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Recommended: What is truth
Truth is often something people take for granted. We believe that because we witness or experience something then it’s true. A color-blind person may see a red table as grey and say the table is grey, contending that’s the truth even when everyone else states the table is red. As humans, we have the tendency to base truth off personal experience even if we’re wrong. Indeed, even the majority of people within a community have mistaken the truth. A few centuries ago it was believed the world was flat and, if one sailed far enough, one would quite literally fall off the edge of the Earth. As absurd as it sounds now, in the past it was espoused as undeniable truth.
Interestingly, this occurs with less material truths as well. Take, for example, the moral concepts of slavery. In recent history our supposed truth on the subject has taken a dramatic shift. Whereas previously slavery was seen as the norm, even as a right (based off believed superiority), it’s vehemently rejected now. Because of this, human’s idea of truth has been on constant flux. It may be contended that we do not know what is true and what isn’t. Indeed, our history supports such a claim considering how often we contradict our own beliefs we presume are truth.
What, then, is the most acceptable theory of truth? Perhaps it’s none of the four: correspondence, coherence, pragmatist, and deflationary. Each has undeniably gaping flaws which cause the theory to fail in giving an explanation of the truth. Take, for example, the correspondence theory which states a truth must correspond to a fact. First, we must define what fact is. Perhaps one definition is something that can be physically verified and always be the case. What, then, of moral truths? The correspondence theo...
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...ll, or is the pragmatist theory correct? Perhaps, then, the pragmatist theory is closest to how humans behave, even if how we behave is not always in accordance with an ultimate truth.
In the end, no current definition of truth satisfies me. I even fail to convince myself of my own beliefs on truth; there’s always a contradiction and flaw. Perhaps the question for everyday use is not of truths, but of good. That is to say, we should focus on providing good for ourselves, others, humanity, and the world. Of course, there’s the insatiable curiosity resting in humans and, especially so, philosophers. We seek the truth even as it effortlessly eludes us and because of this we cannot so easily dismiss it. It’s an integral part of our life; after all, if we find the truth then we also are able to answer many other philosophical inquiries, even on the meaning of humanity.
Many of us hold onto our beliefs or myths even when we are presented with evidence proving our beliefs to be false. In the article, “When ears don’t hear, truth is futile” by Leonard Pitts Jr. he states, “When people are determined to believe a lie, there is nothing more futile than the truth.” (para. 16) Why is that? As human beings sometimes it is easier to hold onto our fabricated worldviews, this allows us to stay and rest in our comfortable bubbles. If we were to appropriately assess truthful information presented to us, we might experience cognitive turmoil, our biased truths becomes lies, and ultimately we now have information that would either force a lifestyle change or we “bury our head in the sand” so to speak. In the article Leonard
The Student Guide to Liberal Learning encourages apprentices to consider the significance of what is truth? James Schall, explains the nature of the universe as an open door to seek guidance through the knowledge of the great thinkers as an attempt to better comprehend the ultimate truth of our reality as a whole, to understand how things perfectly align with each other and how to find the ultimate truth that humanity continuously seeks. Furthermore, Schall states that: “…the truth comes from reality itself, from what is. Truth is our judgment about reality.” Schall lays out the initial quest as form of “clear knowledge of truth” while he persuades to stimulate and spark the curiosity of students to seek his or her own truth of reality through a two-step process:
Socrates once said, “The unexamined life is not worth living.” He questioned the very nature of why things were the way they were, while never settling for simple, mundane answers. Socrates would rather die searching for the truth than live accepting what he considered a blatant lie. I like to think of myself the same way. I too would rather examine the wonders of life rather than accept what I am just told. The truth is some can’t handle the truth. I on the other hand welcome it with earnest anticipation and fervent enthusiasm.
In the article, “Why We Believe Obvious Untruths”, by Philip Fernbach, Fernbach argues that people need to realize their individual ignorance in order to differentiate truths from lies. He believes that people are quick to believe anything they are told, even is what they are being told is obviously untrue. Fernbach convinces us of the nescience of human nature through the use of logical reasoning, scientific evidence, and a clever metaphor.
That's why a series of half-truths and exaggerations are each a small part of the truth. The truth is an enigmatic cloud, a mystery; at its very core is truth. This truth can never be obtained, only hinted upon. The ideas that make up this cloud are each different yet circle a similar theme, which is the real truth. Some of these concepts may be at opposite ends and completely dissimilar, but are each a part of the truth.
“Truth is like the sun. You can shut it out for a time, but it ain't goin' away”- Elvis Presley. In my mind, truth is defined as being in accordance with fact or reality. There will always be truth to every situation, as it is only possible for something to occur in one specific way. The problem encompassing the idea of truth is the reality that only one retelling of a specific situation can be the full truth. Each individual interprets situations differently. For this reason, in order for the truth to be told, one must simply state what was seen, leaving their personal emotions out of the situation. A story can be said to be true when it accurately portrays the account of which is being told.
As Larry says, “To hell with the truth! As the history of the world proves, the truth has no bearing on anything. It's irrelevant and immaterial, as the lawyers say” (O’Neill, pg. 12). Larry makes a good point that we don’t really have any basis to call something true and something untrue. There are certain things that are obviously true but humans tend to view their popular beliefs with the same validity as scientific fact. And anyone who opposes it is seen as wrong and crazy. It could be possible that maybe the things society deems true are actually just a distortion of our damaged minds and that the opinions we view as crazy are actually true. It is in human nature to protect ourselves from things that may cause us harm and things we don’t understand because we fear the
We, as human beings, tend to think that the truth is what we believe to be true. But the truth is the truth even if no one believes that it is the truth. We also think that the truth brings unpleasantness, and that we hate telling the truth. “The challenge of the sage is to decode the clues and solve the underlying riddle of existence, our own and that of the cosmos.” (The Sage). The relation between this quotation and my life is that, I always want to search for the truth, and telling the truth is another
Lastly, I believe that the definition of truth can correspond with my beliefs. Although I don’t believe truth is relative, I believe that the definition of truth as a foundation, support or root is very true. When I read it, I immediately thought of Jeremiah 17:7-8: “But blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in him. He will be like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream. It does not fear when heat comes; its leaves are always green. It has no worries in a year of drought and never fails to bear fruit.” I think it is beautiful how well the definition of “truth” in the Aztec language harmonizes with Scripture.
In the book The Other Side of Truth by Beverley Naidoo, many cultural conflicts have happened throughout the book. One cultural conflict was about Sade’s background. Two girls in her class named Marcia and Donna keep on bullying her based on her background. The text states, “They make trouble. They don’t like Africans.
Everyone always thinks they hold the truth. The Word of God can be a convincing argument for those who rely on faith to survive. The word of man, however, makes a stronger point, as it demonstrates how foolish and artificial our beliefs can sometimes be, and how they can change and evolve with time.
in the minds of people that prevent them from understanding (and accepting as true) the
Can we truly know when something can be considered true or false. The truth can be something that appeals to a person, or that it can reason with a person's knowledge that they have already develop. The knowledge we possess can shape the way we think, so does this also change the in the truth that a person sees. Our knowledge also limits us to what we considered to be true. In our century every year we discover something new so our truth is constantly changing. One of the conflicts that also comes to mind when talking about true and false is whether a true belief counts as knowledge depends on inherently imprecise judgments concerning whether the believer is accidentally right. To analyze the claim I am going to look at the three different theories of truth and how in everything true there is a false aspect to it. The theories are first, the correspondence theory. Second, coherence theory, and lastly pragmatic theory.
Truth can be defined as conformity to reality or actuality and in order for something to be “true” it must be public, eternal, and independent. If the “truth” does not follow these guidelines then it cannot be “true.” Obviously in contrary anything that goes against the boundaries of “truth” is inevitably false. True and false, in many cases does not seem to be a simple black and white situation, there could sometimes be no grounds to decide what is true and what is false. All truths are a matter of opinion. Truth is relative to culture, historical era, language, and society. All the truths that we know are subjective truths (i.e. mind-dependent truths) and there is nothing more to truth than what we are willing to assert as true (Hammerton, Matthew). A thing to me can be true while for the other person it may not be true. So it depends from person to person and here the role of perception comes into play. As truth is a vital part of our knowledge, the distinctions between what is true and what is false, shape and form the way we think and should therefore be considered of utmost importance. We often face this situation in real life through our learning curves and our pursuit of knowledge to distinguish between what is true and what is false. The idea of there being an absolute truth or also known as universal truth has been debated for centuries. It depends on many factors such as reason, perception and emotion.
...evident of what a person sees as fact, and what they would observe. We see different theories of truth and how to find truth, but the one that is more commonly used by philosophers would be the correspondence theory, and ones who would not usually subscribe to the correspondence theory because of its complexity would sometimes follow the coherence theory.