section_path: Views/Modern philosophy/Fromm (1900–1980)
section_name: Fromm (1900–1980)
paragraph_text: Fromm (1900–1980)
  
  Erich Fromm finds that trying to discuss truth as "absolute truth" is sterile and that emphasis ought to be placed on "optimal truth". He considers truth as stemming from the survival imperative of grasping one's environment physically and intellectually, whereby young children instinctively seek truth so as to orient themselves in "a strange and powerful world". The accuracy of their perceived approximation of the truth will therefore have direct consequences on their ability to deal with their environment. Fromm can be understood to define truth as a functional approximation of reality. His vision of optimal truth is described partly in Man for Himself: An Inquiry into the Psychology of Ethics (1947), from which excerpts are included below.