Is There An Absolute Truth? (moral, America, experience, moral)

[michel]

I am not sure; I believe that there are, but I think my thoughts may be biassed.

This is a good take on the question:-

http://www.absolutetruth.net/truth/index.html



PROOF THAT ABSOLUTES MUST EXIST



The denial of absolute truth has more than a few serious logical problems. If we will "follow the train of thought to the station" we will find that it "derails."



Problem #1 -- Self-Contradiction. Those who would insist that there are NO absolutes are believing in an absolute. They are absolutely sure that there is nothing that is absolute. Such a philosophy is self-defeating and self-contradictory. Their statement of belief is, in itself, evidence against their belief!



Problem #2 -- Limited Knowledge. A human being, with a limited and finite mind, cannot make absolute negative statements. You can't say: "There are no dogs in Alaska" unless you have absolute knowledge of Alaska...every home, cave, etc. You would be forced to say: "With the knowledge I have now and the small evidence I have observed, I don't think there are any dogs in Alaska." (On the flip side, making an absolute positive statement is possible, because if we see dogs in Alaska, we could make the absolute statement "There are dogs in Alaska.") Likewise, a finite human cannot make the statement: "There is no God" (although many try), because they would have to have absolute knowledge of the entire Universe from beginning to end in order to know that. The best one could really do would be to say: "With the limited knowledge I have, I don't believe that there is a God." The same logic applies to the statement people make "There are no absolutes."


Problem #3 -- The Real World. Let us, for a moment, suppose that everything really is relative (no standards of any kind). That would mean that everybody does what they think is right--setting their own rules for life. The problem comes when one person's rules clash with another's. What if one person decides that killing is a noble thing to do, and so attempts to kill everyone in sight? If things are relative, then killing is just as right as not killing. Cruelty is equal to non-cruelty. Would you have a problem with that? Of course, most of us would.



When locked in the chambers of philosophy, we can kick around wild ideas about nothing really existing, or nothing being absolute. But the real world greets us when we emerge from that chamber--a world full of life and death, suffering and pleasure, evil and good. If there is no standard of truth in the Universe, then one can never be sure of anything. It is all an accident. We would be free to do as we please--rape, murder, steal, lie, cheat, etc. Who is to say that those things are wrong? A world without absolutes would be horrible indeed!




So, the other possibility--that there is indeed absolute truth in the Universe, can be our only other option. There must be a "reality" somewhere, that defines what is and what is not, what is right and what is wrong. In order for there to be absolute truth, there must be an authority that establishes that truth. You cannot have a law without a lawgiver. You cannot have a design without a designer.



Proof #1 -- Conscience. If you believe in absolute truth then you must accept the idea of a Creator--someone made you and implanted in you a moral code--a conscience. Our conscience tells us that the world "should be" a certain way. It informs us that something is wrong with suffering, starvation, rape, pain, and evil. It informs us that love, generosity, compassion, and peace are positives for which we should strive.



The only rational explanation for the existence of such a "inner knowledge" is God. The Bible makes it clear that it was God who established the Universe. It testifies that God created the world and made mankind. It records God's moral absolutes that He expects His creations to live by. According to the pages of the Word of God,



--it was He who set in motion the laws of nature and conscience.

--he is the architect behind the grand design of our world.

--he is the author of the moral absolutes that govern the hearts of men.



If one accepts the idea of God as Creator, then it becomes easy to understand where morality came from. Why do people disagree with innocent killing? Why are people repulsed by the idea of sexually abusing little children? Why do we think it is wrong to steal someone else's property? It is because God told us. Those morals certainly did not flow out of millions of years of chance evolution and the survival of the fittest-- in fact, evolution would teach us the exact opposite set of guiding principles! Evolution tells us to do whatever it takes to survive and get ahead...not to show love and compassion to the weak!



Proof #2 -- Science. The word science simply means "knowledge." It is the study of what we know, and the quest to know more. Thus, any scientific study must necessarily be founded upon the belief that there are objective realities in the world. (Interestingly enough, many historical scholars surmise that the scientific revolution in the West grew out of the study of the Bible following the "Reformation." As the Bible was printed and distributed, people began to realize that there were laws by which God governed the universe, and began giving up superstition in order to learn about the world God had made.) At any rate, we understand that it would be very difficult for someone to pursue a field of study, while at the same time rejecting that there is any definition of reality. Without absolutes, what would there be to study? How could you know if your ideas were correct? How would you even know if your perceptions of what you were studying were real? You wouldn't, because you wouldn't believe in "real" to begin with!


Proof #3 -- Religion. All the religions of the world are an attempt to give meaning and definition to life. They represent the fact that humanity is craving something "more" than physical existence. We want assurance for the future, hope for the afterlife, forgiveness for our sins, peace through our struggles, and answers for our deepest questions. Why do we want these things? It seems clear enough that the animal world is not pursuing philosophy or grappling with issues of eternity. If we are mere chance accidents, all flowing out of a common animal ancestor, why did we turn out with an insatiable desire to know and grasp reality? Religion is proof that mankind was built with something more...a higher purpose. There must have been a Creator, personal and purposeful, who implanted in us this desire. If there is a Creator, then there is a reality which He has defined in creation. He becomes the standard for absolute truth.





THE ULTIMATE PROOF



If you want to know what the absolute answers are, then get to know the One who has absolute knowledge. If you want the truth about the beginning of the world and the purpose we are on earth...talk to the One who was there! If you want to understand what standards we must follow as human beings, talk to the One who has defined reality! The ultimate proof that there is absolute truth will not come through some clever philosophical argument. It will come from a personal encounter with the One who declared: "I am the Truth."

[ladylazarus]

A truth is a statement which correlates to an observation. This means that truths rely on two things: observation and communication (language, visual display, etc.).

Observation is necessarily relative, I don't think there's any doubt about that. Two people cannot occupy the same space at the same time, and therefore cannot receive the same sensory data.

Communication is even more relative. Words and pictures hold different meanings to each individual. The statement "God exists" is true is you define God as something which you have observed -- the whole debate about whether or not god exists is really just about how you define the word "god."

[Fluffy]

A truth is a statement which correlates to an observation. This means that truths rely on two things: observation and communication (language, visual display, etc.).

Does that mean, therefore that if I state "I observe an orange" and I observe an orange in front of me then this is truth? What if the orange was actually an orange ball that I mistook to be an orange. Here I have made a statement that coheres with my observations yet I am obviously mistaken.

[Syzygy]

There's different kinds of truth, as has been mentioned. There's factual truth, which pertains to, for instance, the historicity of religious or political figures. There's philosophical truth, which depends on each individual's perceptions and is which is really a reflection of their belief system regarding life and themselves rather than an honest opinion, IMHO (ironically). Finally, there is this absolute truth.

A good way for me to define absolute truth is to find meaning in supposedly meaningless phrases, or in other words, to use phrases that represent the abstract concept of 'meaninglessness' in a meaningful way. For example:

nowhere=no+where, right?

guess again! nowhere=now+here. I am right HERE, and always will be. see? That's my way of defining absolute truth.

[Victor]

Originally Posted by Sunstone

Although conditional truth (i.e. a property of the relationship between a descriptor and the thing described) is fairly well defined in philosophy and science, the notion of unconditional, or absolute, truth seems to me to be much less investigated and defined.

For instance, if it is claimed that such a thing as absolute truth exists, then how do we know of it? How is it even possible to know an unconditional truth or whether one exists? I have never found positive answers to those questions. Have you?

Could you give me a link to read about this conditional truth you speak of please.
Unless I’m misunderstanding you, do share where you got the understanding that absolute truth is unconditional only?

[Victor]

Originally Posted by Fluffy

If there is a possibility that something might not be true then that thing cannot be said to be absolutely true, no matter how small that possibility. We can use doubt to determine whether this possibility exists: if we can doubt something then it is not absolutely true, if we can't then it is.

Attempt to doubt whether you are thinking. Doubt is in itself a special case of thought. Therefore, in doubting, you are self-justifying the absolute truth of the existence of your thoughts. "I am thinking" is therefore an absolute truth. However, a thought must have a thinker since that is an essential part of its definition (an analytic truth). And so we derive "I think therefore I am" or the cogito. This is known as rational foundationalism.

Attempt to doubt your experiences. It seems evident (via the arguments of illusion, delusion, dreaming and the evil daemon) that we can doubt everything that our senses tell us. However, what is indubitable is the actual sensory data. For example, if we look at an orange, we can say "I doubt that the orange is actually there" but we cannot say "I doubt that I am under the impression that I am experiencing an orange". This is known as empirical foundationalism.

With this in my mind, I don't know how we can know anything.
Can I say for example "I doubt 2+2=4" ?

[Fluffy]

With this in my mind, I don't know how we can know anything.
Can I say for example "I doubt 2+2=4" ?

2+2=4 is a self evident truth. I believe it to be similar to saying "all bachelors are unmarried men" but I am not well versed enough in the intricacies of analytic statements to say whether they should be categorised as such.

Keep in mind that absolute truth only deals with one tiny sector of the full scale (that of 100% certainty). There are a vast number of things that we can know to a degree of 99%. Its just that some philosophers have argued that knowledge should be reserved for that which is certain and belief should be reserved for that which is uncertain. Therefore, we cannot say we know that which is 99% certain to be true, but we can say we have a strong reason to believe that that which is 99% certain to be true.

I tend to follow such a distinction because I feel that widening the definition of knowledge creates problems because it puts that which is absolutely true and that which is not absolutely true under the same category but there appears to be more of a significant gap between that which is 100-99% certain than that which is 99-98% certain. In other words, absolute certainty appears to be a special case which deserves special attention.

[Victor]

Originally Posted by Fluffy

2+2=4 is a self evident truth. I believe it to be similar to saying "all bachelors are unmarried men" but I am not well versed enough in the intricacies of analytic statements to say whether they should be categorised as such.

Keep in mind that absolute truth only deals with one tiny sector of the full scale (that of 100% certainty). There are a vast number of things that we can know to a degree of 99%. Its just that some philosophers have argued that knowledge should be reserved for that which is certain and belief should be reserved for that which is uncertain. Therefore, we cannot say we know that which is 99% certain to be true, but we can say we have a strong reason to believe that that which is 99% certain to be true.

I tend to follow such a distinction because I feel that widening the definition of knowledge creates problems because it puts that which is absolutely true and that which is not absolutely true under the same category but there appears to be more of a significant gap between that which is 100-99% certain than that which is 99-98% certain. In other words, absolute certainty appears to be a special case which deserves special attention.

And what does "self-evident" have to do with my doubt?
Albeit I agree, I was only following your line of thinking.