Hog-Tied Truth

Truth coming out of the Well (1898) by E. Debat-Ponsan;

by Andrew Porter

Human affairs are tricky, and perhaps for this reason it is especially important to respect how vital ‘truth’ is in one’s relationship to self and others, in institutions, the presiding thrusts of culture, and any form of leadership. The cord is too commonly cut between what is real and acceptance of it. A society that abandons the inalienable value of truth-telling wrecks a whole host of ripe possibilities. The desire for confirmation bias cannot be the foundation of a democracy.

The current United States’ leadership and its sycophants willfully disregard truth and make falsity king. A propaganda mouthpiece called OAN (the One America News), that purports to be a “news network”, has been selected to be the Voice of America. A political pundit calls the organization “just another font of lies”. The United States is fundamentally divided between those who back veracity and those who are willing to accept lies and the injustice that attends them.

Untruth is like radon to a culture, a slow-acting poison. You can’t run a society or a government on deception and misrepresentation. Unsupportable views on justice, adherence to the Constitution, and principles of right simply erode the integrity of what cannot afford to be eroded. Lives depend on whether ‘truth’ is honored – or annihilated.

The hopeful outlook is that assaults on ‘the rule of law’ and the beauty of truth will be a crucible, forcing clarity and inspiring, in democratic countries, a new determination to back ‘truth’. Once loved and defended, ‘truth’ shines the brighter. Truth is the string in a string telephone; what can we hear if it is not there?

The problem of extensive falsity dogs the world currently. It will never not be surprising that there are a good number who do not particularly care about the ‘truth’ if it gets in the way of their suppositions.

A few years ago, Masha Gessen, the Russian-American journalist and activist, commented on Hannah Arendt’s ideas in an essay entitled: ‘Is Politics Possible in the Absence of Truth?’ concluding: 

“When lies overpower truth, politics dies. When politics dies, our world collapses, and we humans die too—because it is only in the world, among other humans, that we exist”.

Which is why a commitment to the truth ought to seriously be reenergised. The unthinkably awful is not just one viable option among others. 

‘Truth’ has, for a good while, been undermined by moral (as opposed to cultural) relativism. This dismisses or denigrates a single or universal set of moral principles. If one person's truth or ethical take is as good as another’s, something essential is and will be in decline. This may well contribute to a loss of moral vocabulary and a shared set of facts, causing people to be unable to distinguish patent falsehood from accuracy. There may be other factors as well, but moral relativism certainly encourages an animus against ‘central or accepted authority’. This paves the way for the siloing of media choices and people's susceptibility to a demagogue or authoritarian.

The veteran American journalist, Edward Miller points out that: 

“the disciplines of science and the rule of law have the same purpose: to find the truth through the careful, unbiased weighing of evidence.”

Miller wonders whether we will stand firm in the fight for this. Because lies are no basis for governance or for conducting any aspect of life. Lies—if they can be understood as such—cause harm to a whole range of things. They damage personal relationships; they undermine trust in institutions; they make government the opposite of a vehicle for advancing the common good.

The question today is, even if truth wins out in the long run, will we be able to weather anti-truth in the short run?

Why Absolute Moral Relativism Should Be Off The Table

Posted by Christian Sötemann

In the case of moral statements there can be many degrees between absolute certainty and absolute uncertainty. 

Even empirical truths, which are thoroughly supported by conclusive evidence, cannot, by their empirical nature, have the same degree of certainty as self-evident truths. There may always be an empirical case which escapes us. And so it may be questioned whether a viable moral principle really has to be either one or the other: absolutely certain or absolutely uncertain, valuable or valueless – or whether it is good enough for it to serve as an orientation, a rule of thumb, or something useful in certain types of cases.

With this in mind, given any moral principle in front of us, it could be helpful for us to differentiate between whether:

• it is only universally applicable in an orthodox way

or

• there is an overt denial of any generalisability (even for a limited type of cases) of moral values and principles.

In the first case, we may try to reconcile a concrete situation with an abstract moral rule, without rejecting the possibility of some degree of generalisation – yet in the second case, we have what we previously discussed: generalising that we would not be able to make any kind of general statement. In the second case, we have an undifferentiated position that renders all attempts at gauging arguments about ethics futile, thus condoning an equivalence of moral stances that is hardly tenable.

This liberates the moral philosopher at least in one way: absolute moral relativism can be taken off the table, while all moral standpoints may still be subjected to critical scrutiny. If I have not found any moral philosophy that I can wholeheartedly embrace, I do not automatically have to resort to absolute moral relativism. If I have not found it yet, it does not mean that it does not exist at all. The enquiring mind need not lose all of its beacons.

To put moral relativism in its most pointed form, the doctrine insists that there are moral standpoints, yet that none of them may be considered any more valid than others. This does not oblige the moral relativist to say that everything is relative, or that there are no facts at all, such as scientific findings, or logical statements. It confines the relativism to the sphere of morality.

We need to make a further distinction. The English moral philosopher Bernard Williams pointed out that there may be a 'logically unhappy attachment' between a morality of toleration, which need not be relative, and moral relativism. Yet here we find a contradiction. If toleration is the result of moral relativism – if I should not contest anyone’s moral stance, because I judge that all such stances are similarly legitimate – I am making a general moral statement, namely: 'Accept everybody’s moral preferences.' However, such generalisation is something the moral relativist claims to avoid.

A potential argument that, superficially, seems to speak for moral relativism is that it can be one of many philosophical devices that helps us to come up with counterarguments to moral positions. Frequently, this will reveal that moral principles which were thought to be universal fail to be fully applicable – or applicable at all – in the particular case. However, this can lead to a false dilemma, suggesting only polar alternatives (either this or that, with no further options in between) when others can be found. The fact that there is a moral counterargument does not have to mean that we are only left with the conclusion that all moral viewpoints are now invalid.

Moral propositions may not have the same degree of certainty as self-evident statements, which cannot be doubted successfully – such as these:

• 'Something is.'

• 'I am currently having a conscious experience.'

These propositions present themselves as immediately true to me, since a) is something in itself, as would be any contestation of the statement, and b) even doubting or denying my conscious experience happens to be just that: a conscious experience.

Rarely do we really find a philosopher who endorses complete moral relativism, maintaining that any moral position is as valid as any other. However, occasionally such relativism slips in by default – when one shrugs off the search for a moral orientation, or deems moral judgements to be mere personal or cultural preferences.

Now and again, then, we might encounter variants of absolute moral relativism, and what we could do is this: acknowledge their value for critical discussion, then take them off the table.