Review: Two.
When you, as a person in a discussion, realize PoPo™ has hit the point where you have met the Wittgenstein Wall™ then you have the best, the simplest, the most useful remedy at your disposal.
QaQa™.
Question and Question again™.
This is what will bring the conversation back under control. It will either clarify the terms, words, concepts, etc to the point where they can be spoken about in useful ways that have meanings or they will show the conversation to be worthless and not worth engaging in.
So the question becomes, “What questions do we ask?”
The first question should be obvious, but because of our conditioning is not.
For example an ad reading, “You too can be a success.”
Or, lets take a shirt a young girl taking a college course in management once wore to work. “You too can be a leader.”
An experienced Map Thinker™ will automatically notice the presuppositions in the statement. With a little practice this takes no thought. It just happens.
You too can be a leader.
It assumes you are not a leader.
It assumes you want to be a leader.
It assumes being a leader is somehow a good thing.
It assumes the person or company can teach you.
Once you see the presuppositions you can question any of them or all of them.
But the real question is, “Why bother?”
Should you spend any time thinking about something simply because you hear it or read it?
Closely related to this is the traditional “Cui Bono”.
Who benefits?
What is your benefit?
You have so much time on earth. The time you spend thinking about becoming, or not becoming, a leader could be spent doing something else. Something that will reward your time either in amusement, learning, or something else.
You may enjoy thinking about this particular dumb slogan, (I found it enjoyable). Then do so. It may be that examining that slogan might produce insights into your own character or that of others. I did.
There is really only one reason for doing anything.
You receive a reward for the resources you put into it.
The reward can be immediate. My immediate reward for writing this blog is that I enjoy putting my ideas on paper and I believe someone somewhere will find reading these blogs rewarding.
The reward can be so distant, such as membership in Heaven, or The Elysian Fields, etc that you have to die to find out if you even receive it.
Most of us settle for in between rewards. I go to work five days a week so I can do what I enjoy during the evenings, weekends, and holidays.
Students are asked to go to school whether they like it or not, whether they are suited to it or not, whether they care about what they are learning or not, whether what they are learning will benefit them in the future or not — with the vague hope they will get a better job than the person sitting next to them. If they would prefer to be happy, healthy, or wise, or even wealthy, — No offer is given them. Only that if they succeed in school they will, on average, receive more money during their lifetime than those who do not.
Is it any wonder most boys would rather play football where they can receive immediate rewards and instant respect?
So the first question should be obvious:
Why bother with the question?
It should be asked more often.
So what questions should we take our time and resources to ask?
If, like me, you enjoy exploring certain questions then that is the answer.
If you are not going to enjoy exploring the question for the sake of doing so, then we have to determine what reward we expect to get from doing so. This is very much like going to work during the week so you can go fishing, or watching football on a big screen TV on weekends.
If you were to study logic then you would be encouraged to be logical and rational at all times. Whether the issue was important or not.
Mapology™ would encourage you to be rational only when the reward for doing so is worth the time and effort you are going to spend decoding the situation. Usually this entails an expenditure of resources versus rewards for doing so.
Making choices that need to be made, reaching agreements that need to be mutually adhered too, that allocate resources towards a goal are the only reasons to apply the time and effort to solve a problem that you do not enjoy solving for the mental challenge. Using this scale which movie you want to see may be more reasonable to devote thinking too than whether war should be waged over a specific issue.
Your choice in movies involves two hours of your time to be spent, and the two hours of time you already spent on your job earning the money to pay to get into the movies. A total investment of four hours of your life. You want to see a movie you are really going to enjoy.
Your choice in whether your country should go to war will not be counted. Your share of the amount of its cost will be taken from your paycheck without your consent. Its impact upon you cannot possibly be determined ahead of time.
On the other hand voicing your opinion does have value. Every time you voice your opinion exposes someone else to it. That exposure may encourage the other person to modify their opinion, change their opinion, or agree with you. The next person they speak too may be effected by the effect you had on the first person. Slowly the world may come a little closer to agreeing with you.
When that happens change will happen.
On the other hand asking questions can be fun.
I do.
I asked the girl wearing the shirt questions.
“Why would I want to be a leader?”
She believes everyone wants to be a leader and anyone who claims otherwise is crying sour grapes because they don’t want to admit they are failures. However she knew that if they faced up to their true desires they too could learn to become leaders no matter how old they were or how often they had failed in the past.
Her college courses had brainwashed the poor girl as thoroughly as any off beat religious cult would brainwash its coverts.
This is one reason to get into the habit of asking questions and never accepting anyone else’s answers. The more easily a person accepts the conclusions of another the more easily they are under the influence of anyone they perceive of as having authority.
The less easily a person accepts the conclusions of another the more apt they are to think for themselves.
Map Thinking ™ is the tool of choice for those who wish to think for themselves.
QaQa™ is the tool of choice for those who wish to maximize their ability to think for themselves.
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