Bearing in mind that truth can only occur in the domains of politics, love, art and science, perhaps the most straightforward example we can give is indeed in the realm of love between two individuals.
Two people meet by chance and fall in love, they commit to each other on the basis of this encounter (the event) and remain faithful to it. These individuals may not be able to fully understand their mutual attraction and commitment or be able to explain it to others. They might not have been able to predict such a development given what they knew of themselves and each other before it happened. The faithfulness to the event of their coming together might last for the rest of their lives, or far less long.
But having met each other and fallen in love, the individuals embark upon a process of truth and self-realisation as subjects in the only way possible, that is in fidelity to an event. It is not possible to prove (in an empirical, positivist sense) that an event has taken place, as the truth process associated with the event only exists through the active commitment of those who declare its existence and importance. It even eludes definition.
Truth is thus primarily a matter of conviction, intervention and action, a process which allows us in the only way possible to enjoy self-realisation as subjects. It occurs rarely and each manifestation of it is unique, but its significance is universal. Badiou’s distance from positivism and empiricism is emphasised by frequent assertions that truth contrasts starkly with knowledge, which is ‘what transmits, what repeats’ (IT, p. 61; EE, p. 269; C, p. 201). In the normal course of things, if ‘nothing happens’, there can be knowledge and there can be facts, but truth cannot occur (MP, pp. 16–17). Drawing inspiration from Lacan (C, p. 201), he describes the relationship between knowledge and truth thus: