#VoxPopuli | Painting the canvas of truth

The Science Scholar
The Science Scholar
3 min readFeb 27, 2023

by Alec Reyes

Cover art by Eris Ramos

Pisay’s school hymn urges scholars to search for the “untarnished truth.” While this is a noble endeavor, we also have personal needs to meet, such as our financial and psychological well-being. How, then, do we take care of our own welfare without sacrificing the pursuit for the untarnished truth?

The human pursuit of untarnished truth is analogous to drawing a portrait. The artist needs to be of good health and needs to use a pencil to draw a portrait. Likewise, in order to pursue the untarnished truth, we need to be of good physical and mental condition, and we need to be actively searching for it. While balancing work and life seems easily solvable by utilizing time management and similar techniques, it overlooks the fact that we would often need to be searching for a lifetime in order to find the untarnished truth, since in a STEM school and career, we normally pursue the untarnished truth through field research.

Expanding our previous analogy, it takes patience to draw a portrait, and along the way we must sharpen the pencil. Likewise, scientists spend their entire lives conducting research in a particular field of study and refining the theories and methodology over time. While the process is slow, there are a lot of activities that come with performing research. This leaves little time for leisure in between analyzing, publishing, and conducting the research. In addition, research is not an exceptionally lucrative profession, which leaves people with very little financial options other than to work. There is no choice but to keep drawing the portrait of the untarnished truth, even if the artist is degrading by the day.

However, if the untarnished truth is the universal truth of all things, wouldn’t the portrait of untarnished truth feature all the shades, colors, and tints of the world, rather than just a pencil drawing? If that were the case, then wouldn’t the artist have the freedom to choose whichever color they please? People are as unique as the colors of the world, surely they could find a color which inspires them most, which resonates with them most, which invigorates them most. For one person, that color may be mathematics; for another person, it may be microbiology; and for yet another, it could be pedagogy. With the color of choosing, it will energize rather than fatigue. It functions as leisure and play, because of the fun and joy from painting the untarnished truth instead of seeing it as work. It also functions as common ground for people to socialize and form long-term relationships with others. If you combine all of the portraits created, the untarnished universal truth of mankind is formulated.

These colors were imprinted in our genetics and early childhood, and reveal themselves as activities we were enthralled with as young children but were conditioned not to enjoy. Alternatively, it could also be activities we are naturally talented at. For example, one may have been intrigued by psychology, but grew out of it when they discovered it did not fit within the trends of that time.

While it may be difficult to find the color that fits, the reward for finding the right color far outweighs the cost of periodic introspection and reflection. This can be seen in the great scientists we hear and see in our textbooks. Einstein, Newton, and many others found the color which resonates with them most, and added to the universal portrait strokes so large and significant, it serves as the baseline of millions of other, more intricate and unique strokes. What the portrait of universal untarnished truth is missing is not shades from a standard pencil, but rather the strokes of a vibrant, novel color only you can provide.

*This was the winning essay for this school year’s Grade 9 Humanities Festival Essay Writing Contest.

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The Science Scholar
The Science Scholar

The official English publication of the Philippine Science High School–Main Campus. Views are representative of the entire paper.