A few minutes of key ideas!
The research & wisdom reminders.
These are the six key ideas that guided the high-level topics of this week’s column.
This week:
Truth.
Truth requires alignment with reality.
1.
Absolute Truth
The Idea of the Unknowable Dao
New Look
Absolute truth exists in objective reality, but human claims to possess it remain provisional—always open to refinement, correction, or falsification.
2.
“The Dao that can be told is not the eternal Dao; The name that can be named is not the eternal name.”
- Laozi
- circa 550 BCE
Laozi opens the Dao De Jing by reminding us that ultimate reality cannot be captured by words, names, or ideas. He opens with the split.
3.
Why do scientific models work if they aren’t literally true?
Scientific models work because they structure aspects of reality like key relationships, variables, and components. Over time, models are refined, expanded, or superseded, not because science fails, but because science progresses models by improving maps, not by claiming direct access to reality.
4.
Does Agrippa’s Trilemma Disprove the Idea of Ideas?
Ideas < Metaphysics < Philosophy
5.
How do I know what is true and what is just an opinion?
Evidence. Inductive reasoning is evidence based; abductive reasoning is a best guess from limited evidence.
6.
Is Philo’s interpretation related to the split in the Idea of Ideas?
Philo’s allegorical reading of Scripture reflects an early awareness that a text and our interpretation of that text are not the same thing.
That’s it. The end.