Certainty and Doubt

Certainty and Doubt

            Certainty and doubt are two concepts’ that go hand in hand in nature.Certainty involves being over a hundred percent sure and positive about something.

On the other hand, doubt consists of having second thoughts about anything that one might be sure of. The relationship between the two terms goes together in an odd combination since one can never doubt without certainty. In Phelps’ quote, he argues that confidence in terms of determination and inner motivation is vital for one to accomplish their desires. Contrary, Russell looks at it oppositely and argues that doubt is essential when challenging ideas and beliefs. If the two concepts are balanced, they can lead to success and significant accomplishment.

Certainty and doubt get seen as one concept. However, depending only on one of either can led to failure. In a case where one is overconfident with ones’ ability, one end up not taking achievement seriously and lack of talent. On the other hand, too much doubt causes un-readiness for anything (Soros et al, 2013). In an instance, when one is wholly sure that they will pass a particular exam paper, they fail to put much time studying for it, an action that does not always favor them. In other cases, people get blindsided by questions they would have prepared more for, which is brought by a lack of doubt..

Both Phelps and Russell differ in opinion where one believes in absolute certainty while the other believes that uncertainty is essential to give accurate opinions. For real-life learning and growth, doubt is highly critical since if one were only too really on certainty, it would be a hindrance to achieving anything. In real-life situations, there are believes that people accept to be surewhile they are not acceptable. For example, Americans were confident that they had all the rights to own the northern America, which led to massive expulsionand mistreatment of the native indigenous people. Besides that, theircertainty caused enormous death andmassacres to the people. In another case, in the eighteenth century, the southern were very sure that slavery was acceptable, a situation that led to a war where thousands of American people got killed. The certainty also led to massive killing and violence. Furthermore, during AdolfHitler’s time, he was very confident and believed that the Jewish were terrible, a disgrace, and horrible people. When we look at the unfolding’s during that time, people can be sure that it would be impossible to murder over 6 million people, but Hitlers’certainty made him do so.

During the holy war, Christians believed that they were entitled to and had the right to Jerusalem. During the war, which continues up to know, a lot of people have gotten murdered, and thousands have suffered (Handlon et al, 2017). If some of these people like the pope and Hitler were not certain about Jewish being evil and Christians getting entitled to the holy land, thenmillions of people would still be alive today. However, no one is certain about what hasn’t happened. Things like the twin towers would still be standing, and there would not have been the second Iraq war if the people doubted any of the things they were doing.

Other men like the great scientists like Edison Dr. Martin Luther King and Mahatma Gandhi would not have accomplished anything if they were not sure that they would achieve something. Some like Edison would have entirely before getting to the thousand times of inventing a way of not building the bulb. These men acted in the certainty that they will achieve irrespective of the obstacles they faced.  However, doubt gets seen as a learning tool.

If men like Isaac newton never doubted, the discovery of the laws of gravity would not have been made since the people back then specific and never questioned the universe ways. If Galileo never doubted the church, the heliocentric picture of the universe would not have been there. Uncertainties make people ask questions, and the issue led to testing, and testing brings an understanding of things (Russell et al, 2017). If people never had a doubt, a lot of scientific discovery enjoyed today would never have been made. Researching on a cure for a disease like cancer and other deadly diseases would not have been there since people would be sure that the conditions cannot get cured. Doubt brings greatness, and schools and other institutions like the military teach people to doubt themselves so that they can overcome the uncertainty. Besides that, the establishment of the army is due to the doubt that people cannot handle and resolve conflicts. Many institutions, like the legal systems, have gotten brought by uncertainty whereby it gets believed that people cannot be naturally good at all times. Atheist and antagonistic and many other areas and fields have existed because of doubt. Thus, uncertainty brings teaching and learning.

In other words, doubt lights up learning creativity and growth, while certainty brings stagnancy since it sticks people to old thinking and old ways of doing things. Doubt, on the other hand, helps shape our lives past future and present. Thus, Phelps and Russells’ bring about certainty and uncertainty. Still, I believe the two concepts cannot be there without each other having both confidence and doubt can bring to greatness bot at an individual level and life experience level.

Word count: 883 words.

Works cited

Handlon Jr, Russell L. Outlaw, outcast, and Obergefell: an analysis of the United States     Supreme Court’s ideology in cases that impact the LGBT community. Diss. 2017.

Russell, Anthony, and A. Bernard Knapp. “Sardinia and Cyprus: An alternative view on

Cypriotes in the central Mediterranean.” Papers of the British School at Rome 85 (2017):

1-35.

Soros, George. “Fallibility, reflexivity, and the human uncertainty principle.” Journal of

            Economic Methodology 20.4 (2013): 309-329.