Truth & Meaning Through Words

In writing this essay today, I began by thinking about the importance of written communication and how what we expect affects the meaning of what is being communicated. When was the last time that you considered the issues associated with decisions associated with the use of words instead of simply their meaning? I am not talking about rules of grammar. I am not discussing the qualities of good or evil that arise from using words. I am talking about the means to achieve accuracy of the conveyance of meaning. I am talking about considering the best way of communicating so that the best decision can be made within the minimal amount of time. Ultimately I am not talking about persuasion but judgment.

That might surprise you but if it doesn’t then it probably should. Mankind now exists within a universe of persuasion. We have chosen to encapsulate ourselves within it. We swim in it and most of our words are chosen to achieve it. Whether we think it desirable or not, we are constantly attempting to use words to gain power over others. Words are hurtful slights, and words are soothing rewards. Words are also temporal. A single word at the right moment can change the way that associates interact. They are for society the social weapons of choice.

Everyone intuitively understands that words carry meaning. However, fewer people actually intuitively understand that words also exist to limit potential meaning. If words did not then we would have only one word within our linguistic arsenal to express everything. When we use words, we are making choices. Many of the choices that we make in selecting words that we want to use have very little to do with the nature of truth because there are many ways to describe the truth. The words that we choose to use limit the potential meaning of truth. If we were to have a single word that expressed everything potentially meaningful, it would represent perfect truth. It would also represent perfect fiction. This is why a single word that represents everything is useless.

As we use words to exclude fiction, we ultimately must exclude truth because unrelated truth is not appropriate or pertinent. The truth is most often simpler. The truth is most often more available. The truth is necessary for believability, competence, confidence, and rationality. Perhaps more importantly, inappropriate and impertinent truths cloud the totality of the truth as it changes the potential value of words. However, in actuality, our limitation of meaning through words involves the purification of values, which we wish to communicate even at the expense of truth. Absolute truths of the specific must sometimes be laid aside by our language in order to transfer value. Writers of words begin to think in terms of the larger truth within their work and readers of fiction understand that maintaining absolute explicit truth within the details can limit their ability to express the larger truth of their story. The limitation of meaning is therefore the purification of purposeful value through which truth may be of intermediate use.

By limiting meaning below a justifiable threshold, we are always able to express an untruth. The falsity of communication exists by what we say and do not say. We create falsity when we choose to use incorrect words. We also create falsity when we choose to leave out relevant concepts.

“Saddam is a nice fellow” may be true in a narrow context. Narrow truths can also be chosen to vilify saintly. Saddam my very well be considered a nice fellow from his family and friend’s perspective. From the perspective of most of the world, this is probably not so. If we had incorrectly chosen “Saddam” when we should have said “Osama Ben Ladin” then we have created a falsity of a different kind, even though the explicit statement may also be true. If we left out the words “until he gets angry and starts executing people,” then we obviously would not have expressed the entire truth with respect to the individual. The fact that Saddam may be a nice fellow some of the time does not mean that Saddam is a nice fellow all of the time or even most of the time. Within the particular moment chosen for our example sentence, Saddam may not be nice to anyone else, and in fact may never be nice again. The writer is asking the reader to believe something that is not possible to be known or universally acceptable.

The truth is not one single thing. Multiple truths exist with simultaneity. Writers write for the future reader, not the present. For the writer, writing is an expectant result unless the writer is writing for himself first and even then, because writing is a serial process, it remains for the future self to accept or reject the truthfulness of the results. The self that will be in a few seconds may very well not be the self that exists at the moment that I as a writer dot this sentence.

The point is that we cannot express the entirety of truth all at once, even those concerning extreme or simplified subjects. Attempts at reaching to achieve exceptions result in subjective conjecture, but that is exactly what we typically choose to do. We writers might expect our readers to understand this, but dependence on the reader is also a subjective issue for the writer. As authors, as we choose to use words, we are creating momentary expectations of values, which depend on both preexisting, implied existing and expected values of our readers. We are operating simultaneously in the past present and future regardless of the tense of our words. It is this dependency which always exists. I may only say this truthfully knowing that the word “always” implies a momentary dependent philosophy rather than a eternal singular perspective.

Truth must exist on a projected base “system of values” and truth is therefore actually resting on a fluid system of truths. Truth is ultimately a multiple of relative contextual values that come and go. If there is truth then truth is therefore not some fixed stone or a pillar that is supportive of the concept of perpetuity. Instead, truth is representative of time. What is truthful in one contextual situation may not be as truthful within another because it may not maintain the same value. The expectation of truth may be a part of the value of the message being sent through communication but cannot be isolated from the context of content. Reductionist ideas that truth is independent of our universe are foolish because such an independent truth is by definition an independent universe. Within this universe, the single attribute all things have in common is change. Therefore, any attempt at communicating truth and that appears to maintain unchangeable rigidity can be found to be a partial truth. Context is the ultimate definition of value, so when new unexpected truth is obtained, it must be of more or less value than the expected truth. The words that we use therefore interplay within the system of truth that we choose to expect. It takes less effort to compose a change in belief using words that play upon a system of truths and therefore that are expected to be true than a system of truths that are unexpected and not known to be true. Both truth and untruth are used to manipulate expectations of truth.

Understanding all of this makes obvious a mistake that our leaders may make within both industry and Government. That mistake is not absolutely necessity for truth but rather the support by which the ideal of truth is reached by being passed through a single synchronized hexarchy of authority. The communication of the truth is therefore always a form of consensus building. It is one thing to ask for words that would express truth and entirely another to delegate truth to words being expressed. Words are carriers of information and therefore they are a physical phenomena but truth is a juxtaposition of ideals.

Without the presence of potential countervailing ideals, contending as alternative contrasting values, there can be no contradiction to untruth and therefore no justifiable supposition of truth. Intentions of truthfulness are only one facet for the existence of truth. It is possible to be unintentionally truthful just as it is possible to be unintentionally untruthful. The reality of truth therefore does not simply exist within a fact of truthful existence, but because of understanding of the system of values through which words relate.

If truth is a necessary part of deliberate scholarly consideration to achieve desirable results, then irrational forms of randomness must be considered as operational errors, even when they are successfully used to achieve objectives. The desirability of truth therefore lies beyond the concept of obtaining immediate objectives because it offers the potential of the twin ideals of understanding and predictability. These concepts mean that understandable and predictable solutions based on an assumption of truth are as a rule generally more reliable. One might therefore rightfully jump to the conclusion that this is the whole point of framing truthful words, and then wrongfully attempt to directly achieve consistent truth through the conformity of intent.

What does this thinking lend us? For one thing, it demonstrates the futility of attempting to overcome the barrier of complexity through the simplification of an assumed communicated truth. Doubt changes the assumption of truth. Therefore, to represent a constant and consistent understanding of truthful communication between two people requires an equally complex representation of simultaneous communication because infinite states of doubt exist simultaneously.

For another, with respect to technology, it implies the necessary strategy for the optimum utilization of control systems. The idea that it is better to concentrate authority in such a way that a single individual rules consistently must be balanced against the idea that conformity degrades the potential for understanding and the ability to act appropriately in the face of complex systems of truths.

For another, it also helps us to better understand the implications of the ways that we choose to delegate the arrangement and delivery of truths. For instance, the single perspective of “Executive” briefings may be thought to save the executive’s time, but for the organization for which the executive is supposed to serve, they do not result in improved rational results from decisions made from them.

Eventually executive briefings turn into formulas so that the more they are used, the further the distance the executive gets from truthfully understanding the meaning of the context with respect to the situation and therefore the reasons for decisions which might comprise the solutions to the problems. Simplicity of complex systems lead to understatements. The untruthfulness lies in the brevity of the reasoning as much as in the ignorance of the decisions. The failure of most executive briefings is not in the brevity but the ultimate dependency of leaders to allow others to introduce unchecked and unaccountable ideals within the decision making process. The fact is that people should not hold others accountable for their own decisions because in doing so they are guilty of delegating responsibility without authority. Executive briefings should not be about saving time, but about using time for delivering decision making content from more sources more effectively.

This essay has been about the importance of the integration of truth within the ways that we use words to narrow ideas and the value of the necessary path to obtain the obtain truth for making decisions. Through this paper, we have considered the underlying reasons why reaching rational conclusions cannot be delegated without risking peril of losing sight of truth. We have discussed the necessity of maintaining contradictory arguments from which one may intelligently argue the validity of truth.

The “truth” of this essay is that as in all essays, the words that have been used were constructed to narrow the path through which the mind of the reader will travel during the moments they have been acquiring a message. The truth is that I have not been completely truthful, or completely accurate, as I have created this path and I have explained why this is so. I did expect that you the reader would have certain assumptions when you read this passage. Your assumption will have brought you to this paper and it will inevitably cause you to react. I would not attempt to contemplate that I will know with total certainty what those assumptions are, nor how well you are able to use your reactions. It is my hope that you are able to gain something useful from this writing and then be able to use these ideas to successfully discriminate those factors that prevent your communication from being more effective in conveying of meaning. All skills in communicating aside, truth is always a factor in successful communication and the basis of truth is always established by intent. And this is the ultimate point from which truth originates and to which we must be able to assign our faith that truth exists. For without intent, "One can easily misinterpret the universal by misunderstanding the particular."

In the final judgment as mentioned at the beginning of this essay, the idea that best represents the use of words is the concept of art, and as Normal Rockwell is quoted as saying, "Art is a lie that helps us perceive the truth.[1]"

On the Relationship of Truth and Meaning

Through Words That Communicate