This is part II in a series on the things a society needs to
value in order to have civilization. In the Spherical Model, civilization is
the positive northern hemisphere of the sphere, with its opposite, savagery,
down south.
The 5 values, which show up in the Ten Commandments, are
God, life, family, truth, and property ownership. I’m doing them in whatever
order works for me. Part I was on life. Part III will be on property ownership.
Honoring God and family are so big, I’m saving them.
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| The quote is from the John Keats poem "Ode on a Grecian Urn." I took the photo of the urn in the British Museum in 2016 |
So, here is the section on truth from the Spherical Model
website article on Civilization.
________________
Value Truth
“Thou shalt not lie” is a commandment with many ramifications
in Civilization. Observe, for example, taking an oath to tell the truth in a
court of law. The oath means that, because God is your witness, and He knows
the truth, and you will be judged by Him in this life and the life to come,
therefore you feel the requirement to tell the truth under oath. God is bigger
than yourself, a mere human, and He is bigger than your human peers; so it is
to God you obligate yourself in the oath, not just to society. If you don’t
believe in God, what does your oath mean? You might be telling the truth; there
are honest people who don’t believe in God. But, without any belief greater
than your personal self, you (your own god) could declare that it is acceptable
for you to lie if it fits your personal needs to do so. You accept no higher
authority to insist otherwise. Society feels no obligation from you, because
you admit to nothing greater than yourself and your personal moral code,
however self-serving.
[Side note: I am not saying that we isolate ourselves from
non-religious people, and not give them the freedoms the rest of us enjoy. I am
saying, societally it ought to be up to the non-religious to present evidence
that they are being truthful. Maybe that would be submitting to a lie-detector;
maybe it would be supplying character witnesses. I’m not sure of a solution,
and it may look no different from now. Affirming, rather than taking an oath,
is already allowed in the Constitution, and there are already laws against perjury.
But I would like to see some initiative on the part of the non-religious to
compensate the Civilized society for the fact that their belief system gives
society less guarantee of their truthfulness.]
While we must not have a state religion (more on freedom of
religion later), there is a religious morality that enables laws and freedom to
exist and encourage civilization that atheism (or secularism) fails to do. And
it shouldn’t be surprising that many of the tyrannies in the world in the past
century have been atheistic (the alternative to atheistic tyranny is religious
tyranny—that is, a single forced religion; societies with freedom of religion
don’t become tyrannies). In Soviet countries during communist rule, Christian
grandmothers persisted in teaching religious values to their children and
grandchildren. The Soviets controlled productions. But developers of the
European Union have conspired that they will not make the same mistake; they
will also control reproduction and education. When you control education of
children, you control the destiny of mankind.
In addition to that original section, it turns out I’ve
written often enough about truth to make a collection. Here they are in chronological order:
· Stand for Truth, March 2, 2012
·
Wisdom and Learning, May 11, 2015
· Speak the Truth and Play Fair, February 12, 2018
· Telling the Truth, May 24, 2018
· Red Pills, Walking Away, and Truth Seeking, July 16, 2018
· Tribalism vs. Truth, August 27, 2018
· Who Is Telling the Truth, September 27, 2018
·
Truth Before It’s Too Late, October 4, 2018
I’ve referred to this before (in “Truth Before It’s Too Late”), but in Jordan Peterson’s 12 Rules for Life, rule number 8 is “Tell the truth, or at least don’t lie.” As he’s talked about this concept, he suggests never saying anything that makes you feel weak. He’s not talking about wielding power over others, or making them think you do so you don’t somehow appear weak. He’s talking about an internal guide. If you’re saying something untrue, pay attention and you’ll notice a weak feeling inside. People use the word conscience possibly to mean the same thing. Unless you train yourself to ignore it, there’s an internal guide to know whether you’re telling the truth.
When asked about whether a person should tell the truth even
when there’s a Nazi at the door to collect the Jew you’re hiding in a closet,
he doesn’t actually answer that question. Instead, he points out that there
were a lot of lies—giving in to the weakness, saying the convenient, mollifying
little lies—building up to the situation where Nazis were in power and could
arrive at your door asking that question. Telling the truth each and every one
of those times, let the consequences follow as they may, is your guide to the best
possible future. Lying, for convenience, self-protection, or manipulation of
others is walking away from the best civilized life you could live.
Truth matters. Civilization depends on it.
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