The Truth is Really True
A reader claimed that we cannot find any truth because of the illusion we live it. As an example, he says this:
“Let us say that you take the statement ‘The Sun is bright’ as truth. Well, it is not the truth. Sun is not bright. Brightness is only a perception or illusion created in your brain because your eyes happen to be sensitive to certain energy photons.”
JJ: I would agree with him if he had said that it is not possible for us in our present state to find the ultimate truth or the complete truth, but it is indeed possible to find many things that are absolute truths as indicated by the Course in Miracles:
“For if what is not true is true as well as what is true, then part of truth is false. And truth has lost its meaning. Nothing but the truth is true, and what is false is false.”
There are many things that are absolutely true. Millions of truths can be found in mathematics. For instance, 2+2=4 and does not equal anything else.
Now let us examine the reader’s statement that he says is not true. “The sun is bright.” He says this is not true because it is only a perception. In other words, the brightness of a thing is relative to the eyes of the beholder, for if our sun was placed side by side with Sirius, which is many times brighter, then the sun would not seem so bright.
Does this make the original statement untrue?
Absolutely not. When someone says the sun is bright, they are comparing its brightness to other things not as bright. So, in comparison to the moon and stars it is absolutely true that the sun is bright.
To say that you cannot make true measurements within a standard that is accepted by your consciousness is illusion.
If I say it is 100 degrees Fahrenheit out there and you say that is not true because it is 37.7 degrees Celsius you are just making a contentious and false argument. Both statements are absolutely true within the reference points of accepted measurements here on Planet Earth.
Absolute truth exists within relative measurements. If a thing is bright to me and dim to a visiting alien then it is still true that it is bright to me. I care not how bright it is to the alien.
There is truth within illusion. For instance, you may dream you are being chased by a monster and wake up to your relief and discover the monster is not real. Even so, it is absolutely true that you did dream of a monster and had the experience of being chased by him.
Our whole universe is created out of wavelengths [an absolute truth] so in reality solid matter is an illusion. Even, so it is still true that I am having the experience of sitting in a solid chair. It is absolutely true that the chair is solid to my reference points.
The path to greater truth is to first accept the truths that we see about us. If you dream that you are being chased by a monster it will not make the monster go away if you just think, “I am not being chased by a monster.” Outside of waking up, the best thing you can do is turn and face the monster and fight it. I did that once in a dream and beat the dickens out of it. That was a wonderful experience.
I have already written a lot about the subject of absolute and relative truth. If you want to check it out go HERE
Then scroll down and read these post numbers:
107, 108, 109, 230,373, 390, 449, 802, 935 and 1124
A reader fives a mathematical formula about gravity and says it has been proven correct, but then asks, “But can this law of gravity be considered truth? No, because no one, no one scientist knows, WHY the celestial bodies KNOW that they have to be attracted to each other? The real truth is hidden.”
JJ: Why do you say that an incomplete knowledge about gravity negates the truth about its law and effects? That’s like saying that because you do not know how a radio works that it cannot be true that my favorite station is 670 on the dial. That’s silly.
If you do not know how gravity works then average people still know many truths about it. Here are some.
- Gravity pulls us toward the earth.
- If we jump over a cliff, we will hurt ourselves.
- If we overeat, we will wind up weighing more.
- Gravity keeps our orbit around the sun in place and consistent.
I could go on and on.
Conclusion: You do not need to know all truth about a subject to know some truths about it.
You do not need to know how consciousness originated to know the truth that you are conscious. Let us hope you are, anyway.
I figured you were using an unorthodox definition of truth. Here is what the dictionary says it is:
“The actual facts or information about something, rather than what people think, expect, or make up.”
What you are defining as truth is not even in the dictionary and to be technically correct you should have used something like “ultimate truth’ or “complete truth’ rather than just “truth.” Any fact or accurate piece of data is true.
The use of unorthodox definitions without clarifying how one is using the word is the cause of many disagreements where no real disagreements are to be had.
We had this problem when talking about law a while back. I tried to get everyone to use the dictionary definitions of the words “law’ and “legal,” and because all would not accept the same definitions we couldn’t get off page one in the argument.
You say that you do not go by the dictionary definition of truth and it appears that in your mind truth can never be discovered or known so it is pretty difficult to have a discussion with you about a subject that does not even exist in your mind.
For instance, because my favorite radio station is different than yours means to you that it is not true that I have a favorite radio. That is pretty strange thinking.
As I said, we had a discussion a while back on what was legal and because we could not agree on the meaning of the word the discussion was stopped in its tracks. I had about seven points I wanted to make and we couldn’t even get to point one because the word legal was a moving target. Truth seems to be a moving target in this case.
Torture numbers, and they’ll confess to anything. – Gregg Easterhrook
July 29, 2013
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