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From our first law lectures, we imbibed the fundamental interests and objectives of a liberal modern legal system, prominent among them being a profound wish for ''[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legal_certainty certainty]''. This is a matter of basic [[jurisprudence]]: we hear it, we think, “oh, yes; well, of course,” and nod along to as our professor continues on his mellifluous way.<ref>Mine was especially mellifluous: Hello, Professor Rowe, if you are reading, 32 years later!</ref> | From our first law lectures, we imbibed the fundamental interests and objectives of a liberal modern legal system, prominent among them being a profound wish for ''[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legal_certainty certainty]''. This is a matter of basic [[jurisprudence]]: we hear it, we think, “oh, yes; well, of course,” and nod along to as our professor continues on his mellifluous way.<ref>Mine was especially mellifluous: Hello, Professor Rowe, if you are reading, 32 years later!</ref> | ||
Thereafter, we are taught with every breath to ''strive'' for [[certainty]]: to plunge as deep into the detail as we can before our lungs burst; to explore it, to unpack it, to revel in its [[granularity]], to the exclusion of all other considerations. This spirit have we carried through our education into our professional practice. Being an unattainable ideal, there is no end to our quest; we can only aspire to carry on, unravelling and exhausting as many nefarious possibilities as we can find before our fingers bleed. We know we will always fall short of the perfect — they are the essences, the εἶδος; our worldly grapplings at them but an imitation. | Thereafter, we are taught with every breath to ''strive'' for [[certainty]]: to plunge as deep into the detail as we can before our lungs burst; to explore it, to unpack it, to revel in its [[granularity]], to the exclusion of all other considerations. This spirit have we carried through our education into our professional practice. Being an unattainable ideal, there is no end to our quest; we can only aspire to carry on, unravelling and exhausting as many nefarious possibilities as we can find before our fingers bleed. We know we will always fall short of the perfect — they are the essences, the ''εἶδος''; our worldly grapplings at them but an imitation of a [[Platonic form]]. | ||
And when our energies subside, we have the little pitons that we can jam into nearby fissures for yet further purchase on [[certainty]]: is there one amongst us who has never once whispered “''[[for the avoidance of doubt]]''”, not even to break some [[tedious]] impasse? | And when our energies subside, we have the little pitons that we can jam into nearby fissures for yet further purchase on [[certainty]]: is there one amongst us who has never once whispered “''[[for the avoidance of doubt]]''”, not even to break some [[tedious]] impasse? | ||
Such is our institutional suspicion of ''[[doubt]]''. Note that dreadful phrase of hack lawyering: | Such is our institutional suspicion of ''[[doubt]]''. Note that dreadful phrase of hack lawyering: “''[[For the avoidance of doubt|avoidance]]''” — as if doubt is so repulsive to our collective morality we should ''evacuate it'', [[ab initio]], from our bowels, and flush it away, whereupon only then can we lie back into cosy, sterile ''certitude''. | ||
Yet you need be no great student of our halting course through the cosmos to notice that, however hard we have lunged at this definitude, we have had a hard time ''finding'' it. | Yet you need be no great student of our halting course through the cosmos to notice that, however hard we have lunged at this elusive definitude, we have had a hard time ''finding'' it. | ||
Unexpected shit still, resolutely, ''happens''. Were it not so deeply buried in the piles of our founding mythology, we might even wonder whether our quest for certainty wasn’t, in itself, the heart of the problem. | |||
So here, readers, I present you a spirited, against-the-run-of-play, defence of ''[[doubt]]''. | So here, readers, I present you a spirited, against-the-run-of-play, defence of ''[[doubt]]''. | ||