Indeed, it appears that “knowledge” is the focus of the discussion we are having with the correspondents on this thread - though until your post I was having difficulty putting a label on it.
Many posts ago I asserted that “objective truth” like “absolute morality” cannot be obtained from within space/time because everything is relative per se in space/time, including language. I also pointed to what we know that we cannot know in math and physics and qualia.
You have underscored some excellent examples of the language problem! Thank you.
In the math and physics, I pointed to Godel’s incompleteness theorem and Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle as examples of what we know we cannot know. Massless particles and dimensionality would also make for good examples. In language, I pointed to qualia which by definition must be experienced and cannot be fully expressed - pain/pleasure, good/evil, love/hate, etc. We discussed the pain, forgetfulness and joy of childbirth which is beyond the ability to describe.
The link you provided sums up the knowledge issue rather well:
The “philosophical skepticism” link from Wikipedia is very useful in conveying some of my points and some of LogicWings’ counter arguments. Here's an excerpt:
Philosophical skepticism (UK spelling, scepticism) is the philosophical school of thought in which one critically examines whether the knowledge and perceptions one has are true, and whether or not one can ever be said to have true knowledge…
Philosophical skepticism can be either the claim that we don't have knowledge, or that we can't have knowledge. It is one thing to say that we could, but unfortunately don't, have knowledge. It could be argued that Socrates held that view. He appears to have thought that if we continue to ask questions we might eventually come to have knowledge; but that we didn't have it yet. It is believed that some skeptics have gone further and claimed that true knowledge is impossible, for example the Academic school in Ancient Greece.
Skepticism can be either about everything or about particular areas. Skeptics who believe that no knowledge can be said to be absolutely true are sometimes referred to as global skeptics. The global skeptic argues that you cannot absolutely know something to be either true or false. Some believe global skepticism has great difficulty in supporting this claim, and criticise skepticism on the basis that it implies that knowledge is philosophically impossible.
Local skeptics deny that we do or can have knowledge of a particular area. They may be skeptical about the possibility of one form of knowledge without doubting other forms. Different kinds of local skepticism may emerge, depending on the area. A person may doubt the truth value of differnt types of journalism, for example, depending on the types of media they trust. People who doubt the possibility of inherently true knowledge of the physical world are sometimes referred to as external world skeptics.
Skepticism is the view that either we have not yet found absolute knowledge, or that we cannot have any propositional knowledge. It is thus critical of formal logic, which must inevitably be founded on propositions that lead to the discovery of the truth through logical argument.
And yet they manage to find their way to the gas mart when they need to.
Skepticism is the view that either we have not yet found absolute knowledge, or that we cannot have any propositional knowledge.
I would be inclined to agree that we can't have absolute or final or complete knowledge, but I would assert that we can have knowledge sufficient to the purpose. You take what you know, or think you know, and extrapolate general principles based on that. You make predictions based on those, and you act. There is an element of faith involved in acting based on incomplete knowledge. As you act based on these incompletely understood principles, you will receive immediate confirmation to the degree that you have understood correctly, you'll bump headlong into reality if you've guessed wrong, but in either case your understanding has advanced.
If ultimate or absolute knowledge is something that can belong only to God, nevertheless such knowledge is progressively knowable; we can move toward such knowledge and indeed the act of pursuing such knowledge is a key part of the reason for our existence.
If I may be so bold as to drag those descriptions back into the conversation at hand, it seems to me that there are a couple of fundamental divisions in play here, having to do with perception and conception.
Perception: You're basically saying that the universe contains more than what we can perceive (by whatever means). Some others are saying essentially that the universe consists only of things that we can perceive.
Conception: The basic question here is: is there anything in the universe that cannot be comprehended by the human mind? Your position is that there are some things that we cannot comprehend. The "we can perceive all" position seems logically tied to the idea that ultimately we are also capable of comprehending all.
The "perception" part seems easy to address -- Heisenberg says that even if we can observe certain aspects of the state of a particle, we cannot observe the state of a particle -- there is always a nonzero uncertainty in our measurement of "the state". Thus:
1. Even if we can conceive of the full state of an electron, we cannot fully perceive it.
2. There is at least one thing that we cannot fully perceive
3. Therefore it cannot be the case that the universe consists only of things we can perceive.
The "conception" part is a lot more difficult -- how can you assess things of which you can't conceive? However, there is a certain class of things we can only partially conceive -- for example, I (a male) can only partially conceive of the experiences of pregnancy and childbirth. For the truly inconceivable, it may be possible to approach it by means of questions. For example, what's it like to be dead? What came "before" the Big Bang? What's on the other side of the edge of the universe? Is it possible for there to be "nothing?"
When all is said and done, I think it's most reasonable to conclude that there are things we cannot perceive, and things we cannot comprehend (all or in part).
The final question is: is it possible to perceive things that we cannot comprehend? The answer is probably yes (think of the blind men and the elephant...). I think it's fair to question the reasonableness of demands for scientific evidence prior to accepting (or even admitting the possibility of) the existence of the perceived but incomprehensible entity: is science capable of addressing the incomprehensible? At the very least, it brings into question the sufficiency of "scientific evidence" as an explanatory method.
I think this last bit is where we find ourselves when discussing concepts such as "the indwelling of the Holy Spirit," which many people -- millions of people -- claim to have perceived, and yet many others reject the idea on the basis of "lack of scientific evidence."