Sunday, March 8, 2020

"Truth"… some brainstorming


We talk a lot about truth here, on Germaine’s political blog.  I’m going to go rogue and infiltrate it with some dastardly philosophy.  (Apologies Germaine. ;)  My quest: A search for the correct definition of “truth.”

Truth is an interesting concept.  Saying that truth is “the absence of falsehood” seems like too simple a definition to me and does not get at the essence of what I am looking for.  I rather fancy one of Webster’s definitions:

3a : the property of being in accord with fact or reality

but I still feel that such a definition does not tell the whole story.  Why?  Because all realities are not created equal.  I think I might have mentioned that before here.  Who’s to say whose reality is more legitimate, more real, than another’s?  To the person experiencing something, it becomes their reality, their “truth.”  So in that sense, truth seems to have the ability to be relative / subjective / malleable.  Ouuu.

Can we equate the word “truth” with the word “fact?”  What makes something a fact versus a truth?  What’s the difference?  When I think about trying to define “fact” (or even “truth”), I think it is “a something that can be no other way than what it is.”  “…can be no other way than what it is??”  There’s an interesting phrase.  Many things can be other ways than what they are and still be a “factual / truthful something.”  Take a simple example like an aluminum can.  It could be open, closed, full, empty, crushed, to name a few ways it can “be.”  Granted, it’s still a can, but not that “can be no other way than what it is.”  It can be many qualifying ways, while maintaining its “can-ness.”

Let’s forget cans for now.  When looking for a bottom line definition of truth, maybe I need to add the element of time into the mix.  A “truth” is something that “can be no other way than what it is at any given moment in time.”  This could be what I’m looking for, yet I still don’t feel happy with my definition.  I’m saying that truth, and by extension a fact (or would that be the other way around?), can be a fleeting thing, some kind of dynamic thing, a variable.  And so, by this train of thought, it certainly can’t be something absolute.  Some would say I’m over complicating it, but I’m just trying to get to the truth of what is truth?

In my mind, it seems like truth should be an absolute concept.  And some “truths” do not change at any given moment in time.  For example, the concept of the number three.  It cannot be something other than what it is, no matter how much time passes.  Numbers can be represented in the physical (perceptual), but they are comprehended in the mental (conceptual).  Could this be a key element in understanding truth?  Would it be right to say that truth is a concept (mental) supported by precept (physical)?  This sounds pretty good but we know from jury duty that circumstantial (inferred) evidence (i.e., missing hard evidence) doesn’t necessarily get to the “actual” (uh-oh, I’m introducing a new variable) truth of some matter.  It seems that I am back to square one, saying that truth can vary based on one person’s mental conception, versus another’s.  No, this argument does not fly either.

Does truth depend on some kind of “majority opinion” to be valid?  No.  Opinions can vary from society to society.  But if we all agree that a certain color, such as green, is truly green, no matter what the society in question says, then that must be some kind of “absolute truth.”  We can measure the frequency of that color and it will always show “green” on the scale.  A colorblind person may not see green but would likely agree that what everyone else sees is what we will define as “green,” based on the measurement.  An immutable "truth consensus” is reached, no matter what anyone else says.

So does the ability to measure something and always get the same results play into “what is truth?”  I think I am getting closer but can I think of any exceptions to the rule?  Are there any truths that cannot be measured?  How about the notion of “love?”

For example, I may declare that I love someone and the truth of that matter could only be measured by others in how I treat that so-called loved one.  An outside observer not familiar with me personally may see me scold my loved one, or do something mean to them, and claim that I “truly” do not love that person, based on observed behavior at that moment in time.  But I could declare that their measurement / analysis of the situation would not be the truth.  Because they are not me, they have no way of knowing how true my feelings of what I call “love” are.  Such “love truths” are personal, not accessible by an outside observer, but we personally believe them to be “truths” nevertheless.  I still have to ask, what about these feelings make them “a truth?”

At what point does something become “true”… or “true enough?”  If something is 50.001% true, is it truth?  Conversely, if something is 49.999% not true, is it not truth?  Can something be partial truth?  We hear it all the time: Well, that’s partially true.  But this is not getting me any closer to understanding truth, and if it is relative or absolute.  I want to understand the essence of truth, after all the fluff has boiled off.

Some would say I need to drag the God concept and religion into the mix.  But to me, that only confuses the question and muddies the waters.  And it makes me feel like I’m grasping for straws.  Scrap this idea.

So, which is it?  What is truth?  Is truth relative or absolute?  Is there some kind of bottom line definition when it comes to truth?  If so, please state it for me.  My definitions seem to be all over the board.  I’ve done a lot of describing, but not any bottom-line defining.  Maybe, like good and evil, that’s the best we can do, try to describe it, when contemplating “truth.”  Maybe that’s why Webster referred to it as a “property.”  I do think it can be both relative and absolute.  How do you know which it is? 

Help me out and give me your thoughts on “what is truth” and “how can we know it?”

(Please excuse any typos and non-sequiturs in my stream of thought. :) Feeling too lazy to review. :(

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