In my experience, people appear to have informal, relatively fluid and vague concepts for things that also have formal, precise and rigorous definitions/expressions in systematic thought, shall we say. Truth appears to be one such thing, as I am sure others have noted here.
When someone speaks of “my truth” there could be a few things implied or confounded within that declaration
What “feels” true to me right here, right now
I can see the arguments, but the chain leads to a core belief of mine that simply cannot be wrong given my worldview, identity etc, therefore it may seem true to you, given what you know, but it is not true to me given what I know to be also true
As others have suggested, this may be a conversation-stopper because the argument is emotionally upsetting, or the other side suspects your motives or reasoning but does not want to engage, or they simply do not care for the emotional and mental energy involved in adjudication of such matters as truth (as defined as beliefs matching some presumed objective reality).
People’s reasoning often appears motivated, utility-driven (be it status, or actual rewards or whatever), ergo they may be redefining truth in terms of what would maximise their expected utility in the context in question...so, for example if you, a sceptic/atheist are debating a religious person in the company of their fellow believers, they have more utility in winning or appearing to reach a noble impasse with you than re-negotiate their beliefs in public. Given how a lot of people do not like to admit to being wrong (and this includes everyone, at some point, and requires good metacognitive discipline to overcome), even if it is a two-person conversation, if the topic is one that requires “truth” to be brought into the picture (well, “Pikachu is ridiculous”...could be the topic, for all I know...in which case, there are very few truthful propositions to examine...), the motivation to not lose face, or not yield may be strong.
The rational response to such a comment is to issue oneself a firm “nolle prosequi” and exit the conversation politely*.
I have no idea what the conversation was about, so I cannot know the truth of things ;)
*if the topic happened to be one with sufficient fogginess in the real world , re-examining one’s own beliefs would be a necessary step—heck, I’d re-evaluate anyway, just as a sanity check.
In my experience, people appear to have informal, relatively fluid and vague concepts for things that also have formal, precise and rigorous definitions/expressions in systematic thought, shall we say. Truth appears to be one such thing, as I am sure others have noted here. When someone speaks of “my truth” there could be a few things implied or confounded within that declaration
What “feels” true to me right here, right now
I can see the arguments, but the chain leads to a core belief of mine that simply cannot be wrong given my worldview, identity etc, therefore it may seem true to you, given what you know, but it is not true to me given what I know to be also true
As others have suggested, this may be a conversation-stopper because the argument is emotionally upsetting, or the other side suspects your motives or reasoning but does not want to engage, or they simply do not care for the emotional and mental energy involved in adjudication of such matters as truth (as defined as beliefs matching some presumed objective reality).
People’s reasoning often appears motivated, utility-driven (be it status, or actual rewards or whatever), ergo they may be redefining truth in terms of what would maximise their expected utility in the context in question...so, for example if you, a sceptic/atheist are debating a religious person in the company of their fellow believers, they have more utility in winning or appearing to reach a noble impasse with you than re-negotiate their beliefs in public. Given how a lot of people do not like to admit to being wrong (and this includes everyone, at some point, and requires good metacognitive discipline to overcome), even if it is a two-person conversation, if the topic is one that requires “truth” to be brought into the picture (well, “Pikachu is ridiculous”...could be the topic, for all I know...in which case, there are very few truthful propositions to examine...), the motivation to not lose face, or not yield may be strong.
The rational response to such a comment is to issue oneself a firm “nolle prosequi” and exit the conversation politely*. I have no idea what the conversation was about, so I cannot know the truth of things ;)
*if the topic happened to be one with sufficient fogginess in the real world , re-examining one’s own beliefs would be a necessary step—heck, I’d re-evaluate anyway, just as a sanity check.