When can we trust our senses to give us truth? Essay

Truth allows humans to stand-alone. When they find truth they are able to be one against the whole. "Being in a minority even a minority of one did not make you mad. There was truth and there was untruth, and if you clung to the truth even against the whole world, you were not

The definition of truth is something that is always valid and cannot be proved invalid. Radiolab's podcast “Truth Warriors”, is about people who pursue the truth. In this podcast Neil deGrasse Tyson proves to a barista that he didn’t put whip cream in his hot cocoa and Errol Morris proves whether a photo of the Crimean War was staged or authentic. Neil believed that the barista did not put in whip cream, but the barista insisted otherwise. To prove him wrong, Neil then made the barista put more whip cream into his hot cocoa and the whip cream dipped once then stayed afloat on the hot cocoa proving to the barista that he did not put in the whip cream originally. Neil did not think the truth was that the cream sank to the bottom so he “fought”

The opening statement of the article Looks can deceive: Why Perception and Reality Don't Always Match Up by Christof Koch reads as follows; “When you are facing a tricky task, your view of the world may not be as accurate as you think” (Koch, 2010) In this article Koch argues that a human’s conscious perception of the world is neither static or accurate. That people everywhere are incapable of being one hundred percent objective and therefore their awareness of objects surrounding them is dependent on factors such as personal strength, confidence, fears and desires. Koch states that being human is equal to “seeing the world through your own, constantly shifting, lens” (Koch, 2010)

A psychologist named Elizabeth loftus has studied for how easy the brain is to manipulate into believing false things. She essentially believes the brains can be manipulated to a point where someone else can alter our memories that make one, them. She says that false memories that there could be a benefit to false memories because it's like a system that allows us to update our memories when errors are found in a memory.false memories. The problem is that the system could be used against us and there is no defense to counter it.

What do you believe truth is? There probably are a few different definitions of truth. I consider truth being honesty and facts. “I don’t care about truth. I want some happiness.” said Fitzgerald’s version of truth. Hansberry says, “Perhaps I will be a great man… I mean perhaps I will hold on to the substance of the truth and find my way always with the right course.” O’Brien’s truth is, “I want you to know what I felt. I want you to know why story-truth is truer sometimes than happening-truth.” These three have some decent definitions, but truth itself doesn't really have just one right definition, it's more open-ended.

Would some people want to know the whole truth? Even if it would hurt that person? What would that person do if it did hurt you? Therefore, knowing the truth can make people question if people can trust other people, it can make people see other people in a different perspective, and it will make it very hard to regain people’s trust.

A man once told me that there is no truth in this world. All the ideas such as Math, Science, Language, and even society is all made up. That the only reason two plus two equals four is based solely off of one man saying it does, and society agreeing with it blindly. But I tell you that there is no such thing as truth, but that itself is a truth.

Our vision is perceived to be our most trusted sense, as the old saying goes ?seeing is believing? thus

Truth is simply the body of real things, events and facts about something, either a transcendent fundamental or spiritual reality. It can also be a judgment, preposition or idea that is true or accepted as true. Each and every one of us has to live with the truth for our entire lifetime. At a point in our lives, we all have to lie which eventually results to conflict and for the conflict to be resolved, we need to reinstate the truth. “The truth doesn’t need to prove itself; it exist whether we believe in it or not” (58). Virtual truth is based on believing what is real; the earth is round, there is no debate and it would be a waste of time to challenge this truth because it is in its purest form and we see everything just as it is. The point of this is for us to be aware of the difference between the real truth and virtual truth. The Five agreement that Don Miguel Ruiz and Don Jose Ruiz with Janet Mills describe in their book,

For thousands of years, mankind has persistently pursued truth, knowledge, and understanding. For most, this pursuit is a driving force which usually doesn't end until one finds a "truth" that is satisfying to him or her. Even then, however, one may choose to look for an alternate truth that may be even more satisfying to them. This pursuit does not always follow the same path for everyone as there are different ideas as to how truth is actually obtained and which is the best way to obtain it. Two individuals and great philosophers of their time, Plato and Charles Peirce, each had their own ideas on how truth and knowledge could be obtained.

Truth can be defined as conformity to reality or actuality and in order for something to be “true” it must be public, eternal, and independent. If the “truth” does not follow these guidelines then it cannot be “true.” Obviously in contrary anything that goes against the boundaries of “truth” is inevitably false. True and false, in many cases does not seem to be a simple black and white situation, there could sometimes be no grounds to decide what is true and what is false. All truths are a matter of opinion. Truth is relative to culture, historical era, language, and society. All the truths that we know are subjective truths (i.e. mind-dependent truths) and there is nothing more to truth than what we are willing to assert as true

Perception is defined as how you look at others and the world around you. Being able to select, organize and intercept information starts the perceptual process. Perception affects the way people communicate with others. An individual’s pattern of thinking can affect their perception of others. Most people communicate best with people of similar cultures.

There are four different sources of knowledge: perception, introspection, reason and memory. All our knowledge roots from our perception. Perception is the way humans sense the world outside the body. We perceive through our five senses: see, hear, smell, taste, and touch. Humans gain knowledge through experiences and experience through perception. Usually we can trust our senses to perceive our surroundings effectively but there are times we misperceive. Illusions, hallucinations or impediments of the accurate flow of information to our senses are examples of misperceptions. For example if someone hits their head causing their vision to blur or impedes them from effectively processing what occurring around them, then they shouldn’t trust their senses. Another example would be an anxiety attack causing a signal of threat to the brain also preventing the person from correctly processing their surroundings. If nothing can prove we are misperceiving then we have good reason to be believe our senses.

For that reason, truth differentiates among individuals thorough their contrasting opinions. But, truth is something that everyone believes to be correct. Thus, it greatly depends on what’s true in the minds of the people. On the contrary, truth that’s spoken with bad intent is considered to be worse than a lie. Hence, truth is an expression, symbol or statement that corresponds to reality and happiness.