Mostly for fun:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hedgehog_and_the_Fox
The fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows One Big Thing...
Are skeptics hedgehogs or foxes?
Why is it an either/or scenario?
Can't I know Many Big Things?
I'm a spiky fox.
I have in fact been pondering this fragment of Archilochus for a few years (not all the time, I hasten to add) and I'm not so sure that it can be an either/or. The hedgehog has the problem that his/her big idea might turn out to be complete bollocks, whereas the fox can be pretty sure of being right at least some of the time.
As for the authors, in my humble opinion the foxes are generally far more interesting to read than the hedgehogs.
I can't see how a skeptic can be other than a fox - doesn't the hedgehog has a unified view of life usually based on belief?
I'm disappointed; I thought this thread would be about Sonic the Hedgehog 2. :(
Obviously I’m a hedgehog - interpret the world through the “lens” of 1990s video games.
Believers generally have one big idea. It is their inability to see beyond that idea that limits them.
Surely skeptics are hedgehogs, with their one big idea being that everything that may accepted as a truism must first be substantiated beyond all doubt?
Is scepticism "a single, universal, organizing principle" which alone has significance? If so, we're hedgehogs.
Or do we "pursue many ends, often unrelated and even contradictory, ... seizing upon the essence of a vast variety of experiences and objects for what they are in themselves, without ... seeking to fit them into, or exclude them from, any one unchanging, all-embracing, sometimes self-contradictory and incomplete, at times fanatical, unitary inner vision."? If so, we're foxes.
I don't see scepticism as an organising principle, more an organising process by which I pursue many ends .....
Guess I'm a bit of both.
Hey - that's me exactly. Perhaps it's because I'm a LibranOriginally Posted by DrS
Fedgehox?
Porcupine ??
It's my considered opinion that I am neither a hedgehog or fox. I slide through life selectively picking up a little bit here, a little bit there as it suits me, whilst leaving behind what I choose to see as a shining silver wake. I am, therefore, a slug.
Skeptics are foxes all the way...
One of my favourite quotes:
"The hedgehog knows one big thing but the fox knows many small things. The human hedgehog is a visionary and everything is defined by his ideals. The 20th century was the age of the absolutist hedgehog and his big idea- the age of men who were ready to help us towards a better world with a gas chamber or a bullet in the head.
We must pray that Reynard the fox will be our hero and our king, a pensive champion whose way of thinking is diffuse, who works on many levels and is able to deal with doubt, uncertainty, complexity and flux. In the 21st century let our engineers be prudent and supple like the fox, let them examine , sniff, investigate. But like the fox they must, as well, be quick to strike. Prudent and decisive does it boys and girls...
And if the fox is not to be the spirit of the age?
Then it will be the crocodile."
From The Wisdom of Crocodiles, Paul Hoffman (2000)
"It is the wisdom of crocodiles, that shed tears when they would devour."
Francis Bacon (1561-1626)
Last edited by dalriada; 28th February 2008 at 09:43 PM.
The Fox seems to be ahead at the moment...
Mind you, I prefer valid arguments to invalid. Is that hedgehoggish?
Sir, I am a lady!
I have never doubted it. They have lady porcupines, don't they?Sir, I am a lady!
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