The Burning of the Library of Alexandria by Ambrose Dudley
During my undergraduate epoch, I had a friend who described to me the critical flaw that everyone, including myself, has with discussion. He more or less stated that people only are waiting for their turn to speak, rather than build upon the discussion in response. Because of this, most disagreements devolve into more or less a shouting match, as neither side wants to actually engage with or understand the opposing view.
I’ve noticed that nobody really reads anymore. As I stated in my rant about our current form of governance, both professional and amateur historians completely ignore quite obvious patterns of history, and focus on rather superficial aspects of history. The same could be stated for discussion. Instead of trying to understand the “other side”, the majority of people seemingly just want to “win the discussion”, or be “the most correct”. In this vein, the majority of people are not discussing, but instead monologuing against someone else.
My frustration grows with the fact that most people nowadays seemingly do not read at all. Most people are exceptionally ignorant of history, philosophy, or anything that is not some pulp fictional story that has little to no critical or deep thinking underlying it all. I’m not stating that people should not enjoy mindless entertainment from time to time, I myself do read those same stories. However, the number of people who seemingly have read any “heavy” reading, grows smaller and smaller.
Furthermore, the amount of work of critical thought does grow, and there are still people out there generating it. However, few, if anyone actually reads the work. If they do, instead of attempting to understand it, they instead seek to destroy it in order to preserve their personal status quo. The destruction of heretical ideas is nothing new with humanity, and is in fact the norm. But we do not live in prior eras, where survival was less assured. We live in an era of safety and bounty. As the years go on, there are fewer reasons for strife, and our conflicts grow pettier. Why not try to understand what someone else is thinking? Why continue to hide under the comfort blanket of the status quo? Why not challenge yourself to see if you could rationalize how the other person perceives? A good thinker can think of a solution to a problem, but a great thinker can truly understand the problem for what it is.
Stop burning the Library of Alexandria in your head.