Epistemology has, over the centuries, brought many philosophers and logicians together, and driven just as many apart. To this day the world's greatest thinkers are divided over many aspects of the field, and it's taken until now for someone to come forward with a clarion call to philosophers and logicians both; a clarion call to unite against the common enemy: the statistician.
When first we see Pandbag, we're amazed. Can he really exist? Heretofore the boogeypanda was a creature of legend, a tale told by parents to explain the bananas left on the front porch on winter mornings. If the boogeypanda truly exists, then everything we know about bananas is wrong.
As epistemologists will point out, though, we know quite a bit about bananas. By using the word 'know', we assert the truth of bananas, not the belief in them. Does the existence of Pandbag relegate our knowledge of the yellow berry to mere belief? Is the banana no more real than the tooth fairy? Common sense tells us that belief in the boogeypanda and belief in the banana are mutually exclusive, but before our eyes is this paradox made manifest.
It would seem, then, that the cerulean boogeypanda is also a black swan. In hindsight, we see the obviousness of the situation; we sit, eating a banana as we stare at the boogeypanda. Wittgenstein would seem to be vindicated; we can constantly look at the panel, we can eat as many bananas we like; however many times we perform these actions, the result is the same. Both exist. Logical positivism reigns supreme.
By positing the return of a school of philosophy long surpassed -- and one founded by a protégé of famed epistemologist Bertrand Russell -- Ndbag is telling us that the very field of epistemology is under threat. Pernicious statisticians, replete with their slide rules and their standard deviations, are mounting an assault on the very nature of reason. We envisage the mad statistician, ensconced in his secret underground lair, planning on bringing about the end of all certainty. Soon, everything will be reduced to chance, and only those versed in statistics and probability will have the wherewithal to rule the world.
A dark future. But, we soon find out, one that is by no means inevitable.
There is, it seems, no boogeypanda. By dressing up in a panda suit, Ndbag is telling us that all those a posteriori ideas we had when we thought it existed were nothing but illusion, brought about by a febrile mind frantically searching for clarity. We can once again be certain; the boogeypanda doesn't exist. And the banana does.
The course ahead becomes clear. We must reject the prattling of evil statisticians bent on world domination, and stand fast with what we know to be true. Extraordinary claims, it is said, require extraordinary evidence. It'll take a lot more than a boogeyman in an panda suit to convince us that bananas don't exist. The knowledge -- the truth -- of this is self evident. This certainty allows us to face the future with our heads held high.
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