In Search of the Truth

A consideration into what is true. One’s perspective can and does alter what is perceived. I would remind you of the old teaching story of the five blind men who were walking down the road to go to a fair when they encountered an elephant. One of the blind men felt only the tusk and said to his brethren, “This beast is like into a spear”. Another had grabbed tin ear and said to a friend, No, it is much more like a fan than a spear”. A third, holding its tail declared that they were all wrong that it was much more like a rope than anything they had described. Then the fourth, who had his arms wrapped around one of the legs, chimed in, “Nope, it is much more like a tree than any of those things”. Finley the last one, who was standing with his arms up and his hands on the elephant’s side said out loud, “My brothers have all gone mad, for it is plain to me that this beast is more like into a wall than any of those other ideas!”

Then another said to the rest, "Agree or disagree, we have to get on down to the fair before it closes" and off they went, each with a firm understanding of what each had perceived of what a true elephant was. This is the state we all find ourselves in trying to perceive the truth, it is colored by the angle of our perception, no two people can see the same thing at the same time because each must, by the inability to stand in the same place at the same time, observe the thing from different points of view.

This is the state we all find ourselves in trying to perceive the truth, it is colored by the angle of our perception, no two people can see the same thing at the same time because each must, by the inability to stand in the same place at the same time, observe the thing from different points of view. Not only is our perception of the truth determined by the angles from which we look at it how much time we have to consider it, to alter our point of view also determine our ability to perceive the true nature of something.  Each mind that perceives is alone in it perception and its reasoning based upon that perception is unique to the individual.  It is an amazement that we can ever agree on what the truth is.

Consider the rightness of smoking tobacco. From the time it was discovered by Europeans in America until fifty years ago, it was considered not only a good thing, but a necessary thing in that a large part of the English’s making colonies in the New World was to grow and export tobacco. Many a people’s livelihoods depended upon its growth, processing, and sales. All of this was possible because of our angle of our perception was solely for the pleasure it brought to us. Pleasure both from the wealth it brought to those who provided it and from the ones who smoked, chewed, and sniffed it.  Now it is perceived as a health hazard  and to be avoided, and taxed to death.

Did not the way tobacco was seen change it from being right into being wrong? And did not this change in our understanding of the goodness/badness of tobacco come from a changing point of view, a point of view focuses more on the negative consequences of smoking, higher incidents of cancer in users compared to non users.

Now if it is true that tobacco is good or bad is still dependent upon the point of view that the user/nonuser looks at the issue from, for some the good outweighs the bad and for others the bad is not worth the good.