Spectrum

by Miguel Jimenez

For this blog post I wanted to attempt to illustrate Gabriel Marcel’s meaning of Truth through a medium in which I thought related to the topic. I feel like the best way to try to explain philosophy is to try to give examples that relate, albeit weirdly, to the topic. I’m no physicist but, whenever I thought about Marcel’s truth and being in the lighted milieu, I was always reminded about one of the most interesting physics topics that I learned in high school, the Visible Spectrum (ROY G. BIV) that the human eye could see. So, taking the “lighted milieu” and the “light” literally, I will attempt to explain Marcel’s idea of truth through some examples and insights I gathered throughout the course of the lectureas well as during times of my own personal reflection using some concepts of the visible spectrum.

In a physical sense, white light, when it hits a glass prism, breaks up into the visible spectrum. This spectrum is the range of colors that our eyes can see. When light hits an object, the color it gives off or reflects is the frequency of light that it cannot absorb. In other words, a particular object, other than the color that it gives off, is absorbing all the other colors. If light doesn’t reach the object, no color is given off. Imagine a leaf in the tree in your backyard; you go to the tree, and notice that the leaf is green in color. Because sunlight is being shown on the leaf, it is reflecting the frequency of the color green to your eyes, and therefore you can say that the leaf is colored green. When it is night time, no light is shown on the leaf and therefore, the leaf doesn’t give off any particular color.

We can relate this to Gabriel Marcel’s interpretation of truth wherein we have to be in the light to be able to witness the truth that is illuminated or has been reflected from a specific object. We have to put ourselves in a lighted place to be able to see the truth. Similarly, we have to make light shine on the leaf for it to reflect it’s color in our eyes. If you are blind to the truth, you will not be able to see it becauseyou are preventing light from shining on it. It’s like trying to determine the color of the leaf in the nighttime or in darkness. In darkness, although you know that the leaf is there, you cannot determine its color because there is no light for it to reflect a color. However, if you are open to the truth and let the light shine into your eyes, you will be able to see the truth in its essence. This is just like being able to see the color green reflected from the leaf. Gabriel Marcel teaches us that you will only see the truth if you are willing to step into the lighted place, or the lighted milieu, if you are in darkness you will not be able to see the truth. We must place ourselves in the light in order to see the truth of the reality that is in our midst.

Truth is an aspect of reality, of which is two-dimensional. There is an objective reality and a subjective reality in which the aspect of truth is embedded.For this metaphor, the physical object, leaf, that I can touch, feel and be in the presence of is the objective reality. Alternatively, the color of the leaf is the subjective reality because it depends on the frequency of light that hits it which determines its color. The color it gives of is the subjective reality where the aspect of truth lies.

One cannot claim to hold the absolute truth, because if someone says that, he is saying that he is like God.God is the one and only holder of the absolute truth. As humans, we can only derive from the absolute truth because of our own biases, perceptions and different points of view. Additionally, it depends upon ones sense of values, backgrounds and experiences which defines the truth for them. Because we can only pick out derivatives of the absolute truth, the closest we can get to the absolute truth is a consensus between people. Using our garden metaphor, God would be like the sun, who shines the purest form of white light, making the leaf reflect its perfect and absolute color of green. The subjective aspect of truth would be like flashlights, which have different lights that aren’t as pure as the sun’s white light. This is so because whenever the flashlights shine their lights on the leaf, although it may reflect the color green, the leaf isn’t emitting its purest, absolute color.

Truths are subjective because it depends on the person who interprets the truth or the light that determines what is true for them. To illustrate this further, imagine it is nighttime and two friends are in the backyard each holding their own flashlights that are different in brand, use(tactical, work, camping flashlights) and luminescence (strength of light). One friend goes up to the leaf and shines his flashlight that gives off a yellowish light;because of this, although the reflection of the leaf is still green it would have a different hue or contrast in color than that of the leaf under sunlight. Another friend goes up to the leaf and shines light on it with his blue colored flashlight, again, a different hue of green appears which differs from the first friend who was holding a different flashlight and the pure form of white light coming from the sun. Say these two friends were quarreling about what color the leaf actually was. The first friend says that the leaf was (as an example) “yellow-green” while the other friend said that the leaf was “dark green.” Both friends say these things because they knew that when they shined their flashlights on the leaf, their respective colors reflected from the leaf. However, if they both shine their lights at the same time, wherein they combine both of their flashlight’s strengths, colors and luminescence, they would get a similar color. This in essence is what is called consensus.

Truths are limited and personal within the person’s immediate environment. In my opinion, truths have a radius, where if we were there to see it, then it would be our personal truth no matter how limited and shallow it may be compared to reality. As humans, we can only mold and interpret facts that we obtain from the objective reality and create our own personal subjective truths about a particular topic. Adding to this, we can also only hope to get close to the actual truth by learning more and obtaining more facts so as to be able to interpret and analyze it to form a deeper truth in which we know isn’t absolute but more of a consensus that is agreed upon by a community of truth seekers. I guess this is what Marcel meant when he talked about being with the lighted community and being in the lighted milieu. In relation to the illustration, this is why the friends have different flashlights. Independently, they both see the leaf in a different color, but with the question of what the actual color of the leaf is lurking in their minds, they can only hope to get closer to the answer by putting their lights together and shining them both at the leaf at the same time. It is this difference of illumination that creates communities of people with different truths. What might be green for a certain community might not be so for another community. This might be one of the reasons to why we have issues such as differences in religion or the correct way to raise a child.

With this being said, it is hard for humans to want to be open to see the truth because of the responsibilities and consequences that come with it. Marcel mentions an armor in which we put ourselves in to shield ourselves from the light of truth. In other words, because the fear of the truth and the responsibilities it brings is real and innate in humans, our defense mechanism is to shield ourselves to the truth in order to keep ourselves in this constant state of unknowing, which is what I think human nature is comfortable with. Therefore, it takes courage for one to take off his armor and fight the naïve side of him and look and see the truth and find out what responsibilities and consequences he has to undertake by knowing the truth.


Veering away from the leaf example (although it would technically be like trying to determine the color of the leaf at night or while wearing shades during the day), I’d like to illustrate this point by using one of the scariest things that all college students will have to face in their time in school, marks on an exam. Say you pulled an all-nighter studying for a midterm that you were so sure was next month, but instead, someone tells you that it is on this day. You get to class, take the test and the following day, your teacher hands back the exam. Before you get the exam back, or even, after the test when you’re going home reflecting upon which questions you messed up or what word you misspelled, your brain is constantly fighting itself over whether you did well or not in the exam. Your mind is in the constant state of unknowing, and because of this, is mentally building and constructing false truths or “what if’s” that may either scare you more or keep you at a confident state. So you’re in class, patiently waiting for your name to be called out. This whole time, your mind is scared of the possibilities that may arise. Personally, when my teachers call out my name for me to get the test in front of the room, it becomes, literally, one of the scariest parts of my entire life. You’re name gets called out, you walk toward your teacher holding your paper, you get your exam paper, walk back to your seat and you fold your paper in half covering the score. Without light hitting the bright red ink markings of your teacher’s pen in the front page, you will not be able to see the score of your exam because it is being blocked by the back page where you folded the paper. This is like the armor that we put on ourselves to shield us from the truth. Because we fold our papers to hide us from the score we got, we shield ourselves from the responsibilities we will have to face by seeing our marks on the exam. It really takes courage for one to open up his exam paper, look at the mark and accept the responsibilities and consequences he has to face. By opening up the page, you allow light to reflect on the front page, which makes the scribbles of the ink in your teacher’s pen absorb all colors except red.