Truthache

Sorry I havn't been around to respond to all the wonderful comments that have come in. For the past week my back has been in splitting pain, and it's been nearly impossible to sit at a computer for any length. I'm on a new course of chemical cocktails now, and for the moment it seems to be working. This is the first day in a week I havn't been in constant pain. The downside is that my brain is pretty fuzzy at the mo, tho. I just can't seem to clear the haze. Hopefully the effect will wear off in a few days as I adjust to things.

But down to business!

There's been a great debate taking place in the comments box. I thought it was a pretty straight-forward question. I wanted to define some basic terms so that as discussion proceeded and someone said "that's not true" we would all know what the statement meant.

It has been suggested that perhaps "What is truth?" should have been the last qestion on the blog, rather than the first. Becuase if we can answer that, we've figured everything else out. There may be some truth in that. (!) Perhaps it will be the first and last question, the alpha and the omega, and at some point we shall all come full circle. But not today.

Here is a synopsis of some of the responses:

• Lardy big bot listed some characteristics of truth, but did not put forth a definition
  
• Violet for the Moment suggests it is that which can be proven objectively with evidence
• Mangonel brings up the critical question of empiricism
• LBB than reminds us that there are different kinds of truth (physical, spiritual, etc.)
• Simon says that truth is what is real, but points out the difficulty in defining reality (at which piont my brain implodes like Neo in the Matrix)
• B, mathematical genius that he is, states that verbal languages are inherently ambiguous and it is therefore not possible to define truth in a language such as English, but that the language of mathematics is much more able to manage such topics.
• Simon counters that in any system your definition of truth depends on the rules that define your system (i think)
• First Nations is in the reality camp
• Homo Escapeons put forth "truth is something which can be tested under any conditions and always presents the same conclusions."
• Keith couldn't find my email address under the "Fine Print" heading at the bottom of the page, and feels that the question is irrelevant and worrying about it is making us unhappy and/or neurotic.
• Tim Footman feels that truth is little more than shared community values
• and Simon finally concludes that truth is faith.

A lot of things really struck me in this discussion, but the idea that surprised me most was how many people think truth is a relative concept, dependent upon the mind constructing it. I expected to see more words like "fact" and "proof," but these were conspicuous by their paucity. I was reminded of the line from 'Jesus Christ, Superstar' where Pontius Pilate sings "But what is truth? Is truth a changing law? We both have truths -- are mine the same as yours?"

Surely there must be some things which are objective, provable, factual truth? Our entire society is based upon it.

2+3=5 That is a fact. It is provable. It is regarded as truth.

Leaves are green because the chlorophyll in them reflects green light and absorbs all other wavelengths. This is a fact. It is proven. No one disputes it. It is regarded as truth.

Our criminal justice system provides me with a good analogy. It's whole set-up is designed to establish truth, and people's lives are deeply and irrevocably affected by the outcomes of the judicial system's tests of truth. As a society, we almost universally accept the decisions of the criminal justice system; true anarchists are very few few in number.

In America the criminal justice system is based around 2 fundamental precepts:
1. You are innocent until proven guilty, that is, the burden of proof is on the prosecution, not the defense
2. Proof of guilt is defined as that which is "beyond a reasonable doubt."

I like this system. I like it a lot. The actual application of the criminal justice system leaves a lot to be desired, but the above named precepts are very sound to my mind. It all revolves around that word, "reasonable."

It leaves room for rediculous, outlandish alternative theories of a crime ("But it could have been shape-shifting aliens taking the form of my client; you can't prove it wasn't!") and at once dismisses them. It calls on people to use reason and judgement, to ask not what is possible (because shape-shifting aliens are theoretically possible), but what is likely. And we accept the rigorousness of this test. We accept it every day when we are willing to lock people up for their entire lives based on it.

So that is the definition of truth I propose for this blog:

Truth is that which is factually demonstrable beyond a reasonable doubt.

There is always doubt. For any given question one can always concoct some alternative scenario or explanation, but we must ask ourselves, is that alternative reasonable? If you take truth to be whatever you believe in your own mind, than there can be no agreement, no consensus, no action can be taken. If I say to you, "but I think it's this way, and since that's what I believe it's as true as what you believe," civilization comes to a grinding halt. That way madness lies.

First Question:

Let's start by defining our terms. We have already discussed, to some degree, the question of 'What is faith?' We will probably return to this question later, but right now I would like pose a parallel question:

What is truth?

By this I mean 'How do you define the concept of truth?'

I am not asking 'What particular things do you hold to be true?'


(Nothing quite like jumping in to the deep end on the first day, is there?)

Have fun, kiddies!

oh, ps: Don't make this harder or more complicated than it needs to be. Right now all we need to do is define our terms so that when we progress we'll be using words with a meaning that is understood, at least in our little community here. All I want to do is get a working definintion going.

Socrates and Separating the Issues

I think the last post may have been a tad premature. So ignore it for the time being. Before we gorge ourselves on food for thought I would like to take a moment to outline some good table manners, and the process by which I hope to acheive Good Things on this blog.

The first is to explain that I'm a big fan of the Socratic Method. My idea here is to pose very specific questions for discussion, and get very specific questions and answers in response, and so on and so forth. Historically the Socratic Method is applied to a 2-person dialogue, so I don't know how well this will worth here, but hey -- let's give it a go and find out! (Hell, historically sex is a two-person deal, but I am aware of numerous places where this has been expanded to included many people, and with great success. So if it can work for sex, why not philosophy?*)

Also, the Socratic Method is often employed as a tool by people who already have a strong stance on a given subject to convert others to their way of thinking. In this case, I am not out to pursuade anyone. I am on a quest for understanding and enlightenment. When I ask a question it is not with an agenda to prove people wrong; it is asked with a sincere desire to understand what others think and feel. I'm not here to defend my assumptions. As the heading says, I'm here to question them. I hope you are, too.

To this end, there is a question of Separating the Issues. Many people seem to have a great deal of difficulty with this. As a person with Asperger's Syndrom it comes naturally to me, because I have a tendency to take things very literally -- too literally, often.

For example: Someone once asked me, "Are you afraid of the dark?" This struk me as a very silly question. Of course I'm not afraid of the dark! I may be afraid of what's IN the dark, but that is a different question entirely. I know, through social convention, that is what the person meant, but in a philosophical discussion it is critical to operate with this level of precision. Some people would call this 'splitting hairs,' which has a derogatory connotation, but splitting hairs is exactly what we're going to do here.

We're going to search for very precise answers to extremely specific questions. Many of the questions will be about abstract concepts, (such as faith, for example) and it is essential that these be discussed as abstracts.

For example: If I were to ask, "What is the best part of a pizza, the sauce or the cheese?" and someone was to reply, "On pizza you always have sauce and cheese, therefore they are the same thing, and I really like pizza," that does not answer the question. I strongly suspect I'm going to be harping on about this a lot in the coming weeks and months, and as readers you may get extremely bored with it all, but please please please please try to answer the specific question at hand, lest our potentially enlightening discussion get mired in a bewildering array of semi-relevant tangent topics and emotional diatribes. (Something to which I myself often fall victim, so I'm soliciting your help here in keeping me on track when I stray.)

So there we go. Them's the ground rules. Bon apetite!


*There's something I never thought I'd hear myself type.

Greetings, Earthlings

If you're a regular Mental Excrement reader, you're probably familiar with my recent spiritualistic angst and atheistic musings. (If you're not, welcome!) I was hugely surprised at the number of people who troubled to read the whole of both posts, and even more suprised at the long and thoughtful responses elicited.

I noticed, however, that many of usual readers did not comment at all, and I feared that if I carried on that route much longer some of you might lose interest in M.E., and as I value your companionship immensely I did not want that to happen. On the other hand, this is really only the beginning. I have loads of questions, things I struggle to understand, and I believe one of the best ways to begin to understand is to look at a problem from many people's point of view, to see things as others see them, to jump in someone else's head for a moment or two. A blog is a great way to do that. I didn't want to have to edit myself and keep M.E. all sweetness, sunshine, hamsters, and Pirates.

The solution was obvious: 2 blogs.

Mental Excrement will continue to run regularly, but from now on all the heavy, philosophical stuff, like Big Question and Faith Part II will appear here.

This is the place to discuss issues of faith and atheism, spirituality and materialism, religion and agnosticism, existentialism, socialism, relativism, secularism, science, the world we live in and the worlds inside our heads. This is where we go back to first principles, examine our assumptions, and re-jig our mental universes. This is where we question: everything!