The 3 doors words must pass through...

An acquaintance of Socrates one day came up to him and said, “Do you know what I just heard about your friend?”

“Hold on a minute,” Socrates replied. “Before you talk to me about my friend, it might be a good idea to take a moment and filter what you are about to say.

That’s why I call it the triple filter test.

The first filter is Truth.

Have you made absolutely sure that what you are about to tell me is true?”
“Well, no,” the man said, “actually I just heard about it and…”

“All right,” said Socrates. “So you don’t really know if it’s true or not.


Now, let’s try the second filter, the filter of Goodness. Is what you are about to tell me about my friend something good?”
“Umm, no, on the contrary…”

“So,” Socrates continued, “you want to tell me something bad about my friend, but you are not certain it’s true.


You may still pass the test though, because there’s one filter left --
the filter of Usefulness.

Is what you want to tell me about my friend going to be useful to me?”

“No, not really.”

“Well,” concluded Socrates, “if what you want to tell me is neither true, nor good, nor even useful, why tell it to me at all?”