8. Socrates (469-399 B.C.) – Q2: What is truth?

… He was more interested in engaging everyone – old or young, rich or poor – in a debate about the nature of things. In doing so, he felt that the inconsistencies of many opinions and actions could be revealed – thereby revealing the truth of things by eliminating the flawed assumptions. 

S: The perception that truth is either truth or an illusion of truth is no more accurate than the perception that the physical is either ‘real’ or an illusion. Tractate 1: The Error of Zeno - Resolving the Problem of Abstraction, found in the library of the site www.panentheism.com within The War and Peace of a New Metaphysical Perception, fully addresses the validity of both the abstract and the physical being real. One is real while one stands within its existence at which point the other becomes not an illusion but a ‘real illusion’. If on the other hand one changes location and stands in what previously was regarded as the real illusion then the ‘real illusion’ becomes what is real and the real becomes the ‘real illusion’. In short reality is not based upon either one or the other. Reality is based upon both simultaneously.

The truth regarding what is real and what is an appearance is simply a contention of semantics.

But what of all forms of truth? Is there such a ‘thing’ as ‘truth’ and if so, what is this thing we call ‘truth’? Truths are perceptual in nature and as such take on the ‘appearance’ of being ‘truth’ based upon ones perceptions which in turn are based upon the point of view, location, from which one speaks.

This is not to say there is no such thing as truth. Truth is the foundation upon which societies are built and as such, truth is the foundation of civilizations. The type of civilization, which emerges from the cooperation of its ‘citizens’, is where free will of choice enters the dynamics of civilization building.

Tractate 11: The Error of Philosophy dealt with the foundations of civilizations in great detail. The concepts of monism/singularity/conformity as represented by Nazism versus the concepts of dualism/multiplicity/individuality as represented by the Western democracies is a prime example of opposing ‘truths’ based upon the civilization emerging from group actions.

Both are based upon ‘truth’, however both are in stark contrast one to the other and as such the two collided in a violent explosion of traumatic actions which saw more than a fifty million people die and countless other lives thrown off their course of traveling unimpeded.

The same conflict is epitomized within the science fiction of Star Trek wherein the Klingons and the Federation clash.

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The point: Appearance (A) – Reality (B) or Reality (A) or Appearance (B) appears to be a reversal of words but it is not a reversal of words rather it is a reversal of position from which one perceives.

Which then is the ‘true’ choice? Which represents ‘truth’? The position we take regarding ‘truth’ from which all actions arise becomes a matter of choice, becomes a matter of free will. The choice, the stand we make, becomes one we as individuals and we as a society choose to take. It is taking ‘the stand’, making the choice, wherein our responsibility lies. But: Responsibility to what? then becomes the question. Responsibility to the whole of reality is the answer. Truth becomes the understanding regarding the complete model of reality and the internal dynamics of such a model.