4 ms·
> Averages are one kind of truth though, and if your worldview is based on averages it has some amount of accuracy to it. I think that is a fallacy. Just becau
by chme 6y ago
> Averages are one kind of truth though, and if your worldview is based on averages it has some amount of accuracy to it.
I think that is a fallacy. Just because some standpoint is in between two other standpoints, does not make it correct. Each side might look at some facts from a different perspective and might be correct but at the same time contradicting (at least at the first glance), but the 'average' could still be wrong.
- buzzerbetrayed 6y agoSounds like you two are saying nearly the exact same thing, using different words.
- bigbubba 6y agoHere is the way I think of it, if a cylinder passed through two perpendicular planes, flatlanders living on those two planes, with different perspectives on life, might call each other to discuss their observations. One flatlander might report the observation of a circle, while the other might say they saw a rectangle. Both have observed part of the truth, but different parts of it, and to a flatlander it may seem these observations are irreconcilable. A third flatlander who decides to simply average the observations together into a rounded rectangle is more wrong than either of the others. The key to resolving the apparent contradiction is recognizing that the truth exists in a dimensional space higher than the flatlander is capable of perceiving.
- ironmagma 6y agoWell what I'm claiming is not that averages can be used to arrive at all truth, or to observe all things. Many things however are distributions and averages can be accurately used to characterize them in a way that works. In that example, one might say that the mean viewpoint is correct within the error bars that encompass the two observations, which could be quite large if they are opposite observations.