Appendix B 



A need is not that of a "copy or transcript of nature, but 

 accuracy as prompting fruitful attack or exploitation." For 

 the truth in dealing with external things is not primarily knowl- 

 edge of the things themselves, but rather of their relation to 

 each other and to us. ... 



The power to sum up the truth arising from ordinary sense 

 impressions derived from realities we call common sense. Science 

 involves common sense, but its operations are continued beyond 

 the obvious into the hidden complexities of truth. By a knowl- 

 edge of these complexities endeavors similarly complex may be 

 carried out with success. Such success is in proportion to the 

 exactness of our knowledge, the degree in which our conceptions 

 correspond to reality, and the courage with which we actually 

 use our knowledge. . . . 



(Again) just as we can trust our lives to truth, so may we 

 trust that for which life is valuable -- our aims, purposes, and 

 hopes. "Livableness" represents our final test rather than 

 "workableness," the word now more often used in this con- 

 nection. An idea may be "workable" as a basis for action and 

 yet be only partially true, a fact which may appear under 

 critical test. (That is, many ideas appear "workable" because 

 nobody has tried to translate them into action.) If then a 

 theory cannot be tested by action in some fashion or other, it is 

 not truth. 



Truth, to be our truth, must have some relevance in human 

 affairs. Probably a majority of the Aryan race accepts the 

 doctrine of Reincarnation which can in no way be tested by 

 action or worked out in terms of endeavor. That you or I or 

 millions of men find it satisfying or acceptable or apparently 

 "workable" (gives it) no standing in the court of realities, 

 because it rests on no phase of human experience. 



. . . The test of "livableness" must also be applied to the 

 process by which knowledge is gained. This is the final test, 

 the test of the long run, for no doctrine can undergo its full 

 verification in the lifetime of an individual. But if it be true, 

 any man or generation of men can depend upon it. ... (On 

 the other hand) if our objective ideas are not true so far as they 

 concern us, the error involved must prove fatal, not at once 

 necessarily, nor perhaps to everybody, but in the long run to all 

 who stake their lives on unverified conclusions. Such error 



C788 



