Warning: Parameter 1 to wp_default_styles() expected to be a reference, value given in /homepages/16/d202020116/htdocs/worldwide/wp-includes/plugin.php on line 601

Warning: Parameter 1 to wp_default_scripts() expected to be a reference, value given in /homepages/16/d202020116/htdocs/worldwide/wp-includes/plugin.php on line 601
Worldwide Ace » The Great Unknown

Worldwide Ace

Because a true Ace is needed everywhere…

Entries Comments


The Great Unknown

15 March, 2005 (06:55) | Philosophy

I don’t know.

I don’t know why two plus two equals four, but I can prove it. I don’t know why math, a system based on axioms, still stands. I don’t know why we can prove something false, but we can’t prove something true.

I don’t know if the facts I know are actually fiction or if the fiction I know is rife with facts. I don’t know if the knowledge imparted to me today will still be with me tomorrow. I don’t know if the knowledge imparted to me yesterday is still with me today.

I don’t know if the pen is mightier than the sword. I don’t know what lurks in the minds of men. I don’t know how people think or what they want. I don’t think I even know what I want.

I don’t know why we’re here. I don’t know how to make a dream a reality. I don’t know the difference between being alive and living. I certainly don’t know what makes me tick. I don’t know how people can claim to know; I’m just guessing and getting lucky every time I’m right.

The fact is that I don’t know. I’m given the criteria, the data, the experience, and even for knowing all that, I still don’t know anything.

I’m tired of people giving advice that they don’t know is right. I’m sick of giving advice I don’t know is right. I’m jaded that well-intentioned theories with incredible flaws are ignored because of good intentions. I’m fed up with people refusing to admit they don’t know.

And worst of all, I still don’t know if they really don’t know either.

«

  »

  • Well, it comes down to a paradox.

    When you start your education, you don’t really know anything.

    No matter how much knowledge you gain, you still don’t really know anything for sure.

    But this is like the paradox that goes “to get from point A to point B, an object must go through the halfway point of every distance increment between point A and point B, and since you can infinitely take the half of any increment, how does it ever get there?”. Somewhere along the line, humans got from where they were to where they are, without ever really truly knowing anything, yet there was still progress in terms of knowledge (or at least nifty tricks).

    I like philosophy, but I get annoyed at the circles it goes in. In my opinion, knowledge is what is consistently consistent with our experience. If at any point it stops being consistent, it stops being knowledge. There’s no way for us to find out the absolute truth, so philosophizing about it is inevitably bound to lead us in circles. I try to live my life in accordance with the pursuit of my definition of knowledge as it pertains to its applications. There’s not a whole hell of a lot I can do beyond that.

  • Well, it comes down to a paradox.

    When you start your education, you don’t really know anything.

    No matter how much knowledge you gain, you still don’t really know anything for sure.

    But this is like the paradox that goes “to get from point A to point B, an object must go through the halfway point of every distance increment between point A and point B, and since you can infinitely take the half of any increment, how does it ever get there?”. Somewhere along the line, humans got from where they were to where they are, without ever really truly knowing anything, yet there was still progress in terms of knowledge (or at least nifty tricks).

    I like philosophy, but I get annoyed at the circles it goes in. In my opinion, knowledge is what is consistently consistent with our experience. If at any point it stops being consistent, it stops being knowledge. There’s no way for us to find out the absolute truth, so philosophizing about it is inevitably bound to lead us in circles. I try to live my life in accordance with the pursuit of my definition of knowledge as it pertains to its applications. There’s not a whole hell of a lot I can do beyond that.

  • That paradox was originally proposed as “Achilles and the Turtle” by Aristotle. And I agree about philosophising about life. The issue isn’t that I don’t know, or that other don’t know, it’s with the fact that people refuse to admit it far too often. Advice is just a wild guess, yet it’s rarely put into a context of “this is my opinion” or “this may not work.”

    I don’t care if what I believe is true is really true since everything I know is applicable to this existence as I experience it. I do care that people have such a short-sighted nature as to what’s the right way and what’s the wrong way.

  • That paradox was originally proposed as “Achilles and the Turtle” by Aristotle. And I agree about philosophising about life. The issue isn’t that I don’t know, or that other don’t know, it’s with the fact that people refuse to admit it far too often. Advice is just a wild guess, yet it’s rarely put into a context of “this is my opinion” or “this may not work.”

    I don’t care if what I believe is true is really true since everything I know is applicable to this existence as I experience it. I do care that people have such a short-sighted nature as to what’s the right way and what’s the wrong way.