Re: The Nature of Truth

From: Alex Ferguson <abf_at_cs.ucc.ie>
Date: Thu, 20 Jan 2000 16:21:30 GMT


Matthew Thale:
> I assume that the Detect Lie spell detects the intent to lie rather
> than the untruth itself.
>
> If I, as a fanatic Orlanthi, truly believe that all Lunar priests are
> chaotic, then this Humakti will detect that I am telling the truth.

I think so. Nor would this be an entirely irrational belief: the mere absence of a 'chaos taint' needn't be taken as proof of 'non-chaoticness', for a whole raft of reasons. Firstly, if one suspects the average Lunar priest of being more intelligent than the average Storm Bull (and one might), one has a problem right there... More seriously, there's the moral question (does 'acceptance' of chaos put one in the same class of entity as manifest chaos?), and of Illumination (they're not all Illuminated, of course, but the Inner Party very much tends to be). This is quite a subtle point, and I could happily argue it either way, if bought a pint and challenged to do so (anyone coming to WARPcon this weekend, hint, hint?).

> I would like to hear the Gloranthan community's opinion(s) on the
> "truth" of my understanding.

I believe that's 'in accordance with the observed evidence', to use a perhaps modest-sounding definition (but a rather handy one) of 'the truth'.

Slán,
Alex.


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