Of Knowledge and Secret Things
From the very earliest days, thinking man has been fascinated by his unreachable boundaries - from the extent of the heavens to the smallest indivisible particle of matter. Mathematicians discovered "numbers" that are just out of reach of computability, and gave then names like "irrational" and "transcendental". Modern mathematicians are studying the "computability" and "complexity" of various classes of problems, and proved that seemingly simple tasks like optimal timetabling are virtually impossible to compute for real-life sized problems. In today’s rationalist humanist information society, we are constantly being tempted to believe that human reason can overcome anything, despite the limits and uncertainties of knowledge being uncovered in theoretical research. But the biggest problem to rational deterministic thinking, is when given a set of options, a "value" judgement is required. All too often, what seemed "good...