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What truths would a wise person pursue?

coberst

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What truths would a wise person pursue?

The book Beyond Alienation by Ernest Becker attempts to clarify the nature of the human problem and to provide a solution for this problem. If humanity is to resolve this problem it must find a way to instruct itself wisely in the matter of social morality.

Humanity must develop a synthesis of knowledge that can serve as a reasoned basis for constructing a moral rationality. We need to develop a means whereby secular moral science becomes the central consideration for learning.

If I had the ability I would draw a cartoon character with an Arnold Schwarzenegger-like upper torso supported on two thin, spindly, and varicose veined legs. This cartoon character would represent humanity as I visualize the human species.

The strong upper torso represents our strong aptitude for technological achievement and the supporting legs represent our weak and wobbly moral rationality that is failing to provide the foundation needed by humanity.

Philosophy and theology does deal with morality but in a fundamentally different manner. The moral philosophy Becker speaks of recognizes that knowledge is never absolute and therefore must not remain static but must be dynamic reflecting the constant discovery initiated by science. Knowledge is that which helps to promote human welfare in the here and now.

Pragmatism is a self-consistent philosophy that honors the idea that what humans value is that which is relative to what is satisfying. This did not mean just the satisfaction of human appetite but there is recognition that humans are rational creatures; meaning that a value is judged so only when it is chosen in a critical mode of careful examination. “And it is the community of men, in free and open inquiry and exchange, who formulate the ideal values.”

Dewey’s pragmatism was dedicated to the task of reconstruction. Education was considered to be “the supreme human interest” wherein all philosophical problems come to a head. Dewey’s pragmatism failed because it was a call to action without a standard for action. Education must be progressive and must have a strong critical content.

The big question then is what can philosophy and science tell education to do? “What truths is man to pursue for the sake of man? What should we learn about man and society, knowledge that would show us, by clear and compelling logic, how to act and how to choose in our person and social life?”

Becker thinks that we must transform the university from its present vocational education institution into one leading the transformation of society. It is in this solution that I differ with Becker. I do not think that higher education will ever change its role of preparing students to become productive workers and avid consumers—at least until after the revolution.

I think that in the United States there is a great intellectual asset that goes unused. Most adults engage in little or no critical intellectual efforts directed at self-actualizing self-learning after their schooling is finished. If a small percentage of our adults would focus some small part of their intellectual energies toward self-actualizing self-learning during the period between the end of their formal education and mid-life they could be prepared to focus serious time and intellectual focus upon creating an intellectual elite that could make up a critical intellectual element dedicated toward the regeneration of our society.
 

Son of the Damned

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The United States already has an intellectual elite, they just don't know( or want to) to communicate with the average person. Over the past 50 yrs, more and more American intellectuals have been using jargon-laced speech to communicate and refine their ideas. This means that only other intellectuals read their work. And why would the common person want to learn from a group of people who only look down upon them?
 

coberst

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The United States already has an intellectual elite, they just don't know( or want to) to communicate with the average person. Over the past 50 yrs, more and more American intellectuals have been using jargon-laced speech to communicate and refine their ideas. This means that only other intellectuals read their work. And why would the common person want to learn from a group of people who only look down upon them?


This is anti-intellectual non sense that you have absorbed from our (American) culture.

It appears to me that science has accumulated a great deal of knowledge regarding human nature that would be very useful for everyone to know. Unfortunately our schools and colleges are focused almost exclusively upon teaching us what we need to know to get a good job. I think that this situation needs to be radically modified.
 

Athenian200

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The United States already has an intellectual elite, they just don't know( or want to) to communicate with the average person. Over the past 50 yrs, more and more American intellectuals have been using jargon-laced speech to communicate and refine their ideas. This means that only other intellectuals read their work. And why would the common person want to learn from a group of people who only look down upon them?

That's because the average person is lazy and stupid. You should be down on your knees thanking intellectuals for regularly accomplishing what the common people have so far proven themselves incapable of. I know I am. I don't consider myself intellectual (yet), but I have a lot of respect for intellectuals, and I can't stand it when people don't appreciate what they do.

Jargon requires only a dictionary to figure out. A simple Google search of a word will reveal the meaning. Study materials are often freely available. You have no excuse.

Sigh, sorry for the rant. I just get tired of hearing this. It's such a common argument, and it's so flimsy.
 

thisGuy

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I think that in the United States there is a great intellectual asset that goes unused. Most adults engage in little or no critical intellectual efforts directed at self-actualizing self-learning after their schooling is finished. If a small percentage of our adults would focus some small part of their intellectual energies toward self-actualizing self-learning during the period between the end of their formal education and mid-life they could be prepared to focus serious time and intellectual focus upon creating an intellectual elite that could make up a critical intellectual element dedicated toward the regeneration of our society.

they have no reason too. smarts give them good jobs that give them good money. after that its all about private jets and cottages on every freaking island in the world

and really...why shouldn't they? slaved so far to go to good school, make decent money, secure their future and all that other crap that comes with this package we call life

That's because the average person is lazy and stupid. You should be down on your knees thanking intellectuals for regularly accomplishing what the common people have so far proven themselves incapable of. I know I am. I don't consider myself intellectual (yet), but I have a lot of respect for intellectuals, and I can't stand it when people don't appreciate what they do.

Jargon requires only a dictionary to figure out. A simple Google search of a word will reveal the meaning. Study materials are often freely available. You have no excuse.

Sigh, sorry for the rant. I just get tired of hearing this. It's such a common argument, and it's so flimsy.

thats bullshit. jargon can be explained by dictionary but its implied meaning as its relates to the context won't be correctly understood till the 'jargon' becomes intuitive to the reader.

by becoming intuitive, i mean till after the reader has seen the jargon pop up a few times in different contexts being used differently so he has a mental interpretation of the word

if that weren't true, right clicking on a word in MS Word and choosing any random synonym wouldn't be as useless as it is.

also, case in point: writings of mark twain
 

Son of the Damned

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Jargon is dangerous, no matter what the usage. Don't give out the bullshit "the common person is lazy and stupid" argument. That attitude is precisely why intellectuals are looked down upon in North American culture. If you really want to change culture, you can't play just to other intellectuals, you need to reach out to the masses.
 

Athenian200

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Jargon is dangerous, no matter what the usage. Don't give out the bullshit "the common person is lazy and stupid" argument. That attitude is precisely why intellectuals are looked down upon in North American culture. If you really want to change culture, you can't play just to other intellectuals, you need to reach out to the masses.

The masses don't really have any use for intellectual ideas. It's like giving a 5-year old a welding torch. They're not interested in anything but sensual pleasures, safety, and the approval of their peers. They shouldn't have to water their ideas down to the point of being meaningless and oversimplified just to reach out to people who just don't care about truth or meaning (and would probably misuse what knowledge they did glean, anyway). Doing so limits how far we can delve into the idea, how far we can carry the theories into the sky, because we get held accountable to what people like, what's practical right now. Which essentially destroys the purpose of having intellectuals in the first place... to have people who aren't bound to that kind of material mentality contemplating things in a higher way in order to see what the masses can't.
 

Son of the Damned

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By that course of action, you doom western culture to stagnation. The masses are stupid and child-like because they haven't been engaged not in spite of being engaged. There is a great cultural meme of "intellectual incomprehension" or the idea that some thinker's ideas are so complex, the common person couldn't possibly understand it. This is a dangerous idea because it promotes the idea that the masses shouldn't be engaged in intellectual dialogue.

And the Intellectual class is already limited by the issues that you mentioned above. To assume otherwise is not acknowledging the nature of the funding of academic research. As well, Intellectuals aren't that different from the common person. They also like sensual pleasures, safety, and the approval of their peers. They've just gained the ability to think critically. Which can be taught to anyone.
 

Athenian200

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By that course of action, you doom western culture to stagnation. The masses are stupid and child-like because they haven't been engaged not in spite of being engaged. There is a great cultural meme of "intellectual incomprehension" or the idea that some thinker's ideas are so complex, the common person couldn't possibly understand it. This is a dangerous idea because it promotes the idea that the masses shouldn't be engaged in intellectual dialogue.

I guess I just see it that way because I've kind of enjoyed the whole idea keeping the dirty little secret of logic and imagination as something whispered about and indulged in behind closed doors. So I guess it seems almost tainted to let common people influence something as beautiful and meaningful as knowledge.

I suppose the fact that I feel that way has something to do with having Ni and Ti, but no Ne or Te. Because people with one of those tend to be more willing to expose knowledge to... them.
And the Intellectual class is already limited by the issues that you mentioned above. To assume otherwise is not acknowledging the nature of the funding of academic research. As well, Intellectuals aren't that different from the common person. They also like sensual pleasures, safety, and the approval of their peers. They've just gained the ability to think critically. Which can be taught to anyone.

Well, limited in terms of funded research, yes. But not limited in terms of how far they can take ideas in their own minds, or how precisely they can analyze something. Putting thought in the hands of the masses results in the simplification of the very tools, standards, and concepts of critical thinking to the point that there's no longer a haven available for unnecessary complexity and detached abstraction of things.

I suppose I'm a bit like Zeus, who thought humans shouldn't be given fire, and you're like Prometheus, the one who stole it and gave it to humans against my wishes anyway.
 

Son of the Damned

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Ah, well then, if you're the Zeus to my Prometheus, then you come out on top in the end.

As for the subject at hand, I'm an ENTP. If I have a good idea, then I will share it with everyone, regardless of the havoc I might unleash.

I've always viewed knowledge and wisdom as things to be shared, for the betterment of us all. If you have a surplus of either, then in my view, you have an social obligation to share it.
 

Athenian200

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As for the subject at hand, I'm an ENTP. If I have a good idea, then I will share it with everyone, regardless of the havoc I might unleash.

Okay, I guess I can see why you would do that. That's how an ENTP works.
I've always viewed knowledge and wisdom as things to be shared, for the betterment of us all. If you have a surplus of either, then in my view, you have an social obligation to share it.

If someone said that beautiful people should be obligated to walk around naked in public regardless of their modesty, you'd say that was absurd, right? Well... I think that's kind of absurd, for the same reason.
 

Athenian200

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Everything is absurd when you really think about it.

Yep. I suppose you could even say thought is itself absurd. It isn't really useful in most aspects of human existence, but it's something no human can ignore, even if they do it badly.
 

rainoneventide

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Wise men don't pursue truths, they pursue the knowledge to find their own.
And then they encourage others with their experiences.
 

thisGuy

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I suppose the fact that I feel that way has something to do with having Ni and Ti, but no Ne or Te. Because people with one of those tend to be more willing to expose knowledge to... them.

Ni and Ti are how you gather facts are process them. not how you reach conclusions. people with 'one of those' tend to understand systems and ideas and logic external to them. their value framework is formed on the inside, applied on the outside


by your thinking, black slavery was right because black people couldn't think for themselves or look after themselves...so, do you agree with slavery?
 

Athenian200

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Ni and Ti are how you gather facts are process them. not how you reach conclusions. people with 'one of those' tend to understand systems and ideas and logic external to them. their value framework is formed on the inside, applied on the outside

That's alien concept to me... a value framework, on the INSIDE? What good are values that aren't based on something external? So it's not their logic I don't get, it's their values.
by your thinking, black slavery was right because black people couldn't think for themselves or look after themselves...so, do you agree with slavery?

But in this case, it was false that black people couldn't think for or look after themselves, because obviously they can. They just didn't have the option as slaves. My prejudice is against people who've chosen not to think for or look after themselves (because they had the opportunity, unlike slaves).

I don't see how you can compare the two.
 

INTJ123

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the title of this thread is a little off from what the content contains. Your ideology is impressive but unrealistic. In the real world there are 3 types of people, people who talk about other people, people who talk about current events, and people who talk about ideas. If the world was only composed of idea oriented individuals, your system would probably work.
 

Mole

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What truths would a wise person pursue?

A wise person would pursue no truths at all.

A wise person would seek to transcend the truths du jour.

A wise person would seek to fight his way out of the conventional wisdom.

The wise person would seek the freshly minted.

Or do a little minting himself.
 

Kangol

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(Just to let you know, Victor, I'm not following you, you just happen to pop up in threads that have interesting titles.)
coberst said:
I do not think that higher education will ever change its role of preparing students to become productive workers and avid consumers—at least until after the revolution...

...If a small percentage of our adults would focus some small part of their intellectual energies toward self-actualizing self-learning during the period between the end of their formal education and mid-life they could be prepared to focus serious time and intellectual focus upon creating an intellectual elite that could make up a critical intellectual element dedicated toward the regeneration of our society.

I'm a bit confused by this; how do you propose adults focusing those intellectual energies without, you know, promoting higher education to focus said energies? What revolution?

As for the thread title itself, I think it's interesting, so let's try answering the question (as a few prior have begun to do), and refrain from circle jerking around a single idea for too long, because that's what making new threads are for. I think it'd be good to see where the agreements and disagreements are.

However, one clarification: is this about what truths people should pursue in order to become wise, or truths that wise people should pursue? Or maybe the word "should" shouldn't replace the original word, "would", which in case is even more difficult to proclaim without sounding like we understand or are ourselves, in fact, wise?
 

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The title was what attracted me but the content seems rather unrelated. Let me critique the title.
1. No one is born wise. It's usually an external and/or posthumous classification. That someone is described as "wise" does not have any effect on the pursuit of truth of that person.

2. The truth is the result of a philosophical framework, an argument of ontology (what are things and what is the nature of their existence?) and epistemology (how can we know that we know?). Philosophers strive to construct such frameworks based (primarily) on reason, and arrive at the truth utilizing these structures on the way. So the construction of these structures are actually of more importance than the truth itself -- if you manage to build them coherently, you'll more or less reach truth, or an interpretation of it. Far more important than an objective, "the only" sort of truth is the formation of a point of view, a perspective, a system of ideas.

By the way, (in response to the argument that brewed underneath) it's kind of unreasonable to suggest that intellectuals' accumulated knowledge should stay with the intellectuals. Modernity and progress, to give an example, are founded on not just intellectuals' own knowledge but also them passing, communicating that knowledge to the lower, more "average" parts of society in some way. Because that's how you change things, not with idealistic dreaming, not with futuristic documentaries or conspiracy theories, but passing ideas down to the majority. The average person might be just that, average, but that's a result of state policy and socioeconomics, not a mechanism in itself. If you're criticising that particular result, good luck arguing with windmills.
 
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