Saturday, August 29, 2009

How Do I Know?

Curmudgeons call me a well informed ignoramus. But I do know stuff, dude, and here's how:

1. Wikipedias. So many people adding so much just makes it "true." And I chose which Wikis to believe.
2. Perception is reality. What else is there?
3. Subjective satisfaction does the trick. It feels good, so it works, so it is "true."
4. Oprah said it.
5. Truth is what my social networking site lets me get away with, which is just about anything.
6. All absolutes are false!
7. All restrictions on my free-flowing, ever-evolving self are false.

There's my epistemology, you curmudgeons! Deal with it.

3 comments:

pgepps said...

I really don't want to disagree with you except possibly on #1, and on your tacit arguments in a couple of the others. However, the most entertaining way to deal with those tacit concerns is to attempt to explicate you by contraries.

Just to keep these tensions live, then, O Curmudgeon:

1) as opposed to encylopedias, whose editorial boards continually revise what is "true" to push sales, then release increasingly unedited material to the 'Net to cover for sagging sales.

2) as opposed to ideology, which allows me to believe whatever I don't know someone taught me.

3) as opposed to objectively metered goods like "the American dream." The union, the doctor, the school board, the insurance company, and Planned Parenthood said it was good, so it is objectively true. With statistics!!!

4) O'Reilly said it.

5) Truth is what my kaffeesklatch exults in, error what it abhors, which is whatever the news tells them to gab about.

6) All critiques are subversive!

7) All efforts to differentiate what a fallen, frail, fallible, self-deceived, God-hating being has already been given of truth from the truth not yet apprehended by any human except Christ infallibly, and even by Him not without exception ( Matt 24:36 ) are relativisms!

Peace,
PGE

Neil said...

LOL. Re. Wikipedia, which admittedly is useful for topics with no controversial elements, Michael Scott from The Office said it best:

"Wikipedia is the best thing ever. Anyone in the world can write anything they want about any subject, so you know you are getting the best possible information."

David said...

DG,

I do think you're being too hard on Wikipedia. It really is a decent resource for initial learning on a subject. Not to be cited in academic papers, to be sure--but helpful nonetheless.