DavidFirth
Well-Known Member
Scientists, of course! They know everything and what they don't know they can make up good sounding theories to compensate!
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How Do We Know Something is True?
- Thread starter Sunstone
- Start date
What is the "fact" at any given moment is what is true.
Curious George
Veteran Member
Facts have not been proven untrue, what was believed to be fact was proven untrue. In other words, it was not fact.
Wouldn't this view depend on the belief that truth is inherently subjective? If so, I disagree; at least, unless we clarify it as "subjective truth" but that's a whole different beast from just plain "truth".
I think my views echo what @Erebus said about objective truth but I would disagree on his definition of subjective truth and what it means.
What about Satan or Shiva?
I find this thought very interesting... we tend to use the word knowledge to mean "correct belief backed up by evidence" but really... maybe knowledge is more akin to what has been experienced or observed and belief is just what is thought of to be true without any evidence or experience.
So then what is it to correctly know truth?
Curious George
Veteran Member
No. Truth is not defined as subjective from this.
Jeremiahcp
Well-Known Jerk
No, that is not correct. An untrue fact is still untrue even if we don't realize it is untrue, otherwise it would be impossible to prove it as untrue.
Mister Silver
Faith's Nightmare
How are you defining fact? Because I know many religious people who confuse mythology for fact.
Curious George
Veteran Member
If it was untrue, how could it be a fact?
If I understand you, Patty, you are implicitly defining "truth" here to be synonymous with "fact". Is that correct?
Curious George
Veteran Member
I believe you are correct, and that definition is: something is true/fact if it is the case.
Defining fact as "truth" is fine, but it does not address the leading question in the thread's OP, which to paraphrase, is "How do we know that a proposition is true"? So I'm curious about how you'd answer that question?
Jeremiahcp
Well-Known Jerk
Is that a real question? A fact is just an observation that meet certain standards, and it is possible for humans to be wrong when they declare something a fact. Some of you seem to be pretending that facts are never untrue, but that is simply not the case.
Curious George
Veteran Member
No, observations that meet certain standards are acceptable to use as facts, but they are not necessarily, in fact, facts...
Mister Silver
Faith's Nightmare
Incorrect, it is why eyewitness testimony is not used as facts, but a followup to question others to discover fact.
Jeremiahcp
Well-Known Jerk
No, observations that meet certain standards are acceptable to use as flim flam bing doo doos, but they are not necessarily, in flim flam bing doo doo, flim flam bing doo doos...
oldbadger
Skanky Old Mongrel!
Jeremiahcp
Well-Known Jerk
We know something is true when it is a fact and we know something is a fact when it is true. I mean get with the program, @Sunstone .
Out of curiosity then, how would you define "knowledge"? So far as you are concerned, what sort of things can be known to you?
Could you elaborate, please, on what you mean by "one truth".
PureX
Veteran Member
You were trying to play the "game of absolutes", wherein any statement that cannot be proven absolutely true, must then it be dismissed as absolutely untrue. The hidden presumption being that relative truthfulness equals falsity. It's a fools game and we've already wasted too much energy on it.
A proposition is true if the observer validates said proposition by way of collecting supporting evidence based on research and that observer's experience.