Dec 30, 2024 11:24 PM
(This post was last modified: Dec 30, 2024 11:46 PM by Magical Realist.)
It is a source of endless wonder to me that all the facts we know about the universe, and all the facts we will ever know about the universe, are spelt out in the sequential groupings and spacings of just 26 letters of the alphabet. How can we be sure all we can know can be captured this way? And why is the universe itself so "languageable"? Not to worry though, as the amount of possible sentences in the English language (around 10^570) is far greater than the amount of atoms in the universe!
In the end though it does not seem to me that we "know" facts per se. Any more than we "see" the objects around us per se. Just as we retro-construct objects out of the seeing of light, so we retro-construct facts out of the words we see spelt out before us. The facts are felt to pre-exist their being worded, just as objects are felt to preexist the seeing of light. We literally construct their given non-verbal existence unconsciously, as being states we only describe by words, just as we construct objects' given non-photonic existence unconsciously, as being things we only see thru light.
In the end though it does not seem to me that we "know" facts per se. Any more than we "see" the objects around us per se. Just as we retro-construct objects out of the seeing of light, so we retro-construct facts out of the words we see spelt out before us. The facts are felt to pre-exist their being worded, just as objects are felt to preexist the seeing of light. We literally construct their given non-verbal existence unconsciously, as being states we only describe by words, just as we construct objects' given non-photonic existence unconsciously, as being things we only see thru light.