In reference to the weekly eclipse, it is not the fact that most people don't have the right answers at their fingertips, it's the fact that no one seems to care. And even more disturbing, that a group of very talented people neither have those answers, but they don't expect (in fact they rely on) anyone knowing or not knowing those things. My rant isn't about people being ignorant (I for one, am ignorant on an infinity of topics), but that few today seem to care. It's just not kewl.

As for the availability of information today, you are right, but that's not the point is it? Our modern methods of disseminating information spread ignorance and lies just as quickly and easily as they spread the truth. If you really think that easy availability of information makes decision making any easier, then you are simply deluding yourself. Sure, you can look up hard facts (like Lincoln's birthday, or the population of Prague) with some confidence on its correctness, but most of the things that really matter are still clouded in contradiction and mystery.

If this weren't the case, this board wouldn't be filled with bright, well-informed people arguing continuously, would it? The world wouldn't be filled with bright, well-informed and highly educated and capable people engaged in debate. The questions that really matter, the ones we're really interested in, are all controversial; and even the encyclopedias and libraries and websites are full of contradictory entries and differences of opinion and interpretation. Pick any topic you like and you will find conflicting views, and they can't all be dismissed as wackos or fools or evildoers, either. Read any scholarly treatment of any subject and you will find honest research and references and footnotes that are scrupulously accurate but still dead wrong, and those who have carefullly (mis)interpreted this research are not fools or villains, they are just mistaken. And sometimes they are not. The sciences are no different, there is no shortage of controversy and different interpretations of the same data by different people.

We all approach our research with prejudices and (mis)conceptions, and we view them through our own filters. We all cherry-pick, and although most of us are intellectually honest enough to accept an unassailable fact carefully demonstrated, one alone is rarely enough to change our minds about a cherished belief, and hardly any of us is cognizant of his own tendency to view raw data through the rosy glass of his own prejudice. We don't seem to have any trouble seeing it in others, though.

Science has procedures and protocols which have proved very successful at explaining the world for us, but they occasionally lead us astray, or miss the obvious. And when a paradigm shift does occur, we often dismiss our previous errors with a cavalier unconscious "well, I knew that" anyway. Look at any scientific controversy throughout history and evaluate the debater's arguments PRIOR to the experimentum crucis or key observation that decided the issue. You will see plenty of subjective but compelling reasoning and wishful thinking on the losing side that seemed perfectly reasonable at the time. And very often the winning side jusde made a lucky guess. As for questions of a more philosophical nature, involving politics, economics, esthetics, morals, ethics, religion, any of the fields that lead to controversy and debate because of their immediate relevance to our lives, there is never an easy answer, no matter how much we research.

The internet is wonderful, but it is no different that a great college library in principle, just faster and more up to date. Karl Marx spent a lifetime in the great libraries of London carefully collecting and cross-referencing material to develop his economic theories, and he managed to convince a generation of economists of the validity of at least some of his conclusions. His theories not only fit the facts, they built on the greatest economic minds that preceded him, extending their work without contradicting it. Today, his results are pretty much ignored by almost everyone. Or look at the incredibly detailed logical and scholarly work that every religion uses to justify its own doctrine in scripture. And all of them are convinced their rivals are completely mistaken (or worse).

So what do we do? We press on, we collect facts, we think, we talk a lot to people who do the same. As we get older we develop the means to intuit the truth, to subconsciously process data and to tune our filters and prejudices so they serve the cause of truth better. This is called judgement. Unfortunately, as we get older, we also become slower and set in our ways, less open-minded, and unfamiliar with modern methods and ideas. Finding the optimum resonance of these two processes is difficult, and by the time we realize we had it, it's gone. That's another bitter lesson that comes with age.

I am not a relativist any more than you are. I believe in objective truth and that it can be achieved by human reason. But I also think that it's a lot harder to achieve than you do, and in some cases we'll never know. How can a scientist believe otherwise? I've had several of my own cherished beliefs devastated, and it tends to make me a bit more cautious about what I know, what I think I know, and why I think I know it. In fact, I often think that the only thing we can ever know for sure is that something we currently are totally convinced of will someday be demonstrated to be dead wrong.