This wiki is my attempt to collect and organize the current state of my thoughts and beliefs. I consider myself to be a logical and rational, well-informed person, but also recognize that the world is complex and sometimes truth isn't always clearly visible on the surface of things. My perspectives and beliefs have morphed and evolved as I've lived life, shaped by my lived experiences, conversations with other people, and both emotionally and logically-guided reasoning.
I'm beginning to (reluctantly) recognize and accept that much of our moral reasoning is actually driven first and foremost by our intuitions and emotionally-rooted responses, with our logical reasoning mind filling in the supporting reasoning post hoc. I think acceptance of this intuitivist model of moral reasoning is useful in helping to remain compassionate toward others who have differing views and divergent experiences, and remembering that logic and reasoned discussion isn't always the best tool for convincing others to change what they believe or to help them see the world and its complex issues from other perspectives.
That said, I hope this wiki will help me to catalog what I currently believe, and why I believe it, both as an exercise in diligence for myself, and also to serve as a reference for myself as I engage in discussions with others. While I feel confident that I'm an intelligent person with sound reasoning abilities, I oftentimes struggle in the heat of the moment to recall all the specific data and sources that underpin and support my beliefs. This, I hope, will provide a place for me to keep track of those things, and serve as a reference I can draw from when I need to refresh my own memory.
I want to also take special care to note that what is written here in the pages of this wiki represents a snapshot of my perspectives at the time that I wrote them. But perspectives can – and definitely should – evolve and change as we have new experiences and are exposed to new information or other perspectives. What is written here doesn't represent absolute, objective reality, it only reflects my experience of it.
My goal is the pursuit of truth, accuracy, fact, compassion, grace, love, justice, and openness. That requires me to be open to changing my views when confronted with new information. I am more interested in learning what's right than I am in having been right. I'm not interested in winning arguments, I'm interested in coming as close to truth as we can get, and doing so through sharing ideas, experiences, and perspectives with kindness and patience and compassion.
If it turns out that one of my beliefs or perspectives is wrong, flawed, disproven or unjust, my interest is in adjusting, changing, and fine-tuning my beliefs, not doubling-down on my existing position in order to comfort my ego.
In lieu of a perfect idea of how to organize my thoughts, I'm going to just dive in and start putting things down "on paper," if you will. I can restructure and re-organize things as I go. Here we go, off the top of my head.