A common phrase that I often hear people use goes something like this: “That may be true for you, but it is not true for me.” Or, “That is your truth, but it is not my truth.” This seems to imply that truth is an individual matter. That interpretation makes truth a subjective, rather than an objective matter. Let’s take a moment to look at these two words:
Objective: Relating to, or being an object, phenomenon, or condition in the realm of sensible experience independent of individual thought and perceptible by all observers; having reality independent of the mind. (Merriam Webster)
Not influenced by personal feelings, interpretations, or prejudice, based on facts, unbiased.
Intent upon dealing with things external to the mind rather than with thoughts or feelings, as a person or a book.
Being the objective or perception of thought, belonging to the object of thought, rather than to the thinking subject. (In other words, it is the external thing we are thinking about, not the thoughts we are having about the thing.)
(Dictionary.com)
So, what this means is that anything that is objective must correspond to reality. There must be a generally understood consensus of what the thing is or what something means. If this were not so, it would be impossible for human beings to communicate verbally or in writing. Let me give you a silly example of what this means. Suppose you were walking around a lake with 19 other people, and you saw a turtle. Suppose you lined the 19 other people up, and asked them, one at a time, what it was. If everyone of them, except one said that it was a turtle, and the one odd-ball said it was a duck, you would not then begin to call it a duck, you would continue to call it a turtle, and conclude that the person calling it a duck was either blind, crazy or simply being facetious. There is a consensus that the thing is a turtle. That is the objective reality, regardless of how each individual member of the group felt about turtles. Perhaps some of them love turtles and see them as things of beauty, while others hate turtles and think they were ugly. Regardless of how we feel about turtles, or what worth we ascribe to them, they are still turtles. Our feelings and thoughts about them do not change the reality of what they are. They are turtles, not ducks. We do not create versions of turtles in our minds to make them be what we desire for them to be. They are just turtles, and there is nothing we can do to change that fact. That is our objective reality. Every morning, all over the world, regardless of your geographical location, you are capable to perceiving what we refer to as the sun “rising”, although “sunrise” is not an actual thing, it is a perception, just as the horizon is not an actual thing. Nevertheless, it is our objective reality. How we feel or what we think about sunrises is subjective. We cannot stop the sun from shining because we prefer darkness. To think we can, is lunacy. (Pun intended.)
Subjective: based on, or influenced by personal feelings, tastes, or opinions.
(Dictionary.com)
Characteristic of or belonging to reality as perceived rather than as independent of mind.
Relating to or being experience or knowledge as conditioned by personal mental characteristics or states.
(Merriam Webster)
Now, think for a moment about the definitions just provided. The actual words, objective and subjective, must have an objective meaning for our communication to make sense. The definitions of the words cannot be subjective, or we have no basis for rational communication. I cannot use the word “objective” to mean one thing, if you ascribe to the word an entirely different meaning. That would make the meaning of the word objective, subjective, given those definitions. That makes no sense. If that is the case, we can think our own thoughts in our own minds, but we cannot communicate rationally. But that is not reality. We can communicate, because there is a consensus of what the words mean. Objectivity must correspond to reality.
Shirley MacLain, one of the proponents of what is referred to as the “New Age Movement”, makes the following statements: “It’s all my dream. I’m making all of it happen-good and bad-and I have the choice of how I’ll relate to it and what I’ll do about it. Perhaps everyone has his own truth, and truth as an objective reality simply does not exist.”
This is complete, and utter nonsense. We do not live in a world where people are free to just make up their own reality as they go along. Her words don’t even make sense. She says she is making it happen, and she will decide how she will relate to it and what she will do about it. Why would you have to figure out how to relate to something you made up? If you are the one making it up, it is all going to be just like you want it, right? If everyone just makes up their own reality, then there is no such thing as reality, and if everyone just makes up their own truth, there is no such thing as truth. This is not reality. This is not how the world we live in operates.
Having said that language must correspond to reality for our communication to make sense, I do acknowledge that language is fluid, and is always in a state of evolution. The meanings of words, and the manner which we use them often change over the course of time, so language is always culturally and chronologically relevant. When we read literature that was written prior to the time in which we live, we need to study what it meant for people during that time frame. If we read it in our own cultural and chronological context, we often mis-interpret the meaning. Many words we use in our culture today mean the exact opposite of what they meant 60 years ago.
Things of a theoretical nature should not be proclaimed as objective truth. While some theories may seem more reasonable than others, for language to make sense, and provide a means for humans to be able to communicate effectively, we must not speak of things of a theoretical nature as objective. Theories are subjected to interpretation and should be understood as such. An example of this is Black Holes in space. Here is a definition of black hole that I found on Wikipedia:
A black hole is a region of spacetime exhibiting such strong gravitational effects that nothing—not even particles and electromagnetic radiation such as light—can escape from inside it.[6] The theory of general relativity predicts that a sufficiently compact mass can deform spacetime to form a black hole.[7][8] The boundary of the region from which no escape is possible is called the event horizon. Although the event horizon has an enormous effect on the fate and circumstances of an object crossing it, no locally detectable features appear to be observed.[9] In many ways, a black hole acts like an ideal black body, as it reflects no light.[10][11] Moreover, quantum field theory in curved spacetime predicts that event horizons emit Hawking radiation, with the same spectrum as a black body of a temperature inversely proportional to its mass. This temperature is on the order of billionths of a kelvin for black holes of stellar mass, making it essentially impossible to observe.
Notice that this definition says, “A black hole “is”, not “is thought to be”. This is using objective language to speak of something of a subjective nature. Then it goes on to qualify this by referring to what the “theory” of general relativity “predicts”, and what quantum field “theory” in curved space time “predicts”. Theory is subjective, as is predictability, but both these terms are used to describe something as if it were an objective reality. This is being linguistically dishonest. It might seem to the reader that I am splitting hairs here, but the problem is that, in today’s educational institutions many things of this nature are presented as if they have been factually proven, when in fact, they are theory. The same principle applies to theories about human evolution. They are presented as if they are fact. The problem is that evolutionary “facts” continue to change as new archeological discoveries are made. Real facts do not change. If facts can be changed, there is no such thing as reality. That does not mean that our perception of reality cannot be flawed, because it certainly can, but our changing perceptions do not change reality itself.
If truth exists, then truth, by its very nature must correspond to reality. Consequently, truth must be objective, not subjective. We cannot both have contradictory “truths” about the same objective reality. So, the statement, “That is true for you, but it is not true for me” is nonsense. A thing is either true, or it is not. It cannot be a matter of our private interpretations and opinions. Instead of saying, “That may be true for you, but it is not true for me”, it would be more accurate to say, “That is what you believe, or think to be true, but it is not what I believe, or think to be true.”
You and I can believe differently about the same thing, but just because we believe it, does not make it true. You can believe that grass is red, and I can believe that it is green, but that does not mean that it is both. A blade of grass is either red or green, or another color entirely. It cannot be red and green simultaneously, so we are either both wrong, or one of us is right, and the other, by default, must be wrong. That is the nature of reality. To speak otherwise is to drown in the abyss of linguistic meaninglessness. People who use those terms about truth being a personal matter don’t really take that line of reasoning to its logical conclusion.
The fallacy of Relativism is that it makes the interpretation of reality a very subjective matter. This breaks down all sane communication. It eventually leads to a form of communication in which words mean nothing. If our ideology does not conform to reality, it is meaningless. In all practicality, we do not live our lives this way, despite what might come out of our mouths. Some of the definitions of relativism are as follows:
“a view that ethical truths depend on the individuals or groups holding them”,
“the theory that value judgements, as of truth, beauty, or morality, have no universal validity but are valid only for the persons or groups holding them”,
“the belief that there is no absolute truth, only the truths that a particular individual or culture happen to believe.”
If there is no such thing as ultimate truth, truth that exists in and of itself, apart from what individuals or groups of people do or do not think or believe, then there is no basis for individuals or groups of people to judge the actions of others as either right or wrong. Saying that we do not judge the actions or beliefs of others sounds very enlightened and tolerant in theory, but it is not what we put into practice in our behavior, so the theory or idea of relativism is not based on reality.
Let me give you a few examples of what I mean by this. Any sane person who knows anything about world history understands what a horrible nightmare unfolded in Germany from 1933 to 1945 under the reign of Adolf Hitler. Millions of Jews and other minority groups deemed undesirable by the Nazi party were tortured and exterminated. Many other examples throughout world history could be used to illustrate this, I just chose to use this one to make a point. The irony of this is that, even though we understand this as a horrible tragedy, to the people of Germany at the time of severe economic hardship, this seemed like the answer to their problems, and seemed reasonable to a large portion of the population at the time. Many people in Germany probably just bought into the propaganda initially because it offered the promise of a more secure life. In the end it turned out to be nothing but a hellish nightmare. If relativism as a paradigm of reality has any validity, then the acts of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi party cannot be judged by others as being wrong. To them, at the time, it seemed right. We know this is not reality. Everything inside a sane person screams out that this is wrong. Genocide, whatever the context is reprehensible.
If you are a parent, imagine that one of your children were brutally and senselessly murdered in a mass shooting, (which, as of late, has become far too commonplace.) Would you be willing to hold to the idea that there was nothing wrong with the actions of a deranged person who took your child’s life in an act of violence simply because to the murderer, his truth was that the act was justifiable and necessary, based on his interpretation of reality? I don’t think so! You would probably want to get your hands on that person and administer your own brand of justice! So, getting back to what I said earlier, relativism sounds good in theory, but it has no basis in reality. This is not the way people, even those who hold to the dogma of relativism, live their lives in the real world. It is a self-contradicting interpretation of life.
If we conclude that truth, as an objective reality does exist, the question we must ask ourselves is, “How do we know what is true, and what is not?” If everything that people said, did, wrote, and believed was, in fact true, that would not be an issue. Unfortunately, as we all know too well, that is not the case. Human beings are very good at telling lies and believing lies!
Jesus Christ said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life.” (John 14:6) That is a pretty bold statement. Jesus did not say, “I know the truth”, He said, “I am the truth”. When Jesus was brought before Pilate, Pilate’s question to Jesus was “Are you the king of the Jews?” Listen to Jesus’s response: “Is that your own idea, or did others talk to you about me?” We should let those words sink in as we confront many controversial issues in life. Are you coming to your own conclusions, or are you just going along with the crowd? Are you listening to current chatter and allowing it to influence how you think about things, or are you thinking through deep things for yourself? It is easy to get caught up in social media and news chatter and draw quick, not very well thought out conclusions. Personally, I don’t want to be like that. That is one reason I do not interact very much on social media anymore. People are constantly knee-jerk reacting to things posted on Facebook, and a lot of it is just made up to start controversy.
Jesus goes on to say, “You say that I am a king. In fact, the reason I was born and came into the world is to testify to the truth. Everyone on the side of truth listens to me.” “What is truth?” was Pilates retort. In a world full of lies, how do we know what is true?
We live in a world that does not value truth. People tell lies and believe lies for many different reasons. People tell lies to try to get themselves out of trouble. People tell lies to cover up other lies. Lies are like rabbits. They multiply rapidly! People tell lies to try and manipulate others to get some result they want. People with certain philosophical or political ideologies tend to frame the narrative of the news they are presenting in such a manner as to influence the readers or hearers to come to certain conclusions. This is done for the purpose of controlling how people think. This is done constantly in the society in which we live and is generally motivated by political agendas. In this atmosphere, it is hard to know what the truth really is. I have found myself reading from one perspective, and feeling as if I am being convinced, only to read or hear from the opposing side, and often feeling as if their argument is just as compelling. It can be confusing. Both sides often make very compelling arguments.
Just as there are many reasons people tell lies, there are many reasons people believe lies. Sometimes believing a lie is more convenient that succumbing to the truth, if the lie leaves your current paradigm unchallenged, and supports your preconceptions or biases. The truth is, sometimes we prefer lies. Truth requires us to change. Reality confronts us with many inconveniences, and we are basically lazy and don’t like to be challenged.
One of the things that astonished me as I began to read the Bible is the number of times people witnessed miracles, and still refused to believe the reality of what they had seen with their own eyes. People still behave this way. We live in a society that has been conditioned to interpret everything in a purely materialistic sense. We think that “science” can answer all of life’s mysteries, and the simple fact is that it can’t. Just to clarify, I am not “anti-science”. Science serves great purposes, but we have deified science to a level that is foolish, and sometimes contradicts reality.
Let me ask you a question. Do you consider yourself a sane person? I would venture to guess that most people I asked that question would answer “yes”. Do you hallucinate? I would also guess that most people I asked that question would say “no”, unless they are in the habit of using mind altering drugs, which I certainly hope you are not. Do you trust your own cognition? Again, I would guess most people would say “yes”. So, what is my point? I started off talking about truth being objective, not subjective, so it might seem like I am off on an unrelated tangent. Humor me while I unpack this. It is relevant, I promise.
Suppose you witnessed something or experienced something that was totally out of the ordinary for you, something so unusual, that it seemed supernatural. If that happened to you, there are several ways you could respond.
You could question your own sanity, or possibly think that you imagined it. That would be difficult, however, if you are a rational person who is not in the habit of thinking, doing, and imagining strange things. I think most people know their own minds well enough to know when this is or is not happening. So, the first possible response is denial. “This did not really happen.”
You could choose to accept that something supernatural happened, but ignore that it probably had some significant meaning, and just try to suppress it, or forget about it and move on with life. The problem with that approach is that it generally does not work. Things can haunt us for years, no matter how hard we try to forget them.
You could question your own sanity or think that maybe something neurological was going on with your cognitive abilities and seek professional help. (News flash: You might visit a doctor, psychiatrist, or counselor who interprets everything in a purely materialistic sense, and they might not be of much help to you, if, in fact you did experience something supernatural. If that were the case, they would discredit the supernatural (miracle) and address the issue with the entirely wrong approach. They might even put you on some medication that ultimately made you worse instead of better. I personally think that psychotropic drugs are dangerous, way overused, and should be avoided, but that is just my opinion. I am not a medical or psychiatric expert.)
So, what does this have to do with truth being an objective reality? Jesus stated that He was born and came into the world to testify to the truth. Jesus did miracles. People witnessed Jesus doing miracles. Jesus obviously believed that the Old Testament (in which many miracles are recorded) was true. He quoted it extensively. So, either Jesus was crazy, or a liar, and all the people who wrote the Old and New Testaments, recording all these miracles, are liars……. OR… It is all true, and the miraculous is part of reality that cannot be explained by a purely materialistic interpretation.
If you are of the opinion that the Bible is not true, let me ask you a question: What would be the reason or motivation for so many people, over such a long period of time, making all this stuff up? Why? When people start talking conspiracy theory, the “Why” question is always the first thing I ask. If this conspiracy theory is true, what is the reason? If one person, or a group of people made it all up, I would also be inclined to question its validity, but this is not the case. The Bible consists of 66 different books, written by many different authors, over a long period of time, and the overarching theme to the whole thing is the revelation of God, in the person of Jesus Christ, for the redemption of mankind. This is not the work of man, although it was written through men. It is the work of God, orchestrating the whole process. It cannot be otherwise. Alternate interpretations don’t make sense, and they do not correspond to reality. There is no rational for so many people participating in such a grand conspiracy over such a long period of time.
As I said earlier, one of the primary reasons people lie is to save their own skin, to get themselves out of a jam. The men who wrote the New Testament were living in an environment that was very hostile to their message. The Jews were hostile towards Christianity because it confronted their authority and long-standing religious domination of social life. The Roman government was hostile towards Christianity because the message of the Kingdom of God threatened their political stronghold on the population. Many, if not all the writers of the New Testament were tortured and killed for their faith in Christ. They would not recant because they had witnessed and experienced something so supernatural that there was no explanation for it, other than God. No one would die for something they knew was a lie, something made up. I would venture to guess that Shirley MacLain wouldn’t be willing to be tortured and/or put to death for the little mental fairy-tale that promotes her lectures and books. Her “reality” would not include a martyr’s death. But martyrdom was the objective reality for the apostles, for they had seen beyond death. They had been given a glimpse of eternity.
This brings up an interesting issue. Our current objective reality is real, but it is temporary. The desk I am sitting at right now is a real desk. I am not imagining it. I did not create it in my mind. I know this, because if I asked one of my co-workers what it is, they would also say it is a desk. If we all make up our own reality, as Shirley MacLain claims, how would it be possible for us to interact in each other’s reality? Everyone in the room would call it a desk, except perhaps that one odd-ball that called a turtle a duck! He might call the desk a turtle! If I made up my own reality, I would have a much nicer desk! However, just as the desk is real, it is also temporary. At some point in the past, this desk did not exist. At some point in the future, it will not exist. Understanding the temporariness of the things of this life keeps things in perspective.
Most days on my lunch break, unless it is raining, I walk around the lake that is behind the building where I work. On one side of the lake there are a bunch of very expensive houses. Most of them look as if they would cost several million dollars. They look solid and well built, like miniature castles. I have found myself thinking about the people that live in those houses. I do not know any of them, but I find myself thinking that people in this world that have enough wealth to build those kinds of houses must feel very secure in their wealth. It seems secure to those looking at them. It probably feels secure to those living in them. But there is a danger. As solid as those houses are, they are temporary. At one point in time, they did not exist. At some point in the future, they will again not exist. As secure as people feel in their wealth and prestige, we must remember that at one point in time it did not exist, and at some time it will cease to exist. In reality, none of it is secure at all. The wealthy man who lives securely in his castle will die, and stand before God just like the beggar holding up a cardboard sign asking for a hand out. The same fate awaits all of us. The danger of worldly wealth is that it can blind us to the reality of the temporariness of all things.
So, how do we know what is true? The only One who can know what is true, is the One who created truth and reality. That is why Jesus can say, “I am the truth.” The only way we can know truth is to be in touch with the One who created truth and reality. The scripture calls Satan “the father of lies.” There is one creator of truth, and there is one creator of lies. Everyone follows one or the other. There are no other options.
Who are listening to?
Danny's Stump 