Accept or reject are not the only options one has. The most important and generally overlooked, especially by the young, is the option to ‘hold’.
It appears to me that many young people consider that ‘to be negative is to be cool’. This leads them into responding that ‘X’ is false when responding to an OP that states that ‘X’ is true.
When a person takes a public position affirming or denying the truth of ‘Y’ they are often locking themselves into a difficult position. If their original position was based on opinion rather than judgment their ego will not easily allow them to change position once they have studied and analyzed ‘Y’.
The moral of this story is that holding a default position of ‘reject or accept’, when we are ignorant, is not smart because our ego will fight any attempt to modify the opinion with a later judgment. Silence, or questions directed at comprehending the matter under consideration, is the smart decision for everyone’s default position.
Our options are reject, accept, and hold. I think that ‘hold’ is the most important and should be the most often used because everyone is ignorant of almost everything.
Do you agree that ‘hold’ should be the option of choice in almost all occasions?
It sounds like you are approaching an Eastern Mysticism in your thought.
To hold to the hold position is to basically refuse the entire bulk of ones entire persona which is self denial and self expansion all at once. It’s one of the paramount paradoxes of all eras, and ages, and in certain ways it is one of the original founding branches of epistomology. You mention in your post that to make an unwise acceptance, or rejection based upon the bludgeonng desire of the ego for unwarranted power is one of the major mistakes an intelligent youth makes these days, and I can’t agree with you more, since at some period in the past when I was “coming of age” I indeed preferred the element of fire, and it’s conflict to any of the other more subtle elements. To be right in all instances and aspects might be a noble desire, but it is also one frought with an insidious potency and a withering folly.
There has definately been a great deal spoken of on this subject through out many cultures and schools of thought and various themes of perceived necessity within the ebb and flow of contemporary conciousness, and I use contemporary in the sense that relatively thought is always contemporaneous, and so in my meaning thought is both current and historical. Socrates subverted the Athenian youth by utlizing a method of dialouge dependant upon an almost martial style of discourse. He professed to know nothing for sure, except that no one else knew anything either, but I’m sure you are aware of that. Descartes rational skepticism was based on this hold premise. Solipsism is capable of sending the most sound of mind into a vortice of fear and self doubt under the right conditions which I’m sure is a debatable statement. Historic thought is rife with the wisdom that one must be wrong, and that one must admit one is wrong before any real learning can take place, unless of course you are right, and to error, and change your mind would be to commit an act of self betrayal.
But to answer your last question, I think the hold option should always be considered, lest you make a fool of yourself.
Your agreement is appreciated. Like you say this bit of wisdom has been spoken many times in history. But most of society reads little history and I think it is a good idea to repeat these important ideas on occassion.
Gerenerally speaking, the youth of today only gravitate towards “negativity” due to a futile search for personal identity in our world.
Here’s my viewpoint on this:
If you are absolutely certain, by all means, do not hesitate to accept.
However in the case of one being even slighty pulled towards “rejecting”, one should first give thought to the position of “hold”.
The most fallacies come about indeliberately by talking without thinking very hard. It takes hard discipline to discuss something on cue and still be quite fair. Because we don’t all have the time for that discipline, it makes sense that we simply refuse to answer until we’ve mauled a subject over.
Truth values are not only True or False, they’re also Indeterminate. It is unassertive to rely on Indeterminate, and so it’s often ideal to leave some form of deadline as to when a response will be. This is how Western justice works.
I think it’s an ideal discipline to train people from early on that they should hold their response, if even for a moment. It’s surprising what you realize before you blurt. But holding is not really a new concept. It just implies that sometimes yes or no questions should be answered with a future date.
