Philosophical Musings

What if there were a story, but the story didn’t have just one main character? What if there was no connecting theme to a Book? We all see stories as we see our own life: everything works around a central focus and in the end, most, if not all, things are resolved in light of one character, one life, one main theme. For most of us, that theme is the ever-present Self.

Now, a story with no sense of Self would be criticized, it would be disregarded by the shallow thinkers and amateur philosophers of our age. Unfortunately for society, people don’t Think like they used to. That is not to say men do not think in the same manner that they did of old, synapses firing and neurons connecting to form intelligence and knowledge. I have known many very intelligent people in my life, and mean them no dishonor by saying that their depth of thinking is not the same as that of our fathers. Mostly, we rely on others to do the Thinking for us, and then we rely on the conclusions that they have come to ahead of us. We tend to treat the Thinkers of old as if their only purpose in Thinking and Writing is to enlighten us, and to have their works dissected under the microscope of our superior intellect, while being held up to and critiqued by works of their ancestors, contemporaries and descendents. We, who have precious few among our number that by some miracle of genes and training and plain dumb luck possess the capacity to have a multi-leveled conversation with any semblance of thought at all, and fewer still that are aware they are doing so! Thinking has gone entirely out of style, first for women and now for men as well. Thinking, particularly for any sub-culture or minority, promotes an air of Education, another lost art, and creates rifts in the solidarity of the community by elevating the Thinker to a status of Knowledge, or at least the appearance of Knowledge. With the appearance of Knowledge comes the supposition of self-righteousness or disloyalty to one’s kind. Writing is the natural progression of Thought into an ordered sequence and form, ending in Knowledge. A true Writer is aware of the truth of what he is Writing, and, like Martin Luther, will stand by his Writings to the death. As a dear friend and respected teacher once quoted, “Men will die for Truth, they will not die for a lie.”

Of course, Thinking and Writing what are merely stepping stones to actually Knowing, but this third step is not only the most important, but also the most overlooked by Thinkers of yesterday and today. Knowing implies that there are absolutes in the universe, and this type of bigotry is not to be stood! In fact, we now know so much, that we must refuse that we know it! To Know something is to Believe it, and to Believe something is to disbelieve its opposite. Therefore, society demands we not Know anything, because that is to put one’s Knowledge above another’s opinion.

Therefore, the real reason that our society no longer Thinks is that Thinking, Writing, Knowing, and Believing offend someone else’s idea of Self, and that is bad, because the precious self-image must be maintained at all costs. And in order that this may not be a purely philosophical essay, but a truly practical one as well:

Imagine that there is a man who, by some turn of events, was born into poverty. His life has taught him nothing but want, violence, and anger, and so he lashes out. In a fit of rage, he beats his wife, not for the first time, but for the last. In his fear of being discovered, he dismembers her and flushes pieces of her flesh down the toilet. The man is caught, and tried. May a judge then say, “This man has shown not a shred of human decency or respect for human life, there is no possibility of his being rehabilitated, and he will die for his crime”? No! And why not? Because the judge is not permitted by law to Think about the case as such. He is not allowed to Know that the man will only do more harm if he is permitted to re-enter society, and he is not allowed to Believe that the penalty for 1 death should be 1 death. The laws of our land stand in witness against us as testimony that We May Not Think!

And why? Why do people fear Ultimate Truth? Why are Thinking and Knowing so disturbing? Because they live their lives under the rule of Self. “If it was me, I wouldn’t want someone to tell me I’m wrong and they are right.” “If it was me, I would want a second chance, not a death sentence.” Because we see the world through Self-colored glasses, we interpret it to be better (or worse) than it is. To be under the rule of Self is to take an ego-centric view of the universe. Who among us hasn’t wailed to his wife, his God or himself, “Why is this happening to me?” Each man has only one pair of eyes, so he expects that the entire world sees through those eyes as well. With only one point of view, how can a man see that others don’t share it, or why? Therefore, the world must see things my way or not at all, and only Tolerance will be tolerated, but only in moderation. I will not be forced to see things the way those who feel themselves my superiors see them, because that is Intolerance, but others must be forced to see things the way I see them: Tolerantly. If we all Tolerate each other and our opinions, there is no need for Thinking, Writing, or Knowing, and one may believe whatever one wishes, so long as other Beliefs are Tolerated.

The sense of Self seems to be strangely warped, because most people believe it means “Self, at the expense of others.” What Self really ought to mean is, “Self, because of others.” A young woman once said, “Even when you get married, you still have to be your own person.” Unfortunately, she was wrong. No one is their own person, married or otherwise. Everyone is affected by those surrounding them, and each action makes ripples in the sea of human Consciousness. Everything that is Done, Thought, Known, Written, or Believed creates a ripple that cannot be stopped or suppressed, no matter how small it is.