“Certainty brings insanity”

 

  Nosce te ipsum “Know thyself”

From Ann Althouse, I learn about the three Delphic Maxims. Shouldn’t I have known about these before? Does not knowing the Delphic Maxims make me an ignorant 72-year old? Or does is just mean I’m following Mao, who said: “Live to old age; study to old age” (活到老学到老 Huo dao lao, Xue dao lao)?

Anyway, I do like them. All three, which are:

• “Know thyself”
• “Nothing in excess”
• “Certainty brings insanity”

I like that last one, which would be my answer to one of those quizzes “what’s your favourite hate?”. Which I’ve always thought of as “Blind Faith”. As in Yeats’ “The best lack all conviction, the worst are full of passionate intensity”. Like religious nutters. Who will kill themselves while murdering innocents. How can we deal with those blinded by faith? Who have no time for other ideas, who are made crazy by absolute certainty?

As we see on the far Left and the far Right.