Truth Is The Pursuit Of Truth

Truth:

Scientific Fact, Philosophical Perception, or Simple Fiction

Humans are in the pursuit of truth within their every endeavour, however, truth evades us. We search for meaning in every relationship, every happening in our lives, every worldly event, for each and every waking moment. We search. Truth, as defined by Wikipedia is, most often used to mean being in accord with fact or reality, or fidelity to an original or to a standard or ideal. Truth may also often be used in modern contexts to refer to an idea of ‘truth to self,’ or authenticity” (Wikipedia, 2015).

Truth is the pursuit of understanding resulting from culmination of life experiences, beliefs, and certainties that are consistent with what we know to be in harmony with fact or reality as we understand it today. “Being true is a mysterious and suspicious property” (Fisher, 2014). There are copious factors to consider when contemplating what truth is. This paper considers scientific facts and theories, use of language and societal norms, philosophical beliefs, and morality, when determining what truth truly is.

The Science Behind Truth

Scientists prove theories by testing situations a series of times to determine if the results are typical and consistent over time. When a theory is found to be consistent it becomes a scientific law, for example, Newton’s Law of Physics. A scientific law is a proven truth. Descartes argues, “that all clear and distinct ideas are true,” (Flage, 2014), therefore, in science, clear and distinct ideas are truths according to Descartes. Further to this he states, “clear and distinct idea is materially true if and only if it is consistent and therefore capable of representing an actual object,” (Flage, 2014). Street an...

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...eality, scientific proof of theory, or something more prophetic? Nietzsche asks:

What, then, is truth? A mobile army of metaphors, metonyms, and anthropomorphisms—in short, a sum of human relations which have been enhanced, transposed, and embellished poetically and rhetorically, and which after long use seem firm, canonical, and obligatory to a people. (1954)

Truth is the pursuit of knowledge resulting from a culmination of life experiences, beliefs, and certainties that are consistent with what we know to be in harmony with fact or reality as we understand it today. No one view can be credited for defining truth, as truth may not be within our grasp. “If knowledge is justified true belief, then it would seem that all the true beliefs of a consistent believer constitute knowledge” (Davidson, 1986). “There is more to truth than our concept of it” (Fisher, 2014).