--- Jon Johanning <zenner41 at mac.com> wrote:
>
> Of course we don't see "absolute reality," but that
> doesn't mean that
> we can't make true statements. It's simply true that
> there are two
> chairs in my room, even though we don't perceive the
> elementary
> particles (or superstrings) which make them up. Nor
> can we be sure,
> even, that they are made up of superstrings; an even
> better theory may
> be discovered by the 24th century, Star Trek time.
"Chair" is a concept in a particular cultural-linguistic framework. Until those things in your room are subsumed under the concept "chair," they are not "chairs." They are Dingen-an-sich. (I don't mean "until" temporally, obviously.) I am pretty sure that, if people were floating Jovian gasbags, they would not have the concept of "chair."
I think Wittgenstein is not on your side in this, BTW. (He certainly took religion very seriously.)
===== Nu, zayats, pogodi!
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