Breann asked:

I've learned so much about all the different kinds of philosophers but never have I come across one
that believes in a little bit of everything. Is it possible that the determinists have some things right, the
skeptics have some things right, and the rationalists have some things right, and what were are
searching for, in fact, is the middle ground in which all theses ideas cross to form the absolute truth.
Is it possible that unless you can take the small truths from each one and combine them to form a
new thought process, that we may never reach truth at all?

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You might be interested that one of the great philosophers put forward the same thought. Leibniz in
one of his letters once wrote that in his reading, he always learnt something; and the more he
observed the cantankerousness of authors in respect of each other, the more he realised that where
they agreed all were probably right,but where they disputed with each other, all were probably wrong.
Take this pronouncement with the grain of salt which is intended. So there is one philosopher who
qualifies for your category of one who accepted a little bit of everything. I'm inclined to agree with you
and him as well. I'm sure that all philosophers have their ways in which they hit on a little bit of the
truth, each according to the shape of their mind.

However, there is a problem with the other assumption you're putting forth. One can't make a
philosophy from such bits and pieces. While you can learn from them, the most important aspect to
understand is that the truth is not in the bits, but the bits are in the truth. And although such great
thinkers as Aristotle and Confucius advocated what they called "The Golden Mean" as the most
probable way to approach the truth, I think they were really talking about the way to achieve
happiness and personal contentment, not the Truth with a capital 'T'. In fact Nietzsche once said (I
believe he was right in this) that the Truth is so elusive that only those who dared to approach it in the
most extreme fashion had any chance of actually touching it. So again you are right in saying that we
may never actually reach it. Leibniz is probably a very good instance of this: because in spite of his
acknowledgement above, he then went on to develop a philosophy of his own which is one of those
'extreme' paths to the truth that few people have been prepared to follow to the end.

You probably have heard it said many times that the Truth, for instance about ourselves, is usually a
bitter pill to swallow and that's why we resist it with all our might. This is an aspect to ponder. How
true! How hard it is to face up to ourselves, how hard we defend our own views and opinion and dig
our heels in when someone points out that we may be wrong about the beliefs we cherish most. You
might indeed say that this striving for the most bitter truths we must discover within ourselves is the
real beginning of a Philosophy of Truth, and this is one reason why thinkers who were obsessed by it,
such as Nietzsche, were loners, exaggerating everything, crying Wolf non-stop and eventually
snapping over. Truth is a dangerous thing!

Jürgen Lawrenz

Sydney