If the search is for truth or Truth, the most sensible thing to do is search as many places as possible, right?
You might think so. Yet how many people walk to particular drawers, pull them out, and only search for truth in one drawer. A drawer marked “Christianity” for instance. Or “Protestant Christianity.” Or “It’s All Metaphor Christianity.”
And all those other drawers. Drawers labeled “Sufism” and “Taoism” and such. And all those drawers marked “natural selection” and “immunology.”
Seeking truth (not so often Truth) in as many places as possible is part of our free-thought heritage. Free-thought is and always has been about looking at what has come to be known as “dominant paradigms.” When we look at them calmly, often we see threads hanging here and there. Do we want the cloth to look neat and flawless, or do we wish to see how it is put together?
Curiosity. Freethinkers are quite likely to pull on the thread and slam their hands against the back of the drawer: “Where’s the rest?” we ask.
We freethinkers, humanists, etc are magpies of meaning making. Magpies of theological, philosophical, sociological, biological, esoteric, and what have-you. Meaning you say!
Look! There’s a new idea!