Maimonides, one of the great Jewish scholars, suggested that there are three ways to know what is true: (1) Direct observation or experience (2) Reasoning, such as a logical deduction or proof, or a preponderance of evidence (3) Prophecy from a known prophet Let’s look at each of these in detail. Direct Observation or Experience Direct observation or experience is exactly that. We use our five senses to learn and understand what is true. (1) I saw it. (2) I heard it. (3) I tasted it. (4) I touched it. (5) I smelled it. Almost any knowledge of the physical world starts with these. Someone, somewhere, experienced something directly. Note that there are some limitations here. First, we can’t directly observe or experience everything. For example, I wasn’t alive during World War II, yet I hold that it occurred. We’ll talk about that in a moment. Second, our senses can be fooled. Movie-makers and magicians do it all the time. The art of special effects has become an amazingly complex discipline. Photographs are so easily modified today that any given photograph cannot necessarily be taken as real. We need to be on the lookout for these types of things. Reasoning, such as a logical deduction or proof, or a preponderance of evidence Let’s start with logical deductions or proofs. These, of course, require a knowledge of logic. (Ironically, in the days of the ancients, logic was considered a prerequisite to the study of any other subject matter. For how could one know whether he is reaching a proper conclusion without a knowledge of logic and deduction? Yet today, logic is an elective course. Consider how you would feel being diagnosed with a serious disease or medical condition by a doctor who had never been taught how to reach a proper conclusion.) As an example, logic dictates that a statement cannot be simultaneously true and not true. If A equals B, then it is not true that A is not equal to B. If I’m in Los Angeles at a given moment in time, then I cannot be in Venice at the same moment. Then there is preponderance of evidence. Consider this. Suppose that a stranger approaches me on the street and explains that he was abducted by aliens earlier that day, they took him up in their space ship, and he had a nice lunch of grilled cheese sandwiches with Elvis Presley. Would we believe him? After all, we weren’t there, so we have no direct experience. It could be true, but then again... Now consider World War II. Many of us didn’t experience that event directly either. Yet we believe that it happened. Why? This is where the important concept of the preponderance of evidence comes into play. Thousands upon thousands of people experienced the Second World War. Hundreds of books have been written about it. Movies have been made about it. There is so much direct observational evidence by those who experienced it that we can reasonably rely on their observations and direct experience. It is possible – and certainly happens – that one or two people make something up or lie about it. But the larger the group that is “in the know”, the harder it becomes to keep a lie a secret. Conspiracies become more difficult – and at some point virtually impossible – the more people are involved. For example, if one person tells me that a bank was robbed in my town earlier today, I may or may not believe him, depending on the person and perhaps other factors. But if 1,000 people report that there was a bank robbery in my town earlier today because they personally watched it happen from their office buildings (not because they read it on the Internet), then I can be fairly certain that something resembling a bank robbery occurred. We learn most of history this way. When there is a preponderance of evidence, we can be fairly certain that an event happened. In other historical situations, where we may have the account of only one or a small handful of people, the veracity of the account becomes more open to question. In fact, much of the knowledge we have comes from a preponderance of evidence based on the direct observations of others. If a doctor gives us a certain medication, we generally trust that it will work, not because we observed the clinical trials, but because there is a preponderance of evidence that the trials were conducted and that they yielded positive results. Prophecy from a known prophet A third way we can know something is true is if the information is provided through prophecy by a known prophet. Now, this would require that we establish that prophecy exists, and the criteria by which we can know that someone is a bona fide prophet. We’re not going to go into that in this series, but I want to include it just so our list is complete. For our purposes, we’re going to focus on the first two: direct observation or experience, and reasoning. But what about belief? Ah yes, then there is belief. So let’s ask the question, what is belief? I submit that “Belief is a conviction that I have concerning something about which I am ignorant.” Read that again. “Belief is a conviction that I have concerning something about which I am ignorant.” Why am I ignorant about it? Because if I knew – through direct observation or experience, or through reasoning – then I wouldn’t need to “believe”. Think about this. Have you ever heard anyone ask, “Do you believe in yogurt?” Of course not. “Yogurt?” you might say. “You mean that creamy white stuff that comes in small containers at the store? Usually in a variety of fruit flavors? Sure, I’m familiar with it. In fact, I had some this morning.” It wouldn’t mean anything to say that you “believe” in yogurt. By contrast, you “know” about yogurt. The only reason you might need to believe in yogurt is if you had no knowledge of it, in which case you’d be ignorant about it. But, you might ask, that’s great for something I can see and touch, but what about something that I can’t see or touch? Ok, how about electricity. Electricity is a flow of electrons. Which of us has actually seen the flow of electrons through a wire? Yet do we say that we “believe” in electricity? No, because we’ve worked with the effects of electricity long enough and studied it long enough to know that it actually exists. The only reason I would need belief around this would be if I were ignorant about it; that is, I had no knowledge of it. I submit to you that belief, in and of itself, means nothing. There are people who believe all kinds of things. Does that make them true? Does it make them not true? Actually, neither. A belief doesn’t tell us anything, and it virtually ends productive discussion. This point was brought home to me years ago when, as a consulting actuary, I was working on behalf of an organization that was considering giving a cost-of-living adjustment to the pension benefits that the company’s plan was paying to retired employees. The company was under no legal obligation to do this. They asked me and others to look into the question of whether they should grant this increase. (The retired employees were on fixed dollar pensions, so that any increase in the cost of goods and services in that society made it more difficult for them because their pension benefits were fixed at a certain level – determined at the time of retirement – for life.) After studying the issue, we determined that there was no business reason to grant a cost-of- living increase, but that it was a judgment call on the part of senior management of the company. The decision went all the way to the Board of Directors. All of the Directors agreed not to give the increase, except one. His position was, “Yes, I hear all of the facts. But I believe we have an obligation to these people.” In telling me this later, my manager sagely said, “As soon as someone says, ‘Yes, I hear all of the facts, but I believe such and such,’ all debate stops. Why? Because you cannot debate a belief.” This is a critical point. It is virtually impossible to debate a belief. If six people are standing around an all-white car, and five of them agree that the car is white, but the sixth person says, “Yes, I see that the car is white and that you all agree, but I believe the car is red,” what can you say? How can you argue with such a position? At that point, all discussion stops, because there is no way to continue.
Posted on: Sat, 14 Sep 2013 17:34:31 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015