Truth. Not a thing in wide use these days. I mean, where's George Washington and his hatchet and crappy cherry tree when you need him.
Today the world lies about everything. Like this lady told her husband: "More people drown in bathtubs than in the ocean or even swimming pools and that's the only reason he found her in her bathtub with a lifeguard."
Yesterday I researched this arcane concept of truth. The reason being I figured only in some encyclopedia can I begin again to understand truth which has dropped from fashion faster than panty girdles.
I learned "The Pragmatic Theory of Truth" was published at the turn of the 20th century by someone named Charles Sanders Pierce. Who he was who knows. Who cares. Anyway, per Pierce: "Truth is that concordance of an abstract statement with the ideal limit towards which endless investigation tends to bring scientific belief, which concordance the abstract statement may possess by virtue of the confession of its inaccuracy and this confession is an essential ingredient of truth."
Yeah? Lotsa luck. And if you can understand that, you're a better man than I am, Gunga Din.
How does all that explain why some yutz is telling his cellphone over a coffee-shop tuna on rye with an egg cream: "Can't talk. I'm going in to a meeting."
Our society has progressed to the point where you have to remember, the person who agrees with you will lie about other things, too.
I researched further. Wikipedia states: "The term 'truth' has no single definition." What's that mean? Means that lies are so accepted today that they come in sizes. Like suits. Now you can slip into an out-and-out lie, half a lie, white lie, Albany lie -- as in -- if the person's lips are moving he's automatically lying, or the Washington politico's lie which means, even if the person TELLS you he's lying, you still can't believe he's telling the truth. And then there's today's Gold Standard, the John Edwards-ism shouted over an infant's squalling: "Baby? What baby. I have no baby. It's that guy who works for me's baby."
Where's this need for lying come from? Is it primal? Does a perfectly comfy newborn in its crib, every need already supplied, instinctively know that, upon acting up, it'll get more attention? How come a kid in pre-K will fib to another: "My father is richer than your father." Or if they're in Hollywood: "My father IS your father."
An old friend took me to dinner at an expensive restaurant. I actually heard him whisper to the maitre d' as we arrived: "The check is in the mail."
Have a relative's story. On a long line at the bank, she bumps into a guy she had a major crush on in grade school. Since she was cashing a Social Security check, you have to figure how long ago that crush might've been. She was single. He was divorced. He took her phone number. Promised to call. He didn't. Long down the line, at a class reunion, he told her: "My cat Ina spilled a glass of milk and it fell on the paper your phone number was written on."
You have to give the guy credit for this one. It was creative. At least his dog didn't eat his homework.
Why? What is it about lying. Is it in our DNA? Or did honesty go the way of last season's bankers, money-managers and swindlers.
Walk on the street. Listen to the cellphone cons: "Stuck on the LIE . . . train was late . . . my alarm didn't go off . . . had a flood in my apartment . . . my crown fell out, I'm on my way to the dentist." At least that last is what I THINK the guy said. Hard to hear him clearly though his bagel.
I know someone who, when she doesn't want to see someone, says: "My family's in from Panama and I have to pick them up at the airport." True, she has family in Panama, but if you track her comments over time, that family comes in every two days.
I did more research. I learned the true meaning of Truth is, "It can have a variety of meanings, from the state of being the case, being in accord with the body of real things."
OK? If the savants supposed to guide us and teach us don't know what the hell they're talking about, why should we?
What's the big problem about defining truth? If it comes with an aroma, it's a lie. If it comes from the tonsils of Tiger Woods, as in, "Honey, I swear I practically almost never saw that hooker before" -- it's a lie.
Clearly, avoidance of truth is a tool. Suppose someone shows you a dress she just spent a fortune for, asks how you like it and you know in your heart it makes her look like a chenille garbage bag -- that's where you keep your comment. In your heart. From your mouth can come all-purpose phrases like: "It's definitely you. For sure you won't see yourself coming and going" etc.
My late husband, comedian Joey Adams, had a backstage patter when visiting anyone whose show was a bomb. He'd say, "Max, you did it again." Or: "Hey, had a little something in it for everybody."
So this accountant came home to find his wife, a heavy-duty liar, in bed with a midget. He screamed: "You swore you'd never cheat again." "Don't be angry," she said, "Can't you see I'm tapering off?"
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