Sure, but when have you ever answered even one of my many "simple, straightforward questions"?
betty boop: "What relation, if any, does "natural science" have to Truth?"
In two words: separate & subordinate.
When we speak of natural-science, we cannot talk of "truth" or "Truth", because science only deals in lesser matters such as "facts" (defined as: confirmed observations), laws (defined as mathematical descriptions of physical processes), hypotheses (defined as natural explanations for natural processes) and theories (defined as confirmed hypotheses).
Science itself can never reach the levels of truth or Truth because, first, that's not its mission, and second, nothing in science is ontologically certain enough to be considered "true".
The word "truth" refers to higher philosophical truths based on consistent systems of logic and observations from the great philosophers beginning with the likes of Plato & Aristotle.
The word "Truth" refers to God's Truth, derived from the Bible and other recognized theological thinkers.
At least that's my understanding.
Do you disagree?
Bro: The word “truth” refers to higher philosophical truths based on consistent systems of logic and observations from the great philosophers beginning with the likes of Plato & Aristotle.
Spirited: The beams of truth expounded upon by Plato and Aristotle originated in Egypt, the repository of sacred knowledge regarding ultimate questions. Thus for Plato, daemons for example, were the evolving spirits of the godlike men who lived during the Golden Age (antediluvian world) and during Plato’s time served as messengers from the gods. This is the basis of ancestor worship.
Apart from Biblically informed thought, the prevailing concept of being has been that being is one and continuous, hence as above, so below, according to Hermes Trismegistus.
This means that Chaos (primordial matter) and the gods, man, and all of the universe are all aspects of one continuous being, the ground of being, to use Plato’s terminology.
Degrees of being may exist so that a hierarchy of gods, daemons, heavens and hells exist (Great Chain of Being)but all nevertheless consist of one, undivided and continuous being. Creation then is not ex nihilo but an emergence from being, in short, an evolutionary process of being.
Elsewhere betty remarked that if Plato had learned of Jesus Christ he most likely would have become a Christian. I agree. Plato was one of a handful of nature philosophers interested in true truth as opposed to myth and vanity.
Well, er — yes I disagree. You describe Truth as, in effect, the utterance of "recognized theological thinkers." That is to say, the only access to Truth comes "second hand" to the thinker, by way of human authorities.
I see Truth, however, as the very Order of the universe, as embedded in all aspects of Nature. The world is the way it is and not some other way because it is the reification of its essential organizational principle which is its Truth.
Truth is not just a matter of epistemology; it is profoundly ontological. God's Truth was in the world before the Holy Scriptures, before Plato, before Aristotle....
FWIW.
Let me wish all my friends here gathered a happy, blessed Thanksgiving!