Creation truth accepts that there was a creator.
Sometimes I wonder.
Check this out
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This is incredibly naive and simplistic. The truth is that if you believe that God is on your side, you are capable of committing any crime necessary to whatever ends you attribute to him, as we've seen throughout history. Belief in God is not the only foundation of morality and in many cases can be a twisted foundation of total immorality and genocide.
>The truth is that if you believe that God is on your side, you are capable of committing any crime necessary to whatever ends you attribute to him, as we've seen throughout history.
True, but potentially misinformative (a vague term, and used as such for appropriateness).
Replace God with most any ideology or methodology and it is also true.
God is on everybody's side.
A person who goes to crime and evil when God is mentions - the Ten Commandments are for you.
>Belief in God is not the only foundation of morality
Very interesting. Can you point to other foundations of morality?
Start here and read the whole page.
A more accurate link in response to my question would have been this.
Regardless, thanks for your response.
But what if I'm not interested in myths and "more convincing histories"
they are interested in you tho
For history to be comprehensible, it still has to be presented as a story, with principal actors, cause and effect, and typical story structure (beginning-middle-end). The story of how the Allies won the Second World War is one example. It’s essentially a myth in the sense that it gives direction and meaning to our history, even if it doesn’t have flying cows or demigods.
Like it or not i think we are always influenced by stories and myths. If we believe we are not then these stories shape us, so the best method would be to embrace the fact and consciously take control of the story we live in.
Well, how do you make sense of human society?
Comparing the various versions of "reality" that different individuals describe offers some useful insight into the nature of humans, as well as the nature of reality.
The author missed a perfect example of a political myth becoming an outright lie in the rise of the Christian Right in the US. The way, for instance the parable of a “judgement day” in the New Testament becomes an actual, physical event people believe will result in them being whisked away to some perfect place before the world’s destruction.
A similar myth is that all Christians believe the same thing.
Another somewhat similar mythical belief is that mind reading is possible. Even Scientific Materialists believe that one, strangely enough...demonstrating the power of myths, I suppose.
Perhaps more politics than philosophy, but here an example of decadence/evil/disaster and restoration, a video explaining how the neoliberal myth replaced the Keynesian myth and how a new story is needed to bring society forward.
Who decides whats dangerpus and what is "better"?
An interesting read given my country's anniversary of the social uprising 3 years ago.
"Stories, narratives, and myths give meaning to our reality."
No they don't. People endlessly repeat this vague claim without examining it. If anything "gives" reality meaning, that presumes meaning doesn't necessarily belong to reality. Sure, reality can create meaning, because stories are part of reality, but the meaning itself would not necessarily be a part of events themselves.
From this perspective, people attribute meaning to events post hoc—and it is implied that events do not have meaning in and of themselves. Meaning, from this perspective, only occurs in the mind. This comes to the fore later, when the writer states,
"As the world is in itself indifferent to human meaning, we need stories that connect contingent events to make sense of the reality we live in."
(side note, I more than mildly dislike when one persons speaks for all humanity in the first person plural)
Before I even get to why such claims stand on shaky ground at best, I want to address the people who will get totally hung up on how right they are about meaning only occurring in the mind. Stories and myths and narratives are not necessary for meaning even if you are one of those people who believe meaning only occurs in the mind.
Meaning, in the sense meant by people who take this stance, can still come from memory. It doesn't need a story. It doesn't need a narrative. It doesn't need a myth. Meaning, the most deeply felt intimate meaning, the meaning that a person lives, that they feel, which drives their actions, comes from memory, memory which doesn't need to be articulated, structured, made sense of or interpreted.
The mind and body know and "understand" pain, desire, etc., etc., without words. In fact, the ability to "understand" sensations without language makes language possible. Distress and pleasure don't need a representational medium to be important or meaningful. If anything, the relation would be the exact opposite.
I don't even believe this to be the case. I am only providing it for the people who are so entrenched in the hubris of materialist reductionism that they can only consider meaning as occurring in the mind (reserving the stance of ultimate truth teller for themselves while "discrediting" humanity as a whole).
It is obvious to me that meaning exists independently of the mind, and the mind gets closer or further from articulating that meaning through the life course. I won't argue this case. I will, however, point out how Blumenberg and the author use this sense of meaning when it suits them.
"The possibilities of constructing meaningful narratives from collective histories are indeed not infinite. At a certain point, stories and myths start misrepresenting or even abusing history. It is, therefore, important to determine when exactly myth becomes illusion."
He goes on to elaborate how myths become illusions when they lie, but if they are giving a meaning that does not actually exist except in the mind they are all giving lies. An underlying truthful meaning must exist, in reality itself, for there to be a distinction between illusory and true myths.
Do you not know that the truth, the simple materialist reductionist truth, the phenomenological truth, whatever takes your fancy, can be told in such a way as to give a false (illusory) meaning? After all, truth is never complete. People are not that smart. The very idea that I could even imagine such a truth is ridiculous. I can't even accurately imagine, in totality, what happens in a single city on any given night. Perhaps someone else has a brain that is that much more powerful than mine, but I haven't seen it.
Anyway, this is making my brain hurt. I've already done my eight hours of work today.
Your commentary is well written but you make certain leaps that I'd like to question, if you don't mind. Feel free to ignore me.
What is objective meaning in your view? Can you present an example of meaning without narrative? Memory is narrative, so that doesn't work. To demonstrate this, I simply ask you to give an example of something you remember that isn't drawn from narrative. Even non-personal facts like 1+1=2 are remembered principles extracted from narrative memories of examples where this was true.
I also must ask you to examine when you say, 'if they are giving a meaning that does not actually exist except in the mind they are all giving lies.' You mentioned pain. Pain does not exist outside the mind, or at least we have no evidence that it could. Is pain a lie? Is desire?
And again with 'the truth... can be told in such a way as to give a false meaning,' if only 'truth' is transmitted, where does the falsehood in that 'false meaning' come from? It would seem the falsehood is the one that conflates the map and the landscape.
Just thoughts...
Memory only seems like narrative because that's the primary tool you're using describe it. Unlike narrative, however, memory doesn't necessarily exhibit a beginning, middle and end.
Memory exists in the hippocampus and dispersed across the pfc. It's a network, not a line. There is no beginning, middle or end in a network, just nodes with more less amounts of connection between them.
For a good example of memory that doesn't present as narrative, consider traumatic memory. Traumatic memory persists (by persists I mean the defining symptom is flashbacks) because it cannot be incorporated into the existing explanatory framework (the story of why things are the way they are) of an individual.
Now, the fact that traumatic memory presents as surface reality, as meaningless, would seem to reinforce the idea that memory requires narrative to have meaning, but traumatic memory is not the only type of memory that refuses to be incorporated into narrative.
People can also experience memories that don't present as narrative, but these memories involve an intense multiplication of meaning (as opposed to the other extreme, the closure of meaning). People sometimes refer to such experience as awe, sublime or transcendental.
In either case, the memories belong to the realm of the unspeakable. Their meaning cannot be articulated (brought into narrative), either because the meaning is too terrible to be absorbed by the psyche, or too great. In both cases, the zero day quality of the memories tends to become like a genius loci of a great many words (because they are never enough).
​
As for the idea that "if they are giving a meaning that does not actually exist except in the mind they are all giving lies," my point is that the conditions they give are false, not that the meaning they have given is false. That is, the totality of phenomena involved in the production of meaning are not restricted to the mind.
(so, to look again at pain, pain indicates something about reality; its existence in the mind in no way invalidates its truth—we do not need to attribute "puncture" to a needle popping through the skin in order for the sensation to mean "puncture")
Meaning is not merely imposed on reality like a map over the territory. It is (should be?) the exact opposite. The territory demands that the map accommodates its nature, or the map becomes nonsense. The author of the essay and the German guy he wrote about both recognize this, but they do so while earlier insisting that the map gives the territory meaning. Surely, the territory gives the map meaning.
​
As for objective meaning, I don't deal with the objective and subjective dichotomy in the normal way (i.e. the way it was hammered into me in college). A subject is just a subcategory of object, namely an object with a model of itself for itself. Subjective meaning is objective meaning; it's just an incomplete part (subcategory) of it.
The incompleteness of subjectivity precludes absolute truth (this is where the falseness comes into truth, the incompleteness of truth). Objective truth, essential truth, to the subject, only arrives in bits, or it overwhelms. I see through a mirror darkly.
Noob alert...
Challenging political myth can serve to double down on the conviction of believers whereas growth and expansion on the original can gently move things on.
The Romans did this effectively with their gods when invading. Rather than banish, or outlaw the established god's of the country they had invaded, they gently introduced their similar deities and entwined them into established myth. Maybe not the best example but thought it was relevant.
I know that many people won't agree but I think the Enlightenment was a pretty cool movement and that one of the values of the Enlightenment is that reason matters more than myths. The thing about a myth is that if it is an effective enough story it can justify whatever you want. There are probably comics somewhere in the middle east that portray the 9/11 hijackers as noble heroes who sacrificed their lives for Islam (which is how they saw themselves).
So, much as it is out of fashion in a lot of ways these days I think reason and facts in the long term trump (no pun intended) myths and stories and people who argue for social justice, environmentalism, universal healthcare have reason on our side. Even from a purely selfish standpoint these things make sense, especially from the long term point of view of future generations and (although their behavior often isn't consistent with it) everyone, especially those on the right, love their children and want a good life for them.
Just a few examples of facts you virtually never hear in the Main Stream Meida: 1) A gun in the home is far, far more likely to be used to injure or kill a friend or family member (either due to accident or rage) than it is to defend the family from an intruder. 2) People talk about government healthcare in fiscal terms saying the US "can't afford it" but universal healthcare is both more cost effective and gives much better outcomes. When you look at how much the US spends on healthcare as a percentage of GDP we are either at or very close to the top of all nations. While our outcomes are down at the level of 3rd world nations (there are standardized metrics that healthcare professionals use to rate everything from individual hospitals to the healthcare system of a nation) 3) Alternative energy is already as or more cost effective than fossil fuels if you take away things like the tax subsidies the US government still gives to companies like Exxon for looking for new sources of oil. Paying Exxon to look for oil is like paying me to look for attractive, single intelligent women. I'll take the money but I'm already looking as hard as I can.
BTW, if you want to see an alternative point of view to what I just said in another post I recommend reading Saul Alinksky's Rules for Radicals. He gets quoted by the right so much... not so much anymore actually but for a while they were always referencing the book as the bible for all left wing people so I gave it a read. To my surprise I didn't like it much. It was a fun read and Alinsky did some amazing things but it was all about how it's important to present people with someone to hate and make politics personal. E.g., if some company is polluting the drinking water then Alinsky says to demonize the CEO of the company and what a creep he is rather than emphasizing all the bad consequences of not having clean water. Maybe that's why I would never make a good politician, I like to think that down deep most human can be reached by rational arguments. Which is also why I thought Trump would never be elected so I should probably admit defeat but I'm stubborn... kind of irrational that way... no one is completely consistent... ;-)
"Writing more convincing histories" is a bit suspect.
Fiction always makes more sense than reality, which is full of accidents, luck, and human irrationality.
In his writings, Hans Blumenberg addresses the question of why humans are the only creatures on Earth who have a sense of history. He argues that this sense of history is what allows humans to create and maintain their own cultures.Blumenberg first addresses the question of why humans have a sense of history while other animals do not. He argues that this sense of history is what allows humans to create and maintain their own cultures. He then goes on to discuss the nature of human history and how it is different from the history of other animals.Blumenberg argues that the sense of history is what allows humans to create and maintain their own cultures. He states that human history is different from the history of other animals because it is based on the idea of progress. This idea of progress is what allows humans to create new things and to improve upon existing things.
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Sounds a lot like Anand Giridharadas' thesis in The Persuaders.
And herein lies the issue with the people who view “Great Man Theory” as some evil.
The alternative is boring, dry history with unfocused stories that no one really remembers or cares about
>The alternative is boring, dry history with unfocused stories that no one really remembers or cares about
That is not true. There are many alternatives and each one has their pros and cons. Problem or solution orientated history is much more interesting than hearing what charles Dick the 5th has done in his life. I would rather read about how London solved their wastewater issue than hearing about the deeds of some random dude who played some part in it. Chronological history can sometimes be very boring, as there is no inherent storytelling involved. But luckily you are able to combine several approaches.
Unfortunately, it is true.
You think the story of London’s world-changing sewage system is most effectively told through the lens of a guy digging the hole?
The fellow who, despite public opinion being against him, managed to get it done takes a back seat to that? What story are you telling here?
Anyway, you retain the Great Man approach her too.
>Anyway, you retain the Great Man approach her too.
Please dont lay words in my motuh? I accept it as one of many tools. I say that a nail needs a hammer. But different things need different tools.
​
>You think the story of London’s world-changing sewage system is most effectively told through the lens of a guy digging the hole?
No. I never proposed that. Depending on what you goal is and what you want to tell your lens should vary. So if you want to tell people about innovation and how to deal with limited space/resources then its most effective to tell a problem/solution orientated story. For example it will begin with the Problem, how they perceive that problem, what resources they had, what was tried and what worked. The process of all those decisions is what matters. It really does not matter that one big guy that politically supported it despite public opinion. Such Drama only distracts from the problem solving aspect that the story want to effectivly tell.
On the other hand if you want to educate people about holding on to good ideas, then it is a good way to tell the story like that. Because then the goal changes. The actually process of finding the right solution matters less, because the goal is not one of an engineer but one of an activist.
We need heroes for inspiration until we learn to become our own hero.
Everyone being their own hero really sums up our modern malaise to me
It'd probably work as long as people remembered they have to do heroic things to be a hero, rather than just being awarded it as a right.
>writing more convincing histories
Blumenberg instructs mankind to lie successfully?
I think it's more a matter of emphasizing historical details selectively. There is more history than can be written, so the choice of which information constitutes relevant history is a reflection of values. For example, A People's History of the United States was an unprecedented book for it's time because it examined a familiar historical chronology from an uncommon perspective. Both ways of telling the story are true, but with contrasting emphasis.
Thanks for the summary. Yes, a whole lot of nuance is needed to get a proper view of history.
lpuckeri t1_ist8grt wrote
I would be careful with the hyperbolic language... things like "can only be countered by".
I don't think you or anyone is
nievenaive enough to actually think this is the only way. But when we exaggerate the importance of one tactic, we ignore others.Statements less extreme are boring, but more importantly they are true.