Being Wrong - A Skeptic Manifesto
From "Being Wrong" p 318
"When Socrates taught his students, he didn't try to stuff them full of knowledge. Instead, he sought to full them with aporia with a sense of doubt, perplexity, and awe in the face of the complexity and contradictions of the world. If we are unable to embrace out fallibility, we lose out on that kind of doubt ... an active, investigative doubt: the kind that inspires us to wander onto shaky limbs or out into left field; the kind that doesn't so much divide the mind so much as multiply it, like a tree in which there are three black birds and the entire Bronx Zoo.This is the doubt we stand to sacrifice if we can't embrace error -- the doubt of curiosity, possibility and wonder"
This passage perfectly captures what it is to be Skeptical and open to wonder. To many, Christianity (or any religion) is all about "belief" or "faith" -- things accepted without evidence. That is not the way I see it. The part of our tradition that resonates with me is humility -- acknowledgement that I am fallible, wrong about 50% of the things I "believe" without knowing which 50%. I'm therefore open to wonder, standing before the amazing universe with big un-answered questions, ready, even eager to find that I've been wrong about something important.
"Being Wrong" points out one of the central strategies that protects me from the pain of constant wrongness: a sense of humour. I do not approach the world as a wise man, but as the court jester, full of impertinent questions.
"When Socrates taught his students, he didn't try to stuff them full of knowledge. Instead, he sought to full them with aporia with a sense of doubt, perplexity, and awe in the face of the complexity and contradictions of the world. If we are unable to embrace out fallibility, we lose out on that kind of doubt ... an active, investigative doubt: the kind that inspires us to wander onto shaky limbs or out into left field; the kind that doesn't so much divide the mind so much as multiply it, like a tree in which there are three black birds and the entire Bronx Zoo.This is the doubt we stand to sacrifice if we can't embrace error -- the doubt of curiosity, possibility and wonder"
This passage perfectly captures what it is to be Skeptical and open to wonder. To many, Christianity (or any religion) is all about "belief" or "faith" -- things accepted without evidence. That is not the way I see it. The part of our tradition that resonates with me is humility -- acknowledgement that I am fallible, wrong about 50% of the things I "believe" without knowing which 50%. I'm therefore open to wonder, standing before the amazing universe with big un-answered questions, ready, even eager to find that I've been wrong about something important.
"Being Wrong" points out one of the central strategies that protects me from the pain of constant wrongness: a sense of humour. I do not approach the world as a wise man, but as the court jester, full of impertinent questions.
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