Does anyone REALLY know anything?

Originally posted by theresult
Does it matter?? would you be able to ask that question that is spinning about in your head if you was not here?

It is important to me, yes. And no, if I didn't exist I couldn't seek, but I do exist.

I dont understand why we have odd numbers is that a question I should ask Yes! does that mean I dont know anything? Nope, it human to ask and find out things about ones enviroment..but sometimes the question you ask you will never get an answer for "and that is the answer"

I'll try to answer your question and I hope you will try to answer my next question. The reason we have odd numbers is because someone created them. Numbers are just ideas of some living beings, not real, they determine amount. Now my question is: why is that a question you should ask?

being right and being wrong is the same thing ! a result of the question..

No, being right is not the same as being wrong, I'm pretty sure. Light is not the same as the absence of light, correct?

Originally posted by cancerian42
Hello all. I have been lead to ask myself the question, "Do I really know anything for sure?" and the only answer that I found to this question was the timeless reply, that I am. I see lots of people on ATS who claim to know something, be it about religion, spirit, science, math, philosophy, history, and every other conceivable topic and no matter what there is has always been some possible conflicting explanation that could prove that "knowledge" wrong. If what you know to be true is proven wrong then you should probably be wary about trusting yourself with other knowledge,right? So I ask now, "Does anyone REALLY know anything besides existance?" I am not asking for someone to prove that they have faith that something is true, because faith is not knowledge. Knowledge is the certainty of something true. I hope someone can enlighten me with some knowledge other than the fact of existance of what is undeniably true.

Ok lets read this..

I hope someone can enlighten me with some knowledge other than the fact of existance of what is undeniably true.

you dont understand what it is you are asking.. why? becouse you are asking us to give you the answer to something you are saying we do not know.

"Do I really know anything for sure?" and the only answer that I found to this question was the timeless reply, that I am.

Well if the answer is always the same then why ask the question???

I have read all this thread an many views on the question you have, are correct and in may views.

So now i want to end the thread for you as it seems you can not understand wha it is that you are asking not us but yourself!!

If I told you I knew the reason why you are asking what you are you would call me nuts but hey like this is ats lol so here goes!

You are asking a question becouse you are just like me, forever wanting to seek something that is in you to ask why? and the simple answer to you questions is we dont know!! that is the answer yep its boring yes its frugle in its lamest but you asked it not us!..

Now asking a question about how something works or why is another matter but the question you ask is philisophical in nature why? becouse you are no better or smater than the next human on the question you ask.

So therefor the answer as you stated yourself will always be the same egor sum of nothing..

I hope that this helps put this topic to bed somewhat as i thought it would be more about a topic other than a wide open loop of you dont think anything is real no matter what anyone says to you.

Im not real and im not posting this can you prove it? .. see what i mean?

Originally posted by RFBurns
I dont know about that now. If obvious removal of bits and pieces of truth are kept out of what is supposed to be truth, then you do not have complete truth at all, which means that if you apply the deleted parts, then that what was once thought to be true is no longer the real truth.

We can't add or remove any part of truth by observing it...or perhaps we can, but it is a mystery to me how.

reply to post by TheMayMelancholies


alternate realities explain it all.

reply to post by Scaye


The spiritual, I guess would be where the only answers lay, since matter is just meaningless, at least I think so...how can we find truth in matter? And probably a better question would be how to find truth in spirit because that is where I think it is.

Originally posted by theresult
you dont understand what it is you are asking.. why? becouse you are asking us to give you the answer to something you are saying we do not know.

Actually I was asking to gain some insight from the people who have posted here and if I thought you didn't know something I wouldn't have even asked. However, I think we do know something...but what is it?

"Do I really know anything for sure?" and the only answer that I found to this question was the timeless reply, that I am.

Well if the answer is always the same then why ask the question???

I learn from it.

So now i want to end the thread for you as it seems you can not understand wha it is that you are asking not us but yourself!!

I understand what I am asking, Does anyone really know something?
I do not understand the answer. Do you?

You are asking a question becouse you are just like me, forever wanting to seek something that is in you to ask why? and the simple answer to you questions is we dont know!! that is the answer yep its boring yes its frugle in its lamest but you asked it not us!..

It appears you do know something afterall. I appreciate your replies and your help in solving this mystery.

Im not real and im not posting this can you prove it? .. see what i mean?

I can't prove it, and I don't think that is an undeniable truth either.

IM sorry if this came out as a doublepost..

But to answer your question.

Right and Wrong are the same thing... you see what i love about maths is the understanding of it..

right = 1 wrong = 1 the question/me = 1

you see? no mater what argument one gives.. he being wrong will be the same as the person being right "equilibrium"

the only way you get that is by having odd numbers "me" or the question is to that you are asking.. or why bother asking it?

You are asking a question just the same as me.. do we really understand what it is we are in?

Do we realy understand the consept of Elogic or the reason why oddness is needed in maths? and if so were did that come from..

you see for me there is mathimatical equations for eveything we know but the only one we dont know is how we got here.. and the end product of that anomliy is odd numbers..

I know that this thread will cause for great debate and a few
comments like this.
I also know that i prefer half and half in my coffee oppose to 2% milk.

It is interesting what he is asking..but at the same time there is no real answer to what he wants other than hes alive???

If this thread was about aliens or 9/11 we could debate something that we all know to be real "evidence" or whatever but asking something like

Does anyone know anything is vague but still fun to debate.. and its clear from the posters that we do indeed know alot about nothing lol

i love open ended questions like this becouse you get a wide range of views on something. and realy the questions is the same as "why we are here" or "do i live in the 11 dimention"

its been good fun trying to put my view across and read others "many i agree with".

He has his questions and I have mine like many others but the thing I love the most IS the question and what comes from it.

befor you get an outcome one must ask it ! and asking is a equation on its own im just not sure how it fits in with it all yet..

Most of us "know" something about various things, but I don't think any one knows everything, even about say, a physical object like, an F-22. To build and fly one you need to be totaly knowledgeable about metalurgy, electronics, combustion science, programing, etc, etc. Civilization IS civilization because every one brings something to the party. Its also possible for two people to look at a series of events or data points and come to a different conclussion. The scientific method works so well because it's designed to draw a single conclusion from multiple people looking at the same data. Everyone uses the same "program", one that employs math for example.

Although not as personality driven as other areas of inquiry, or beliefs, you can never remove personalities from a conclusion in total. One thing I can attest to is those of us who have been briefed on classified information, the higher the better, although often by its nature limited, its a wonderfull, intoxicating feeling. Or you can be trapped. It's easy to be very impressed with your self. It also is frequently discouraging. The more about something you know in a classified, or realy any area, it becomes very easy not to live up to your own expectations. If I'm any example, this club is not made up of people with small ego's.

reply to post by arbiture


You state it well sir!

It has taken ALL humans to get to the point were we are today and that is a result "pardon the pun" of us all asking the very same questions..

We may be right we may be wrong but the questions will always give us the same answer yes or no..

I look at everything based on maths i know thats sad but everything I have came to understand right now is not right not wrong but an outcome of the person asking the question and to think of the question is the next step for my own quest of understand how i fit in and what is it that i live in.

I could be right And I could be wrong but that does not say to me nore anyone who has a valid question that it was not worth asking or being wrong.

now back to my quest of understanding how we get odd numbers for me!!

its been great reading the posts and i flaged this topic becouse i liked the fact you asked a question no one can give you the answer to but you got it at the same time

Originally posted by TheMayMelancholies
Existance is not one hundred percent undeniable. What if this existance you observe is merely an illusion? You could be a computer program for all you know. Nothing can be confirmed as truth. Truth is what you perceive it to be; what you accept to be true is the truth for you. No SINGLE truth exists.

After many trips with psychedelic drugs I have come to this conclusion. If you were to know everything down to the last bit of your reality it would be pure chaos, and to be dampened by illusion this chaos is nothing more then controlled observation.

There for to know nothing is better to know everything, that is with our current level of consciousness.

Who's to say there isn't something out there that knows all that is to know.

Maybe the thought of an all knowing being was the creation of all of the knowing we experience today.

And if we didn't know anything and were never right I would not be talking to you via the internet.

A very bright friend of mine who has fried his brain to many times explained to me that the reality in which you create is your reality your own illusion created by your mind. What if there was no other living life form besides yourself.... would that mean your reality was all that is and ever will be, a mind blowing thought indeed; could it be that all life forms realities put together form this reality and keep it stable...wouldn't that mean that a strong consciousness could bend this mass-enabled reality?

hmmm hmmm hmm


-Psycho



[edit on 8-12-2008 by Psychonaughty]

[edit on 8-12-2008 by Psychonaughty]

Originally posted by yeahright
I'm a big "maybe logic" fan. It's the brainchild of the late and much lamented Robert Anton Wilson. His belief was that the certainty of anything was the death of knowledge because once you're "sure", you quit considering it. I find that to be a very appealing notion.

i concur...

"Beliefs are dangerous. Beliefs allow the mind to stop functioning. A non-functioning mind is clinically dead. – Believe in nothing…"
-Timothy Leary

... I "believe" he said that... heh.. actually I'm not sure.
"maybe" he said that.

-

Originally posted by cluckerspudI also know that i prefer half and half in my coffee oppose to 2% milk.

Oh man, I use to love the cream texture of the 1/2/1/2 in my coffee. Milk, whole, or any % was flat compaired to that.

However I got off the cow tit. I rarely every even have a bit of cheese anymore. Now a days I use this hazelnut milk. It's real good too. I know that for sure.

No, you don't know anything for sure, except that which you personally observe yourself. You can reasonably accept certain facts that you haven't personally observed based on the preponderance of the evidence.

As for existence, I accept that I exist because I perceive and can interact with objects around me. That doesn't preclude that everything could be an elaborate hologram (see The Holographic Universe). But as a consciousness I exist within the hologram.

Silly overgrown multicellular organisms. Like strange complex yeast fermenting wildly within the vegetation that the earth provides, pondering things that they will never comprehend, wondering what exists beyond the great primary fermentation vessel of life - busy yourselves with your simple sugars; consume, excrete and expire...

By the time you've worked out that all there is apart from the universal urinal awaiting you, the poisonous saturation of human filth will intoxicate even ourselves.

Originally posted by cancerian42
The spiritual, I guess would be where the only answers lay, since matter is just meaningless, at least I think so...how can we find truth in matter? And probably a better question would be how to find truth in spirit because that is where I think it is.

You all keep trying to live where you came from. Makes no sense. You are here for a reason. This is different. Being able to connect to the feeling of oneness during small moments is great. However, you can't truly know anything about our true existence. This is different for a reason.

Originally posted by RuneSpider
Well, so far 2 and 2 has always equaled four.

Unless you're a big fan of Orwellian doublethink (or a Communist), in which case two plus two makes five.

This is quite an interesting topic, and there are a lot of interesting responses so far...

Personally, I prefer to keep an open mind to consider all possibilities. I'm merely the product of past experience, and I can't really know the depth to which those experiences cloud my judgement and mold my own personal reality. I try to use logic and look at things objectively, but it's impossible to be TRULY objective about anything that truly matters to me. Of course there are things that I think I can safely categorize as knowledge, for instance I can say I know if I unplug my computer, it will go off. Then there are things that I can categorize as educated guess, for instance I figure if I throw my computer against the wall, it will probably go off permanently, lol.

It all depends on the type of knowledge in question. There are a lot of things our primitive minds will never comprehend, and some things that logically seem as if they should be easy to know, but are quite the opposite. One thing we can never truly know is what lies in the minds and hearts of anybody else, we just have to try to guess based on things like what they say and do. Some of us can't even claim to know ourselves- denial can be a very powerful and convincing thing. Whether what we take as truth actually is or not is irrelevant in the end, because perception is reality, and life is an ongoing learning experience, so knowledge is constantly being shaped by new insight.

[edit on 12/9/2008 by Voltzen]

[edit on 12/9/2008 by Voltzen]

Interesting thread Cancerian. A metaphysical post. I remember reading in either "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenence" or "Lila", both books by Robert Pirsig, he said

Metaphysics is a restaurant where they give you a thirty thousand page menu, and no food.

You are never dedicated to something you have complete confidence in. No one is fanatically shouting that the sun is going to rise tomorrow. They know it is going to rise tomorrow. When people are fanatically dedicated to political or religious faiths or any other kinds of dogmas or goals, its always because these dogmas or goals are in doubt.

Both books are highly relevant to your question. They are the kinds of books that are fun reading 2 pages at a time on the crapper.

Everyone already knows everything you just gotta remember it again!

Or to quote Socrates : ''I am the wisest man alive, for I know one thing, and that is that I know nothing. ''