Musings Volume Zero: Ethos
03 Nov 2024Proasek2
I think of myself first and foremost as a scientist. This is not to say that I seek to discover that which is new or unheard, though I certainly would not complain, but rather it is with the diligence of a scientist that I wish to apply rigour to all that is around me. There is a saying, that if something has happened once it is an anomaly; if it has happened twice it is a coincidence; however if it has happened three times then and only then is it a pattern. To take the discoveries of others and repeat them is not to walk in their footsteps, but to hold them aloft upon a stable foundation which none may question, or else if it cannot be repeated it is to cast down falsehoods from those who would extend the truth to serve their interests and not the other way around.
So too is the duty of the researcher to take that which is rare and make it common, by way of description and imagery so faultless that to reader may feel as if they hold the object within their own hands, and may apply their experiments towards it even when separated by time and space. To take these inarguable conveniences is to never waste one's breath, if even a single additional word would better convey the idea to someone who would wish for it.
And finally it is the duty of all to ask questions, even if the answer should be obvious, or impossible, or unattainable by them, or failing that to take the questions of others and to attempt at the least to answer them. To take absurdity and find it is indeed absurd is the root of experiment, for the mass of every positive answer is given weight only by the depth of how many were a simple 'no'.
So then think these writings as the collected efforts in these areas that are otherwise insubstantial, and yet further these goals for myself or for others. It may be that the reader finds them benign, and perhaps I would agree to most, but I remain diligent in these duties irrespective of their glamour, for this is the role for which I am most suited. Think these not the ravings of a fleeting manic, but the dispassionate interests of an explorer who is distant from their destination.
Commander Proasek, unaffiliated Quaestor Notii of the Empire of Achenar, thirty-two lightyears from Babylon.