This word humantruth has been coined to distinguish that truth which is knowable, and highly relevant to our daily lives, from the whole truth which I believe to be understandable to the human mind but which may never reach our understanding, and which, though it is of great interest, is not relevant.
I have already said that truth is the fulfilment of the postconscious mind, the function of intellect, and therefore the fulfilment of being human. Supraconsciousness binds us to the truth, and more important than the amount we know is that all of our understanding should be true and our reality seen in relation to that. There is much uncertainty and confusion about the meaning of truth and it is frequently claimed to be unknowable, or non-existant. This is my definition of it (in the year 1990):
It is sometimes claimed that truth is a conceptual relationship between the observer and the observed, which can change as the viewpoint of the former and the position of the latter changes. This is a simplistic view which chooses to ignore that it is vital for each member of a species to observe that truth which is relevant to all, at the same time recognising that all viewpoints and positions are actual or possible, and the whole truth includes them. It is a view applicable to animals, because they are instinctively limited to one concept and incapable of comprehending truth, but that does not make it a true view for us to adopt, whether in relation to them or to ourselves. It is true that disagreement amongst humans occurs because we each claim that we know what is true. This does not mean there is no knowable truth common to us all, only that it has not yet been discerned. Whatever any person perceives, all others can perceive also. The truth about that which exists but which nobody perceives is that nobody can yet perceive it. Although we don't perceive it, however, it still exists, and it is part of our truth to acknowledge this. I believe that truth certainly does exist, in all the seven meanings above, and that the human intellect is potentially capable of understanding the first three meanings, though we may never fully achieve that understanding. We are by our nature designed to acknowledge, and already capable of embracing, the fourth, fifth, sixth and seventh meanings.
In important matters we cannot afford to have random differences. Where we have different emotional attitudes towards certain unimportant things, our truth is that we do feel differently about them, not that these things themselves are different. Where we have different emotional attitudes towards important things they should give way to the responsible attitude of true reason. The truth about the present fact that humanity cannot perceive, or realise, the same vital truths is not that those truths do not exist but that humanity is not yet willing to make the effort to cover all perceptions and thereby reach agreement.
As an example of an unimportant difference : one person views an object as beautiful, another as ugly. The truth about this situation is that the two minds are differently conditioned; that the object is one and the same; and that beauty is not an absolute quality.
As an example of an important difference : one person regards homicide as justified when it is the means of securing a good end, and the other that truly good ends forbid the use of bad means. The second is the true moral view, for it seriously takes as binding that no human shall kill another, according to which homicide can never be justified under any circumstances (excepting mercy killing in extremis and by consent). The conclusion to be drawn is that a society whose good name requires immoral acts is itself immoral, and we require to change it, not to change our morality to suit it.
Truth, then, is not a shield of limited fact which may be used to defend personal bias. It is all propositions which, when subjected to all possible doubt, questioning and criticism, and correlated with all knowledge and reasoning, emerge with undeniable signal strength to form total conviction. Humantruth is the product of all propositions relevant to human well-being correlated with all available knowledge.
The following illustrates how individual observance of humantruth shall bring about its realisation in the world. The individual feels pain and seeks to avoid or alleviate it. But the individual is aware that all others also feel pain, so is impelled by supraconsciousness to seek the avoidance or alleviation of their pain also. The humantrue individual views pleasure, satisfaction, contentment and fulfilment in the same communal way. When all individuals thus make themselves responsible for all, they shall increase happiness by the fact of its being contributed to by all, and by the knowledge that it is shared by all.
All human brains are potentially similar organs for pursuing one and the same process. They appear to have the same capacity (10 to the power of 11 cells), but to vary in concentration and efficiency. How much such variations may be due to inherited characteristics, such as differences in the level of energy made available to the brain, and how much to differences of experience and stimulation in upbringing, is uncertain. What is certain, in my view, is that any single mind is capable of judging and understanding the essential truth about human society, as it is and as it should be. Therefore, in this sense, the potential mind of humanity is far superior to the actual facts and concepts of reality which presently dominate it. In this regard any individual mind which accepts its responsibilities is equal to any other, and the same relevant information is available to all. Two minds which achieve their essential scope shall reach agreement on the same body of humantruth. Therefore if all minds intellate, if only to a minimum degree necessary, and become supraconscious, then the whole human race shall be essentially in agreement.
The power of intellect must subject itself to voluntary control through collective agreement because it is capable of pursuing disagreement to the extremes of destructive conflict. Disagreement is appropriate only to instinct because animals are incapable of voluntary agreement and need a degree of controlled conflict within the species to survive. So agreement is as vital to the stability and survival of humanity as disagreement is to the balance of nature. To agree must be the voluntary intention of fulfilled intellect, and to its true reason an undeniably good intention is as supraconsciously compelling as instinct is to the animal.
Free intellect can give us both the ultimate meaning of life and the means of its optimum fulfilment, by way of supraconsciousness of humantruth. When we have achieved that state, our minds, which form the common humantrue character of ourselves and our society, will be as shown in the following Figure 11 - the truly logical completion of Figure 9 - Automated Human Mind
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