Today’s topic was briefly touched on in a post on Nic’s Thoughts Instagram Page, and the response I got from the post was crazy! Thank you for sharing your opinions, thoughts and spins on the questions I opened up.
How can we tell if someone is truthful and trustworthy? Is there such a thing? The struggle to answer this question is the need for a universal agreement, and the majority of ways suggested will take time and trust itself. There aren’t expressions, movements or certain forms of body language that will tell you 100% that a person is truthful, making it difficult to find friends who really care for you.
First, we can open up the question of whether ‘truth is true’ is true. You’ll hear your friend tell you a story but it will always be from their point of view, or the previous point of view of where they heard about the event - and so on - until you get to the original, which is still from another point of view. Life is a game of Chinese whispers, so the story might be told truthfully to the truest version of what was heard or seen but it might not be factually correct, and usually never is, as it is in fact just another point of view. Here, we might say that truth isn’t always true but the truth is all that matters for trust, whether completely correct or not.
If you don’t believe that, and truth should always be true, then it is much easier to depict a truthful and true person by facts. Facts Philosophically are statements which are indisputable, based on empirical research and quantifiable measures. Facts go beyond theories. They're proven through calculation and experience, or they're something that definitively occurred in the past. However, is this too unrealistic? Human nature is not robotic and our truth is entirely different; it may include fact, but it can also include belief.
Behind our screens are our data and daily likes, and habits, which produce together a personalised feed of posts, interactions and advertisements. It has become harder to move away from TikTok, Instagram and Twitter since these advancements. We are a community of zombies, which is not a community at all anymore. Epistemic Bubbles form of those who become entrapped by people sharing the same views and opinions on situations and events online and all over their feeds on an average day, but these do not take long to become Echo Bubbles. Echo Bubbles are described as cult-like, by Thi Nguyen, and this is too how I would view them. The groups form easier nowadays due to the online personalisation we see and the ability to be in touch with anyone around the world. Outside voices become unbearable and unworthy of listening to, so they fade to the very back, whilst the opinions supported in the bubble swiftly move to the forefront of all priorities in their belief system; only those in your bubble are those who should be listened to and accounted for.
The problems are more prominent in society now, with huge divides and less human community than there was previously. By this I mean the social interactions with those in the village, seeing them and catching up, without knowing everything already from their Facebook page, and though they may share differing opinions, these don’t bare to cause hatred or judgement. It is a natural human difference and we thrive on gaining more knowledge from those opposed to us. Having an open mind to possibilities is human, but we are becoming brainless zombies, who will destroy those who think differently.
The issue here is not only the pure loss of a sense of community around us, it is the stubbornness and loss of any factual information. We all may argue truth is not real, which I will touch on, and there are always things hidden from us, which I may not in this particular post, but at the bare minimum, we are more likely manipulated online by Fake News and many people will argue nowadays with opinions without taking any fact into account; we have lost more so the respect for fact, than the access to it. Our access to the News and various articles has been good in respect of keeping up with daily news in our busy schedules, but this has also opened up the opposite door to becoming obsessed with celebrity news and gossip, and the political anguish of all leaders in some way or another. Most of it is inaccurate or completely false. Technology is distracting us more than keeping us aware and we are losing knowledge of what is really happening vs what is not. Trust is something difficult to have nowadays, and trust determines in this era who we talk to, forming ourselves into smaller groups and becoming anti-social. If someone doesn’t like your status on Facebook, it means they hate you. Or it just means they don’t spend their entire life on their phones all day. My point here, in relation to the question, is the total dependency on our interactions rather than trust… so this topic may not even be important in upcoming years - trust is spoken through quick replies and likes on all uploads.
Back to Fact. An orange is orange. But is it? From everybody's unique pair of eyes, we could see two completely different colours and scream orange… but they’re different. Is fact a true thing or is everything we have ever known been point of view and opinions? Common sense would tell us that the colour difference is mind-baffling but not important, but to believe what we learn is fact is important to remain sane. That is a fair argument and I believe this on a daily, I don’t go around objecting to any fact or truth that is universally true across the world: 2+2=4… we should all agree on that at the very least. The question remains though when you really dive deep into your mind, how can you prove that the facts we learn, and the history we document are true by fact, and not by opinion. This is how conspiracies form, and that is not my goal here whatsoever, but dig into a sceptical view… but not so far down that you cannot get out. Basically, are we really here or are we a brain in a VAT being given a personal experience?
Anyway, that was fun but back to the main point. As much as we may tell the truth, we may be recalling incorrect data or mixed up information or may even be accidentally spreading Fake News. This does not make you untrustworthy to some philosophers, but for some, it would. In the current Post-Truth Era, we are in, we find ourselves revolved by opinions more than facts thus making trustworthiness a difficult goal. Conversations aren’t as simple as taking a statement and distinguishing whether someone is trustworthy, it takes time and there are many different ways Philosophers argue this.
How to know if the testimony is worth believing and therefore if a person is trustworthy?
We’ll begin with John Locke. In Locke’s view, we cannot know something on the basis of testimony. Knowledge requires certainty, but there is always the possibility that someone’s testimony is mistaken: perhaps the person is lying, or honestly stating her belief but is mistaken. So, although credible testimony is likely to be true, it is not guaranteed to be true, and hence we cannot be certain that it is so. If there is something believed by another, it may not be fact, but you should make your judgement on the surface of what you already know. The testimony may be worth believing, but always be sceptical. Locke’s argument leads you to be in a position of never fully trusting anything other than fact - and testimony is never enough evidence on its own.
Hume’s Reductionist view argues that we are justified in accepting pieces of Testimony because we are justified in thinking testimony is usually true on the grounds independent of testimony. This is based more on making a judgement on the person relaying the information; does a stranger, who gives you directions, lead you to believe them because you’ve noticed a pattern where people usually give correct directions or that the speaker themselves are trustworthy in that five seconds? In either of them cases, you are right to trust the testimony, the information has nothing to do with your decision. This seems difficult to follow as there is ignorance of the actual information being correct and basing your trust on people themselves, but as stated before, there is no certainty to people. I personally believe the information remains important in these cases.
Reid on the other hand is an anti-reductionist and argues that “in the matter of testimony, the balance of human judgement is by nature inclined to the side of belief; and turns to that side of itself when there is nothing put into the opposite scale”. He is claiming our natural instincts make us inclined to believe testimony always - we do not require grounds independent of testimony to be justified in accepting it. So is trust natural? This is following the common sense view; it is easier to trust and we should trust, but also follow strong instincts if not to trust.
Elizabeth Fricker bases her argument more on the listener, aka you. This is referred to as local reductionism and she argues that hearers must monitor the speaker for trustworthiness, but as I pointed out in the beginning, is there any universal way we all agree an untrustworthy person will present themselves? If there is, I’d love to know. It would save me a lot of time & effort.
Back on the anti-reductionist side, Tyler Burge defends the Acceptance Principle:
A person is entitled to accept as true something that is presented as true and
is intelligible to them, unless there are stronger reasons not to. If the information is correct, it is to trust, if there is strong doubt and reason to not trust, no matter the reason, you should follow your instincts to not trust them.
There is also The Assurance View which is more alike to the idea of promises - if you promise, or tell me something, I will trust you, but once you go against that promise, or what I trusted you with, my reasonings to reassure you with my trust no longer stands. There is a relationship formed between the speaker and listener which is different to the other theories and is very important for everyday instances. It follows the theory of how we all act pretty much now.
All-in-all, there is never any certain way to distinguish a trustworthy person from an untrustworthy person, however, there are ways in which to approach the instances of trusting, dependent on your own personal beliefs and attitudes toward trustworthiness.
Is Truth Always True? I think it is unlikely to be that way, as to be honest involves beliefs and opinions, and cannot always base itself on true facts. Not only this, but with the constant rise in technology and therefore Fake News, it is very difficult to remain factually correct on a daily basis. Be careful who your trust… if anything is even true anyway, (to all you Sceptics). The only thing you will ever truly know, that you can trust, is you.
Thank you so much for reading today’s blog. Let me know your thoughts on this topic or other topics you’d like me to dive into. Are these posts too long? Let me know. Whilst you’re here, I would love it if you would have a peek at my new shop - So Thoughtful! Vegan, highly scented Wax Melts with All-Natural Ingredients. Go & treat yourself ;)
See you in the next one! I promise not to make it such a long time again before I post next time.
Love & Thoughts,
Nic X
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