Etiquette



DP Etiquette

First rule: Don't be a jackass.

Other rules: Do not attack or insult people you disagree with. Engage with facts, logic and beliefs. Out of respect for others, please provide some sources for the facts and truths you rely on if you are asked for that. If emotion is getting out of hand, get it back in hand. To limit dehumanizing people, don't call people or whole groups of people disrespectful names, e.g., stupid, dumb or liar. Insulting people is counterproductive to rational discussion. Insult makes people angry and defensive. All points of view are welcome, right, center, left and elsewhere. Just disagree, but don't be belligerent or reject inconvenient facts, truths or defensible reasoning.

Wednesday, February 5, 2020

Was Democritus right after all?



I’m starting to wonder if there is anything that’s real.  (No, I’m not on drugs.  My husband jokes, “No, just too much 7Up!” 😛)  But math is real, right?  It’s supposedly the most real thing we can point to.  Not so fast…

Per an excerpt from Wikipedia, “…mathematical thought is a natural outgrowth of the human cognitive apparatus which finds itself in our physical universe. For example, the abstract concept of number springs from the experience of counting discrete objects. It is held that mathematics is not universal and does not exist in any real sense, other than in human brains.”

Okay, a lot of 50Ȼ words there.  What I take it to mean is that we can’t really touch a number, per se; we can only experience math by proxy.  And that makes math just one more “unreal reality”; a human construct.

Which leads me to my frustration here, per Democritus.  Let’s get down and dirty.  Being the political animal that I am, take last Monday’s Iowa Caucuses.  First we hear it’s an app problem.  Then they say it’s a flawed process problem, with second-round voting messing up first-round voting.  Then let’s pile on last night’s SOTU lies and made-for-TV "unreal" “reality show.”

I’ll tell you, I am the point where I just don’t believe anything I hear anymore.  It’s become so tribal; so "alt-reality" versus "my reality."

So, question(s): Is there anything that’s really real?  As Democritus suspects, is life all just a personal opinion, alt or otherwise?  If objective truths are countered by alt subjective truths, can we believe anything to be the truth anymore??

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DM1Ylv7-DA8

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