Quote:
Originally Posted by Castout
Reason ideally is path to truth and understanding and revelation AND STILL IS(So I disagree with the article conclusion).
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Yes, but how is it that it doesn't arrive there? How do we know anything? Have we actually learned 'truth and understanding' by means of reason, or are we simply stuck in endless cycles of received wisdom and categories of reason/understanding whose origins we can't trace, but which we nevertheless repeat uncritically?
I would disagree with the article, but perhaps on somewhat different grounds. At some point maybe that is why reason developed, but we can't know when and by who it was developed. However modern reason isn't so much something that we shape, but something that shapes us. It's wired into language and society to an extent where it's difficult to get away from thinking about things in terms of reason or lack thereof, in terms that are not our own.
Otherwise the argument can certainly be made about any traditional endeavor of the mind and creativity. By the same token, 2500 years ago Plato attacked poetry for being primarily aimed at persuading and misleading people. But Plato is also much responsible for the spread of this faith in reason as an eternal, immutable form, all the while acknowledging its inacessibility and inexpressibility. And that's a fundamental problem. People easily resort to reason and claims of certain knowledge, while up to this day there's still no incontrovertible epistemology of reason that really addresses how we know anything. There is faith in reason, which isn't 'wrong' by any means, but it does invite uncritical reliance and open it to be used as a weapon indeed.