We are all in agreement; disagreement is simply our inability or unwillingness to see that

Reply to WISDOMfromPO-MO I like using self-organizing systems metaphors. If the universe(or multiverse) is an auto-peiotic development, then it moves progressively from a state of lesser dynamic differentiation-integration-stability to a state of greater integrity. What this means at the level of cultural evolution is that our origins are necessarily violent and chaotic , but our future holds the promise of the sort of interpersonal agreement you state as a fact, but most would hold onto as a dream.
Of course, whether we judge the other to be agreeable or not is a function, among other things, of the breadth of our perspective. The fact that Western Europe, for instance, is in the midst of its longest period without war, is considered by some a sign that we know how to agree with each other at the most general political level in a way we didn't used to.
At a more up-close level, however, real intellectual disagreement can be measured by the negative affects(hostility, disgust, bewilderment, ridicule,etc) that run rampant in discussion forums and many other places, as reflected in the vast machinery of the litigation industry.
On this forum there are almost as many philosophical worldviews represented as there are contributors. These world views are not reconcilable in the sense that you can't reduce Hegel to Kant or Kant to Plato.
If agreeing to disagree can be considered "being all in agreement", then we are all one big happy family here. But I suggest what is missing from this near-utopia is the resources to understand each participant's view as pragmatically true relative to their own perspective, and the ability to link each participant's perspective to those of all the others via some superordinate undestanding.
That is the means by which I can, if not move the other towards my position, at least see their viewpoint as valid and necessary for them given the world as they see it.
The best way to fool yourself into thinking that everyone agrees on the fundamental
philosophical issues is to use a naturalistic vocabulary borrowed from mathematics and physics. These descriptive languages are designed to be so conceptually abstract as to mask important differences in worldview.

Quoting Joshs

I like using self-organizing systems metaphors. If the universe(or multiverse) is an auto-peiotic development, then it moves progressively from a state of lesser dynamic differentiation-integration-stability to a state of greater integrity. What this means at the level of cultural evolution is that our origins are necessarily violent and chaotic , but our future holds the promise of the sort of interpersonal agreement you state as a fact, but most would hold onto as a dream.

Maybe even better than the alternatives I thought of.

Quoting Joshs

Of course, whether we judge the other to be agreeable or not is a function, among other things, of the breadth of our perspective. The fact that Western Europe, for instance, is in the midst of its longest period without war, is considered by some a sign that we know how to agree with each other at the most general political level in a way we didn't used to.

Is this agreement pre-existing, a priori, or whatever adjective you want to use, and then discovered, arrived at, made conscious, etc.?

Or is it previously non-existent and then created, manufactured, etc.?

Quoting Joshs

At a more up-close level, however, real intellectual disagreement can be measured by the negative affects(hostility, disgust, bewilderment, ridicule,etc) that run rampant in discussion forums and many other places, as reflected in the vast machinery of the litigation industry.
On this forum there are almost as many philosophical worldviews represented as there are contributors. These world views are not reconcilable in the sense that you can't reduce Hegel to Kant or Kant to Plato.

Many years of observations have left me inclined to say that 99% of the time such negative effects are due to people talking past each other, not any real disagreement.

Often when people say they are in disagreement they probably do not know what--if anything--they are disagreeing about.

I am inclined to ask the gods of the intellectual world to eliminate the phrases "I agree" and "I disagree" from all discourse. The latter is probably at best meaningless. The former is probably at best redundant.

Quoting Joshs

If agreeing to disagree can be considered "being all in agreement", then we are all one big happy family here. But I suggest what is missing from this near-utopia is the resources to understand each participant's view as pragmatically true relative to their own perspective, and the ability to link each participant's perspective to those of all the others via some superordinate undestanding.
That is the means by which I can, if not move the other towards my position, at least see their viewpoint as valid and necessary for them given the world as they see it.

I have not read more than one Ken Wilber book and a few Ken Wilber interviews, reviews, etc., but his stages in the evolution of consciousness sure helped me like nothing else has understand my perspective and other people's perspectives.

But if you bring up Ken Wilber he is likely to instantly be dismissed as a New Age quack.

Quoting Joshs

The best way to fool yourself into thinking that everyone agrees on the fundamental
philosophical issues is to use a naturalistic vocabulary borrowed from mathematics and physics. These descriptive languages are designed to be so conceptually abstract as to mask important differences in worldview.

Can you illustrate that?

Quoting WISDOMfromPO-MO

The title of this thread is an update: disagreement is real; but it exists in spite of everybody essentially being in agreement.

I essentially disagree with this.

I disagree with the silly argument made in the OP.

Quoting Marchesk

I essentially disagree with this.

If people were not essentially in agreement--we exist (can't imagine a substantive dialogue between a being who believes he and the other exists and a being who believes his own self and/or the other does not exist); the symbol "1" represents a particular quantity; words uttered aloud are associated with thoughts in the mind of the utterer and are not random sounds; etc.--the exchange of ideas would not be possible.

The exchange of ideas is probably mostly referencing that essential core.

The beliefs of whoever best masters that essential core are probably the beliefs that prevail.

Did heliocentrism prevail over geocentrism because disagreement came to a head and the facts settled that or because agreement could no longer rationally be denied?

Quoting WISDOMfromPO-MO

-we exist (can't imagine a substantive dialogue between a being who believes he and the other exists and a being who believes his own self and/or the other does not exist);

Well, the solipsist argues that others do not exist. And then the Buddhists and other like-minded folk say the self does not exist. Descartes can be criticized on the grounds that he assumed there was an I to the experience of having a doubt, given that he was supposed to be entertaining 100% radical doubt.

Quoting WISDOMfromPO-MO

the symbol "1" represents a particular quantity;

Or it exists platonically independent of any actual quantity.

Quoting WISDOMfromPO-MO

words uttered aloud are associated with thoughts in the mind of the utterer and are not random sounds;

Alternatively meaning does not exist in the head (semantic externalism), and language does not reference private states (Wittgenstein). You also have the behaviorists and the eliminative materialists.

Quoting WISDOMfromPO-MO

The exchange of ideas is probably mostly referencing that essential core.

An exchange of ideas happens, but what that entails is very much up for debate, as almost everything can be called into question or interpreted differently.

Quoting Marchesk

Well, the solipsist argues that others do not exist. And then the Buddhists and other like-minded folk say the self does not exist. Descartes can be criticized on the grounds that he assumed there was an I to the experience of having a doubt, given that he was supposed to be entertaining 100% radical doubt.

Does not change the fact that a consensual exchange of ideas is highly implausible between people who do not mutually believe in each other's existence.

Quoting Marchesk

Or it exists platonically independent of any actual quantity.

Depends on what everybody has agreed on.

Quoting Marchesk

Alternatively meaning does not exist in the head (semantic externalism), and language does not reference private states (Wittgenstein). You also have the behaviorists and the eliminative materialists.

Depends on what everybody has agreed on.

Quoting WISDOMfromPO-MO

For many years now I have sensed that we are all in agreement.

I used to say that disagreement is an illusion.

You could not be more wrong.
It's all about Point of View.

Reply to WISDOMfromPO-MO Reply to WISDOMfromPO-MO This gets a bit complicated, but it has to do with seeing every person's understanding of the world from moment to moment as a holistic gesatt, and each particular area of interest that that person is involved in is authorized, is a derived from and is consistent, with that larger gestalt. Think of such gestalts as worldviews. In any given city, there are myriad worldviews represented, defining political , religious and social subcultures . And these worldviews cannot be in simple agreement with each other since they are really different forms of life. We may respect each other but we dont see the same world, so its hard to know what it is we are supposed to be agreeing about if we are looking at different worlds with different facts(since facts dont exist apart from a larger framework of understanding).

You could take a representative from 10 of these subcultures, put them in a room together and find that they all agree on the fundamental facts of physical theory. I would argue this isnt because this aspect5 of reality is something that they are able to understand nearly identically, but on the contrary, each of them are understanding it slightly differently, in accordance with their larger worldview. The reason they all seem to be on the same page with regard to their understanding of physics is because the descriptive language of physics and its accompanying mathematics is abstract enough to mask those differences in interpretation.
It will only show up when we get to a much deeper level of metatheoretical implication, for instance if we were to ask everyone in the room what the larger spiritual or existential significance of physics is.,

Quoting WISDOMfromPO-MO

No matter how you prefer to explain it, the more that I hear/see people interacting intellectually, the more apparent it becomes to me that we are all basically in agreement while nitpicking and splitting hairs over superficial differences.

No, we're not.

Quoting charleton

You could not be more wrong.
It's all about Point of View.

Different points of view mean seeing things differently.

Disagreement would be two people with identical points of view getting different results.

Quoting Ying

No, we're not.

How do you know?

Quoting WISDOMfromPO-MO

Disagreement would be two people with identical points of view getting different results.

No disagreement could be two people with the same POV having different reactions, or two people having a different POV and disagreeing for that reason.
It is conversely possible that two people with different POVs could agree, as well as two people with the same POV agreeing.

Reply to WISDOMfromPO-MO Disagreement dwells in ignorance. Agreement requires truth and knowledge.

Imagine two people in a forest at night. They're surrounded by darkness and the shadows of the trees. One sees a man, another a wolf. They disagree. However, come morning light they see the truth - trees and bushes - and agreement follows.

Reply to WISDOMfromPO-MO Don't try to shift the burden of proof. You made the controversial claim, you prove that we are all supposedly in agreement. And no, you didn't do that in the first post. If A is to be determined, then "A because B" is an argument. "B because A" would be an after the facts explanation, and that second one is what you did in the OP. Not playing ball, here.

Quoting WISDOMfromPO-MO

Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit and disagreement is millions of minds trying to put everything back together.

How are these connected?

Quoting WISDOMfromPO-MO

If naturalism suits your taste: the mind was unified when if first appeared; it then diverged into hundreds/thousands of languages and/or cultures; disagreement is that fragmentation.

The direct conclusion of this is that there's disagreement. Where does the agreement come in? Also, the conclusion does not follow from the premise of naturalism.

Quoting WISDOMfromPO-MO

No matter how you prefer to explain it, the more that I hear/see people interacting intellectually, the more apparent it becomes to me that we are all basically in agreement while nitpicking and splitting hairs over superficial differences.

1) Define superficiality.
2) Let's take, say, rejecting the existence of everything but one's own mind, and rejecting the existence of the mind as examples. How is the difference between these a superficial one? What do they even have in common?

Quoting WISDOMfromPO-MO

If people were not essentially in agreement--we exist (can't imagine a substantive dialogue between a being who believes he and the other exists and a being who believes his own self and/or the other does not exist); the symbol "1" represents a particular quantity; words uttered aloud are associated with thoughts in the mind of the utterer and are not random sounds; etc.--the exchange of ideas would not be possible.

Seems to me more like the universal subjects of agreement are the superficial ones, rather than those of disagreement. By the way, there's not even agreement on whether we agree on the meanings of symbols and whether the words mean the same to everyone.

Quoting WISDOMfromPO-MO

Did heliocentrism prevail over geocentrism because disagreement came to a head and the facts settled that or because agreement could no longer rationally be denied?

Probably the former to be honest. And actually there's more disagreement on that nowadays than there was before.

Quoting WISDOMfromPO-MO

Does not change the fact that a consensual exchange of ideas is highly implausible between people who do not mutually believe in each other's existence.

So now you're only considering people who believe in each other's existence? That's essentially saying that people who agree agree.

Quoting WISDOMfromPO-MO

Depends on what everybody has agreed on.

But they haven't.

I disagree, because there are some very fundamental disagreements based on very real physical differences.

A psychopath who cannot feel empathy, cannot be in agreement with someone who does.

A person who is missing a hand, cannot be in agreement with the viewpoint of someone who has two hands.

I could see what you are saying if we were all physically identical, but had different experiences. At that point, if we all saw each others experiences, we would all be in agreement.

But the fact that we're all physically different means we will have fundamental experiences we cannot share with another human being. Their experiences will fall on our deaf ears, because we do not have ears to hear. As such, there will be things we will never agree on.

So we agree on some things but disagree on others?