Thomistic Apologetics

The Objectivity of Truth

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What is Truth?​

 

In this article you will find the answer to the question of whether or not there exists such a thing as absolute truth. We shall delve carefully into what it means and what it entails, how we find that truth, and how we rightly order ourselves towards it. In our relativistic age, many claim “truth is subjective” or “my truth, your truth.” Christian theism offers the only coherent option—absolute truth exists because God is Truth. This truth is not an abstract idea but a living reality—eternal, immutable, and personal. It is revealed in Scripture, defended by the church fathers, systematized by the great doctors of the Church, and harmonized with philosophy that submits to divine revelation.

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The word "absolute" is derived from the Latin word absolūtus, meaning "set free," "loosened," or "separated" from restrictions, conditions, or limitations. The word "truth" is derived from Old English treowð (faithfulness, loyalty, veracity) and treowe (faithful, trustworthy), rooted in Proto-Germanic treuwaz ("having good faith") and Proto-Indo-European (PIE) deru/dreu, meaning "firm, solid, steadfast accuracy, correctness, conformity of thought with fact." By the late 1400s, it was attested  as "that which is righteous or in accordance with divine standard, true religious doctrine, and virtuous conduct." Now those two words taken together birth the words "absolute truth," which, by the definition of Saint Thomas Aquinas and countless others is a fact, principle, or reality that remains consistent, unchanging, and universally valid regardless of time, place, culture, or personal belief. It is objective, independent of human opinion or perspective, and applies to all people. Key aspects of absolute truth include:

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1. Universality: True at all times and in all situations.

2. Objectivity: Independent of the knower’s consciousness, emotions, or opinions.

3. Unchanging: Unaffected by changes in culture or context.

4. Logical Consistency: It is often considered a logical necessity, as denying it can lead to self-contradiction (e.g., claiming "there are no absolute truths" is itself an absolute statement).

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Thus for something to be an absolute truth it must fulfill the given criteria. Absolute truth can be something as simple as 1+1=2. It fulfills all the criteria given above, namely that it must be universal, objective, unchanging, and have logical consistency.​

 

Truth qua Being, not Relative​

 

The aim of this article is to demonstrate that absolute truth exists, that there are realities, facts that exist outside of ourselves that are objective, universal and independent of whether we perceive them or not. Something can be true insofar as it has being. Thomas Aquinas phrases this perfectly:

 

A thing is true precisely to the extent that it has being (actuality/perfection), because being makes it knowable and conformable to intellect. (ST I, q. 16, a. 1)

 

Without being, there is no truth; truth is not an add-on but convertible with being itself, though it adds the relation to mind. Central to Aquinas's realism is the convertibility of the transcendentals—being, truth, goodness, unity—which he treats as properties that apply to every being qua being. Pulling from Aristotle's Metaphysics, Aquinas proves the convertibility of truth with being:

 

As good has the nature of what is desirable, so truth is related to knowledge. Now everything, insofar as it has being, it is knowable. (ST I, q. 16, a. 3)

 

Hence, truth is not separate from existence; a thing is true insofar as it has being (i.e., actuality). The more perfectly something exists (the more actual it is), the more knowable—and thus the more true—it is. In things themselves, truth is convertible with being "as to substance"; in the intellect, it is the manifestation of what is. This indirectly refutes relativism in the following way. If truth were dependent on the human mind or cultural consensus alone, it would vary and lack stability. But since truth is rooted in being, and all being participates in God's eternal, immutable Being, truth in creation is objective and participatory. Absolute Truth exists fully and primarily in God alone, who is the sovereign and first truth. Created truths are true only derivatively, insofar as they have being from Him— the patristic insight that all truth belongs to God. The First Truth is the measure of truth in all things and the proportion or conformity of any thing to that First Truth determines that thing's truth.

 

Relativism is Eggregiously Self-Refuting​

 

The claim: “Absolute truth does not exist.”

 

Why it’s self-refuting: The claim “absolute truth does not exist” is either absolutely true or it’s not. But, of course, it can’t be absolutely true, since that would create a contradiction: we would have proven the existence of an absolute truth, the claim itself. Since it cannot be absolutely true, we must concede that there are some cases in which the proposition “absolute truth does not exist” must be false… in which case, we’re back to affirming the existence of absolute truth.

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What we can know: Absolute truth exists. Put another way, the claim “absolute truth exists” is absolutely true.

 

Uncertainty Falls Victim to the Same​

 

The claim: “We can’t know anything for certain.” Or “I don’t know if we can know anything for certain.”

 

Why it’s self-refuting: This one is a subtler self-refutation than the first, because it looks humble. After all, if I can say, “I don’t know the number of stars in the universe,” why can’t I take it a few steps further, and say, “I can’t know anything for certain?" Simple. Because in saying that, you’re claiming to know something about your own knowledge. When we say, “I don’t know x,” we’re saying, “I know that my knowledge on x is inconclusive.” Take the most mild-seeming statement: “I don’t know if we can know anything for certain.” What you’re really saying is that, “I know that my knowledge on whether anything can be known for certain is inconclusive.” So you’re still affirming something: that you know your knowledge to be inconclusive. There are two ways of showing this. First, because it could be a lie. The claim “I don’t know who took the last cookie,” could very well be proven false, if we later found the cookie in your purse. So these “I don’t know” claims are still affirming something, even if they’re just affirming ignorance. Second, apply the “I don’t know” to another person. If I said, “You don’t know anything about cars,” I’m making a definitive statement about what you do and don’t know. To be able to make that statement, I have to have some knowledge about you and about cars. So if I was to say, “you don’t know if we can know anything for certain,” I’d be claiming to know that you were a skeptic – a fact that I can’t know, since I’m not sure who’s reading this right now. So when you say “I don’t know if we can know anything for certain,” you’re saying that you know for certain that you’re ignorant on the matter. But that establishes that things necessarily can be known for certain. This is unavoidable: to make a claim, you’re claiming to know something. So any positive formulation of skepticism (“no one can know anything for certain,” “I can’t know anything for certain,” “I don’t know anything for certain,” etc.) ends up being self-refuting. For this reason, the cleverest skeptics often word their skepticism as rhetorical questions (e.g., de Montaigne’s “What do I know?”). If they were to say what they’re hinting at, it would be self-refuting. They avoid it by merely suggesting the self-refuting proposition. Finally, remember that in Step 1 we determined that the claim “absolute truth exists” is absolutely true. We’ve established this by showing the logical contradiction of holding the contrary position. In other words, we’ve already identified a truth that we can know for certain: “absolute truth exists.”

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What we can know: Absolute truth exists, and is knowable.

Scientism, Again, is Guilty of the Same​

 

The claim: “All truth is empirically or scientifically testable.”

 

Why it’s self-refuting: The claim that “All truth is empirically or scientifically testable” is not empirically or scientifically testable. It’s not even conceivable to scientifically test a hypothesis about the truths of non-scientifically testable hypotheses. In fact, “all truth is empirically or scientifically testable” is a broad (self-refuting) metaphysical and epistemological claim. What about the seemingly moderate claim, “We cannot know if anything is true outside of the natural sciences”? Remember, from Step 2, that “I don’t know x,” means the same as saying, “I know that my knowledge on x is inconclusive.” Here, it means, “I know that my knowledge on the truth of things outside of the natural sciences is inconclusive.” But the natural sciences can never establish your ignorance of truths outside the natural sciences. So to make this claim, you need to affirm as certain a truth that you could not have derived from the natural sciences. So even this more moderate-seeming claim is self-refuting. Furthermore, all scientific knowledge is built upon a bed of metaphysical propositions (for example, the principle of noncontradiction) that cannot be established scientifically. Get rid of these, and you get rid of the basis for every natural science. There’s no way of rejecting these premises while still affirming the conclusions that the natural sciences produce. Finally, remember that in the previous refutation, we established the truth of the claim “absolute truth exists, and is knowable.” This is a truth we know with certainty, but it’s not an empirical or scientific question. It can be established simply by seeing that its negation is a contradiction. So that’s a concrete example of an absolute truth known apart from the empirical and scientific testing of the natural sciences.

 

Conclusion​

 

There exists absolute and knowable truth, outside of the realm of the natural sciences, and not subject to empirical and scientific testing. Absolute Truth exists fully and primarily in God alone, who is "the sovereign and first truth" (Summa Theologica I, q. 16, a. 5). Created truths are true only derivatively, insofar as they have being from Him.

Having seen that absolute truth exists, is knowable, and transcends empirical testing—rooted in God's immutable Being—we arrive at revelation's fulfillment. Scripture declares not merely that God is Truth, but that Christ is the Truth: "I am the way, and the truth, and the life" (John 14:6). As St. Thomas Aquinas expounds, Christ is that Truth incarnate, the perfect union of divine intellect and reality, making absolute truth personal and accessible to us. In Him, the sovereign and first Truth becomes knowable in human form.

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Written by Matthew Troniak