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door · 05-26-2004, 06:50 AM

A retort to the "My truth" theory-

Can something be both true and not true? of course not! Yet many people have contridicting "truths".

It is ignorant and actually the best case of bad faith to believe in personal truth. All it does is excuse people from seeking out any truth.

If I bought into the nonsense of relative truths, or "whatever I believe in becomes the truth" I could believe I should kill and rape etc etc. ad nauseum, and that would be a TRUTH (notice, a truth is a must, necissary. If it is truth that I should do X, that means it is Necissary I do X)

Further, epistemological reasoning shows a difference in beliefe and Truth, so you can't simply equate (truth is what we believe).

I can believe you are not here, and make that a "personal truth" but that doesn't mean you are not here does it?

So I am willing to grant that "personal truth" does exist. But it isn't actually truth at all, just belief.

So you either wrongly believe that TRUTH is what you believe (which is a trapping of insanity) or you agree and believe TRUE truth isn't belief (your post seems to grant this) but personal truth is belief and its okay to have personal truths.

So by you saying personal truth is belief, you are simply pointing out a definitional sameness. Or as some call it being redundant.

Of course one MUST have beliefs to function, and if you didn't believe that the beliefs were truths you couldn't function at top ability. To illustrate this, what if you didn't believe that food was needed for survival in TRUTH. You would die of course.

But here is the BIG idea of all this. Belief in truths is not KNOWLEDGE of truth, but rather HOPE in truth.

Knowledge is different than belief. Knowledge comes from sensations and experiences, while belief comes from a lack of knowledge, and where the knowledge isn't hope replaces.

Like someone with the belief of an afterlife. They have FAITH that it is so, but they cannot KNOW (and so it is HOPE they have, or a belief; they do not have knowledge).

Whats the importance of this? With knowledge-based 'ideas', they are TRUTHS in our minds, and belief based ideas are HOPES in our hearts. (let me point out that the TRUTHS we 'believe' are believed EVEN STILL in hope that we are right about it being a truth. The reason we still must have a bit of hope even in what we think is truth is because we all have had things we took as true that ended up being false, so the possibility of us being wrong exists. But none-the-less these 'truths' are BELIEVED as truths, whereas the others are BELIEVED as HOPES.

Their is nothing wrong with having hope as well as truth. But these shouldn't be muddled and confused with one another.

So the list of your "truths" aren't Truths at all (unless you claim to have un-confusable evidence for them) but rather hopes.

Now that I have said that, they, for the most part, seem like good hopes, based on some knowledge (if not quite enough to make them truths).

---

I harp on this because I see too many people who have "personal truths". This is inauthentic in its very idea. Taking something not known as a truth can lead to terrible things. At the very base it leads to closemindedness, since your beliefes seem sufficient for truth, all other truths shown to you can simply be "believed" away. This is dangerous, to say the least.

05-26-2004, 06:50 AM	#9 (permalink)
door Upright	A retort to the "My truth" theory- Can something be both true and not true? of course not! Yet many people have contridicting "truths". It is ignorant and actually the best case of bad faith to believe in personal truth. All it does is excuse people from seeking out any truth. If I bought into the nonsense of relative truths, or "whatever I believe in becomes the truth" I could believe I should kill and rape etc etc. ad nauseum, and that would be a TRUTH (notice, a truth is a must, necissary. If it is truth that I should do X, that means it is Necissary I do X) Further, epistemological reasoning shows a difference in beliefe and Truth, so you can't simply equate (truth is what we believe). I can believe you are not here, and make that a "personal truth" but that doesn't mean you are not here does it? So I am willing to grant that "personal truth" does exist. But it isn't actually truth at all, just belief. So you either wrongly believe that TRUTH is what you believe (which is a trapping of insanity) or you agree and believe TRUE truth isn't belief (your post seems to grant this) but personal truth is belief and its okay to have personal truths. So by you saying personal truth is belief, you are simply pointing out a definitional sameness. Or as some call it being redundant. Of course one MUST have beliefs to function, and if you didn't believe that the beliefs were truths you couldn't function at top ability. To illustrate this, what if you didn't believe that food was needed for survival in TRUTH. You would die of course. But here is the BIG idea of all this. Belief in truths is not KNOWLEDGE of truth, but rather HOPE in truth. Knowledge is different than belief. Knowledge comes from sensations and experiences, while belief comes from a lack of knowledge, and where the knowledge isn't hope replaces. Like someone with the belief of an afterlife. They have FAITH that it is so, but they cannot KNOW (and so it is HOPE they have, or a belief; they do not have knowledge). Whats the importance of this? With knowledge-based 'ideas', they are TRUTHS in our minds, and belief based ideas are HOPES in our hearts. (let me point out that the TRUTHS we 'believe' are believed EVEN STILL in hope that we are right about it being a truth. The reason we still must have a bit of hope even in what we think is truth is because we all have had things we took as true that ended up being false, so the possibility of us being wrong exists. But none-the-less these 'truths' are BELIEVED as truths, whereas the others are BELIEVED as HOPES. Their is nothing wrong with having hope as well as truth. But these shouldn't be muddled and confused with one another. So the list of your "truths" aren't Truths at all (unless you claim to have un-confusable evidence for them) but rather hopes. Now that I have said that, they, for the most part, seem like good hopes, based on some knowledge (if not quite enough to make them truths). --- I harp on this because I see too many people who have "personal truths". This is inauthentic in its very idea. Taking something not known as a truth can lead to terrible things. At the very base it leads to closemindedness, since your beliefes seem sufficient for truth, all other truths shown to you can simply be "believed" away. This is dangerous, to say the least.