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 Posted: Fri Apr 13, 2012 10:03 am
So, this started out as a really interesting discussion with Aer...
not really sure how to phrase this.. uh.
ok.
if we agree that an individual's ideology affects their every action- then how can humans call themselves objective creatures? as their cognitive processes and decisions are affected directly by a set of beliefs, that are in turn influenced by class and education and other factors-
or in Aer's words: how individuals are may influence to a certain extenct their decisions, but everything else is influenced by their ideology, since all their psychology will only influence their ideology-
I myself am still not decided on this topic, but it's a really interesting thought.
anyone care to add anything? biggrin
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Posted: Fri Apr 13, 2012 6:30 pm
Well, not everything is set by ideology, and some things are only partly set by ideology. For instance, I don't like racist music because I am against racism (that's my ideology working there), but that doesnt say what music I do[/] like, which is based on a whole host of psychological factors which I neither know nor understand.
But to the main part of your question, how can we be objective. Well, we can't. We are humans. Not only are we ideological and social products, but we are also emotional. So we can't be fully objective. This does not mean, however, that we cannot be objective about certain things. Objectivity simply means not letting biases influence your decision. In other words, making decisions based on what fits the facts, not based on what we want to be real, or who we like, or if we are angry right now. Humans can do those things, just not all the time.
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Posted: Sat Apr 14, 2012 9:03 am
I wouldn't say that ideology affects all of the actions of an individual. It will probably affect some things like, for example, certain types of music, like Gracchvs said. I'd say that in 'normal' life ideology has little effect. However, in other things like say, politics, I'd say that ideology has a much bigger impact on decisions than psychological factors since it is something that is determined primordially by the ideas that a certain person has - by the ideology.
Is there such thing as real objectivity? Even if there was no such thing as ideology, psychological factors would affect every single decision of a person due to maybe the personality, likes and dislikes, emotions, economic factors... Would a decision still be able to be objective? Is there such thing as something objectively good in all decisions, that can be achieved no matter what?
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Posted: Sun May 06, 2012 5:04 am
Le Pere Duchesne Objectivity simply means not letting biases influence your decision. In other words, making decisions based on what fits the facts, not based on what we want to be real, or who we like, or if we are angry right now. Humans can do those things, just not all the time I would go even further here. Is it even possible for a human being to make an objective decision?
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Posted: Mon May 07, 2012 3:44 am
Aerlinniel C Robleda Le Pere Duchesne Objectivity simply means not letting biases influence your decision. In other words, making decisions based on what fits the facts, not based on what we want to be real, or who we like, or if we are angry right now. Humans can do those things, just not all the time I would go even further here. Is it even possible for a human being to make an objective decision? Of course it is, we just need to look at maths, that most vaunted of the objective sciences, and look at any situation where one is either divorced from the question, such as giving advice to someone you don't know about something you don't care about, or where one is able to divorce themselves from personal interest, such as Trotsky coming to accept the Leninist conception of party building once he saw that it was correct, which he had opposed for 15 years. If you want to take it to its furthest extent, pure objectivity, a lack of any and all emotional investment in any and all questions results in a lack of motivation to find out the answers to any and all questions, but that sort of 'objectivity' really can't be described as objectivity because it engages in nothing which it can be objective about. It is a rock. A rock has no emotional investment in any question at all, but it provides no answers, so it is only less useless than that sort of abstract 'objectivity' because at least you can throw rocks at people who insist on such empty questions ;D
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Posted: Thu May 10, 2012 10:06 am
Le Pere Duchesne Aerlinniel C Robleda Le Pere Duchesne Objectivity simply means not letting biases influence your decision. In other words, making decisions based on what fits the facts, not based on what we want to be real, or who we like, or if we are angry right now. Humans can do those things, just not all the time I would go even further here. Is it even possible for a human being to make an objective decision? Of course it is, we just need to look at maths, that most vaunted of the objective sciences, and look at any situation where one is either divorced from the question, such as giving advice to someone you don't know about something you don't care about, or where one is able to divorce themselves from personal interest, such as Trotsky coming to accept the Leninist conception of party building once he saw that it was correct, which he had opposed for 15 years. If you want to take it to its furthest extent, pure objectivity, a lack of any and all emotional investment in any and all questions results in a lack of motivation to find out the answers to any and all questions, but that sort of 'objectivity' really can't be described as objectivity because it engages in nothing which it can be objective about. It is a rock. A rock has no emotional investment in any question at all, but it provides no answers, so it is only less useless than that sort of abstract 'objectivity' because at least you can throw rocks at people who insist on such empty questions ;D That's true, I won't even try to refute that. Maths is pure objectivity, but is it an objective decision? and of course that when giving an advice to someone under the circumstances you mentioned an objective advice and solution will be reached. However I wasn't questioning the objective proof provided by the mathematical sciences or questioning the ability for an objective decision to be reached in such a scenario. Instead (and sorry for not making this clear before). I was making reference to what Engels describes as the 'third' group of sciences in Chapter 9 of Anti-Duhring, the 'historical' sciences: Quote: "But eternal truths are in an even worse plight in the third, the historical, group of sciences, which study in their historical sequence and in their present resultant state the conditions of human life, social relationships, forms of law and government, with their ideal superstructure in the shape of philosophy, religion, art, etc … In social history, however, the repetition of conditions is the exception and not the rule, once we pass beyond the primitive state of man, the so-called Stone Age; and when such repetitions occur, they never arise under exactly similar circumstances … Furthermore, when by way of exception the inner connection between the social and political forms of existence in any epoch comes to be known, this as a rule occurs only when these forms have already by half outlived themselves and are nearing extinction. Therefore, knowledge is here essentially relative, inasmuch as it is limited to the investigation of interconnections and consequences of certain social and state forms which exist only in a particular epoch and among particular peoples and are by their very nature transitory. Anyone therefore who here sets out to hunt down final and ultimate truths, genuine, absolutely immutable truths, will bring home but little, apart from platitudes and commonplaces of the sorriest kind — for example, that, generally speaking, men cannot live except by labour; that up to the present they for the most part have been divided into rulers and ruled; that Napoleon died on May 5, 1821, and so on" Is it possible to reach a pure objectivty in things such as these, to reach "immuntable truths" in this level? In mathematical sciences, like it is also described in this chapter of Anti-Duhring, it is obviously possible, but is it possible in historical, political and similar sciences? I would say that such a thing isn't possible due to the relativeness of the knowledge of this particular type of sciences and the emotional investment and other factors that will inevitable affect the objective truth that is reached in this type of science. I must admit though having such "rocks" to get these "pure objectivity" with this group of historical sciences would be very useful. I would be curious as to what the final result would be.
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Posted: Thu May 10, 2012 8:33 pm
Aerlinniel C Robleda Is it possible to reach a pure objectivty in things such as these, to reach "immuntable truths" in this level? In mathematical sciences, like it is also described in this chapter of Anti-Duhring, it is obviously possible, but is it possible in historical, political and similar sciences? I would say that such a thing isn't possible due to the relativeness of the knowledge of this particular type of sciences and the emotional investment and other factors that will inevitable affect the objective truth that is reached in this type of science. I must admit though having such "rocks" to get these "pure objectivity" with this group of historical sciences would be very useful. I would be curious as to what the final result would be. This is a totally different question. Earlier you asked if it was possible for people to make an 'objective decision', which I took to mean 'a decision free of personal bias', and I showed how it is possible. Now, in order to each an answer you like, you drop the question of bias, and ask if it is possible to know any final truths in the realm of history or whatever. Of course not, but the reason why was explained by Engels: there's too much information out there that we don't know, and we can't perform repeat experiments, so when things do repeat, they are not in lab conditions, but in different conditions each time, and those influences need to be taken into account. But let us look at the question another way. Say you ask someone if they are so confident in their sense-perceptions that they can make sense of the world around them. They say yes. So you decide to test them by giving them a puzzle. If the puzzle has half the pieces missing, and they can't figure out what the picture is, that's not proof against their sense-perception! You've done pretty much the same thing here. :/
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