The title is true for a lot more areas of life than linguistics. There are no shortcuts to truth, DVD anyone who tries to offer you one is probably trying to sell you something.
(Perhaps a roundabout way to say "Make obsolete", as a way to say "Get rid of"?)
> Please don't post comments saying that HN is turning into Reddit. It's a semi-noob illusion, as old as the hills.
So, your "redditer detector" went through a false positive it seems. :)
> Who Lusts for Certainty Lusts for Lies
I think this is one of the one-liners that sound good, but is bogus at closer inspection.
That articles talks about history. In that context it might make sense as it is hard to say something with certainty.
But in every speech I can say things with certainty without lying.
If we furthermore drag the word certainty out of a philosophers grip and apply a layman meaning to it, then many things are certain as the word can also mean commitment.
But I think the point of the saying is in the other direction. If you are listening to a speech, the things that the speaker can say with certainty may not be the ones where you want certainty. And if you demand certainty on those things, you will find those who will give it to you. But the certainty itself is a lie - that's why the speaker can't (honestly) say those things with certainty.
What is the optimum political program for the United States? There are plenty of people willing tell you with (apparent) certainty what the answer is. The truth is that nobody knows with certainty, and so the answers that sound certain are lies. The actual program may be correct - may be - but the certainty itself is a lie.
This is often true in linguistics, and history, and politics, and economics. Don't demand certainty where there is none.
I've seen people who strongly crave for (a feeling of) certainty prefer simplified categorizations and false absolutes to complexity that doesn't offer absolute certainty and discrete clarity.
Similarly, some things aren't readily quantifiable, and in some cases any quantification might be a great oversimplification at best. In those cases wanting a quantified and measurable answer instead of a more complex answer with less (of a feeling of) certainty can amount to wanting a lie. Or at least to wanting an answer that feels a lot more certain and true than it actually is.
I think that's what the post is about.
Of course the title isn't absolutely true either. Of course you can say and find things that are true and (to a good approximation) certain. But that's not really what the post or its title are trying to say.
I hear what you're saying. In the end, we have to believe something -- on less than perfect information.
But understanding human nature, isn't a conspiracy theory. And accepting obviously overreaching statements of "fact", that literally nobody had the data to state unequivocally, is not following the science.
It wasn't so long ago, that most people understood big pharma was a profit seeking machine, that wasn't primarily motivated by what is best for humanity. Overstating the risks of Covid, and pretending that we faced an existential threat, made everyone forget that truth, and unquestioningly believe that only the purest of intentions motivated the industrial/media response.
No. This is the exact trap. We have to act, but we have to keep our actual belief in line with the evidence.
That's what everyone does.
Just with varying degrees of success and with differing levels of intellect and experience. But we are all faced with the same conundrum of evidence being less than perfect. Everything comes down to a best-guess in the end. Even for the most rigorous scientist, all conclusions are provisional, and susceptible to the emergence of new evidence.
If by "varying degrees of success" you mean "mostly abject failure", I guess we can agree. But no, not everyone does that. Most people broke in the early pandemic, either toward trusting "the science" or toward weird bullshit.