Deciding What to Believe: Exploring Different Types of Truth

1. 19-Oct-19 How do you decide what to believe? Young woman Old woman

2. How do you decide what to believe? Duck Rabbit

3. Is there anything we can know for certain? ‘The earth is a cube.’ THERE IS ACTUALLY A FLAT EARTH SOCIETY! False True

4. ‘It’s cruel to keep too many animals.’ False True

5. ‘King Henry VIII married 6 times.’ False True

6. ‘If we are good in this life we will spend an eternity in paradise.’ False True

7. Different kinds of truth Objectives By the end of this lesson you should be able to… Describe different kinds of truths Choose which ‘truth’ is most important Question whether any truth can be considered alwaystrue Keywords Truth, moral, scientific, historical, religious

8. The media Through scientific evidence Through historical evidence How do you decide what to believe? Think about which is the most important to you? Teachers Through religious leaders and texts Through family and friends

9. How do we know what to believe and what should be considered to be true? There are different kinds of ‘truth’ Historical truth: Something is considered to be true because there are historical records that thing is true. The more evidence there is for something then the more likely it is we’ll believe it. Scientific truth: Science attempts to prove things through observations and tests. The more tests and observations that are done make the data even more reliable. Moral truth: This is the idea that some actions are right or wrong and that is a ‘true’ way in which humans should act. Religious/spiritual truth: This means that you consider something is true or false because of your religious and or spiritual beliefs.

10. What does this picture show? Can you think of an argument using scientific ‘truth’ to claim that the Loch Ness monster is real? Can you now try and think of an argument using historical ‘truths’ to prove the same thing? More difficult, but can you think of a religious or moral way of arguing its existence? IMPORTANT: You don’t have to believe the ‘truth’, this is just an exercise to see how people might use these methods to justify their belief in something.

11. In pairs try to come up with a statement you could say is a truth that relates to historical , scientific, moral and religious. You don’t have to believe these statements but you’ll have to explain how someone might believe it using these ideas. The Romans came to Britain

12. Challenge time • How many apps do you know?

13. Would you be able to use this? Have you ever helped an adult with technology? What 3 things could you do to check the quality of online content?

14. Different kinds of truth For each of the following write your own definition of the term and then give an example. Religious truth: When you believe something is true because of your religious views e.g. God exists Moral truth: Scientific truth: Historical truth: Which type of truth do you think is the most reliable and why?

15. We are going to play the LEFT, RIGHT, BACK game Religious Moral Truth Historical Truth Scientific Truth

16. Henry VIII had six wives Religious Historical Moral Scientific

17. It is wrong to bully Religious Historical Moral Scientific

18. We go to heaven when we die Religious Historical Moral Scientific

19. The Earth is a sphere demonstrate Religious Historical Moral Scientific

20. Stealing is wrong demonstrate Religious Historical Moral Scientific

21. The Great Fire of London was in 1666 Religious Historical Moral Scientific

22. Mohammed was Allah’s greatest prophet Religious Historical Moral Scientific

23. On your Post-It note write IN 12 WORDS which of the truths you think is the most reliable.