Absolute Truth and the Relativity of Truth

Paper Summary:

This paper investigates the intelligibility of the philosophical understanding of truth as appearance and reality. After reviewing the nature of the philosophical picture of what constitutes truth, there is an extended discussion of an often-cited example of truth's relativity in the movie, "Rashomon". There is then a discussion of some other examples, which attempt to clarify the philosophical picture, only to conclude that the philosophical posing of truth and appearance is actually not yet understandable.

From the Paper:

"In Theaetetus Socrates quotes Protagoras with what is possibly the first clear statement of the relativist: that "man is the measure of all things" and that anything "is to me such as it appears to me, and is to you such as it appears to you?" (856, 152a) On the other hand, there is Plato's well-known allegory of the cave in the Seventh Book of the Republic, (747- 750, 514a-518b) in which he advances the notion that there is an ultimate truth that lies beyond our interpretations or appearances of that truth. But how understandable are both the notions of relativism and of an absolute truth?"

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