But to answer your questions directly,

Is absolute certainty (and thus accuracy) necessary to be able to interpret objective truth? Or can we be “certain enough”?

I chose the latter. I do not believe that man, as a limited creature by definition, can have absolution certainty - if he were, he would be god. Part of the scientific method takes this into account, which is why there is so much conflict between “religion” and “science.” Of course, someone can say they have absolute certainty without actually having it, i.e. David Icke (who ironically enough claimed to be god, or the son of god). Science is about gaining a relatively certain amount of unbiased truth, but this has not always been the case - the earliest scientists did seek an underlying objective reality to everything.

Can the standard of certainty in law be comparable to a standard of certainty in philosophy/theolgoy? i.e. In law, “absolute certainty” is not necessary, only evidence “beyond reasonable doubt.”

I have very little experience in law. As you know, by background is in theology and philosophy, so I have my own prejudices. From what I know of law, I would say that law is philosophy in practice, and hence often fails. Philosophy gives many ideals, but rarely practical measures. Likewise with theology. Theology succeeds until it is met with the reality of life.This is why there is such a tension between theologians and much of the Old Testament - the OT was not written by theologians or priests, they were written by storytellers, court historians, and poets. That god of the Hebrews can not be theologized because… wait, this is a long tangent to something you didn’t ask.
To answer your question I must ask it of you… is it enough for you? I know that I can never know, with “absolute certainty” that there is, or is not, a God. This is not why I consider myself an agnostic. I consider myself an agnostic because doubt is not my enemy - if doubt is my enemy than why am I not a Scientologist? Why are you not a Scientologist? Or a Muslim? We are not because we doubt those truth claims. I am an agnostic because I must be fair to myself and allow myself to look into the arguments in a reasonable way. In my doubt I have been led away from Christianity because I do my doubt has not allowed me to fight tooth and nail to reconcile contradictions of evidence, whether internal or external. I could definitely see myself accepting a truth claim of Christianity if I found there to by enough evidence for even parts of it, although because of my evangelical upbringing it is hard for me to take a moderate stance on anything.

I apologize if my answers did not answer your questions. I am fairly scatterbrained today and I am having difficulty keeping my focus. Hopefully I can clear up some things at a later date.

(P.S. my previous response about Nietzsche’s perspectivism was copy and pasted from an older post I wrote on my own personal blog - email me at rational.ape@gmail.com if you want a link).

http://seminarianblog.com/2007/11/08/certainty-and-knowledge/

Heh, it’s probably where I’m getting most of my understanding of this topic.

This is an area I have very little experience in…

So basically, Nietzsche would say that, whether or not there is an objective truth, humanity (collectively or individually) cannot apply or interpret it for one of two reasons:

1.) They are unavoidably bias and use it to gain power, or
2.) Our subjective lens will never be able to accurately interpret it.

Is that right? I’m just trying to put it in my own words to understand it. The second option, if I am understanding it correctly, sounds very much to be influenced by a scientific/enlightenment standard of certainty.

So my questions in response are:

Is absolute certainty (and thus accuracy) necessary to be able to interpret objective truth? Or can we be “certain enough”?

Can the standard of certainty in law be comparable to a standard of certainty in philosophy/theolgoy? i.e. In law, “absolute certainty” is not necessary, only evidence “beyond reasonable doubt.”

If I am totally missing the point, please correct me! This is very interesting…

It is our needs that interpret the world; our drives and their For and Against. Every drive is a kind of lust to rule; each one has its perspective that it would like to compel all the other drives to accept as a norm. - Nietzsche (Will to Power)

The ideas of absolutism, objectivism, relativism, and the like are hence subject to the perceiver. Truth is relative, not in truth itself, but relative in the sense of degrees of validity based on circumstantial grounds that cannot be simplified to “truth” and “not truth.” Rather, the perceiver(s) is/are able to say whether something is [more] truthful or [probably] truthful without complete certainty of the truthfulness.

“An example of an objective truth is that combustion is a chemical process that burns up the fuel which is undergoing said process”

On what basis do we describe something as a chemical process? What if some other group of people say that combustion doesn’t fit the bill of a chemical process? I guess we need God to come down and slap us in the face with what is or isn’t a chemical process otherwise we are screwed!

Sorry to intercede, but “fire is hot” is not objective nor subjective, it is relative. “Hot” is a relative term, as in, it is hotter than something else. We perceive the fire to be hot because it is relatively hotter than our bodies.

Not that anyone cares, since it isn’t relevant to the discussion (…or is it… - just saying that, for accuracies sake, a better example is probably in order.

True enough, but no one expects the toaster to pay your phone bill. I claimed to do one thing: point to an objective basis for describing things as just or unjust that does not require the existence of a God. You can state I have not done it, but you have not provided any arguments against it.

We can go on to discuss why suffering exists, why people act unjustly, and even what justice is. Those are separate, though related, issues.

I would like to maintain this place as an arena to discuss my initial assertion which you have already reiterated you continue to deny (namely that evil/pain/suffering is a problem for everyone).

I’m sorry. I thought you wanted to address the theistic and atheistic arguments on an equal footing (#12).

I would like to add that I do believe that evil, pain and suffering are problems for everyone- theist or non-theist. It’s just that pain, suffering and evil are also a problem for theism in a way that it can not be for atheism (atheism not being a set of beliefs, but simply a lacking of a specific belief or set of beliefs).