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Ezkerraldean
from the lowest common denominator (United Kingdom) on 2006-06-11 07:22 [#01917681]
Points: 5733 Status: Addict | Followup to Drunken Mastah: #01917680
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college is after high school, before university for 16-18yrolds (usually)
university is afterwards
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Drunken Mastah
from OPPERKLASSESVIN!!! (Norway) on 2006-06-11 07:26 [#01917685]
Points: 35867 Status: Lurker | Followup to Ezkerraldean: #01917681 | Show recordbag
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oh.. I always thought colleges were the same level as universities, but with silly class-oriented lectures and tasks...
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Drunken Mastah
from OPPERKLASSESVIN!!! (Norway) on 2006-06-11 07:31 [#01917686]
Points: 35867 Status: Lurker | Followup to goDel: #01917675 | Show recordbag
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quality-assurance is always counter-productive...
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Indeksical
from Phobiazero Damage Control (United Kingdom) on 2006-06-11 07:37 [#01917689]
Points: 10671 Status: Regular | Followup to Ezkerraldean: #01917681 | Show recordbag
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what do you study ezkerraldean
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SValx
from United Kingdom on 2006-06-11 07:54 [#01917698]
Points: 2586 Status: Regular
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I just explained why it is a tautology... it passes the test of intersubstitutionality which means that it is a tautology by definition. Maybe you misunderstand the word tautology. What you just presented about the world just doubling in size is not a tautology. Something is in a tautologous relationship with something else when it means exactly the same thing as something else. For example. A bachelor is tautologous to an unmarried man. This is because they mean exactly the same thing as each other. If you understand the word tautology, I think you'll understand why the verification principle for significance is a tautology.
Emotive significance is different from literal significance because of the reasons I stated before... emotive significance is non-propoositional, whereas literal significance is propositional. That means that things that are literally significant are EV or T whereas things that are emotively significant are not.
Ayer does not say that we should not talk about metaphysical things at all, he just says that we cannot talk about them in any significant way. Here he draws a distinction between a poet and a metaphysician. He has no problems with poets, because they talk emotively and realise that all they are doing is playing with flowery words and merely showing emotions, whereas mataphysicians are different. They actually think that they are saying something significant, when they are not. We can talk about metaphysics as long as we accept that we are not actually saying anything.
I'm still having trouble understanding your example. I think you mean that you can't decide whether something is or is not empirically verifiable unless you understand the sentence, yet that you cannot understand it unless it is empirically verifiable.. I'm not sure what makes you say this though. If I say "A blobble tob tabs" I don't understand it, and I do not need to understand it to say that it is meaningless and cannot empirically verify it. I think you're misunderstanding my distinction between
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SValx
from United Kingdom on 2006-06-11 07:58 [#01917704]
Points: 2586 Status: Regular
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significant and meaningful again. If something is meaningful to one person, it does not make it literally significant.
What makes you say that to decide if something is empirically verifiable we have to understand it? All we have to know is whether we can concieve of any tests that we would carry out to empirically verify something, or if it is a tautology. If we cannot understand a sentence, such as "A bobble tob tabs" we would never be able to think of any tests to carry out to verify its significance empirically. We do not first need to understand this sentence to know that we could not do any tests. The very fact that we do not understand it, is reason enough to know that it is not empirically verifiable
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Ezkerraldean
from the lowest common denominator (United Kingdom) on 2006-06-11 07:59 [#01917706]
Points: 5733 Status: Addict | Followup to Indeksical: #01917689
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maths, physics, geography, geology, and yes i am going to uni
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SValx
from United Kingdom on 2006-06-11 08:10 [#01917712]
Points: 2586 Status: Regular
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Yeah, you're damn right it's not always the case. Last year I studied Maths, Physics, French and Philosophy. You're no better than me.
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Ezkerraldean
from the lowest common denominator (United Kingdom) on 2006-06-11 08:14 [#01917715]
Points: 5733 Status: Addict | Followup to SValx: #01917712
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when did i say i was?
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SValx
from United Kingdom on 2006-06-11 08:16 [#01917717]
Points: 2586 Status: Regular
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You said that people who study philosophy are people who are too crap to do anything else. You study other subjects, and so you were insinuating you were better than people who study philosophy.
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Ezkerraldean
from the lowest common denominator (United Kingdom) on 2006-06-11 08:18 [#01917718]
Points: 5733 Status: Addict
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i was just ranting about the people round here, specifically at my college. its the same with psychology here. probably the teachers
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Raz0rBlade_uk
on 2006-06-11 08:19 [#01917719]
Points: 12540 Status: Addict | Show recordbag
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SValx
from United Kingdom on 2006-06-11 08:20 [#01917720]
Points: 2586 Status: Regular
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Well I'm going to study philosophy and psychology (two times as crap!) Where do you live? Maybe you go to a shit college
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SValx
from United Kingdom on 2006-06-11 08:21 [#01917722]
Points: 2586 Status: Regular | Followup to Raz0rBlade_uk: #01917719
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ha, genius
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Ezkerraldean
from the lowest common denominator (United Kingdom) on 2006-06-11 08:22 [#01917723]
Points: 5733 Status: Addict | Followup to SValx: #01917720
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yes, i do. i hate the place.
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SValx
from United Kingdom on 2006-06-11 08:24 [#01917725]
Points: 2586 Status: Regular
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Well then, that explains a lot doesn't it? My old college has an incredible Philosophy department. We're apparently working beyond degree level.
Where is it that you live that's full of scummers and there's nothing to do at night except play in fields?
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Ezkerraldean
from the lowest common denominator (United Kingdom) on 2006-06-11 08:26 [#01917726]
Points: 5733 Status: Addict
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here!!!!!!
theres nothing to do because...............the only thing here is a postbox.
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Drunken Mastah
from OPPERKLASSESVIN!!! (Norway) on 2006-06-11 08:28 [#01917727]
Points: 35867 Status: Lurker | Followup to SValx: #01917698 | Show recordbag
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eh.. it seems english and norwegian terminology differs.. or I've had too much logics... a tautology is what you have when you have a sentence that is always true, like "Either P or not P"; whether P is true or not, the sentence is true.
we call such things as "a bachelor is an unmarried man" analytical truths and they have nothing to do with synonymity.
however, I do still not believe the verification principle to be a tautology by your definition; "This is a very significant discovery" isn't the same as "this is a discovery we can test empirically." Significance implies that something makes an impact.. also, I'm not quite sure about your distinction between significance and meaning as it seems Ayers was talking about meaning, but just used the word significance...
"They actually think that they are saying something significant,
when they are not. We can talk about metaphysics as long as we accept that we are not actually saying anything. "
Not saying anything is the same as that what we're saying isn't meaningful.. ever heard of a meaningful nothing?
my example is still about the original verification theory of meaning, which says that something isn't meaningful unless you can test it empirically. One of the major problems for the theory is that the sentence "everything just doubled in size" isn't meaningful, but the verificationist who looks at the sentence understands what it means and he must to be able to say "this sentence cannot be checked empirically; there are no possible experiences that allow us to check whether or not everything just doubled size, and it is therefore meaningless, but he obviously understood the sentence. As you say, that's not how meaning works.. a meaningful sentence is meaningful if someone understands it while gibberish sentences like your "A blobble tob tabs" or "Sirok kf3¤ 6kd" aren't meaningful to anyone.
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fleetmouse
from Horny for Truth on 2006-06-11 08:34 [#01917728]
Points: 18042 Status: Lurker
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"...and then after Nietzsche cuts Hegel's head off, his sperm flies across the stage into Heidegger's mouth."
"Wow! What do you call your act?"
"The Philosophers!"
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Ezkerraldean
from the lowest common denominator (United Kingdom) on 2006-06-11 08:40 [#01917729]
Points: 5733 Status: Addict | Followup to fleetmouse: #01917728
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fleetmouse, are you on the IIDB ?
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SValx
from United Kingdom on 2006-06-11 08:53 [#01917732]
Points: 2586 Status: Regular | Followup to Drunken Mastah: #01917727
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"x" is in a tautologous relationship with "y" when they mean exactly the same thing. Tautologies produce analytic truths.
That example doesn't work because you are mixing up the philosophical meaning of significant and the ordinary meaning of significant. There are many words which have this problem, for example, fact in the philosophical sense, is completely oposite to fact in the normal sense. Normally if somebody said that something was a fact, we would take it to mean that it was certian. In philosophy, if somebody says something is a fact about the world, it is empirical and can therefore only ever be at most highly probable, by definition.
Your example is of the ordinary meaning of significance. In philosophy significant means something else. It means that it is ermm sort of meaningful and sensical. If something is insignificant, it means that it tells you nothing synthetically or analytically and therefore is telling you nothing, as there are only two types of truths, analytic and synthetic. If something gives neither of these truths it is telling us nothing. It is non sensical and non-propositional, with no truth value. This is why metaphysics is insignificant, because it tells us nothing synthetically nor analytically, as it is not empirically verifiable nor a tautology.
If we now understand the difference between important significance, and philosophical significance, we can see how the verification principle is a tautology.
"It is significant to say that Sophie has brown hair"; "I can use either a tautology (which is not the case here) or sense data to empirically verify that Sophie has brown hair"
Ayer did mean meaningful when he said significant, but not meaningful as in "important to that particular person" or "each word made sense" but meaningful as in it actually meant something, it was not non-sensical. It would be meaningless and non-sensical to talk about metaphysics as it does not fulfill the verification principle's criteria and doesnt give synthetic or analytic truth
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SValx
from United Kingdom on 2006-06-11 08:54 [#01917734]
Points: 2586 Status: Regular | Followup to Ezkerraldean: #01917726
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Shame.. can't you drive?
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fleetmouse
from Horny for Truth on 2006-06-11 08:55 [#01917735]
Points: 18042 Status: Lurker | Followup to Ezkerraldean: #01917729
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Yes, once in a while.
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Ezkerraldean
from the lowest common denominator (United Kingdom) on 2006-06-11 08:55 [#01917736]
Points: 5733 Status: Addict | Followup to SValx: #01917734
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not yet, my parents will not help me learn, and living so far away from anywhere i cant get enough time at work to earn the money for lessons, let alone a car +tax +insurance. annoying, isnt it?
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SValx
from United Kingdom on 2006-06-11 09:01 [#01917739]
Points: 2586 Status: Regular
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Just get a scooter. Where are you going to uni?
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Falito
from Balenciaga on 2006-06-11 09:02 [#01917740]
Points: 3974 Status: Lurker | Show recordbag
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idont think,enjoy not to drive to live where you do is more stimulating...uh?
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Falito
from Balenciaga on 2006-06-11 09:03 [#01917741]
Points: 3974 Status: Lurker | Show recordbag
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and yeah..a scooter would be nice to enjoy rural roads
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Ezkerraldean
from the lowest common denominator (United Kingdom) on 2006-06-11 09:04 [#01917742]
Points: 5733 Status: Addict | Followup to SValx: #01917739
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scooter, on roads with potholes a foot deep? i dont think so!
leicester uni. i will be driving by then.
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SValx
from United Kingdom on 2006-06-11 09:05 [#01917743]
Points: 2586 Status: Regular
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no, I was only joking about the scooter. You're not tridenti
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SValx
from United Kingdom on 2006-06-11 09:05 [#01917744]
Points: 2586 Status: Regular
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You won't need to drive at uni
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Ezkerraldean
from the lowest common denominator (United Kingdom) on 2006-06-11 09:07 [#01917745]
Points: 5733 Status: Addict | Followup to Falito: #01917740
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although its so annoyingly remote, its really pretty out here. i love it. i havent lived here all that long, and when i lived in the town i always thought about how shit it would be living somewhere out in the country (many of my friends do). but now i am out here, the actual place is quite pretty. i definately do appreciate the view out here. it does make up for the remoteness, in a way
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Falito
from Balenciaga on 2006-06-11 09:07 [#01917746]
Points: 3974 Status: Lurker | Show recordbag
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then you live in deep forest uh? i also live in town but got roads in good shape and ride is cute...
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Ezkerraldean
from the lowest common denominator (United Kingdom) on 2006-06-11 09:08 [#01917747]
Points: 5733 Status: Addict | Followup to SValx: #01917743
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lol
problem is, if i cant drive, i cant actually get there to start with!
well, theres public transport of course, but i would have to drive 30 miles anyway to get to a train station.
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goDel
from ɐpʎǝx (Seychelles) on 2006-06-11 09:09 [#01917748]
Points: 10225 Status: Lurker | Followup to Drunken Mastah: #01917686
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...but always beneficial
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SValx
from United Kingdom on 2006-06-11 09:11 [#01917749]
Points: 2586 Status: Regular
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Now that's just silly. I'm sure you could find a lift somehow or even get a bus or a taxi to the station. It'd be completely pointless to get a car and pay for tax and insurance and lessons just to drive to uni and back every term.
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Falito
from Balenciaga on 2006-06-11 09:16 [#01917751]
Points: 3974 Status: Lurker | Show recordbag
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-(yo man,hope to to hurts you that deep selfphotoshoportrait.my intention was to spoke about the meaning of this mboard.love from my place)-
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Ezkerraldean
from the lowest common denominator (United Kingdom) on 2006-06-11 09:17 [#01917752]
Points: 5733 Status: Addict | Followup to SValx: #01917749
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i suppose i might not be going to uni this year anyway, i might be doing an apprenticeship in rugby which will probably require driving.
and, for when i am not in uni (term breaks etc.) i would probably come home, and i definately want to be able to drive then. i cant stay out here all the time!
sharing a car with one of my parents would be helpful, insurance would be cheaper. problem is they drive posh yuppie cars (freelanders) and would not let me touch them if their lives depended on it!
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Drunken Mastah
from OPPERKLASSESVIN!!! (Norway) on 2006-06-11 17:43 [#01917992]
Points: 35867 Status: Lurker | Show recordbag
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ok.. I don't know where you got your philosophy education, but we need to get a few things straight to be on common ground... I can't believe england would be so different from norway in terminology.. or maybe Ayer tried manipulating language to somehow save the verification principle..?
a tautology is a sentence that is always true in formal logics like the sentence "P [or] notP" (see picture). Now, for Ayer to get his verification principle (for a sentence, A, to be meaningful is for it to be verifiable through sense data or for it to be an analytical truth) to become meaningful by its own criteria, he seems to perform a rather weak attempt at saying it is an analytical truth, but it doesn't become so just because he says so; when someone says meaningful, that is not the same as saying that it is empirically verifiable or analytical: Meaning is something you understand or grasp whenever you percieve something meaningful and there aren't several types of meaningfulness (that may not be a word); you either understand something or you don't. In the first case it is meaningful in the second it isn't (to anyone; if someone can understand something, it is meaningful). That is analytical and also a quite redundant sentence.
Now, for something to have significance, both in philosophy and elsewhere, is for it to make a difference or impact; significance is force. Significance isn't the same as meaning either, but the logical positivist may have used significance as a criterium of meaning in that they meant that something had to make a difference to our future experiences to be meaningful, which is kind of the same as saying that something has to be significant to be meaningful, but this again renders lots of meaningful sentences (sentences you understand) nonsense sentences.
will continue.
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Taffmonster
from dog_belch (Japan) on 2006-06-11 17:45 [#01917994]
Points: 6196 Status: Lurker | Followup to Drunken Mastah: #01917992
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i missed this one but it looks heavy for late night reading!
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Taffmonster
from dog_belch (Japan) on 2006-06-11 17:47 [#01917995]
Points: 6196 Status: Lurker | Followup to Drunken Mastah: #01917992
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btw isn't a tautology something like a triangle has three sides.... something that simple states its self like "all bachalors are unmarried men" thats what i was taut a tautology was. btw i ahvent read anything in this post so please feel free to ignore me!
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Drunken Mastah
from OPPERKLASSESVIN!!! (Norway) on 2006-06-11 17:56 [#01918001]
Points: 35867 Status: Lurker | Show recordbag
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"If something is insignificant, it means that it tells you nothing"
no, that is when something isn't meaningful. A string that tells you nothing is something like "35kfl Gl bk,m s.mew.d0+\" while something insignificant can be something like if I tell you "I can't really feel every single hair on my body"; knowing that won't really affect you in any way, but it doesn't make the sentence not meaningful.
"Ayer did mean meaningful when he said significant, but not meaningful as in "important to that particular person" or "each word made sense" but meaningful as in it actually meant something, it was not non-sensical. It would be meaningless and non-sensical to talk about metaphysics as it does not fulfill the verification principle's criteria and doesnt give synthetic or analytic truth"
what is it to actually mean something? according to verificationism, there aren't many meaningful sentences, and if we were to keep to discussing what would be considered meaningful according to the verification principle, we wouldn't get very far; it's hard to prove even to a satisfying extent that any experience really is an experience.
I bet Ayer was pissed about Heideggers "wie steht es um dieses nichts?"
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Drunken Mastah
from OPPERKLASSESVIN!!! (Norway) on 2006-06-11 17:57 [#01918005]
Points: 35867 Status: Lurker | Followup to Taffmonster: #01917995 | Show recordbag
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nah, the bachelor sentence is a prime example of an analytical truth.. a sentence that is true just because it says that something is what it is or something like that.
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Taffmonster
from dog_belch (Japan) on 2006-06-11 17:58 [#01918006]
Points: 6196 Status: Lurker | Followup to Drunken Mastah: #01918005
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but its still a tautology... isn't it? shame my philosophy dictionary is in teh attic. hehe
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Drunken Mastah
from OPPERKLASSESVIN!!! (Norway) on 2006-06-11 18:14 [#01918022]
Points: 35867 Status: Lurker | Followup to Taffmonster: #01918006 | Show recordbag
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well.. the only way I can see that is if you use some sort of "=" logical operator like P <--> P, but the problem is that even with logical structure, if you want to capture the meaning of the sentence, you'd need to use a different letter to signify the second condition.. and if something is a tautology in logics, it isn't the same as it being true; "if humans are to live forever, we have to drink other peoples blood or not drink other peoples blood" is a tautology, but it isn't really true. There have also been people who have denied the existence of analytical truths... I think Quine may be one of them...
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fleetmouse
from Horny for Truth on 2006-06-11 19:19 [#01918064]
Points: 18042 Status: Lurker
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So many posts in this thread yet not one of you has managed to produce the philosopher's stone.
CHOP CHOP PEOPLE LET'S SEE SOME ACTION
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SValx
from United Kingdom on 2006-06-12 03:26 [#01918164]
Points: 2586 Status: Regular
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Drunken Mastah. Please read this. I am positive that I am correct on the definition of the word tautology. You're still misunderstanding the word significant as well. I have got my definitions from my philosophy tutor and from every philosophical writing that I have ever read. To emphasise my point, I've done some research on the difinition of the word tautology. I just picked 3 different sources at random. A normal dictionary, an online dictionary and an online guide to the meanings of philosophical words. I didn't see anywhere your definition of the word.
dictionary.co.uk- "the unnecessary and usually unintentional use of two words to express one meaning"
Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary of Current English- "The saying of the same thing again in different ways without making one's meaning clearer or more forceful; needless repetition"
http://www.philosophypages.com/dy/ix3.htm#t- "Logical truth. A statement which is necessarily true because, by virtue of its logical form, it cannot be used to make a false assertion."
I hope that this is enough evidence for you that a tautology is what I say it is. It gives analytic truths, which by their definition cannot ever be wrong. If not, please feel free to do more research on ENGLISH websites. Ayer was an English philosopher and so I think it is almost certain that he was using the English philosophical meanings of the words.
We cannot carry on this discussion until you understand the language that I am using.
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DirtyPriest
from Copenhagen (Denmark) on 2006-06-12 03:31 [#01918168]
Points: 5499 Status: Lurker | Followup to SValx: #01918164
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Difinition? What language is that?
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SValx
from United Kingdom on 2006-06-12 03:34 [#01918170]
Points: 2586 Status: Regular
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What? I said definition..
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DirtyPriest
from Copenhagen (Denmark) on 2006-06-12 03:38 [#01918173]
Points: 5499 Status: Lurker | Followup to SValx: #01918170
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One of the times, yes.
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SValx
from United Kingdom on 2006-06-12 03:41 [#01918174]
Points: 2586 Status: Regular
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oh DEAR! I showed that I knew how to spell the word another 4 times in that same post yet made one typo. Well.. my point can pretty much be ignored now :D
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