SATURDAY, 3 JULY 2004
The difference between the ENLIGHTENED and the UNENLIGHTENED
The UNENLIGHTENED says: This is who and what I am, so I should just accept it.
The ENLIGHTENED says: These are the cards I’ve been dealt, and these are the resources at my disposal. Here are my capabilities and my limitations, and here are my interests. Considering all these things, I declare a particular vision of WHO and WHAT I WANT to be, and WHERE I would prefer to be this person. Let the work begin.
SUNDAY, 4 JULY 2004
Salute to the brilliant nine! (out of every ten)
One statement that does not get nearly the attention it deserves: People are brilliant! People are magnificent creatures who manage to survive and even live happy lives to a ripe old age, this despite the fact that they know or understand bugger all about their own species, and about how human beings function.
Someone might say, “Maybe they know more than you think.”
My opinion is, of course, most people know something, and of course they understand many things. But taking into account the totality of what can be known, what people know and understand represent such a fraction of the whole that one can hardly be blamed if you use a somewhat vulgar phrase to indicate the amount of knowledge and understanding you think they possess.
“Are you not also one of this species?” an intelligent reader may inquire.
Yes, I will answer, but I think I can get away with it by now to say that I am not nearly as ignorant as nine out of every ten people on the street.
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