In a universe of infinite possibilities, how can people be so sure as to what the truth is?

Question

In a universe of infinite possibilities, how can people be so sure as to what the truth is?

Answer 1

What your talking about is termed philosophical skepticism and says that we cannot be certain of anything.  We only deem things as truths because we see them repeated and say that when viewed again the truth will still exist, but there is no reason for it to.  There is the definite possibility that the sun will never rise again, but we have seen it so many times we understand it as a truth.  Even what we know through our 5 senses since they just have us feel sensations and we assume that what we are feeling is a good representation of what is actually going on in reality. What you will need to do is define how sure you need to be to believe. Nothing is 100%

"This world is not one, in which certainty is possible

If you think you've achieved certainty, you are almost certainly mistaken, that is one of the few things you could be certain about"

* From *Russell Speaking-BBC interwiew with Woodrow Wyatt *

Answer 2

What is truth? Objective or subjective? Who is the arbiter? Mine's a large one on the rocks please.

Answer 3

Truth isn't a static, it's forever new and is the living present that is always alive. Possibilities are statics. When thought tries to capture the present to say this is what Reality and Truth is, it's already dead and gone. Infinite possibilities only exists when thought holds on to the present and creates the past and defines the present as having infinite possibilities when in reality it's the present that is never the same so there isn't even any room for thought to make it into possibilities.

Answer 4

Truth is what works with the world around us. However, since most philosophers find no problem finding arguments that dismiss an objective outside world then we find that, in practical terms, what we call "true" is just what "works" with the world around us. It's called the Pragmatic Theory of Truth - the idea that the true is what is useful to us.

Answer 5

Truth is a presupposition factual or theoretical that clarifies complexity and clears confusion. Each man has a personal truth, it is when this individual truth merges, is aligned and incorporated into the universal absolute truth that man gains the same.

Answer 6

It has to do with "justified true belief." Everything we know to be "true" can be proved untrue when new data comes along.

Actually I covered this topic in today's blog, and there is a link in the blog to my source on this topic. From that you can get more details, or just Google "justified true belief."

My site: Thank you very much for looking at it. http://freeassemblage.blogspot.com/

Answer 7

There are certain truths which are observable. Natural laws such as gravity ("hey the apple falls down towards the earth!")are observable and do not need to be proved.

Other than natural laws, humans tend to try to fret out as many possibles as they can imagine and then distinguish which hypotheses are the most likely, or those which can be proved. Most things however are theories... complex hypotheses with large amounts of evidence to support these hypotheses leading one to safely assume that these theories are correct. This applies both to science and to other areas of life.

We observe events in history, we take in behaviors and thoughts and we internally dismiss the unlikely and find evidence to support our theories.

Answer 8

This is a good question.

You can and should not be sure.

Philosophy has asked this question and you'd be surprised something as simple as that what you see and hear and feel is very complex.

There are more arguments arguing that what you see and feel and hear is not real than that it is real, now imagine the possibilities with something as "truth".

truth is relative, I question it's existence.

Answer 9

Because people are not as rational as you think.  As you go through life, you will often come across people who seem extremely sure of things based on no evidence or reasoning at all.