Does Truth = Peace?

Originally posted by mnemeth1
Reality dictates what is true.

We determine what is true by using rigorous logic and reason.

If we can empirically demonstrate that initiating violence against the innocent is illogical, then we can make the claim that a belief which holds the initiation of violence against the innocent is good must be false.

Ahhh I see, we are in the pursuit of truth in this thread. Wonderful! I love these kind of threads. Thank you for starting it!

Now we need to agree on what constitutes the "innocent". How would you define this?

With Love,

Your Brother

Here is a generic representation of why I think the OP is entirely correct on the assertion that lies lead to violence and truth leads to peace. In a vague, broad, and generalized sense.

The brain is a computer. If it is not physically damaged, than the veracity of data input directly effects the outcome.
False information (data) being input leads to false assumptions which leads us to false conclusions, which basically set us up to make potentially disastrous actions (often times violent if possible).

False Information ----> False Assumptions ----> False Conclusions ----> Potentially Disastrous Actions

Originally posted by mnemeth1
reply to post by IAMIAM

 

Truth is what logic and reason demonstrates to be factual about the world we live in.

A belief that is in "conformity with fact or reality"

I think this definition is a problem.

Can logic and reason be something universal that can be agreed upon, and do they provide evidence of a factual world.

What I was trying to get at with my hypothetical about the tribe was that truth for one may not be the same as another. The truth for the tribe according to their reason(supported by experience of attack by the neighboring tribe), and their logic(that this other tribe must be destroyed for their own survival) is sound. According to their perspective the "truth" is that the other tribe deserves death. They would look on the other tribe as a poisonous snake that needs to be destroyed because all logic and reason shows the threat it poses. It is not a lie to initiate violence with this neighboring tribe, but a necessity dictated by their "truth" born of logic and reason.

Do you see what I am getting at? Once you involve truth the terminology becomes a difficulty, and pokes holes in the argument.

Personally, I believe in the non-aggression principle. I agree that it is the height of insanity to ever initiate force because it goes against your rational interests.

I still think any attempt to nail down truth as a universal is doomed to failure. Yes, people lie to themselves to justify force. They also live in realities that according to their logic justify aggression. I may be able to point out the flaws in their thinking. The knowledge available to them though may fully justified violence, and a truth in their minds to support it.

reply to post by stephinrazin


I'm not the one with a moving definition of truth here.

Reality dictates what the truth is.

How reality is perceived does not change what reality actually is.

My proposition that truth = peace is predicated on the non-aggression principle being what reality is.

If you want to argue against my logic, you would need to demonstrate why it is logical for one person to initiate violence against another innocent person.

Originally posted by mnemeth1
reply to post by IAMIAM

 

Truth is what logic and reason demonstrates to be factual about the world we live in.

A belief that is in "conformity with fact or reality"

By that defenition I would say that what logic and reason has shown me to be factual about the world we live in is that the violent rule over the non-violent until the non-violent have had enough and come together to become a more violent force than their oppressors and usually end up being the new violents.

Originally posted by mnemeth1
reply to post by stephinrazin

 

If you want to argue against my logic, you would need to demonstrate why it is logical for one person to initiate violence against another innocent person.

Define "innocent". Just because someone is ignorant of the fact that what they are doing is threatening the life of someone does not mean that they are innocent.

To say that if everyone knew the truth then no one would be ignorant of the fact that what they are doing is threatening the life of someone, is illogical.

We can not tell the future. We do not know what will happen in the future. We can only anticipate what will happen in the future based on what has happened in the past. And when you step into that realm of anticipation and interpretation, then we go into the non logical world.

So, logically, there is no such thing as innocent, everyone plays a part in the outcome.

If a person takes a cab ride to a person’s house to kill someone before he leaves. Is the person driving the cab innocent? If you kill the cab driver before he can give the killer a ride, then the killer can’t get to the person’s house before he leaves, so the person doesn’t get killed. Just because a person is ignorant of what they are doing doesn’t mean they don’t contribute to the outcome.

If a person isn’t familiar with an area, and doesn’t know that a high speed train travels through an area, and he needs to get a heavy vehicle from one side of the tracks to the other. So he tries to drive the vehicle over the tracks. A policeman sees the person getting ready to drive over the tracks and sees the high speed train coming down the line. That policeman knows that if the dude tries to cross right now, that the train will hit him, and many people will die. Does the policeman have the right to use deadly force, or the threat of deadly force to stop the person from driving the vehicle over the tracks?

That problem arises from the fact that the “truth” does not propagate to all people automatically. We only know what is happening when we see it or hear it. We all operate with a limited knowledge of what is happening around us at any one time. We can not know what everything and everyone is doing at all times. We are not telepathic.

What person A knows may, or may not include what person B knows. And vise versa. Person B may be able to see what person A is doing is wrong, but unless they can communicate telepathically, then person A may not know what B knows because person A can’t see what person B sees.

“Innocent” is an illogical construct. We all contribute to the final outcome in some small way.

That is a fact of human life. We live in an imperfect world, where X doesn’t always equal Y without conditions. There is always conditions on X equaling Y.

reply to post by Mr Tranny


I did define innocent.

An innocent person is a person who has not initiated violence or stolen/damaged the property of another.

If you can logically justify why initiating violence against such a person is good, then you can refute my logic.

Originally posted by mnemeth1
My proposition that truth = peace is predicated on the non-aggression principle being what reality is.

The non-aggressión principle is not what reality is. Just because someone decided to place the word "natural" in "natural law" does not mean that it isn't just another construct of man. It's just something that some may subscribe to while others don't, for whatever reasons.

Originally posted by mnemeth1
I did define innocent.

An innocent person is a person who has not initiated violence or stolen/damaged the property of another.

If you can logically justify why initiating violence against such a person is good, then you can refute my logic.

Now that we have an idea of what constitutes an innocent person, lets make the world smaller and see how this definition of innocence plays out.

The world is a 10 square mile piece of earth. On this earth is 10 people, 5 male 5 female. They all live happily and pair up. So now you have 5 breeding pairs on 10 square miles of earth.

To ensure each has a sense of privacy and property ownership, they divide the earth into parcels of 2 sq. mi. lots to build a house and provide food through farming.

Breeding eventually takes place and each happy couple ends up with 2 children each. So now each 2 sq. mi. lot of land is occupied by 4 people for a total of 20 people.

Lets label these families, family A, B, C, D, and E.

A drought strikes the farm of family A and they have no food for the winter.

They go to family B, and are denied aid.
They go to family C, and are denied aid.
They go to family D, and are denied aid.
They go to family E, and are denied aid.

If they do not get aid, they will not live through the winter. Should they steal the food they need? Should they kill off one of the families so that they can get the food? Should they just hang themselves from the nearest tree to prevent the slow death of starvation?

With Love,

Your Brother

At certain degree, the truth doesn't mean peace; for instance, would some of you parents out there shout at your 6,7 years old kids that Santa is NOT real, that you are the one has been giving Christmas gifts to them from day one? I believe some of you do, but who can say that they will believe right away ?
In our cases, they are little bit more extreme......there are hundreds race out there in our universe....a secret shawdow government has been formed since ancient time to govern us from behind the scene......everything you see day to day have been staged.....etc Well, you get the picture.

Originally posted by mnemeth1
reply to post by Mr Tranny

 

I did define innocent.

An innocent person is a person who has not initiated violence or stolen/damaged the property of another.

If you can logically justify why initiating violence against such a person is good, then you can refute my logic.

The problem with that question is the premise of the question is illogical. How do we know all the possible ways that we can initiate violence or steal/damage the property of another? We can not know the future. We can not know how our actions today will affect a person tomorrow. At any one time, we do not know if what we are doing is initiating violence or stealing/damaging the property of another.

Someone putting decorative stone around a mailbox. How does he know he is contributing to the death of a person that will run into that mailbox in five years, and have a piece of that stone go through his skull?

How does someone know that a part on an auto store shelf has a defect that will cause the trailer he is towing to break loose and smash the car following him?

If he knows it will cause the resulting event or not is irrelevant. What he does causes pre-stated result. If he did not know what he was doing was going to cause the accident, does that mean he is any less responsible for the outcome? If he did not know what he was doing was initiating the death, loss, or destruction of property, does that mean he did not initiate it? To say he is not initiating when he does not know he is initiating is illogical.

You are going on the definition of absolute truth. The knowing of everything and how it will play out for the rest of eternity. That is something that we can not know. That is something we are not capable of knowing.

A question based on it is illogical.
So discussing it is similarly illogical
.

reply to post by Mr Tranny


There is nothing illogical about the premise.

If one accepts that it is illogical for one person to initiate violence against an innocent person, then my OP stands as being an accurate depiction of reality, and hence, the "truth".

If one can demonstrate why it is logically rational to initiate violence against an innocent person, then my OP is not an accurate depiction of reality.

reply to post by IAMIAM


It is illogical to deny aid if something of value is offered in return.

Since family A has a farm, they can sell the farm to the owners of B,C,D,E etc.. in exchange for food/shelter and then seek employment for future sustenance.

Alternatively, they could offer to labor on their neighbors farm in exchange for food.

It is not rationally logical to argue from a standpoint of an entire society acting irrationally, which is what your example is doing.

For your hypothetical example to ever play itself out in reality, each individual actor in an entire society would have to act against their own self interest.

Originally posted by mnemeth1
reply to post by Mr Tranny

 

There is nothing illogical about the premise.

If one accepts that it is illogical for one person to initiate violence against an innocent person, then my OP stands as being an accurate depiction of reality, and hence, the "truth".

If one can demonstrate why it is logically rational to initiate violence against an innocent person, then my OP is not an accurate depiction of reality.

Why would it have to be logically rational?

It doesn't have to be to be real.

Originally posted by daskakik

Why would it have to be logically rational?

It doesn't have to be to be real.

Yes, that is how reality is defined.

The definition of reality and truth are interchangeable.

Truth is what reality says it is.

Reality is the truth.

Originally posted by mnemeth1
It is illogical to deny aid if something of value is offered in return.

Since family A has a farm, they can sell the farm to the owners of B,C,D,E etc.. in exchange for food/shelter and then seek employment for future sustenance.

Our society has not evolved to the point of having money as yet. We will get there, but for now this is the first farming community on earth. If you want to get to the truth, you have to start at the beginning.

Originally posted by mnemeth1
Alternatively, they could offer to labor on their neighbors farm in exchange for food.

The need for additional labor hasn't arisen yet for each family has the hands it needs to do the farming.

Originally posted by mnemeth1
It is not rationally logical to argue from a standpoint of an entire society acting irrationally, which is what your example is doing.

They are not acting irrationally. Each family IS looking out for it's own self interest.

Originally posted by mnemeth1
For your hypothetical example to ever play itself out in reality, each individual actor in an entire society would have to act against their own self interest.

The families are acting out of their own self interest. They all know that if family A dies off, that is two more acres of land to divide amongst themselves.

So, what should family A do?

With Love,

Your Brother

Originally posted by mnemeth1

Originally posted by daskakik

Why would it have to be logically rational?
It doesn't have to be to be real.

Yes, that is how reality is defined.
The definition of reality and truth are interchangeable.
Truth is what reality says it is.
Reality is the truth.

Reality and truth are the same but someone can do something logically irrational and it would not make it unreal or untrue.

I would also like to say that I don't like the way natural law seems to center around mankind. A guy with a rifle taking down a white tail is violence against something innocent. I'm sure most (except the vegetarians) would see this as logically rational and of course it's a reality.

reply to post by IAMIAM


Your example is predicated on an irrational society, in contrast with mine which is predicated on an entirely rational society.

It is illogical to argue from the standpoint you are arguing from.

This is no different than me proposing a world where gravity is inverted and everyone must live in a cave or go flying off into outer space, then formulating logical premises based on this society to deduce what could happen in the real world.

Originally posted by daskakik5y6

Reality and truth are the same but someone can do something logically irrational and it would not make it unreal or untrue.

absolutely, which is the entire point of my article.

If someone is acting irrationally, they can only be doing so because they are in a state of self-delusion about what the truth is.

hence, they are lying to themselves.

reply to post by mnemeth1


I will state this again.

The reason it is illogical is there is no absolute way for you (the one who makes the decision to use violence to defend yourself) to know if that person is innocent.

The very concept of someone initiating violence is based up on past experiences which may, or may not apply to the new situation.

The only way you will know if he is truly initiating violence against you is to let the situation play out and look at it after the fact. If he didn’t, then good. If he did, and you are dead, then you won’t be able to contemplate it in the first place.

The very concept of defending yourself to prevent a result is based upon the perception of the situation and it’s possible outcome if you do nothing, based upon your previous experience. Not based upon the intent of the perpetrator, because you don’t know his intent, and his intent may be irrelevant because he may not know that what he is doing will cause something.

If you apply strict logic to self defense, then you can’t defend yourself until you are killed by the other person because until you die, you don’t know if he is going to kill you.

To initiate self defense before you are killed is basing your actions on previous experience, and determining that the person is trying to kill you without any proof that your would have been dead if you had not acted. You won’t know until after the fact, when you take the clip from his gun, and see if the gun actually had any bullets in it.

So, to say that we can only initiate violence against someone if we know that they are going to kill/steal/destroy is illogical, because we don’t know until after the fact. If we prevent them from doing what they were going to do, then we may never know if they were innocent or not.

So, the natural result is, sometimes you may initiate a violent response to someone that did not intend to do violence to you. And it may be justified because just because they did not intend to do violence didn’t mean that their actions would not have resulted in a violent result which was justifiably defended against. And it may be justified because you did not know that the gun he had was not loaded, and that you wasn’t going to die when he pulled the trigger.

To recognize the concept of self defense negates the concept of the initiation being the trigger for self defense, because to defend your self prevents the initiation. That is because the initiation is the final event that results in the death. Or it’s every event that results in death. It can’t be somewhere in between in squishy land.