I would say that there is great 'truth' in the 'experiential understanding' of;
"the more I learn, the less I 'know'."
I define 'knowledge' as the 'momentary contents of 'memory'' (no matter how fervently we 'believe', or egoically identify with that 'memory').
That i am reading this is 'this' reality, 'this' universe, 'this' Perspective, Now! 'This' 'is, what is. Nothing else 'could be', in 'this' universe..
That you are reading this, seeing this, is thatPerspective, 'your' reality'.
It is the egoic Perspective that 'knows'...
I need 'know' nothing, necessarily.

So, is this a poll?

I would say yes, following Sartre's reflective (positional) consciousness principle. You are not only aware of the Question, but you are aware that you are aware of the Question.

Hi. I just found myself in this thread. Does it have a title?

Ayer's verification principle applies to the truth or falsity of a statement of fact, but does it apply to self-known states? How would one go about verifying a statement such as "I have a toothache" as opposed to "JGW has a toothache"?

In the case of reading this question, a second party could verify that I am reading the question by standing at my side and observe my reading it, but how could I myself verify that I am reading it? Would I have to ask the second party, or would I have to ask myself?

I think we can at least say from a simple subjectivist point of view, that I am in fact reading the question; you said you are, and from said point of view we need no further justification.

The problem comes when we do try to justify my answer. Assuming the equality of all people in regards to as seemingly simple a task as judging whether or not one is reading the question, what would be the point of someone next to me affirming that I am reading the question if I can't affirm it myself?

Mathematically speaking, if my opinion as to this matter does not add to its validity, then how would someone else's agreement do that if their opinion standing alone would also be insufficient. The sum of all opinions can't approach whatever the required threshold is, if the very thing we are questioning is the value of one opinion.

This is similar to one of the foundations of mathematical philosophy:

None + None = None
None + Few = Few
None + Many = Many
Few + Few = ?
Few + Many = Many
Many + Many = Many

Here, "few" has a value in between the least and most, and without numerically defining the thresholds for few and many, we really don't know how many times we must add few together to achieve many.

So if one person believes I am reading the question, and their opinion is worth x, then how many x's does it take to reach affirmation? Is a verification by a second party worth more than my original statement? If so, why?

As I know I do not exist and have never existed and neither have you, No one is reading this post that no one wrote.

If I or you vanish then from our perspective so does everything else, even God and all the rest of existence :shocked:

Whether I am reading this question, or reading some other question, can be easily tested by someone's asking me what question I am reading. And, if I reply, "I am reading this question", the tester will have confirmed that I know I am reading this question; on the other hand, if I reply, "No, I am reading another question", the questioner will have disconfirmed that I know I am reading this question. It is quite simple when you finally think about it.

I know, because it is never without attention and effort that I read; yet it is with knowledge that I understand, so I focus on understanding rather than the process by which I understand... To reach the prize I reach for the prize and do not reach only for the exercise...

If I may; concepts and forms are bits of knowledge, but in using them we do not think about them, and we do not examine them in detail... They may be knowledge but we only use their meaning, and if thinking changes our view of reality it is through a shift of meaning which will inevitably affect our concepts, and forms...We use forms to think... We do not think about forms to think..

I used to bolt pieces of iron (structural steel) together to make my wages... If you are like most folks, you don't think about it, you just do it... But being me meant thinking about it... And it is true that if you have some ten foot long, six inch I beam you could pick up with one hand, then it does not take much thought, and only little effort.. If you have to get 16 bolts through a double connection in a two foot tall girder beam twenty five feet long with a pile of floor deck on it; then that is a good time to have your thinking behind you... People learn to think without troubling to know...And for that, many do well in life... I was always solving a mystery, trying to do everything better, faster and smarter... So often in life a problem presents itself that takes nothing so much as hard work until a correct answer is arrive at, and then you might never come across another opportunity to use your hard gained knowledge in twenty years...I wish there were some cure for the way I am, but the easy problems sometimes gave me the worst trouble, and the difficult problems were no trouble... My mind is loaded for bear with nothing but mice to shoot at.

The question begs,

Are you real? am I real?, is everything we are not real?

Maybe we are all a figment is the mind of god??

Don't you mean Fig Newton???

What question???

Alan, we would necessarily be just as real as any conception of 'real' we could have, so that the concept real came from experience, real is relative but we most certainly must be it. Dreams and imagination are clearly an aspect of reality, it makes no sense to claim one thing more 'real' than another, only to assign more superficial attributes to our conception of it.

When asked whether I 'know' I am reading something, one could be asking whether I am aware of my actions or whether I am aware of how my perception is acting on my actions.

To ask whether I am aware of my actions begs the question: What sense does awareness have to it? According to awareness - definition of awareness by the Free Online Dictionary, Thesaurus and Encyclopedia. Aware implies knowledge gained through one's own perceptions or by means of information. I think that this is an apt perspective on the word. Do I know what I am doing? Can I know what I am doing? This is easier, can I know what I am doing? Yes, the information exists in the fact that I am doing something, so it must be potentially true that I know what I am doing, thus if one were asked: 'Do you know you are reading this question?' one could potentially answer 'yes' truthfully. Now, the person in question may be aware that he is reading, or that it is this particular question he is reading, or both? But whether he is aware before gaining a sense for the question is a different matter.

He can most certainly be aware of the fact that he is reading, and maybe even that he is reading a question before getting the sense of what has been said, but it is necessary that he get the sense of the question before he is aware of the specific question and that he has read that specific question. So if what is meant by 'know' assures a negative response if the sense is meant to be that he knows the sense of the question during the posing of the question. On the other hand, if 'know' is meant to be referencing his awareness of action and that it is A question that is being read, one could certainly cliam the affirmative truthfully.

It would be scary to be a fig newton

I know I am reading the question. But when I ask myself, "How do I know?" I have to admit that I am trusting my senses and (probably a host of other things). So it seems to me that I can know stuff, but I have to admit that the nature of knowing (so far as I know!) is always a process of trust in something. The implications of this stike me as enormous, because I have been indoctrinated to treat knowing as if it is some kind of very stable or sure thing. Now I "know" that this is false. I constantly encounter people who know things and yet they think that by knowing something, they have accessed truth, and I "know" they are in fact wrong. Whereas, I know that what I "know" is frequently a misunderstanding (based upon my updated "knowing") and so my previous state of "knowing" was merely a misapplication of my trust in one or another thing.

(Sorry about the ramble.)

[size=3][INDENT]
If it was impossible that a person reading a question was incapable of realizing the same, would anyone have ever thought to post a thread like this? It is evident that we are aware of our awareness of certain objects for sure. The only reason this thread exists is because certain philosophers have sought to question this, but questioning doesn't make the awareness go away.
[/INDENT][/size]

Yes I do

I Think therefore I AM

I am Me you are You

You think and you are You

I am not substantial I am a whirlpool of empty matter

You are your Mind I am My mind

We are Mind we ONE

We are Ever where

We are the First Thought


.

This made enough sense.



Erm...okay.



Seperation=Unity?



This might have been where you lost me, but I'm just not sure.....

Some one must have thought that we are a good idea, Thought about us, maybe God God when he was a little bored