For the average voter it's all rather confusing. Unless, that is, you're the kind of voter who also knows the truth, and you wait to hear from the candidate who announces your truth!
If I sound a little skeptical, it's because I am.
I've been thinking a lot about truth claims—allowing my thoughts to percolate; testing them out; rethinking them; testing again; checking out the ideas against experience and life. And where truth claims are concerned, I find myself skeptical. My skepticism runs to any kind of truth claim—not just political, but religious, scientific and philosophical claims to truth too.
To be more clear, I am not against the search for truth. After all, as the X-Files remind us, "The Truth is Out There." My skepticism kicks in when any of us think the truth that is "out there" is now "in here," and I know what it is.
Here's where my thinking has led me:
Truth claims at their worst and most dangerous are:
• certain
• brash
• literal.
Truth claims at their best and most helpful are:In some way most of us long for certainty. Uncertainty seems dangerous. If you are not certain that the narrow rope bridge across the gorge will hold your weight, you don't cross. If something is certain, then we can rely on it. It's a firm foundation to build on. A few years ago, teaching on the little Chinese classic the Daodejing, I told the class that many scholars now say that the supposed author Laozi most likely did not exist, and that the little book was a compilation of Doaist thoughts current at the time. This worried one student who felt very let down. If we couldn't be certain who wrote the book, and that its supposed author likely did not exist, then the book was a lie. How could we trust it with so much uncertainty about it? The student came round to embrace the Daodejing's ambiguity, subtlety, and inexactness later in the course.
• ambiguous
• subtle
• approximate.
Certainty would be nice, and would provide an element of comfort in a very uncertain world. I suppose that is why many are so tempted to embrace politics and religions, sciences and philosophies that offer us certainties. But such certainties are merely a chimera. They are illusory. So when I hear the certain truth claims of politicians to both the left and the right, however attractive either may seem, my skepticism kicks in.
But, if the world is uncertain, and we are tempted to answer the uncertainty with illusory certainties, which seems foolish, how do we live with the uncertainties?
I've found a few pointers to be helpful. First, don't abandon the quest for truth; after all, it's part of the human lot to search for meaning. Second, lay aside the need to be certain. If certainty is not to be had, then it seems silly to want it. And third, make peace with the ambiguities, subtleties, and approximations of life. The narrow rope bridge across the gorge may not hold your weight. Do you cross or not? It's risky, for sure. But then, life is risky.
+Ab. Andy