A few thoughts

My last post made me ponder, yes we all have our own ego but do we have a communal social ego and maybe further a social arrogance. It has been seen in the past that a community will boast superiority over another. I mean not just religions, for I wish not to go down that path, but also between those of different education. When I say education I do not just mean standered school learning, I more refer to what you learn beyond that. Yes it is cliched but you do learn something new every day even if it is something inconsequential like the score of a football match. From everything we read and hear we either choose to believe or dismiss. This decision in most cases does not even cross the conscious mind. For instance you would never listen to the news and then think 'I don't agree with that it didn't happen', unless you check your calendar and it happens to be the 1st of April. So with every bit of information you learn you are taking a point of view as to what is correct.

This is where I feel the arrogance comes in. With this increase in knowledge I feel we look back at our past selves and previous ages and think higher of current society thanks to those advances. Yet we always seams so short sighted as if the knowledge we have now is the be all and end all.

I like to think I do not fall into this trap, again a sign of arrogance, thanks to being a scientist. I deal every day with theories, not facts, theories as to what models best describe the world around us. A theory is just a guess never to be proved right but only surviving until proved wrong.

However following this way of thinking to the letter can prove rather depressing because you end up with the view that we know nothing and so have not advanced beyond those that went before as they too knew nothing. But that though is easily quelled as I write, or you read, this note. Its very existence proves our ability to create whether it be language, via which we communicate, or through the physical act of communication. Thanks to not just the internet but computers and electricity and even going back as far as to look at those who sourced and distributed the materials from which all those things were made. This sort of view of understanding, and to an extent thanking, all the things done and the people they are done by is one adopted by Taoists.

This is a view I think could make all of us a little less arrogant i.e. thinking less of ourselves by realising all the things those that came before us did put us where we are today.

With that thought lingering I bid you Adieu

Ed