Objective Truth Doesn't Exist

To start this thread off: I am not arguing in favor of a transcendent entity. An entity does not exist just because there is a need for it to exist.

Also - this is my opinion and I hope my wording doesn't sound like I'm forcing you to believe everything I say.

Hi there. I've been seeking after this elusive creature we all claim to know: truth. The entity that is so important to humanity and yet nobody can agree upon what it is. Every time I feel that I've captured truth in the grip of my palm it falls through the crevices of my fingers like sand.

People across the earth all hold different truths to themselves. "Objective Truth Doesn't Exist" - this is a truth claim itself isn't it?? We like to envision this gigantic tangible "T" that is as real as we think we are conscious and awake. I would argue that truth is more like the value on a logic gate, where one side is on and one side is off, but you can flip the gate 180 degrees and the value can lead the other way as well. Jesus is the truth, Muhammad is the truth, no Gods is the truth - and everyone may very well go to their graves believing this as some solid tangible truth to life itself.

Any time I try to pursue some type of truth in the world, I find that it has many sides and many people can be right even though they disagree with someone on the same topic. It is evident that we have the ability to choose whether we want something to be true or not. The fact that we still all debate on age old topics reveals this to me even more. It is as though the popular theological argument that 'there can be no objective truth without a supernatural entity' is very true indeed. This does not however prove a supernatural entity exists, only that objective truth does not exist without one.

Truth is used in language by humanity to overcome ourselves and Nature. We weight truth and lie just like we weigh good and evil, and eventually we declare our truths just like we declare what is good to us. Truth also seems to be dependent upon lie to value what is "true" to us or not - just as good is dependent upon evil to know what is good. We know a healthy body feels much better than being sick, so many of us deem that "good".

People may bring up examples like gravity, in which it will pull you to the ground whether or not you believe that is true. In this case, we are still making a truth claim toward the law itself. I would argue laws and truths are not equivalent. Our bodies react to laws regardless of what truth we assign to them.

The values of true and false aid us every day in improving ourselves, at least relatively. You may not agree with someone else upon their truths but they believe their life is better whether that is relative to you or not.

Just as everyone thinks they are the only person with their head screwed on straight, everyone also thinks that they know what is true in life. It's almost as though we cannot function without having stable knowledge of reality. Making truths is natural for us, and we will continue to do so into the future. If you are not making your own truths, then you will be accepting other peoples' truths as your own. Whether we are consciously choosing or not, we live by these standards day to day.

Perhaps really believing in "truth" helps us progress toward the future. Just as we are so overly obsessive and infatuated about having sex with each other not realizing that it is all in the name of procreation and making more kin - we set truths before us as a means to build ourselves greater toward this ideal. We are the smiths of purpose out of purposelessness, and we are the wave riders of chaos.

Thanks for reading

Do you believe there are any objective moral values? Is anything objectively good or objectively evil?

If someone wanted to kidnap and torture a toddler for their own amusement ... is this objectively wrong or simply distasteful (against current culture or personal opinion)?

Philosophy is certainly not my forte so my question could be flawed.

Personally I believe objective evil (and good) are real... not just relative to culture or individuals.

Thanks for the thought-provoking post!

a reply to: Myollinir

Remember that 'true' is an adjective, and 'truth' is an abstract noun. The adjective can describe things that exist outside of the imagination, while the abstract cannot.

What we lack nowadays is the ability and tools to describe what is true.

originally posted by: VegHead
Do you believe there are any objective moral values? Is anything objectively good or objectively evil?

If someone wanted to kidnap and torture a toddler for their own amusement ... is this objectively wrong or simply distasteful (against current culture or personal opinion)?

I don't personally believe there is objective good or evil. We often as a mass find people who have the same values for "good" and those sure feel like they are objective when we will throw people in prison over their relative evils.

The minority group of people won't agree with the majority's morality.

I would like to believe there is some sort of moral objectivity - like how our bodies obey gravity - but philosophically speaking I don't think we have a pulling moral force at all...

Thanks for the response!

originally posted by: Myollinir
Any time I try to pursue some type of truth in the world, I find that it has many sides and many people can be right even though they disagree with someone on the same topic. It is evident that we have the ability to choose whether we want something to be true or not. The fact that we still all debate on age old topics reveals this to me even more. It is as though the popular theological argument that 'there can be no objective truth without a supernatural entity' is very true indeed. This does not however prove a supernatural entity exists, only that objective truth does not exist without one.

Could you please explain that more? Why does objective truth require the presence of a supernatural entity?

Truth is used in language by humanity to overcome ourselves and Nature. We weight truth and lie just like we weigh good and evil, and eventually we declare our truths just like we declare what is good to us. Truth also seems to be dependent upon lie to value what is "true" to us or not - just as good is dependent upon evil to know what is good. We know a healthy body feels much better than being sick, so many of us deem that "good".

I love this part, probably the best part in your post. I agree, truth helps us overcome. But how absolute is it? I've wondered this for a long time. We can look at ancient peoples and conclude they were ignorant fools. Or we could conclude they did well within their capacities. In sum, how can someone be an ignorant fool if they don't have the means or the time to know something? And since hindsight is 20/20, our perspective on it's flawed. Future peoples may conclude either of the two about us. In fact, I see no reason they should conclude otherwise. All through history we can see an increase in understanding, it's surprising this should suddenly stop now.

People may bring up examples like gravity, in which it will pull you to the ground whether or not you believe that is true. In this case, we are still making a truth claim toward the law itself. I would argue laws and truths are not equivalent. Our bodies react to laws regardless of what truth we assign to them.

Yes I'm familiar with this I think. It goes like "Truth doesn't go away if you stop believing in it."

Perhaps really believing in "truth" helps us progress toward the future. Just as we are so overly obsessive and infatuated about having sex with each other not realizing that it is all in the name of procreation and making more kin - we set truths before us as a means to build ourselves greater toward this ideal. We are the smiths of purpose out of purposelessness, and we are the wave riders of chaos.

Thanks for reading

Assuming at the heart of everything is chaos, and If purpose is integral to our needs, this is what should be expected.

originally posted by: jonnywhite
Could you please explain that more? Why does objective truth require the presence of a supernatural entity?

The entity wouldn't necessarily need to be a "person" but something like a law holder or law creator. Some arbiter that tells us what is true.

But when you state it like that - laws already are in place so why wouldn't truth be in place? It could be deemed that knowing what is objectively true is impossible when thinking this way. I'm trying to imagine outside of the box we are currently in and I guess that's a blanket answer as to why supernature would be needed - because Nature does not provide objective truth.

Yes I'm familiar with this I think. It goes like "Truth doesn't go away if you stop believing in it."

Much like being able to move beyond good and evil, I too feel like we can move towards utilizing truth and being honest about it. It is a part of us innately, just like morality is innate to us as well .. being social creatures!

Ultimately I guess my wish for humanity is to be honest about what we do not know - which is entirely too much

a reply to: Myollinir

I think I get what you're saying but I'm not sure. I think your syntax distinction between truth and law is faulty. By classifying things that are objectively true as laws you've answered your own argument. It is of course objectively true that one plus one equals two, always and everywhere, regardless of what anyone thinks.

If we are just talking about objective truths regarding human affairs then I still think your argument has holes. Just because we cannot agree unanimously, as flawed creatures, does not mean that something or another is not true. I think what you're really saying is that there is no objective "good" or "evil". I still would not agree with this in the arena of human affairs. Just because reasonable minds can disagree does not mean it is neither objectively good nor evil. The problem I see is that we are using the wrong gauge. We are not designed to be able to discern objective good or evil. In any given situation we have a lifetime of learning, experiences, beliefs, and character defects that way into our decision on judging something either good or evil. Further, we can never fully know all of the facts of the situation because we do not have the full knowledge of the individuals involved history. Despite the fact that it is one of our favorite past times, we were not meant to judge. If judgement is to take place, it is by someone or something better designed for the function. And before you think this is some Christian rant, it is not. I'm not Christian. Many other spiritual traditions also believe that it is not man's job to judge but to go with the flow.

All fixed set patterns are incapable of adaptability or pliability. The truth is outside of all fixed patterns. Bruce Lee

a reply to: TobyFlenderson

By classifying things that are objectively true as laws you've answered your own argument

I'm speaking of truth philosophically - not by physical laws. Things like religious beliefs, where the universe comes from, what is right and what is wrong - etc. Hence placing it on the philosophy board but I suppose I could be more specific. I think we confuse the word "truth" with "fact".

Good and evil concerns morality, while my search for truth pertains to existence which does not have a positive or negative value...

a reply to: Myollinir

Thank you for your post Myollinir. Throughout, you demonstrate thoughtful consideration on the nature of our existence.
Likewise you peppered the post with observations that jumped out at me singular thoughts that tantalize my own sense of things. For example

The fact that we still all debate on age old topics reveals this to me even more.

A minor sentence in a minor paragraph in a minor thread on a minor web site yet a profound observation I think. We still do not know what so many of us claim to believe as true.

When I began to study the famous philosophers I had the notion that together they would have cobbled together a precise understanding of reality. My thought was ''the best minds'' of all time'' over thousands of years was certain to have uncovered the ''truth'' that is beyond the ken of us normal people who seem willing to believe what ever it is that our parents and local cultures have accepted as truth before us.

Yet, over time, I began to sense that these minds might not have been the ''best minds'' but rather just minds that at certain times in certain places and situations came to be thought of as the best minds and really might not have been any better than my own, just that they had become ''famous'' as the best minds. That, as an example, any of those famous thinkers might only have become famous simply because they had been a teacher at a certain college whose ideas were picked up and expanded upon by a cluster of listeners which ended up establishing 'schools' of thought that in reality had little more basis in ''truth' than could be thought by Joe Blow on his way to the corner market for a supply of cigarettes for the day.

A current notion of my own is, after several years now, still perplexing me. Is there a difference between ''thinking something'' and '' believeing something''. I had noticed that one of the main ingredients in the turmoil of our species is that people ''believe' certain things. Christians believe this and Muslims believe that. Communists believe something and capitalists believe something else. And then they fight over what they believe. I also notice that that belief, whatever it is, need not have any roots in reality, that just the belief alone was enough to build edifices of truth that demands more and more belief if they are to continue.

Studying a cult and it's message points this out. The cults message garners belief from followers. As the message fails to incorporate new things and the message begins to loose it's luster, the believers must begin to bend over backwards and conjure up better and deeper and more illusive ''truth'' to bolster their already existing belief in what once might have been just a simple message. We convolute what we believe in attempts to rationalize it with our surroundings.

So basically, at this point, I try to steer clear of believing either this or that, as just that simple act of believing seems to be a trap, a prison to our own, at least my own, thought processes. Rather I now am holding to ''thinking things'' rather than believing things and this for now seems to allow me the freedom to dive into a wider variety of considerations than someone who believes either this or that.

Anyway, see what your excellent post did to me? Opened a flood gate of my own mental meanderings and for now, I can see no better avenue for my own existence than that. Thanks My.

PS. By the way there were a number of other points in your post that sparked within my the same level alliterative conjecturing but at later time for all our sakes. Toodles for now.

a reply to: TerryMcGuire

the believers must begin to bend over backwards and conjure up better and deeper and more illusive ''truth'' to bolster their already existing belief in what once might have been just a simple message. We convolute what we believe in attempts to rationalize it with our surroundings.

I feel like this happens in many areas - truths emerge out of simple beliefs through the teachings of many generations...

I like your idea of thinking things rather than believing them - as this may be one step further towards human evolution and overcoming our nature. That believing can set yourself in a prison of that ideology (or it does rather). I've experienced this myself time and time again as I donned a separate cap of a different belief system (I've fully experienced Veganism, had my crisis of faith, thought I was a "hard atheist", went beyond that .. but fully experienced all of these motions with much belief in them).

I hope I can think rather than just believe - especially in ideas that bring such conviction to us. Politics is a very dangerous area because it is so incredibly popular and enticing, and there is no shortage of popularity and antics among other humans.

Glad to have a bit of fun with you! I feel like these are the worthwhile conversations in life.

Just because a person/collective have information gathering problem do not mean there is no objective true statements of what is on all levels of creation.

I do not know "the quantum state of each individual particle in every specific cell that is the collective making up this biological avatar" that I am using to process this awareness/consciousness. That do not mean that it is impossible to know "the quantum state of each individual particle in every specific cell that is the collective making up this biological avatar". The right tool and awareness/knowledge on how to examine it and the information is revealed.

Just because you are blind (do not have the tool to know) do not mean there is not something to know.

a reply to: Myollinir

Agreed that there is no "Truth", with a capital "T".

As you say there is no objective truth, then why must only false or lie be the opposite of truth?
Perhaps the opposite of truth is just: something else? Or Other?

Like two people looking at opposite sides of a coin, and arguing about what they perceive. They are both right about the truth they see, and they are both wrong about the truth of the other.

They are experiencing a temporary subjective truth, yet we all seem to project this out into the world as us knowing an objective truth. We don't.

a reply to: Myollinir


There is plenty of objective truth but not for the un-humble.

a reply to: LittleByLittle

So in the case of God existing, vs. God doesn't exist - how can both appear to be right? How can they both say they have the truth when neither can coexist?

I do, however, like your response and it is a good point!

Do you believe you can use the same methodology for finding answers to tangible quantum questions as finding answers to philosophical questions?

Also - I can believe that your statement has no truth whatsoever to it and I can decide that is truth but that's obviously a cop out

a reply to: Logarock

As you say there is no objective truth, then why must only false or lie be the opposite of truth? Perhaps the opposite of truth is just: something else? Or Other?

Truth and lie/false are just fragments of human language, in my opinion. They are the vocal emissions formulated by our brains and vibrated off our vocal chords. They are an attempt to describe our outer world and we acknowledge the value of the word in society.

I agree the opposite of truth could be something else but we use the language of what we best understand (as for example science shows again and again, when we prove old ideas wrong and switch our understanding to the new ideas).

originally posted by: Logarock
a reply to: Myollinir


There is plenty of objective truth but not for the un-humble.

Sounds like you may know your own quote best

Does humble mean surrendering all of your decision making processes to authoritative figures?

a reply to: Myollinir

Famous psychologist George Kelly has said precisely the same thing more than 50 years ago.

Although he took a step beyond truth and just asserted that there is no objective reality all together, and that objectivity is a construct that we rely upon to perceive and to interact with the physical world.

Pretty parallel to what the Buddhist cosmologists said thousands of years ago and to what quantum physicists are saying today.

originally posted by: Myollinir
a reply to: LittleByLittle

So in the case of God existing, vs. God doesn't exist - how can both appear to be right? How can they both say they have the truth when neither can coexist?

Do you believe you can use the same methodology for finding answers to tangible quantum questions as finding answers to philosophical questions?

We see it everyday: people arguing until they're blue in the face, about whether God exists or not.
They think that their subjective belief, is an absolute Truth!
When you stand back, and observe all of this two-sides bickering, about God, politics, sports, whatever, it's really unbelievable that folks get so worked-up about this.
Cat-fights, spit and fur flying everywhere. Name calling, and hurtful actions done, all in the name of a difference in personal truths.

They're called: Opinions.
And these words are not objective truth, they are merely my temporary opinions.

QM can help us understand the foolishness of this, by showing us how everything is impermanent, and even questioning the originality of our thoughts, and the supposed free-will we think we have.

A clock could be true one minute, then false the next, without ever changing.

a reply to: Nothin

If we could move closer towards this type of honesty, I think that would be a giant leap for humanity.

It's just unfortunate that while in a solitary place we are able to contemplate and reflect on these thoughts about reality, but at any moment can be taken by the crowd as that is the flip side of our nature even if we consider ourselves intellectuals. So at the same time we are much like the dual slit experiment intellectually where we can slow down and be silent but we are also helpless to be part of the wave of conscious emotions in our cultures.

At least it keeps life interesting!