"Read not to contradict and confute, not to believe and take for granted, not to find talk and discourse, but to weigh and consider." -Sir Francis Bacon
Don't let philosophy just happen to you. Be intentional. Ask big questions and seek to understand opposing answers.
So often we decide by intuition and then read in order to seek serious support for this quasi-subconscious philosophy, or casually read strong authors and become swept away by the new ideology, or some even read simply to sound well read. Though the desire may be for the true and the good, we fail to realize our own responsibility in seeking it out and testing what we find. Readily painted with the colors of the convictions of others, we remain hollow people.
Perhaps far more of our social woes are rooted in this widespread lack of circumspection and in the education of wishful thinking than in any of our current points of concentration within the current sociopolitical paradigm. Our children's ability to graduate able to read, write, preform arithmetic, and use technology is a national concern, but is it not possible for such a philosophy of education to simply produce well educated bigots and criminals?
Poverty and lack of education are loudly proclaimed as the roots of global violence but the most widely accepted example of evil in a society in all of history is a very economically strong and academically sound Nazi Germany.
There is nothing wrong in offering basic education in subjects that may lead to future occupations and the ability to live skillfully in this modern world. But the lifeblood of the individual and the society is movement and movement is impossible without direction. Without an active, intentional guiding philosophy the individual and the society sicken and become vulnerable.
Perhaps somewhere in our romance with "freedom" and "individuality" the zeitgeist has gone a step too far. Looking for liberty and the pursuit of happiness we have demanded that every uncomfortable, imposing, or taxing train of thought be declared tort against the mind. With every difficult axiom and sublime ideal safely locked away we are safe. Safe from knights, chivalry, heroes, saints, deep hope, and deep success. Safe from understanding, purpose, submission, sacrifice, and love of the sort worth writing about. Safe from contradiction, safe from conflict, and safely bound in slavery to groupthink.
Will you be blown about about the fancy of your culture? Or will you shape it?
Please, don't let philosophy just happen to you.
