This is continued from Tuesday the 18th. This is just a light and informal way for me to explore philosophical concepts in a casual way. I hope readers will be intrigued and ask questions so we can dig more deeply into these issues. It will be good practice for me. Some people think these issues are trivial, or nonsensical, or a waste of time, but I don't. I enjoy following ideas to see where they go. Sometimes they lead to very real and practical insights and innovations. Even when they don't, the exercise is good for the mind.
I said I disagree with relativism about truth. 'Why,' you may be asking. 'It sounds so perfectly reasonable.' Well, I admit that for practical day-to-day purposes there is a lot to be said for it. But I cannot believe that relativism is actually true. (I mean relativism about truth. From this point on when you see 'relativism' or 'absolutism', just imagine the words 'about truth' right after it.)
The reason is this: relativism portrays us perceivers as having far more power over reality than we actually have. If I say the color swatch is blue, then it really is blue, according to relativism. If my neighbor says the color swatch is yellow, then it really is yellow. When this is a trivial issue, it seems quite acceptable (and socially pragmatic) to say the swatch is blue for me and yellow for her. But what if ... I don't know ... what if we were in business together as interior designers - and we're trying to coordinate colors for our client? Aren't we going to disagree strongly? And if there is no objective truth to the matter, then what are we arguing about? This isn't merely a question a taste - it's a question of what color we are actually looking at.
'But that's beside the point,' I can hear you say. 'People are merely accustomed to thinking that their own way of perceiving is the correct one, and so they disagree. They are laboring under the misapprehension that their own truth is the only one. But no actual conflict exists, because they are both correct from their own point of view.'
I disagree. I think there is such a thing as absolute truth. The reason I believe this is that my perceptions have seemed to me to be mistaken from time to time. Suppose I see a big modern office building in the distance. It looks to me to be square. As I approach, I realize that it has all kinds of funny angles, and the outside walls are not square with each other. Some of the angles are greater than 90 degrees. As a relativist, how could I make sense of this? Was the base of the building square while I was far away, and then became some other shape as I got closer? Afterwards, even when I am far away I will recognize the building and I will no longer think it square. How is it that I discovered the building was not square, if whatever I perceive is true for me? Haven't I discovered an objective truth, or at least realigned my beliefs to more closely conform to an objective reality in some way?
I have a classmate, David, who speculated that when we say 'objective' what we are really talking about is a synthesis of subjective views. His idea was that our own views are instilled by-- or are at least strongly influenced by-- the traditions, beliefs, and culture to which we are exposed. In other words, 'objectivity' is a kind of sum total of everyone's subjective views. David's idea does not seem to me to be the right one. How are all these subjective views synthesized? What are the rules? If enough people change their minds about something, does reality then change?
David said that today we think the earth is round. At times in the past, the majority of people have thought that the earth was flat. We believe that the earth was always round even when the majority thought it flat, but we can never know this - we can never go back in time and check to see if the world was flat at some time in the past. (I think we can know it, but that is a different issue.) The ultimate point David was making was that those people in the past believed they were in possession of the objective truth that the earth was flat. Today we believe we possess the objective truth that the earth is round. How can we be certain that our truth will not be overturned by some new truth? Therefore our truth is subjective, not objective.
The way I look at this subject is different from David's way. What I think is important to keep in mind is that we discovered that the world was not flat. If objectivity is the sum of all subjective views as David was arguing, then I don't understand how such a discovery could be made. If almost everyone thought the world was flat, then how did they change their minds? It wasn't as though someone went around convincing people to believe the world was round, and eventually the world came to be round. No, rather a very few people saw that the world was round and showed others their discovery. (And the idea was met with much skepticism, by the way.)
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