Great stuff. Some of you are touching on my beloved Benjamin.
SU and I have been down this road before, but I'm a firm believer in J.S. Mill's postulate that the presence of error empowers truth. It's not that we shouldn't try to differentiate the one from the other, but that we should have enough humility to let them play out. The certainty of "I know" testimonies and corrleated manuals would put itself above "error," alternative voices in democracy, and the serious investigation of the relation of historical artifacts to myths (a subject I love). Hagiography loathes the stone rejected by the builders, but nonetheless risks revealing it.
Had I read through this thread I would have just posted this here.
Linkage:
http://cougarguard.com/forum/showthr...2497#post82497