1. What is the Truth?
Introduction to the Philosophy of the Human Person

2. Learning Competencies:
• Distinguish Opinion from Truth
• Analyze different situations that show the differences
between truth and opinion

3. St. Thomas Aquinas’ Definition of Truth
• “With respect to its conformity with a human intellect, a
thing is said to be true insofar as it is such as to cause a true
estimate about itself.”
• ‘‘Veritas est adæquatio intellectus et rei’’ (The truth is the
conformity of the intellect and things’’

4. Arthur Schopenhauer’s Definition of Truth
• Truth is the reference of a judgment to something different
from itself which is its sufficient reason (ground).
• If a judgment is to be an expression of knowledge, it must
have a sufficient reason or ground by which the judgment
could be called true.

5. Immanuel Kant’s Definition of Truth
• Reason is an important source of the unifying structure of
experience, it proves essential as an arbiter of empirical
truth.

6. Friedrich Nietzsche’s Definition of Truth
• The search for truth, or 'the will to truth', was a consequence
of the will to power of philosophers.
• Will to Power – man’s driving force to do something
• Truth should be used as long as it promoted life and the will
to power

7. Generalization
• Truth is any idea or concept that is supported by any proof
that could reason out its existence

8. Let’s take into consideration …
“As the speed of a moving fluid (liquid or gas) increases, the pressure
within the fluid decreases.” (Bernoulli Principle)
“Energy cannot be created nor destroyed in an isolated system.”
(First Law of Thermodynamics)
Are these examples of truthful arguments? Why or Why Not?

9. Axiom
• Also called as postulate
• A statement taken into account as truthful, if used as a proof
to start an argument

10. ACTIVITY
• What is your own definition of truth?
• Knowing the definition of axioms, write down 3 to 5
examples of axioms