Why Preach?

A lot of what I do some consider "preaching."   Given the negative connotations of the word I might take offense, but generally I get their point.  In an age where people are often rigorously protected from the harm a negative word might do to their self concept, where "self-esteem" is the holy grail of human potential, to hear someone suggest, sometimes quite strongly, that they aren't quite up to snuff can be pretty discomforting.  Nobody likes a critic.

On the other hand, nobody likes a person so self-centered that they cannot see the damage they are doing to themselves and/or to those around them either.  The insensitive, the narcissistic, and the "I don't give a...." attitude some people display, and all people display from time to time, does little for community harmony and peace.  But to ignore your short-comings and your failures in the name of keeping a "healthy self-concept" is a really, really damaging thing if you are, in fact a real jerk.  Wisdom would say it's not a good thing to be blind to your own short comings.

When I address young people, as I'm sometimes called upon to do, I generally tell them there are only two ways to become wise.  You can travel through life "getting kicked in the seat of the pants" when you screw up and learn your lessons that way, or you can listen to those who have traveled ahead of you getting "kicked in the seat of the pants."  They have learned.  And they have a map of all the places you can screw up.   And you know what?  They want you to have the map!  So take the map, please!    Seeing people succeed and having a hand in helping them reach their potential is what many, and maybe most people love about getting old.  So the old declare where the pit falls are, sometimes passionately, not because they want to take away your "good time," but because they want you to have a "good life."  Exchanging a a "good life" for a "good time,"  is not a healthy bargain.

Now of course, one can preach a lot of things, some of them just plain wrong.  I can subscribe to the idea that only blue-eyed blonds are valuable (I have blue eyes but not the 'right' hair color, alas), but if I subscribe to it and try to preach it, pretty soon somebody is going to ask me for WHY I believe it to be so (that is if they even give me the time of the day in the first place).  This is how you know the map is genuine.  It is supported by a lot of evidence from various sources, including experience, authorities and good reasoning.  But you only know that if you as "WHY" somebody thinks something is true.

This "WHY" is what civil discussion is all about.  It is the form of "preaching" I try to stimulate by my little missives, and it is important to me and to a lot of other people.  It is important because it is what makes us able, as human beings, to get along without violence (or at least without as much violence perhaps).  Without it the world would be involved in a giant shouting match that would soon dissolve into "wars and rumors of wars."  There is a reason "civil" is in "civilization" and "civilized."

So I "preach," I "cajole,"  I "challenge" and sometimes I make mistakes and go too far.  It takes, I think, a bit of courage to be out there "preaching."  And any time you stick your neck out to try something really new and possibly dangerous there is a good chance you will come back headless.  That's a risk I'm willing to take, though my neck might beg to differ.

I told you why I do this.  I care.  I care about people and what they think and how they act.  Not because I think them good or bad, but because the wise do not live as the unwise and the world is better for it.  Wisdom is the application of knowledge to a situation to reach a goal.  I try to get people to ponder and think about things so that they come to what will be truly their own goals and conclusions instead of the goals and conclusions they inherit unquestioned, from their community.  I don't believe the community is necessarily wrong.  But how would anyone in the community know if nobody questioned?  In any case, I do it because when a person has thought through the issues for themselves, looked at the evidences, the reasoning, examined the underlying premises; when they have done their own homework, they usually quit echoing the mantra's of their group and begin to speak in their own voice.  And if they are brave souls, they sometimes change for the better.

But of course, you may not care much about others, or perhaps care about them and express your caring in other ways.  I "preach" because I care.  I think we humans are made up of three core "realities": the physical, the social and the mental.  A fully living person is healthy in all three and needs to exercise in all three.  At least that is my philosophy.  But most of us are pretty lazy, usually in at least two of the three "realities."

Most of us do not exercise our bodies.  Some of us do not exercise our minds.  And some of us do not maintain social relationships very well.  "Preaching," at least as I try to do it, is one way to exercise the mind.  And it has the added benefit, if you "preach" in public, of sometimes engaging other minds so that both benefit.  When that happens those engaged often become more aware, more 'awake' to life itself. 

So I "preach" to wake people up, including myself.  If I did this in a philosophical forum where people are already awake, or at least more people seem to be awake, what good would that do?   That would be like a doctor setting up practice among the healthy.  So here I am, in Illyriad.  In a forum where most subjects are not designed to engage on any deep level of speculation.  Thus, in a forum which, to my way of thinking, does not awaken the mind in ways that are important not only in Illyriad, but in real life as well.  

So if you come across something written, by myself or by some other "preacher," be open minded enough to take it seriously.  Ponder it, Think about it and what it means.  Gather your thoughts, organize your evidence, marshal your arguments and step up onto your own soap box.  Then, if you have a moment, look over at the my soap box and wave.  I would like that.

 AJ

i enjoy a good conversation. 

i tend to deplore chit chat, partially because i am not overly good at it, but mostly because i find it wasteful when communication can do so much more than pass the time.

so i applaud the effort to introduce substantive subject matter to the conversation.  if ever you would like to delve into any issue of the day or self or universe, i am generally quite happy to join in. 

i will tell you, though; in honesty and good faith, that i do not believe i have seen over much resistance to conversation, but must admit i do not read all of these posts.  you see, i shy away from the declarations of right and courage and wisdom, as i think many others do. 

these missives do not read as invitations to converse on the weightier issues of life, offering the opportunity for personal and communal growth, but as hubris laden critiques designed to elevate the author.

if you would like to talk, by all means, lets talk, but i also deplore dogma, and will pass on the preaching.

Of course you may be right.  But then again, if even a moderate level college basketball player showed up at the local YMCA and proceeded to compete it might very well appear that he was tooting his own horn.  And if he offered any advice to the younger or less experienced players, would his advice be worth anything less even if he were?  If the dust on my shoes shows that I've walked down the road a bit farther should I pretend otherwise and dust off my shoes before I show up?

Along those same lines, suppose I am "showing off" in some way and my motives ARE other than stated.  Does that mean, if it were true, that the ideas I present are reasonable or unreasonable because of my motives for presenting them?  Wimsatt and Beardsley have a nice commentary on a related fallacy, titled "The Intentional Fallacy" which, in short, says that what counts is not what the author intended, but what was received by the reader.  And while their point is restricted to literary criticism, the same could be said of any argument I present.  Motives do not effect reasoning (except perhaps to cloud judgement which is usually easily revealed without an appeal to the motive of the speaker) and thus, if you can look past the supposed motives and deal with the content that would be useful to yourself and many others, no doubt.

Along these lines though, another idea occurs to me which I shall call the "Single Motive Fallacy."  It's probably been noticed by scholars far more advanced than I, but often we try in our ad hominem remarks to focus on a single motive of the speaker as if it accounted for the entire effort put into what was said.  "Oh, he's just in it for the money...." when a Senator votes a certain way, would be one possible example.  That Senator may stand to make millions from the passage of the bill, but even if it was a reason for his or her voting the way he or she did, it does not therefore mean that the bill was a bad one.  It may be that I have motives other than self-aggrandizement or ego boosting at the same time I may think that what I do may, in fact, boost my standing in certain circles.  Thus, the Single Motive Fallacy usually serves to do little but attempt to deflate the force of the argument being made by deflating the authority of the speaker, rather than actually address the argument at all.  (BTW, Kenneth Burke's "A Rhetoric of Motive" would be a good read on this subject).

So, by way of recommendation I might suggest two things: first, if you like philosophy, as I do, ignore whatever negative motives you may find in my missives and deal with the subjects themselves; and second, write some things yourself as that will, no doubt, demonstrate by example, how to better come across as less a pedant.

Thanks for your reflections.

AJ

Wisdom is waffling on a video game forum?

Edited by Princess Botchface - 19 Jan 2016 at 06:04

You remind me of the guy in the blond pony tail in this scene:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=azM6xSTT2I0