If you ever visit Edinburgh, don’t miss to visit the statue of David Hume located at the top of the Royal Mile near the High Court of Edinburgh.
It’s a telling example of our mythical character and superstitious nature that we are totally unaware of.
One by one, you will observe people rubbing off their hands against the toes of the Scottish Enlightenment Philosopher. Originally, it was the students of philosophy who thought that this would help them scrape off some of Hume’s wisdom but then there were those visiting the High Court who saw in this ritual ‘good luck’ before heading to the court.
How ironic because Humes is considered both the father of Empiricism and one who took Positivism to its extreme edge. There is no truth except that which can be proven through evidence.
Clearly, this is a myth but it tells something very profound about the power of culture:
• There must be value in this ritual because others are doing it.
• Don’t question the ritual, just do as everyone else.
• Who cares about the original story, as long as I can see everyone around believe in the ritual.
• I don’t need evidence, all that I need is social validation.
• If I didn’t participate in the ritual, bad luck will follow.
• If bad luck followed, it must be because I didn’t participate in the ritual.
• Conversely, if good luck followed … see I told you!
• This is how we attribute value to myths that have no intrinsic value.
• And this is how Attribution becomes Causation.
When I say A caused B, I actually mean that I give attribution to ‘A caused B’. Because there may be others around me, who don’t see value in touching Hume’s feet. They may or may not even know who is David Humes and so they cannot correlate A with B. Don’t crucify them, don’t mock them, don’t get upset with them. Instead, sit down with them and have a conversation. You may learn something about yourself.
That is what I see is seriously missing in our world today.
