THE TRUTH

Some ideas about Truth

You could have two axes (like a Maths graph) around which you think about truth and how it is challenged and changed?

major kinds of truth

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accidental distortion--+--deliberate distortion

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minor kinds of truth

Facts are a minor truth – but the absence of even one fact can change a whole pattern of understanding that creates a huge difference in somebody’s effort to capture a major truth – e.g. what caused WWII? (I almost said “distortion” rather than “difference”, but can you see that to use the word “difference” acknowledges how there may be more than one valid construction of a major truth.)

A major truth is more likely to be a pattern of understanding rather than a simple fact. It is more likely to be truth relative to something, and sometimes involve beliefs as much as facts. (e.g. Peace is better than war). We know that truth exists – and both minor and major truths exist. So, if a politician or a journalist tells a lie – inserts of omits a simple absolute fact – he or she is also betraying another major “truth”, that humans must respect and trust each other and not betray each other. The truth that human love and respect is sacred.

Right at the top of the scale of major truths it begins to occur to us that “truth” may not be something achievable but a direction in which we head, or a principle that we abide by. So some people talk about being “in the true” or acting “in good faith” or “making an honest mistake”.

Minor truths tend to be absolute rather than relative but they are also slippery characters, because all facts need to be reportable in order to mean anything in human understanding, and often in the act of reporting the facts great errors can occur. For example, transcription – rewriting - can simply be wrong. Or if somebody substitutes an original word for one they think is better – e.g. in an interview between a 19^th Century policeman and an Aborigine who speaks bad English – the whole historical record can be changed forever. Human perception is also very inaccurate – what was said? Who spoke first? Who started the fight? What was the order of events? Even minor facts often end up being a matter of interpretation.

So, using my axes you could have at least four kinds of distortion:

An accidental distortion of a major kind of truth

§ e.g. Historical and scientific misinterpretation, such as the failure by Western societies to make an early response to the reality of Global Warming. This involves thousands of minor facts but also an interpretive effort and framework. Many still remain unconvinced that it’s happening, when it is.

A deliberate distortion of a major kind of truth

§ e.g. Frontline (the imaginary show that goes to air) works hard to convince the audience of the smoothness of their operation, and the predictability and reliability of their reporting. This is done primarily through a uniform image, a presenter who always appears to be in control, reporters who smile on camera, and the way they always appear to be in charge of events.

§ e.g. wartime propaganda, that portrays the enemy, repeatedly and constantly, in a negative light, or political propaganda during an election campaign.

An accidental distortion of a minor kind of truth

§ e.g. simple errors or mistakes

§ e.g. the act of selection and editing – not all of the material collected for a TV show can be used. Not all of the relevant material is actually available. It could be late, lost or never collected. E.g. the incriminating tape that is almost lost in Smaller Fish to Fry.

A deliberate distortion of a minor kind of truth

§ E.g. Brook adding the fictitious question in “Add Sex and Stir” – but there are thousands of examples of this.

How we understand and what we understand is changed by the process of telling. This is what Module C is really about, the process of representation – i.e. the stages of creating a version of something – verbal, photographic, oral, - that go into making up the whole picture and whole understanding. Our elective “telling the truth” needs to be understood with as much emphasis on the word “telling” as on the word “truth”. What shape, what order of ideas that goes into telling something, will change how it is perceived, how much truth it is felt to carry? In other words, the method of construction of ideas, even of simple reports, can change how they are perceived. This is one way in which truth is “constructed”. Equally, the “major” truths are always bigger than facts, they are complex patterns of interlocking facts and opinions, they are “constructs” – or “constructed”.