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From: David Yeo <dyeo@oise.utoronto.ca>
Subject: Re: Heisenberg: was he blind? 
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On 14 Feb 1997, Neil Rickert wrote:

> In <Pine.SOL.3.91.970214071039.10795C-100000@tortoise> David Yeo <dyeo@tortoise> writes:
> 
> >I doubt MY definition of truth would carry much weight.  However, I do
> >suggest that truth is not a binary state (as many appear to believe). 
> >Rather, I adhere to the pragmatic view of truth as a goal not as an
> >absolute. To quote Peirce (1871): 
> 
> >  There is, then, to every question a true answer, a final conclusion, to 
> >  which the opinion of every man is constantly gravitating.  He may for a
> >  time recede from it, but give him more experience and time for
> >  consideration, and he will finally approach it.  The individual may not
> >  live to reach the truth; there is a residuum of error in every
> >  individual's opinions. 
> 
> >  ("Charles S. Peirce: Selected Writings", Dover Publ., pp. 81-82)
> 
> That is a commonly held view, I think.  But it seems to depend of
> faith that the future will discover 'truth'.
> 
> Suppose that the population splits into two different camps, which
> don't communicate much with one another.  After a while, both camps
> may come to different conclusions as to which is truth.  That is,
> they might gravitate in different directions.  So which of them
> really has 'truth'.

I think that the isolated truths held by each camp are most appropriately
viewed as a temporary divergence from the truth to which all camps (except
those rooted in dogma) will, in theory, EVENTUALLY gravitate.  To answer
your question, in their divergent state neither camp embodies the truth,
although each may contain portions of a truth to which they are evolving. 

> 
> I think this view is a prescription for relativism.
> 

True ... but it's a TRANSIENT relativism.  Moreover, you say this as if it
(i.e. relativism) is a bad thing.  If I understand the term correctly, all
the relativist maintains is that the social environment plays an important
role in determining the contents of "belief". Or more strongly, that there
is no objective knowledge of reality independent of the knower.  Of course
if taken to the extreme, this may lead to idealism or even solipsism.  But
when the individual "knower" is replaced by a community of "knowers", all
of whom share the knowledge/belief/opinion, then doesn't relativism simply
constitute a paradigm (a la Kuhn)? 
 
Cheers,

- David Yeo (Applied Cognitive Science, University of Toronto)
