Every day is see people who are so unconcerned with philosophical issues that I wonder how they get through the day, let alone life, without doing serious harm to those around them. They seem to pop about with inflatable chests and muscles and what not, with all the obliviousness of Ken and Barbie at their Malibu mansion and God, how I envy these people. While I never thought of myself as a great thinker, and I mean that in every sense, I know that I am thinker and perhaps at times an over thinker, but I always reasoned (of course, reasoned, since that is the point) that this was still preferable to never thinking at all, never considering consequence or concern not only for yourself, but those who happen to be in your path. Thinking, higher thinking is what supposedly separates us from lower mammals. Just ask that nut bag Valerie Solanas who, in her Scum Manifesto, a truly hilarious book were it not so self-serious, that there are those among us who act like “that of the lower mammals” in their thinking. I’m no big fan, but I can’t say I disagree with her on that. I don’t think I would have shot Andy Warhol to prove the point, but I will say she got a word in when he wouldn’t take her calls. Surely there were other ways, but it was her way… but this is not the point.
I was always taught that one is taught to think; that thinking is not necessarily a natural state – not higher thinking or so called higher thinking. We can all think to a greater or lesser extent, but logic and the theory of logic must be learned like any equation. Logic follows its own rules and tautologies, things to be studied. To say otherwise is to deny the obvious: we also learn from experience, but for those who have limited experience, logic can be used in its place to help us understand the whole human experience.
The Socratic Method is called the Socratic Method for a reason, and that is that it was the method used by Socrates in his effort to get to the root of any problem or thorny issue with a series of questions and answers that lead directly to a specific answer – though note that Socrates often made the questioning follow a certain course to the get the answer he was looking for (I think this makes him human; nobody likes to lose an argument)l.
In Socrates’s day, one didn’t just charge at walls and declare a thing true because they said so (well, some did, but many more knew the value of philosophy, which meant proof), and in ancient Greece and Rome, as in other cultures, there were those great men (usually they were men, sexism must have been alive and well; women were only good if they had died horrible deaths and been then later turned into goddesses, which wasn’t a bad gig, but you had to die first, or be turned into a tree or some such nonsense. After that, you would were good to go and would be revered and adored and loved, but all of it involved death, or that’s my understanding. But back to the point; the men got to hang around all day, drawing diagrams in the sand (think: Plato’s Meno) to explain abstract concepts like geometry and calculus, the nature of existence, the reality of existence (did we exist at all – which I think Descartes was wrong about, by the way.
Article comments
1 - Robert Nagle
Oh, it's a nice thought that geekiness=sexiness. Meanwhile, back in the real world...
I taught at two business colleges overseas and changed my mind about business students. They focused on action, the practical, on making dreams a reality. It wasn't true so much with the business students I knew in USA, but in Albania, they were the best and the brightest.
The main problem with philosophers (and artists too) is that they rarely can support themselves. They believe that ideas and feelings takes precedence over plans and realities.
A new paradigm has emerged. The web-savvy creative geek (the kind you find at sxsw interactive ). They are brash, creative, ambitious and keenly aware of the political and moral aspects to what they are doing. Into self-expression, alternative lifestyles, well-connected, single (usually), hiply subversive and keenly aware of what's going on in the blogosphere.
2 - sadi
well, the last part comes close to defining me, save for the single part, though perhaps i fit both. not sure. mostly, i try NOT to define myself because it's all to freaking limiting. can't i be all sorts of contradictory things at once? i mean, aren't we all, both ugly, beautiful, strong and weak, subversive and conventional? i think maybe that's the new paradigm.
as for artists, a ha. i 've got you. you see, i'm an artist who makes money, or usually do anyway, because i found a way to turn my writing into technical and medical writing which pays very very well, so i have written for harvard, intelihealth, mass general, etc. and some of the largest telecom firms in the world where i also helped develop component names and onscreen content for new software applications.
the smart artist/writer will find a way to do this without selling his/her soul and you can be just as creative.
shit, i ran my own imprint called Lumen Editions for years and we published only work in translation and fiction and the last book ever by Marguerite Duras and we were hugely successful. everyone told me i would fail, yet we went to the moon. i was profiled all over the place in industry pubs as the "enfant terrible of publishing" which frankly, didn't fit, but still. the point is, you dn't have to be poor to be an artist and i have to say i don't like that attitude.
artists can be wealthy as hell, and why not. we should be. the most creative of us, throughout history, have historically been the poorest, aka van gogh, and it's all after death that we achieve that measure of fame. for the first time, i am seeing true artists actually making a real mark and making a living that is above the poverty level and in some cases, over the 100K mark because they, like me, have found a way to turn what they do into something that is valuable to a large corporation. Now, at present, i am unemployed, which blows, but that happens in life. it's happened before and surely will be remedied. with every job i left, i took two steps up the next time. this time will be no different, i expect. that's not arrogance, just experience. with every job, i learned something new and that made me more valuable in the market, and since i'm a nut and have hypergraphia (oh, epilepsy, my muse!) i can also write a ton as well and still keep my creative mind greatly occuppied and happy.
so you can have both.
i dont' know if i'm subversive? probably in some ways. i'm a genxer so likely i'm just apathetic and subversive just to be difficult. what do you think? (generational differences fascinate me and i've written a great deal about this as likely you know...). Sadly, GenXers came along at the wrong time. Boomer had all the good jobs and now that we are older, the generation Next are getting all the jobs because they are entry level and will work nutty hours and have that corporate loyalty thing going on (these are generalizations, yes i know).
it's rather tough being the middle child, generationally speaking, don't you think.
in any event - i think geek is sexy. i think smart is sexy. so it's not about geek chic or some crap, it's about having a brain that can follow a pathway and keep up with me in a way that may not always make sense to others. my mind makes odd connections and a lot of times, i think people are a bit mystified or confused and perhaps that's my fault, but when i'm with "geeks" for lack of a better term, i find they understand me just fine and we become fast friends. are wiring is similar - it's like calculus. either you get it, or you don't. it's a hard thing to explain a figure on a plain that exists only in space unless you have a certain way of thinking and of seeing.
a friend told me recently that most of the people he knew who were really successful and at the top of their field were either manic depressive or epileptic. and though there is no relation between the two conditons, both do affect the brain as you know, and it takes a certain kind of, let's ay, eccentricity and mad faith to believe that something can be done. a certain irrationality if you will. Hate him if you want, but i think Richard Branson has that kind of thinking - he's not afraid to take a chance just because something hasn't been done. I think John Lennon was the same way, also Isaac Newton, I think many real geniuses are sexy because they just don't take no for an answer and they keep at it and that kind of energy and enthusiasm is sexy and inspiring and people want to be around it. Whether they always succeed or not is another issue, but i'lltell you this much; the more you try, the more likely you are to succeed and so in time, if you keep at it, you will likely hve a fair measure of success.
Never listen to naysayers. Your idea may be crazy, but if you believe and you have faith, then there is someone else out there who will too and that is something i learned from experience, and boy, it felt great to thumb my nose, albeit briefly because i'm not mean, at those who said "oh, sadi, it's impossible" when all of our books made the NY Times and hit every bookshelf and we got featured in the news etc etc.
It felt good to swing my way up Beacon HIll every day to my little apartment knowing that my "zany" idea worked and that as my publisher used to say, "that quirky combination" that made me ME, was the very force that made the engine go and that means everything and that is something that you can have forever and noone can take that away. that in turn builds a core of confidence and that is sexy.
so you see?
sorry for long response. i'm feeling very wordy this evening. likely i should shut the f. up soon.
love
sadi
3 - Gordon Bell
I attended a sales training preview and am so frustrated because I haven't been able to find the source or comprehensive material. I may not even be describing it sufficiently well. However, if you know of it at all this should help identify it.
In the area of objections how to recognize the opportunity and how to build stories utilizing contrasts or reverse tell. It is supposed to get you to get the prospect what you want them to say.
Ring a bell? If so please let me know about book(s) courses what and whoever teaches this.
4 - sadi
what? sorry, but i don't know what you are asking; please clarify.
cheers