Reply to comment

Interesting Thursday conversation in group G.  Some notes of what I remember/thought useful, hoping others will add their own.  It started with an effort to understand why some people think of themselves as "humanists" and other as "scientists".  Among other things that evolved was the idea that that distinction was itself a human construction, perhaps originating in whether people preferred more or less certainty and hence whether they were inclined to try and understand non-human or human products (with the later, "humanities", being less certain because it involves the hidden workings of the brain).  That in turn (via some thinking about "naive" artists and "naive" scientists) led to the thought that the nature of inquiry itself (scientific or otherwise) was a narrative story that people are constantly trying to turn into a non-narrative one (in particular, a difference between "science" and "humanities", akin to an essentialist distinction between humans and rhinoceri).   To mull further ....