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February 14, 2008

I have been thinking about the duality of the mind. We have already experienced it in the manifested forms of the creature, and the thinker in Moby-Dick, but also in other works such a Frankenstein. We discussed that “the creature” is a manifestation of our sub-conscious mind, it’s fears, desires, and obsessions. We also discussed that the “thinker” is roughly equivalent to the conscious mind. Both exist in humanity, and the territorial battle for control of the body’s ultimate actions has proven itself to be a timeless theme and archetypical struggle.

What I have found engaging about empirical non-foundationalism is that while it deals with this struggle, it does not condemn it to black and white terms. Emphasis on one will not lead you to a correct answer. (in fact there aren’t any right answers.) Both interact in order to create the world we’re in, to create the “right” and “wrong” to begin with. Like perhaps Ishmael does with his experience at sea, we invent the meaning necessary to create a stable environment.

This notion is not without it’s unsettling features. How do we rectify a world without rules, when they seem so intrinsic to our understanding not just of scientific principle, but also of social constructions? What do we do with this general principle when applying it to the particular that is our lives? I’ll admit that patterns, rules, and principles can be just as appealing to a modern audience as fate and an omnipresent God has been for thousands of years. These systems allow us to tap into a source of knowledge that will direct our lives. According to Empirical non-foundationalism, our lives seem to be swept up into active transformation. We are not simply encountering random possibilities, we are making them, we are them. Ishmael is not the narrator, not a character. The story only exists because he does, and because on some level he needs it. On some level even, he may be like God.