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How do you know what is true?

How do you know what is true? Watch a collection of humanists answer the question.
9.6
Gosh, making decisions about what’s true and what’s not in the world is a mighty difficult thing to do. Deciding truth is a matter for our capacity for reason. It’s all about trying to be as informed as possible about reading as much as possible about understanding and taking on different people’s viewpoints and being flexible with your own. I think you try to find out the facts and you also try to triangulate so say well this source says this, this source says this, what are the, let’s look at the details of how they’re finding these things out, which seems the more credible? My decisions about what’s true and what is not is based on evidence and reason and science.
53.8
we can’t look at all the scientific data or whatever it is, but it’s worth thinking about why it is someone’s making that claim, whether they have something to gain from it, what are their credentials for making it, what processes have they gone through. There’s no good, I think, can come from simply accepting somebody’s word for something. For me, as a Humanist, it’s everything is up for questioning, doesn’t matter what it is, I can always have a discussion with you about it. So I don’t have a clear answer really about how I make those decisions but I sort of think that’s alright.
82.2
I think the world would probably be a better place if more people acknowledged that they don’t have a clear answer either.

Take a look at the video of different humanists answering the question, ‘How do you know what is true?’

Look out for similarities and differences between the humanist responses and consider where you agree and where you disagree.

Question: How can we know what is true?

This article is from the free online

Introducing Humanism: Non-religious Approaches to Life, with Sandi Toksvig

Created by
FutureLearn - Learning For Life

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