#philosophy
Truth and Belief
“Truth is a property of beliefs, and beliefs are psychical events. The truth that we can attain to is merely human truth, fallible and changeable like everything human. What lies outside the cycle of human occurrences is not truth, but fact (of certain kinds).
Beliefs are vague and complex, pointing not to one precise fact, but to several vague regions of fact. Beliefs, therefore, unlike the schematic propositions of logic, are not sharply opposed as true or false, but are a blur of truth and falsehood; they are of varying shades of grey, never white or black.
People who speak with reverence of the ‘Truth’ would do better to speak about Fact, and to realise that the reverend qualities to which they pay homage are not to be found in human beliefs.
There are practical as well as theoretical advantages in this, since people persecute each other because they believe that they know the ‘Truth’.
Speaking psycho-analytically, it may be laid down that any ‘great ideal’ which people mention with awe is really an excuse for inflicting pain on their enemies.“
– Bertrand Russell, Sceptical Essays (1928).
