Multiculturism and Truth

Tuesday, 22 March 2011

Multiculturism and Truth

The British spent almost a thousand years from Wycliffe and the Lollards onwards questioning received religious wisdom in the light of the possibility of truth. After the Enlightenment there were even Church of England bishops who were uneasy about the Virgin Birth and Resurrection stories. But the world has changed. In this Post Modern world, with the widespread acceptance of the philosophy of individuals such as Derrida, especially amongst the literary, legal and sociological establishment it is now commonplace to hear people say that "there is no such thing as the truth".

The fact that an "establishment" has been penetrated by these lost souls is bizarre. Those who deny that the truth exists should not be acceptable in government, the law or civil service because they genuinely and openly admit that they do not know right from wrong.

The truth does exist. The first truth is the truth of consistency (for instance 1 + 1 = 2 is true in the consistent system of arithmetic but 3 + 1 =2 is untrue because it is not consistent with the system). The second truth, and the most important truth, is the truth of experience. If something happens over and over again and is observed to happen in many places by many people then we say that it is true that this event occurs.

The consistent system that is built on the "truth of experience" is called a "theory" and the combination of observations and theory is known as "science" (from the Latin word 'scientia' which means knowledge). There is a popular argument that science is never absolutely true because scientific theories are always changing therefore science is false. This argument misses the point that the truth of science depends on both the observations and the theories: if the theories are changed the observations remain and furthermore are always described more fully by the new theories.

In 1000AD the idea that the world was created in 6 days and Jesus rose bodily from the grave seemed quite normal but by 2000AD enough people had looked at enough of the world to know that these claims are probably inconsistent with what happens in nature. In Britain our culture had undergone the Enlightenment where it was made possible for these things to be discussed and two World Wars where the population learnt that the claims of the religious establishment such as wars being supported by God were shown to be appalling. By 1960 the British had learnt the truth about religion: religion could be a personal revelation but beware of the religious, they can make claims that are lies and fanatical belief can get you killed.

The open, liberal, educated society that was Britain from 1960 onwards, with its availability of work, its Social Security and National Health Service attracted large numbers of immigrants and by 1997 the Labour Party realised this influx was a way of entirely restructuring British society (See The Roots of New Labour). As part of this policy of restructuring the left pursued the idea of Multiculturalism with vigour. Multiculturalism rests on the philosophical view that each culture has its own truth that should be respected. This is a perfect way to polarise society and create revolutionary tension but it is also a kick in the face for ordinary British society which had struggled for a millennium to get to the position where the credibility of ideas is measured according to the real truth in terms of consistency and observational veracity, not "its own truth".

In the British tradition a tale about Jesus rising up on a cloud is regarded as pretty unlikely and the idea that Ganesh was a young lad who had an elephant head stuck on by magic is a story for gullible children and the Islamic idea that there might be two angels recording your every move looks like a psychological technique for controlling kids. This clear statement of the wishful thinking of some Christians and the gullibility of some Hindus and Moslems is now dangerously close to being regarded as criminal in Britain. The truth, that men rising on clouds and the magical transplant of elephant heads is at least 99.9999% likely to be a lie is cast aside in the interest of maintaining polarised factions in British society. The government has been actively encouraging the teaching of arrant nonsense to children and has even permitted the widespread establishment of religious schools to further this absurdity.

Ah, but shouldn't people be allowed to have their own beliefs? Well, in a Liberal democracy you cannot stop them but they should not be encouraged in false beliefs by the government and should be discouraged from spreading ignorance, especially spreading ignorance to their children. It is dangerous to encourage false beliefs when the people who are taught this nonsense are going to be voting in my society for MPs who will govern me. Tolerance of ignorance is fine when it is the ignorant few but Multicultualism is intended to expand the numbers of ignorant people and has already produced constituencies where the ignorant are plentiful (from English sub-cultures to Islamic ghettoes). Britain became a liberal democracy after most of these silly myths were put to sleep so that the electorate were educated and had a grasp of the truth. Now we have put the clock back many centuries and run the risk of getting the sort of representatives and public officers that they have in the countries where these childish cultures originate.

As for the people who believe that everyone has their "own truth", apart from the fact that they are encouraging ignorance, do they really believe that a society where substantial numbers of the electorate are away with the fairies is really going to deliver a just, equitable place to live in the long run? Do they really think that Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Iran and India are better places to live than Western Europe?

It is ridiculous that discussions of other cultures always skate over the substance of the culture and focus on the "rights" of its adherents. If there is a discussion of Hindu or Islamic culture it should go straight to their myths about elephant heads and avatars, or the divine inspiration of Mohamed rather than their right to spread ignorance. Other cultures have the right to be ignorant but must publicly justify the content of their culture if they want their own schools or any special treatment such as that guaranteed by the Equalities Act.

The belief that "everyone has their own truth" or "truth is relative" should be grounds for dismissal from any government post because it demonstrates that the speaker has no idea of what is right, no way of assessing facts and no concept of honesty. If post modernists are allowed to get away with "everyone has their own truth" they can pose as everyone's friend and truly be a danger to us all.

Readers might be interested in the article Science and Religion. I am not against religion but I utterly reject the supremacy of "faith" and I am happy to argue the point with anyone.