Posted by
Doc Stephens on Wednesday, February 18, 2009 10:15:12 AM
What do journalism, science, and theology all have in common? Among other things, the practitioners of these enterprises claim to be searching for truth--whatever that might be. Indeed! I would argue that none of these human enterprises could ever know if their search was complete--that the whole truth had been discovered, uncovered, described, or explored.
Truth is sometimes misleading. Lies are sometimes quite precise. If I were to tell you that I'm ten feet tall, that would be the truth, but if I said I was exactly 72.0439122358902134718 inches that would be a very precise lie that was closer to the truth than the truth itself. Wait a minute! Why is saying that I'm ten feet tall a true statement? Because the level of precision of the statement is so low, rounded to a precision of one significant digit, my height could be truthfully stated as 1 X 101 ft, or ten feet tall. A more accurate statement would be that my height is between 72 and 73 inches and it varies with the time of day, my posture, and what I'm doing at the moment--and that's a little more precise, but not yet the whole truth.
So, a journalist writes a story and makes a concerted effort to get the facts straight. Does that ensure that the story is truthful? No! Depending upon how the facts are used in the story, and also on what facts might be left out of the story, the article might be perceived as truthful, but actually quite misleading; it might be dishonest if the intent was to mislead even though the facts are accurately stated; and finally, it might be both very dishonest and very imprecise. Obviously, there is more to this story than we first imagined.
There is no end to the scientific pursuit of truth. No matter how much we know, we can learn more. Whenever scientists claim they understand something, they eventually discover that the truth has yet to be fully uncovered.
Theologians accept that faith counters the weight of truth. When there is no human understanding, then faith rules. Scientists and journalist also practice faith, but they label it differently. For scientists, when they accept a theory they are practicing faith. When a journalist publishes a story after striving to find the truth, this is practicing faith in the general acceptance of the report by the reader as evidence of their achieving the truth.
But none of this is really the truth!