What is Truth?

[+Doomstick]

4 minutes ago, Scarletfox said:

 

So this idea, that we should all find our own truths, is a truth that I should follow by following my own truth?

This isn’t for us to say, but for you to find out

paradox averted

Edited October 13, 2020 by Doomstick

[Karger]

6 minutes ago, Scarletfox said:

So this idea, that we should all find our own truths, is a truth that I should follow by following my own truth?

It is true for me because I said so.  I don't care what you do(although I would find it ideal if you could refrain from harming others or yourself).

[Scarletfox]

2 minutes ago, Doomstick said:

This isn’t for us to say, but for you to find out

paradox averted

Has it been? That very statement “this isn’t for us to say, but for you to find out” is assuming objective truth in itself, is it not? 

1 minute ago, Karger said:

It is true for me because I said so.  I don't care what you do(although I would find it ideal if you could refrain from harming others or yourself).

So what we say/think determines truth? How do we know that’s true? 

[Karger]

Just now, Scarletfox said:

So what we say/think determines truth? How do we know that’s true? 

I don't care.

Edited October 13, 2020 by Karger

[Scarletfox]

1 minute ago, Karger said:

I don't care.

Please elaborate, you don’t care about what?

[Karger]

Just now, Scarletfox said:

Please elaborate, you don’t care about what?

How you find truth.

[+Doomstick]

TRUTH ISN’T REAL

[Scarletfox]

1 minute ago, Doomstick said:

TRUTH ISN’T REAL

Is this true? Is it true that truth isn’t real?

 

[+Doomstick]

1 minute ago, Scarletfox said:

Is this true? Is it true that truth isn’t real?

 

IT ISN’T TRUE ANYMORE THAN IT IS SHNDTOJCDTTG

[Scarletfox]

1 minute ago, Doomstick said:

IT ISN’T TRUE ANYMORE THAN IT IS SHNDTOJCDTTG

What do you mean by this?

[Karger]

2 minutes ago, Scarletfox said:

Is this true? Is it true that truth isn’t real?

You are operating on circular reasoning.  The Truth cannot exist because we all live in diverging realities informed by our own choices.  You could choose to live in a reality that operates according to rules you and someone else agrees on but until you do Truth will not exist.  By telling you this I am drawing you into my reality where my statements are true.

[Frustration]

Just now, Karger said:

You are operating on circular reasoning.  The Truth cannot exist because we all live in diverging realities informed by our own choices.  You could choose to live in a reality that operates according to rules you and someone else agrees on but until you do Truth will not exist.  By telling you this I am drawing you into my reality where my statements are true.

Is Platinum more reactive than Cesium? no, that is not true. Truth is fact, truth is reality. Please explain this worldview in which nothing is factual and all is a product of a person deciding something.

[+Doomstick]

Truth is not real, words are not real, language does not exist WHY ARE WE HERE

[Frustration]

1 minute ago, Doomstick said:

Truth is not real, words are not real, language does not exist WHY ARE WE HERE

I can give you a religious answer.

[Scarletfox]

11 minutes ago, Karger said:

You are operating on circular reasoning.  The Truth cannot exist because we all live in diverging realities informed by our own choices.  You could choose to live in a reality that operates according to rules you and someone else agrees on but until you do Truth will not exist.  By telling you this I am drawing you into my reality where my statements are true.

What you’ve done, is create an idea governed by rules of ‘truth’ just as much as (you think) I have. A reality governed by truth in which we all have our own realities. How is that not truth?

by saying the statement “we all live in diverging realities” is assuming truth of itself

6 minutes ago, Frustration said:

I can give you a religious answer.

I can give an answer that I can reasonably support 

Edited October 13, 2020 by Scarletfox

[+Doomstick]

13 minutes ago, Frustration said:

I can give you a religious answer.

but since truth is not real, does it really matter?

10 minutes ago, Scarletfox said:

I can give an answer that I can reasonably support 

shots fired

Edited October 13, 2020 by Doomstick

[Karger]

19 minutes ago, Scarletfox said:

by saying the statement “we all live in diverging realities” is assuming truth of itself

Assuming you believe in Truth at all.  I don't.  The only actually true thing humans know at the moment is I think therefore I am.  Everything else is just conjecture and ego.

[+Doomstick]

Truth

noun

noun: truth

1. the quality or state of being true.

    
   • that which is true or in accordance with fact or reality.
      
   • a fact or belief that is accepted as true.

      

[+ILuvHats]

You know, this whole discussion reminds me of one of the dialogues in 1984.

Spoilered for length.

Spoiler

'But how can you control matter?' he burst out. 'You don't even control the climate or the law of gravity. And there are disease, pain, death --' 

O'Brien silenced him by a movement of his hand. 'We control matter because we control the mind. Reality is inside the skull. You will learn by degrees, Winston. There is nothing that we could not do. Invisibility, levitation -- anything. I could float off this floor like a soap bubble if I wish to. I do not wish to, because the Party does not wish it. You must get rid of those nineteenth-century ideas about the laws of Nature. We make the laws of Nature.' 

'But you do not! You are not even masters of this planet. What about Eurasia and Eastasia? You have not conquered them yet.' 

'Unimportant. We shall conquer them when it suits us. And if we did not, what difference would it make? We can shut them out of existence. Oceania is the world.' 

'But the world itself is only a speck of dust. And man is tiny helpless! How long has he been in existence? For millions of years the earth was uninhabited.' 

'Nonsense. The earth is as old as we are, no older. How could it be older? Nothing exists except through human consciousness.' 

'But the rocks are full of the bones of extinct animals -- mammoths and mastodons and enormous reptiles which lived here long before man was ever heard of.' 

'Have you ever seen those bones, Winston? Of course not. Nineteenth-century biologists invented them. Before man there was nothing. After man, if he could come to an end, there would be nothing. Outside man there is nothing.' 

'But the whole universe is outside us. Look at the stars! Some of them are a million light-years away. They are out of our reach for ever.' 

'What are the stars?' said O'Brien indifferently. 'They are bits of fire a few kilometres away. We could reach them if we wanted to. Or we could blot them out. The earth is the centre of the universe. The sun and the stars go round it.' 

Winston made another convulsive movement. This time he did not say anything. O'Brien continued as though answering a spoken objection: 

'For certain purposes, of course, that is not true. When we navigate the ocean, or when we predict an eclipse, we often find it convenient to assume that the earth goes round the sun and that the stars are millions upon millions of kilometres away. But what of it? Do you suppose it is beyond us to produce a dual system of astronomy? The stars can be near or distant, according as we need them. Do you suppose our mathematicians are unequal to that? Have you forgotten doublethink?'

Reality can only exist as we perceive it, filtered through our minds. In a way, the question of whether capital-T Truth exists is irrelevant; if everyone believes something to be true, does it matter whether or not it is really True? I tend to think not. Perception will always be more important than reality. Our own senses don't even reflect actual reality. Do you know how many ways your brain deceives itself in order to create a cohesive view of reality? It's ridiculous! The point of perception is not to gain insight into Truth, but to find a way to meaningfully interact with the world around you. Your 'world' is filled with an infinite number of inconsistencies, too many to imagine. Since we are so inherently inhibited in our ability to know actual reality, Truth is unobtainable. Because it is unobtainable, it doesn't matter, only perception does.

[Ixthos]

This is quickly ballooning, and I am feeling a sense of panic at the urge to respond to everyone here, so I apologise if this doesn't seem directed at anyone here, but I don't think I will be able to post otherwise. And likewise I apologise if I repeat something that has been said already - I'll be going back over this post and upvoting later, but for now I just need to say this.

 

There seems to be an issue here between Beliefs and Facts. Two views are expressed here about Truth - the question of which of the two, between beliefs and facts it belongs to, and if we ignore the word truth and focus entirely on beliefs and facts, if facts actually exist. For the first question, the question of which of the two the word Truth applies, that is down to personal usage of that word, and becomes meaningless semantics and circular reasoning if arguing about it. In that sense it is like arguing if the word "plane" means a flat piece of ground or a mathematical surface. Someone can tell the truth, but that is only what they believe and they could be wrong - someone can declare 1+1=2, and that is a fact that doesn't depend on what others think. 1+1=2 is true, and it will always be true, and always was true, even before humans existed. Peas taste disgusting unless turned into a soup is something I believe to be true, but someone could make a dish that contains peas that I like, and that belief would change. Again, this is just asking the question "do you think the word truth applies to belief or to fact", and while I think it should only apply to the latter it has become part of the English language to use it in both, and that annoys me, but so long as everyone agrees on a system its fine, as we still have the words belief and fact to clear up ambiguity. I think truth should only be used for fact, but I also believe people should spell "colour" and "honour" with a u. This is a thing of language and about successfully communicating ideas, and as long as you are talking to someone who knows what you mean (when you say jelly they know you mean the desert and not the spread) that is fine.

 

The second issue then is if facts are independent of beliefs. Consider, for a moment. I have seen a few posts saying "if there is no such thing as a fact, is that itself a fact?" To this person - I could kiss you, and I will be upvoting you later. Not right now though, I'm still worked up and will need to leave this thread for a bit :-P This is very much a key point. Anyone who says "there are no facts, no objective reality, nothing that doesn't come from within you", also has to admit the following:

• Anyone who disagrees with you on anything isn't wrong - if they think there are facts, then accordingly they are right, because everyone's beliefs are just as valid.
  • Therefore there is no objective morality - no action taken can ever be wrong because wrong is your opinion
  • You cannot disagree with anyone's reasoning, even if it is faulty or contains paradoxes or contradictions, because if they don't think those contradictions exist, then 
• Anyone who suffers from a disease or sickness of harm hasn't actually been harmed, they only think they have been. Anyone killed in a war or suffering any other damage is only experiencing that because they THINK they are, and if they changed their beliefs then - as facts are beliefs - they would be fine.
  • All your problems are because of you, and no-one else, because any actions they take are just the ones you choose to believe they took - and it has to be a choice, because if they didn't 
• Science cannot discover anything meaningful about the world, as anything science discovers, and any mathematical law, any invention, doesn't actually follow the principles discovered, for those discoveries are just "what the scientist believes". Nothing can be proven.
  • History is a lie - if you believe the Egyptians were a race of cats from outer space, then they were. If you believe colonialism never happened, then it didn't.
  • Technology works because of magic smoke.
• Rhythm of War isn't coming out in a few weeks - it will come out the moment you believe it does, and if I believe it already came out then it did, and you can't say I am wrong, only that you think I am wrong, but your belief I am wrong doesn't override my believe I am right, for if it did that would mean my belief is less valid than yours, no matter who I am or how many people believe me

 

If facts don't exist, is that conclusion itself a fact? That is very much the underlying question. And if someone says "no facts exist other than the fact that no facts exist", why is this an exception?

 

There is, of course, a third definition of Truth, and one that can be proven. That proof is a man who is also God, and will return. That is either truth or falsehood, and if falsehood then I and those like me are the most pitiable people in the whole world, but if it is truth then the One who is True, who knows what is true, will one day remove all confusion and ambiguity.

[Scout_Fox]

Ok first off I just gotta say that I love that this is even a topic of discussion here lol. Anywhere else and this would just be an "idk it is" conversation and be over with. Shows just how amazing we all are if I do say so myself 

And none of what I say is professing itself to be the absolute truth because as you will see from the opinions our reality is all shaped by our consciousness and therefore not an objective truth. Just providing some thoughts of prominent philosophers to back up ideas (and some opinions to start lol)

4 hours ago, Frustration said:

Truth is truth. Fact is fact, right is right, Good is good. I don't see why people have to complicate things, it's really simple, if it is true, if it can be proven, the it is true, that's all there is to it.

Good is a matter of perspective. Removing excess employees is Good for the employer but not Good for the employee. This is how we generally think of things yes because all of everything else is too complicated to do every second of our lives but it isn't always valid.

3 hours ago, Doomstick said:

3 hours ago, Scarletfox said:

To be clear, you're saying that truth is subjective?

Yes, in many instances 

Valid but also an easy way out. We always define things from multiple perspectives or break it down when we can't define it as one. Defining it as one is the challenge (and the fact that we can't may mean it can't be done). This isn't wrong I just think it's good to recognize it's easy to just slap a "it's subjective" on it when we don't have a good answer (and every one of us does this from time to time)

3 hours ago, Karger said:

It is my truth.  If you don't like it find your own.

Also valid but also an easy way out. Saying it is your truth avoids you having to explain to others because no one can ever fully understand your truth. Again, not wrong, just saying it's a really easy way of getting out of things like above (not that I even have a better way of doing it tho and most opinions of philosophers below think the same)

3 hours ago, Doomstick said:

This isn’t for us to say, but for you to find out

paradox averted

Genius, what a mad lad

3 hours ago, Karger said:

You are operating on circular reasoning.  The Truth cannot exist because we all live in diverging realities informed by our own choices.  You could choose to live in a reality that operates according to rules you and someone else agrees on but until you do Truth will not exist.  By telling you this I am drawing you into my reality where my statements are true.

Better, much, much better at explaining. You would agree with Jean-Paul Sartre: You are the authority of truth, free to organize the chaos and construct meaning and truth for yourself. We are radically free or "condemned to be free." If we are feeling sad we are choosing to feel sad. At every point in our lives we are making a choice to continue doing what we are doing or to change it.

He really took choice even to the furthest degree. If you are at a ledge on a really tall building the only reason you should be scared is if really you are worried that you would choose to jump if you got too close. Otherwise, why would you be afraid? You either choose to jump or choose to stay on. You always have the right to choose in every single moment. To deny this is Sartre's concept of "bad faith" or when we ignore the anxiety of radical freedom because it's easy. This makes us an object with a predefined purpose and not a subject free to choose. (My main argument to the ledge example here is wind and slipping and the like but it's assuming none of that).

3 hours ago, Frustration said:

Is Platinum more reactive than Cesium? no, that is not true. Truth is fact, truth is reality. Please explain this worldview in which nothing is factual and all is a product of a person deciding something.

Interesting thinking. This is essentialism: Essence precedes Existence, you or an object (cuz we are subjects) are given a purpose even before you are born/created. More along the lines of the dominant thinking of Aristotle up until the 1800s that each human being was born with an essence or a property that makes them who they are. Ferdinand de Saussure and the "Gang of Four" of Structuralism would disagree with you tho.

• Structuralism

  • We emerge into a particular time and place in the world where the chaos has already been subjectively organized (structured)

  • We are products of the time and place (culture and context) into which we are born

  • Everything we do is inhabiting pre-existing structures 

Our society already has determined what being successful or not is and what weird or not is. Even if we make our own decision our own decisions are being based off of what society has already ordered. Someone decided what the meaning behind reactive is. How do we know it is true? Why isn't it just hedeldiuk? And even if you look past words, how can we be sure it is more reactive? How can we be sure what we have is actually Platinum or Cesium or whatever?

Senses and logic are creations of our own brains and are therefore subjective. The objective truth is what Edward Husserl tried to prove in the 1800s and failed to do. His work proved that neither our reasoning or senses could lead to truth because they were both products of our consciousness. Everything we interpret is a product of us (or someone before us) deciding how this should be interpreted so literally nothing is factual and it is all a product of a person deciding something 

2 hours ago, Karger said:

Assuming you believe in Truth at all.  I don't.  The only actually true thing humans know at the moment is I think therefore I am.  Everything else is just conjecture and ego.

Yeah this is very much what Husserl came about to in the 1800s: there is no objective truth beyond our subjective reality. This may even be a more true statement depending on how you view it.

1 hour ago, Ixthos said:

"do you think the word truth applies to belief or to fact"

Belief or fact is a great distinction but as Husserl literally dedicated his life to finding and failed to do so there is no objective truth beyond our subjective reality so nothing is actually a fact. All existence assumptions need to be put in brackets because they are all assumptions and therefore everything we know is subjective. You have defined a distinction that is good but still neither can be proven to be true or a "fact"

1 hour ago, Ixthos said:

Anyone who disagrees with you on anything isn't wrong - if they think there are facts, then accordingly they are right, because everyone's beliefs are just as valid.

Yes, exactly! That is the whole thinking of Sartre: You are the authority of truth, free to organize the chaos and construct meaning and truth for yourself. This is because he and those he was working with realized the above that there is no objective truth or reality so everything is based upon you and your authority to choose

1 hour ago, Ixthos said:

There is, of course, a third definition of Truth, and one that can be proven. That proof is a man who is also God, and will return. That is either truth or falsehood, and if falsehood then I and those like me are the most pitiable people in the whole world, but if it is truth then the One who is True, who knows what is true, will one day remove all confusion and ambiguity.

I don't think you should bring religion (although we can't even define if it is religion lol) into this because any criticism may be taken as a criticism of the religion. This is not at all that, I respect each person's right to practice whatever they choose I am merely commenting on the statement.

This is basically the same as saying just if we accept one person's subjective reality it will become the truth. This is exactly what we have done (think language as accepted sounds that have meaning, think money (paper and cloth) having value, think objects having the meaning and purpose they do) and yet we still can't know this is absolutely true. To use Husserl again that there is no objective truth beyond our subjective reality because they are both products of our consciousness. The One who is True would just be saying what I know is true, placing their subjective reality on everyone else just like any other person could and has done.

2 hours ago, ILuvHats said:

You know, this whole discussion reminds me of one of the dialogues in 1984.

Spoilered for length.

  Hide contents

'But how can you control matter?' he burst out. 'You don't even control the climate or the law of gravity. And there are disease, pain, death --' 

O'Brien silenced him by a movement of his hand. 'We control matter because we control the mind. Reality is inside the skull. You will learn by degrees, Winston. There is nothing that we could not do. Invisibility, levitation -- anything. I could float off this floor like a soap bubble if I wish to. I do not wish to, because the Party does not wish it. You must get rid of those nineteenth-century ideas about the laws of Nature. We make the laws of Nature.' 

'But you do not! You are not even masters of this planet. What about Eurasia and Eastasia? You have not conquered them yet.' 

'Unimportant. We shall conquer them when it suits us. And if we did not, what difference would it make? We can shut them out of existence. Oceania is the world.' 

'But the world itself is only a speck of dust. And man is tiny helpless! How long has he been in existence? For millions of years the earth was uninhabited.' 

'Nonsense. The earth is as old as we are, no older. How could it be older? Nothing exists except through human consciousness.' 

'But the rocks are full of the bones of extinct animals -- mammoths and mastodons and enormous reptiles which lived here long before man was ever heard of.' 

'Have you ever seen those bones, Winston? Of course not. Nineteenth-century biologists invented them. Before man there was nothing. After man, if he could come to an end, there would be nothing. Outside man there is nothing.' 

'But the whole universe is outside us. Look at the stars! Some of them are a million light-years away. They are out of our reach for ever.' 

'What are the stars?' said O'Brien indifferently. 'They are bits of fire a few kilometres away. We could reach them if we wanted to. Or we could blot them out. The earth is the centre of the universe. The sun and the stars go round it.' 

Winston made another convulsive movement. This time he did not say anything. O'Brien continued as though answering a spoken objection: 

'For certain purposes, of course, that is not true. When we navigate the ocean, or when we predict an eclipse, we often find it convenient to assume that the earth goes round the sun and that the stars are millions upon millions of kilometres away. But what of it? Do you suppose it is beyond us to produce a dual system of astronomy? The stars can be near or distant, according as we need them. Do you suppose our mathematicians are unequal to that? Have you forgotten doublethink?'

Reality can only exist as we perceive it, filtered through our minds. In a way, the question of whether capital-T Truth exists is irrelevant; if everyone believes something to be true, does it matter whether or not it is really True? I tend to think not. Perception will always be more important than reality. Our own senses don't even reflect actual reality. Do you know how many ways your brain deceives itself in order to create a cohesive view of reality? It's ridiculous! The point of perception is not to gain insight into Truth, but to find a way to meaningfully interact with the world around you. Your 'world' is filled with an infinite number of inconsistencies, too many to imagine. Since we are so inherently inhibited in our ability to know actual reality, Truth is unobtainable. Because it is unobtainable, it doesn't matter, only perception does.

Exactly, exactly what Husserl, Sartre and later Camus arrived at. Husserl's work proved that neither our reasoning or senses could lead to truth because they were both products of our consciousness so there is no objective truth beyond our subjective reality like above. The meaning of life is the struggle for meaning.

Sartre's concept of the Absurd: we struggle to find meaning in a meaningless existence.

Camus: “You will never be happy if you continue to search for what happiness consists of. You will never live if you are looking for the meaning of life.” Existence is meaningless, but we can find happiness in our efforts to make meaning of it, in each moment, for ourselves

So yeah not that I disagree with anyone because as I just put above everything is part of our subjective reality. I was just including some popular philosopher thought to support people's ideas.

And also Camus important question: "“Should I [go do a dead for PG purposes], or have a cup of coffee?” 

 

Edited October 13, 2020 by Scout_Fox

[Scarletfox]

5 hours ago, Ixthos said:

This is quickly ballooning, and I am feeling a sense of panic at the urge to respond to everyone here, so I apologise if this doesn't seem directed at anyone here, but I don't think I will be able to post otherwise. And likewise I apologise if I repeat something that has been said already - I'll be going back over this post and upvoting later, but for now I just need to say this.

 

There seems to be an issue here between Beliefs and Facts. Two views are expressed here about Truth - the question of which of the two, between beliefs and facts it belongs to, and if we ignore the word truth and focus entirely on beliefs and facts, if facts actually exist. For the first question, the question of which of the two the word Truth applies, that is down to personal usage of that word, and becomes meaningless semantics and circular reasoning if arguing about it. In that sense it is like arguing if the word "plane" means a flat piece of ground or a mathematical surface. Someone can tell the truth, but that is only what they believe and they could be wrong - someone can declare 1+1=2, and that is a fact that doesn't depend on what others think. 1+1=2 is true, and it will always be true, and always was true, even before humans existed. Peas taste disgusting unless turned into a soup is something I believe to be true, but someone could make a dish that contains peas that I like, and that belief would change. Again, this is just asking the question "do you think the word truth applies to belief or to fact", and while I think it should only apply to the latter it has become part of the English language to use it in both, and that annoys me, but so long as everyone agrees on a system its fine, as we still have the words belief and fact to clear up ambiguity. I think truth should only be used for fact, but I also believe people should spell "colour" and "honour" with a u. This is a thing of language and about successfully communicating ideas, and as long as you are talking to someone who knows what you mean (when you say jelly they know you mean the desert and not the spread) that is fine.

 

The second issue then is if facts are independent of beliefs. Consider, for a moment. I have seen a few posts saying "if there is no such thing as a fact, is that itself a fact?" To this person - I could kiss you, and I will be upvoting you later. Not right now though, I'm still worked up and will need to leave this thread for a bit :-P This is very much a key point. Anyone who says "there are no facts, no objective reality, nothing that doesn't come from within you", also has to admit the following:

• Anyone who disagrees with you on anything isn't wrong - if they think there are facts, then accordingly they are right, because everyone's beliefs are just as valid.
  • Therefore there is no objective morality - no action taken can ever be wrong because wrong is your opinion
  • You cannot disagree with anyone's reasoning, even if it is faulty or contains paradoxes or contradictions, because if they don't think those contradictions exist, then 
• Anyone who suffers from a disease or sickness of harm hasn't actually been harmed, they only think they have been. Anyone killed in a war or suffering any other damage is only experiencing that because they THINK they are, and if they changed their beliefs then - as facts are beliefs - they would be fine.
  • All your problems are because of you, and no-one else, because any actions they take are just the ones you choose to believe they took - and it has to be a choice, because if they didn't 
• Science cannot discover anything meaningful about the world, as anything science discovers, and any mathematical law, any invention, doesn't actually follow the principles discovered, for those discoveries are just "what the scientist believes". Nothing can be proven.
  • History is a lie - if you believe the Egyptians were a race of cats from outer space, then they were. If you believe colonialism never happened, then it didn't.
  • Technology works because of magic smoke.
• Rhythm of War isn't coming out in a few weeks - it will come out the moment you believe it does, and if I believe it already came out then it did, and you can't say I am wrong, only that you think I am wrong, but your belief I am wrong doesn't override my believe I am right, for if it did that would mean my belief is less valid than yours, no matter who I am or how many people believe me

 

If facts don't exist, is that conclusion itself a fact? That is very much the underlying question. And if someone says "no facts exist other than the fact that no facts exist", why is this an exception?

 

There is, of course, a third definition of Truth, and one that can be proven. That proof is a man who is also God, and will return. That is either truth or falsehood, and if falsehood then I and those like me are the most pitiable people in the whole world, but if it is truth then the One who is True, who knows what is true, will one day remove all confusion and ambiguity.

Thank you thank you thank you! I could kiss you back! I have reasonable support that there is a God... The discussion of the existence of God shouldn’t be shied away from unless there’s anyone here who is sensitive to that kind of thing. God and truth are pretty closely intertwined.

6 hours ago, Doomstick said:

but since truth is not real, does it really matter?

shots fired

Actually mine would be religious as well, I was just pointing out that religious answers don’t need to be specified as ‘religious’ if they’re just as true as the fact that my hair is red. (Sorry I realize it came off as something it wasn’t)

@Scout_Fox

For that comment on Hesselr, he came to a conclusion that reasoning could not be trusted. If he used logic and reasoning to conclude that, how can we trust what he said?

 

The biggest problem with the subjective truth claim is that it relies on the idea of absolute truth to exist, we wouldn’t be arguing if truth were subjective or not if absolute truth didn’t exist, it’s something engrained to the human nature. The existence of truth is something we’re born knowing, just as we’re born knowing it’s bad to kill. Scoutfox (I think it was you, sorry I’m on my phone so it’s really hard to navigate) you said that morality is also subjective to society. My question would be this: in Nazi Germany, their society said it was ok to murder the Jews, does that make it ok?

Edited October 13, 2020 by Scarletfox

[Bearer of all agonies]

Truth is a very nice Sharder. 

[Turtle]

I think I found a ton of lightweavers. Wow, this thread is so interesting to read. I don't have much to bring up here but I would like to bring up Szeth, his concept of truth and the concept of truth to whoever banished him. Does truth have to be something you can clearly see, for can it be something you believe to be true, even if it isn't? Did the leaders of the shin have truth, even though they where wrong? I hope this makes sense.

Edited October 13, 2020 by eltruT
replaced an of with a to.

[Experience]

1 minute ago, eltruT said:

I think I found a ton of lightweavers. Wow, this thread is so interesting to read. I don't have much to bring up here but I would like to bring up Szeth, his concept of truth and the concept of truth of whoever banished him. Does truth have to be something you can clearly see, for can it be something you believe to be true, even if it isn't? Did the leaders of the shin have truth, even though they where wrong? I hope this makes sense.

Ya, I think this bleeds into the concept of faith. When you have faith in something, you believe it to be a truth, even though you can't know for an absolute 100% fact that it is actually true. So, when you believe in something I think it is the truth for you but is not necessarily the truth for everyone else.

I think there are three types of truths. First there's the kind of truth that is fact. This is something with unrefutably evidence, such as saying to another human "You are alive." Unless they are dead, it is a fact. Then there's the kind of fact that goes into belief. I think of it more as something that you want/believe to be fact. The first thing that comes to mind is religion. If you believe in God, chances are you don't know for a fact that he exists, but that doesn't make it untrue. On the other hand, for someone who doesn't believe in God won't take that belief as truth. The third kind, I don't know what to call. It's the kind where you say: "That bird is blue." Yes, to you it is blue, or whatever your concept of blue is. But does that make it truth? To a colorblind person it might appear red, making it so that the blueness of the bird is actually false. Another example is tastes. You can describe a taste all you want, but rarely will it ever be the exact same as even one other person, unless described most basically such as "it's sweet." These truths are true for you. There is no opinion about it. It is fact, for you. But it might be a different truth for the person next to you. 

So I think these group into two main types of truth: The type the is funded in absolute fact, and the one that is funded in belief and perspective. I believe that they are both 'truth', just different definitions of the same word.