F*ck you, I won't do what you tell me to.

Narrative Response (½ single-spaced page, 10-12 pt. Times Roman font): Based on the lecture “The Masks of the Universe” and the two readings this week, is it going too far to conclude that doubt is a virtue and certainty a vice?

Professor Wil van Breugel’s lecture asserts the superiority of disprovable theory over the un-provable, faith, basically, or ‘certainty’ if you will. In its most basic argument it places the two on opposite ends of a spectrum forcing the student to choose. It takes this polarization one step further in that it asserts that an absolute truth exists and can be found if only one is skeptical enough to rigorously examine the evidence, check their facts and premise, and keep working at it. Through science this truth takes the form of a universal set of laws that govern the actions of the world macro to micro—which is noteworthy in that it has yet to be discovered. Yet there can be no such process for the religious who must rely on their certainty of faith to sustain them. To further Science’s legitimate claim of truth, professor Wil van Breugel asserts that the scientist’s only aim in the practice of his discipline is the discovery and application of his discipline, implicitly adding ‘the same cannot be said of the faithful’ who lacking evidence must find other means of legitimizing their certainty. This in itself a specious claim-- all individuals in the scientific community have their own motivations in the conducting and presentation of their research (just ask Barry J. Marshall whose motivation for scientific recognition drove him to ingest the causal bacteria of peptic ulcers) and in making this claim, weakens the argument of science’s superiority. The argument presented in the lecture places a highly flawed discipline of academic study of academic pursuit on a pedestal, presenting some its flaws (inconsistencies for example) as virtues while completely overlooking others and worse, implicitly juxtaposes it with faith. Never mind that these are two completely incompatible issues (as in, do not belong on the same spectrum), but the task set for the student is nevertheless, to deliberate on the constructive doubt of science vs the omnipresent certainty in faith.


To begin I am not a person of faith, nor am I a person of science. And I do not believe there is any inherent value in either of the words ‘certainty’ or ‘doubt’. There is only the meaning we as a society give to them. And to that end, there is still no value in either having certainty in something, or being doubtful of it. The virtue, in my mind, applies only when one acts on his or her certainty or doubt. And of that, the situations are so vast it is impossible to judge merit or vice.