http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/20 ... dont-know/
我觉得人类就是有个无法满足的愿望：给我一个肯定的答案，告诉我怎样做才对。可是没有肯定的答案肿么办？不行，没有也得造出个肯定的答案。我们都渴望一个充满了正确答案的世界，而世界却不肯满足我们的愿望。The Power of ‘I Don’t Know’
By TIM KREIDER
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There seems to be a widespread presumption that writing is prescriptive (or proscriptive) rather than simply observational or meditative. Some people condemn or commend even memoirs and novels as though their purpose were to instruct or offer models. I suppose I can’t entirely fault readers for this misapprehension. Confident authority is an appropriate tone for straight reportage, but it’s become the default of columnists, essayists and bloggers, one that’s so reflexive that some of them seem to forget it’s a pose.
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You’d think these disclaimers could go without saying; every piece of writing includes the tacit caveat: Or I could be wrong. And yet quite a lot of readers respond to your personal observations with wounded outrage when they fail to reflect their own experience, as if you were proposing your idle speculation as totalitarian law.
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This is another reason so many writers feel the need to impersonate someone wise or in possession of some marketable truth: it’s a function of insecurity, of fear. If we don’t assume some sort of expertise, why, exactly, should anyone bother reading us, let alone buy our books or invite us to appear on “Fresh Air”? The one thing no editorialist or commentator in any media is ever supposed to say is I don’t know: that they’re too ignorant about the science of climate change to have an informed opinion... To admit to ignorance, uncertainty or ambivalence is to cede your place on the masthead, your slot on the program, and allow all the coveted eyeballs to turn instead to the next hack who’s more than happy to sell them all the answers.
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I have no pretensions to any special knowledge, let alone anything like wisdom; I am just some guy, a PERSON IN WORLD looking around and noticing things and saying what I think. If what I say doesn’t reflect your own experience, it’s possible that it isn’t about you. It’s also possible that something that’s not About You might still be of some interest or use. There is even some remote possibility that I am oversimplifying, missing something obvious, or just speaking ex rectum.
科学的进步，给出了一个又一个的答案：感冒是病毒造成，病毒入侵身体一般可被自身的免疫系统消灭；地球绕着太阳转，是因为宇宙万物皆有引力，一个公式即可搞定。自然科学更加深了“肯定的答案是有的，只是你还没找到”的误解，于是大家到处去找，仿佛人生的一切都可以用一个公式搞定 ...
年轻的时候我是多么自信地相信万物皆有道理这一套，教育亦不停强调真理的普遍性。年纪越大，不得不，被迫，dragged kicking and screaming，只好承认，大多数的事情不是搞物理研究。自己没答案，专家也未必有，也许答案根本不存在。听上去很虚无主义。难怪人都说越老越虚无呢，原来这才是自然规律。
