absolute truth and critical thinking are not two mutually exclusive concepts. In fact it can be said that the ultimate quest of critical thinking is to arrive at the ultimate truth. Being a critical thinker, one is often accustomed to challenging conventional wisdom. For a critical thinker, it may seem that there is no such thing as the absolute truth. A careful and critical analysis of this, however, leads to the answer that it is improbable that the ultimate quest of a critical thinker is something that is unattainable by all stretch of the imagination.
There must therefore be a goal to all the critical thinking and that has to be the truth that is unquestionable, the absolute truth. While it is certain that no critical thinker believes that every decision made is based upon the absolute truth, it is not impossible that certain decisions are made based on a certain absolute truth that has been the end product of possibly centuries of critical thinking. A perfect example is the existence of gravity. In the earlier days, the concept of gravity was largely unproven and more heretical dogma than it was scientific knowledge.
The Essay on Truth: Absolute Understanding
Absolute Understanding [This essay was my first in Philosophy 201. I have another that is similar but different which I wrote at the end of the term. Read both.] Absolute Understanding An elephant was brought to a group of blind men who had never encountered such an animal before. One felt a leg and reported that an elephant is a great living pillar. Another felt the trunk and reported that an ...
With the help of Galileo and Newton, however, to accept a truth different from that of gravity would subject a person to a barrage of questions from the critical thinkers of the world. As such, critical thinking not only seeks to uncover absolute truths but also protects and prevents any derogation from such unless it is clearly proven and shown to be, in a manner of speaking, more absolute than the former. In believing therefore that the absolute truth does truly exist when making a decision is not contradictory but instead marks the culmination of one aspect on one’s quest for the truth.
