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Truth does not exist

3 points by gioscarab ↗ HN
fact = truth

fact = statement proven with evidence

evidence = anything presented in support of an assertion

so

truth = statement proven with anything presented in support of an assertion

source wikipedia, just a little condensed

22 comments

[ 4.6 ms ] story [ 54.8 ms ] thread
grizzles
Non-Truths certainly exist and can be proven as such. The truth is what remains. This process is known as Falsification.
dmfdmf
This is Popper's theory and it is false. You can't define what is false without some standard of what is true. It is a misapplication or misrepresentation of Aristotles's law of non-contradiction, i.e. a contradiction proves something false but not what is true.
grizzles
So if you had a theory that the moon was entirely made of blue cheese and Buzz Aldrin gave you a piece of lunar regolith that was obviously not blue cheese. I'd say he proved your claim wrong without necessarily establishing any necessary standard of truth. In pure sciences like physics, if you need to use statistics to make your point then you've probably did the wrong experiment.

Popper's contribution is about finding theories that offer greater explanatory power than previous theories.

Also it's a misunderstanding of his work to think he rules out establishing a standard of proof. He does not. Check out the wikipedia page for more about this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falsifiability

dmfdmf
A "theory" that the moon was made of blue cheese is complete arbitrary non-sense which doesn't need refuting. On the other side -- the moon, orbital mechanics, Newton's laws to design the space craft and get it to the moon, that there are men who fly such machines and the machines are designed to support human life are all facts that are being implicitly denied by the blue cheese "theory". There is nothing to refute it is non-sense on its own terms.

Moreover, theories are just a collection of statements so your distinction is irrelevant and you contradict your own position by claiming a statement; "that the moon was entirely made of blue cheese" is a theory.

While your example is fanciful and exaggerated to make your point, it actually makes mine. You/Popper can't rip the application of the non-contradiction principle out of the context of the law of identity on which it is based and gives it meaning. The fundamental principle of existence is that anything that exists has identity. Non-contradiction is a (very crucial) corollary of identity and not a primary as Popper holds.

[dead] BigFish12
You state that Popper is incorrect because you need a sense of what's true to know what is false. But you then continue by saying Artistotle shows something is false(contradiction) but not what is true?... You just contradicted yourself.
dmfdmf
> Truth does not exist

Are you claiming that this is true? If so that is a self contradiction and you have reached a dead-end. Check your work.

gioscarab
You are right my mistake, the title should have been: "Does the truth exists?"

thank you :)

dmfdmf
Changing it to a question with only one possible answer does not solve the problem.
gioscarab
This wanted to generate a discussion related to a problem that, I aree with you, in my opinion seems unsolved. Not only truth, but also at higher level, looking at the scientific method and its problems and limitations.
dmfdmf
I think you misunderstood my reply. Your original statement that the truth does not exist was shown to be self-contradictory. Changing your statement to a question does not solve the self-contradiction problem, it just masks it.

It is valid to ask "what is the standard for truth?" but it is not valid to ask "Does truth exist?" Such questions are part of philosophy and in particular, epistemology.

nvusuvu
Earth orbits the sun. I love my wife and children. Checkmate. :)
Rainymood
>Earth orbits the sun

This is not true. The earth and sun both rotate around its barycenter. The point is that the sun is so huge that the barycenter is (really) close to the center of the sun which makes it seem that the earth orbits the sun.

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croo
Err... Citation needed? I think the definition of fact changes if you ask a mathematican or a lawyer. Those definitions will both be good in the context of their work.
tsegratis
The steps have similarity but not equality

football = air filled balloon

air filled balloon = hot air balloon

But if we assume no truth/equality, then each of your steps becomes in effect correct, and the final step self-fulfilling

The result would be Nihilism -- nothing is true or false or meaningful

But the evidence against this, for me, would be that 2 == 2 has held throughout my lifetime

I.e. 'truth does not exist' holds where 'reality does not exist' also holds

gioscarab
an air filled balloon does not necessarily contains hot air

football = hot hair balloon holds in some cases

a fact is necessarily true

kleer001
Doesn't matter, we can know enough to get structural work done. Everything else is decoration.

To clarify: we may never truly know the value of pi as it is an irrational number, but we really only need the first 5 digits or so for most things. Still, you have to be careful of accuracy loss and should wait to use its numeric representation until the last possible moment.

throwaway413
Everything and nothing co-exist as one. Truth is relative to time. Both are invented paradigms to describe the great state machine that is the universe.
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[dead] BigFish12
> fact = statement proven with evidence

Axioms are facts, but they aren't proven.