Different cultures have different truths/A truth is that which can be accepted universally - what are the implications for knowledge of agreeing with these statements?

Essay on Prescribed Title

Theory of Knowledge

DIFFERENT CULTURES HAVE DIFFERENT TRUTHS/A TRUTH IS THAT WHICH CAN BE ACCEPTED UNIVERSALLY - WHAT ARE THE IMPLICATIONS FOR KNOWLEDGE OF AGREEING WITH THESE STATEMENTS?

Truth is not found, nor does it exist on some ephemeral territory outside of our worldly reality. In fact, we do not yet know where the drive for truth comes from, or what truth is? The principal conflict lies in the definition of truth, and the implications of that definition for the different areas of knowledge. It seems that the contention that favors the universality of truth is less likely today than the Foucauldian condemnation of universal truths, however his, is not without detractors. Foucault said that “Each society has its regime of truth, its general politics of truth: that is, the types of discourse which it accepts and makes function as true”, whether we accept that truth resides in all-embracing and universal systems, or that the regime of truth lies with its purveyor, both schools of thought have their merits.

While the nature of truth is downright deceptive, Foucault made the argument that they are produced not induced by authority figures, and that as such, the regime of truth depends upon deceit for its power. There is no denying that to be truthful means to make unconscious choices in accordance with metaphors that are centuries-old, lying as it were, according to a fixed convention. Nietzsche seemed to agree, and his belief that “truths are merely illusions which have forgotten are illusions” captures my contention that once a fabricated vision of things is taken to be true, it becomes a regime of truth that will determine the context on which a discourse might function as true. The regime of truth has to hide the fact that it is a human fabrication and that it feeds the unconsciousness through which we arrive at a sense of truth. Instead, it reveals itself as a sum of human falsehoods that have served us over time by providing us with self-appointed judges that establish and sanction truth within a discourse. Charles Peirce defined truth as an opinion to which the community adheres, that with sufficient investigation would cause to be universally accepted and all others rejected, however, his argument is easily dismissed if we condiser Foucault's views on the matter. "Truth" he says "is produced and reproduced by the adherents of ideology", in other words, while each society is ultimately in charge of its own regime of truth, theirs could never become a larger, all-encompassing universal truth. On the other hand, there is no doubt universal truths exist, math is full of them, and there are some obvious universal truths about values and morals. The inherent worth and dignity of every person translates in Christian theology to "love thy neighbor as thy self", and in Buddhist spirituality it relates to the theme of compassion. But even this universal paradigm has its drawbacks, this sort of statement is too broad to be meaningful, and even the implications of such a statement are hardly universal. Even a spiritual interpretation of this statement would be different from religion to religion. Finding universal ground for all religious would be completely impossible, since they each push their own agenda and regard their particular brand of dogma as the real truth. To assume that the different religions of the world would ever agree on an universal truth is completely futile, and undermines the concept of organized religion, which dictates that truth must always be a commmunal activity, and implies that the community is responsible for distinguishing betweem true and false statements and determining who is charged with saying what counts as true. Only when we compare our own outlook to those of others, do we then realize what is universal and invariant, and what is distinctive and variable. Therefore, the arguments for the possibility of an universal truth are weak, since the role of the individual, more often than not, is to express the stifled truth of his own community, therein establishing the truth for his own culture.

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However, we see that in science and mathematics, universal truths are abundant, and necessary in order to satisfy all our demands of scientific theories. According to Einstein, "Science is the attempt to make the chaotic diversity of our sense-experience correspond to a logically uniform system of thought", his statement is significant because it introduces the necessity for an universal truth, in the scientific world consensus is a vital requisite since only through the human activity of verifying can something be true. The Pragmatic theory, although reviled by a number of scholars, explains what is meant by truth of natural laws, since it implies that truth is not absolute, but constantly modified as discoveries are made. Truth according to the Pragmatic Theory is relative to time and space, and is associated with the human need to understand, predict and to control. However, the Pragmatic theory also suggests that in order for something to be true, it must have some sort of human use and it must induce scientific inquiry, this is not always the case though. Those who call the terms of the Pragmatic theory too vague, instead subscribe to the Correspondence theory, which is generally accepted accross all fields of study. The Correspondence theory implies that truth must match or correspond to a state of affairs in the world, in other words, it says that something is true provided there exists a fact corresponding to it. In essence, it suggests that truth is a relationship between a proposition and its corresponding fact, but then, we must dwell on the definition of a fact. Most critics of this theory point out that the characterization of facts in the Correspondence theory implies that facts are whatever true propositions must correspond to in order to be true. However, Reuben Abel asks the question in his "Man is Measure" of whether it is possible to compare such different entities as a proposition and a fact, the latter relates to a state of affairs, while the former refers to a state of mind, could they ever correspond. The Pragmatic theory on the other hand requires the human element, and emphasizes that only when something is acted upon does it become true. It holds that in order for something to be true, it must be useful to someone, however it may be useful for someone to believe a proposition but also useful for someone else to disbelieve it. For example, Freud said that many people, in order to avoid despair, need to believe there is a god who keeps a watchful eye on everyone. According to one version of the Pragmatic Theory, that proposition is true. However, it may not be useful for other persons to believe that same proposition. Since this theory suggests that truth is what an ideally rational inquirer would in the long run come to believe, it also espouses the idea that different cultures have different truths, not that a truth can be universally accepted.

Truth is the ideal outcome of rational inquiry. Yet, as a theory of truth, the Pragamtic theory does not reveal what truth is, and neither does any other modern definition. Pilates' original cosmic question remains to be answered, and yet, it seems more reasonable to assume that each culture prepares its own version of the truth, rather than admit the possibility of an universal truth.

Different cultures have different truths/A truth is that which can be accepted universally - what are the implications for knowledge of agreeing with these statements?

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