НАЗАД К СОДЕРЖАНИЮ
УНИВЕРСУМ ПЛАТОНОВСКОЙ МЫСЛИ VIII
L. Castle Richard L. Purtill
LOVE AS A MEANS
TO TRUTH
AND TRUTH AS A MEANS TO LOVE
{ L:} In a previous discussion you talked about art as
a means to beauty inquiry as a means to truth and love as a means
to goodness. I had some doubts about love as a means to goodness:
surely sometimes love leads to unhappiness and other things that
are not good.
{ R:} Yes and I said that real love has to be a means to
goodness: `love' of something bad is actually based on an
illusion. When we love or desire something it must be because it
seems good to us. That seemed to satisfy you at the time.
{ L:} Perhaps it did but when I thought about it more I could
see some difficulties. Even if we grant that `real' love has to be
of something which exists not just an illusion then you would
still have to tell what makes something `not an illusion'. As a
neo-platonist I think that Beauty Truth and Goodness are all names
of God and they are really much more interconnected than you allow
for. You can't really talk about any of these ideas without
talking about the others.
{ R:} Well we talked a good deal about Beauty in our last
discussion so let's confine ourselves in this discussion to the
relation between Truth and Goodness and the relation between
inquiry as a means to Truth and Love as a means to Goodness.
{ L:} All right. Let's start out with what you mean by
`inquiry'.
{ R:} Well as a preliminary definition I think that experience
raises certain questions in our mind and inquiry is trying to
answer these questions. To take an everyday example someone dies
and we want to answer the question of why he died. We
investigate or inquire. In fact what in American english we would
call a private detective is called an `inquiry agent in British
english.
{ L:} All right then inquiry is the attempt to find the truth
about something: but that means that the truth is seen as
something good. So what's the difference between inquiry as a
means to truth and love as a means to goodness.
{ R:} I see what you mean: it looks as if inquiry leading to
truth is simply a special case of love leading to goodness. But
perhaps inquiry uses certain distinctive means to get to the
desired object truth.
{ L:} That would fit in with what I said about art: the
importance of technique in achieving or exhibiting or displaying
beauty. So if the end of inquiry is a good how do the techniques
differ from for example art.
{ R:} Well even though inquiry aims at a good that good is
truth not beauty or other kinds of goodness. Perhaps as you say
all good things are God or derived from God but for our
present intellectual situation we have to make differences between
beauty truth and goodness. I'd say that the methods of
inquiry into truth are experience and reason.
{ L:} Doesn't an artist have to have experience to create
beauty or exhibit or display it and doesn't he use rational
techniques to achieve these ends?
{ R:} I'd say that experience alone doesn't get you either
beauty or truth. The artist must after experience communicate his
experience to others in the form of a work of art. The inquirer
must make use of his or her experience to form a theory about the
world. Again perhaps these theories are one in the final result
but we can certainly distinguish between a work of art like
Dante's Divine Comedy and a theory of the universe such as
Aquinas's in The Summa.
{ L:} And yet we can speak of the beauty of a theory and even
regard a theory as a human creation and we also talk of the truth
found in art. So you want to say that inquiry leads to a theory
and art leads to a work of art.
{ R:} Yes so long as you realize that a theory need be not at
all high-flown. If someone dies and a detective thinks that
someone killed him this is a theory in the broad sense. Theories
are confirmed or unconfirmed by reason or further experience.
{ L: } Well we said we'd confine ourselves to inquiry and truth
so I won't keep trying to find parallels in art. As a
neo-platonist I not only have the view that truth beauty and
goodness are ultimately the same but also a theory about how we
attain them.
{ R:} I'd be very interested to hear this theory.
{ L:} Begin with a human being with very little experience.
Something usually something out of his ordinary experience arouses
him to inquire and he comes to what you call a theory about the
thing that has aroused his inquiry. Then she or he tries to test
this theory by testing it for logical flaws and by further
experience. Take the case of religion. Something happens to us
which makes us happy and we know that we could not have done it. A
natural reaction to this is to look for someone to thank.
Sometimes this is another human being but for certain things we
have to thank someone beyond human beings. God or at an early
stage of religion `the gods'.
{ R:} Yes. G. K. Chesterton said that the worst moment for an
atheist is when he feels thankful but has no one to thank.
{ L:} Like many things Chesterton said that is both wise and
witty. So the person we are talking about forms the `theory' that
there is a God and that God is good. Later on other experiences
seem to conflict with this; the experience of evil which we are
not responsible for. So then you must form a new theory for
example that God is good but human beings by their choices have
brought evil on themselves.
{ R:} Yes `the problem of evil' and the `free will defense' as
many philosophers would call them. But how does this relate to
inquiry and truth?
{ L:} Our thankfulness leads us to love God and by
loving God we get to know more about God and knowing more about
God leads us to love God.
{ R:} You and I agree that God is the Supreme Good. The more
you know about God the more you love God; the more you love God
the more you understand God. But how does this apply to more
ordinary cases of inquiry?
{ L:} Since God is a person the closest analogy to the love of
God is love of a human person. Someone does something for
us which causes us to love him or her. This love helps us to know
the other person.
{ R:} But many people would dispute that. They'd quote the
proverb "love is blind" blind that is to the faults of the loved
one and say that love is in one sense `the great deceiver'.
{ L:} Here I can make use of something you said in our dialogue
about art: love has to be of something existing and false or
mistaken love is love of what doesn't exist.
{ R:} But surely many people love things which don't exist.
{ L:} I would say that they are loving an imaginary picture of
the person they think they love. Or in some cases they concentrate
on the good things about a person ignoring the bad. I think that
women are more realistic than men about the faults of someone they
love. Real love is knowing someone's faults and still loving them.
But of course women try to do away with the faults they see.
Literature (and life) is full of women who marry men and then try
to improve them.
{ R:} Yes men are `romantic' in this sense (and some women
too); they don't see the faults in the one they love. If all the
good things they see are imaginary then you have a case of
infatuation not love. But can you extend this to inquiry about
subjects?
{ L:} I think I can. We both admire Socrates. Wouldn't you say
that two of his characteristics were his love of truth and his
ability to inspire this love of truth in his students.
{ R:} Yes I certainly think that this was what made him such a
great teacher. We've both taught introductory philosophy courses
and certainly if someone is indifferent to or even hostile to
philosophical truth it's almost impossible to teach him or her.
You have much greater success with students who believe that some
philosophical error is the truth and defend it: at least they
care about truth.
{ L:} Yes and to take another example a person who does not
love mathematical truth will never really understand mathematics.
{ R:} That's very true. Unfortunately some people who don't
love mathematics get enough grasp of it to be teachers of
mathematics. In high school I had a teacher who inspired in me a
love of algebra which was promptly killed by my next teacher who
taught geometry so badly that for a long time he killed any
interest in mathematics for me. It was only later when I began to
study logic that I regained a love of formal systems.
{ L:} Yes though some lovers of mathematics are bad teachers
simply because they can't see how anyone cannot `just see' a
mathematical truth or not love it as they do.
{ R:} Yes such teachers love mathematics but not students. To
be a really good teacher you must love your students as well as
your subject. Socrates was interested in the souls of those he
taught not just interested in philosophy.
{ L:} But what does it mean to `love' your subject? Is it an
emotion?
{ R:} I think you might get some idea of what love of a subject
is if we look at the two kinds of persons we've talked about. A
mystic who is `in love with God' isn't always happy about it.
Sometimes she or he suffers what some mystics call `the dark night
of the soul' and have no consolation in the thought of God;
perhaps even negative emotions toward God. But nevertheless he or
she is dedicated to God. His only real object in life is to know
and serve God better. Similarly a person in love with another
person doesn't always have positive emotions about that person: if
there is a quarrel between them or other problem in their
relationship they may even have negative emotions about that
person. But at the same time if it is real love he or she is
dedicated to that person wants to know and serve that person. Now
in the case of loving philosophy or mathematics it doesn't always
mean you have positive emotions about the subject but you're
dedicated to that subject wouldn't think of abandoning it for
another subject want to know more about it and teach others to
appreciate it.
{ L:} So the bad teacher of philosophy only wants to get a
minimum knowledge so that she or he can get a teaching job and
would gladly abandon it for an easier job.
{ R:} Very true. Similarly if a supposed mystic gets
discouraged by `the dark night of the soul' and stops praying to
God or thinking about God he didn't really love God. And if a
human loving another human is discouraged by difficulties in the
relationship and goes on to find someone `easier' to love he
didn't really have real love for that person.
{ L:} I see that you're doing the same thing here that you've
done in other discussions: if something doesn't have what you
think are the proper characteristics of love you say it isn't
love. Others may prefer to describe it as not real long lasting
love but a lesser love. Certainly in my study of philosophy there
were times when the whole study of philosophy seemed pointless and
abstract and I was tempted to abandon it.
{ R:} Yes but you didn't and your love of philosophy comes
through in your teaching which is why you're a good teacher. Any
relationship with a person or a subject goes through peaks and
valleys what C. S. Lewis called `sloughs. Love of anything has to
be worked on and that includes love of philosophy.
{ L:} But now where is truth in the discussion? You've said a
lot about love but less about truth.
{ R:} Well truth is the way things really are. For theists like
ourselves we can define truth as `the way God sees things'.
{ L:} But some truths like the sinfulness of humans and our own
sinfulness isn't something we love.
{ R:} That's a good example for my purposes. That humans are
sinful that we are sinful is part of the facts. But these facts
have to be connected with other truths; that Christ died for us
and redeemed us. When we put the depressing facts into context
then we can love the whole truth.
{ L:} So `love of truth' for you has to be `love of the whole
truth'. Did Socrates for example love the whole truth?
{ R:} He loved as much of it as he knew and was always eager
for more truths. In one way a `truth' out of context isn't really
a truth at all.
{ L:} Well take some fact: the number of murders or rapes in
the world today. Are you saying that isn't a truth?
{ R:} I think that to know a truth you must do more than just
know the facts: you have to understand them. And understanding
involves putting them into context. As Aristotle might have put it
"not just knowledge of the facts but the reasoned facts".
{ L:} I have some sympathy with that: as a neo-platonist I
think all truth is connected and is ultimately one and is
ultimately God. So Aristotle's `reasoned facts' would be connected
with each other and ultimately with God.
{ R:} Yes God is the ultimate reality and the source of all
other reality.
{ L:} How would you distinguish among `facts' `reality' and
`truth'? Are they all the same?
{ R:} We sometimes substitute one for the other but I think we
can make a distinction among them. Truth involves language: an old
definition of truth is "the equivalence of thought to reality".
Reality is what exists regardless of whether it is described in
language and facts I would regard as uninterpreted
statements about reality. You my have seen the television program
"Dragnet". The police sergeant Sergeant Friday often says "just
the facts" and I think that means he wants the facts without
interpretation. For .example if you say "I saw him steal it" that
involves theory which you may not be certain of; whereas if you
say "I saw him pick it up and put it in his pocket" you can be
certain of it since you observed it. Your interpretation may be
wrong: perhaps the person didn't intend to steal it but put it
into his pocket because he wanted his hands free.
{ L:} So as you said earlier we can know `the facts' without
love but love is needed for understanding and if the truth is
facts plus interpretation then we cannot know `the truth' without
love.
{ R:} Yes. Notice when we use the words "I know the facts but
have no idea what they mean" we are not self contradictory. "I
have experienced the reality but don't know how to express it in
words" is not self contradictory. But I think that "I know the
truth but don't know what it means" or "I know the truth but can't
express it" are self contradictory.
{ L:} Yet you say that these terms are often used
interchangeably.
{ R:} Yes in a given case we might say "I want to know the
truth" "I want to know reality" or "I want to know the facts" and
mean pretty much the same by all of these statements. What's
involved are various ways of speaking where we take a part for the
whole. If I say "Moscow objects to the proposal" I am using Moscow
which is part of Russia to express "the Russian Government
objects".
{ L:} What's the difference between saying something which is
true and saying that the statement you have made is true.
{ R:} Some philosophers think there is no difference: what's
sometimes called `the redundancy theory of truth'. But I think
that in ordinary language saying that something is true is more
than just saying it. For example someone might say "God is good"
and you and I would agree that is a true statement. But if someone
says "It is true that God is good" they've added something to what
they said before. Students can often see this in the case of "God
is good" and "It is true that God is good" because they can see
that "It is true that God is good" really adds something to only
saying "God is good".
{ L:} What do you think it adds?
{ R:} I think that to say "It is true that God is good" is to
say that you have some reason for thinking that God is good.
Students often say that the statement "God is good" may be spoken
out of faith or belief but "It is true that God is good" raises
the question of how you might defend or justify the idea that God
is good.
{ L:} You recall that in one of our earlier discussions I
defended the idea that faith is a means of knowing.
{ R:} Yes and I think you made a good case for that thesis. But
if faith is a means of knowledge then you do have a reason for
saying "God is good" is true. Many of my students seem to define
`faith' as believing in something for no reason.
{ L:} Yes I agree that many students do have that idea. So in
your view "God is good" being not true is different from it being
true that God is not good.
{ R:} Yes. Suppose as some students believe that "God is good"
can not be shown to be either true or false. Then on this view it
is not true that God is good but that does not mean that God is
not good.
{ L:} So what do you think is shown by what you have said
today?
{ R:} I think my key point was the close connection between
love of something and understanding it. Since in my view
understanding is necessary for truth this means that the
connection between truth and love is much closer than many people
think.
{ L:} As a neo-platonst I find this quite satisfactory but it
only makes a start on understanding truth. Ultimately I hope we
can explore this topic for all eternity and have as our basis for
discussing it our experience of God who is truth.
Лилия Леонидовна - канд. филос. наук директор Центра Глобальных
Исследований Шаминад-Университета Гавайи США
Ричард - почетный
проф. философии Западного Вашингтонского университета США
©СМУ, 2000 г.
НАЗАД К СОДЕРЖАНИЮ
