I used to be one of those people on Facebook who would engage about politics. I entered into lengthy debates with anyone who would participate. I tried to be humble, honest, pragmatic and genuine in trying to understand all sides of the issue. I really believed that kind and thoughtful public discourse was the way that we could understand and agree on the best policies and best candidates to solve all or many of the biggest problems we face.
I know that I gave some of my own assumptions and closely held notions some serious scrutiny when faced with a good argument supported by compelling evidence. But, I found that almost without exception people don’t base their arguments on evidence and they don’t change their mind. Period.
This started me thinking about how everyone sees the world so differently. Foolishly I thought that maybe if we could find a starting place – a single point of truth and agreement – that we could work out from there and come to some consensus. Over the next several months I pondered the question “What is one single truth that all (or even 90%) of humans could agree on?”
That seems like a simple question. It isn’t. And after lots of noodling on it I had a single conversation that gave me the answer. The answer is: there is nothing, not a single, solitary thing that 90% of humans will agree is true. Go on, try. Imagine posting any single statement of fact somewhere on the internet and asking if it is true. Now mentally scroll through the comments. See?
If you need further convincing, I’ll tell you about the conversation that shifted my perspective. It was with someone I respect. An Electrical Engineer. This person has earned a bachelor of science and a Professional Engineer certification. He is brilliant with Electricity, learns quickly and is generally a really great guy.
This same guy rejects all evidence that might suggest that the world is more than 5000 years old. Radio-carbon dating? “Not reliable.” Fossil record? “Some guys put some bones together wrong once so how can you trust any of it?” Geology? “No one witnessed it so who’s to say it didn’t all happen in a few days?”
I was astonished. But my astonishment quickly morphed into a realization. That realization is that we all have completely different starting points for our idea of how the world works. His truth starts and ends in the bible. If anything can be seen as contrary to that book, it is wrong no matter how much evidence there is to support it.
He is willing to question everything, EVERYTHING, except his single source of truth. Once I realized that most people probably have something similar going on it changed everything. It changes the meaning of the word truth.
I used to think of the word ‘truth’ as meaning fact. An indisputable, evidence-backed, certainty that was as true for Newton as it is for me. That doesn’t seem to fit anymore. For me, the word now speaks more to the pillars of belief that shore up someone’s world view.
I’ve used it as an opportunity to question my own ‘truth’ with greater scrutiny. It gets pretty crazy because I’m willing to go to extremes. What happens when we question observation itself? Several theories right now paint our Universe as a collection of abstract probabilities – not absolute certainties.
And if we’re going there we may as well bring up Simulation Theory which basically states that if a civilization becomes sufficiently technologically advanced, eventually they will build sophisticated computer simulations of reality. To the simulated beings within the simulated reality, it won’t seem like a simulation – it will seem completely real. And of course, if you can accept that then you have to ask the next obvious question: “How can we be sure that what we think of as reality isn’t a simulation?” There’s even a chance we may be able to prove that this is the case.
When seen from this perspective I realized that there is no starting place. There is no one single true thing. For me that realization is simultaneously liberating, fascinating and terrifying.