Consensus is a kind of testing for truth, but truth itself. Hopefully, people will believe true things in aggregate, but sometimes your peers will agree on an untruth.
A philosopher would say that there is no truth, or at least we can’t be sure we know it. After all, what is “truth” when everything you perceive might not even exist?
An educator would say there are some things we can know for ourselves, like what “too hot” feels like or what “tasty food” is, some things we have to rely on experts for, like “how far away stars are” or “what the earth is made of”, and some things that aren’t objective at all and so can’t be known, like “who deserves this” or “what is immoral”. These are all kinds of truth.
Consensus is a kind of testing for truth, but truth itself. Hopefully, people will believe true things in aggregate, but sometimes your peers will agree on an untruth.
A philosopher would say that there is no truth, or at least we can’t be sure we know it. After all, what is “truth” when everything you perceive might not even exist?
An educator would say there are some things we can know for ourselves, like what “too hot” feels like or what “tasty food” is, some things we have to rely on experts for, like “how far away stars are” or “what the earth is made of”, and some things that aren’t objective at all and so can’t be known, like “who deserves this” or “what is immoral”. These are all kinds of truth.
I hear moral rightness and reasonable rightness knocking against each other here.
It might be as simple as “it works for them so maybe it would work for me too”.
And there’s also “around here we say thus and thus. You are from around here, aren’t you?”
There has to be a more casual way of working with this stuff. As casual as monkeys poking anthills with sticks. We are clearly too invested.