Mr. Moderate

One of the greatest speeches in the history of US trial courts was given by Dudley Field Malone on Day 5 of the Scopes “Monkey Trial” where he argued in favor of admitting expert testimony on the subject of evolution:

There is never a duel with the truth. The truth always wins and we are not afraid of it. The truth is no coward. The truth does not need the law. The truth does not need the force of government. The truth does not need Mr. Bryan. The truth is imperishable, eternal and immortal and needs no human agency to support it. We are ready to tell the truth as we understand it and we do not fear all the truth that they can present as facts. We are ready. We are ready. We feel we stand with progress. We feel we stand with science. We feel we stand with intelligence. We feel we stand with fundamental freedom in America. We are not afraid. Where is the fear? We meet it, where is the fear? We defy it, we ask your honor to admit the evidence as a matter of correct law, as a matter of sound procedure and as a matter of justice to the defense in this case. (Profound and continued applause).

The above comments represent a touchstone of intelligent discussion and debate. We recognize that some people may have been indoctrinated to believe falsehoods, or that some people might have misunderstood the evidence presented for examination, but the truth allows for any question to be met with facts and reason. To survive, untruth must protect itself from exposure by any means possible. This is, in essence, the morality play that the Scopes trial represents.

More recently, Eric Hufschmid wrote these words along the same lines:

The truth can be placed in the open; exposed naked to the entire world. The truth does not need any laws to protect it, and it does not need secrecy to protect it. The truth does not need evidence destroyed, nor does it need videotapes to be confiscated.

Only lies need secrecy; only lies need protection from laws. Only lies benefit from fear, secrecy, blackmail, gossip, and confiscation of evidence.

Frequently we humans find it to be the case that some powerful person or organization stands to gain or preserve wealth or power (or avoid public exposure of their guilt) by suppressing the truth. When these cases arise, all the mechanisms of suppression are invoked: propaganda (more lies), secrecy (the sequestering of facts and evidence), confiscation (ditto), and/or imprisonment (the great credibility destroyer) are all weapons in the arsenal of lies competing against truth. Whether we are talking about Galileo’s support for the theories of Copernicus, the idea within the biological sciences that organisms have evolved over billions of years, or any of several contradictory theories of the 9/11 attacks (including Hufschmid’s), the overall principle is the same: if we can examine the evidence carefully enough, with scientific help and explanations as might be needed, eventually we will all come to understand what the truth is, or at least a much-closer approximation of what the truth is.

It may take a substantially long time, but eventually the truth usually wins out. Over the long run, the truth cannot be suppressed, because eventually everybody who stands to gain from its suppression will die out. The difficulty, of course, is whether or not the evidence still exists necessary to establish the truth when the opponents of truth no longer hold sway. When we are dealing with matters of repetitive astronomy, like the motions of the planets around the Sun, that evidence cannot be destroyed by mankind (at least, not with our current technology). But when we are dealing with matters of the distant past for which no reliable evidence survives (such as the events surrounding the founding of the Christian religion), then those matters are destined to remain controversial for as long as any opponents remain to join the battle over what is true or untrue. Not every alleged fact is subject to being settled one way or the other through scientific inquiry.

So, it does occasionally happen that the truth becomes lost in the mists of history and can never be truly unraveled. But, in those cases, it stands to reason that the question at issue retains little meaning for those still alive. Are we now greatly concerned over whether or not Emperor Augustus was born of a virgin as his official biography claimed? (Hint: his sister was older than he was.) Due to the prevalence of Christianity, the only virgin birth that merits much attention these days is the birth of Jesus. Modern virgin births get little or no press at all. (In case you did not know, there are at least three scientific explanations for virgin births, only two of which currently can apply to human beings: artificial insemination, in vitro fertilization, and parthenogenesis.)

In any case, so long as the evidence exists, the truth can be found out. And if the evidence no longer exists, then the question will most likely lose importance over time. Either way, lies cannot be expected to survive into eternity. Eternal truths can.