The Epistemological Fog and The Oxford Murder
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1) As a suspenseful crime film, "Oxford Murder" explores a series of fundamental epistemological issues, which not only lay out the suspenseful plot, but also serve as clues to reveal the nature of the suspense film. The film is regarded as a "meta-genre" suspenseful crime film. This "metatype" is in terms of the meaning of ideas, as the way in which the form of ideas is organized.
2) As an epistemological question, the first and foremost question is "how to know", and in answering this question, one must place accidental knowledge or unexamined common sense in the absence of presuppositions. The structure of this situation is "don't know → know + know → don't know", which is the state of suspense.
2-1] The primary question presented in The Oxford Murder is "Can we know the truth". Among them, most of the epistemological content discussed by Professor Seldem and Martin revolves around this issue. They first exiled "mathematics as the science of all modes" from the paradigm of knowledge to the desert of knowledge, where the necessary assumptions of knowledge become contingent and uncertain. Then they discussed the situation of uncertainty, when common sense is not knowledge, but people's self-righteousness: for example, the object of feeling can be contradictory even in feeling. The things in front of you are no longer so certain, but become a fog in a trance.
3] The so-called suspense is the process of letting the light of intellect appear through the fog of epistemology. This is the type definition of suspense. In order for the suspenseful effect to be significant enough, the epistemological fog should continue until the light of understanding emerges.
3-1] "Oxford Murder" allows such epistemological fog to be presented directly through the discussion of issues, while for suspense films, the epistemological fog is often deduced through a less direct epistemological approach. But in any case, if there is not that kind of direct knowledge of the fog, then it will not be suspense.
3-2] Of course, the light of intellect cannot be outside the fog of knowledge created by suspense, otherwise it would not be a fog, but darkness. The light of the intellect is scattered throughout the epistemological fog, where it is reflected and refracted, and in some way it is brought into focus at the end of the suspense.
3-3] In The Oxford Murder, the final light of the intellect looks a little weird because it's a denial of the intellect. This is also a trait of its being a metatype. Generally speaking, in order to create a significant contrast effect after the suspense, the presentation of the light of intellect is often exaggerated compared with the previous fog of cognition, which makes it appear somewhat unreal. The more obvious the suspense effect is, the more likely it is to deviate from the truth. After all, it is closer to a thinking game.
4) The basic principle of suspense is to use the inherent flaws of people's cognition. There are two main deficiencies in cognition. First, the things to be known are obscured; second, the viewer is bewitched by false appearances. Using the first kind of flaw to set up suspense is to cover up facts or not to inform knowledge in a certain way; to use the second kind of flaw to set up suspense is to mislead in a certain way, or the viewer will fall into the false picture. The first way of suspense can be called "the way of consistent clues"; the second way of suspense can be called "the way of differentiated clues".
4-1] Although the clues of a film using the first type of suspense are consistent, it is not so clear in the process of suspense. It lies in the clear correspondence between the end and the beginning. Films using the second type of suspense can give a clear clue because there is no need to worry about the suspenseful atmosphere dissipating prematurely, but this clue is often not a really effective clue in the ending. It is differentiated and misleading clues of action. The Oxford Murder takes the suspenseful way of dividing clues.
4-2] For the first method, viewers often feel suddenly enlightened after seeing it, as if they have really gained some kind of clear understanding; and for the second method, some viewers, after seeing it, But yelled at them, as if they were being played by a suspenseful pretense. This is an interesting phenomenon. Although suspense films take advantage of the viewer's cognitive flaws, the viewers probably come out of their self-affirming nature, but they don't want to see this. At the same time, it is also out of their self-affirming nature, and they will not accept certain suspenseful settings.
4-3] "The Oxford Murder" directly presents people's cognitive deficiencies, which are unfamiliar problems and non-self difficulties to the common sense world. The premise for the successful unfolding of the film's differentiation thread is also to exploit the self-affirming tendency of the film's character Martin, who presupposes unexamined premises in his self-knowledge. It is in his tendency to seek clarity that he is caught in a fictional thread, and at the same time, as a viewer, he has a similar tendency and is caught in the same imaginary thread.
5) The light of understanding that emerges behind the suspenseful epistemological fog is the basis for the suspenseful plot to be resolved. Such grounds cannot of course be just facts, they must be explanations, and thus the real grounds are the laws of nature. The laws of nature include physical laws and psychological laws. As a suspense film involving psychological participation, the law of psychology is generally human nature, and the phenomenon of its expressiveness is the experience of life, and the law of physics also participates in it. For living people, the epistemological problem is never just a problem of thinking, it is a problem of the state of existence. The most basic truth of philosophy is contained in idealism, that is, "the domain of ideas is a complete domain of living phenomena" (that is to say, "to exist is to be thought and perceived"). Epistemological fog, that is, the fog of existence.
5-1] Since the epistemological fog is also the fog of the state of existence, it can be said that suspense is to look at its origin or basis through the fog of the state of existence. In The Oxford Murder, Professor Seldem's purpose in laying out that epistemological fog is finally revealed to be that he wanted to liberate those he cared about from the fog of the latter's existence. In general, when a suspense film seeks a basis through psychological laws, it is also liberating the fog of living conditions.
6) Suspense plots are often associated with crimes. Presumably, "ignorance is sin," so that an understanding of the strong connection between suspense and crime can be established. Ignorance means the lack of ideas, and at the same time it is the lack of a state of being. In this way, for the survivors, ignorance is taken for granted as a sin. It is because of this connection that suspenseful crime films are not only permeated with the fog of epistemology, but also of justice. Justice is the overcoming of sin, it is the complement of the lack of existence. Justice is nothing else, it is the meaning of existence in the concept.
6-1] Rumor has it that when Brandt Russell asked Wittgenstein, "Are you thinking about logic, or your sin?" Wittgenstein replied, "Both." Such a joke may surprise some people, so they are so willing to spread it as anecdotes. I'm putting this out here, not because Wittgenstein's answer is clever, but because it's so commonplace for philosophy, and because it fits the theme of The Oxford Murder. In "The Oxford Murders," a logical thought contributed to the evil before the evil. Beth heard Martin say, "You should try". The suggestion was so logical that Beth had a hard time rejecting it. This makes her kill people. Plus, after sin, thinking about logic actually masks the sin that actually happened. Professor Seldham hides the real perpetrator by laying out the appearance of a serial murder with a logical sequence. In fact, without such a logical suggestion, the sin probably wouldn't have happened that way. Without that logically constructed sequence of crimes, sin would have easily manifested itself from the start. Logic not only facilitates evil, but also conceals evil.
6-2] In the case of "Oxford Murder", the meaning of "ignorance is sin" is no longer so simple, but becomes "if you are ignorant, you cannot cover up your sins". This is probably also the need to study the law: the first thing is not to use the law to ensure justice, but to use the law to ensure that there is no ignorance.
7] In some suspenseful crime films, logic belongs to justice because it can reveal evil; but sometimes, logic is not justice, but it can cover up evil and create the illusion of justice. Over and over again, justice becomes impossible to guarantee. This should be disturbing for non-game reality, but for suspenseful crime films, it is a way to create a suspenseful effect. Mystery crime films do this not against reality, on the contrary, it just presents reality: justice is indeed impossible to guarantee. Suspenseful crime films create a fog of justice, which means that the justice that viewers expect cannot be guaranteed. In public life, the basis of justice is in the law, and the law actually works through positions. The basis of justice is not in logic, but in position. Position is relative, so specific justice is also relative. Is the relative world disturbing? Probably yes, but if you're good at using logic, then you can hide that.
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