'For the person or persons that hold dominion, can no more combine with the keeping up of majesty the running with harlots drunk or naked about the streets, or the performances of a stage player, or the open violation or contempt of laws passed by themselves than they can combine existence with non-existence'.

- Benedict de Spinoza. Political Treatise. 1677.




Thursday, February 25, 2010

on certainty 307


307. And here the strange thing is that when I am quite certain of how the words are used, have no doubt about it, I can still give no grounds for my way of going on. If I tried I could give a thousand, but none as certain as the very thing they were supposed to be grounds for.



here we have the argument –

that certainty is groundless

the next step is to see –

that the claim of certainty –

only has rhetorical function

which effectively means –

it is and exercise in deception –

if not delusion


© greg t. charlton. 2010.