I would continue my rant and perhaps be a bit more eloquent but... that's it for now.
Wednesday, October 6, 2010
Truth
So a few nights ago (or maybe it was last night, I don't even remember days correctly any more!) my friend and I were talking about religion and spirituality and belonging to a certain group and such. During this talk I went on a rant about how "truth" or "the right way" is said to be such varying things by different ideologies. Why can't truth just be obvious? Think about it. It would eliminate all the animosity that exists between groups with opposite or different ideologies. It would eliminate wars. As I'm writing this the movie "The invention of lying" comes to mind.
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I approve of this topic. :]
ReplyDeleteTruth can't be obvious because that would mean that it is defined. Once you define something, you make it static, immutable. Once you state that "truth" is this or that, you become no better than them. Doing so (defining it) inherently means that you're telling them that they're wrong, and you're right.
Here's where the problem lies. You aren't wrong. Neither are they. You are telling the "truth," and yet so are they.
Truth (the real truth) is everywhere. In every statement, in every argument, in every belief. There's (obviously) a problem with this. Since truth is indefinable and, as I believe, is everywhere, that would mean that it is fractured infinitely (what happens when you divide 1 by infinity? You get countless pieces of negligible value).
People's belief that they are following the "right way" is actually a legitimate belief. They have seen (or maybe they are following someone else who has seen) a glimmering shred of the real truth in the world or in a value. Then they make an establishment or they go out of their way to tell other that they're "right."
It becomes chaotic because they aren't the only ones that have seen a speck of real truth. The real truth shines differently to each individual, and they grasp that value (their own) and don't let go. They don't see other people's truths because the other countless truths out there are so minute that they become (almost) insignificant, and if anyone is close-minded in the slightest sense they'll miss the other specks of truth because of their belief that they're "right"
This is why finding the truth is impossible. You have to sort through what is true and what is "true." You have to say that this is right, and this is wrong. And you have to make that correct judgment an infinite number of times. Being human, we all have our own personal preference, and there is no one that is absolutely impartial.
I agree, as you probably do, that some ways that others present the "right way" is appalling due to various reasons, but I believe that there is something in there. However, it's far from worthwhile to try to find what it is. What is repulsive about their "right way" as they present it isn't the actual truth, but the establishment that they've constructed around that truth.
And to end my rant, it would be good to eliminate war, "strategic force," bitterness and resentment, but I don't know if I want everyone to be enlightened by the whole truth... I think that if the entire truth was known, everyone would be uniform, almost to the point where individuality is lost. It might be me, but I value the differences and uniqueness among people. That's why I find so many people and so many other things fascinating. They aren't the same. They have something to contribute.
Up to this point, everything has been my original thought, but I'm going to use someone else's idea now. I went to a lecture about foreign policy hosted by the Panetta Institute. One thing that I thought was very interesting was the idea that we, as humans, could possibly "unlearn" war. As examples, we've "unlearned" cannibalism, racial discrimination (more or less) and other distasteful activities. How? We attached a stigma to such actions. We've deemed it unethical or otherwise. I believe that we can do this to war as well with time, but in order to do so we must step out of the confining lines of religion. We have to make it a universal social value.
(I have many solutions to war; this is just one of them...) Instead of learning what the truth is (partly because it is not obvious, and partly because it is impossible), let's attempt a more manageable feat to find unity in this world.
I approve of this topic. :]
ReplyDeleteTruth can't be obvious because that would mean that it is defined. Once you define something, you make it static, immutable. Once you state that "truth" is this or that, you become no better than them. Doing so (defining it) inherently means that you're telling them that they're wrong, and you're right.
Here's where the problem lies. You aren't wrong. Neither are they. You are telling the "truth," and yet so are they.
Truth (the real truth) is everywhere. In every statement, in every argument, in every belief. There's (obviously) a problem with this. Since truth is indefinable and, as I believe, is everywhere, that would mean that it is fractured infinitely (what happens when you divide 1 by infinity? You get countless pieces of negligible value).
People's belief that they are following the "right way" is actually a legitimate belief. They have seen (or maybe they are following someone else who has seen) a glimmering shred of the real truth in the world or in a value. Then they make an establishment or they go out of their way to tell other that they're "right."
It becomes chaotic because they aren't the only ones that have seen a speck of real truth. The real truth shines differently to each individual, and they grasp that value (their own) and don't let go. They don't see other people's truths because the other countless truths out there are so minute that they become (almost) insignificant, and if anyone is close-minded in the slightest sense they'll miss the other specks of truth because of their belief that they're "right"
This is why finding the truth is impossible. You have to sort through what is true and what is "true." You have to say that this is right, and this is wrong. And you have to make that correct judgment an infinite number of times. Being human, we all have our own personal preference, and there is no one that is absolutely impartial.
I agree, as you probably do, that some ways that others present the "right way" is appalling due to various reasons, but I believe that there is something in there. However, it's far from worthwhile to try to find what it is. What is repulsive about their "right way" as they present it isn't the actual truth, but the establishment that they've constructed around that truth.
ReplyDeleteAnd to end my rant, it would be good to eliminate war, "strategic force," bitterness and resentment, but I don't know if I want everyone to be enlightened by the whole truth... I think that if the entire truth was known, everyone would be uniform, almost to the point where individuality is lost. It might be me, but I value the differences and uniqueness among people. That's why I find so many people and so many other things fascinating. They aren't the same. They have something to contribute.
Up to this point, everything has been my original thought, but I'm going to use someone else's idea now. I went to a lecture about foreign policy hosted by the Panetta Institute. One thing that I thought was very interesting was the idea that we, as humans, could possibly "unlearn" war. As examples, we've "unlearned" cannibalism, racial discrimination (more or less) and other distasteful activities. How? We attached a stigma to such actions. We've deemed it unethical or otherwise. I believe that we can do this to war as well with time, but in order to do so we must step out of the confining lines of religion. We have to make it a universal social value.
(I have many solutions to war; this is just one of them...) Instead of learning what the truth is (partly because it is not obvious, and partly because it is impossible), let's attempt a more manageable feat to find unity in this world.