I’ve been talking a lot about skepticism lately. I think that this is vitally important that we keep skepticism in mind. It’s not a one time event. It’s a process, similar to the scientific method. It’s a continuous experience of gathering and evaluating data, finding trusted sources, questioning and finding answers.
I think it’s that last bit that confuses people. Skeptics can and do find answers to things. They can decide that something is so fixed, there’s no reason to remain “skeptical”, to use the common definition of the term.
Gravity. No on is skeptical of gravity. We know how it works. We can predict the effects decades, even centuries in advance. If a skeptic saw something fall upwards, they would be skeptical of the event, but not gravity. The skeptic would look for a trick or wire or something else. Not chuck hundreds of years of observations and experiments and successful predictions because of one event.
That doesn’t mean that we would evaluate new data and maybe even come to the conclusion that our current understanding of gravity needs to be altered, but it would take some pretty exceptional evidence to totally discredit gravity. It is essentially impossible that a new concept, however powerful, would mean that our understanding of gravity is wrong.
Oh, we might get a better understanding of how it works, but it won’t mean that things start falling upwards.
Using this, is someone who is skeptical of gravity being skeptical?
I don’t think that they are. Oh, they say “I’m skeptical”, but what they really mean is that they are ignoring all the supporting evidence and the reality of our knowledge about gravity. They have convinced themselves that the rest of the universe is wrong. I mean that literally. In their mind, reality, the rest of the universe we inhabit is wrong and they are right. Rarely is there any form or amount of information that will convince them otherwise.
This is not skepticism, it’s dogma.
In my experience, the people who run around shouting, “I’m skeptical” really aren’t. They are trying to take the higher intellectual ground by claiming a status that they really don’t have. A useful hint is to ask them what information it would take to change their mind. If they don’t have anything or what they want is completely unreasonable, then they are probably not really a skeptic.
Saying that one is skeptic doesn’t make it so. People can say anything. Skepticism is an act, a process. If the person you’re talking to doesn’t display the characters of a skeptic, then they aren’t. No matter what they may say.
Sometimes people say things that are wrong and may really believe them. But I can say I’m the King of Siam all I want. People are free to ignore me and/or demand evidence that I am.
So be skeptical of those who say that they are skeptics until you are familiar enough with them to make a determination.
