Question of the day
I added a 'quote of the day' to my blog the other day...mainly because there was a George Bernard Shaw quote that I liked at the time and thought a daily quote would at very least be something of interest for anyone who checks out my blog every day :) So this is all for my regulars:) hehe. For someone who is good at using computers I suck at figuring out blogs...it took me forever to find out how to put it where I wanted it :) But it's done now and I have no intentions of moving it! hehe.ANYWAY I got sidetracked there...my point is today's quote. It's a quote from Freidrich Nietzsche: There are no facts, only interpretations. I am trying to decide whether I agree with it or not. I do...but I don't. I'll think about it...
Studying politics in college we had to do a lot of philosophy...the likes of Plato, Aristotle, Machiavelli, Hobbes, Locke, Kant, Marx, Rousseau...and it taught me, to a certain degree, to question everything: authority, laws, beliefs, religions....but that leads to the question of is there ultimately any truth? Religions all have different gods they pray to, and they believe in different ends to life. Laws that are so strict in some places are unimportant in others. Beliefs change from person to person, never mind countries or cultures. And as for governments, democracy is seen as 'the greatest good' in the West but it isn't the only answer...Communism works in Cuba (it had positives and negatives...but so does democracy)...and democracy isn't right for every country in the world...so is there anything that the world can agree on? As an idealist I want to say yes but as I dwell on it.....I don't really know.
On a brighter note, I will leave you quickly with another Nietzsche quote:
In heaven all the interesting people are missing :)
posted by Oreo @ 8:54 PM
5 Comments:
I'm a political science major at University - so I know exactly what you're talking about. I read that Nietzsche quote last night on your blog, and also got to think about it. When you think about it though - he's saying that there are no facts. And if one is to believe what he says - well then they are accepting what he says as fact - which would be self-defeating...
Can't there be facts for which people interpret different? I mean think about 'reality.' I believe that reality (the here and now) is a fact. I belive that I exist in a world that acts a certain way (ie. laws of nature) However, there are plenty of people who interpret the present reality different. They don't deny (well most don't) that we exist, and are living in a world with certain characteristics. That would be a fact. We exist. Schizophrenics have vastly different views of reality - but they don't question that they exist - for the most part.
Bah, I don't know if any of this makes sense. Maybe I've just taken one too many metaphysics classes :P
< S >
I like your point on the self-defeating fact :)
I was going to discuss laws of nature as being truths that everyone accepts, but all I kept thinking about was 'the world being flat' issue and maybe, just maybe, we may all think something is fact but it's just because we have become complacent and accept it as fact instead of questioning and thinking...not that I'm questioning gravity or anything...from my experience, it's always worked :)
If people cant even agree on when life begins (conception, birth...) maybe the only fact that everyone will agree on is that physical death is unavoidable...
i, being a scientist, believe that EVERYTHING needs a proof, and facts are absolute.
philosophy sucks. that's all i know.
i won't even get into it.
absolute truth is an interesting area of thought. As humans, we perceive only a small fraction of what is reality. If we had organs that were sensitive to different forms of energy, life would probably be totally different for everyone. I really like the first Nieztche quote. Even the language we speak is just another interpretation of the world around us. Without communication, would ideas such as truth and reality exist?
I like what louis said about what if we had organs that could feel different types of energy. Then attraction would not just be physical, aesthetically-pleasing attraction, we could be physically, e.g magnetically or chemically attracted to people. So walking down the street you could feel naturally attracted to, or repelled from certain people. I like that....
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