*===========                 Public disclaimer                 ===========*
The following document is opinion based and relies on very few concrete
sources, if any (those used will be noted).  Comments are welcome to the
media in which this was found, or via email.  Comments may be read, unread,
deleted for no cause, deleted for good reason, ignored, archived, burned, or
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This document is response rated: 3 - author will post and mostly ignore
(c) 1997 Lion Templin (jtemplin@monolith.leonine.com)
*===========                 Public disclaimer                 ===========*

                     Proving Individual Contherianthropy
                     ===================================

                               by Lion Templin

                with special appearance by Christopher Hughes

           copies of this paper and  other papers may be found at:
                   http://www.leonine.com/~jtemplin/mt_d/

Part I - Assume the truth

I assume several things in this set of theories.  These are only assumptions
to keep the explanation from getting too complex.

 o You have read and understood a previous paper, _A short view on
          modern contherianthropy_.  You should understand the difference
          between therianthropy and contherianthropy. [1]

 o You include all assumptions listed in Part I of _A modern view of
          modern contherianthropy_.

 o You have read and understood a previous paper, _Fun with Faith:
          The Fallacy of Therianthropy_. [2]

Part II - Question the truth

Because of the nature of contherianthropes [see 1], one's self knowledge of
their contherianthropic status would provide a basis for the remainder of
their life, giving the individual a baseline for reactions and long term
goals.  However, barring infection, contherianthropic persons may or may not
know of their therianthropic status because of the deep level in which the
animalistic nature resides.  Reactions based upon their animalistic nature
may appear to be distinct parts of an individual personality with
justifiable origins.  The case may be, however, that these reactions are
truly based upon their own segments of species specific nature.  Some will
discover it with time, however, there are some that will fail to notice
their animalistic nature and continue through life unknowing of the
deep-coded segments that do indeed make up their personality.  Because the
individual may not have self-knowledge of their own contherianthropic status,
self-knowledge is not a tenet of contherianthropy.

Therefore, in determining contherianthropy, a simple poll of the individual
fails the determine their status.  In fact, a poll could possibly lead to
incorrect results because of the possibility of infection.  When a subject
is confronted with the question of their status, three basic response sets
exist:

 o "Yes, I am."
     This result has two possible reasons:
  1) The individual IS a contherianthrope.
  2) The individual has been infected by the therianthropic
                   model.
 o "No, I am not."
     This result also has two possible reasons:
  1) The individual IS NOT a contherianthrope.
  2) The individual is unaware of their contherianthropic
                nature.
 o "I do not know."
     Finally, this result also has two possible reasons:
  1) The individual IS NOT a contherianthrope, but could be:
   - investigating contherianthropy openly.
   - bordering on infection.
  2) The individual IS a contherianthrope, and is:
   - investigating CTH openly.
   - bordering on denial.

You will notice that any answer given contains both truth values, that of
being and not being contherianthropic.  By this, the poll method is
ambiguous in determining contherianthropic status and fails.

Part III - Question your own truth

Because of the danger of infection, polling also can be dangerous to the
results of the poll.  If the individual becomes infected at poll time, the
YES answer will skew the results.  However, the knowledge of the exsistance
of CTH may be the only way a person can identify and understand the nature
of themselves.  Many have, in the past, understood their own nature without
being able to put solid theory to it.  However, this percentage of
individuals will remain low as the percentage of individuals that are
self-aware enough to observe their animalistic nature.  Those who have
trouble, through past knowledge and/or environment, understanding themselves
(many just lack time) will never achieve self-knowledge because the amount
of work involved in self-determination is high.  Therefore, the risk one
takes with contacting contherianthropic theory is acceptable because of the
possible outcome of understanding one's self.  The poll answer then results
in these basic long term answers:

 o "Yes"
      The person IS contherianthropic and will benefit from this
             knowledge.
 o "Yes"
      The person has become infected, but rational thought will
             destroy the misconception. [2]  See "No".
 o "No"
      The person has determined WHAT THEY ARE NOT, which still has
             use in self-determination.  Elimination of a specific
             possibility allows for n-1 possibilities.
 o "No"
      The person has denied their contherianthropic status.  The
             value of this is questionable, for it may provide problems in
             the future or benefit the individual because contherianthropy
             is incompatible with their current and deep-set belief systems. 
             All other results have positive ends, with this exception of
             this result, with is unknown at best.

But again we are confronted with both IS and IS NOT answers in the results. 
The reason we find this behavior is because we are attempting to determine
the truth value from within the system.

 Any system needs basic underlying principals to operate.  The
        principals, or axioms, form the base of the system and without the
        axioms, the system would fail to function.  Because the axioms
        determine the rest of the system, they cannot be tested from within
        the system simply because the system relies on the axioms and always
        assume the axioms are true.
  [paraphrased from conversation with Christopher Hughes]

Since contherianthropy is an axiom of the system, testing from within the
system can fail because of the link between the running system and it's
axioms.  Therefore, testing of contherianthropy requires a view from outside
the system.  But then the question is what outside the system can provide
the correct truth value?

Part IV - Question other's truth

One may surmise that soliciting the opinions of those close to the individual
may indirectly be able to lend direction to the truth value.  Usually those
close to the individual could see those traits associated with
contherianthropy.  However, a problem occurs when you face a biased set of
persons.  They too may fail to see animalistic nature or see nature that is
not present and/or is attributable to other sources.  This is possible
because in the first case, the individual does not have the knowledge to
judge nominal and animalistic reactions, or in the second case, is already
predisposed to the individual's claims.  However, it may be common to those
who are therianthropic to have middle-level relations that will make remarks
such as "He seems like a big bear." but not understand what the source of
that behavior is.  All in all, the opinions of others close to the
individual are suspect.  The idea of those that don't know the subject
judging the truth value is also invalid simply because of the deep-set
nature of therianthropy requires time and contact to understand the
individual.  Finally, leaving such a judgment to non-solicited marginal
individuals making leading comments is such a low probability that it also
is invalid.

Another possibility is to trust the judgment of another individual that
claims to be a specialist in the field.  Since the nature of
contherianthropy is beyond current science in studying the brain or soul,
this option then leads to persons marginal to science.  Shamans, psychics,
healers, what have you, are all those who claim to understand that which
science is unable to prove.  Many more problems appear here because an
attempt is made to levy judgment by an individual who's methods are
possibly questionable, unrepeatable, and for the most part, unknown.  Beyond
that, the question remains just who of these people do you trust to make
such a judgment?  And furthermore, since the issue again comes down to
individual opinion on the part of the judge and the person themselves, the
acceptability of such judgments will not be universal.

Part V - Question your faith

Until contherianthropy is something that can be scientifically proven, it
will always remain questionable.  As with everything marginal to science,
contherianthropy as it is now requires faith.  Faith in your own judgments,
faith in those who judge you, and faith in the judgments others have made
of themselves.  Until directed physical study, which is unlikely to be taken
up, if even possible, is available, contherianthropy must remain a study of
the mind and philosophy.  It may be possible though such study to robustly
prove contherianthropy, but as it currently stands, only indicators,
directors, and implications are useful in providing a direction for faith. 
Note ONLY a direction for faith.  That direction may be taken up only to be
later proven wrong, or ignored only to be proven correct.  Because we only
have .. at this time .. direction available to us, we can take into account
the opinions of friends and respected specialists.  We can also take our own
views into the direction.  But, until a robust proof of contherianthropy is
available, we only can rely on a direction to base faith upon.

Keep in mind, however, in using such unreliable sources for a basis of
faith, doubt will always be present in the system.  Doubt of one's self and
doubt of other's claims.  Doubt may be reduced by more evidence attempting
to imply the truth, but total removal of doubt is not possible.  Only
determining the total truth value in a directly observable and repeatable
scientific method could remove doubt completely.