Is truth subjective or objective?

[cxim]

odd how history can be factual.... even recent history ....

 

[AvesPKS]

<< Nothing is absolute. >>



Isn't that an absolute statement in of itself?

If I score 300 in a game of bowling, that's an absolute score. I cannot get any higher than that. If I then score a 0 in another game, again, this is an absolute score. Of course, this may just be a RELATIVE absolute, but is an absolute, nonetheless. I also like the point raised about the earth being flat. As this applies to truths, so this also applies (after a fashion) to absolutes. Whether we are able to obtain the absolutes is beside the point. Will we ever be able to reach absolute zero? Probably not. That doesn't mean that it does not exist. Similiarly, we will never be able to design a 100% efficient engine. However, does this mean, that as a model, as an ABSOLUTE, as an upper bound, it is not an absolute? Of course not.

 

[Elledan]

<< Not necissarily, datalink7. If the truth is being real than those people sometimes called Avatars, or perfect men, would be embodyments of truth, living exemplars, such as Christ. >>

And do you've any prove for this? Can you really prove that Christ was objective?
The bible doesn't count as proof, for it's a myth and myths have the nasty property to be unreliable when used as proof.

Like I said in my earlier post in this thread, I don't think that it's possible for any intelligence to be objective.

Emotions, desires, morals, your view on what's wrong and right and your upbringing mixed together make it impossible to be objective.

Christ was a normal guy from a (for that time) normal family, with more children. He had an idea and wanted to use it to either improve the world, or only to become famous himself, or both.
Was he therefore objective? No, not in the least.

 

[Moonbeam]

My dear cmix, You have such a burning need to hurt I would under normal conditions just ignore you and let you rave on. But you posted something in another thread that made me feel a real sympathy for you. For that reason I'll respond. You see my dear man, I did not vote for Clinton because I didn't like his morals. You, like the mighty Corn, are tilting at windmills inventing and slaying dragons all of your own making. About me and my morals you haven't even the faintest notion. And you like Corn have the notion that you know something, that what you know is right, and that being right gives you the right to try to hurt people who think differently. That is a very tiring trait. I don't want to tell you what to do but you should be able to see that the people who are the nastiest are the ones who have been put down the worst and the ones maybe most in need of personal work. But if all this does is piss you off even more, maybe I can save you some of another kind of work. I have felt unbelievable pain. I know, I remember.

 

[PakG1]

My thoughts on truth will come later. This first.

<<The bible doesn't count as proof, for it's a myth and myths have the nasty property to be unreliable when used as proof.>>

OK, moot point. This in itself, you can't say. You have no proof that it is a myth and many historians will agree that the Bible is historically accurate. Not only that, true science never once contradicts the Bible. Most schools of thought won't actually, unless the guy who is speaking is atheist. I have yet to come across someone who can prove that the Bible is a myth.

<<Christ was a normal guy from a (for that time) normal family, with more children. He had an idea and wanted to use it to either improve the world, or only to become famous himself, or both.
Was he therefore objective? No, not in the least.

Someone who claims to be the Son of God is either:
a) leading a cult
b) insane
c) the Son of God

From any of these perspectives, he would NOT be objective. Nobody can be objective because we all come from a certain perspective, our own perspective. Be it yours or mine (or even God's if you believe in him), that perspective will keep you from being objective IN THE SENSE that you will be willing to contradict your own set-in-stone ways to keep no bias in your thoughts. So if I'm a police officer, of course I'm going to arrest a guy who broke the law, no matter what his story. That's something I have to do, he broke the law despite his background, way of thinking, etc. What needs to be decided then is how to deal with him in court. That's not my job, that's someone else's biased work (biased because it needs to follow the law and valid or cogent arguments from the prosecution and defence). Perhaps one view is closer to the truth than another.

Now, my thoughts on truth.

It exists objectively because if it doesn't, who are we? Without objective truth, we cannot be defined (whether as living things, races, or whatever) because it will be up in the air from so many different views. There is no final answer. It's like the difference between a theory and a theorem.

 

[Moonbeam]

Elledan, the Bible is the last thing I'd offer as proof. If you read the Bible with a faith that Jesus is God I think you can see indications that something way beyond some need for popularity was going on there. Unfortunately, I can't read it quite that way. Now if you read it with the notion that there is a different state of consciousness from which Jesus spoke and compare what he said to what others who seem to have experienced the same stat say, you may get the feeling that there really may be a way of seeing that is totally revolutionary to what we call consciousness. The key I focus on is a state that might be called Oceanic Love, total love of everything. I can't prove anything, but I point to the feeling that there are absolutes in spite of apparent subjectivity as a hint that we have a direct link to that state, that that was where we first were and from which we feel a separation.

 

[EpsiIon]

#1 Truth is objective.
#2 There are absolutes.

To say either of the above statements is false is to contradict oneself:


Evidence for #1 ----
A quote from Damaged:
&quot;Well, for all you subjectivists, there is at least one objective truth: truth is subjective. &quot;


Evidence for #2 ----
To say there are no absolutes is an absolute statement. &quot;There are absolutely no absolutes!&quot;


I'd be willing to discuss this with anybody, but I can't guarantee I'll have access to this thread all the time. So, if you have something that you think can stump logic, please PM me and I'd be happy to debate it with you.


Epsilon

 

[FrontlineWarrior]

Subjective truth is not truth at all.

I don't know whether objective truth is something that can be described. To say objective truth &quot;exists&quot; sounds odd but how else could we say it? I think my inability to understand the nature of truth leads me to believe that there is no truth.

 

[EpsiIon]

Moonbeam:

Forgive me if I say mentioning Jesus and what you call Oceanic Love in the same thought seems a bit sacreligious to me. Jesus did not (does not) love everything (It's important to make that distinction because he loved [loves] everybody). Have you seen the passage where Jesus drives the dealers / etc. out of a temple. I'm not quite sure of the exact reference or quote, but it's essentially, &quot;How dare you turn my Father's house into a marketplace!?&quot; He obviously didn't love what they were doing, did he?

I'm too tired to go on... bedtime!

Epsilon

 

[cxim]

OH Moonbeam ... I have no pain .... I detest liars ....

I find it of interest that you want to discuss truth, when you have such a penchance for deception &amp; distortion....

therefore, I guess this has some relevance to you... you want truth to be relative so that you can justify your own actions ... for you truth is relative, That is obvious... but it does not validate your position...

subjective truth is real &amp; practiced every day... that it is common does not make it honest...

we all have a simple word for subjective truth ... lie

we can quibble about who is injured by a lie, or if the subject was important... in the end, tho, we recognize a lie for what it is, a simple garden variety dishonest act.

 

[pamchenko]

cxim, could u either PM me or post for all of us what thread you are talking about...moonbeam yelled at me in one of my threads and I don't like moonbeam already ...

 

[Double Trouble]

Even 'statements of fact' that might seem to be objective 'truth' are not. Take for example the statement made in this thread about the earth being round. Well, if someone said &quot;the earth is round&quot;, most would concur with that statement being 'truth'... however, we all know it's not perfectly round, it's more of an oval. So once again, 'truth' boils down to the framing of the question and the context for truth.

As for Moonbeam's question on truth as it relates to human evolution, I think our concept of 'right and wrong' has evolved over thousands of years based on actions that have either enhanced or decreased our chances of survival. Those early humans that did not adequately protect the young in their helpless state would have less chance to survive, and would thus vanish in terms of evolution. Survival is the name of the game.

In modern times, survival is not so much a matter of right or wrong anymore, and as such, we as a society have had to start making decisions and rules as to what is right or wrong. Right and wrong are clearly subjective in this context.

 

[syzygy]

yes, i agree with hanpan, damaged, skoorb, and like minded ot'ers who believe truth is not
subject (or victim) to personal whim, factors of culture, the time of day, political ideology,
or other mitigating temporal influences. there needs to be one established, universally held core of beliefs to guide all institutions in their duties. one rational standard of moral truth does
in fact define many of the internationally approved laws of human rights, irregardless of cultural vagaries, as applied by the united nations, numerous signed treaties, and national
laws.

 

[Moonbeam]

&quot;OH Moonbeam ... I have no pain .... I detest liars ....&quot; Please cxim, YOU HAVE NO PAIN IS A WHOOPING LIE OBVIOUS TO ALL. The reason you need to have some sympathy for liars is to have some sympathy for yourself, enough, so that seeing how you lie isn't so painful that you can't do it. You remind me of that movey where they got this baseball player in a straight jacket and somebody makes the comment that he's gone nuts because of pressure from his father. He's frothing around screaming if it wasn't for my father, I wouldn't be where I am today.

pamchenko, do your own defending. Quote where I where I yelled at you. It's gonna be a tough life if everybody that takes a different tack than you is gonna be somebody you don't like. I don't know the instance you're refering to, but it might just be that I replied to you because I thought enough of you to do so. If not maybe I'll apologize, so go for it.

EpsiIon, You understand that I come at Christianity not as a believer in that one single instance of Godhood. I see an other explanation behind the text and so I don't get bogged down in this or that instance. I'm looking at a more general picture in which your counter instance holds no weight. I believe there is a state of consciousness in which paradox is resolved under a greater understanding in much the same way that, in physics, forces unite at greater temperatures.


tagej, you have all the right data and yet I think you arrive at the wrong conclusion. Our nature evolved over millions of years and remains identical to what it was thousands of years ago. Just as we are still anatomically human in a modern society, we remain psychicly human as well. That means that our determination of right and wrong is derived from, or is underpined by, our human pattern. I think we are the joyous ape and not the killer ape and the reason that I think so is because of the identicalness I perceive in the teachings of our most spiritually advanced. Clearly, though, this kind of truth is the product of an inner journey, self realization, and not something you can get from a book.

I sense an enormous sadness in the world among those who have no traditional faith and yet still feel that pull or yearning for that something which I woud call the gravitating body of our own inner true nature. I think it's really there. For those who are religious, I can also see no way to distinguish it from God.

 

[UG]

Entity pegged it.

<...Truth, by nature, is relative to the perspective of the individual...>

Truth, as an absolute, is relative. Absolutes exist only on the local scale where they are defined by mutual agreement.

On larger scales, nothing is absolute because mutual agreement is not possible: things happen for one observer out of sight of another observer and so agreement between such observers must be based on trust, not on mutual experience.

Trust is not always trustworthy.

No truth can be Known to be universal.

 

[Hanpan]

The problem with this argument is 90% of the people here don't know what truth is. There are logically only two states of something. Are or are not. For example when one says the earth is round it is a sentence. A sentence cannot have a truth value. However this sentence expresses a proposition. Name the the mass we call earth is roughly sherical in shape. If you mean someting else you must state it. For people who don't follow take the following instance.

John says olives taste good.
Steve says olives taste bad.

One could argue that this makes truth (wether olives taste good) subjective but if one looks at the propositions not the setences one will see this is not true.

Watch

John is really saying that &quot;at this moment in time to the best recollection of memory the substance defined in teh englsih language as an olive enactes pleasureable taste sensations in my taste receptor cells when ingested by myself.&quot;

Steve says the same thing except relace plesurable will unpleasant.

In such a way both propositions can be true yet truth stays obejective. Truth is based on the way things are not what we think of them. FOr example if everyone on earth were coulor blind grass would still be green. We could call it vert or grune(sp?) or whatever you want to describe the colour. YOu could call grass lala or whatever you want but it wouldn't change teh way the grass is or the truth. Consider teh following proposition as well. ON feb 4th 1258 the population of the world was odd. Now there is probably no way to tell the truth of this but it is either true or false and never both. Futhermore everything is either true or false. TEh only subjective thing is the definition of terms. But subjective definition of terms in no ways infers subjectivity of truth.

 

[poop]

Moonbeam is talking about Truth, not truth. There is a big difference.

I am a noncognitivist, so I don't believe in Truth. It doesn't make sense to me.

The reason I get along in life with no Truth, no Right or Wrong, no Good or Evil, is that I realize it is all subjective. I think the quote goes, &quot;Man is the measure of all things.&quot; I really believe this. We come up with our own versions of right and wrong, moral codes, and live by them. These codes make sense to us as humans. They help us to propogate the species and follow our instincts.

Killing is bad, because it is bad for the species.
Stealing is bad, because if everyone stole, there would be chaos. (Chaos is not good for society. It makes life less enjoyable/livable)
Adultery is bad, or at least it used to be, because it spreads disease.

These things are judged bad because they are detrimental to our species. There is no natural law, as CS Lewis tauts, that govenrs these things. It is simple to rationalize nearly every facet of right and wrong that many attribute to a metaphysical entity.

 

[Hanpan]

Poop you are sadly mistaken. We make up for ourselves wether murder is wrong or right etc. This however doesn't make it true. Remeber truth is way things are. If we couldn't go into outer space and see the world was round in shape (not perfectly spherical but round in nature) it would still be so. Truth is not defined by interpretation. Truth is beyond that. Murder is either wrond or right. I'm not sayng which it is just that it can't be both.

 

[Entity]

I believe Nietzsche pegged it when he said:



<< We still do not yet know where the drive for truth comes from. For so far we have heard only of the duty which society imposes in order to exist: to be truthful means to employ the usual metaphors. Thus, to express it morally, this is the duty to lie according to a fixed convention, to lie with the herd and in a manner binding upon everyone. Now man of course forgets that this is the way things stand for him. Thus he lies in the manner indicated, unconsciously and in accordance with habits which are centuries? old; and precisely by means of this unconsciousness and forgetfulness he arrives at his sense of truth. From the sense that one is obliged to designate one thing as ?red,? another as ?cold,? and a third as ?mute,? there arises a moral impulse in regard to truth. >>



Rob

 

[UG]

<...The problem with this argument is 90% of the people here don't know what truth is...>

The problem with generalities, especially those claimed to be supported by unattributed statistics, is that they are seldom true.

 

[UG]

Still, I agree. Though truth is individually relative, by-in-large, too many people look to others for confirmation of personal truth.

 

[Hanpan]

The problem with words such as cold is they are open to interpretation. AN inuit native of norhtern canada might think -50 Celcius and colder is cold while a native of hawaii might think colder than 10C is cold. However When on clearly defines the terms truth is not subjective. In fact it is never subjective, but hard to discern when things are left to interpretation.

 

[Hooobi]

truth?

errrr... sorry

doesn't ring a bell

H

 

[Moonbeam]

Entity, I think your Neitzsche quote is not dissimilar to wnat I spoke of as the appearence of duality out of language. My point has been that there appear to be numbers of people, for whom some personal qualities seem to attract lots of believers, that there is some state of mind equivalent to the collapse of dualistic thinking and a return to original mind.

UG, 'No truth can be Known to be universal.&quot; In a room full of people some of whom are awake and some asleep, those who are awake recognize each other. If there is something real to the phenomenon we could lump under the umbrella, enlightenment, people who have not experienced it would make poor witnesses to the possibility. I am merely suggesting, as as a reality implied by shadows on the wall of a cave, that there is strong evidence that here and there some people stumble, or are led into a transcendent reality, the same one every time. Something about the experience confers a sense of certainty that this is indeed Truth, and worth seeking.

 

[PakG1]

<<No truth can be Known to be universal>>

Someone already said this before, but who cares. If the above semantics denote a truth, then there is a universal truth.

hehe, hanpan, I see you've taken some courses in philosophy/critical thinking! Love those courses.

edit: Oh yeah, one thing. It's also possible that we're all talking crap here. We have a certain realm of knowledge and it is finite. As some mathematician proved (Gurdel?), we won't be able to figure it all out. Induction can only get us so far outside of the box.