Questioning the Unquestionable

I read the following in a blog called Sovereign Man:

Human beings are not meant to exist in isolation. We strive for inclusion and acceptance of our peers. And the forming of social groups, whether families, tribes, dynasties, and kingdoms is as old as human civilization itself.

I'm sure few people would argue about that.  It seems to be one of those universal truths on which we all agree.

Yet, I am going to question.  I do agree, however, with the second and third sentences in that paragraph.  They are observations which reflect my own experiences.  It is the first sentence which I want to examine.  

Begin with the principle that just because you observe something doesn't establish the cause.  Just because you see a black cat running in a field of red poppies doesn't mean that red poppies are the reason black cats exist.  Even if you observe this hundreds of times and you've read about this in writings of scientists and artists and religious leaders written hundreds of years ago, still does not establish that red poppies have anything to do with the reason why black cats exist.

So, in this case, the fact that humans have from, the beginning of time, tended to form groups doesn't establish the fact that human beings must form groups.  All that we can say with absolute certainty is that, based on all recorded evidence we could expect that humans will want to form groups with others.

Where does this notion come from?  Who, or what established that humans "are not meant to live in isolation"?  

There are religious arguments that God may have decreed this and will point to various scriptures in sacred books, but even if a person does believe in God, it cannot be known for certain that what is written in these books are really the true words of their deity or merely a widely accepted interpretation created by some man.

Some people might argue that humans need to couple with others in order to reproduce, and survive as a species, yet in spite of being true it does not establish a cause for a long term or permanent relationship between several or many other humans.

I don't raise this objection because I have concluded that this is an issue which merits a great deal of debate, but rather as an illustration of how passively we let very basic questions go unanswered in our lives.  Perhaps, the question is of gigantic importance and if we were to seek to find an answer to this we might start to completely reshape society.

The attitude I'm proposing, more than anything, is that we should be continually questioning statements we hear, and habitually examine ourselves to see if things we say or believe are based on solid principles and, if not, start to wonder how things might be different if a new foundation were established.

The Delights of Thinking

OSHO International Asharam via Wikipedia

I have just had an epiphany and it is the first time I realized that "epiphany" is what it is called!

Isn't it great when you make these discoveries?  It seems that all of a sudden a veil has been lifted from something you've been straining to see so long it seems like forever.

This discovery comes from reading some of the thoughts of a controversial, possibly misunderstood original thinker who I have only recently stumbled across: Osho, also known as  Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh.

For most of my recallable past I have been a person who has not subscribed to the popular way of thinking about life and the things that we see and hear around us.  I have been aware of this and occasionally have tried to share or explain my ideas to others.  Most of the time, however, I have not tried to recruit others to join my viewpoint.

It's not that I don't care, the fact is that I would like to have more people think the way I do but the idea that came out of the blue after my introduction to Osho was a notion that says:

 I would like you to agree with me, but I don't want you to accept my ideas without thinking about them.

Now, I don't consider most of my ideas to be original because I have adopted the majority of them from others, but I tend accept the ideas I hold because I have thought about them, examined them from a number of different angles, compared them with my experiences, attempted to extrapolate them into other situations which I haven't had but think might possibly come to pass, and after all this still conclude that they could be useful to me.  I believe that if anyone else passes through a similar process and THEN adopts my ideas, then it is healthy for them and for me to be in agreement.

I don't believe it is healthy, or perhaps a better term might be "reliable" for you to agree with me simply because I happen to present the idea in a way that sounds good, or because you wish to please me or avoid conflict with me.  If that is the only basis of your agreement, I would be reluctant to accept that I could count on your support if some kind of harsh test were to arise.

In addition, I don't think our world would be better off if everyone agreed with me about everything.  Yes, it is something that might feel good, but in the long run it would lead to stagnation and boredom.

If everyone agreed with everyone else about everything, there would be no change, no growth, no progress.   Of course it's nice to think how pleasant it might feel if we could experience a life where everything was perfect, where we had no problems, where everything went just as we wanted it day in and day out, but I submit that sooner or later we would become bored with that kind of life and, if nothing else, we would start inventing problems just to have a bit of variety.

So then the question arises:  How much disagreement is the optimal amount? Is it even possible to measure this and would it be possible to agree on the answer?

That's the delightful thing about thinking -- you think you've made an important discovery about yourself, or the world around you and when you start to examine your discovery you find out that there are more questions to be answered each time you reach a new level of understanding.