The Statement Game

Someone makes a statement .
Everyone Discusses the statement.
New statements should naturally spring up from the discussion.
Creating an endless chain of philosophy.
Feel free to post a new statement.
No rules just philosophy.

First Statement

Anarchy is possible, if everyone is kind and productive

 

Opposite factors do not and cannot exist together.
If something is black, it cannot be white at the sametime.
Similarly, Anarchy is "Political disorder and confusion."
Confusion and political disorder is opposite of productiveness.
It cannot exist together with its opposite factor.
Therefore, what you say...("Anarchy is possible, if everyone is kind and productive") is false.

 

Yes.

An idea is said. This is a thesis.
An opposing idea is introduced. This is the anti-thesis.
The ideas are thrown around and jumbled up a bit,
And either one of them wins, or there is a compromise.
The winner, or compromise, is a synthesis.
And the synthesis is always closer to the truth than
(or at least as close to the truth as) either the thesis or antithesis.
And this synthesis becomes another thesis,
Which has an antithesis,
And the process repeats itself ad nauseum.

However, anarchy is not a possible solution.
Not everyone is kind.
Not everyone is productive.
And if they were,
It would not be anarchy,
It would be civilization.

 

Another definition of anarchy is 'the absence of government.'
Therefore your statement:

is false because the absence of government is possible, whether or not everyone is kind and productive.

In addition, a statement saying "X is possible" is ambiguous and cannot be proven to be false. Saying "X is possible" is the equivalent of saying "X may or may not be true" or "X may or may not occur".

Therefore Zion has pulled a mind trick on you by getting you to attack a statement that cannot be proven to be untrue.

"It is possible that 5 can equal 4" is another ambiguous statement. "It may or may not be true that 5 can equal 4" is another ambiguous statement that cannot be proven to be false because it covers all of the options.

 

The statement "It is possible that 5 can equal 4" is not ambiguious, it is false; it is not possible that 5 can equal 4. In this case there are on "options" to cover other than true or false, either 5 equals 4 or it does not. The addition of the word "possible" does not necessarily make a statement ambiguous. Ambiguity occurs when the meaning of the statement is itself unclear and/or when the statement can be easily interpreted in more than one way. For example, the statement "It is possible that I am wearing a blue shirt" is true whether I am actually wearing a blue shirt or not, there is no ambiguity here both the meaning and the truth value are quite obvious.
The statement "anarchy is possible, if everyone is kind and productive" is ambiguous not because of the word "possible" but becuase of the misleading, irrelvant, and possibly contradictory "if everyone is kind and productive".

Here is a statement for the game. It is an oldy but a goody. And perhaps it is too cliche and over done, but I simply can't resist. Here goes. "This statement is false"

 

Productivity would deal more with each human working, producing, bearing fruit, not being lazy.

Politics are personal preferences. Different to each individual. They hold no nuecleus, thus they are obviously no productive. But in fact harmfull and vain for humans to participate in.

 

As for 5 equaling 4, I state that gravity exists. Which is to say, somethings cannot be denied. Which is to say not everything is opinion

 

haha, you are right, I fell into the trap of my own assumptions with out contemplating if this statement is vague or not. Well, thank you for clearing that up.

Now lets reword this statement a little here: "Anarchy is reasonable where there are individuals who are productive".
Now lets attach a truth value to that shall we?

 

You make claims, but if you really want to play a statement game try to back them up with a valid argument or strong argument.

 

I must say, Prof. Jumbo expressed that beautifully. Clear, precise, and simple, that's what philosophy is all about.

 

"What are facts but compromises? A fact merely marks the point where we have agreed to let investigation cease." - Bliss Carman

i think this guy is an idiot. and may our investigation into that matter cease there.

 

lol

No, lets continue ,

Who is an idiot?

A person who contemplates on being one is that, you are what you think you are thinking, you are.

 

because, a fact is that 5=5. there is nothing further. it is a fact.

what is thought in sicence to be a fact is not actually a fact but our closest rendition of a fact. but the essence of the fact remains. you cease investigation when you believe you have found a fact. that doesnt mean that most 'facts' are facts. though a fact is more than a mere comprimise. then it is not a fact.

maths is the essence of fact.

 

No it's not. Anarchy is a state of political disorder and confusion, or equivalently, "absence of any cohesive principal, such as a common standard or purpose."

Productivity is a common standard, thus for anarchy to exist, productivity could not exist. If productivity existed, it would no longer be anarchy.

Also, if everyone is running around confused and disoriented, there wouldn't be any productivity anyway. The only productivity would go into restoring an at least temporary form of modern feudalism, and it still wouldn't be anarchy then anymore.



To the guy who said "It is possible that 5 can equal 4."

That statement is, without a doubt, false. It's not "ambiguous," because every single statement has some value of truth. We don't necessarily need to know what that value of truth is, but in this case, we do. 5 does not equal 4. Ever. So the statement is false, and it is not ambiguous in any way. Just adding the word "possibility" doesn't make the statement ambiguous, it just means, the person saying the statement is either (1) unsure, or (2) a moron.

Ambiguous means: It is open to more than one interpretation. Like this statement:

I had to help my uncle jack off a horse.

Now, you could take that to mean, you have an uncle named Jack (whose name is not capitalized here), and you had to help him dismount a horse. Or, you could take it another way, a more risque way.

THAT is an ambiguous statement, and it's not because of a word like "possible." Whoever made that statement above, was either referring to the first meaning, or the second meaning. And you can't tell, even if you enforce capitalization, because if you do enforce that rule, you're assuming that the person who wrote it also enforced it (which he may not have), which means your assumption would be flawed.

That's the difference between syntax and semantics. A statement is separate from its implied meaning; the meaning cannot be ambiguous, the statement can.

 

The word possible means "it may or may not be true" or "it may or may not occur."

You are incorrect that the statement "It is possible that 5 can equal 4" is false. "It may or may not be true that 5 can equal 4" is a true statement. It covers all of the options. It is not a falsifiable statement.

Ahh, I see that I should have said "not falsifiable" rather than amibuous. Learn something new every day.

I love that one. It's like an if/then loop.

Modus Tollens yall...

 

Another thing. In a different language 5 could be used the same as 4. So saying it is possible that 5 can equal 4 is true in more than one sense- 1) it is not falsifiable 2) in a different language 5 = 4. They have 2 words (or symbols) for 5 (or 4), that they use in different contexts.

How many words do eskimos have for snow? It is possible that some day geeks will have a million words for.... a million.

 

Okay, I think we've abused Popper enough for one day.

 

Fine I'll use the statement:

If the above statement was false then there would have ben no way to prove it for the statement would not have come into existence... if it hadn't come into existence the validity of it would not have been brought up. Basically it puts us in a paradox and to argue that a statement that says this statement is false to be false would be to flat out admit that the said statement was true... and therefore a lie in which it was stated that it was false.

 

The statement IS false. The statement DOES presuppose that there is a possibility, so UNLESS the actual truth value of the statement is revealed, then the statement isn't NECESSARILY false.

But since we live in the real world, where it is NOT possible that 5 can equal 4, then the statement is absolutely, positively, and inarguably false.

The word possible, by virtue of meaning it "may or may not" be so, extends the capacity for EITHER case to be true. But in the real world, only ONE case is true, so as long as you know which case is true, then the statement is false.

If 5 is not equal to 4 ... then it is not possible for 5 to equal 4 ... and then the statement (which allows 5 to be equal to 4) cannot be true.

If 5 IS equal to 4 ... then it is not possible for 5 to not equal 4 ... and then the statement (which allows 5 to not be equal to 4) cannot be true.

If we don't know if they are equal ... then BOTH possibilities are possible, and the statement is then true.

But since we know what we're talking about, the statement is entirely false, because it allows something that is false to be considered true, which is a semantical fallacy.

As an example, take this statement:

"Red may or may not equal blue."

The statement requires that there is a possibility that red equals blue. If there IS a possibility that red equals blue, then the statement is true. However, in the real world, there is NOT a possibility that red equals blue, so the statement is invariably false. If it's not a possibility, and it is definite, then either the "may" or "may not" part is contradictory of the truth. And anything that contradicts the truth is false, which renders the entire statement false. See where I'm going?

We are not speaking in a different language, Kharakov, we're speaking in English, and in the English sentence "5 is equal to 4," the quantities represented by those symbols are not equal.

If you were speaking in a language you made up ... then it'd still be impossible for 5 to be NOT equal to 4, and the statement would still be false anyway.

As long as you are talking about quantities and not symbols that represent quantities, then you can't be correct. If you want to talk about representative symbols, you should be saying "the number 5" instead of "5." Because 5 is a quantity, and the number 5 is a number that represents the quantity 5.

So the number 5 may be equal to the number 4, but 5 cannot equal 4, ever.