Re: Knowledge and Belief

[Logical Language Group <lojbab@ACCESS.DIGEX.NET>]

>Getting back to that. If I were to say, in the context of a base ball
>game: mi cu djuno lo du'u le kavbu cu djuno lo du'u le renro ba'o renro
>le bolci (given that I translated that right), then I think it makes
>sense. Because, I will have directly observed the catcher catching the
>ball, or attempting to catch the ball, and obviously the catcher would
>do neither of those things, if he/she had not seen the pitcher throw it.
>
>Could not the default value, for x4 almost always be direct observation
>in these cases? If the speaker does not directly observe the event, then
>should not one supply a x4 for djuno to provide their argument as to why
>they know someone else knows something? Especially, given the main goal
>in providing an unambiguous grammer in lojban is to ensure clear
>communication, correct?

For a Christian who accepts the Bible as a statement of truth by faith,
then for them, "they know that Paul knew that Christ was the Son of God".
There is no direct observation present or implied in the English, and
to Biblical literalists, a claim that faith in God is any less valid an
epistemology than direct observation (which can be flawed in the case
of optical illusions, for example) or mathematical knowledge (which is
depednent on axioms), is blasphemy.

Lojban has to be as usable by mystics as by rationalists in order to be
culturally neutral.  The gismu, even more than other Lojban content
words, need to be sufficiently vague that they allow use by people with
alternate cultural mindsets to that of the typical Western-culture scientific
skeptic that has dominated the develeopment of the language.

lojbab
----
lojbab                                                lojbab@access.digex.net
Bob LeChevalier, President, The Logical Language Group, Inc.
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