What is TRUTH??? Part 1

Part of my contemplations are about what TRUTH means and I intend to post on my own perspectives on truth. I ran an internet search on the topic and found these definitions - Pretty interesting. My own perspectives will come subsequently (hopefully!!!)

Definitions of truth on the Web:

• a fact that has been verified; "at last he knew the truth"; "the truth is that he didn't want to do it"
• conformity to reality or actuality; "they debated the truth of the proposition"; "the situation brought home to us the blunt truth of the military threat"; "he was famous for the truth of his portraits"; "he turned to religion in his search for eternal verities"
• a true statement; "he told the truth"; "he thought of answering with the truth but he knew they wouldn't believe it"
• accuracy: the quality of being near to the true value; "he was beginning to doubt the accuracy of his compass"; "the lawyer questioned the truth of my account"
• United States abolitionist and feminist who was freed from slavery and became a leading advocate of the abolition of slavery and for the rights of women (1797-1883)
  wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn
• This article is primarily concerned with truth as it is used in the evaluation of propositions, sentences, and similar items. For example, the sentence "3 is less than 4 is true" is an evaluation of the sentence "3 is less than 4".
  en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Truth
• Truth was the first full-length album by Jeff Beck and his backing group. Highlighted by covers of the Yardbirds' "Shapes of Things", Willie Dixon's "I Ain't Superstitious" and the traditional "Greensleeves", it is considered by many to be the first heavy metal album.
  en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Truth_(Jeff_Beck)
• This is a word best avoided entirely in physics except when placed in quotes, or with careful qualification. Its colloquial use has so many shades of meaning from ‘it seems to be correct’ to the absolute truths claimed by religion, that it’s use causes nothing but misunderstanding. Someone once said "Science seeks proximate (approximate) truths." Others speak of provisional or tentative truths. Certainly science claims no final or absolute truths.
  spider.ipac.caltech.edu/staff/jarrett/LiU/resource/misused_glossary.html
• knowledge of an external ideal. "Love serves truth, and truth is knowledge of an external ideal which is beyond the reach of the individual's will." [Psychoanalysis and Civilization] analog: right
  www.geocities.com/Athens/Delphi/5179/Glossary.htm
• propositions, statements, sentences, assertions and beliefs have been offered as appropriate bearers of truth or falsity. Understanding truth is filled with difficulty. ...
  www.filosofia.net/materiales/rec/glosaen.htm
• the experience resulting from relative polarity balance. A holistic experience of reality which is based on wholeness and recognition.
  www.synchronicity.org/Glossaryp.html
• Making new technology work may be easier than using it to discover truth. Roger Brent, "Functional genomics: learning to think about gene expression data" Current Biology 9: R338- R341, 1999
  www.genomicglossaries.com/content/research_genomics.asp
• The most adequate comprehension of reality that man's mind and reason make accessible to him. Man is fallible and can never become omniscient or absolutely certain that what he considers as certain truth is not error. The criterion of truth is that it works even if nobody is prepared to acknowledge it. B. 113; HA. 24,68; UF. 94.
  www.mises.org/easier/T.asp
• a Primary Principle, means conformity with fact, agreement with reality, accuracy, correctness, verity of a statement or thought, genuineness, reality, conduct following the divine standard, spirituality of life and behavior, that which is true, real, or actual in a general or abstract sense, reality, specifically in religious use, spiritual reality as the subject of revelation or object of faith. "I am the way, the truth and the life. No man comes to the Father save through me. ...
  miriams-well.org/Glossary/
• of propositional content or existential presuppositions;
  www127.pair.com/critical/gloss.htm
• "I tried very hard to write the truth but...the real truth is so often one of the most difficult things to discover, let alone to tell and impress upon others." - Vera Brittain, 1933
  www.embassy.org.nz/encycl/t5encyc.htm
• A self-evident ethical principle, which has value provided no substantial harm is done; not to be dispensed with for expediency alone.
  www.jansen.com.au/Dictionary_SU.html
• "An ingenious compound of desirability and appearance. Discovery of truth is the sole purpose of philosophy, which is the most ancient occupation of the human mind and has a fair prospect of existing with increasing activity to the end of time." [DD]
  members.aol.com/porchnus/dict04.htm
• That which is universally and at all times the determining basis for the reality of existence. Factuality, and the which exists regardless of view point or relative opinion. The essence of natural law and its principles.
  www.eoni.com/~visionquest/library/glossary.html
• [A58/B83] Kant writes: "What is truth? The nominal definition of truth, that it is the agreement of knowledge with its object, is assumed as granted; the question asked is as to what is the general and sure criterion of the truth of any and every knowledge". Kant denies that there can be any such general criterion, because "such a criterion being general cannot take account of the varying content of knowledge (relation to its specific object).... ...
  www.texttribe.com/text/kant_glossary.htm
• the dictionary defines truth as "the quality or state of being true" (cf circular definitions). Truth is an abstract Western European concept, and whether or not something or some concept has the quality of trueness is determined by people, living or dead, in positions of authority within the Western European hierarchy. ...
  www.maquah.net/We_Have_The_Right_To_Exist/WeHaveTheRight_26Glossary.html
• as used in this Study is the intersubjective agreement on the connectedness of two entities. In this sense it is anything but objective truth; it is subjective, but not totally so. Abstract truth is tokenized by the usage of an assigned 1:1 correspondence between a given string of symbols and a given state of affairs. This is the "correspondence theory" of truth.
  www.cs.vu.nl/~mmc/tbr/content_pages/repository/nel/glossary.html
• The information recorded from the simulation of the tracking of the generated particles though the detector.
  www.phys.ualberta.ca/~gingrich/research/zeus/seg/node22.html
• Conformity to a tested fact or actuality. A statement proven to be or accepted as true. (true = consistent with fact or reality). Reality, actuality. "Truth refers to a determinate object of cognition". A philosopher, Richard Rorty says of truth, on p. 8 of Anderson's book on Truth, "Truth is made rather than found". Heidegger saw truth as something we are, not something we have".(Katen, p. 214) On p. ...
  www.greeleynet.com/~cnotess/gloss.htm
• "The real state of things; fact; reality; an accepted statement or proposition." Some suggest that there is no true reality, only perceptions and opinions, while others argue that there must be some absolute basis. This being said, we can say that there are two diametrically-opposed beliefs related to absolute truth:
  www.crosscurrent.org/cc_glossary.htm
• disappears behind every substitution by signs and representations.
  www.a-studio.nl/en/writings/abc/
• The actual state of things.
  www.new-york-lawyer.ws/law-dictionary/tribute.htm
• State of being true or accurate or honest or sincere. Almost completely unheard of in politics, where it is used about as often as a pair of Imelda Marcos's shoes.
  www.razza.fsnet.co.uk/oyfordttwo.htm

Neat!!!

Nigeria and Shell (aka To MEND or not to MEND!!!)

Last week a good friend and ex-teammate, Luis, asked for my opinions on the "crisis" in Nigeria with the kidnapping of 4 workers of Shell Nigeria, who have since been realeased, by an organisation called Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND), over the operations of Shell in that area. This kidnapping caused Shell to withdraw most staff from that area and reduced the crude oil output of Nigeria by 10%.

Below is the response which I sent to my teammates on my views. I was then asked by another teamamate, Amit, to use this blog to share more of what my views and opinions are and perhaps spur debate and more education for those not familiar with this area and issue.

I know some of my numerous friends who work with Shell might stumble upon this...Well, just so u know, I have nothing against you personally, perhaps against your company...


Re: Nigeria and Shell

On the issue in Nigeria, you are really poking a stick at a bee's nest by asking me my view. For the answer to your first question which I think some of you guys already know, I personally detest Shell beacause of their operations in Nigeria and for the fact that they have used a CSR mask to cover from the view of the world their many atrocities in my country. As Rajiv, Lele and Artthur know, Shell is the one company in the world I have a vow not to work for.YES I believe they have (and still) exploited MY COUNTRY more than they can ever add to our development. Actually when I think of Shell, I curse the year 1956 when oil was discovered in Nigeria.

My country is widely known to be corrupt but personally, I think the biggest beneficiaries of our corruption is not our leaders that stash so much money in Swiss banks than they can spend in 3 lifetimes, but rather the many multi-nationals like Shell who gain profits from not being checked as a guzzle away greedily at our natural resources with absolutely no regard for the environment where they operate, the living conditions of the poeple in those areas or the general welfare of the country at large. Any attempt by them for us to be developed would be like taking the wool off our eyes and thus stemming the tremendous income they rip from us so of course, I don't think to consider them friends.

I agree the government doesn't work, but trust me, Shell and co would everyday prefer this government that doesn't work to a government that works 'cos a government that worked would throw them out head first.

Part of the big problems in Nigeria is our over-dependence of oil to run our economy without developing other sectors to run alongside. In the view of radical thinking Nigerians, forgetting that this resource exists, leaving it be in the ground and focussingon other sectors is our long term solution to growth and development. We have a population of about 150 million, which is immense human capital. We have abundant fertile land which can and should be exploited agriculturally. We have besides oil, mineable quantities of most miineable minerals -tin, gold, iron, platinum, bauxite,coal, which have all been forgotten in the quest for oil. We have potential to be another IT capital of the world which our very intelligent people who have no recourse but to channel their intellectual abilities into internet fraud.If we do not get over our overdependence on oil, we are doomed to ignoring the rest of our potential forever.

By kicking at Shell, MEND has succeeded in reducing our oil exploration capacity by 10%. They yesterday kicked at another oil company AGIP "successfully". Much as I abhorr violence, I am glad that now perhaps we'll be forced to start looking alternative income sources more closely.

Let me tell you something more about the Niger Delta or guide you to where you can find more info...Do a google search on Ken Saro-Wiwa. He was one of Nigeria's greatest writers and activist who was executed slightly more than 10 years ago after being framed for a murder in the Niger Delta with 8 others. HE was the head of a group that was seeking to resolve the condition of living of people in the Niger Delta and he had had high levels of interaction with Shell to get them to clean their shit. Instead, they went back to the government who they paid bribe to and he was set-up and killed. Because of his death, Nigeria was kicked out the Commonwealth for 4 years and the whole world had an inkling of what Shell had been doing in Nigeria.And instantly they started doing some cosmetic reporting and hired top gun PR experts to clean up their image so the world outside was lulled back to sleep but the condition of the people in the Niger Delta did not improve.

The Niger Delta has 90% of Nigeria's oil but even as a Nigerian who travelled wide in the country a la AIESEC, I can say that they live in the least developed part of the country. Part of the blame for this goes to the government, but it also goes to the oil companies who make a loot there without caring that the people live in conditions that they wouldn't allow in the countries they come from.

MEND's action should once again let the world know the problem in the Niger Delta is extremely far from over. Yes, they will be branded terrorists and insurgents and rebels, which is not at a good time considering Iraq and Afghanistan but then, weren't Nelson Mandela, ANC, George Washington etc all once branded terrorists, insurgents and rebels. Aren't they all revered today? MEND consider themseves freedom fighters and I buy into their cause. I believe the hostage taking is perhaps the only way they can get their case back on the world map and that's fine. The Shell staff taking hostage make more money daily than some of their captors would make in their life time. They took the risk to come out there and maybe they should sweat it out a bit...

I know it sounds harsh but that just my feeling and take on the issue.I am a sympathiser with their cause but would rather not be judged by that...

I'll be interested in hearing comments on this and I hope it motivates you to find out more so you can form an opinion.