Y is for You

I've said before that I find monologue boring. I have to listen to myself in my own head enough as it is, going over the same tired ideas again and again, reinforcing my own errors through repetition. It would be a total waste of time for me to write the same stuff down just so I could sit back and admire it- oblivious to the flaws everyone else can see. Over and over I will overlook the obvious, until it is pointed out by someone else. Decade after decade I will go on believing some core principle of mine is ‘self-evident’ until someone else tells me it isn’t.

If nobody had ever commented on this blog, I would probably have given up after a few months. So, it is yours as much as mine. And in any list of important figures whose influence has gone towards creating the Clamly memeplex, you certainly deserve a mention. Thank you, lexifab, marco, winstoninabox, jenny, and everyone else who has stopped by and said anything, ever. I still don’t really understand how any of you think. But I sure do like having you around.

You have made me expand on things I would never have thought of expanding on if left to my own devices, which has been good for me; you have forced me to clarify and clarify and clarify my thoughts about the things I feel most strongly about, until they are practically coherent; you have led me to read all sorts of things I wouldn’t have thought of reading, which have also been good for me; you have introduced me to Mr Stross when I have abandoned all faith in science fiction; you have persuaded me that the ‘Many Universes’ model of quantum mechanics may not be entirely stupid; and you have taught me at least one invaluable lesson.

(Probably more than one. But I can't remember the others at the moment.)

I had another little mission statement I prepared earlier hanging around- ah, here it is:

I believe there is such a thing as truth.

Therefore, I wish to be corrected when I am in error.

An assertion of a contrary opinion does not correct me.

I hunger and thirst for reasoning which will correct me.

If I say I do not understand you, I do not understand you.

If what to you is self-evident is not self-evident to me, I need to imagine a worldview in which such a thing could be self-evident. Please help me to do this.

Thanks for all your good work in correcting me thus far. Grats! :)