Copernicus 1473 - 1543

According to Ptolemy

According to Copernicus

Image from: www.mundesleyjuniorschool.com

Galileo 1564 - 1642

Image from: www.wikimedia.org

Image from: www.nclc.uconn.edu

Einstein 1879 - 1955Image from: www.rosenblumtv.wordpress.com

TruthA proposition is true if it• Corresponds to the world we perceive

• Coheres (fits with) other truths

• Is useful /works in practice (Pragmatic)

v.d. Lagemaat, p. 447

Image from: www.history.sandiego.edu

A recent example:

• In 1915, the Ottoman Turkish authorities carried out the systematic genocide of one and a half million Christian Armenians. Photographs, diplomatic reports, original Ottoman documentation, the process of an entire post-First World War Ottoman trial, Winston Churchill and Lloyd George and a massive report by the British Foreign Office in 1915 and 1916 prove that it is all true.

R. Fisk, INDEPENDENT, 10 November 2007

Current Turkish gov’t position:

• Armenians died in a "civil war", • they were anyway collaborating with

Turkey's Russian enemies, • fewer Armenians were killed than have

been claimed, • as many Turkish Muslims were murdered

as Armenians.

The US position:

• The US House Foreign Relations Committee voted last month to condemn the mass slaughter of Armenians as an act of genocide.

• General Yasar Buyukanit, chief of the Turkish armed forces, in an interview with the newspaper Milliyet. The passage of the House resolution . . was "sad and sorrowful" in view of the "strong links" Turkey maintained with its Nato partners.

R. Fisk, INDEPENDENT, 10 November 2007

• "We all deeply regret the tragic suffering of the Armenian people... But this resolution is not the right response to these historic mass killings. Its passage would do great harm to our relations with a key ally in Nato and in the global war on terror."

(G.W. Bush, in R. Fisk, INDEPENDENT, 10 November 2007)

Intellectual integrity

• Being willing to stand up for your best judgment of the truth . . .

. . . regardless of whether it fits with your immediate interests.

• Do you care about the truth?