The View from 40,000 FT and the Tip of Ones Nose

[honorentheos]

The subject of truth came up elsewhere, specifically the question, “…but really how does one discern truth?”

My view was captured well by another friend who suggested it wasn’t ours to know truth in any objective way. At best, we can seek understanding if objective truth is beyond our ken.

I thought it worth exploring a bit more as it can seem like a rather radical position to hold. Some years back I was discussing my early conclusion that certainty over what is true was an illusion, and our innate resistance to accepting this was very, very strong. The person with whom I was discussing this made a comment, “If you don’t know things are actually true, and just go around believing we are deluded into assuming what we believe is true is actually true, how do you ever actually accomplish anything?”

It was a good question in many ways. I think it highlights one of the problems we face with this. That being either truth is objective and accessible, and therefore it’s possible someone has it all figured out. Or truth is unknowable, but to function we need to act as if truth is something actionable therefore what we regard as truth may be true but purely in a subjective way.

I came to a few conclusions about that.

First, in both cases we should be required to justify our belief in something (philosophically claiming knowledge of something is to have justified true belief about that thing) so regardless of whether truth is objective and accessible or not, there is an obligation for finding, vetting, and understanding evidence to support it.

Second, if we can’t rule out the possibility no one has it right, attempts to justify belief using circular arguments (arguments that require us to assume the belief is first true to be able to then apply them as evidence) do not qualify as strong evidence. Their potential bias must be seen as a cause for skepticism. Explanations for why one should buy Amway products that come from Amway should be considered biased and not sufficient justification or able to really serve as evidence on their own. Does the hypothetical super drink PowerJuice 2000 give a person the skills of an Olympic-level track and field athlete? Repeatable, reputable evidence should be required rather than just marketing materials from the makers of PowerJuice 2000 to determine if this is actually the case. In short, one needs external evidence to justify belief.

Finally, there is value in looking at truth in relation to the other two pillars in the Platonic triad of the Good, Beautiful, and True. This triad isn’t unique to Plato but appears in multiple cultures such as in the Bhagavad Gita. Despite what some hipsters and professional artists might say, I don’t believe that beauty is objective in any meaningful sense whatsoever. While we share sufficient biology that there are commonalities between us, it’s proven that culture has a significant influence over our sense of what is beautiful when it comes to music, art, poetry, or any other aesthetic matter. Personal experience matters, individual relationship to the subject of art matters, individual biology matters…clearly beauty IS in the eye of the beholder to a large extent with overlap that can appear to be objective but not conclusively and demonstrably so. And it’s easy to manipulate someone into questioning their own sense of what is beautiful. Someone who is seen as trend setting or an expert can easily persuade someone a particular film is terrible, a band is hack, an art piece is derivative and valueless kitsch. And they can claim something we find unappealing or even repulsive is high design, extremely creative, and demanding a sophistication to appreciate that we don’t want to appear guilty of not possessing. If beauty is subjective, culturally complex, and manipulated what should we then conclude? I suppose it depends on context, but for me if there is no harm done in accepting my own aesthetic sense then so be it. Purely subjective definitions of Beauty are not completely without consequence or ethical demand but pretty close. Leader of Men is a good song, even if Nickelback wrote it.

To come back to justification, does a person need anything more than to say, “I think it’s beautiful” to provide sufficient evidence that it is indeed beautiful to them? I’d say no. But when it comes to overlapping individual aesthetics it gets much more complex, requires different kinds of evidence, and a fair amount of judgement. If I were to recommend a film to someone I’d be negligent to not take what I know about them into consideration and try to overlay it with my own perspective to assess if it’s reasonable to believe they’d also enjoy it. And I have a certain obligation to myself to acknowledge when something appeals to me for reasons that just aren’t likely to be shared by others. A song listened to on a long drive that starts just as the sun comes up over a vista and meshes into some sort of magical moment…that’s not transferable nor reasonable to assume it justifies my personal elevated sense of the song’s merits in a way that means I can assume those merits can be shared by others who didn’t have that experience. So it is with any personal subjective experience that we might be tempted to translate into justification for truth.

Truth and Good both seem to share these same challenges with Beauty when it comes to the question of subjectivity. But society demands there be much more overlap in their expression as norms and values. What is Good, what is True requires cooperative action in society that is meaningful and make demands of our social organizations.

I think part of what feels like society pulling at its own threads right now is due to our focusing a lot on where we disagree on what it true or good, all while assuming that everyone knows why something is true, or why it’s good so those who act differently must be either bad or lovers of lies. It isn’t a reflection of one side of the political divide in America. All sides engage in this, viewing their paradigm as accurate hence those who disagree must be flawed.

This is already too long. But what I am getting at is this: we’re obligated to acknowledge our inabilities to known what it true, what is good, what is beautiful in an objective way and at the same time be cooperative in a social order where not everyone is willing or able to do so. That’s tricky. All the more so because the person making bold claims of absolute knowledge is appealing. Toss all this into a context where the universe may be absolutely indifferent to earth, life on it, human life in general, or the life of any one particular individual human, and it can seem meaningless and even cause for despair.

In the end, there is a quote from Soren Kierkegaard that frames my personal response to all of this:

“Life is not a problem to be solved but a reality to be experienced.”

In an indifferent universe where truth may be murky, good is relative, and beauty highly subjective, there is still the reality that we are improbably alive, we have relationships and are part of something that is and has immense capacity for being beautiful – a billion, billion subjective visions for what that means. Where we can experience what we believe to be good and choose to act accordingly towards one another, and can feel the sparking light of learning. It’s an existence where cause still equals effect so we are above all obligated to consider the consequences of our beliefs and resulting actions before we act.

Life (and all that comes with it) is not a problem to be solved but a reality (subjective as that reality may be) to be experienced.

[Meadowchik]

Great topic and thoughts. I would make a compromise with Kierkegaard: we each have our life experience, each with problems some of which can be solved.

We each can only start with what we know, which is limited, but if we're careful we can sort the best information from the less reliable information. And we can expand that by sharing information. And we can improve the sharing of information by creating standards for doing it. And we can be very careful by remembering there's more we do not know, and we can remind ourselves that we could be wrong. We can use the best (reproducible) information as a touchstone.

[honorentheos]

Hi Meadowchik, I appreciate you reading though that long wandering post. And I think you make good additional points.

One of the most critical aspects I was circling, perhaps not hitting, was that I firmly believe we are closest to the truth of something when we acknowledge that truth isn't something that exists in an objective way to be discovered. Instead, truth is justified by human processes in the same way beauty exists only by human interaction and reaction with a thing. And like you say, this skepticism of our own grasp on what is true should lead us to engage in processes that demand respect of other people's experience as well. We triangulate our way into figuring things out in a way that is justified and aligned with the other subjectively constructed ideas of what it means for something to be good and beautiful through hearing others out, through trial and error, through groping for it in the darkness of our own conceit.

I don't know, and I am unfortunately too busy to spend enough time on it to be succinct...haha.

[Chap]

truth isn't something that exists in an objective way to be discovered

What, in every case? I have to ask, have you ever been hit on the head by a brick? I would say that most people would definitely claim that one knows when that has taken place.

Perhaps it might avoid such problems if you were to say that in the collection of propositions about the world capable of being put into human speech, there is a long spectrum of 'truth'. At one end of it are some propositions such as 'I love you', the truth of which is entirely subjective to the person uttering it. At the other end are ones such as 'bricks falling on your head from a height of 100m will very likely smash your skull and kill you'. Your emotional state and human relationships have no relation to the truth of that statement.

Poetry lives at one end of that spectrum. Science tries to get as close to the other end as it possibly can.

[Doctor CamNC4Me]

I'm really glad you made a passing reference to the Bhagavad Gita. I'm currently reading 'The Three Branches of India's Life-Tree' by Sri Chinmoy, not because I'm a student of Indian philosophy or anything, I'm just trying to wrap my head around, as the cover of the book indicates, the Vedas, Upanishads, and BG. Why am I doing that? Because I'm trying to tap into a different perspective on reality, the reality that we're experiencing.

It's interesting that you're playing around with the notion of just what is truth - objective reality, facts? This has been weighing on my mind for the last few years, the back and forth between what we're forced to concede is reality due to our physical make up and the physical world in which we live, and trying to ascertain just what is this reality in which we exist. It almost feels like a rabbit hole you fall down when you realize that reality is kind of shaky at micro and macro levels, as far as what we can make of it. It's also interesting how reality itself is experienced when you introduce something into our brains, whether it's a philosophy or an intoxicant of some sort. Our perspective of reality changes depending on our ability to observe and experience it.

I wish I had some deeper truth to share other than what we all can pretty much assert from our shared experiences. I don't. Chap is correct - in that there are rules by which we all have to abide in this universe. From his example, we can ascertain gravity is an unassailable fact. We have to accept it. There is nothing else but the truth of gravity, that smaller bodies are attracted to larger bodies. Why is that? Thems the rules, I'm afraid. But isn't it from that point that we can actually start to establish, for this reality, that there are unbreakable rules until we're shown or proven there aren't?

I guess my question, then, for you, is at what point do you break from objective reality, factual reality, to subjective reality?

- Doc

[canpakes]

Instead, truth is justified by human processes in the same way beauty exists only by human interaction and reaction with a thing.

This.

Although, there tends to be some trends regarding the perception of both that are innate. As example, babies or animals with larger eyes appear to be fairly universally ‘cute’. Misshapen mythical critters (think Tolkien’s orcs) appear to be more or less universally ‘unattractive’ - or, at least, folks seem to have a fairly universal idea of how to represent them as such.

The same may hold true for some of what are considered ‘truths’, in the social sense. The discussion of morals and ethics comes to mind. Religious folks will assert that these are defined by their particular version of god, but I don’t find their explanation as satisfactory as those ‘truths’ being borne out of simple evolutionary practicalities.

Nevertheless, Honor, both of these examples are fairly different in scope and process. I don’t mean to derail the discussion with mention of them.

[honorentheos]

truth isn't something that exists in an objective way to be discovered

What, in every case? I have to ask, have you ever been hit on the head by a brick? I would say that most people would definitely claim that one knows when that has taken place.

Perhaps it might avoid such problems if you were to say that in the collection of propositions about the world capable of being put into human speech, there is a long spectrum of 'truth'. At one end of it are some propositions such as 'I love you', the truth of which is entirely subjective to the person uttering it. At the other end are ones such as 'bricks falling on your head from a height of 100m will very likely smash your skull and kill you'. Your emotional state and human relationships have no relation to the truth of that statement.

Poetry lives at one end of that spectrum. Science tries to get as close to the other end as it possibly can.

Stolen out of expediency, minus the bit about God's mind even if it reflects the historic discussion:

Answer by Craig Skinner

It was Dr. Samuel Johnson, the English writer and author of the famous Dictionary, who kicked the stone.

Boswell, in The Life of Samuel Johnson (1791) says that he and Johnson were discussing George Berkeley’s view that matter was nonexistent and that everything in the universe is merely ideal, when ‘Johnson answered, striking his foot with force against a large stone, till he rebounded from it, ‘I refute him thus’ .’

I hope the following imaginary dialogue between Johnson (J) and Berkeley (B) will clarify the issue.

J. I refute you thus (kicking a big stone).

B. In what way?

J. Well, I felt the weight, hardness and solidity of the stone when my boot struck it. In short its substance or matter. So your talk of matter not existing is nonsense.

B. Not so fast Sam. You just said you felt the weight, hardness and solidity. But feelings are in your mind. The qualities of the stone are in your mind. And those you mention are what some call primary qualities, as contrasted with secondary ones like colour or smell. So all qualities are in a mind. They are ideas.

J. The qualities of the stone are ideas in my mind… mm… yes you could say that, I suppose, but the stone itself isn’t in my mind.

B. The stone itself you say. But what can that be. Take away all the qualities, like colour, weight, solidity, shape, texture, and what’s left. What can such a thing be that has no weight, solidity, hardness, shape or texture. How can it be a stone?

J. I see what you mean, George. A ‘bare particular’, as it were, devoid of any qualities whatsoever, would be a strange beast indeed. But hold on. can’t we then say that the stone is just the totality of its qualities, a ‘bundle of qualities’.

B. Yes, Sam, we can. That’s just what I do say. The stone is a bundle of qualities. Qualities are ideas. So, the stone is an idea composed of these simpler ideas. How else to explain what unites the qualities in the bundle if we have discounted a bare material thing that ‘bears’ the qualities or holds them together.

J. So you deny that the external world exists.

B. Of course I don’t. Any child knows there is an external world. I deny that matter exists. The world is composed of minds (including God’s mind) and ideas in them. Only these two. Minds and ideas. Simpler than your notion that there exist minds and ideas plus matter.

J. I’ll have to think about this George. If you say that stones, plants and planets are ideas in your mind, then surely other people are ideas in your mind too, and your position is solipsism, that you (your mind) and its ideas are all that exists. That’s even simpler than minds (including God’s) and ideas.

B. Ah well, no, you see. God exists, and I can prove it, and the external world is the same for all of us (finite spirits like you and me, Sam) because it exists in God’s mind.

J. It won’t wash, George. To assume God’s existence sounds like question-begging to me. And you can no more prove God’s existence than Descartes could, although you have to enlist God to make sense of other finite spirits (such as people) and an external world, just as Descartes enlisted God to guarantee the reliability of his clear and distinct ideas. No, the arguments you make against matter apply equally to other minds, and so you haven’t established idealism as opposed to solipsism.

B. (a little uneasily) Let’s leave it for now and pick it up another time. Fancy a beer?

J. Fine. Although of course we may be knocking back an idea rather than a cold, hoppy liquid.

Hume rightly said that Berkeley’s arguments ‘admit of no answer and produce no conviction’.

If you haven’t read Berkeley, do so. Begin with Three Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous. The version edited by Dancy (OUP 1998) is very good. Berkeley’s prose is concise, clear, witty, and a delight to read compared with that of many other great philosophers.

Craig Skinner at philosophos.org

[Doctor CamNC4Me]

How did J&B know they were both talking about a stone?

- Doc

[Chap]

If you haven’t read Berkeley, do so.

Years too late with that advice.

And I am not playing the philosophy game here. I am talking about people being sincere with one another about how they make the decisions that define their life choices, which is a different matter.

Have you ever decided that there will be no harm in you kicking a large sharp-edged stone with bare feet because you have become tangled in doubts about primary qualities, bare particulars and so on? I bet you never, ever have. You know it will hurt, and may even damage you in a long term way. And you don't do it. You act exactly as if you believe that the proposition 'kicking a sharp stone with bare feet hurts and may cause injury' is just plain true.

Don't you? Or are you telling me that you acted differently after reading Berkeley?

[honorentheos]

And I am not playing the philosophy game here. I am talking about people being sincere with one another about how they make the decisions that define their life choices, which is a different matter.

I don't think it's a game nor do I think it's insincere to realize what we are describing as "reality" is an aggregate of various peoples experiences combined with predicability of outcomes.

I use this to bound certitude and maintain healthy recognition that reality isn't so cut and dry as to demand people stop playing games and get on the bus that is my way of perceiving the world. I'd argue doing so is a step away from, well, truth.