No Rationality without Poetry
Rationality without poetry (‘depth’) is meaningless. Moreover: it’s not even rational. Thus, better call it ‘rationality’ (between brackets).
[see: ‘AURELIS USP: ‘100% Rationality, 100% Depth’]
Rationality is not only about concepts
Of course, conceptual thinking is of huge importance. No doubt. However, through correct conceptual thinking, one can arrive at its own limits:
- 100% conceptual thinking – apart from mathematics, arguably – is not humanly possible. [see: ‘About Concepts’]
- There is a realm of reality that cannot be fully conceptually grasped. [see: ‘About ‘Subconceptual’]
Rationality is – by definition – about taking into account reality as a whole. Thus, the borders of conceptuality are not the borders of rationality.
Think ‘poetry’ (in general, not only poems). Rationality is also about this.
Do you think poetry exists?
Well then: poetry is precisely beyond conceptuality. This is even why it exists.
Thus:
One should not equivocate ‘rationality’ with ‘getting rid of poetry’.
Half a rationality is no rationality at all.
‘Getting rid of poetry’ is only what it directly means: ‘getting rid of’. I hope, dear reader, that you don’t abuse rationality for such a meager endeavor.
Nevertheless, I do see it being abused this way
even by people who are otherwise rational.
This abuse is plainly not rational. The result is irrationality. Because this may nevertheless seem so close to rationality, let’s put the term ‘rationality’ between brackets to denote a lack of poetry inside:
Rationality MINUS poetry IS ‘rationality’.
Unfortunately, ‘rationality’ is a huge source of dividedness, worldwide.
People who value poetry and see ‘rationality’ being used as an instrument for abusing the same, may turn away from rationality (without brackets) altogether.
Simply put, they:
- equivocate rationality with ‘rationality’
- see the abuse of poetry through ‘rationality’
- turn away from rationality.
How pitiful is this?
And with huge consequences…
Specifically, I see as one of the most appalling consequences: many people (+/- 6 billion, more precisely) are stuck between one’s own deeply felt – and valuable – religious feelings and the necessity to believe in some Santa Claus stuff.
Because ‘rationality’ cannot manage depth, eventually depth has mainly irrational outlets…
It’s even worse if ‘rational’ people point their finger to depth as source of irrationality.
The source of course is multi-faceted, including ‘rationality’.
Intercultural divides. Intra-cultural divides.
What a waste!
Related Posts
About Reasoning and Planning in Humans and Lisa
In artificial intelligence, reasoning and planning are often presented as separate faculties. Reasoning is about drawing conclusions; planning is about organizing actions toward goals. Yet in humans, and even more in Lisa, the two are deeply entangled. This blog explores how reasoning and planning flow together, why the divide arose in A.I., and how Compassion Read the full article…
The Dance of the Ego
This is how consciousness comes into being moment after moment. The ego can be seen as the way consciousness is conscious of itself. This is no magical meta-level, just a tiny recursion that hopefully becomes evident through the dancing metaphor. Please give it some of your time to digest. Dancing Consciousness is the dancer. At Read the full article…
Never Change a Habit
Instead, let the habit change you. We’ve been told that to improve our lives, we need to break bad habits and form good ones. The idea seems simple — identify a habit, replace it with a better one, and repeat until it sticks. But anyone who has tried to forcefully change a habit knows how Read the full article…