Isn't that another case of hasty generalization? You should know by now that the world is inhabited by people quite different from you.
I am very aware of that, but many others do not seem to be. Quite a few think I know what they are thinking without their telling me. The only opportunity to find out their thoughts is when I happen to do something they don't want me to.
The usual ritual for such occasions is to be showered with scolding, accusation, name calling, saliva, bits of food that have been stuck between their teeth...
Anyway, even the great minds are rather small.
The statement is as meaningless as saying that even the small minds are great. In fact the two may mean the same.
We occasionally witness children show understanding of the world that is more encompassing or deeper than we expect. The same happens with people who are mentally ill or retarded. This is what is meant by small minds being big.
Their levels of understanding in different areas are uneven compared to an average adult, and we tend to think that their overall comprehension of the world is low.
Oftentimes they do not have the means to express what they understand, so we assume that they do not know or understand.
Tyranny of verbalization...
That is how the "civilized" world formed the view of the "primitive" world, by the way. When the West discovered what is outside world to them, it was behind in terms of weaponry and did not share the language and mode of communication. Hence, they thought they found savage beings.
It goes to show the importance of being able to attack physically and verbally. Without them, we cannot preserve our dignity.
I maintain that the level of civilization is measured by how much energy we devote to what is not strictly necessary for biological survival and by how we tame and tweak our animal instincts. They could make us nasty in situations which are not life threatening and hence unnecessary to be so.
But a civilization of higher level can be wiped out by one of lower level if the latter happens to be equipped by superior means of destruction.
Think about Vasco da Gama's barbarism against Calicut. He attacked the city when his demand to expel the Muslims was denied. Of course, Calicut must have had economic and political reasons to accommodate people of different religions, but he tried to destroy peace and commercial wealth with brutal force.
The Portuguese succeeded, as evidenced by the cities that they colonized along the coast.
Ranking various civilizations would be tricky, but I think we can say that the ones that spend more of its resources for activities beyond pure survival are more humane.
What about the people who had been labeled "primitive"? They spend more time and energy to survive compared to the people who labeled them so, but they tend to have more hands-on knowledge about nature and live in much better harmony with it. Isn't that a civilization of a better kind, at least in terms of taking care of the environment?
Very true... What if I say a civilization which spends less of its resources for destruction of any sort is preferred?
What about racial segregation? For people who are happy with it would think that they live in a peaceful world and that anti-segregationists are trouble-mongers, even terrorists.
True again. But segregationism is based on the idea that human beings should be conferred with different sets of rights and that the biological features determine which set. The anti-segregationists are for a society that has nothing to do with such erroneous idea of human beings.
But then, the segregationists would say that keeping the superior apart from the inferior is the better for the society as a whole.
The anti-segregationists would retort that the superiority is the result of unfair distribution of society's resources.
The segregationists would say that it is fair because the superior do the important work and thus deserve more.
And the anti-segregationists would say that because of such patterns of redistribution the inferior lack education, opportunities, etc. and are locked into menial jobs.
And the segregationists would demand the anti-segregationists to name a person of the inferior kind who is worth giving up some of what they have.
The named person may well fail to live up to expectations, and...
We'll hear remarks like, "You see, I told you, they're good for nothing."
The problem here is mistaking what has been caused by external factors as something inherent.
But then, we hear lines such as, "It's because they lack will that they cannot go beyond their lot."
It's not fair to have to exert much more effort to achieve the same goal, just because your biological features are less favored by people in power.
They would say, "Nothing is fair in this world."
We would point out that they did not want redistribution of wealth because it is not fair. Hence, they are contradicting themselves.
Comrade, the anti-segregationists won!
I hope so... Getting back to the importance of being capable to destroy physically, that is why nations still build up weapons. If you don't want others to attack you, you have to show that you can attack them.
Preferably better than they are able to.
Think about what we can do with all the money that we spend on destroying each other or trying to do so. We even attempt to restore something after destroying it.
The Iraq War, for example. I know that some people say the bad was destroyed and the good is to be restored, but there is no denying that it is physical destruction followed by resuscitation.
Do you think we would ever overcome the lack of goodwill and trust that permeates our world?
We first need to do away with hypocrisy that surrounds it.
Yes, hypocrisy, my favorite word of the moment! How can you preach others to act with goodwill and trust when you are not doing so yourself?
Comrade, I know that you are envisioning someone, but calm down, he is not with us here, and besides, we are talking about nations.
Anyway, it is important to demonstrate our capacity for physical attacks, but so is our ability to threaten in words.
The problem here is that verbosity is often taken as a sign of intelligence...
As I pointed out earlier, if you don't have the means to express your complicated thoughts, you may be taken as an idiot.
In a way, that's not so odd, because if you know what your thoughts are, you should be able to communicate it.
Precisely. And we don't know many of our thoughts.
Are you sure about that?
I am. I would not say all, but many of malicious acts originate from base emotions and thoughts which we are not so conscious about.
Such as, "I don't like her/him, and I am going to make her/his life miserable," "I am jealous, and I want her/him to be even more jealous," "Let her/him know who is the boss," "I am very unhappy, and therefore, I am going to take it out on her/him," ...
Those are the emotions and thoughts behind the acts, but not so well articulated in our minds. Most people would deny that it was what they were feeling or thinking. I would say verbalization is the first step toward being able to analyze our emotions and thoughts and to decide whether we should carry out actions based on them.
Put differently, ethical behavior is not possible without consciousness.
I agree with qualification. It is possible to be disciplined so that we have stock reactions that are ethical. However, we may not be able to match the situation that we face with what is in our instruction book. Moreover, some situations we encounter may not be in it. It means that we need the ability to analyze and arrive at what we think is appropriate reaction. For that, we need at least some consciousness of what we are feeling, thinking and doing. This is not to say that reactions that come to us unconsciously are useless.
You mean it is useful to touch the tip of your nose with your thumb and wiggle your hand?
Unconscious acts do not involve questioning and they come to us as if they were reflex. That is, we engage in them with very little effort. It is natural, built-in, and thus, consumes very little energy. Different cultures have different sets of such autonomous responses. That is why many of us marvel at people in various countries dealing smoothly with what we consider difficult situations.
Could we say that articulation in words is required for out-of-the-box situations, but it is taxing on our minds?
I think so. Good examples of that may be religious converts. They change their religion from one that they grew up with into another which they decide to adopt consciously later in their lives. What the first religion taught them comes to them more easily, and they tend to fight it off by saying out loud the tenets of the newly embraced religion. We can tell that they are trying hard. Since they have to be explicit about the second one, they are in great danger of being hypocrite.
Comrade, your eyes are shining with anger...
It's hard to have too good examples around, you know... Let's talk about great minds being limited.
You have to admit that you are jealous.
I admit that I am, but that does not make the statement false.
... True...
Remember, even Uncle Isaac said that he was merely standing on the shoulder of the giants.
But he was a physicist, mathematician, astronomer, natural philosopher, alchemist, and theologian. Many consider him to be one of the greatest minds in history!
Okay, that was not a very good example. But I have been noticing lately that usually an artist has one theme, especially writers. They have one truly good work, and the rest is of a similar theme and/or so-so in quality.
What about writers like Uncle Leo?
He has two great works, "War and Peace" and "Anna Karenina," both of which are about love and family life in the Russian upper crust.
Did you expect him to write about an auntie practicing Vodou in Haiti or about the Andromeda Galaxy at war with the Tirangulum Galaxy?
No, it was good that he wrote what he knew best. My point is that we cannot live on Tolstoy alone, just like we cannot on Pirozhki alone.
We can change the filling. In fact, most people do live on Pirozhki alone and with various fillings, because they read only a handful of authors each of whom produces based on one formula.
In a way, authors have to have a formula which can be more kindly called style. For most artists, we can recognize whose work it is from its 'style.' That means they all have a 'formula.' But even people who like repetitive story lines---or motifs in general---want some variation.
Otherwise, they can read the same story or look at the same painting over and over again and be satisfied.
Readers who are fond of a certain formula want several formulas with slight differences. The catch is that one author cannot produce those small variations to satisfy a reader.
One reader needs more than one author, then.
Yes, even if the reader is happy to have some repetition. In other words, we are capable of absorbing much more than we as individuals can produce. A person owes to more than one another person to satisfy her/his cerebral needs. That is true not only in writing, but also in other arts. It is also true for human relationships.
Hurray, here is an incentive to be nice to many others!
It is a motivation for infidelity, comrade...
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