immodesty and apathy, common to man

Philosophy Forums Philosophy
1

An unwise person whom thinks he is wise
is in more trouble than an unwise person whom knows he is unwise.

An unknowing person whom thinks he knows
is in more trouble than an knowing person whom understands he lacks knowledge.

I have come to see it as 100% true that many persons do not revel in education.
And if they read often, it is often fantasy, or drama, or some story that never
actually happened. kids don’t want to go to school. Learning can be fun, but
sometimes, and for some people, it is painful. It requires a long attention
span, personal effort, changes in beliefs, humility to accept a new idea as
worthy or greater than your own, etc. There are just a few reasons why
education isn’t “fun”. A human will normally prefer a fun activity moreso
than a non-fun activity. This fact of the human being should be obvious,
especically in a media so focused on entertainment value.

We are left with allot of people who think they know allot, and are wise.
When in fact they do not know allot [rarely study]
They get lied to by the most skillful con men of society, culture and the mass media.
And they are probably morally confused and not versed in philosophical discipline.

This person can be nice and clever, but more often they do havoc.
There is this myth around about how ratiol people are.
Well thinks like the aztex religion to me seem highly irrational.
Here these people are, making huge assumptions about invisible gods.

In the passed I was over-assuming and over-believing also.
It is customary in society to be so and do so.
Also apathy effects knowledge.
Apathy means we don’t care what exactly is in the food that we eat,
or who governs our country and how. As long as it feels good,
it is good. Hedonism.
Also I am going to make the claim that drug use is hedonism and unwise.

The apathetic soul will be the downfall of civilization.
Long before the civilization falls, or becomes horrible, I feel I can
predict this due to the unwisdom and the apathy.

Apathy is one side of it, then being immodest is another side to it.
If we were not imodest, we would not over assume.
Modesty means you know your limits well. Limits of what you can know.
I consider the western fundamentalists as immodest, while not apathetic.
Maybe apathy is worse than immodesty.

2

A recent study indicated that both liberals and conservatives sub-consciously bend the facts that they know to be true in order to maintain their pre-existing sentiments. Essentially cognitive dissonance.
Specific neurons and neurotransmitters such as norepinephrine, trigger a defensive state when we feel that our thoughts have to be protected from the influence of others.
If we are then confronted with differences in opinion, the chemicals that are released in the brain are the same ones that try to ensure our survival in dangerous situations.
In this defensive state, the more primitive part of the brain interferes with rational thinking and the limbic system can knock out most of our working memory, physically causing narrow-mindedness. Humans are primarily emotional beings. Doomed into a state of perpetual ignorance.

3

That sounds true to me.
Thanks for responding to my thread also.
For a few days nobody said anything.

4

Maybe nobody responded because it wasn’t entertaining enough,… you know the problem you alluded to in your post. Also the post is rather confronting, and when one is honest with oneself, the person probably has to admit that he has some, or a lot, of the decribed tendensies. Being critical of yourself feels less good than believing you got it all figured out.

But i think your post made a lot of sense, and i usually read what you write here. I will say though that it’s very hard to not become apathetic concerning politics and the people who govern us. The more i look at how that system functions, the less faith i have in it continuing to work good. I see it as inevitably going one or the other direction based on factors that don’t make a lot of sense, and without me having any influence on it whatsoever. I basicly decided that it’s better not to put to much energy into things i can’t do much about, and focus more on things i can do something about. That’s a also a kind of fatalism and apathy, but i think it makes some sense in the context we live in.

5

I’m surprised. Thank you.

In my writings, I suggested modest alms. What I mean by that is, if you adopt some pets that were going to be put down, or adopt a child from a bad situation, or if you give a bit of cash to a charity each month, you’ve done your part. It’s sad that we can’t help the world more, but maybe we need to just be happy to make a small difference instead of a big difference. It still counts, it’s just that we wish we could do more.

Changing and upgrading your personality can take years. It’s worth it, but, people need to make internal, philosophical progress.

Philosophical progress basically equates to important truths. Realizing one then another, seeing how one promotes the other.
This is a slippery slope. Allot of people can’t do it. Important truths are life relative and morally relative. Unimportant truths are like the color of a car.

Years ago I was super religious, then as I was leaving the religiousity, I started to over-assume about allot of things, and I spoiled the true value of the visions that I was having. I didn’t know that my mind and subconscious are full of deception. I had too much faith in my ideas and perceptions. But I was never really apathetic. Years ago I was also self-righteous. In a bad way.

I could go on and on about my flaws, but I think it was natural to be born with allot of crap. I tried to get over what ever I could though.

6

I think we are starting to see more and more that our psychology deceives us, especially about ourselves, and that often gets worse not better at the collective level. However, I wonder whether this is a rationalist perspective, and that perhaps from a short-term, survivalist point-of-view our intellectual laziness and self-deception is often very useful. Either that, or the human race is in desperate need of evolution.

7

We need upgrades badly, but I don’t think we’ll evolve it. After all, evolution is supposed to take millions of years.