It is the truth, not the Truth, that will set you free.

Yes, we have no bananas.

March 19, 2015

But St. Patrick’s Eve continued

“Gone!” Sundstrøm is saying. “What was I talking about?” (If you don’t know, or remember, see here.) The question is surely rhetorical, but I have an answer nonetheless.

     “You were talking about what is true and what is not true, right? You’re claiming, aren’t you? that what we can see – touch, taste, and smell – is real. What we hear, on the other hand, may not be.  Our mugs of coffee are real and the table under them.  But your words are air; they blow away as soon as I turn my head.”

     “I should be more careful what I say maybe. You were listening, even if I was not.” He looked at me faux-forlornly then smiled out the window.

Both of us, Axel and I, make our livings with words. He talks them out; I write them down. And we both assume – I think – that we can arrange them in a way they can at least describe what is real. But the description is accurate – it is true, Axel is saying – only as long as the words remain tables, chairs, coffee in sturdy off-white mugs. If we want to tell the truth, we can’t detach our words from what we know by sight, touch, taste, and smell, from what we know in our own experience.  Here’s George Santayana:

“A conception not reducible to the small change of daily experience is like a currency 
not exchangeable for articles of consumption; it is not a symbol but a fraud.”

Put your money where your mouth is. Don’t show me a spreadsheet or a pie chart or tell me how I can pay my bills electronically. Put your nickels, dimes, and quarters on the table, where we can both see them.  Here are mine; we can count up what we have between us.

     Many of us want to locate our ideas - and especially ideals - out of time.  The truth is that the Truth is timeless – so we want to think, so we want to say.  But, we live in time, and Truth is notoriously difficult, if not impossible, to import.  It’s like bananas.  You can buy a bunch in the store, perfect for eating, but by the time you get to the parking lot, there is not one you would put in your mouth.