This is a short entry that I wrote at the end of March 2005 but never posted.

The Lost World

The Lost World (1912) by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle is a story about truth. What is truth? Is it what those around us believe? Is it what scientists say? Is it what our church believes? Is it what we believe?

A lost world in the middle of the Amazon is revealed to Dr. Challenger, and he returns to London with various proofs. No matter the proof, the people are unwilling to believe because they are dedicated to their own epistemologies (theory of truth). The scientists reject Challenger at every turn because what he has to say conflicts with what they think not what science has to say about the matter.

We do the same don’t we? We become dedicated to doctrines and dogmatically refuse to accept the possibility that we might be wrong because our world (the world we built in our minds) may crumble around us at any time.