Hi pamchenko:
Sorry for the delay in responding. I checked the thread as soon as I had a chance.
Thanks for responding. BTW, I didn't plagiarize my post. Nor did I spend a large amount of time actually writing it. But I do spend a lot of time thinking about the issues this thread raises, soo I tried to use "shorthand" and metaphor to communicate ideals that are not easily communicated in perhaps any setting, much less a BBS. ALthough I did not plagiarize, I am not claiming that my thoughts are truly original, because I have certainly been influenced by other's thinkings a great deal. Perhaps truth is never original, only newly discovered or rediscovered?
The original question was: Is truth subjective or objective? I suppose I would start the way Mr. Palco did in his reply: define the terms. I tried to suggest that there is a difference between truth and facts. In the last three hundred years of western thinking, perhaps no real distinction has been made between the two ideas. I think Descartes is one who perhaps summarizes the western point of view. In the 17th century, Descartes split the mind and body into two spheres, with the body belonging to science and the mind belonging to metaphysics. This split is useful, but I believe in the end it is arbitrary and does not accurately reflect all of reality. By splitting the mind from the body and the metaphysical from the scientific, western society was able to protect itself from the superstition and apparent subjectivity of any supposed metaphysical realm, but at what cost? Now we have facts, but no unifying theory of truth or meaning or purpose that gives existence a transcendent meaning. We have more facts than we can deal with. We live in the information age. But we also live in the most suicidal, depressed, nihilistic age western society has seen in the last millenia. We look at the "facts" as we understand them and teach survival of the fittest and then are shocked when a ten year old blows someone away over a pair of shoes. More is caught than taught. Ideals sink in, even if only subconsciously. We tell people that murder is wrong, but we teach a system of existence that leaves very little evidence to suggest why murder is "wrong." Then we are shocked when surburbanite, well-provisioned children murder without much of a second thought or any obvious and prolonged regret. The facts of a defiant naturalism that denies the possibility of any spiritual metaphysic leave our society without any objective "truth" or "Way" that gives a foundation upon which we can build. If you want a short book that addresses something of this concept, I would recommend The Abolition of Man by C.S. Lewis
Plus, some aspects of modern science are beginning to show that Descartes' divide, however pragmatic and useful, is not correct. I might suggest The Einstein Factor by Will Wenger and Richard Poe, The Holographic Universe (I forget the author's name), or Molecules of Emotion by Candace Pert to give you serious evidence that the presuppositions of militant naturalism are not sufficient to account for the data.
I believe Personality is greater than matter, that a non-material Consciousness is the best explanation for the existing of the material universe, that the Foundation of Existence is ultimately non-local and non-physical. If these beliefs have any merit, then Truth is greater than the individual facts that we can ever hope to accumulate through naturalism. Hence, truth is greater than "the body" side of things that Descartes compartmentalized. It touches on the metaphysic, the poet, the myth-maker, and the artist. A person walking in the truth sees the sunset and says, "That is beautiful." And recognizes that the sunset is worthy of evoking that response. That a failure to give that response is not just do to the subjective taste or whim of the individual. A failure to recognize beauty is a failure to BE what we are supposed to be. Hence, there is a calling, a Voice seeking to elicit a response:
Here the song of all creation say Hosanna
Here the sun and moon and stars say Hosanna
Listen to the ocean waves and here what the thunder says
Hosanna to the King of Kings.
Michael Card, Hosanna
Although I am a Christian, all of the references I gave you are non-Christian as far as I know, and often agnostic or atheistic. The exceptions are C.S. Lewis' The Abolition of Man and Michael Card's song Hosanna.