Perception, Truth and Community (second blog, week two)
What has been tickling me is the figure/ ground illusion that was in chapter seven in The Thompson Handbook (the above is a similar one) and Plato’s discussion about trusting our senses in the Allegory of the Cave. What do you see in the following pictures?
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Perhaps you see the cartoon man with a horn/pipe and/or the woman’s face?
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This one challenges us to admit that we see what is not there.
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We are dealing with perception. Our eyes see, and our brains decipher what we see into some form of truth. But what happens when there are two possibilities of truth? What thoughts does Plato’s Allegory of the Cave bring to our discussion of “truth”? His prisoners of the cave are defining their reality through shadows. In his allegory he uses this story to illuminate a number of objectives: the pursuit of knowledge, the shortcomings of relying on our sense perceptions for a source of truth, and as a discussion of justice and the ideal government. How does one make the decision of what is true when we know that our sensory perception can be illusory?
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What you are experiencing is not really moving. It is a static picture, the movement is purely manufactured by an optical trick.
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Often we rely on our perceptions of an event or what we perceive about information to distinguish its “truth.” Plato’s ideas and the optical illusions on this page challenge the validity of our sensory perceptions. Can we trust what we see as true? Can we believe what we see to be true when there are alternate possibilities there to see? How do we define what is true when perception is seemingly so unreliable? In what way are we like the prisoners in the cave looking at shadows?
Angels and Demons
Filed under: Allegory of the Cave, community, illusion, perception, Plato, truth, Uncategorized | 17 Comments
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Experiences from the past along with information and experiences from other people can help an individual decide what is “true”. Whether it be a political stance or something as simple as which football team is better than another.
Can we trust what we see as true? Yes, sometimes we can, but humans are born with a curious nature. Therefore, everything has room for questioning. Don’t believe everything you read, ponder it.
Can we believe what we see to be true when there are alternate possibilities there to see?
Of course we can. Take religion and beliefs about life for example. Religions such as Christianity believe in God, while certain Buddhist sects believe attaining a state of nirvana will lead their soul to salvation.
How do we define what is true when perception is seemingly so unreliable? In what way are we like the prisoners in the cave looking at shadows?
From personal experience, I feel that ideals and family values help make an individual decide what is “true”.
I feel that we, the human population as a whole, are like the prisoners in the cave in a religious sense. There are so many different belief systems in the world, and none of them have been proven to be “correct” or the most possible over another.
We humans should not believe everything that we see all the time. Sometimes what we see is all truth; sometimes, only half of what we see is truth; and sometimes, none of what we see is truth. We should pray for wisdom to understand and “see” the things that are in our lives; therefore, we will know what is truth and what is not. We humans are too small compared to this universe and God. So we should humble ourselves and ask God, Jesus, to reveal the truth to us. He is the only God. When we know about Him, we will know about truth. When we are far away from Him, we will be lost. (We will not know about what is truth.) Therefore, if you want to know the truth you can just open your mouth and say, “the only Almighty God, let me know the truth.” He will let your know if there is God and who He is; he will also reveal the truth to you.
Truth is just a fancy word for an opinion or theory that has enough evidence that a person is willing to agree with it. Sometimes very little evidence is needed and in other instances much evidence is needed. Truth is more dependent on a personal perspective. As with religion, large communities believe the teachings to be true. Yet others require more evidence to agree with such a radical claim.
One looking at truth with an open mind would see that it is not possible for something to be true unless every intelligent being were to agree and also agree with the laws of science.
please debate this… cuz it feels incomplete
I believe personal ideas and thoughts affect how we perceive different situations and ideas. To us, we may see something completely different than the person next to us, but unless there is evidence or facts that prove you wrong it’s your opinion. I believe you can trust any feeling you have. Notice I said feeling you have, not feeling you see. Religious view points are not often based on something you see as much as being based on a set of beliefs and knowledge that you hold true. Truth is constantly changing, who is to say something is right or wrong? Since there are many explanations out there for different things everyone can form their own ideas and opinions. As humans its natural to feel as if our opinions are naturally correct and those that disagree are wrong. However this is not necessarily true, we must all approach different topics with an open mind and willingness to at least listen to the view points of others. Has any one ever felt very strongly about a topic and then was talked into another view?
I think we are struggling with the ideas that many who have walked this path before us have struggled with. Let’s remember in class that we identified differences in “truth”– personal, scientific, historical, religious, and philosophical. Doreen520favor has a strong faith in Jesus that she feels will guide her to the truth; however, there are many who do not share that faith or if they have an equally strong faith, as derekroz mentions earlier, they call that same level of faith by a different term.
Is it possible to have our faith deliver all our truths to us? Doesn’t this occasionally cause problems– 9/11 comes to mind– when equally strong faiths decipher occurrences differently? Or value the response with a different filter?
Is truth a majority? I am reminded of the children’s story, The Emperor’s New Clothes. If we all agree that the emperor’s clothes are beautiful does that make him any less naked?
Is truth defined by what we have sensed to be true (seeing, hearing, feeling, tasting, smelling)?
For that matter is truth allowed to a minority– are we allowed to believe that whatever is comfortable to us is true?
“Truth is just a fancy word for an opinion or theory that has enough evidence that a person is willing to agree with it.” (innerberto)
Well, perhaps we have to look at how we have come to define these terms and clarify them for our purposes– truth, opinion, evidence, fact, and theory.
Perhaps, we should consider Palmer’s The Grace of Great Things.
Not everything we witness is for real. Whether its movies or actual events happening right in front of us, we can never be sure if what is happening is actually real or true. We know the things that are true to ourselves, if we believe something or feel strongly about something we know that to us that is true. Truth has a lot to do with what our bodies will let us believe, for example, if we taste something we know for sure if we like it or not or if we smell something we can know the certain scent it is and be sure that that in fact is real and true. I think in life their are many different ways to look at anything and everything, many different possibilities and perceptions. One person might feel one way and another person can feel a completely different way, but to the both of them what they believe themselves is considered the truth. Truth is a personal belief, no certain feeling is right or wrong…truth and perception is different for everyone.
Sometimes we perceive things to be “true” that may not be. In the cases of the optical illusions, people see different things. Take the angels/demons picture. In my case, I only saw the angels, but I’m sure many others saw the demons. I think it’s all in how you were brought up. I believe that I saw angels because I am a Catholic and that’s what I believe is right. I agree with Doreen. I feel that because of my religion, I will have Jesus looking after me and taking care of me. He will tell me what is right and what is wrong. It’s all a sense of conscience. It’s what you feel is correct.
I think that for so long we have been fed certain ideologies and opinions that we have a habit of perceiving everything fed to us as truth. I definitely agree with what Jamie had to say. It is very easy when talking about religion to get the truth mixed up with what is “believed”. Some may believe that the bible is just a book of moral opinions that keeps society functioning. Like I said in a previous blog, I think the truth is unquestionable and real, it is conclusive and sometimes almost tangible. I think if we let emotions get too involved we have a tendency to be incorrect in what we deem to be true.
I don’t think we can trust what we see. Our eyes always have a way of tricking us, I think. Optical illusions are the perfect example of this. What you believe is a personal thing. What you see is also a personal thing, because you might see something someone else does.
How does one make the decision of what is true when we know that our sensory perception can be illusionary?
I think that if we “know” that our sensory perception is illusionary, then we do not know what is true. We cannot decipher from something that is “false imagination” and “true imagination.” Our minds play tricks on us, which leads me to believe that we, as humans, see what we want to see, and we believe what we want to believe; that is just how the mind works.
I agree with Leeanne when she says, we see what we want to see and we believe what we want to believe. Basically, you think what you want to think. One person will feel one way about something and another person can feel totally opposite about the same thing.
I also agree with leeanne. People only believe what they want to believe. If they don’t think it is right then they just close that entire perspective out, like it doesn’t even exist. Sometimes people don’t even believe what they see is truth. They aren’t willing to admit that it is right, so they won’t.
Me three… I also agree with Leeanne when she says people see and believe what the want to. Truth is what you make it out to be.
The optical illusions are great examples as to images we perceive to be there. Just like our mind we believe in “truth” whether it is shown blindly or we force ourselves to believe it. This can be a pain sometimes because in the end it can always turn around and smack us with the real truth. There are so may different situations where truth plays a role, the biggest situation begin religion.
our perceptions trick us all the time. we see what we want to see, nothing more and nothing less. This makes us up our own reality. which eventually makes up all of our truths, causing us to believe whatever it is has tricked our perception.
After reading several stories dealing with “truth” a definition is still very complicated to produce. I personally think that truth comes in a variety of ways. Personal, Factual, Spiritual, and Assumed truth. Although for one person one thing is the religious truth it is not true to someone of a different religion. Something that one person holds as personal truth is not at all the same as the values and other beliefs another person holds as truth. Truth varies from situation to situation and from time to time. Due to this only Factual truth can be backed with actual information that prooves it
I believe truth is about trust. Sometimes however, we can not believe what we perceive to be true because there are limitless possibilities in the world that exist solely to challenge what we believe in. They exist to strengthen our knowledge and trust, not only in ourselves and one another, but our values as well.