Jane_the_Bane
Gaia's godchild
- Feb 11, 2004
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Naturally, you won't find too many people who do not believe that their world view matches the reality they experience - if any. Still, you will find them ending up with totally different convictions about the nature of the universe, the purpose of life, their moral convictions, their political ideals and so forth.
For example, Objectivists and Communists both claim to follow a world view based on nothing but objective facts observed and analysed by reason - and yet, they could not be more diametrically opposed.
With that it mind, let me try to answer how *I* figure out what's what:
The scientific method clearly provides the best way to prevent confirmation bias and subjectivity from messing up our understanding of natural processes: these errors still occur, but the method accounts for them and tries its best to eliminate their influence. Accordingly, we've already learned quite a few things that are vastly counter-intuitive, and yet are sustained by the evidence.
But the scientific method cannot be a substitute for the humanities; philosophy, spirituality, anthropology, etc. In all matters of generated meaning, matters become a bit more complicated. I like to look at these matters from a Post-Structuralist/Deconstructionist perspective, meaning that I acknowledge language as a self-referential medium that already projects specific ways of interpreting the world upon things: it doesn't merely *label* a pre-existing framework, but *creates* it to begin with.
Looking at religious/mythological texts, I see human beings trying to understand their place in the greater scheme of things, NOT divine beings communicating with man. Quasi-human agency is projected upon an enormous canvas, and totally indifferent, undirected natural events suddenly become intentional punishments, godly omens or divine displays of power. I believe that it takes special pleading to single out a specific text and claim that it is different from all the rest of a fundamental level, constituting the One True Revelation.
For example, Objectivists and Communists both claim to follow a world view based on nothing but objective facts observed and analysed by reason - and yet, they could not be more diametrically opposed.
With that it mind, let me try to answer how *I* figure out what's what:
The scientific method clearly provides the best way to prevent confirmation bias and subjectivity from messing up our understanding of natural processes: these errors still occur, but the method accounts for them and tries its best to eliminate their influence. Accordingly, we've already learned quite a few things that are vastly counter-intuitive, and yet are sustained by the evidence.
But the scientific method cannot be a substitute for the humanities; philosophy, spirituality, anthropology, etc. In all matters of generated meaning, matters become a bit more complicated. I like to look at these matters from a Post-Structuralist/Deconstructionist perspective, meaning that I acknowledge language as a self-referential medium that already projects specific ways of interpreting the world upon things: it doesn't merely *label* a pre-existing framework, but *creates* it to begin with.
Looking at religious/mythological texts, I see human beings trying to understand their place in the greater scheme of things, NOT divine beings communicating with man. Quasi-human agency is projected upon an enormous canvas, and totally indifferent, undirected natural events suddenly become intentional punishments, godly omens or divine displays of power. I believe that it takes special pleading to single out a specific text and claim that it is different from all the rest of a fundamental level, constituting the One True Revelation.
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