Conclusions

Abstract

Human existence calls for some degree of certainty. Such certainty is ordinarily provided by the sensorium. However, it is not the immediate present that arouses uncertainty and anxiety in humans but the anticipation of the future. It is mankind’s ability to symbolically encode past and present experiences that creates the anticipation of things to come, the hopes and fears about the unknown future. Exclusive reliance on sensory information cannot inform about the future, especially since such information is purely quantitative and microstructural.⁹⁴ Hence the quest for certainty takes a different route, a discursive search for common understandings with others. While the scientist also engages in the quest for certainty, and in doing so resorts to discourse with other scientists, the fundamental assumption is that underlying the various scientific observations is a stable empirical reality (Popper’s World 1). Scientific constructions serve the need to systematize and generalize that which is under empirical observation. However, spontaneous discourse is much more likely to seek expression and comprehension of that which is only intuitively sensed. Secure reliance an a permanent social reality is simply not available to the lay person. Discourse with other people establishes a symbolic validation of perceptual evidence because it corroborates that the world is indeed as it is perceived.