packbat | Truth or Happiness?

Current Mood: curious
Current Location: home\bedroom\north_desk

Entry tags:

mysteries of the universe

Truth or Happiness?

Okay, I can't sleep for wondering how people would answer this, so...

Which do you value more: truth or happiness?

Answer any way you please (though I reserve the right to delete anything obscene).

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Erk! I think this page (http://yudkowsky.net/bayes/truth.html) works...

Ah, yes.

I didn't enjoy that one at all. I suppose the point was to make that character who dies a real tosser, but most of that article seemed like a waste of time, it resembled far too closely arguments I've had with real life idiots.

Perhaps I went in with the wrong expectations, I was hoping for a clear definition of a couple of different versions of "truth".

Well, I don't really know how to define it - I'd say "truth" means "correspondence with reality", where reality is like he said:

Frankly, I'm not entirely sure myself where this 'reality' business comes from. I can't create my own reality in the lab, so I must not understand it yet. But occasionally I believe strongly that something is going to happen, and then something else happens instead. I need a name for whatever-it-is that determines my experimental results, so I call it 'reality'. This 'reality' is somehow separate from even my very best hypotheses. Even when I have a simple hypothesis, strongly supported by all the evidence I know, sometimes I'm still surprised. So I need different names for the thingies that determine my predictions and the thingy that determines my experimental results. I call the former thingies 'belief', and the latter thingy 'reality'.

Now, I'll admit I haven't read 1984, but I've never quite understood the objection to this idea.

It's actually a really good read. I'd been recommending it to my cousin (

poxy_report) for ages, and when he eventually sat down to read it, he was surprised at how compelling it is. You expect it to be dry, it's really not.

I've got that quote - it's not nearly as effective out of context, of course, but this single piece of writing has had more effect on me than anything else I've ever read. I mention that to people, and they think that I'm trying to say it will effect them the same way - I'm not, I'm just pointing out how significant it is to me, even if you disregard it off-hand.

I've changed the names to avoid spoilers.

Anything could be true. The so-called laws of Nature were nonsense. The law of gravity was nonsense. 'If I wished,' O'Brien had said, 'I could float off this floor like a soap bubble.' Winston worked it out. 'If he THINKS he floats off the floor, and if I simultaneously THINK I see him do it, then the thing happens.' Suddenly, like a lump of submerged wreckage breaking the surface of water, the thought burst into his mind: 'It doesn't really happen. We imagine it. It is hallucination.' He pushed the thought under instantly. The fallacy was obvious. It presupposed that somewhere or other, outside oneself, there was a 'real' world where 'real' things happened. But how could there be such a world? What knowledge have we of anything, save through our own minds? All happenings are in the mind. Whatever happens in all minds, truly happens.

"Truth", hey?

It does sound like a mindbender. Of course, I do plan to read the book, you know. ;)

Anyway, belated thanks for the response - I'm always interested to hear what people think.

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Truth or Happiness?

I blame YOU!

Mua-ha-ha! No, wait, I mean, "Why blame me, I didn't do nuthin!"

Erk indeed, good sir. Erk indeed.

The author is a bit of an odd duck - I'm guessing he was tired of the arguments too.

It's not an objection, as such.

Not really - it's grabbing, though.