Post by Tannaidhe on Dec 19, 2005 5:49:26 GMT -5
I would like to share a (fairly long) quote with you from the book I am reading, 'Enchantment', by Orson Scott Card.
"Where exactly did I earn the reputation of an unskeptical believer of whatever bullshit comes down the pike? And you, Father, when did you become the supreme rationalist, the impartial judge of evidence you haven't even seen? It seems to me that I'm the eyewitness, and you're the one making judgments based purely on your pre-existing faith."
"Faith in a rational universe, yes."
"No, Father. You don't have faith in a rational universe. This is a universe where nothing can move faster than the utterly arbitrary speed of 186,000 miles per second, where feathers and rocks fall at the same speed in a vacuum, where a measurable but inexplicable force called gravity binds people to planets and planets to stars, and where a butterfly's wing in China might cause a hurricane in the Caribbean. But you have faith in all this incomprehensible mumbo-jumbo which you don't begin to understand, solely because the priests of the established church of the intellectuals have declared these to be immutable laws and you, being a faithful supplicant at their altar, don't even think to question them."
"You sound like a convert to a new religion yourself," said Father dryly.
"Maybe I am. Or maybe I'm the guy who crawled out of the cave, and you're still back inside it, trying to understand the universe by studying shadows on the wall. Well, Father, I've seen things that can only be explained by magic. Now, I guess I'm really still a closet materialist, because I believe these things all have rational explanations, using principles of nature that are not yet known to us. But what I can't do is close my eyes and pretend that the things that have happened to me will go away if I just say 'Einstein' five times fast."
"Where exactly did I earn the reputation of an unskeptical believer of whatever bullshit comes down the pike? And you, Father, when did you become the supreme rationalist, the impartial judge of evidence you haven't even seen? It seems to me that I'm the eyewitness, and you're the one making judgments based purely on your pre-existing faith."
"Faith in a rational universe, yes."
"No, Father. You don't have faith in a rational universe. This is a universe where nothing can move faster than the utterly arbitrary speed of 186,000 miles per second, where feathers and rocks fall at the same speed in a vacuum, where a measurable but inexplicable force called gravity binds people to planets and planets to stars, and where a butterfly's wing in China might cause a hurricane in the Caribbean. But you have faith in all this incomprehensible mumbo-jumbo which you don't begin to understand, solely because the priests of the established church of the intellectuals have declared these to be immutable laws and you, being a faithful supplicant at their altar, don't even think to question them."
"You sound like a convert to a new religion yourself," said Father dryly.
"Maybe I am. Or maybe I'm the guy who crawled out of the cave, and you're still back inside it, trying to understand the universe by studying shadows on the wall. Well, Father, I've seen things that can only be explained by magic. Now, I guess I'm really still a closet materialist, because I believe these things all have rational explanations, using principles of nature that are not yet known to us. But what I can't do is close my eyes and pretend that the things that have happened to me will go away if I just say 'Einstein' five times fast."
