Excerpt from Chapter seven of the book ‘BEYOND SCIENCE’ :Truth as value by Robert Priddy

TRUTH AS A VALUE

By ever insisting on the distinction between what is ‘true’ and what is ‘right’, modern thought and language have in effect divorced the two, reducing the idea of truth to a question of fact, thereby eliminating questions of value and goodness from the pursuit of truth. This arbitrary and categorical view of truth easily engenders attitudes of disinterest or supposed ‘ethical neutrality’, which easily degenerates into ethical irresponsibility and the service of destructive masters, both in business and politics. Academic philosophy and science mainly regard truth as a conceptual standard for deciding what is factual. There is a clear distinction between fact and truth. A fact is true, but truth is not just factuality, but a supra-factual standard. A fact can be observed by aid of one or more of the five senses, then described and recorded, while many facts can be summarised in generalisations or in the shorthand form we call scientific theory. However well-founded in observation and reason, no factual or theoretical statements - however accurate, however precise - can capture the essential and final truth of any matter.

Though truth is the criterion by which we decide what is the case or not, it is more essentially a quality pertaining to the understanding in general. Understanding proper not only takes account of facts and theories, but also of values through the sympathy that springs from deep identifications of meaning and purpose as these are expressed in all life and are seen as reflected throughout the cosmos. One says that truth is something that has to be lived, meaning that personal experience in all its many aspects is the real basis of understanding. This may sound obscure, until one realises that the only vehicle of truth, where its light alone can be seen, is the living human mind. Truth is not some kind of neutral, objective or inanimate quantity, like information or theory that can be stored, transmitted, sold and consumed. To think that the deepest or final truth about anything or everything can be discovered by research and stated clearly so that practically anyone who understands the language and culture easily can appreciate it is a grand misconception, far from the truth.

Truth is undoubtedly itself a value, one closely related to truthfulness and one which informs our conscience, by which we decide matters of right and justice. The modern tendency is to define truth in purely intellectual terms and to overlook the great importance of this idea as a value. It can be seen from the gamut of human culture that truth is a value closely interwoven with unity, goodness, beauty, justice, righteousness and wholesomeness. Truth is also closely related to integrity, which is a word we use for self-consistent wholeness or completeness… ‘the whole truth and nothing but’. Thus, truth implies authenticity of understanding as coherent meaningfulness and relevance to life, whatever issue may be at hand.

Witnesses in British courts of law must swear the oath to tell “the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth”. Sometimes it is a quite straightforward question where one knows what is the correct answer - “yes” or “no”. But this may often not be at all easy. Were it so, not least philosophy had been superfluous and science and jurisdiction could together have disposed of the whole question.

One need give no examples to prove that, as soon as a complex moral issue arises, opinions can differ depending upon a veritable host of facts and values. Even if everyone has the same access to the facts of the matter, and even if these are fully known (which is very seldom so in all but the most straightforward instances), personal values always tend to affect a person’s judgement.

Personal values arise from one’s life experience, the nature and quality of one’s inclinations, feelings, viewpoints, theories, beliefs and hopes, to name but a few sources. One’s own background cannot be rubbed out, for it always naturally conditions one’s understanding generally, influencing one to be less than objective in some way or other. It may seem easy for an outsider in a dispute to be wise, especially after the event when the outcome is properly known, but even then that feeling of knowing may still be at variance with the truth and the good.

In the broad sense, truth inevitably has to do with doing right and avoiding wrong, not only with making correct judgements or avoiding false statements. In human relations, truth usually means both avoiding lies and stating the facts as they are. It is associated with openness of mind, including not concealing anything one knows that would affect judgements about the truth of things. Such openness is only possible when one trusts others implicitly, so truth and trust go hand in hand, just as do deception and fear. Openness accords much more with the truth than does secrecy and suspicion, one need only think of the importance of Glasnost. Even so, in our time there also seems to be less agreement than ever about the nature of truth, its importance both in the sciences and as a value human relations.

In general, truth depends upon the overall insight, the total understanding… not on details that may be irrelevant or may be but small flaws in an otherwise great and unitary design. Relativity theory is incapable of explaining certain known facts… but this does not, at least according to its proponents, make it an untrue theory. It is true as far as it goes, just as classical physics is true to the facts as far as it extends (i.e. within the limits of the reach of the technology of the 18th century).

Truth cannot be made a mere mental construct, because it is an ultimate value by which all mental constructs can be judged. Some prefer the mental conception of scientific ‘truth’ because of what it can produce and change in the material world. Others prefer the mental and emotive constructs of spiritual or religious ‘truth’ more because of what it can do to the quality of personal experience and in the society.

Spiritual truth, as expressed by great thinkers and mystics through the ages, can only be reduced to conceptual codices or human laws at the price of losing its most sublime and transcendental nature. The move away from regarding truth as a timeless and objective value has led to the alienation of our institutions of knowledge and their members from pressing questions of value in many walks of life. The result is often the acceptance of ‘absolute relativism’, where no viewpoint is regarded in principle to be superior to or better than another, or one’s own standpoint is implicitly taken as the only fixed and sound reference point. This is seen, for example, in value-neutral liberalism in which human freedom is confused with licence to pursue whatever beliefs and aims one wishes, whether they express values or anti-values.