Tuesday, January 04, 2005

Substance and Shadow

Suppose a man who talks about the sacred value and awe and wonder of truth, and about how he is devoting his life to truth and reason; and who, in looking back on history, holds up as great exemplars those he calls martyrs for truth. And suppose he believes that truth is divine and that reason was made for communion with it.

Now suppose a man who talks about the sacred value and awe and wonder of truth, and about how he is devoting his life to truth and reason; and who, in looking back on history, holds up as great exemplars those he calls martyrs for truth. And suppose he instead believes that truth is simply a formal operation of disquotation (or some such) and that reason was not 'made' for anything.