Someone coined the word or concept post-truth recently. If this is remotely accurate, we are indeed living in interesting times. But for a second sit still and think about that. Still very recently people thought cigarettes were good for you, that we can with surgery rectify depression or mental illness etc. It seems unreal, but "to google" something is a very recent phenomenon. To have instant knowledge at the tip of your fingers is something new. So to say that we are living in an era that is not concerned with the truth is not accurate. We are, in my opinion, in a post-belief era. We no longer hold any beliefs close to us, because in a sense we can just "google" something. Is this type of food good or bad for you? Google it. This is part of our need for immediacy. We want knowledge now and immediately. We have a lot of options to go through, we can read summaries of journal papers. We can read blogs, we can watch youtube videos. This is where our first problem arises.

First Problem

Everyone has an opinion on something. If not, you are not alive. You have the opinion that cheese tastes good or bad for you. We live in interesting times where these opinions of people are made vocal on social media platforms. It is even more interesting that people actually believe these opinions of people, or that they listen to it. A youtube video can thus influence countless people's opinions over something. Opinion can never be regarded as a truth. An opinion can be true, but truth can never be regarded as opinion. If you think it is only an opinion that for example, water is H2O, then life will become very interesting, to say the least. This is in a sense what this post is about. We are so far away from a post-truth era as the sun is from the moon or something in that line. The first problem then: Some people's opinions are regarded as truths. This is why people talk about the post-truth era in a sense. But once again this is wrong. We are not in an era where truth is disregarded. The truth is still something we value. If we did not value truth, society will fall apart. This where the second problem comes in.

Second Problem

Social cohesion, as I understand it, is how societies function: everyone signs an invisible contract to not, for example, kill each other and disrupt daily lives of people. You can climb in your car, drive to the shop, buy some bread, come home and cook dinner. This is all done (in a sense) without any fear of being stopped by a rebel group with machine guns asking you for your car and your money. If you had to fight small wars every day to get to the shop to buy bread, society would crumble. The shop will close down, the roads will break apart and people will randomly kill each other. There is enough evidence that this is possible: the news is full of countries of war. What is the relation between social cohesion and truth? It is simple: we need to have a common truth that binds us as societies. This, in a sense, is the economy. What does this have to do with truth? The simple fact that we cannot believe something that is not true. If we believe that water is not H2O, we can drink something that is poisonous etc. We thus need truth, or we need the search for truth, otherwise, societies won't survive and evolve. If no one ever discovered anti-biotics, we would not have had google today etc. This is the third problem.

Third Problem

Doubting or questioning beliefs are some of the first steps of philosophy. But this leads to a problem: doubting everything will lead you into a corner where you may get stuck. Questioning things that are true, like water being H2O, is not advancing towards truth, but going backwards. If you start to question the basic foundations upon which society is built, you will start to break down some of the pillars that hold you up. This is happening around the world currently. The fight against freedom of speech is one that stifles (and stifled) so many unique ideas that lead to great findings. Art is also one aspect of life that cannot function under a restriction of freedom of speech. We cannot thus in a sense tug away at the foundations of our society.

Looking Reality in the Face

If you, the reader, will give me the benefit of the doubt that we are not living in a post-truth era like it is claimed, I will now try and give my argument. A couple of days ago, I drank too much whisky while sitting on a deck and looking out over the mountain where I live. It got me thinking. This is so beautiful, but it is all so contingent. Horrifically contingent. This scared me. Everything can change in a second. Some foreign object from space can destroy everything we hold dear, killing everything. Even worse, if most things are killed but some are spared and you need to live in this desolate world. How would you cope? And if everything you held dear is gone, will there be a remote will to keep on living? Or some rebel group can capture your city or country, throwing everything out of order, disrupting life as you knew it. With these thoughts, what is the use of questioning certain things? Is it not better to have blind faith in some things? Having blind faith in the truth that water is H2O, having blind faith that "x" is "x"? But this attitude is also problematic. People accepted slavery as a given. We accept the capitalistic system as a given. Now this is where I am. I am stuck at this desolate place of my own making: It is the same as questioning everything. Without questioning everything you are left paralyzed. Questioning everything leaves you paralyzed. Fellow steemians, if you did the trouble to read this, what is your opinion?