Epistemic priority: Difference between revisions

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 How one knows one is on the path to enlightenment is just the question, of course, to which epistemic priority gives an answer. If only we could all agree about it.
-On this reductionist theory there is, at the top of that grand staircase (often the [[metaphor]] is literally inverted, and the progress described as a ''descent'' into structural engineering of the basement, but a “stairway to heaven” seems to us a much better image) a grand unifying theory of everything. when we have that, then — well, supporters of the grand unifying theory haven't carried on that thought experiment. But notice how it cleaves to the idea the universe is a bounded, time-bound, ''[[finite]]'' system.
+On this reductionist theory there is, at the top of that grand staircase (often the [[metaphor]] is literally inverted, and the progress described as a ''descent'' into structural engineering of the basement, but a “[[stairway to heaven]]” seems to us a much better, lordly, and pious image) a [[grand unifying theory of everything]].
-If this is right, then epistemic priority is important for the second order connections it vouches safe. Rather like a crossword solution that looks right, but isn't, and thereby buggers up the rest of the grid, a valuable but wrong theory will lead to trouble down the line if it isn’t rooted out pronto.
+When we have that, then — well, supporters of the grand unifying theory haven’t carried on that thought experiment. Nirvana? Utopia? Eudaimonia? Game over? Have we clocked the machine and have to start again?  [[Apocalypse]]? — but let us say that the mysteries of the universe will have been solved, and whatever terrifying joy it  presented hitherto will feel a bit entropic, warm and brown.
+But notice, too, how the idea of the “ultimate solution” — I know, right? — cleaves to rather [[monomyth]]ical ideas about the nature of life: that there are rules, it is bounded, has a running time, a definitive up and down, left and right, start and finish. There is a quest to be resolved. ''We are players inside a [[finite game]]''.
+If this is right — ''only'' if this is right — then [[epistemic priority]] is important. Not just for its efficiency, but for the [[second order derivative|second order connections]] it vouches safe. For all theories must interconnect, m
+Rather like a crossword solution that looks right, but isn't, and thereby buggers up the rest of the grid, a valuable but wrong theory will lead to trouble down the line if it isn’t rooted out pronto.
 So to [[reductionists]], epistemic priority is important. Critical to the mission.