What seemed like a good philosophy at the time...
While reading Mr Frank Herbert's Dune novels (the original 6) I came across an axiom that was as illuminating as it was confusing- one of the younger characters was being lectured by the Bene Gesserit reverend mother about perceptions and she scorned his answer that he knew something for sure- her bitter rebuke was 'Know nothing! That way you can learn everything!'

That seemed like a fairly good code for living, it promoted the idea of open mindedness as once you 'Knew' something (if it was true or not) you wouldn't go on to find the actual truth or a deeper truth than what you'd settled for- (I have since found this is a useful tactic when other people at work respond to a problem by saying 'It's definitely not X, Y or Z' because quite often it is so you have to go in with an open mind).

Anyway, fine to begin with but pretty soon the problem was, this simple philosophy went viral in my mind and all of a sudden everything had to be questioned because -as assumptions are usually the mother of all fuckups- I kept saying to myself 'Ahh, but do we REALLY know that for sure?'.

I'd like to think this was a somewhat Zen philosophical experience except that I really didn't like it because until I ditched it as a code for living I was basically unable to make any decisions at all because what I thought I might know in the way of facts could all be false.... When I almost didn't get on a train because I couldn't know for sure that it wasn't going to break down then I had to draw the line.

Instead I went back to basically the same method of not trusting everything at face value but based on healthy pessimism as a basic starting point instead of nebulous uncertainty everything got back to normal and my head didn't turn into a pumpkin.
( Rotating Wobbly Hat That's not a banana. THIS is a banana., Thu 21 Jul 2011, 15:53, 2 replies)

Yeah
Dune will fuck with your head good and proper.

Repeat after me: I must not read Dune. Dune is the mind killer. Dune is the little-death that brings total confusion.
(Booce, Thu 21 Jul 2011, 16:09, closed)

pessemists
don't have to deal with disappointment,
probably.
(spleenspleenspleen coffeeflavouredsugarcoatednicotine, Thu 21 Jul 2011, 20:03, closed)