Skepticism and probability

Some people, when faced with uncertainty, weigh all the factual and interpretive possibilities and respond to the one that seems most probable. Sometimes they’ll cycle through a whole series of possibilities, one at a time.

Others generate multiple possibilities, and weigh the degree of uncertainty of each, looking for overlap between the most plausible possibilities. They then respond practically to the whole probabilistic cloud as a single situation.

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The latter approach is optimal for hermeneutics, for concepting, for psychology, and for pretty much any situation involving extreme indeterminacy or doubt. There’s the facts and there’s the interpretive arrangements, and each modifies the other. Knowing how to dismantle an interpretation (which can look for all the world like reality itself) into bits of data and then to reassemble them into multiple divergent interpretations, when combined with an active imagination and a nuanced recall results in the capacity to generate a vast array of persuasive possibilities. Everything is left liquid to some degree. It’s a gift and a curse.

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For a skeptic, no knowledge is complete until it includes the meta-knowledge of ground of certainty. To lose track of this is to lose command of the knowledge.

One thought on “Skepticism and probability

  1. I read , read, and REread this before I decided an a reply.

    And I didn’t decide on a definite stand on the subject , that is I didn’t find I had a determined position on it. But when I came to consider whether or not I could accept that, I found that uncertainty seems to be a very accurate portrayal in this respect for me, (more than a response) that it in fact was my stance.

    to be sure I have done these things, and know all to well their applications, perhaps that is the very reason I lately find myself savoring a bit of uncertainty here and there.

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