Your point was that logical analysis is more reliable than intuition, because logic can correct feelings, but not vice versa. What if two logical systems collide?
You are right. I realize that sets of logic that cannot be reconciled exist side by side. In fact, that is what cultures are all about.
If we operate within one culture, it all makes sense. But once we come into contact with another, we face contradictions.
One may tell us to be assertive, not to be stepped over, while the other may urge us to be self-deprecating so as to show our confidence in ourselves. There would be no problem if we know which rules prevail.
Things get tricky when we don't know which, because we don't say such things like, "I know that we come from incompatible cultural backgrounds, but I firmly believe that we should go about based on the Triangulum protocol."
What we leave out is, "I am from the Triangulum Galaxy, and I think we are culturally advanced than you guys from the Andromeda Galaxy, ha!"
While the guy from the Andromeda Galaxy is thinking the reverse.
Again the winner is the one that manages to be more brutal and ruthless.
We shouldn't act by the Gentlemen's Code, then?
I don't know why we should be bothered with it at all. Think about all the historical events. The ones who did away with such codes have always been the winners. Who said that the fighting should be on the ground only? If we realize that we can attack from the sky, we don't ask the enemy whether it is okay to do so. We just start dropping bombs from airplanes.
But isn't it self-destructive? If you take a no-holds-barred approach, the other party is going to retaliate with the same. The response could be more dramatic than the original acts, because they would be fueled by sense of defeat and revenge.
It is self-defeating only in the long run. What if the more brutal party annihilates the other? There is no point in our acting gentlemanly if the price to pay is our very existence.
If the tougher guys are going to win thanks to their toughness, why are they destined to self-destruction later?
When the culture is characterized by brutality, they can turn to each other with the same cruelness that they applied to their enemies. We know that once the first enemy is eliminated, the rest would split themselves to create enemies. With all regret, I have to say that it is human nature to do so.
We keep on destroying who is left until there is no one.
It is the course of fate that governs too many aspects of our lives. Think about price wars. They may benefit consumers, but not if the workers are insufficiently rewarded for their work to produce the goods. And the workers are consumers, too... Back to the issue of colliding logical systems, if we are to decide which to believe in when not threatened by immediate danger of annihilation, the choice will be dictated by our feelings and emotions.
We cannot logically compare logical systems that are incompatible in terms of logic.
Hence, if we are pressed to choose, it will be based on how we feel about each one against others.
You mean our decisions are more emotionally charged than we'd like to admit.
All of us try to present our arguments if they were the only ways that the discourses can reasonably unfold, but that's not true.
I know that one. Parents versus children, political left versus right, religious fundamentalists versus atheists, and more.
Sometimes we are brought up with one way of thoughts and do not deviate from them, because deviation may lead to reexamination of the fundamentals of what we believe in and how we are. We want to avoid that at all costs. But other times, we are given the freedom to choose.
Downhill versus cross-country skiing, sci-fi versus suspense novels, classical versus rock music...
Those are easy, because we may indulge in both without any problem. It becomes more interesting when it comes to political systems, for example. Nobody can say that s/he supports both democracy and dictatorship. The two cannot coexist.
Or, capitalist and communist economies.
The decisive thrust for one over the other comes from our feelings for them.
And the feelings originate in our experiences with them, right?
If your hard-earned assets have been forcibly confiscated by the communist party and that in front of your eyes, there is no way you are going to be a staunch communist. Likewise, if you and your parents have been exploited by a big landowner, there is little chance that you are going to be a capitalist.
That is irrespective of the logic behind the capitalist and communist systems.
We have to be careful not to treat the two systems as if our attraction to the two were the same. For the sheer reason that the capitalist system appeals to our base instincts to consume and own, it has a stronger draw.
In the case of the exploited peasant, s/he may strive to become a landowner her/himself instead of abolishing the unfair landholding scheme, then.
Exactly. It is our personal feelings generated through personal experiences that serve as the dice for the final selection among incompatible choices. However, when it comes to defense of that choice, we argue as if we had arrived by logic alone.
Well, not many people are going to be convinced by saying that your parent's castle was ransacked by the thuggish party members and that is why you hate the party and its doctrines.
That is why we build up arguments for our decision devoid of such events. Such behavior is not confined to our private thoughts and affiliations. It holds for various views in professional arena, including academia. Contrary to popular belief, we do not start with a clean slate of mind in deciding what we believe in. Rather, we start from our beliefs and build a fortress around it in the name of logic and science.
I bet that's why we seldom manage to convince the other camp.
Most of the time, we ourselves are even not aware of what is at the very bottom of our seemingly rational convictions. If we are, we are loathe to admit it, because we know that the material is not something that makes the other party to change sides. A variation of this theme is found in our appreciation of art.
We know what we like first and then try to find arguments as to why?
That is true, but it would be of the same theme. What I meant by a variation is that the knowledge of the personal aspects of artists affects how we appreciate their works.
Whether the painter was near starvation or living comfortably with the inheritance money should not matter when we judge how good a painting is.
I know an artist with paralyzed limbs who manipulates the brush with his mouth. I was greatly surprised to learn his handicap, considering the level of accomplishment. The question is: are we supposed to, or is it correct to, be more appreciative of his art now that we know his hardship.
If we are to publish one book of paintings, should it be his or the other's whose artistic value may be higher but without such difficulties?
In terms of pure profit, I am certain that the publisher would choose the former. But in terms of artistry, I am not certain if we should appreciate the handicapped more. It is like giving a student a better grade just because s/he suffers from learning disability. The implicit agreement is to evaluate the results, but we take efforts into account as well.
It is true that we are often curious about the artists' private lives, and we tend to like their work more if we are familiar with their biography.
Sometimes it can go the other way, too. If we find out that the artist is awfully conceited, that puts off quite a number of people and make them dislike her/his art. Similarly, our own personal events associated with a certain work can determine whether we like that particular piece.
It is hard for me to listen to the music that I heard when my dear pet beetle passed away. I was digging a hole in the backyard to bury it...
I know that Francisco Goya will forever be a very special painter for me. His exhibition was the first one that I remember attending as a child. It's amazing how vivid the memory has stayed. The crowd, the atmosphere, the weather, the changes in the dominant color in paintings as Goya aged, asking my mother about it, seeing his painting shortly afterward as a poster and recognizing it as his right away, and so on.
A piece of music suddenly means more if a story is attached to it, right?
It is not that I think about the story as I listen, but somehow the music becomes alive. Art begins to mean much more when a bit of context is given. In fact, the story or the context only serves to make me truly listen or see.
Without a story or a context, you pay cursory attention to art?
It seems that I often---not always, mind you---need a story that allows me into the world that each piece of art creates. Once I gain access to that world, I don't need to go back to the story or the context. Sometimes, they even become bothersome during the moments when I appreciate the more abstract nature of art.
Who said that we are rational beings?
You are right. I realize that sets of logic that cannot be reconciled exist side by side. In fact, that is what cultures are all about.
If we operate within one culture, it all makes sense. But once we come into contact with another, we face contradictions.
One may tell us to be assertive, not to be stepped over, while the other may urge us to be self-deprecating so as to show our confidence in ourselves. There would be no problem if we know which rules prevail.
Things get tricky when we don't know which, because we don't say such things like, "I know that we come from incompatible cultural backgrounds, but I firmly believe that we should go about based on the Triangulum protocol."
What we leave out is, "I am from the Triangulum Galaxy, and I think we are culturally advanced than you guys from the Andromeda Galaxy, ha!"
While the guy from the Andromeda Galaxy is thinking the reverse.
Again the winner is the one that manages to be more brutal and ruthless.
We shouldn't act by the Gentlemen's Code, then?
I don't know why we should be bothered with it at all. Think about all the historical events. The ones who did away with such codes have always been the winners. Who said that the fighting should be on the ground only? If we realize that we can attack from the sky, we don't ask the enemy whether it is okay to do so. We just start dropping bombs from airplanes.
But isn't it self-destructive? If you take a no-holds-barred approach, the other party is going to retaliate with the same. The response could be more dramatic than the original acts, because they would be fueled by sense of defeat and revenge.
It is self-defeating only in the long run. What if the more brutal party annihilates the other? There is no point in our acting gentlemanly if the price to pay is our very existence.
If the tougher guys are going to win thanks to their toughness, why are they destined to self-destruction later?
When the culture is characterized by brutality, they can turn to each other with the same cruelness that they applied to their enemies. We know that once the first enemy is eliminated, the rest would split themselves to create enemies. With all regret, I have to say that it is human nature to do so.
We keep on destroying who is left until there is no one.
It is the course of fate that governs too many aspects of our lives. Think about price wars. They may benefit consumers, but not if the workers are insufficiently rewarded for their work to produce the goods. And the workers are consumers, too... Back to the issue of colliding logical systems, if we are to decide which to believe in when not threatened by immediate danger of annihilation, the choice will be dictated by our feelings and emotions.
We cannot logically compare logical systems that are incompatible in terms of logic.
Hence, if we are pressed to choose, it will be based on how we feel about each one against others.
You mean our decisions are more emotionally charged than we'd like to admit.
All of us try to present our arguments if they were the only ways that the discourses can reasonably unfold, but that's not true.
I know that one. Parents versus children, political left versus right, religious fundamentalists versus atheists, and more.
Sometimes we are brought up with one way of thoughts and do not deviate from them, because deviation may lead to reexamination of the fundamentals of what we believe in and how we are. We want to avoid that at all costs. But other times, we are given the freedom to choose.
Downhill versus cross-country skiing, sci-fi versus suspense novels, classical versus rock music...
Those are easy, because we may indulge in both without any problem. It becomes more interesting when it comes to political systems, for example. Nobody can say that s/he supports both democracy and dictatorship. The two cannot coexist.
Or, capitalist and communist economies.
The decisive thrust for one over the other comes from our feelings for them.
And the feelings originate in our experiences with them, right?
If your hard-earned assets have been forcibly confiscated by the communist party and that in front of your eyes, there is no way you are going to be a staunch communist. Likewise, if you and your parents have been exploited by a big landowner, there is little chance that you are going to be a capitalist.
That is irrespective of the logic behind the capitalist and communist systems.
We have to be careful not to treat the two systems as if our attraction to the two were the same. For the sheer reason that the capitalist system appeals to our base instincts to consume and own, it has a stronger draw.
In the case of the exploited peasant, s/he may strive to become a landowner her/himself instead of abolishing the unfair landholding scheme, then.
Exactly. It is our personal feelings generated through personal experiences that serve as the dice for the final selection among incompatible choices. However, when it comes to defense of that choice, we argue as if we had arrived by logic alone.
Well, not many people are going to be convinced by saying that your parent's castle was ransacked by the thuggish party members and that is why you hate the party and its doctrines.
That is why we build up arguments for our decision devoid of such events. Such behavior is not confined to our private thoughts and affiliations. It holds for various views in professional arena, including academia. Contrary to popular belief, we do not start with a clean slate of mind in deciding what we believe in. Rather, we start from our beliefs and build a fortress around it in the name of logic and science.
I bet that's why we seldom manage to convince the other camp.
Most of the time, we ourselves are even not aware of what is at the very bottom of our seemingly rational convictions. If we are, we are loathe to admit it, because we know that the material is not something that makes the other party to change sides. A variation of this theme is found in our appreciation of art.
We know what we like first and then try to find arguments as to why?
That is true, but it would be of the same theme. What I meant by a variation is that the knowledge of the personal aspects of artists affects how we appreciate their works.
Whether the painter was near starvation or living comfortably with the inheritance money should not matter when we judge how good a painting is.
I know an artist with paralyzed limbs who manipulates the brush with his mouth. I was greatly surprised to learn his handicap, considering the level of accomplishment. The question is: are we supposed to, or is it correct to, be more appreciative of his art now that we know his hardship.
If we are to publish one book of paintings, should it be his or the other's whose artistic value may be higher but without such difficulties?
In terms of pure profit, I am certain that the publisher would choose the former. But in terms of artistry, I am not certain if we should appreciate the handicapped more. It is like giving a student a better grade just because s/he suffers from learning disability. The implicit agreement is to evaluate the results, but we take efforts into account as well.
It is true that we are often curious about the artists' private lives, and we tend to like their work more if we are familiar with their biography.
Sometimes it can go the other way, too. If we find out that the artist is awfully conceited, that puts off quite a number of people and make them dislike her/his art. Similarly, our own personal events associated with a certain work can determine whether we like that particular piece.
It is hard for me to listen to the music that I heard when my dear pet beetle passed away. I was digging a hole in the backyard to bury it...
I know that Francisco Goya will forever be a very special painter for me. His exhibition was the first one that I remember attending as a child. It's amazing how vivid the memory has stayed. The crowd, the atmosphere, the weather, the changes in the dominant color in paintings as Goya aged, asking my mother about it, seeing his painting shortly afterward as a poster and recognizing it as his right away, and so on.
A piece of music suddenly means more if a story is attached to it, right?
It is not that I think about the story as I listen, but somehow the music becomes alive. Art begins to mean much more when a bit of context is given. In fact, the story or the context only serves to make me truly listen or see.
Without a story or a context, you pay cursory attention to art?
It seems that I often---not always, mind you---need a story that allows me into the world that each piece of art creates. Once I gain access to that world, I don't need to go back to the story or the context. Sometimes, they even become bothersome during the moments when I appreciate the more abstract nature of art.
Who said that we are rational beings?
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