A philosophical reflection about "truth"

It's hard to believe, what with the Biblical Ten Commandments and all, but the concept of "truth" is under attack by people who want to ignore the meaning of truth.

So, for that reason, I found this philosophical reflection written by Alan Lightman, in his book, "Searching for Stars on an Island in Maine", to be a thoughtful way of trying to determine a point of view about "truth". I recommend this book because the examples written to describe the author's journey into understanding the human spirit make for interesting and enlightening reading.

Also, as www.mainewriter.com, the title obviously caught my eye when I found the book at the Topsham, Maine Public Library. 

Reading Lightman affirmed what I already knew about my own writing. I am never destined to be a philosopher.  His creativity is energizing, but I am unable to contemplate the depth of the concepts he so genuinely explores.

Lightman explains how he met a Buddhist Monk named Khema.

He then transitions the narrative into a chapter titled "Truth".

During my visit with Khema, he mentioned the Four Nobel Truths of Buddhism.  First, that life is filled with suffering.  Second, that the origin of suffering is the craving and clinging to impermanent things.  Third, that the suffering of life can be ended. And Fourth, that the path to that end is through meditation, self-discipline and mindful living.  Although the Buddha firsst articulated the Four Noble Truts 2,500 years ago, Khema was careful to make clear that we come to these truths through our own experience with the world. But, on other matters, such as their belief in the infinite cycles of the universe, Buddhists base their convictions exclusively on the words of the Buddha, a human being, born Sidhartha Gautama, later known as the lokavidu, the "knower of worlds".  

I thought to myself, "How do we know that the Buddha was the knower or worlds"? Were Einstein and Darwin also knowers orf worlds?  The truths and laws that we believe about the physicial and spiritual worlds....why do we believe them?  And, on what authority?

The concept of a law goes back at least four thousand years.  Long before laws for the physical world, the ancient Assayrians articulated their Code of Ur-Nammu. Those first laws were, of course, rules fo rbehavior in human society.  Quantifiable, only in the number of shekels of silver owed or quarts of salt poured into the mouth for each specified infraction. For example, "If a man proceeded by force and deflowereed the virgin slavewoman of another man, that man must pay five shekels of silver."

The Four Nobel Truths of Buddhism- are they laws?  Perhaps they are simply observations about the human condition.  Certainly, religious traditions have rules governing behavior, similar to the Code of Ru-Nammu. Not that human beings will always necessarily behave according to certain rules, as a drooped stone will necessarily fall to the ground. But, various theological traditions command us human beings to behave according to certain rules. For example, "Thou shalt not kill," the sixth of the Ten Commandments.  Or, from the Qur'an: "He (Allah) loves those who keep themselves pure and clean....When ye prepare for prayer, wash your faces, and your hands (and arms) to the elbows: rub your heads (with water); and (wash) your feet to the ankles". Such daily routines as the manner of washing before prayer may seem mundane and insignificant, but when they are described in the Qur'an, and considered the word of Allah, they are elevated to laws. Likewise, the statement that the relief of mortal suffering is to be had through meditation might seem like an opinion, or a bit of philosophy or a page from a self-help book. But, when it is uttered by the "knower of worlds", it takes on the imperative of a law, or an absolute truth.  (Here and in the following chapters, I use the words "law" and "truth" interchangeably, with the recognition that I am not being quite precise. I take a law to be a statement that expresses a truth. In science, laws are almost always expressed in quantitative and mathematical form.)

Science and religion differ profoundly in the way that truths are discovered. In religion and theology, these truths and beliefs seem to have two origins.  First are the sacred books such as the Bible, the Qur'an, the Vedas, the Pali Canon, and their interpretations. Believers assume that these books contain the true word of God or of special enlightened beings. If so, the authority of the teachings derives from the infinite wisdom associated with God,or the Buddha or other divinities. That divine authority can also be transferred to the authority of the religious institution as a whole, as in the authority of the "Church" in Catholicism, or the authority of shriah in Islam.  The second origin of truth is more personal, what one might call the "transcendent experience", which I will discuss more in the next chapter.  

Quotations from the sacred books are used to declare truths ranging from the origin of the universe, to the question of free will to the details of reproductive biology.  

For example, Saint Thomas Aquinas makes a difficult (IMO, difficult to read....) philosophical argument against the Aristotelian view that the universe has existed forever, but then falls back on Scripture for his authority:

"Potentiality is prior in time to actuality (although actuality is prior in nature), yet, absolutely speaking, actuality must be prior to potentiality, as is clear from this, that potentiality is not reduced to actuality except by some actual being. But, matter is being in potentiality. Therefore God, first and pure actuality must be absolutely prior to matter and consequently cause thereof: This truth divine Scripture confirms, saying: In the beginning God created heaven and earth."

Another leading Christian theologian, John Calvin, invokes Scripture to argue that everything that happens in the (physical) world, including the actions of human beings, is predetermined by God.  

As we know, that was chiefly for the sake of mankind that the world was made, we must look to this as the end which God has in view of the government of it. The prophet Jeremiah exclaims, "O Lord, I know that the way of man is not in himself; it is not the man that walks to direct his steps", (Jeremiah 10:23)....man can do nothing without the power of God... Scriptures moreover, the better to show that every thing done in the world is according to His decree, declare that the things which seem most fortuitous are subject to Him.

According to the Islamic hadith, the Prophet Muhammad caught these facts of reproductive biology:

"He is created of both the semen of the man and the semen of the woman. The man's semen is thick and forms the bones and the tendons. The woman's semen is fine and forms the flesh and blood."

Still today, many religious thinkers attribute absolute authority and absolute truth to the teachings of the sacred books, called, "divine revelations". Here is part of the announcement of the Second Vatican Council's Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelations, called Dei Verbum (in English: "word of God") and endorsed by Pope Paul VI:

"The books of Scripture must be acknowledged as teaching solidly, faithfully and without error that truth which God wanted put into sacred writings for the sake of salvation."

I respect the notions of God and other divine beings. However, I insist on one thing. I insist that any statements made by such beings and their prophets about the material world, including statements recorded in the sacred books, must be subject to the experimental testing of science.  In my view, the truths of such statements cannot be assumed*. They must be tested and revised or rejected as needed. The spiritual world, and the the world of the Absolutes, have their own domain. The physician world should be the province of science.

*This statement is probably directed to the "earth is flat" societies, the "Creationists" and, of course, to the "climate change deniers."

So, there you have it! "Let's Write", a contribution from the astounding world of philosophical thought.

Travel writing as family history - lovely way to create memories

This article is a journal narrative and an informative first person report.

Nancy-Ann Feren writes about how her family has chronicled memories about their history, by travelling in America's National Parks.  This is creative travel and journal writing.

Published in the September/October 2019 edition of "Northern New England Journey".

417 and Counting - This family could be the National Park Service's biggest fans!

On September 9, 2017, my husband, Dick, and I visited our 417th national park site.  Saint Gaudens National Historical Park in our home state of New Hampshire. We had deliberately saved this one for last- or almost last. After practically every trip, the National Park Service has added another new location, so our goal of visiting each one is a moving target.  By the time this is published, we will have visited Camp Nelson National Monument in Kentucky*, which opened in October 2018; Honouliuli National Historic Site in Hawai'i, No. 417, at this count, is not yet open to the public.

Our quest began in 1977, when we camped at Maine's Acadia National Park with our two young sons. We fell in love with the natural beauty, the wildlife, the hiking trails- and the blueberries.  Like many young families, we didn't have a lot of money for vacations. Camping provided a viable alternative. Our children had important roles to play in this camping/travel experience.  A spirit of cooperation grew. With everyone's help, we could be totally set up with dinner cooking within 40 minutes of arriving on a site.

Our camping vacations over the next nine years took our family to 48 states and 65 sites in the National Park System. We rode the train to the top of the Gateway Arch in St. Louis Missouri, and went on a moonlight hike on the dunes at Colorado's Great Sand Dunes National Park and Preserve.  Our boys became junior rangers at the Grand Canyon. We made hot chocolate with hot water form a hot water "jug fountain" at Hot Springs National Park in Arkansas and enjoyed eating s'mores by countless campfires. We got a real appreciation for the life of the early pioneers. Our van was the wagon train. Our tent was the primitive cabin.

By the time our children headed off to college, Dick and I knew we wanted to continue our explorations. We downsized to a two-person tent in 1995, and drove more than 12, 000 miles round trip to Alaska. We returned in 2016, by air this time, to take bush planes to remote parks in the Alaskan wilderness, including Aniakchak National Monument and Preserve, which has a caldera** formed by the collapse of a 7,000-foot volcanic mountain. Rangers told us that this is one of the hardest parks to reach; fewer than 300 people visit it in a typical year.

Travel has provided something personal to each member of our family and has challenged us to look beyond our everyday lives. Through these shared adventures, we have gained an appreciation for our nation's immensity and great diversity, while developing a special family bond. 

Nancy-Ann Feren, is a resident of Manchester, New Hampshire. Using family journals she compiled on every trip dating from the 1970's to 2018, she wrote the book, Not Your Average Travelers: 40 years of Adventures in All the U.S. National Parks.  

*Camp Nelson: In the Footsteps of Freedom: Established as a Union supply depot and hospital during the Civil War, Camp Nelson became a recruitment and training center for African American soldiers, and a refugee camp for their wives and children. Thousands of slaves risked their lives escaping to this site with the hope of securing their freedom and, ultimately, controlling their futures by aiding in the destruction of slavery.

Nancy-Ann is a retired 5th grade teacher, has a BA from Wellesley College and an MA in teaching from the University of New Hampshire. She and her husband, Dick, live in Manchester, NH where they both grew up. Nancy-Ann loves spending time with her family, baking cookies with her grandchildren, reading, walking, camping, traveling, and sharing stories about their not-so-average travel adventures including the bear perched in a tree above their tent, canoe trips through mangrove swamps, and flights in bush planes to remote parks in Alaska. 

** Caldera- a large volcanic crater, especially one formed by a major eruption leading to the collapse of the mouth of the volcano.

Bon Voyage writing!