eThoughts : The Age of Ignorance?

It seems to me that future generations from now will look back on the present state of human reason, emotion, and spirituality, at least regarding politics and human interaction, much like today’s medical community looks back at the state of medicine during the Civil War—as relatively uninformed. Perhaps the Dark Ages are not at all over, much less replaced by something better.

Don’t get me wrong, ignorance is one of our states of being. No matter what we learn, we still remain ignorant about something. Ignorance is not necessarily something to be ashamed about, but it is surely something to be humble about. In fact, one could argue that being ignorant is a gift allowing one to grow (similar to Alfred Adler’s idea about inferiority as a positive). But when we look at ignorance as opposed to intelligence, ignorance takes on a darker side. And maybe that’s one of our basic problems—the human propensity to see conflict rather than range. Whether it involves emotions, cognitions, or spiritual issues, humans imprint upon particulars and that imprint drives experience and interpretation. From an early evolutionary perspective, imprinting upon specifics is about survival, it serves as an anchor in an otherwise chaotic world. However, in an advanced evolution, anchors can turn into dogma, especially where the abstract, such as faith, belief, and interpretation become important issues, rather than the concrete, such as who is the nurturer and who is the predator.

If what we presently call conflicted emotions are simply separate points in a range of emotions, then there is a lot less actual conflict. If what we see as cognitive dissonance is merely a set of separate points in a range of cognitions, then there is a lot less actual dissonance. If what we see as spiritual disequilibrium is only individual belief along a spectrum of beliefs, then there is a lot less actual disequilibrium.

Broadening our scope to include seeing things as part of a range of thinking, feeling, and experience rather than focusing on seeing things as a conflict of thinking, feeling, and experience doesn’t mean we will turn into purple dinosaurs, we can and should practice due diligence about potential combative particulars in a spectrum of particulars. But as is the case with most law-enforcement people, just because one carries a weapon and practices with that weapon, doesn’t mean one is likely to use it in the line of duty. Practicing vigilance doesn’t mean we have to have or create conflicts to justify the practice. In fact, in human interaction and human politics, there is by far less real conflict and far more contrived conflict than is even remotely reasonable. How do we know and what a real conflict is? How about one in which we actually have to choose a side? How often does that really come up when we each practice consideration of others as opposed to worrying about what we stand to lose?

An odd thing about affluent people and affluent nations, is anxiety about losing that affluence. And when loss dominates our reality, we tend to embrace the conflict side of living. Maybe we have actually grown to love our conflicts, despite what we might otherwise say. But as long as we primarily see conflicts, we’ll likely remain in a preschool state of evolution, despite all of our technological advancements. But if we can smartly embrace and traverse the range and beauty of human experiences, maybe humanity will actually move into an age of true consideration for each other. That’s important as an individual who is ignorant and on their own is more likely to have trouble growing, but an individual who is ignorant and embraced will more easily grow and learn. And just because we can’t avoid ignorance, doesn’t mean we have to remain ignorant.