Can literature “tell the truth” better than other Arts or Areas of Knowledge? Essay Essay

Even as tikeren, plenty ar on a n eer-ending quest for the faithfulness. Anyone who has witnessed a toddler incessantly ask his bewilder Why? commode attest to that. Writers, inventionists, and scientists all in all ache methods of finding fairness and express it to new(prenominal)(a)s. While the standards for what justness can be vary amongst Areas of Knowledge, no Area of Knowledge is significantly more(prenominal) capable of presentment the truth than another. Since each atomic number 18a is strictly a human enterprise, they all face difficulties created by human spirit, which makes them all equally capable (or incapable) of state the truth.Before the effectiveness of incompatible Areas of Knowledge in conveying truth can be evaluated, however, it is necessary to define truth, or rather, to clarify its nature. Typically, wad rely on their senses, observations, and information taken from sources they believe to be esteemed to learn of the truth. History has shown repeatedly, though, that common sense, referenceity, and consensus gentium argon not always the considerably-nigh reliable methods of obtaining truth.For instance, from the 2nd century until the l6th century, people believed in the Ptolemaic schema with the body politic as the center of the universe and all of the planets and stars revolving around it. The root condition also corresponded well with peoples personal observations of the Earth as stable and the stars and planets as moving and was nonetheless supported by the Catholic Church. Today, however, we sock (or at least, we conceive of we know), that the Ptolemaic system is incorrect and that the Earth and other planets in our solar system revolve around the sun.What people judgement to be true back then be casing of obvious reasons dour out to be false after all. Can there ever be an absolute truth then? And if there is, is there whatever way for man to know it and to be certain that he knows? For the predi ctable future, or for possibly all eternity, I believe that absolute truth, if it exists, is beyond our grasp. After all, humans open too many limitations, such as senses that can be deceived. There is no way for humans to know with absolute certainty that what they believe is true, stock-still if it is true.Therealways exists the adventure that what we believe to be the truth is not actually the truth. Furthermore, beliefs, experience, and other factors cause divergent people to have different truths. A psychotic thinks his delusions are true, and sane people tend to believe otherwise. Outside the dry land of school of thought, however, this concept of a lack of an absolute truth becomes impractical and cumber some. As C.S. Peirce said, Let us not pretend to doubt in philosophy what we do not doubt in our hearts. Thus, when addressing the ability of literary productions, other Arts, and other Areas of Knowledge in conveying truth, truth moldiness be thought of in a differen t, pragmatic way.The standards plume for truth can change, though, crosswise Areas of Knowledge. In lit (in reference to novels, poetry, and other writings aside from scientific and historical nonfiction lit), the seed tries to convey his own truth. That is, the message or the truth of the flirt is tied inexorably to what the author believes to be the truth, and frankincense is subject to all the factors that have bowd the author. Many great works of literature illustrate this idea, such as Master Haroldand the Boys.If Athol Fugard had had a different vivification where he had not acted wrongly towards his childhood friend and felt discredited for the racist act afterwards, his masterpiece would have had a decidedly different view on the truth of racism. The similar idea holds true for authors in spite of appearance the magic realism genre of literature, such as Gabriel Garcia Mrquez and Isabel Allende. In their subtlety, events such as people levitating in the air are con sidered dead natural. What others outside of their culture think of as figments of their imaginations, they think of as earthly concern and as the truth. As such, truth in literature varies from one author to another.Truth also varies in this way in other Arts. An artist, analogous a releaser, tries to convey his insights about the world. No matter how he does it, it is he who decides what the truth of his work is. As a result, other arts are like literature in that everything usurping the artist affects the truth of the work. The incertitude then is whether literature or other arts are best(p) at conveying what the creator believes to be true. Both face the comparable problem here in that they are open for interpretation by the audience. Thus, the viewer or listeners background, beliefs, and other variables play into how well the artists truth can be told.Two different people can allege the same novel or have a bun in the oven at the same painting and uncover different tr uths. Forinstance, the book The expectant Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald ends with the line, So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past. An optimistic proofreader may gather from this line and the rest of the novel that Fitzgerald is emphasizing the truth that perseverance in the face of difficulties may be difficult just now is necessary, while a more pessimistic reader may think Fitzgerald is revealing that some of humanities efforts are just futile and worthless. close to may even say that other arts face even more difficult problems in this respect because the artist does not write down his/her message, but moldiness instead convey it indirectly by invoking feelings.This problem with other arts, however, is actually dependent upon the audience. For instance, a concerto is much more likely to be able to tell the truth to a child with a limited vocabulary than a Charles Dickens novel is. It may be countered, though, that other arts have an advantage over literature in that they need not be reded for various cultures. It is difficult to translate and capture the essence of a literary masterpiece (especially with poetry) because records have connotations that may not translate into other languages. In some cases, the interchange does not even exist in another language. For instance, the Lusitanian word saudade has no equivalent in English because no English word carries the same amount of emotion. Other Arts, however, actually do face this same intercultural challenge because symbols or sounds vary in meaning from one culture to another. The color red symbolizes good luck to the Chinese and permeates their artwork.In some parts of Africa, however, red is strictly a religious symbol that cannot even be worn on clothing. As such, a piece of art that uses the color red heavily and whose message is not clearly diaphanous may be interpreted in different ways. Therefore, both literature and other Arts face the same probl ems when it comes to the audience and their interpretations. That is not to say, however, that uncomplete literature nor other Arts have a great influence on the masses often times, it is exactly the opposite. It is highly unlikely, though, that literature and other arts are always able to successfully tell the truth, or in this case, what the writer or artist believes is the truth, to everyone. The natural skills, however, differ from literature and other arts when it comes to the truth.The truth in science cannot be taken as the scientists individual truth, as it can be with the author or poet or artist, but must rather fit setstandards. The scientists biases and prejudices must be taken into account and other scientists have to critically evaluate the evidence before any research can be considered to be true. Science faces a problem with truth, however, when it comes to interpreting info. Scientists are able to legitimately ignore some variables in their studies, such as wheth er or not the participants in a memorize of how effective a new treatment for cancer is have blue or embrown eyes. Other variables are simply beyond their control though, and may affect the outcome of the study, like the diets of the aforementioned participants.These variables affect not only the research, but also whether or not people believe the results. slightly may see the inability to control the patients diets as a reason to vitiate some conclusions. Furthermore, different people can interpret the same data and come to two conflicting conclusions. There are people who experience at the same environmental data as others and still hypothesis there is no such thing as global warming. Since science is unable to successfully tell everyone the same truth, just like the Arts, it must thus progress in the direction believed to be the most truthful. Some people may argue, however, that the Arts are still better at revealing the truth than the sciences because people must have sp ecific scientific knowledge to obtain truth in the sciences.The Arts, however, also require work and knowledge on the audiences part. The audience must read between the lines and make inferences, since the writer or artist rarely explicitly states what the truth is. While literature, other Arts, and the sciences have different standards for what can be considered to be the truth, none is more effective than the other at telling the truth. Each must face problems inherent in human nature in conveying their messages and none of these problems can easily be addressed.Nevertheless, none of these Areas of Knowledge should be discarded as methods for communicating truth. Instead, people must individually and collectively evaluate every work or study on its own merits to attain a better grasp of the truth. BibliographyFarrell, Patrick. (2004). Portuguese Saudade and Other Emotions of Absence and Longing. Semantic Primes and Universal Grammar. Empirical Findings from the Romance Languages, ed. by Bert Peeters, Amsterdam and Philadelphia. Fitzgerald, F.S. (1925). The Great Gatsby. New York, NY Simon and Schuster.Magee, B. (1998). The Story of Philosophy. New York, NY Dorling Kindersley Publishing, Inc. Peirce, C.S. (1868). Some Consequences of quartet Incapacities. Journal of Speculative Philosophy, 2, 140-157.