On Truth and Falsity

                               The Reality of Causation

The skeptics believe that if any person desires to get their philosophy right, then those persons should adopt the skeptics philosophy that no one can discern the difference between truth and falsity in their appearances. This means that the skeptics believe that all appearances could be but mere illusions. But if the skeptics would examine their sense objects and thought objects more closely, they would observe that illusions, by themselves, always prove to be useless. Humans can add or subtract other ideas to systems of illusion to make them useful but, by themselves, illusions are always useless or even harmful. On the other hand, humans possess the mental power to use sense objects and thought objects to create systems that prove to be beneficial to their fellow humans. Humans can also use these same sense objects and thought objects to invent false systems, such as lies, that always prove to be useless or even harmful to their fellow humans. One would think that since humans possess the ability to formulate sense objects, such as machines, and thought objects, such as abstract mathematical formulas, into useful and beneficial systems, then both the objects used and the beneficial systems created would both be true and real. One would also think that since illusions always prove to be useless or harmful, then all basic sense objects and thought objects and their useful systems would have to be true and real. One would also think that since humans can also formulate false systems with the use of real and true sense objects, such as machines that do not work, and real and true thought objects, such as lies, then that fact would prove to humans that falsity never appears in reality, but only occurs as the result of false systems comprised of true and real objects. Falsity never directly appears to the human mind. Humans always use the true and real idea of nothing to indirectly indicate the non-appearance of falsity which, in turn, indicates that false systems should be usefully discarded. This fact means that every sense object and every thought object that humans can experience has proven to be useful in some way, and therefore, true and real.

The skeptics attack the idea of causation as being a proof that appearances can be true and real. The dogmatists used the idea of cause and effect to try to prove that appearances can be real. But the skeptics counter the dogmatists' arguments with the contention that causes are never directly observed, that the dogmatists disagree with each other about what causation could be, and since one cause would need another cause to explain it and still another cause to explain that cause reaching toward infinity, then no one can know that causes can be true and real. pb. OP ps.68-70. The skeptic, David Hume, adopted the idea that causes are never directly observed with his theory of association. Hume opined that one never observes one thing causing another. One can only observe two or more events happening repeatedly at the same time, but which may not happen the same way in the future. Just because the sun comes up every morning does not mean that it will come up tomorrow morning. Hume believed that inductive reasoning can fail. But inductive reasoning never fails if a particular system that repeats itself never changes. If the sun does not come up in the morning that will happen because the system of gravity that holds the earth in orbit around the sun became weaker and the earth flew off into space, or the sun exploded, or some other drastic change occurred in the repeated system. Inductive reasoning, within an unchanged system, never fails, but changes within an inductive system can cause it to seem to fail. If a scientist obtains a different result from an experiment that always produces the same result, he will immediately investigate to find out what changed in his system that produced the different result.

In addition, causes can be indirectly observed. Hume contended that if a person pushes a book across a table to a friend, that person never observes the cause of the motion. That person only observes his fingers in contact with the book with both in motion across the table. But one knows by experience that a book lying on a table will always remain that way until its system changes. In other words, sense objects have inertia. When one applies one's fingers to push the book, one feels the pressure of the weight of the book against one's fingers. In this way, one establishes a system where one experiences the weight of the book by a needed pressure on one's fingers which has to be the same as the force needed to move the book across the table. One can therefore establish a valid logical system that pressure means force which, in turn, causes the movement of a book with the use of the fingers. One can also logically assume that force can cause motion in any sense object even though one never directly observes the force or the cause itself.

If both force and cause are true and real elements of reality, then how did they become real? The skeptics argue that one can never know that they are real because one cause needs to be proven to be real by another cause and still another toward infinity, and this infinite test happens to be impossible for humans to do. But all sense objects and thought objects could have already been proven to be true and real by an infinite test applied by an Infinite Consciousness. But admittedly, that infinite test of reality would require faith and not direct knowledge.