You may need to use creativity to find the 'truth'. All scientific experimentation does this. There is a need to design experiments to check out a hypothesis. This experimental design may involve a lot of creativity for the outcome to be clear and unmistakable. Good scientists are good at experimental design. A great deal of creativity is involved in formulating hypotheses. He told me: 'My scientists have been trained to believe that science is the analysis of data - and that does not get you anywhere'.
A classic example of the power of hypothesis is to be found in the treatment of peptic ulcer - a common medical complaint. The standard treatment was the removal of part or all of the stomach. Other patients might be on antacids for twenty years or more. Then a young doctor in Perth, Australia, had a hypothesis. Maybe peptic ulcer was an infection. No-one wanted to listen. Years later he was proved to be right and today the treatment is one week on antibiotics!
We are trained to believe that there is only one truth. What is the point of truth if there is more than one? So much of our thinking, talking and arguing is directed to finding this one truth. Furthermore, if you have the truth then anyone with a different version must be wrong. That attitude has been the origin of so many wars, persecutions, hatreds, etc. over the past centuries.
Yet in perception there may be many truths, all of which are correct. It is very easy to make a physical object which is circular when looked at from one angle but square when looked at from another angle. Which 'truth' is right?
ONE TRUTH? Many religions would argue that there are many ways of believing in a central truth and many ways of 'getting to heaven' (or its equivalent). CREATIVITY IN PERCEPTION If different perceptions are equally possible and equally true then how are we to distinguish between them and choose one to use? This is exactly where value comes in. If you choose to eat lobster thermidor once a month, this could be perceived as an unnecessary extravagance. It could also be perceived as a special 'treat' that raises your spirit and enables you to work harder. Both perceptions could be correct. There are also two values involved. It then becomes a matter of balancing the two values. Is it such an extravagance? Is there any other way of raising your spirits? To drive into central London you have to pay a daily 'congestion charge'. Is this a way of reducing traffic? Is this a way of raising revenue? Is this a way of encouraging people to use public transport? All perceptions could be right - in part.
If, indeed, the purpose was to reduce traffic then there are far more effective ways of reducing traffic which might not raise any revenue at all. If the purpose was to raise revenue then there are better ways of raising revenue which might not reduce traffic - for example, ample and expensive car parks. If the purpose was simply to encourage use of public transport, a periodic issue of free tickets might be far more effective. So it all depends on how you look at it. What is the real purpose? Maybe there are several mixed purposes. In times of recession the 'proper' thing to do is to lower interest rates. This encourages businesses to borrow and to invest. That is the classic, traditional perception. But it now seems that if you lower interest rates people invest more in property. As a result they spend more of their disposable income on mortgage payments and have even less to spend on consumer goods. So the recession can be made worse. TRUTH AND ACTION Law courts take action on the basis of a belief in 'truth'. This action can be quite severe even to the extent of the death penalty. There have been several cases where it turns out that the judgment has been in error. Even if the judgment was the 'best possible' at the time, advances in technology (such as DNA) may show the judgment to be false at a later date. That is the reason many countries have dropped the death penalty. We have the great convenience of the compass directions. You can set out to drive north and keep heading in that direction. Very few people who drive 'north' actually want to reach the North Pole! North is a useful reference point for action. In exactly the same way 'truth' is a reference direction. We seek to head in that direction. At times we need to accept that there may be multiple truths - as in perception or value differences. One of the functions of creativity is to create such possible alternative truths. We seek to create alternative truths so that our actions are better designed. It may become necessary to design 'back-up' actions if the original approach is seen not to be working. It may occasionally happen that a sudden new perception opens up completely different avenues for action. For example, stores seek to provide such excellent service that there are no complaints. A different perception is to welcome customer complaints because the way you deal with the complaints and the way you reward that customer might do far more for the image of the store than not having any complaints at all. A change of perception leads to a different action and strategy. PERMANENT TRUTH
It could be argued that in order to define 'truth' you also need to define the context, the perception, the point of view and the values of that moment. If you did all this, then there might well be one 'truth'.
Because there are many possible perceptual truths, there is a need to be creative. It is true that a few accountants have got into trouble by choosing to perceive something in one particular way when society, and the law, wants them to perceive things differently. This is a more difficult point than most people believe. The law can set guidelines, but can the law dictate perceptions? Much of the work in any court of law is precisely around this point. How is this behaviour to be perceived?
In order to act you need to believe that you are doing the right thing. The 'right thing' usually means a true picture of reality. Since such a 'true' picture is difficult to obtain - even if we convince ourselves otherwise - it may be better to accept different versions of reality and then to design actions which would be adequate for any of them. Such actions might be less optimal than designing for just one version of reality. In the long run, however, such designs would avoid disasters.
Truth is seen to be single, universal and permanent. Philosophers need this idea of truth in order to play their philosophical games. Society needs this idea of truth in order to administer the legal system. In real life, however, this notion of truth is highly artificial and very limiting.
