Is truth a constant through time?

Hahaha, what? You think that because people get stuff wrong now and then there's no such thing as truth? That's frickin' stupid!

You illustrate it quite well with your flat earth reference. Putting aside that the idea that people believed the earth was flat is pretty much an urban legend anyway, you say "the world was once flat". No. The earth wasn't flat. It didn't cease to be flat when people found out it was round. So the truth didn't change, people just learned more about it.

Sorry to come off a little terse, but I really don't understand how you can confuse people not knowing the truth with truth being "unstable". It's just not what "truth" means. There is an argument that the truth is subjective, but the examples you're giving here don't give the impression that you're making that argument.

 

Could've fooled me.

 

Truth in the present is what every person may hold to be true; truth in the future may consist of different things, but it will still be truth

Don't get so pickery Self; you're right, but xenon doesn't mean exactly what you think he does (he's right too).

 

Xexon is just trying to convey his knowledge, but he speaks as if he is absolute. He is forgetting he is not the only enlightened one, and I think he is unaware that his level of knowledge/advancement has been surpassed.

I never thought I'd see the day where I'd be correcting Xexon, everyday grows faster and faster for my development, it's pretty intense.

Sorry if I'm being an ass

 

I'm not convinced that coming up with a new definition of "truth" and then getting nebulous and condescending whenever someone calls you on it really qualifies as "enlightenment". I'm very wary of anyone who claims to be enlightened, particularly when their enlightenment doesn't seem to be contagious, i.e. when they're unable to offer much more than "you're not enlightened, you wouldn't understand" as an explanation of things they're said or written. Seems like yeah, an enlightened person might act like that, so someone who acts like that might be enlightened... but a lot of other people act like that too.

Back on truth, truth pretty much by definition is unchanging. It might seem very wise and enlightened to say that the truth is whatever we think it is right now, and thus changes subjectively, but it's also a very self-referential argument and unfalsifiable. The evidence that the truth is subjective is that it changes between people, and the evidence that the truth changes depends on the belief that it's subjective. Seems like, rather than redefining what we understand truth to be, we're just lacking a word for something else here. Point of view, opinion, whatever, it's pointless to reimagine the world as devoid of stable truths simply because two or twenty of two million people might disagree with them at some point.

 

actions speak louder than words.

 

very true, these words are empty because they're just words.

 

Neither you nor Xexon is enlightened. Xexon admits this (though I think he has a tendency to forget at times ). You remain in a state of delusion about it. Xexon also doesn't succumb to reactionary emotional responses that are essentially arguments with subconscious aspects of himself projected onto others, as you do. I'd say that means Xexon still outranks you on the continuum of consciousness (as do several others on these forums).

Travis

 

haha.

true.

but it's kind of hard to be the lesson over forums if you never post. all I have at my disposal is words here.

 

Good, I can see you really do understand what he means, then. The thing is, with subjunctive truth, it's only as true as we are prone to being. Science has found some wonderful things in the past hundred years, but there are still radical changes we've made in our view on the universe in a short amount of time, decades even. It is not wrong to take something as true, but when the time comes, do not hesitate to let go of what you thought was true. I'm not saying that you should ignore science and solid fact, but don't let contemporary values or ideas interfere with your view on life, they'll be gone in a matter of sunsets.

 

It's true. It's not that there isn't truth, it's just to be open to life experience changing your view of what truth is.

 

Yeah, that's the difference, I think. It's not true to say that, because what you know of the universe changed, the universe changed. Something is true, at all times, and we're either closer or further away from that at any given time. Like you said, we should be willing to let go of something we thought was true once we know that it's not. But I don't see how regarding truth as subjective allows that, since it allows us to believe that the thing we believed before we were persuaded otherwise was the truth and now isn't, rather than that it never was and that we were just wrong for a while. I also don't think it does anyone any good to believe that the truth is so subjective as to be unknowable. I'd like to think that, with study or inquiry, we will get there, someday, or get nearer. Regarding truth as subjective seems a lot like giving up.

 

Exactamundo!

True in the manner you said it, however, for those who have beliefs about reality being in the eye of the beholder (a good bit Eastern), the universe shifts with our perceptions of it.

Good, I liked that.
It does seem like we're at least moving forward, doesn't it? Like ourselves, truth probably moves forward with the environment it's featured in, wherever forward may be.

If humanity (well, whatever we call what we will become) ever finds all truth, we probably won't have much to do. Except manifest ourselves into a universe.

 

In biology, things in the environment come to exist according to what happened in the environment. It means that somebody who has made the cause to see the truth, can see it.

If the question is wrong then the answer only comes out wrong. That's why in order to see the answer you wanted you need the appropriate question first of all.

Then, what is the truth?

Truth is the principle through which things in the world make their results.

In my opinion it is the meaning inside what it is.

 

I no longer am bound to the identity that came with it. -xexon
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I disagree. As long as you are using your senses to identify, classify, and become consciously aware of anything not you or not associated as being you, separate from you, you are bound to the identity that comes with it.

As long as you see and am pleased, displeased or indifferent with what you see, you identify with it, you say it is you seeing, you identify self as one that sees ... you are bound to this identity.

As long as you hear and am pleased, displeased or indifferent with what you hear, you identify with it, you say it is you hearing, you identify self as one that hears ... you are bound to this identity.

As long as you smell ... taste ... feel with the body (tactilely), you identify with it, you say it is you feeling tactilely, you identify self as one that feels ... you are bound to this identity.

As long as you think and am pleased, displeased or indifferent with what you think, you identify with it, you say it is you thinking, you identify self as one that thinks ... you are bound to this identity.

As long as you identify forms with the senses, am pleased, displeased or indifferent to forms, you identify with it, you identify self as being in forms, you identify self as forms, and you identify forms as self ... you are bound to this identity.

As long as you identify feelings ... perceptions ... ideas ... consciousness with the senses, am pleased, displeased or indifferent to consciousness, you identify with it, you identify self as being in consciousness, you identify self as consciousness, and you identify consciousness as self ... you are bound to this identity.

When you speak (communicate verbally or written), you use words to identify every aspect (forms, feelings, perceptions, ideas, consciousness), every event of this identity (forms, feelings, perceptions, ideas, consciousness) with other beings who have the capability to also speak (communicate) and hear and that can understand what you speak. Typing words on a computer on the internet are also this same medium as speaking because you are communicating using words, labels, to identify. In identifying something as being what it is, you are litterally identifying yourself as being separate from what it is you are identifying ... you are bound to this identity.

As long as you are communicating your ideas of what a self is or is not you are identifying with this idea ... you are bound to this identity.
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When a fire begins it continues as long as there is fuel for it to continue. The originial flame goes out, but the fire continues ... as long as there is fuel for it to continue.

If one person has realized the truth, instructs another so that the other also realizes the truth, has passsed from this life, as long as the other also still lives the truth still continues. And if this one who has realized the truth, instructs many others so that the many also realizes the truth, has passed from this life, as long as the many, or one of the many still lives the truth still continues.

Beings living in any realm of existance will always classify themselves as being separate from and a part of the realm they exist in as long as they possess the means to identify, classify and become consciously aware of the reality they happen to claim existence in.

A truth may disappear over time, but that truth will always be there, waiting for someone else to stumble or come across it and then propogate the way to it. One cannot say, "This is the truth", and others believe it as being the truth without fully realizing it as being such. Truth is relative only to the one realizing it. If the one saying, "This is the truth", wants others to realize it as well, the one proclaiming the truth must provide a way to the truth so others can realize for themselves.

There is a difference between knowing something and understanding it. There is also a difference between understanding something and realizing it. All these are relative to the one perceiving and using their senses (eyes, ears, nose, tongue, body, mind) to identify, classify, and become consciously aware of.

Mind does not arise without the conditions for it to arise. Therefore mind is a conditioned response. Remove those conditions and mind neither arises nor passes away ... it is not applicable.

The whole idea for a truth is one of personal discovery. What is true for one is not true for another until the path to the truth can be verified as always producing the same results consistently. It does not mean that there cannot exist various paths to the same conclusion. But it does mean that whatever path one chooses, must remain consistent to produce the same results. Therefore truth is a conditioned response.

Truth does not become an untruth to the one realizing the truth, but only to the one not realizing it, as well it should be. It cannot be both simutaneously for the same perceiver. Either it is, or it is not. Something that is an untruth, or not true, simply has not yet been realized. Just because it has not been realized as being true does not necessairly classify it as being an untruth, rather an unrealized truth ... but then again ... everything is relative to the perceiver.
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Stop perceiving ... then one is not bound to the identity that comes with it. Perceptions (Name and Form, Mental and Physical aggregates) are a conditioned response to consciousness. Consciousness is a conditioned response to perceptions. Actions give rise to consciousness, and actions are a conditioned response to ignorance. With the cessation of ignorance everything conditioned by the arising of ignorance ceases. It neither is nor will be because the condition for its arising will never occur. Self identification ceases, as does the motivating factors for the arising of self, namely greed, ill-will and delusion (Ignorance).

 

Bound, is not the same as use.

I still play with a dollie that looks like me.


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You like to play with words also.

You use what you are bound to. Even if what you use is not you, you identify with it by separating yourself from it.

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If my hand is cold, I slide on a glove.

If I wish to interact with this world, I slide on a body.

It hardly represents the totality of what "I" am.

A spirit who has no roots in this world, yets visits it like one would Disneyland.

You, are but one of the attractions here.



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If your hand is cold, you identify self as being cold and cold as being self ... MY HAND is cold

If you wish to interact with this world, you identify your self as being of the world and the world as being of your self ... I INTERACT with this world

If I am one of the attractions here you identify yourself by separating your SELF as being separate from my SELF ... YOU ...

If you truly were not bound by this identity, you would not be sharing this idea with anyone else without a basis as a path to a means to this truth ...

Saying you are, or are not this or that does not make it so ... it only indicates that you, or anyone else for this matter who makes these claims, are declaring their own identity through the craving of their own ideas, perceptions, views ...

As long as one experiences pleasure, pain or indifference (greed, ill-will and delusion), one experiences self, is bound to the idea of self, identifies self in these experiences ... I, ME, MY HAND, YOU (as being separate from ME).

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Ever hear of play?

It's creativity itself.

Rules are for people who think they're grown up.

God belongs to playful children. Not monks or priests or religions.



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