This passage comes from Robert M. Prisig's famous book Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance :
" I should talk now about Phædrus' knife. It'll help understand some of the things we talked about.
The application of this knife, the division of the world into parts and the building of this structure, is something everybody does. All the time we are aware of millions of things around us...these changing shapes, these burning hills, the sound of the engine, the feel of the throttle, each rock and weed and fence post and piece of debris beside the road...aware of these things but not really conscious of them unless there is something unusual or unless they reflect something we are predisposed to see. We could not possibly be conscious of these things and remember all of them because our mind would be so full of useless details we would be unable to think. From all this awareness we must select, and what we select and call consciousness is never the same as the awareness because the process of selection mutates it. We take a handful of sand from the endless landscape of awareness around us and call that handful of sand the world. "
The above passage suggests that what we know as reality is the sum of parts we choose to retain, consciously or unconsciously. From this grab bag of information we define the existance of people, places, objects and events. We relate to others the least common denominator of what we perceive these things to be. It is funny that when we first encounter Gorgias' statements that "Nothing exists." or "If anything does exist, it is unknowable.", that we pause to ponder them and often refute them. In essence, he is absolutely correct. How would one describe a red,shiny apple if there were no descriptors to give it it's quality? You wouldn't even know if it was an apple. It would exist as a thing.
Alternatively, Socrates avoided the debate over what existed or didn't exist in the physical world. His ideas revolved around having the individual pick and choose through personal moral dilemma how he/she existed in the world and what his/her duties were.
Neither philosophers are wrong in my opinion. They both have valid points for different aspects of what life is about as they have understood what existance and ethics are. However, what happens to individual thought or perception when someone else supplies you with the adjectives or the tag of quality for you to choose from? We see this everyday: the opinionated peer; the images and commentary on the daily news; the required reading in our schools. These descriptors that we are offered have distorted our perception. It would be exceptional for someone to use their free time to pursue a path of knowing the truth of a situation, a population, or a belief system. In this age of instant information, we are not given a choice to know the essence of anything. We are merely treated to a brief synopsis, some images and a commentary which pass for the truth.
I recall back in 1993 when I was in Pakistan studying medicine. There was political turmoil in the city of Karachi. A political party known as the MQM was vying for power for representative seats and had employed the disenfranchised youth and criminals to use terror tactics such as bus bombings or drive by shootings to paralyze the city. The US Embassy would issue out warnings for US citizens to return home (as I'm sure other embassies had). The news back in the States would mention a brief soundbyte of bombings taking place in the city of Karachi. I remember that my parents would call me almost everyday to see if I was alright. As for my personal experience: there were isolated instances of terrorism taking place. It wasn't happening in the part of town where I resided. All I ever encountered were police checkpoints and maybe occassionally being pulled off a bus to be frisked down for weapons. There was only one instance where I was in the vicinity of a drive by shooting, and traumatic as it was at the time, it didn't take on the mask of what others were perceiving back home or those that were directly affected.
On the other hand, I remember how I felt when 9/11 occured and I was living in Alabama at the time. I was more terrified then because I saw the images as the second tower went down. Not because of the threat of an outside force attacking my country but rather, what the backlash would be against me, an American Muslim. Thankfully, nothing untoward happened to me, except having to explain (in my words, through my experiences and my perception) who I was, what I was, and why I was to random people who couldn't make sense of what happened either. There's nothing more invasive or aggravating than that in my opinion. And, in the end, it doesn't lead to any true relevance in any one else's life. If you go about speaking of what your experiences were or what your thoughts are on a topic, people will generally have a preformed truth regardless of your input. They just need a consensus or additional ammunition in the form of information to make their truth seem more relevant.
If I had enough people to agree with me to say, for example, that white people are the most barbarous race of man and are responsible for most of the suffering in mankind's history, wouldn't my truth be right? If I had documented information of atrocities to support that claim, wouldn't I be correct? If I had TV shows and movies to show that it's the sterotypical white man that shows up, kills multitudes of people and then takes over the land of the vanquished, wouldn't my truth be more relevant?
The problem of this age of information is that the information that is out there is biased and interlinked with commentary and filtered through the hands of a few and it makes for a tough material to cut through if we choose to use Phaedrus' knife.
The above passage suggests that what we know as reality is the sum of parts we choose to retain, consciously or unconsciously. From this grab bag of information we define the existance of people, places, objects and events. We relate to others the least common denominator of what we perceive these things to be. It is funny that when we first encounter Gorgias' statements that "Nothing exists." or "If anything does exist, it is unknowable.", that we pause to ponder them and often refute them. In essence, he is absolutely correct. How would one describe a red,shiny apple if there were no descriptors to give it it's quality? You wouldn't even know if it was an apple. It would exist as a thing.
Alternatively, Socrates avoided the debate over what existed or didn't exist in the physical world. His ideas revolved around having the individual pick and choose through personal moral dilemma how he/she existed in the world and what his/her duties were.
Neither philosophers are wrong in my opinion. They both have valid points for different aspects of what life is about as they have understood what existance and ethics are. However, what happens to individual thought or perception when someone else supplies you with the adjectives or the tag of quality for you to choose from? We see this everyday: the opinionated peer; the images and commentary on the daily news; the required reading in our schools. These descriptors that we are offered have distorted our perception. It would be exceptional for someone to use their free time to pursue a path of knowing the truth of a situation, a population, or a belief system. In this age of instant information, we are not given a choice to know the essence of anything. We are merely treated to a brief synopsis, some images and a commentary which pass for the truth.
I recall back in 1993 when I was in Pakistan studying medicine. There was political turmoil in the city of Karachi. A political party known as the MQM was vying for power for representative seats and had employed the disenfranchised youth and criminals to use terror tactics such as bus bombings or drive by shootings to paralyze the city. The US Embassy would issue out warnings for US citizens to return home (as I'm sure other embassies had). The news back in the States would mention a brief soundbyte of bombings taking place in the city of Karachi. I remember that my parents would call me almost everyday to see if I was alright. As for my personal experience: there were isolated instances of terrorism taking place. It wasn't happening in the part of town where I resided. All I ever encountered were police checkpoints and maybe occassionally being pulled off a bus to be frisked down for weapons. There was only one instance where I was in the vicinity of a drive by shooting, and traumatic as it was at the time, it didn't take on the mask of what others were perceiving back home or those that were directly affected.
On the other hand, I remember how I felt when 9/11 occured and I was living in Alabama at the time. I was more terrified then because I saw the images as the second tower went down. Not because of the threat of an outside force attacking my country but rather, what the backlash would be against me, an American Muslim. Thankfully, nothing untoward happened to me, except having to explain (in my words, through my experiences and my perception) who I was, what I was, and why I was to random people who couldn't make sense of what happened either. There's nothing more invasive or aggravating than that in my opinion. And, in the end, it doesn't lead to any true relevance in any one else's life. If you go about speaking of what your experiences were or what your thoughts are on a topic, people will generally have a preformed truth regardless of your input. They just need a consensus or additional ammunition in the form of information to make their truth seem more relevant.
If I had enough people to agree with me to say, for example, that white people are the most barbarous race of man and are responsible for most of the suffering in mankind's history, wouldn't my truth be right? If I had documented information of atrocities to support that claim, wouldn't I be correct? If I had TV shows and movies to show that it's the sterotypical white man that shows up, kills multitudes of people and then takes over the land of the vanquished, wouldn't my truth be more relevant?
The problem of this age of information is that the information that is out there is biased and interlinked with commentary and filtered through the hands of a few and it makes for a tough material to cut through if we choose to use Phaedrus' knife.
1 comments:
Pass. Your blog was understanble and once again I found it a joy to read.
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