I’ve finished plowing through (enjoying) “Nonsense on Stilts, How to Tell Science from Bunk” by Massimo Pigliucci. My pleasure at reading this is multilayer. The one layer I want to talk about is Professor Pigliucci’s unwitting penchant for sending me (and I suspect others) to the dictionary. Mind you I’m not complaining, on the contrary I find it exhilarating to be presented with complex ideas and arguments, eloquently written out, without over simplification. He uses words and phrases to express complex ideas and arguments in a concise fashion.

Words I learned today.
1. Verity, from the Latin veritas – truth (Veritas is also the name of my favorite woodworking tool manufacturer). Verity is the condition of being true or real. Related words that are more common are verify and verdict.

2. Cabala, a Jewish thing. After looking this up in the dictionary, I realized that I had heard of it before but Professor Pigliucci used it in unusual and creative way. Cabala primarily understood to be the practice of Jewish mysticism. My guess is that Jewish mysticism is shrouded in secrecy as a derivative meaning of cabala is any secret doctrine.

3. Empiricism, the only way to know is through the senses. This seems to separate data from hunches. This is a huge topic for a Zennist, who would refer to the senses as the 6 senses, eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, mind. Including the mind complicates things.

After writing this I realize that I might seem a Simpleton to those who already understand this lingo, jargon and specifically these words. So be it. I’ve made room for those of you on the right hand side of the Bell curve. Laugh if you want but I’ve enjoyed having my mind exercised by Massimo’s writing and I look forward to more.

Thank you Massimo.