The immediate effect of theories of ontology on our understanding of the world

Question

It is very common to hear people assert that a news article, encyclopedia article, anecdotal account of a situation, history book, etc., is “biased”.

Of course, this motivates the question of what bias is, and if it is possible to define what an unbiased description of the world is.

If you were tasked with writing a school textbook on the history of the US, at the outset, can one claim there is an “unbiased” way to do so?

We could start by asserting the criteria that the book should fulfill. Let’s simplify the scenario by imagining the book to actually be a “collection of facts (/propositions)”.

First, we can try to define the criteria that our selection of facts should fulfill. We could try to define a concept of “balance”, but it would not be a trivial undertaking. For example, maybe facts are weighted in relevance or importance with regards to to what extent they are a causal nexus for a relatively high number of other facts, amongst the total pool of facts. Or, maybe we can think about how facts become more important when they relate to certain things of our choosing, like the total number of people who lived in a certain area during a certain period of time; the facts that are relevant to their lives. Or, maybe we can even take an algorithmically random sampling of all the facts, and then just order them loosely by chronology or something.

On a practical level, many such approaches could be very interesting, and I think very useful. But on a theoretical level, all of the above questions of how to filter the set of facts assumes there is a universal collection of facts. It appears that this is just a deeper and much harder part of the question of how to compose an assemblage of “facts” about the world.

On the bright side, maybe we can evade unwieldy complexity by reformulating ‘the problem’: let’s not even worry about how we are going to define various filtration functions on a universal set of facts. Let’s just think about how one could even define or generate a universal set of facts.

I don’t know, but this also strikes me as a similar problem to choosing the set of criteria for selecting a subset of facts. It may be related to a very general paradigm, which is that sometimes, one is faced with a number of choices, and there is no immediately obvious, let alone unavoidable, way to distinguish one of those choices as “canonical” for any reason. I believe this comes up in data science, and it might sound like a stretch, but I think some connections can be drawn with the axiom of choice.

I think it may touch on the ideas of Carnap and Quine, and the principle of “tolerance”.

I’m not sure, but I think, in order to try to describe a world comprehensively, we have to choose a language to do so; and there is seemingly no way to choose one language over the others, without essentially “excluding some of the information”.

I think there are two ideas to explore to try to resolve this question.

The first is exploring if one could still argue that even though languages differ, there are ways to show that they are logically equivalent in what they express; so that we should not fret about the infinite variety of languages, because there is actually still just “one world” (and that we can even accommodate things like subjectivity, which is just the contents of a person’s mind, within this “single world”).

The other is that we don’t actually have to choose one single language, but mathematically, can explore actually the entire collection of possible languages which could describe the world. This is not a practical idea, but a theoretical one.

This leads to a deeper problem, however.

I think the deepest problem of all is our attempt to separate our language from the world. Because, to a very great extent, all we really know about the world is through our minds. In some ways, I have thought about that it is not clear what “objectivity” means; sensors and apparatuses are still perceived and interpreted through the mind (the numbers on an electronic thermometer); to some extent, I wonder if the regularity / consistency of “measuring devices” makes us falsely believe that they provide a different category of “knowledge”. Ultimately, it seems that even though there is some sort of external world, I believe it is the fundamentally Kantian idea that there is simply no way for it to get to “us” except through our minds: thus there really only is the subjective world; the objective world is paradoxically, there yet inherently unknowable; the moment it becomes “known” is the moment it is actually “subjective”, insofar as it is perceived, structured, and cognized by a mind.

This might lead us to reject subjectivity vs. objectivity; and instead consider analytic truth versus synthetic truth - things which can be known to be true by pure reason alone, a faculty within our minds, versus truths which must be gleaned from an external world. Quine apparently rejected this distinction, I haven’t yet understood in what way. But, coming back to the history book: I think there is the deep problem that since all knowledge of the world appears to be “synthetic”, you are already doomed in your desire for objectivity.

On a much deeper level, that I would like to elaborate on, we can imagine the cognitive processes which structure all perception of the world, which construct experiences and systems of meaning, mean that it may be much harder to use a language to describe “the world we commonly share or live in” than initially thought; if we begin to consider to what extent each of us has, at least to some extent, a different “world” in our minds, constructed by different brains.

So, there is a lot more to say on all of the above, but I wonder: are there any practical lessons to be drawn, from related theories, in any situation in which one strives for “objectivity”? Is it possible? If so, how? If not, then how does that affect how we do what we originally intended to?

Answer 1

OP: "On a much deeper level, that I would like to elaborate on, we can imagine the cognitive processes which structure all perception of the world, which construct experiences and systems of meaning, . . . if we begin to consider to what extent each of us has, at least to some extent, a different “world” in our minds"

This question puts me in mind of Heidegger's distinction of existing authentically and inauthentically. These are two different existential mindsets within a single ontology, so no problems comparing apples with oranges.

The difference may be likened to simply enjoying a sunset instead of obscuring the moment by photographing it to post on Facebook.

Different approaches. Change your thoughts and you change your world.

The Self of everyday Dasein is the they-self,¹ which we distinguish from the authentic Self—that is, from the Self which has been taken hold of in its own way [eigens ergriffenen]. As they-self, the particular Dasein has been dispersed into the "they", and must first find itself. This dispersal characterizes the 'subject' of that kind of Being which we know as concernful absorption in the world we encounter as closest to us. If Dasein is familiar with itself as they-self, this means at the same time that the "they" itself prescribes that way of interpreting the world and Being-in-the-world which lies closest. GA2 29

because Dasein is in each case essentially its own possibility, it can, in its very Being, 'choose' itself and win itself; it can also lose itself and never win itself; or only 'seem' to do so. But only in so far as it is essentially something which can be authentic—that is, something of its own³—can it have lost itself and not yet won itself. As modes of Being, authenticity and inauthenticity (these expressions have been chosen terminologically in a strict sense) are both grounded in the fact that any Dasein whatsoever is characterized by mineness.⁴ But the inauthenticity of Dasein does not signify any 'less' Being or any 'lower' degree of Being. Rather it is the case that even in its fullest concretion Dasein can be characterized by inauthenticity—when busy, when excited, when interested, when ready for enjoyment. GA2 42-3

In an earlier passage authentic and inauthentic existing have been characterized with regard to those modes of the temporalizing of temporality upon which such existing is founded. According to that characterization, the irresoluteness of inauthentic existence temporalizes itself in the mode of a making-present which does not await but forgets. He who is irresolute understands himself in terms of those very closest events and be-fallings which he encounters in such a making-present and which thrust themselves upon him in varying ways. Busily losing himself in the object of his concern, he loses his time in it too. Hence his characteristic way of talking—'I have no time'. But just as he who exists inauthentically is constantly losing time and never 'has' any, the temporality of authentic existence remains distinctive in that such existence, in its resoluteness, never loses time and 'always has time'. GA2 410