I came across this article the other day, and found it fairly interesting. For those that don't want to read it, the basic idea is that, while we have not yet reached ultimate knowledge about the universe, we are closer than we were before. Asimov claims that if we examine the history of science, we can see that each change in theory is not a complete rewrite, but a modification of what came before. So, going from the idea of the earth as flat to the earth as round is a correction. Going from the earth as round to the earth as an oblate spheroid is also a correction, but it is not as large as a correction. In effect, when we claimed the earth is round, we were wrong. But we were less wrong than when we claimed it was flat.
My question then, is do you think philosophy progresses in the same way? That we may not know all of the answers, but the longer the ideas get tossed around by different thinkers, the closer we can come to the truth?
My question then, is do you think philosophy progresses in the same way? That we may not know all of the answers, but the longer the ideas get tossed around by different thinkers, the closer we can come to the truth?