So, no one is right.

[jaymirror]

Originally posted by masterofNone


it seems we should at least be able to recognize that 2 plus 2 equals 4. no?

Indeed we can recognize it as a convention. In fact it only holds true if we agree that we are computing on base 4 or higher. On base 3 for instance, the sign "4" does not have any meaning.
You can state what you stated because you assume that people are computing on base 10, that is what we learn in basic school and we use for general purposes. However your statement does not have to be true everywhere.

False premises, or implicit premises, can turn what's "true" into false. They can also make communication impossible, if the two people talking have different premises and they do not know that they are disagreeing on those.

I think that i quite agree with NYC that even those truths that seem most obvious could result wrong if the premises change. That does not mean, to my opinion, that they are false and that we are stupid to believe in them, but that they are partial, and their meaning can change a lot when we observe them in a different context.