To doubt everything or to believe everything are two equally convenient solutions; both dispense with the necessity of reflection.
Interpretation
This quote emphasizes the importance of critical thinking over blind belief or doubt.
Jerry Pournelle's quote highlights that both extreme skepticism and unconditional belief are convenient but ultimately avoid the crucial process of reflection and critical analysis. It suggests that engaging thoughtfully with ideas and questioning them leads to deeper understanding and knowledge, rather than taking an unexamined stance on either side.
In practice
This quote could be used in a philosophy class to discuss the value of skepticism.
I am sure it has been done with less, but you should be prepared to write and throw away a million words of finished material. By finished, I mean completed, done, ready to submit, and written as well as you know how at the time you wrote it. You may be ashamed of it later, but that's another story.
CERBERUS, n. The watch-dog of Hades, whose duty it was to guard the entrance - against whom or what does not clearly appear; everybody, sooner or later, had to go there, and nobody wanted to carry off the entrance.
In the Church, considered as a social organism, the mysteries inevitably degenerate into beliefs.
As for the men in power, they are so anxious to establish the myth of infallibility that they do their utmost to ignore truth.
The greatest block today in the way of woman's emancipation is the church, the canon law, the Bible and the priesthood.
In a Wonderland they lie, Dreaming as the days go by, Dreaming as the summers die: Ever drifting down the stream- Lingering in the golden gleam- Life, what is it but a dream?
Regarded in isolation, an idea may be quite insignificant, and venturesome in the extreme, but it may acquire importance from an idea which follows it; perhaps, in a certain collocation with other ideas, which may seem equally absurd, it may be capable of furnishing a very serviceable link.
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