How Do You Know the Truth
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Question of the Month
What Is Truth?
The following answers to this question each win a signed re-create of How To Be An Agnostic by Mark Vernon. Sorry if you're not here; at that place were lots of entries.
True behavior portray the world as it is; imitation beliefs portray the world equally other than it is. A straight ruler appears aptitude when one-half-submerged in a glass of h2o. What is the truth of the matter? Truth'south graphic symbol is both logical and empirical. The logical 'principle of non-contradiction' ensures that the contradictory propositions 'the ruler is straight' and 'the ruler is non directly' cannot both be truthful at the same fourth dimension, and in principle observation should settle which is the example. In practice, things are not so simple. The observable truth would seem to modify as the ruler enters the water. Perhaps this is to exist expected? Subsequently all, if true beliefs describe the world, and the globe changes, then truth must change likewise. Still, relativists rubbing their hands at the thought that we each construct our own truth, and sceptics finger-wagging that this shows there is no such matter equally truth, should both concur fire. As well every bit the principle of non-contradiction, we are too guided past the empirical principle that nature is uniform and not capricious. Solid objects are not commonly plain-featured by immersion in water. And then, we tin can approach a truth that is contained of item observations past, ironically, taking account of the observer in looking at the bigger picture: optical effects resulting from refraction of low-cal explicate why the ruler appears bent but, really, is straight.
Merely how tin nosotros be sure there is a earth to describe? What if reality itself is an illusion, like the bent stick – a flickering shadow on a cave wall? We may never know whether our observations are just shadows of what is real, but nosotros should resist both mysticism and metaphysics when thinking nearly truth.
Reaching a consensus on an objective description of the world is possible in principle. That is the wonder of science. Consensus on our subjective descriptions is impossible in principle. That is the wonder of consciousness. Truth is the single currency of the sovereign mind, the knowing subject, and the all-time thinking – in philosophy, scientific discipline, art – discriminates between the objective and subjective sides of the coin, and appreciates both the unity of reality and the diversity of feel.
Jon Wainwright, London
Let's not inquire what truth is: let us ask instead how we tin can recognize it reliably when information technology appears. Four factors make up one's mind the truthfulness of a theory or caption: congruence, consistency, coherence, and usefulness.
• A true theory is congruent with our experience – meaning, it fits the facts. It is in principle falsifiable, but nothing falsifying it has been found. I mode we can infer that our theory is congruent with the facts as we experience them is when what we feel is predictable from the theory. But truth is always provisional, not an end state. When nosotros observe new facts, nosotros may need to modify our theory.
• A truthful theory is internally consistent. It has no contradictions within itself, and it fits together elegantly. The principle of consistency (aforementioned equally the principle of non-contradiction) allows us to infer things consistent with what we already know. An inconsistent theory – one that contains contradictions – does not allow u.s. to practice this.
• Alongside this benchmark, a true theory is coherent with everything else we consider true. It confirms, or at least fails to contradict, the residuum of our established knowledge, where 'knowledge' means beliefs for which we tin give rigorous reasons. The physical sciences – physics, chemistry, biology, geology and astronomy – all reinforce each other, for case.
• A true theory is useful. It gives united states of america mastery. When we act on the ground of a truthful theory or explanation, our actions are successful. What is true works to organize our thought and our practice, so that we are able both to reason with logical rigor to true conclusions and to handle reality effectively. Truth enables the states to exert our power, in the sense of our ability to get things washed, successfully. It has predictive power, assuasive us to make good choices concerning what is likely to happen.
Does this mean that what is useful is true? That is not a useful question, as information technology's not the sole criterion. Rather, if a theory is congruent with our experience, internally consequent, coherent with everything else we know, and useful for organizing our thinking and practice, then nosotros can confidently consider it true.
Bill Meacham, by electronic mail
Proffer P is truthful if P is the example, and P is the case if P is truthful. Together with all other propositions which meet the same criterion, P can and then merits to inhabit the realm of Truth.
But is P the case? P may exist a sincerely-held belief; just this solitary is insufficient to establish its truth. Claims to truth must be well justified. Those beliefs based on prediction and forecast are particularly doubtable, and can normally be discounted. The recent prediction that 'the world will end at half-dozen.00pm on 21 May 2011' is an example. There was never whatever systematic attempt at justification, and without this any claim to truth is seriously (and unremarkably fatally) flawed. If it cannot be shown that a belief either corresponds to a known fact, coheres with a 'consistent and harmonious' organization of beliefs, or prompts actions which have desirable outcomes (the pragmatic approach), then whatever claim to Truth becomes impossible to justify.
The realm of Truth may contain those arising from mystical convictions, which are more than difficult to justify than those based on observations. Although attempts are made to pragmatically justify religious beliefs, the many competing claims exit us in confusion. As regards Truth in the Fine art-World, Aquinas identifies Truth with Beauty, and defines the truth in fine art as 'that which pleases in the very apprehension of information technology'.
So, Truth is the realm populated past well-justified behavior. To a certain extent truth is subjective, although a belief gains greater currency past its wider acquittance.
Truth is not constant. Some beliefs which were held to be true are now considered simulated, and some for which truth is now claimed may be deemed faux in the future, and vice versa. Truth is good for helping u.s.a. determine how to human action, because it serves as a standard for making some sort of sense of a earth populated besides by one-half-truths and untruths.
Ray Pearce, Manchester
Our ancestors did themselves (and united states of america) a bully favour when they began using noises to communicate. They probably started with "Hide!" "Wolves!" "Eat!/Don't consume!" and "Mine/Yours!" The invention of language enabled u.s. to exercise many things. We could use it to describe the world as we institute it; but we could also use it to create things, such as boundaries and private property. Every bit John Searle has argued, the vast structure of our social world, including our laws, businesses, politics, economics and entertainments, has been built out of language.
Telling the truth is just 1 of the uses of language. Telling the truth is complicated by the fact that we live in a hybrid world, partly natural, partly invented. "Earth rotates" is a true business relationship of a natural given. "Earth rotates one time every 24 hours" is only truthful within the linguistic communication community which imposes that organisation of time-measurement on the given reality. Some other complication is that we ourselves are physical objects which can be described using objective terms, but we are too social beings, in roles, relationships and structures which are all man-made.
Classifications are a key component of language. A judgement of the elementary grade '10 is Y' can locate an private within a class ('Socrates is a man') or one class within another ('Daisies are weeds'). Some classifications are givens in nature (the periodic table, biological taxonomy, concrete laws) while others are inventions (social roles, types (uses) of furniture, parts of speech). Sentences tin can mix natural classes with inventions: 'daisies' refers to a class of plant given in nature, whereas 'weeds' refers to an invented class of 'dislikeable plants'. In their search for truth the natural sciences seek to find natural classifications, as distinct from social inventions.
Truthful descriptions are similar maps. Some descriptions map objective reality, equally the natural sciences do, which is like a map of physical contours. Other descriptions map our socially-constructed world, as journalists, historians, novelists and theologians do, like a map showing political borders.
We take made slap-up progress since our ancestors first grunted at each other. Language was essential to that progress and information technology provided the true/false distinction which enabled us to analyse and understand the natural globe which sustains us.
Les Reid, Belfast
I would like to say that truth exists outside of u.s., for all to see. Unfortunately, humans can be stubborn, and then the actual pinning down of what a truth is is more complicated. Society plays host to two types of truths; subjective truth and objective truth. Subjective truth is given to u.s. through our private expe riences in relation to those around us: in short, it's the truths we have been raised with. Objective truth is discovered by a search which is critical of our experiences until sufficient evidence has been gathered. The subjective truth is not always in opposition to the objective truth, merely it does depend on the discipline valuing their worldview more than others'.
Our preference as a society is, I believe, revealed through our utilize of linguistic communication. If we say: "Look, the sunday is going down" we are speaking from our subjective viewpoint. It is truthful from our individual standpoint, simply it is not a truth in the objective sense. The truth, in an objective sense, is that we live on a planet which spins on its axis and it orbits the Lord's day. So in fact what we should say is "Look, the world is spinning away from the Lord's day and will before long obstruct our view of it." This may seem a pedantic signal to make; withal, if our language does non reflect the objective truth, information technology must mean that truth stands firmly in the subjective camp. Based on our use of language in the majority of situations, an conflicting may and so well judge u.s. to be very ignorant, and that our truth is cocky-serving.
It could be said that subjective truth isn't truth at all, more than conventionalities; merely because as a order our values requite more strength to the private and to personal experience, nosotros must bow to the power of the individual conventionalities as truth, every bit we seem to practice through our everyday use of language.
Anoosh Falak Rafat, St Leonard's on Sea, East Sussex
Everyone knows perfectly well what truth is – everyone except Pontius Pilate and philosophers. Truth is the quality of being true, and beingness true is what some statements are. That is to say, truth is a quality of the propositions which underlie correctly-used statements.
What does that mean? Well, imagine a man who thinks that Gordon Brown is still the British PM, and that Gordon Brown was educated at Edinburgh (as he was). When he says "The PM was educated at Edinburgh", what he ways is clearly true: the person he is calling the PM was educated at Edinburgh. Therefore, if (somewhat counter-intuitively) nosotros say the argument itself is true, we're saying that what the statement really means is true: that what anyone who understands the meanings and references of all the words in the statement means, is truthful. Even so, information technology is perfectly natural to say that a argument itself is true; people who recollect this would say that the higher up statement, every bit uttered by the man who thinks Gordon Brown is PM, is false (even though what he meant by it is true).
However, to generalise, it is not really the statement itself that is true (or false), merely what is meant by it. Information technology can't be the possible state of affairs described by the statement which is true: states of affairs are non true, they simply be. Rather, there must be some wordless 'suggestion' nailed downward by the argument which describes that country of affairs, and which could exist expressed accurately in various forms of words (in a variety of statements); and information technology is that suggestion which is either truthful or false. So when nosotros say that a particular argument is true, that must be shorthand for "the proposition meant by someone who utters that statement, in total cognition of the meanings and references of the words in it, is truthful."
Bob Stone, Worcester
I dilute my solution, place it into a cuvette, and take a reading with the spectrophotometer: 0.8. I repeat the process again and get 0.7; and one time over again to go 0.nine. From this I go the average of 0.8 that I write in my lab-book. The variation is probably based upon tiny inconsistencies in how I am handling the equipment, then three readings should be sufficient for my purposes. Have I discovered the truth? Well yes – I have a measurement that seems roughly consistent, and should, assuming that my notes are complete and my spectrophotometer has been calibrated, be repeatable in many other labs around the world. Nevertheless, this 'truth' is meaningless without some understanding of what I am trying to reach. The spectrophotometer is set at 280nm, which – so I take been taught – is the wavelength used to measure out poly peptide concentration. I know I have made up my solution from a bottle labelled 'albumin', which – again, as I have been taught – is a poly peptide. So my experiment has determined the truth of how much protein is in the cuvette. Merely again, a wider context is needed. What is a protein, how do spectrophotometers work, what is albumin, why practice I want to know the concentration in the first place? Observations are nifty, but really rather pointless without a reason to make them, and without the theoretical cognition for how to interpret them. Truth, even in scientific discipline, is therefore highly contextual. What truth is varies non and then much with different people, just rather with the narrative they are living past. Two people with a like narrative will probably concord on how to treat certain observations, and might agree on a conclusion they call the truth, but every bit narratives diverge and then too does agreement on what 'truth' might be. In the finish, even in an entirely materialistic globe, truth is just the word we utilize to describe an ascertainment that we call up fits into our narrative.
Dr Simon Kolstoe, UCL Medical Schoolhouse, London
Truth is unique to the individual. As a phenomenologist, for me, that I feel hungry is more a truth than that 2+3=5. No truth can be 'considerately verified' – empirically or otherwise – and the criteria past which we define truths are always relative and subjective. What we consider to be true, whether in morality, scientific discipline, or fine art, shifts with the prevailing intellectual wind, and is therefore adamant by the social, cultural and technological norms of that specific era. Non-Euclidean geometry at to the lowest degree partially undermines the supposed tautological nature of geometry – usually cited as the cornerstone of the rationalist's claims that reason can provide knowledge: other geometries are possible, and equally true and consequent. This means that the truth of geometry is one time more inextricably linked with your personal perspective on why 1 mathematical paradigm is 'truer' than its viable alternatives.
In the terminate, humans are both fallible and unique, and any knowledge we notice, true or otherwise, is discovered by a human, finite, private mind. The closest we can get to objective truth is intersubjective truth, where we take reached a general consensus due to our like educations and social conditioning. This is why truths often don't cross cultures. This is an idea close to 'conceptual relativism' – a radical evolution of Kant's thinking which claims that in learning a language we learn a way of interpreting the world, and thus, to speak a different language is to inhabit a different subjective world.
And so our definition of truth needs to be much more flexible than Plato, Descartes and other philosophers claim. I would say that a pragmatic theory of truth is closest: that truth is the 'thing that works'; if some other ready of ideas works better, then it is truer. This is a theory Nietzsche came close to accepting.
The lack of objective truth leaves us gratis to carve our own truths. As in Sartre'south existentialism, we aren't trapped by objectivity; rather, the lack of eternal, immutable truths allows us to create what is true for ourselves. Truth is mine. My truth and your truth have no necessary relevance to each other. Because truth is subjective, it can play a much more unique and decisive role in giving life meaning; I am utterly gratuitous to cull my truths, and in doing so, I shape my ain life. Without subjective truth, there tin can be no self-determination.
Andrew Warren, Eastleigh, Hants
Truth is interpersonal. We tell each other things, and when they work out we call them truths. When they don't, we call them errors or, if we are not charitable, lies. What nosotros accept equally truth depends on what others around us espouse. For many centuries European Christians believed that men had ane fewer rib than women because the Bible says that Eve was created from Adam's rib. Nobody bothered to count because everyone causeless it was truthful. And when they finally counted, information technology was because everyone agreed on the consequence that the existent truth became known. Even when we are lone, truth is interpersonal. We express these truths or errors or lies to others and to ourselves in language; and, every bit Wittgenstein pointed out, there tin be no individual language.
But the most essential truth, the truth by which nosotros all live our lives, is intensely personal, private. We might call this 'Truth', with a capital T. Even though each of u.s. lives our life past Truth, it can be different for each person. Shall I believe and obey the Torah, the New Testament, the Quran, the Bhagavad Gita, the Zend Avesta, the Dhammapada? Or none of the higher up: shall I discover my own Truth in my ain style?
We thus need a customs of seekers with a delivery to meta-Truth, recognizing that personal Truths are to be respected, even though whatever Truth will differ from someone else's. But even in such a community, some beliefs would be adequate, and others not: my belief that I am exceptional and deserve preferential treatment, perchance because I alone have received a special revelation, is not likely to be shared by others. From inside the in-group we look with fright and revulsion on those who deny the accepted beliefs. From outside, we admire those who concord aloft the lite of truth amidst the darkness of human ignorance. And in every case it is we who gauge, non I alone. Even the most personal Truth is adjudicated within a community and depends on the esteem of others.
Robert Tables, Blanco, TX
The word 'true' comes from the Anglo-Saxon 'treowe' meaning 'believed'. 'Believe' itself is from 'gelyfan', 'to esteem dear'. And so etymologically, 'truth' would be something believed to be of some value, rather than necessarily existence correct. 'Believe' is even so used in the older sense, as in "I believe in commonwealth" – a unlike sense to 'believing in Father Christmas'. Such ambiguity facilitates equivocation – useful to politicians, etc, who can exist economical with the truth. One office of language is to muffle truth.
In an experiment past Solomon Asch, subjects were given pairs of cards. On one were 3 lines of different lengths; on the other menu a unmarried line. The test was to determine which of the iii lines was the same length equally the single line. The truth was obvious; just in the group of subjects all were stooges except i. The stooges called out answers, most of which were of the same, obviously wrong, line. The self-doubtfulness thus incurred in the existent subjects made only one quarter of them trust the show of their senses enough to pick the right answer.
Schopenhauer noticed the reluctance of the establishment to engage with new ideas, choosing to ignore rather than risk disputing and refuting them. Colin Wilson mentions Thomas Kuhn's contention that "in one case scientists take become comfortably settled with a certain theory, they are deeply unwilling to admit that at that place might be anything wrong with it" and links this with the 'Correct Human being' theory of writer A.E.Van Vogt. A 'Right Man' would never admit that he might exist wrong. Wilson suggests that people showtime with the 'truth' they desire to believe, and then piece of work backwards to find supporting show. Similarly, Robert Pirsig says that ideas coming from exterior orthodox establishments tend to be dismissed. Thinkers hitting "an invisible wall of prejudice… nobody inside… is ever going to heed… not considering what you say isn't truthful, but solely because you lot have been identified as outside that wall." He termed this a 'cultural immune arrangement'.
We may remember our experiences and chronicle them accurately; only every bit to complex things like history, politics, peoples' motives, etc, the models of reality we have tin at best exist only partly truthful. We are naive if taken in past 'spin'; we're gullible, paranoid or crazy if nosotros give credit to 'conspiracy theories'; and, with limited knowledge of psychology, scientific method, the nature of politics etc, the 'truth' will tend to elude the states there as well.
Jim Fairer, Kirriemuir, Scotland
As I gather amongst my fellow lovers of wisdom for another round of java, debate and discussion, I try to filter in the question I am trying to answer: 'What is Truth?' With many a moan and a sigh (and indeed a giggle from some), I try to wiggle out the truth from these B.A. philosophy students. I think it is interesting to examine why philosophy students should hate the question so much. Information technology seems that the question itself is meaningless for some of them. "Really?" they asked, "Aren't we a fiddling as well postmodern for that?" Actually, I reminded them, the question itself can be considered to be postmodern. Postmodernism is not the opposite of realism. Rather, postmodernism only questions the blatant acceptance of reality. If postmodernism did not enquire the question of truth, but rather, causeless that [it is true that] there is no truth, it would be but every bit unassuming nigh truth as realism is.
"But wait," said one crafty lilliputian Socrates, "Yous mentioned, realism: so are the questions of what is true and what is real the same question?" So it became terribly frightening, because nosotros entered into a debate nearly the relation between language and reality. We agreed amongst ourselves that it certainly seemed that both questions are roughly treated equally equal, since when one questions certainty, ane questions both truth and reality, and postmodernists certainly question both. The question then became: If Truth and Reality are and then intimately connected, to what degree do nosotros have access to reality, and what practise nosotros apply to access this reality and come up to truth? We perused the history of philosophy. It seemed to united states that from Descartes to Kant (and some argued that fifty-fifty in phenomenology and existentialism) at that place has been an unhealthy relationship betwixt u.s.a. and reality/truth. Indeed, you could argue that a corking deal of the history of Western philosophy was trying to deal with the problem of alienation, ie, the alienation of human beings from reality and truth.
Abigail Muscat, Zebbug, Malta
'Truth' has a diverseness of meanings, only the most common definitions refer to the state of being in accordance with facts or reality. There are diverse criteria, standards and rules by which to judge the truth that statements profess to claim. The trouble is how tin can there be assurance that we are in accord with facts or realities when the human mind perceives, distorts and manipulates what it wants to see, hear or decipher. Perhaps a better definition of truth could be, an agreement of a judgment by a trunk of people on the facts and realities in question.
I have indeed ever been amazed at how far people are willing to be accomplices to the vast amount of lies, dishonesty and deception which continuously goes on in their lives. The Global Financial Crisis, the investment scandal of Bernard Madoff, the collapse of Enron, and the war in Iraq, are familiar stories of gross deception from the past decade. The Holocaust is another baffling case of a horrendous genocide that was permitted to take place across a whole continent which seemed completely oblivious to reality. And all the same even today nosotros find people who deny such an atrocity having taken place, in spite of all the prove to the contrary.
Discovering the truth will exist a hurtful and painful experience when the facts or realities turn out to be different from what is expected. Yet in that location ought to be no grounds for despair if nosotros accept that the ideal of truth, similar all other virtues, can be approached rather than attained. This platonic truth tin be glimpsed if we manage to be sceptical, independent and open up-minded when presented with the supposed facts and realities. However, in searching for the truth, precaution must be taken, that nosotros are non trapped into a life overshadowed by fear, suspicion and cynicism, since this would suspend us in a state of continuous tension. One might easily conclude that living a life not concerned with probing for the truth would mayhap after all yield greater peace of mind. But it is the life that continuously struggles with the definition of the truth that volition ultimately requite telescopic and meaning to human existence.
Ian Rizzo, Zabbar, Malta
Side by side Question of the Calendar month
The adjacent question is: How Can I Be Happy? Demonstrate the road to happiness in less than 400 words, please. Easy. The prize is a semi-random book from our book mountain. Subject lines or envelopes should exist marked 'Question Of The Month', and must be received by 25th Oct. If you want a chance of getting a book, please include your physical address. Submission implies permission to reproduce your reply physically and electronically.
Source: https://philosophynow.org/issues/86/What_Is_Truth
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