Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id JAA09114 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Sat, 20 Jan 2001 09:57:04 GMT Message-ID: <020101c082c6$b6a3d6a0$5eaefea9@cable.rcn.com> From: "Aaron Agassi" <agassi@erols.com> To: <memetics@mmu.ac.uk> References: <LPBBICPHCJJBPJGHGMCIEENJCMAA.ddiamond@ozemail.com.au> <00f701c081fe$021cebe0$5eaefea9@cable.rcn.com> <3A695604.DF0C5ADF@clara.co.uk> Subject: Re: ....and the beat goes on and on and on... Date: Sat, 20 Jan 2001 04:52:34 -0500 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 5.50.4522.1200 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.50.4522.1200 Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
----- Original Message -----
From: "Douglas Brooker" <dbrooker@clara.co.uk>
To: <memetics@mmu.ac.uk>
Sent: Saturday, January 20, 2001 4:10 AM
Subject: Re: ....and the beat goes on and on and on...
> Aaron Agassi wrote:
>
> > Heck, Chris Lofting, do tell, will you acknowledge Ontology, objective
> > reality, at all?
> >
> > If truth is possible, then the refinement, as you put it, may be
productive.
> >
> > If there can be any such thing as truth, then the next question is
whether
> > there can be knowledge of any truth (correspondence to reality).
> >
>
> About 100 years ago the meanings of 'objective' and 'subjective' became
> inverted. (Except in common law jurisprudence) What we now describe as
> 'objective' would before the change have been referred to as 'subjective'.
> Considering that shifting meanings of words is a messy business, there
had to
> have been a theoretical point where both 'objective' and 'subjective'
meant the
> same thing! Sort of like when the North and South pole swap polarity - is
it
> every 25,000 years or so? This also makes me think of how the left-right
> orientation of some written languages in the Levant became inverted about
3,000
> (?) years ago. "|_" for example, became "_|".
>
> Truth is also very problematic in legal theory. Some aspects of the
'truth'
> problem in law elude legal scholars. The elusive aspects are those most
embedded
> in cultural values, and so taken for granted. Attitudes towards truth
(and the
> concept of the State) are a usually undiscussed subtext or much legal
theory.
> It is very difficult to see in oneself, until you experience a culture
where
> these values are absent or different. De Tocqueville wrote that there are
some
> truths about themselves that Americans can only learn from others (i.e.
aliens -
> used here in its U.S. legal sense). Legal scholars are trained in the law
of a
> specific jurisdiction, Germany, USA, etc, but come to legal theory as if
there
> was a very general something called 'Law' which their local
> jurisdiction-specific training made them qualified to speak about. In one
> sense, their training does, but behind this training are 100s of years of
> accumulated cultural values. The relationship between legal expression
and
> these values is notoriously absent from the culture of law school.
Lawyers
> aren't trained in this kind of self awareness.
>
> Culturally conditioned attitudes towards truth in jurisprudence are one of
the
> values neglected in legal education. European Civilian theorists speak of
law
> assuming truth is an absolute. European litigation is a search for this
truth,
> an inquisition led by the judge, and consequently the litigants have a
less
> important role to play in this inquest than in common law systems. Legal
truth
> in litigation in common law systems pursues a more relative truth, or
'parties'
> truth' - litigants offer up to the court their versions of truth (and
challenge
> each others) and this in most cases is all that the court is permitted to
work
> with.
What adversaries offer in court are competing hypotheses. "Versions of the
truth" is linguistic nonsense.
>
> Both systems work very nicely (theoretically) at the local level. The
problem
> I study is what happens when the two competing truth orientations of
common law
> and civil law meet in legal theory, where scholars from both systems speak
about
> big L law without taking into account their different attitudes towards
the
> nature and role of truth in law. Whether its Civilians like Luhmann or
Kelsen,
> or Common law writers like Dworkin or Hart, both create a big L Law, as a
> universal that essentially is just a more abstract version of their own
local
> system and far from universal. That's what I'm seeing alot of here.
>
> When someone speaks about truth and correspondence to reality, it seems
it's
> time to put on the anthropologist's pith helmet and get out the note book
and
> start asking questions about everything except truth and its
correspondence to
> reality.
Bullshit!
To avoid confusion, I have explicitly stated that my questions are
pertaining to truth as defined as correspondence to reality, of statements.
Because such are the questions continually begged by Chris Lofting.
If I raise any question regarding the life savers on the Titanic, then
pointing out that 'Life Savers' is the brand name of a mass produced candy
is digression at best!
>
> Douglas
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> ===============================================================
> This was distributed via the memetics list associated with the
> Journal of Memetics - Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission
> For information about the journal and the list (e.g. unsubscribing)
> see: http://www.cpm.mmu.ac.uk/jom-emit
>
===============================================================
This was distributed via the memetics list associated with the
Journal of Memetics - Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission
For information about the journal and the list (e.g. unsubscribing)
see: http://www.cpm.mmu.ac.uk/jom-emit
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Sat Jan 20 2001 - 09:58:44 GMT