Heresy is the Best Policy: Why The World Needs Heretics (Part 2 of 2)

The world needs heretics. If every philosopher, every writer or every artist agrees with what’s generally accepted, society will never progress. If no one dares to be a heretic, there will be no improvement for humanity. The most obvious example is in science: If every scientist simply accepts the established paradigms, no research will take place. So why call yourself a scientist if you do not seek to improve, augment or even challenge the accepted paradigms? Similar questions could be asked for other vocations: Why call yourself a philosopher if all you do is simply swallow and restate the prevailing philosophies? Why call yourself a writer if your main goal is just to appease the powers that be or to elicit a positive reviews? And why call yourself an artist if you are afraid of offending the sensibilities of the public?

Any proper PhD is a PhD is heresy.

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Heresy is the Best Policy: The Value of Heresy (Part 1 of 2)

The great Clarence Darrow once said, “To think is to differ.” This truth implies that those who cannot disagree cannot think. Independent thinking is the only kind of thinking there is; to unquestioningly embrace opinions handed down ex cathedra is to abdicate one’s sacred right to think.

More importantly, the fact that thinking is differing implies that those who do not tolerate dissenting opinions do not tolerate thought. If disagreeing against orthodoxy is turned into a wrongdoing then the act of thinking is effectively criminalized. To require a group of people to think in the same way and to have the same opinion on important matters is to stifle their right to think, it is to make intellectual zombies out of them. No matter how intelligent a person is, this intelligence will mean nothing if he will allow himself to be the slave of a hive mind.

We can therefore restate Darrow’s words in the following manner: To think is to be a heretic.

This is perhaps why Roman Catholics who are for the RH Bill are effectively branded by the CBCP as heretics. Apparently, using one’s brain automatically excludes one from the Communion of Saints, if the bishops are to be believed. Perhaps this is also why Filipino secularists are heretics. In a country where the violation of church-state separation is “standard practice”, only those who think on their own manage to see the Catholic clergy’s practices for what they really are – acts of corruption, greed and abuse of undeserved power.

The said facts force upon us the following conclusion: Heresy is the best policy. I therefore urge everyone who values truth to be heretics! In other words, think! After all, everyone worthy of some consideration was a heretic. Only heretics change the world; without heretics, human history would be a never ending Dark Age.

Clarence Darrow. What that fierce face is saying: "I want YOU to be a heretic!"

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Philosophy and the tragic virtues, or Philosophy as an ode to life

All of philosophy originates from two things – burning curiosity and uncompromising honesty. All the other rudiments of good philosophy like eagle-eyed insightfulness, logical rigor and exacting intellectual standards, passionate skepticism, a deep moral and existential concern for matters of life and death and, of course, a teary-eyed wonder, spring from these two wellsprings, these two cardinal virtues.

            Curiosity, because philosophy is naught without deep reflection, and reflection is impossible without curiosity. But being reflective is not enough. Many people spend all their intellectual energies reflecting on deep questions, but they end up holding on to their comforting beliefs. But such comfort-beliefs are like comfort pillows, nice to hug and cuddle; however, they’re mostly air and won’t stand against a moment of honest scrutiny. So why are they held on to dearly, and not only by the all-too-many, but also by those who are intelligent and reflective?

The reason is that the other pillar of good philosophy, intellectual honesty, is all too often lacking. Intellectual honesty is a requirement of any philosophical search, and when philosophizing is done without honesty – and uncompromising honesty at that – personal predispositions, the irrational desires of our animal selves and that dreaded monster called public prejudice infiltrate our thinking. These infiltrators combine in the end to make up our comfort-beliefs. Comfort-beliefs are, well, comfortable, and people cherish and hold on to them because they supposedly make life bearable. But I can’t see how one could bear living a life centered on a comforting lie.

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Holy Mirth

Laugh at what is most sacred.

Poke fun at what is most holy.

Joke most about what you revere the most.

Good laughter sanctifies everything.

And evil is that which we cannot laugh at.

For a god who does not laugh is the devil.

And a god who cannot be laughed at is doubly so.

On politeness, truth and laughter

18 March 2010

Sometimes, being nice to people is not being nice to the truth. Politeness must never be allowed to trample honesty. Offending by telling the truth is not being rude, keeping the truth from others is.

***

Our beliefs are not just our beliefs. We can’t just say, “Well, these are my belief and yours are different. We disagree, but that’s alright. Now, can’t we just all get along and be friends and say everything is fine and dandy?” Our beliefs dictate how we live life and how we view it; they dictate how we treat others and how we want to be treated. Most importantly, our beliefs will, if we are conscientious enough, define how we act in matters of life and death – in other words, in everyday matters. We therefore cannot skirt around our beliefs. In the face of the world, this we must say: “These are my beliefs, and these are my reasons for believing them. If you disagree with them, let us argue that we may see who is in the right.”

***

We must learn how to laugh at matters of life and death from time to time, for after all, a good hearty laughter is what makes life worth living. But we must never use laughter to hide the truth. Rather, we must employ laughter to entice the truth. Hence, never must we forget that the truth does not like the dumb laughter of the shallow and dishonest. The laughter that will entice the truth is like the laughter of a warrior: bold, hearty and harsh.

***

Fighting for the truth is not defending a conviction to the death. Fighting for the truth is seeking after the truth. We must never argue to win an argument. In any argument, it must be the truth that is the victor, for otherwise, both sides lose. But before we enter any dispute we must never forget this: any argument from which no laughter was derived is a waste of time.

***

The truth is a jester and loves only a jester. The truth never comes to him who takes everything with a heavy heart. 

Creation as Motherhood

When a mind bears great promise, we call it pregnant, but when this promise is fulfilled, we almost always call it a father – the father of an idea, of a school of thought, of a science, and so on. The contradiction before us is clear. To be consistent, this we must profess: All creators are mothers. Thus all creation is like giving birth – painful, bloody, and dangerous. And this too we must profess: All creations are like children – they come from one's very bowels, yet after being born they take on a life of their own.

Untimely Meditations 2

11
A world without argument is a world without truth. (July 2008)

12
A life is a work of art, it is the masterpiece of the soul who lives it. (July 2008)

13
The ideal individual is one who always seeks to improve herself. The ideal society is the society consisting of such individuals. (July 2008)

14
Where science is silent, one ought to pass through with caution. Where philosophy is silent, one ought to pass through with fearful respect. Where religion is noisy, one ought to go away from. (August 2008)

15
Of all the ways of acknowledging the ineffability of things, there is none more powerful than humor. (August 2008)

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Untimely Meditations 1

The mind as a flux
The following thoughts and ideas I have believed at one time or another. I may not believe some of them anymore. I may even believe the contrary. But the self, after all, is a history, and the mind is a flux. The thoughts here presented are just snapshots of the author's ever-changing mindscape.

1
Love is the safety net that catches those who fall trying to walk the tightrope of expectations. (February 2008)

2
The theologian's trade consists of being certain of things for which no honest human should be certain of. (April 2008)

3
Our optimism gives us reason to live, our pessimism keeps us alive. (May 2008)

4
Only a free individual can become a moral individual, for morality is impossible without choice and being moral cannot be forced upon anyone. (May 2008)

5
There is nothing more damaging to the cause of freedom than the illusion of freedom. (May 2008)

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On Proof and Evidence

Words, words

Sometimes – actually oftentimes – we can get pretty sloppy and careless in our use of words.

Take the use of the words “proof” and “evidence”. Proof and evidence, like speed and velocity, or theory and guess, have colloquial definitions that often lead to confusion. In order to smooth the progress of communication and avoid misunderstanding, these words have been given technical definitions in science and philosophy. For example, speed is defined as the magnitude of velocity; the latter is a vector, the former is the scalar magnitude of that vector. Also, a scientific theory is not simply a guess; rather, it is a system of ideas constructed from a verified set of generalizations and observations. In the same way, scientists and philosophers use the words proof and evidence to designate two very different things. For example, we prove a mathematical theorem instead of “finding evidences” for its truth, while we accumulate the evidence for a particular scientific theory but we never “prove” a theory.

What’s the difference? The distinction is best illustrated by examples.

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Ecce homo

The main motivation of a philosopher for writing her thoughts and ideas should, I believe, be this – so that someone may disagree with it. For a philosopher may exert all the efforts of her mind to doubt her thoughts and to see her most subtle and deep-seated prejudices in an objective light, the fact stands that there will always be biases and predispositions that only another thinking mind will see. As such, it is the duty of every person who thinks, who mulls over, who ponders, and especially of those who claim to worship doubt, to submit their thoughts to the careful scrutiny of others.

The above thoughts and the others that will follow, I submit to your scrutiny, dear reader. “Judge, that you may be judged,” said the philosopher Walter Kaufmann. So here I stand under the microscope, ready to be examined. Here I stand in front of the jury, ready to be judged. Ecce homo.