Wednesday, December 31, 2008

thought of the day.170

Truth is an idea about reality and is therefore dependent on and limited by mind; whereas reality exists independently of and uncompromised by mind.
Posted by at

5 comments:

homesicksooner said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
January 3, 2009 at 1:27 PM
homesicksooner said...

If this is the case, then truth is relative. Christians, naturalists, new agers, pantheists and so forth all have ideas about reality. Mutually exclusive truth claims can't be true at the same time in the same way.

Can God exist and not exist at the same time in the same way? If relativism is true then God can exist and not exist at the same time and in the same way.

If you want the word idea in your definition of truth, I think a better definition of truth would be an idea that corresponds to reality. This definition makes truth objective rather than relative.

The 18th century philosopher, John Locke (who was also an empiricist) defined truth as that which corresponds to reality. I see no reason to try and improve upon this definition.

One thing to keep in mind if you are a relativist is that there is no way to deny absolute truth without affirming it.

January 3, 2009 at 8:27 PM
john evans said...

I think Locke’s definition of truth is very good but does not go quite far enough.

Reality and truth are not the same thing. Reality exists independent of mind, truth is dependent of mind.

Mind is a flawed filter of reality not a copy. Therefore truth—or what we think corresponds to reality—is indeed relative to whatever mind is observing reality.

January 12, 2009 at 12:26 PM
john evans said...

To be clear, I am not suggesting reality itself is relative . There is an objective reality—at least as far as we can tell—but the problem is, we are only human and are limited in our ability to comprehend and regurgitate it.

January 12, 2009 at 12:31 PM
Janet Greene said...

Homesicksooner, I think you may have misunderstood the quote. To paraphrase, reality exists independently of our minds. There is an actual reality, I believe, but we as humans are always limited in our understanding of reality because of our experiences, prejudices, beliefs, the way we grew up, etc.

I believe in relativism to the extent that nobody has a grasp of the "whole truth"...Much like the 5 blind men who were asked to describe an elephant. One touched a leg, and described that; another touched the trunk, and decribed it; yet another the body, the tail, and so on. None of them were wrong, but none of them were right either. I think the only way we eventually come to anything resembling truth is to keep our humility; not to believe strongly in any dogma, unless strongly supported by evidence, and then be willing to change our beliefs as the evidence changes. We must listen openly to others and learn as much as we can. At no time should we ever think that we have "truth". I feel that I have found some "truth" for myself, but I am still learning and evolving. I will be different in 5 years than I am now; my beliefs may have evolved also.

And homesicksooner, I agree that the best conception of truth is that which corresponds best to reality. You may wish to ask yourself:

1. Is it reasonable that, out of all the religions and beliefs in the world, christianity is the only true religion, when other religions believe as strongly as you do that THEY have the only truth faith?

2. Do you think that if you had been born into a muslim family, you would probably be blogging about the truth of Islam instead of christianity?

3. Does it correspond to reality that the bible is literally true; meaning that the earth is only 6000 years old (in spite of the evidence that we are 13.7 billion years old)?

4. Does it correspond to reality that Jesus performed all those miracles, but there is no record of these miracles other than the bible itself? Doesn't is seem as though such an incredible thing would have been written about at the time it happened? Especially since he cured the sick, walked on water, and then rose from the dead? Yet the books of the new testament are all many years, even centuries, after the fact...

5. If Jesus performed miracles so freely in the new testament, why has he never provided us with any evidence of his existence? I can tell you that if Jesus appeared before me, like a ghost, and showed me the nail scars, then walked through my wall, I may reconsider my views on christianity.

6. If god created us, I assume he created us to reason. Why, then, is it essential that we put aside the god-given ability to reason (which is what separates us from animals) in order to believe the spectacular and supernatural claims of the bible?

I could go on and on, but I'm sure you get the point! Thanks for listening.

January 12, 2009 at 12:34 PM

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)