The Logic Off Topic list

GA Moore wrote:

>Primitive people always ascribe God to anything they can't
>understand or control.

Kind Sir ... be very careful indeed what you choose to say about primitive 
people for _I_ am one of them.

What I cannot control is that, entirely because of the colour of my skin, I 
am immersed in a world in which 1/3rd of the people I meet are unfailingly 
unpleasant to me for no reason I can understand. WHY exactly?

I therefore ascribe to the god in which I believe the following myth: that 
they are all really very pleasant people underneath it all ... but that at 
present they are just plain ignorant and that one day everyone I meet will 
be kind to me because they will all know more, and that in knowing more 
they will be wiser. What is wrong, Sir, with such a myth and with such a 
prayer? And ... what is wrong with subscribing to a god who gives one the 
strength to continue thinking and behaving like that? What is wrong with 
it, exactly?

Thank you very much but that is one myth that I fully intend to keep 
clinging on to. I shall do so because the alternatives -- that I actually 
DESERVE the way I am being treated, or else that those who do such things 
are unredeemably evil and bigoted and everlastingly incapable of holding 
and sustaining any degree of kindness towards one so different from 
themselves -- those alternatives seem to me to be far too horrible to 
contemplate.

You ... you believe what you like.

I cannot understand or control why people are so objectionable to me on so 
many occasions that I can do nothing about; but I ascribe to the gods in 
whom I believe the fact that there does indeed exist something worthy and 
noble within them that it is my DUTY to perceive and my DUTY to react to 
rather than the manner in which they have chosen to conduct themselves. And 
... as I do for all of those persons, so do I intend to do for you. Thank 
you very much but I fully intend to keep on being 100% primitive in that 
regard.

>... why don't you try debating with valid issues and sound facts. I
>am wondering why some of the most anti-American speakers are also unable
>to debate using facts and sound reasoning.

Well it may be, and it may not be, that _I_ am one of those whom you have 
chosen to style an 'anti-American', but I am fast getting beyond caring, to 
be honest what your opinion is. I subscribe, with every fibre of my body, 
and with every shred of belief in the gods to whom I dedicate my life, as I 
am sure you would also say that you do to the following grand myth:
"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, 
that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, 
that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness".

Well -- it's very obvious to me that a goodly number of people that I bump 
into do not believe that that myth applies to me. No, Sir, they do not. 
Would that they did. My life would be a lot easier. So ... which of us is 
the more primitive, Sir ... me for holding to fast to that great myth of 
our time even in the face of provocation, or they for deciding, 
arbitrarily, that its courtesies should not be extended to me? And please 
do not even begin to try to tell me that I am imagining this kind of 
treatment. I am not quite as primitive -- by which you clearly meant stupid 
-- as that. I am quite sure I could debate the history of structuralism 
within linguistics with any of them but it doesn't seem to do me a shred of 
good, actually.

And then ... regarding the question of facts and exactly what they are. 
There is a philosophical study that I am quite sure you are at least 
vaguely familiar with called epistemology. Its first great proponents were 
Plato and Aristotle who both tried to systematize the nature of facts and 
what one could do with them. They were concerned with 'rational reasoning' 
once 'facts' had been gathered together so that further facts could be 
elucidated. Clearly, any attempt at rational reasoning in order to produce 
facts requires a beginning. Plato felt that there must be at least one 
First and Ultimate Fact that simply cannot be argued with. Therefore ... 
what is a First and Ultimate Fact? Without such a thing there is surely no 
basis to proceed further. So ... that is what those ancient thinkers 
attended to. Where is such a First and Supremely Almighty Unarguable Fact 
to be found?

Of course ... they could not find any such fact although many candidates 
were offered. And ... without a first such fact it's a bit hard to grasp 
what on earth use is served by rational reasoning, frankly.

But ... to this matter Plato took what is called the 'naturalistic' 
approach. He and his followers have always insisted that there are certain 
things that simply ARE. Since the whole thing was ultimately bound up with 
language, it became an argument about words and how words could have 
meaning. Plato tried to argue that it is just 'obvious' that apple is apple 
from the sound of the word and because it simply does evoke the image of 
apple because that's what the sound does. The French say 'pomme' for 
example and somehow come up with exactly the same image. This one-to-one 
connection between sound and object is plainly ridiculous which even Plato 
was forced to concede ... although the naturalist philosophy has always had 
its proponents. Aristotle took a different approach. It is called 
'conventionalism'. On this approach ... well ... at some point or other 
there might have been some kind of grand council meeting amongst all the 
people who had desired to use language, and they just came to some kind of 
generalized agreement that when this particular sound was made, that 
particular thing was meant. In the Aristotelian or conventionalist 
approach, the association between word and idea is entirely arbitrary. Of 
course, the problem here is that there is no record anywhere in any human 
folk memory or anywhere else that any such meeting ever took place. And 
even if it did ... so what? Why should any such convention be felt to bind 
generations yet unborn in perpetuity?

Deciding what a 'fact' is is clearly very slippery.

There is a fallacy in epistemology and language regarding the history of 
words. It is called 'the etymological fallacy'. This means that just 
because a word used to mean one thing at one time does not mean that it is 
obliged to keep on meaning the same thing ever afterwards. Nevertheless ... 
the etymology of words is a most interesting subject that I would commend 
to anybody. It gives a very good guide to how the users of words have 
thought throughout both their history and the history of those words.

In this respect the word 'fact' is of very particular interest. The word 
'fact' means 'a thing done'. In its more active sense, a 'fact' is merely 
an act that has been undertaken ... or else a deed that has been engaged 
upon ... or else a feat that has been performed. A fact is something that 
is created by an activity or an interaction. Even Plato, perhaps the 
biggest naturalist there has ever been, was forced to concede that much.

Please observe, Sir, that a 'fact' is not some pristine 'thing' that exists 
'out there' in all its pristine glory. A cursory review of epistemology 
would indicate that much, although there are those who stick to the strict 
Platonic approach and still try to argue the point. No, Sir. A 'fact' is 
quite something else. A 'fact' is a deliberate act of 'noticing' and 
'regarding' by someone or some body who is particularly interested in that 
fact. Facts, after all, go in cohorts, and facts therefore and immediately 
lead to the thorny issue of the classification of facts which is another 
great epistemological study. On what basis are things, and so-called facts, 
to be classified? And ... what is to be done with the system of 
classification itself. Is it also a fact or what?

So ... such issues have been evaded, for otherwise one cannot proceed, the 
business of 'pertinent facts', however they have been gathered, is so that 
a person can then go forth and try to build a 'rational theory' based upon 
those observations. So therefore ... Euclid, as but one example, observed 
the 'fact' that two parallel lines, if drawn on and on in perpetuity will 
never meet. This 'fact' was in fact a myth of gargantuan proportions 
because such a thing cannot by its very nature ever be observed by any 
human. One must therefore take it on trust. Or not ... as is one's choice. 
But nevertheless, upon this 'fact' or myth of truly cosmic proportions, the 
Ancient Greeks constructed a system of geometry -- a geometry -- that has 
lasted until today and is still held up as a symbol of excellence and sound 
reasoning. Although ... how one can reason soundly upon a myth of such 
stature is a topic widely debated in the mathematical logic and the 
philosophy of mathematics. That this 'theory' or 'fact' regarding parallel 
lines was entirely bogus was eventually demonstrated by Janos Bolyai, Karl 
Friedrich Gauss, Bernhard Riemann and a few other eighteenth century and 
later geometers of note who were eventually able to construct perfectly 
valid systems of geometry -- i.e. systems of reasoning -- based upon other 
'facts' (also of course great myths) which did not accept Euclid's 
trenchant declaration about parallel lines.

And ... in our own era Albert Einstein has constructed a most beautiful 
theory of light and relativity based upon the fact, an assumption of metric 
space, that 'the time it takes for light to travel from A to B is equal to 
the time it takes to travel from B to A'. Probably totally bogus that 
declaration, tucked away in a footnote to his paper somewhere, but since it 
explains the observed universe better than pretty much anything else I for 
one am happy to accept it as a working proposition.

The primitive and tribal person that I am, though, would like to point out 
to one and all that probably in a few generations or so someone else with 
come up with an equally startling new 'fact' that we will all then happily 
accept.

One person's 'fact' is another person's 'myth', Sir.

Me ... I come from a primitive culture where we have a plethora of gods and 
stupidities that we use to guide our lives. In spite of that, I have done 
absolutely everything I can to learn about the world in which I live, and 
to try to understand the thought patterns of those who control my life 
because they have absolute control of this planet and absolute control of 
my society and they somehow think it appropriate to go around assassinating 
the leaders of my country who struggle for the right of self-determination 
so that the only thing left for us is for complete idiots to take control 
-- and then to be told that it's all our fault because we can't get 
effective leaders. It gets a tad annoying after a while as I'm sure you 
will agree. May the gods and the Ancestors protect me from becoming a 
terrorist in response to that kind of rank stupidity.

Try myths, Mr. Moore. Maybe ... human beings are not defined by the facts 
they hold in common but rather by the myths they are jointly prepared to 
recognize and subscribe to.

I have my stock of myths. I subscribe to the myth that one day I will walk 
up and be living in a truly glorious and wonderful world in which everybody 
makes an effort to try to understand everybody else -- and in which I am 
not obliged to read any more fatuous and ludicrous pronouncements about my 
forefathers and my ancestors. That is my myth, Sir. And I am surely 
entitled to it.

I can't say that your facts are of any great interest to me any more. My 
myth is a lot more comforting to me and I just pray that tomorrow a few 
more people will share it.

But then again ... what do I know? Me ... I am just a primitive man. Born 
into a primitive tribe. Most of my compatriots are still stuck in the wilds 
of Africa. And yes ... we're probably all really rather stupid, actually. 
Many of us ... and I mean members of my own extended family here ... are 
still unable able to read. Probably because they're stupid, or something. 
You know. Primitive. Never heard of Plato. How much more primitive can you get?

The genetic evidence is very clear, Sir, that every human being on this 
planet was descended from a small group of no more than about 500 women who 
lived in north central Africa several million years ago. From there, the 
whole of this species, in which I am intemperate enough to include myself, 
spread out. And then, one fine day, some of them crossed the seas in ships 
and went back to where they came from. And for some reason that still 
baffles almost an entire continent those who returned started raping and 
pillaging and stealing and denying us our very humanity. They are still 
doing it. Why, for God's sake? Oh yes ... because we were primitive then, 
and we are still primitive now. Yes. That must be it. We are so primitive 
that when we were fighting for our independence every leader we threw up 
with a voice that could be heard somehow and mysteriously came to a sticky 
end just so that the goods and resources could keep flowing out of Africa. 
We, of course, were way too stupid to notice such a thing and we certainly 
deserved the tyrants and despots who those good people selected and 
supported to govern us instead. Probably, we deserved it.

I am, Sir, a primitive person. And I am proud of my heritage. Why should I 
not be? We make great music, to begin with. In case you hadn't noticed.

Mostly, though, I identify with my primitive ancestors because I have seen 
with my own eyes how civilized people conduct themselves. There is just way 
too much of it that is not at all to my liking. It is not to my liking for 
I suffer almost daily from the wounds and the humiliations that they choose 
to inflict on me in their 'oh-so-civilized' way. The fact that I can debate 
Nietzche with any of them, even with you, Sir, if you wanted, just doesn't 
seem to matter, much, actually when it comes time to find a job or buy a 
house or any of those other little things.

If I were to ask the other members of this group who was the more 
primitive, you for making that remark or me for writing this email, what do 
you think they would all say, Sir? And please do not prevaricate and begin 
with justifications about what you actually meant. I know what you meant. I 
have been called primitive before and I know exactly what the word means 
and what people mean by it. They mean by it my parents. That is what they 
mean. MY parents.

The next time, kind Sir, that you feel like sending off an email with some 
fatuous and ridiculous remark about 'primitive people'. be so kind as to 
remember that one of them is a member of the Logic Off-Topic Users Group 
and will be reading what you have to say about him and his family.

It was you, Sir, who pointed out that the best way to have a peace is to 
ready yourself for war. Well ... I am readying myself. My hand is rising, 
Sir. You just make another foolish remark like that and we shall all see 
what I do with it and which part of your anatomy it comes down upon and at 
what speed. I would like it to come down extended in friendship, actually, 
Sir, and to embrace you with it ... but I am finding it very difficult 
indeed to do that right now. Probably because I am just a primitive.

Who knows. Maybe tomorrow I will be as civilized as you are. I can only 
hope so, Sir.

All I can promise to do is make the effort. And I WILL make the effort. 
What you choose to do tomorrow and how you choose to treat other people on 
this list is entirely your business. What I promise is that I will be 
kinder and more considerate to them tomorrow than I have been today. That 
is what I have learned from my gods and from my ancestors.

Kool Musick
Keep Musick Kool


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