Definitions of "Subjective" and "Objective"

[sealchan]

Four definitions of subjective vs objective...

(1) biased vs unbiased

(2) opinion vs fact

(3) values and/or morals vs facts

(4) personal point of view vs omniscient point of view

I like to use local vs general. That is subjective-objective assumes a community of knowers which have individuals capable of knowing truth. All truths are, in fact, known by individual knowers. A truth that is local or minority is subjective with respect to a truth that is general or majority. Truths with weak epistemologies also tend to be subjective even if they are majority. This is clear when one compares that general majority to an even greater set of knowers.

Truths are determined by more than one epistemology at the level of personality and cognition. Culturally there are also a wide varieties of epistemologies.

Epistemologies that "do work", that is, are able to solve individual or collective problems consistently and progressively are stronger (and therefore more objective) than those that are idiosyncratic, static or authority driven. On the other hand, a great deal of wisdom can be unconsciously contained in traditional ways of getting things done even if the individuals doing them are unaware.

So...

Local vs general (how many think it?)
Effective vs inconsequential (what can it accomplish?)
Practiced vs theoried (how many make use of it?)

...these are all ways of differentiating subjective vs objective truths.

 

[sooda]

The terms "subjective" and "objective" have at least four distinct definitions. How many definitions of subjective and objective do you yourself know -- without resorting to a dictionary or encyclopedia?

This is real simple:

He threw the ball versus the ball was thrown.

Power speakers don't use the later.. Its wiggle speech.

 

[sealchan]

Another perspective:
Objective: Right or wrong.
Subjective: Not even wrong.

So that means you're not even wrong out of the gate? And so am I?

How depressing, I thought your thoughts were insightful.

 

[joe1776]

Do you suppose you might be over-thinking the question? You make it sound like dictionaries and encyclopedias would grind to a halt if and when they ever dared to define/explain "subjective and objective". You make it sound like they would have an impossible task.

You wrote "define/explain" as though the tasks are connected. They aren't.

The dictionary editors' only job is only to define the word. They do that by reporting what the word means in common usage so that if we use it we can count on our message being received by our audience as intended. That's the dictionary's sole purpose.

If, in argument, my opponent offers a unique definition of a word like subjective, that's his right, IMO. But a red flag goes up in my mind because you can bet he can't make his argument hold up using the dictionary definition.

 

[Revoltingest]

So that means you're not even wrong out of the gate? And so am I?

How depressing, I thought your thoughts were insightful.

I'm using the Wolfgang Pauli standard.

 

[icehorse]

Do you suppose you might be over-thinking the question? You make it sound like dictionaries and encyclopedias would grind to a halt if and when they ever dared to define/explain "subjective and objective". You make it sound like they would have an impossible task.

Well maybe. In "real life" I'd say you have a point. But in the philosophy forum on RF I think these words offer a lot of "opportunities for discussion"

I know that arguing over the definitions of these words comes up a LOT in religious debates.

 

[Firemorphic]

Hmmm....it is quite the question.

What we call "objective" in a materialist sense is still relative to the temporally observable conditions in which they are being observed. All things objective at the same time are only ever experienced through the subjective. The subjective is known through sense-perception and thought cognition. The outside world is known and observed only through the mind, we create things but those things aren't knowable or experienceable without being through mind-perception.
The whole thing is a mind-f***k

 

[Straw Dog]

Objective means independent of human consciousness.

Subjective means dependent upon consciousness.

Two sides to the same coin of reality.

 

[Martin]

Subjective: What I think.
Objective: What WE think.

A tricky question!