So far in the argument, the idea that regarding use as the measure of truth is fundamental to truth-seeking has been alluded to but has yet to be explained. Indeed, some criticisms of this claim have been given. Criticisms of logic were also made but the necessity of logic in truth-seeking has been established. This has yet to be done for use. This is partly because the full justification for both logic and use requires the melding of the two in order that they may mutually support one-another. This will be done eventually, but before this is done it could be worthwhile to focus on use and the relation that it has to the truth, not least because it comes packaged with other concepts such as goals and decisions and it is worth tracking the relationship between these concepts in order to add clarity to the overall picture.
And so, we might begin by asking the question: “Why is the regard for use so essential to truth-seeking?”
To begin with, we should return to what this means. To claim that “use is the measure of truth” is to claim that “truth is measured by its ability to help us meet our goals” and so, it is in fact our goals and our aims that set the measure of truth; a thing is true if it helps us to achieve our goals.
But what does this mean?
To understand what this means, let’s begin by considering that a goal initiates the enquiry. That is to say, unless truth is our goal, truth is never sought. Therefore, goals initiate truth-seeking; there cannot be a search for the truth without them. However, to recognise that a goal initiates our truth-seeking efforts does not demonstrate that truth is measured in relation to our goal. The goal to seek the truth alone does not tell use how truth is to be measured – it only commences the search.
Yet, this may not be so if we consider that our goals do not only commence our enquiry into the truth but parameterise it. Our goals do not only mark the beginning of our truths-seeking efforts, but they also mark its end. Therefore, truth becomes measured by its ability to fulfil the criteria of or goals, which is the point at which we regard a given “truth” (however we may understand it) to be true enough to satisfy our enquiry. Therefore, use is the measure of truth because to claim that use is the measure of truth is to claim that truth is measured by its ability to serve or satisfy our goals and it is our goals that parameterise our enquiry; it is our goals that determine or “measure” whether the quest for truth is or is not fulfilled. This must always be the case.
Of course, a lot is packed into making this claim and it is doubtful that this will act as a satisfactory demonstration of the argument. In which case, we can now attempt to clarify this argument by turning to four examples that will help to illustrate how our goals must relate to our search for, and understanding of, the truth.
Example 1:
Let’s say that a man is hungry. He is no philosopher, nor a scientist, nor does he have any explicit concern for finding the truth. Nonetheless, he wants to get some food: that is his goal. As a result, he goes on his way to find food.
He starts to put a meal together and checks the ingredients: do they smell unpleasant? Do they show any strange colouration? And the like. Upon finding no issue with the ingredients he cooks and enjoys his meal, marking the end of this enquiry.
Now, it may not even seem as if there was an enquiry but the man still had to discern whether it was true or not that he could cook his meal; even if they were implicit, he was judging ideas such as “this ingredient is edible and safe to eat” to be either true or false. Ultimately, the meal is cooked and the question that was framed by the goal: “is this meal edible?” was answered “yes” by the time that the man sat down to eat it.
There are at least two considerations to take from this example.
The first is that when the man regards the meal to be edible, he is regarding the claim that the idea is true enough to satisfy his goal. Why is this the case instead of the claim that the meal is edible in some absolute sense? The answer is that we can ask what would make something absolutely edible: is it a question of our being able to eat it? We can eat sand at a push and so why is that not on the radar? Is it a question of serving one’s good health? Then we could ask what exactly we mean by “health” and whether the ingredients are or are not healthy. Yet, these considerations were not in the man’s purview. Instead, his goal was to satisfy his hunger.
However, despite the fact that the enquiry did not include a concern for the true definition of “edible” or “health”, it did include some other enquiries: the food may not be absolutely “healthy” but it at least had to not be rotten, which is why the man checked for colour and smell. This brings us to the second consideration that we can take from this example which is that a given enquiry into the truth is not only parameterised by a main goal, but also by a number of sub-goals. If we break down the man’s enquiry, we find that yes, the goal was to “eat edible food to satisfy hunger” but this goal also included sub-goals such as:
· The ingredients cannot smell foul and
· The ingredients cannot show strange colouration
And there may be a number of other implicit goals which set the criteria for when the man will regard that it is “true enough” that his meal is good to eat and he can achieve his goal.
The key point is that what the example demonstrates is that a given goal sets and constrains our truth-seeking by determining what we will or will not be willing to accept as “true” and the lengths that we go to in this search will depend on what we are trying to achieve.
Example 2:
The first example may have seemed trivial; the description of a task with no real relation to a more philosophical quest for truth. Yet, the conclusions drawn from the first example carry over when we apply them to the explicit search for truth itself…
So then, let’s suppose that a man has the goal of searching for the truth until he knows the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. In what way would his goals parameterise his efforts in this example?
On the one hand, this goal will also contain sub-parameters for its completion and on the other, those parameters may determine whether the main goal itself will be “open” in the sense that it is continuous and may never end, or whether it is “closed” in the sense that it has an end-point at which its criteria can be satisfied. For example, just as the first man may have decided that the criteria for “edible” food is that it has to smell fine, this second man may decide (explicitly or not) that his criteria for finding “truth” is that it must be consistent, or beyond any question of doubt, or be in line with his experience, or perhaps event that it must be meaningful. These criteria will determine the extent to which the man can be said to have knowledge of “the truth”.
Now, of course, use of this example invokes a kind of meta-analysis on the overall project the aim of which is, after all, to know how we are to seek the truth. From how the example is being described it seems to suggest that we, like the man, will come to know the truth depending upon how we parameterise our aims. If we had any control over this, could we not just define truth as “anything we want it to be”, reach our goal and be done with the whole thing? Thereby, does not the attempt to measure truth by its use beg the question again or ultimately render the definition of truth relative?
The answer is no, with a slight qualification… the argument is that this approach can be adopted, but it fails because the pursuit of some goals excludes the potential to pursue others. If our choice of goals is constrained, it cannot be the case that we can simply adopt any goal, and if our goals set the measure of truth it therefore cannot be that truth is relative because it cannot be the case that anything goes when it comes to truth.
We shall explore this by considering the third example.
Example 3:
Let’s say that a man wants to leave his house, but he will not leave his house until he knows with absolute certainty that it is safe to do so. Being “absolutely certain” here means going beyond any conceivable doubt that he is safe. This would essentially entail that the man has a full proof philosophical system and science of safety that is tested and re-tested, defined and proven to every degree with mathematical precision that has no possible room for question. In brief, the end of this goal will likely never be reached. Or, let’s even suppose that he could reach absolute certainty. With all that this would entail, what if he needed to leave the house within an hour? The point is: the man has one goal that limits the other from being achieved. If he aims to leave the house within an hour, he cannot do so if he must first attain absolute certainty.
And so, what this example demonstrates is that a selection of goals and their criteria can exclude the realisation of another goal. Therefore, our ability to choose which goals can or cannot be pursued is constrained.
Let’s consider another variation…
A man wants to live as if logic does not apply, but he also wants things to make sense, including his arguments. Assuming that these goals are not limited to circumstance and considering the previous discussion about logic and why things make no sense without it, these two goals are incompatible. The man can aim to be illogical but cannot aim to be logical at the same time; the slightest attempt to do so would demonstrate that impossibility to him. Therefore, the adoption of one goal – once again – excludes another and if the man is to pursue either, he must either forego one or change the criteria by which the goal can be achieved.
We may see the entire rationale for the heuristic in this third example. Goals are necessary: they parameterise our truth-seeking efforts and, therefore, “use” is a measure of truth. Logic is also essential because no truth-claims can hold up without it. Yet, logic is not self-propelling; it is our goals that provide its value as logic helps us to achieve them – this is how use supports logic. However, it is also the case that we cannot arbitrarily adopt our goals: we cannot adopt goals that are contrary to one-another; we cannot adopt goals that contradict one-another. Therefore, goals behave in a logical manner and it is our logic that allows us to discern which ones can or cannot be pursued, and which combinations of goals are exclusionary. Therefore, just as “use” supports logic, logic supports use, saving it from relativism by determining that our conception of what can or cannot be useful is constrained.
Example 4:
It would appear that most of what needs to be said on the matter had been said with the previous example, but this final example serves to provide a final proof for the relation of use to our truth-seeking efforts.
In this example, let’s say that a man aims to seek the truth independently of what his goals guide him to. The aim is, in itself, a goal. Therefore, the goal cannot be pursued. Therefore, goals must always relate to the search for truth.
That’s all for the examples and hopefully by this point they have illuminated the idea that use is a measure of truth, how use relates to goals and how these tie into the overall scheme of the project.
Of course, the concept of decisions was mentioned at the beginning, and so how does that tie in? It’s quite simple…
Positing a goal without the ability to make decisions is redundant. A goal without decisions is merely a wish or an event. It is our decisions that make a goal a potentiality and therefore make our powers of discernment relevant to it. Therefore, if I ever mention use or goals or decisions, I may at times be referring to the same thing because all three concepts are intimately related, and just as concern for use and goals are fundamental, so too is relevance to our decisions fundamental to the truth-seeking process.