Written by Geoffrey Chia
Philosophical Musings #1
Dear E,
It may be reasonable to summarise the job description of a Philosopher as being to “question everything”. The website by Professor George Mobus is in fact titled “question everything“. He is a scientific systems analyst and his view of the world is similar to mine, each arrived at independently.
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I agree with your assertion, consistent with my personal painful experience, that it is generally impossible to change people’s minds by rational, logical argument. More about that later. There are not enough hours and minutes in our short lives to question everything, so we have to limit ourselves to questioning the most important things and those crucial questions can form the bedrock foundation for your career in philosophy.
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A couple of years ago I attended a talk on philosophy by a university academic, organised by the Skeptics Society of Brisbane. At the end, I asked him what his definition of “truth” was and he gave me a roundabout non-answer, name-dropping a lot of dead male philosophers but ultimately stating he had no working definition of truth because we could “never” know what absolute truth is. I, therefore, decided that he was a useless ivory tower academic with nothing worthwhile to offer the world.
I assert that there are fewer things more important in life than determining truth. Why? To answer that we must define what we mean by truth. For what it is worth, here are my two cents regarding how we can find out truth, based on my study, training, and work as a Physician and Cardiologist:
https://doczz.net/doc/6511054/dr-geoffrey-chia-seeking-truth-in-science
My definition of truth is “that paradigm which best approximates objective reality“. Of course, we can never determine absolute objective reality with perfect precision and certainty. However in many, if not most situations, by employing the process of evidence-based rational inquiry, we can reach a good working approximation of objective reality. This process is none other than the scientific method, the most spectacularly successful way to determine objective truth that has ever been devised in the history of humanity.
Bottom line: Objective reality does exist, but we can never determine it with absolute precision and certainty (indeed, Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle is a keystone Law of Physics, as is the three-body problem). We can, however, (mostly) determine a useful approximation of objective reality to a high degree of accuracy. We call this truth with a small “t”.
- For the physician, truth is a correct diagnosis, without which proper treatment is impossible.
- For the judge and jury, truth is a correct verdict, without which justice is impossible.
- For the epidemiologist, truth is correct understanding of disease spread, without which pandemic control is impossible.
- For the traveler, truth is an accurate map, without which navigation is impossible.
- For the ordinary person, truth is acceptance of the reality of anthropogenic climate change, without which proper action to mitigate against horrific death and suffering is impossible.
If our policies are not determined by truth, our societies will ultimately disintegrate and we are doomed. This is why the stock market Ponzi scheme based on lies is poised to collapse soon and why America is in the process of unraveling.
I previously wrote a series of articles about mental health (roughly defined as a mindset consistent with objective reality) and mental illness (roughly defined as a mindset divorced from reality). Apologies for the inadvertent weird text formatting due to a transcription glitch:
http://www.doomsteaddiner.net/blog/2015/03/21/thinking-about-thinking/ http://www.doomsteaddiner.net/blog/2015/04/16/on-belief/ http://www.doomsteaddiner.net/blog/2015/04/22/on-the-nature-of-belief-appendices/
If your job is to question everything, then surely you should also question Socrates, who supposedly said that “the unexamined life is not worth living“? I questioned it and concluded that Socrates’ assertion was not only incorrect, it was also shamelessly self-serving. I suspect other philosophers unquestioningly accepted that “axiom” because it was self-serving for them as well. However, I do agree that deep philosophical inquiry can contribute to the richness of life and can even be life-saving.
Going back to our previous assertion that it is impossible to get people to change their minds by rational, logical arguments: If finding out truth is one of the most important things in life and if that process requires rationality and logic and if people cannot be convinced by rational and logical arguments, then why even bother? Just give up. May as well just stay at home and binge-watch Scandi-noir TV thrillers.
I agree it is impossible to change the deluded minds of the vast majority of people by rational argument. The sheeple have been brainwashed by religious/political/cultural/commercial propaganda over their lifetimes and will never leave their thought-prisons, even in extremis. The climate change denier will deny the reality of global warming, even as the unseasonal bush fire engulfs his house and burns his body to a crisp.
But here is the bottom line: it is possible to change the minds of a tiny minority of people by rational arguments, people George Mobus describes as “sapients”. I like to think I am one such person, having benefited from a scientific education and having learned to believe in real things and to discard nonsense (gave up on the Catholic faith at age 15). I hope and believe you are sapient too. It is this tiny minority of people, my guess being less than 1% of the population, upon which the entire survival of humanity rests. Going back to the most important questions that we should focus on: different people will have different priorities. The questions I am most interested in are:
- What is truth? (which I believe I have largely answered, at least to my own satisfaction)
- Do we face near-term human extinction? (short answer: yes, if we continue on our current trajectory)
- What can we do to avoid near-term human extinction? That is a short question with a long answer. Part of my personal answer is to also eventually move out of the city.
Sorry again for the length of this email but I hope it is of some use to you. Feel free to critique my views. Question everything, right?
Best regards,
Geoffrey
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