posted by Matt
I understand this to mean that at least I, as a person, exist. For as long as I fulfill the definition of existance, no one can rightly say that I don't exist, simply because they choose not to believe it. I think that would be an example of an absolute truth.
Actually
anyone can say the
you may not exist, but
you can rest assured that
you exist. The truth that you have of your existance does
not provide proof of that existence to others.
Let us, for the moment, assume that there is Absolute Truth. More questions pop up:
Is it discoverable? (Can a person seize on it?) Can Absolute Truth change?
I think a more interesting question is to what lengths are you, personally, willing to go towards an understanding of anything (in this case the nature of existance which calls into question
why is the universe the way it is). I, personally, have never taken the easy path of relying on others to have provided the effort needed to gain knowledge. This is because knowledge can only be mastered by taking the time to discover it yourself. I have questions about why we (and the universe) are here that most people would leave to either the
scientist or the
theologians, but would never invest the personal time to discover themselves.
Lets, for a moment
not look at religion, but look at aspects of the physical world around us. The world that we live in is
very Newtonian in nature, consequently we relate things to that comfortable understanding of nature. In our Newtonian world gravity and electromagnetism are
forces of nature. But with a far deeper understanding of the geometry and topology of the universe, we can see that
no forces are actually in play. Gravitation is a distortion of Minkowski space-time and electromagnetism is a connection on a phase space that has the properties of a Lie group.
The point here is that the last sentence of that paragraph represents 9 years of hard studying of both mathematics and physics (mathematics being something that most physicist are actually very weak in, so the last part of the sentence would be lost on many of them) to make that knowledge mine. I can describe to you in great detail what it is I am talking about, but most of it would be lost because it requires discovery on your part.
Then there is the social aspect of trying to find out about the universe we live in. I know that I am not going to see any answers to the big questions in my lifetime. Anything I do represents the smallest of steps down a path of discovery. We, as a race, have wander down dead ends before, only to back track and find our way once again. The point is, then, not the final discovery... it is playing a part in the journey of discovery that matters.
Now realize that an religion has not yet entered into the picture. I'm just talking about a truth that is true always, for every person. It wouldn't matter if that person believed it or not, it would still be true.
Religion does not rely on facts, or proof, it is a
faith. You have faith in that what you believe is the truth, but you have no facts that can be given to others. What you believe maybe true, it maybe partially true, or it maybe completely wrong... the point is that without actual facts it remains a faith.
The interesting thing to note is that some people with a weak faith need others to believe in the same thing they do to reinforce that belief. I feel no need to
convert anyone to what I believe, because anyone blindly believing in the same thing I do without having my experiences would have to rest that belief on the efforts of others. My beliefs are unique and my own, and I am quite secure in them. I know that they are clouded by having been created from my own perspective, but not any more or less than anyone else's beliefs are clouded by their own personal perspectives (unless we are talking about mental illness, but that is another subject).
