Tuesday, May 11, 2021

Shallow People And Deep Aspects Of Philosophy

Depth manifests intellectually or personally in several ways, with precision, autonomy, and philosophical significance being among the markers of intellectual depth and passion, complexity, and sincerity being among the potential markers of a more personal kind of depth.  Small flashes of either kind of depth are scattered throughout the lives of most people, yet only a rare person wholeheartedly possesses the depth of consistent rationality and authenticity.  This is not because only a few people have the chance to identify or cultivate depth.  No, deep truths are always accessible to any being capable of reasoning out logical truths, and expansive inner life is within the grasp of any being capable of introspection.  The issue is a failure to rationalistically understand and pursue depth of any kind.

It is entirely possible for very philosophically deep issues--deep in the sense that they are metaphysically/epistemologically important, precise, or both--to be misunderstood by shallow people.  Indeed, this happens all the time.  Since every aspect of reality and therefore every aspect of life has a philosophical nature, every person who trivially or incompetently handles an issue like epistemology (in all of its applications), moral concern, and the inescapable scope of truth has done exactly this: they have approached or recognized that which possesses great depth with halfhearted and random intentions at best.  They have squandered the plentiful opportunities to embrace depth that have already come their way.

Each person is surrounded by philosophical truths and issues at every moment of their life.  While all truths are part of reality, some aspects of reality are either more foundational or central or have more extensive, philosophically important ramifications than others.  This means no one is truly isolated from matters of immense depth even if they fail to acknowledge them, search them out, or eagerly reflect on them.  Depth is within everyone's grasp and yet almost no one consistently understands what depth even is or tries to pursue it for the sake of aligning with reality.  At best, this kind of typical non-rationalist latches onto several personally appreciated concepts that they do not even explore thoroughly.

People who have never displayed any signs of looking beyond mere perceptions, whims, and preferences to see things as they are have the potential to understand things of great depth, yes, but they have either scarcely developed their own intellectual and personal depth or they have consciously fled from doing so.  Both intellectual and personal depth are not part of their lives in any consistent sense as long as they refrain from orienting their lives around genuine rationalism.  It is therefore delusional to believe or sincerely act as if every person has immense depth just by being a person.  Otherwise, everyone would brim with philosophical and introspective depth rather than sporadically display hints of their ultimate potential for pursuing depth.

Rationalism, the cure for avoidable ignorance, inconsistency, and intellectual aimlessness, is of course the cure for superficiality and stupidity as well.  There is nothing more superficial and stupid than living an entire adult lifetime without even dedicating any thorough thought to matters of truth and how to respond to various truths.  A rationalist can go far beyond those who remain adrift in shallow priorities and worldviews that reflect nothing more than asinine preferences.  Yes, even people with the most irrationalistic beliefs possible (those entailing an outright, direct rejection of reason as inherently true) inevitably brush up against issues of great depth, but blind, happenstance contact with truth does not indicate anything deep about the people in question.

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