{"id":5856,"date":"2015-02-06T06:00:52","date_gmt":"2015-02-06T06:00:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.cvm.org.uk\/blog\/?p=5856"},"modified":"2015-02-06T09:50:14","modified_gmt":"2015-02-06T09:50:14","slug":"theres-no-such-thing-as-truth","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cvm.org.uk\/blog\/demolition-squad\/theres-no-such-thing-as-truth\/","title":{"rendered":"There’s No Such Thing As Truth #25objections"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"There's<\/p>\n

This seems like a good place to start a book that answers the tough questions posed of Christianity. After all, if there is no such thing as truth then Christianity cannot possibly be true in the way that Christians hope it is, and so there\u2019s no point writing a book that tries to support and outline the truth of Christianity, is there?<\/p>\n

So, is there no such thing as truth? Or, to put it another way, is the statement, \u2018There\u2019s no such thing as truth\u2019 actually\u2026true?<\/p>\n

We live in a very post-modern world. A world where radical scepticism is king. The most pure definition of post-modernism is simply: not modernism. However, when we talk about things being \u2018post-modern\u2019, we often mean that they reject the idea of absolutes \u2013 absolute truth, for example.<\/p>\n

And it would be lovely to think that truth is whatever we decide it to be. Indeed, you will hear people say, \u2018This is my truth; what\u2019s yours?\u2019 But what if my truth is that your truth can\u2019t possibly be true? What happens then? If my truth is true, then my statement that your truth can\u2019t possibly be true is also true, and so your truth can\u2019t possibly be true. Alternatively, if my truth isn\u2019t true, then it\u2019s not truth at all.<\/p>\n

Somebody once said, \u2018If someone tells you there\u2019s no such thing as truth, they\u2019re asking you not to believe them, so don\u2019t.\u2019<\/b>\u00a0And here\u2019s the problem with the statement, \u2018There\u2019s no such thing as truth\u2019: it\u2019s a self-refuting statement. If the statement is true, then it proves itself false. And if the statement itself is false, then it\u2019s still false.<\/p>\n

It would seem that using the idea that there is no absolute truth is just a way of making ourselves feel like the kings of our own lives. But nobody really lives as though truth is so easy to manipulate \u2013 it\u2019s all around us. If I told you, in my native English tongue, that \u2018I only speak Russian and Turkish\u2019, then there isn\u2019t really any way of that being true. It\u2019s obviously untrue from the moment I start telling you in English.<\/p>\n

Every adult who has ever died was born. A giraffe has never played Premiership football. There are no married bachelors.<\/p>\n

Lots of things are objectively, absolutely true. And we all know it. Nobody is post-modernist when they are reading the warning label on a bottle of poison.<\/p>\n

We live in the world of scepticism. We don\u2019t like to commit to truth claims, because it makes us feel controlled. We want to be free, to be critical thinkers. But to be truly sceptical, you have to be sceptical about your own scepticism. How do we know that scepticism is the best way to view the world? If we\u2019re prepared to accept that we need to be sceptical about our own scepticism, and that the idea of truth is a true on \u2013 that there are things out there that can be said to be true \u2013 then we can ask the next logical question: what, exactly,\u00a0is<\/i>\u00a0true?<\/p>\n

\n

This is the first of a series of excerpts from the forthcoming book from the Demolition Squad, tackling #25objections to the Christian faith.<\/em><\/p>\n

<\/div>