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Comment on: How do you know when someone is telling you the truth

Bigthink — Sat, 24 May 2008 04:20:28 +0100

Interesting question:

I will believe what I am told in three situations:
1. There is empirical proof to back up the assertion.
2. The source of the information as a history of being able to back up their assertions with empirical proof.
3. When the assertion has a good probability of being true, on the basis or related informantion and proofs.

The first one is the most reliable, but on most occasions we depend on two and three. This is about trust.

RO

Comment on: How do you know when someone is telling you the truth

Bigthink — Tue, 06 May 2008 21:53:10 +0100

Hello Whitman and thanks for submitting.

I would agree with your statement that, "we need to know our own truth(s).%u201D

How human beings are able to know what is true from what is false is not mutually exclusive from knowing what can harm us and what is safe. Both processes require an internalized and established set of beliefs. I say this because I have to question another one of your statements.

You said, "Honest, sincere truth has no need to convince as it stands on its own understanding and is willingly recognized as such," and when I read that it sounds as though honesty and sincerity is a quality of the truth.

I have to disagree with you based upon my belief that honesty and sincerity are qualities that we, as a society, attribute to human beings, not objects or ideas.

Although objects and ideas can be portrayed honestly, they must BE portrayed by somebody honestly and sincerely. We can deduct that this is true because the inverse is also true: somebody can portray what is true to be false, and though they haven%u2019t changed what is true, they have presented the truth insincerely, and therefore the truth has been dishonestly interpreted as a lie.

Truth is neither honest nor sincere; rather the person who delivers the truth is...the truth is simply the truth.

What I really want to know is how we as individuals discover the simple truth for ourselves in any situation. I believe that each one of us is intelligent enough to know when someone is telling us a blatant lie. I also believe that we know when someone is telling us an obvious truth (usually because we make fun of them for stating the obvious). What I would like to develop is a method that would allow us to distinguish all points in between.

For me, I prefer personal interaction as a medium for extracting truth, however when it comes to actually assimilating the truth I find it to be a longer process. I don%u2019t know why, but I have to let my old beliefs (ones that I discover are no longer valid) be replaced gradually and painlessly even though it would be better to rip them away like a band-aid!

Comment on: How do you know when someone is telling you the truth

Bigthink — Tue, 06 May 2008 02:36:57 +0100

Ben,
Truth is a solution and/or a gift when provided by another, without seperate agenda(s).
We need not ever expect nor can we know prior what is the truth from another.
We need to know our own truth(s) and how we interpret such, wel. From this we, more readily, understand whether the information we are encountering is truth (or not)and acceptable to one self.

Those who have to "convince" others of their idea(s) or intention may not be dealing in a "complete" or fully acceptable truth. Thus the need to convince.

Honest, sincere truth has no need to convince, as it stands on it's own understanding, and is willingly recognized as such.

Connecting-to-the-Value-of-Why 2005-2008 �