Regarding Ignorance.

[ZenitYerkes]

I have a simile for that.

Well, imagine we founded the ToS Hotel. In that hotel all windows point to the same landscape; but they are distorted and each of them is in a different color. Now, if we assigned a different room to each member of ToS, and asked them to say what they see, we'd hear.

"There's a large blue cloud and a little blue mountain"
"There's a small red cloud and an enormous red mountain"
"---"

We see things from a different perspective; however, we're perceiving the same landscape. And we all agree on saying there is a mountain and a cloud.

About the "what's real" question; I've already made a thread about it. But what I can say, is that perceived reality is the only reality common to us all. We can give to what we perceive different names, assign it different symbols,... Hence why they say language is a social contract between all the speakers: we all decide to put a certain perception of an object a symbol, and thus being able to work on that concept.

And about the "It is red" statement, it is not false for me if I perceive it red. Other persons perceiving the same wavelight will say the same as I do.

All our knowledge comes from perceptions from reality. However, that knowledge is valid to us because we perceive more or less in the same way, and assign the same symbols to the same perceptions.

The key to knowledge is to observe widely; using our simile of the ToS hotel, it is to compare as many views as possible so we can know from where those perceptions come.

(Now it's me who's wondering if this makes any sense)

[Human No More]

It makes sense, but there's no way we can ever evaluate whether something is 'true' in that sense or not, because it may be the way everyone perceives it, but it could be perceived differently.

[ZenitYerkes]

Originally Posted by Human No More

It makes sense, but there's no way we can ever evaluate whether something is 'true' in that sense or not, because it may be the way everyone perceives it, but it could be perceived differently.

Perceived differently by who?

When we make knowledge we have to make it for someone, that's a point I forgot to mention. Hence why we need to broaden the perspective. It's not the same to formulate a political theory for a small tribe or the whole world -we need to take in count different variables, and the different perceptions of the affected people.

So if we for example were working on a book about universal alimentary habits, we would be looking for a human perspective, wouldn't we? And that means taking out of our theories the opinion of the sacrificed animals or the reaped cereals.

Should we take them in count then?

If we're making knowledge for our species, it just does not make sense to put the perceptions of a duck on reality. What doesn't mean that we should stop to care about the rest of beings in this planet though. We must respect our environment, it's the feeding hand and we're now seeing what it makes if we abuse its resources.

However, we perceive things similarly; as far as I'm concerned most of us have two eyes, two ears and the three remaining senses in perfect conditions. How we interpret the information we receive through them, that's what needs to be compared.