Walls in the mind
They cripple and they bind
Keep you deaf
Keep me blind
Keep us both confined

Those are the words from a word piece I wrote years ago. They came into my head, loud and clear, after a particularly frustrating attempt to reach someone. Today I heard them again in my head. Once again I was frustrated by all kinds of walls in the mind - such powerful forces against seeing, hearing, registering what is going on.

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Examples.

I watch a documentary on suicide bombers and their allies. A smiling woman talks sweetly of feeling privileged that she was able to help someone fulfill his mission in life, to blow himself up along with as many Israelis as possible. A voice from off-camera asks, "Didn't children die that day? After all, it was a family restaurant." The woman continues smiling her peaceful smile, "Yes, I think so. Three children." The off-camera voice, quiet but much less peaceful, says, "It was nine. Nice children." The woman nods a friendly, absentminded nod. "Ah, yes, nine." It clearly does not matter at all to her.

My partner is impressed by Al Gore's film, An Inconvenient Truth, on the imminent danger of global warming. He wants everyone to watch it. I am glad Al Gore's film was able to reach him - I was impressed by it too. I also ask: why did other sources not reach him? Why did all the information that has been coming at him, year after year, not reach him? More generally, why have so many people not taken in the information and reacted to it?

I cared about global warming twenty years ago. I've cared about so many environmental issues. Some other people also cared. Al Gore was able to understand, over two decades ago, the information coming at him. But many did not, could not or would not hear, see, connect the dots.

More care now. Slowly the information does get past the inner barriers. But even now, according to An Inconvenient Truth, 50% of non-scientists think we need to get more information before we decide that global warming is actually happening or something serious. 100% of scientists, looking at the data, agree global warming is a major threat. In other words, 50% of people - due to whatever reason - are not registering loud and clear information.

Walls in the mind. They are all around.

The majority of my students - I teach at a college - come into my classes with the rigid belief that all opinions are equal. How I dare I say they are wrong, I have been asked. How can I not, I answer - when all the evidence is that they are wrong. But it's an opinion, an area where right and wrong does not exist, many hold.

But the opinion that blacks, Jews, women, gays and lesbians are inferior - those are all opinions.

I have had very nice students - in favor of all kind of rights - hold that they agree with me, but it's just a matter of opinion. In other words, no better than any other opinion.

Some students are horrified, outraged, shocked, that I can flat out say they are wrong. But they are saying I am wrong, I counter. No they're not, absolutely definitely not, some insist. And they waffle words, to try to show that I am wrong to believe they are wrong, but that they are not saying I am wrong. More walls in the mind.

For more of the arguments they give, and more of my counter-arguments, see The Opinion that All Opinions Are Equal.

****

I come back to the word piece -

Walls in the mind
They cripple and they bind
Keep you deaf
Keep me blind
Keep us both confined

I remember that, with "keep me blind", I found it hard to decide - should it be, "keep me blind" or "keep you blind". I decided not to make the other totally out of touch with reality, and myself totally able to perceive.

But how am I blind, I ask myself today? In part, through my own walls in the mind - much harder for me to perceive than those in other people. That's the worst thing about those inner walls - they are invisible from the inside. They set limits, like the nose filters what we can smell, and our eyes filter what we can see.

It's only when we change the filters, the walls in the mind, that we change what we perceive.

So I will start with a wall of mine.

A wall of mine - I have found it so hard to invest in myself, my projects. A huge barrier against that, even when I was giving hugely to back another's dream - something I have done more than once. I am trying my best now to take that barrier down, to put into my project - into this site, into my creative projects - as much as into other things. Hard to believe my projects deserve more than my labor, especially. Much of my life, I've given masses of time. Not easy to invest money. And even harder to see the steps to having the project make money.

But these are becoming somewhat clearer. For now, the emphasis is on my major drive - just to get the projects out into the world.

****

In case you think I'm letting myself off too lightly, here's at least part of the problem. The walls are invisible to those within them - or mainly invisible, anyway. Sometimes one may sort of see them.

Inner walls can be clear and massive - when one feels trapped behind an inner wall. I've felt that - when I felt like reaching out to people, but could not. The word that came to mind - shy. Another word - afraid.

But the walls I'm writing about aren't like that. They're walls one can't see, if caught inside - except maybe momentarily.

So the best person to ask about my walls is someone else.

****

Walls in the mind
Keep you deaf
Keep me blind ...

There is a way I am often blind when I come across the walls in another's mind.

I am usually unable to see the wall. I can see the impact of the wall - people will rigidly hold religious beliefs that make no sense, hold opinions unbacked by evidence, deny evidence right before their eyes. I can see that clearly. But I cannot see the wall itself. It is invisible to me.

****

I come to frustration. So frustrating to see what others cannot.

A famous example is Cassandra, who was cursed by the gods to know the Trojan horse was a trick of the Greeks, but to be unable to get others to hear her, believe her. I can well imagine her overwhelming agony, her desperation and pain - to know, to warn, and to go unheard.

I think of someone my father told me about in childhood. No gods involved there, just human inner walls. In hospitals, about a century ago in Vienna, women were dying en masse, when they gave birth in a hospital. Semmelweis, a doctor, figured out that it was because the doctors handled corpses, gangrene, any kind of infection - and then touched women giving birth. Within a few days, the women were dead a a raging infection. One year, according to my father, no woman who gave birth in a hospital in Vienna, survived. Women who gave birth at home, on the other hand, usually had no complications.

Semmelweis tried to reach the other doctors. All they had to do was disinfect their hands - nasty caustic stuff, but it did prevent death. The other doctors were deaf to his words, outraged even. They washed their hands. What more could anyone want?

Semmelweis went mad. It was too much for him.

****

Some people do not go mad, but still cannot reach through to others.

I think of Copernicus and Galileo, who each separately figured out that the earth went around the sun, and not the other way around. It took them years to make sense of the overwhelming evidence they gathered (each observed and charted the movements of planets, etc. ), since they, like those around them, started by believing the earth was the center of the universe.

Those around them did not take in the evidence, when it was presented. The walls in their minds were too massive, rigid, high, strong.

Maybe it was that those around them had not for years added up data that slowly chipped at those walls, until they dissolved or crumbled or melted away. For neither Galileo or Copernicus just had a glance at a bit of evidence, and presto, found enlightenment. But they were each willing to continue, keep gathering evidence.

Those around them were not. They reacted against those with the unwanted information. And neither Galileo nor Copernicus went mad.

****

I can tell what it does, to have lower walls, or fewer walls, than most people - even if one can't reach others.

One can discover more. Darwin, taking in the evidence of his findings in the Galapagos Islands, figured out stuff about evolution. On the other end of the scale, there are many Americans, even today, who want evolution to be taught as a theory, to be given equal weight in school with the theory of creation - as if there were equal weight for both theories.

So lower than average walls means higher than average perception.

And higher, denser walls means lower than average perception.

****

Walls - prejudices. Against various race, against women, against people with different religious beliefs, against gays, lesbians, bisexuals. Against information.

****

I come to some words from Virginia Satir, best known as a family therapist, a warm person who was able to see and reach so many people. One brief piece of hers is on The Five Freedoms:

      The freedom to see what is there, instead of what could or should be.
      The freedom to feel what one feels, instead of what one should or ought.
      The freedom to ask for what one wants, instead of always waiting for permission.

Those are the ones I remember at the moment. Uppermost right now is the one that came to mind first - the freedom to see what is there.

A powerful freedom. And not one that can be enforced by law. It's a freedom that comes from within.

****

The freedom to see does relate to the society one is in. One society does its best to create walls against perceiving certain people (women, people with differing religious beliefs, etc.) as fully human. Another society does its best to stop people from realizing that all opinions are not equal. Still another does not encourage people to take in evidence, ask questions.

****

A technical term comes to mind: the narcissistic shell, a shell that uses - among other things - anger, rage, hatred to keep out information. So when, in the south of the United States, the laws were changed and the first black students were enrolled in previously all-white schools, enraged and outraged whites lined the street leading to the school on the first day of classes.

The narcissi shell. During World War Two, the Canadian Prime Minister's policy on allowing Jews into Canada was One Is Too Many. He could not see the humanity of the people he was keeping out.

Many people who would not use violence still have an invisible electrical fence that gives off high voltage bolts when unwanted information comes their way - so the information does not get in.

****

I am still left with questions:

How does one encourage as many people as possible to be like Al Gore - to take in evidence, to connect the dots, to see what is happening?

And how does one help pull down the walls in the mind of those where they are strong?

****

Walls in the mind. One can chip away at them - so that people do change, almost as with evolution - not quickly, but one tiny alteration at a time, until the person becomes quite different in terms of inner walls.

And sometimes one gets an ultra powerful tool - so that Sojourner Truth, a black woman who spent much of her life as a slave, was such a powerful speaker in the nineteenth century, that she was able to reach many listeners with her message of the equality of women. Popular arguments: women are too delicate and weak to have equality; they need to be lifted over mud puddles and be given the best place everywhere; plus god is male. Sojourner's words (from memory):

"No one ever gave me any best place, or lifted me over any mud puddles. And ain't I a woman? (She bared her right arm, showing its tremendous muscular power.) I have planted and plowed with the best of men, I have brought corn to harvest, and no man could head me, and ain't I a woman? I have eaten as much as a man - when I could get it. I have born the whip as much, and borne thirteen children, and seen most of them sold off into slavery, and when I cried with my mother's grief, no one bus Jesus heard me, and ain't I a woman?

"And they say women shouldn't have rights because god isn't a woman. (Lifting her voice to rolling thunder, she pointed at the minister who had raised that point.) But where did your Jesus come from? From god and a woman. Man had nothing to do with him."

At the end of her speech, the crowd - against her and her views before she spoke - applauded. Her words had tremendous power - the power of conviction, plus the power of evidence.

At present Al Gore, with his Powerpoint presentation on global warming, is reaching many - again with the power of conviction and evidence.

****

Where to end this?

I'll start my ending with the link to the word piece on walls in the mind. It's actually, I realize, on Chains in the Mind.

It captures my sense of intense frustration when up against The Wall.

Chains or walls, by the way, does it matter? Is there a difference? Yes. When one is chained, one can usually feel the chains, recognize they are there. One may prefer them, like a caged bird may prefer the shelter of its cage, even when the door is open.

The walls I've spoken of are different from chains - invisible to those who have them, like permanent distorting glasses. I come to a childhood memory, from The Wizard of Oz. In Emerald City, everyone must wear green glasses, so everything looks green even if it isn't, and the inhabitants are convinced everything is green.

****

Once again, where to end this?

I would like to find an adequate tool to get students to realize the incredible overwhelming importance of taking in evidence, and of backing opinions with evidence.

Perhaps the next time I am faced with students who hold that all opinions are equal, and who insist., for example, we must not judge any culture and the opinions of that culture - I should, like Sojourner Truth, lift my voice to rolling thunder. And maybe I should get together as much evidence as Al Gore did. I tried to, actually, in my piece against the opinion that all opinions are equal.

And in my most recent encounter with the "all opinions are equal" wall, fewer than usual students ended up holding that all opinions are equal.

So maybe, just one tiny bit at a time, I am making a dent in the walls in my own mind, and the walls inside the minds of others. After all, Al Gore has been making his Powerpoint presentation for years, and now his film has been seem by millions - getting somewhere, and still quite some distance to go. But not losing hope - because like with the wall that long separated East from West Berlin, lots of walls can come tumbling down.

****

The walls do come down. I suppose that's the best place to end.

Amazing grace
How sweet the sound
That saved a wretch like me
I once was lost
But now am found
Was blind
But now I see.

The words - or so I've been told - of someone who was a slave trader, and came to recognize that was wrong, and became a minister preaching against slavery.

signed,

Elsa
January 28, 2006

copyright © Elsa Schieder 2007, all rights reserved
publishing house - FlufferDuff Impressions 2006

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For another idea piece on chains in the mind,
The Rage of the Righteous
clock here.

For my arguments against the opinion
that all opinions are equal,
click here.

For Elsa's creativity blog,
on the writing of these ideas and much else,
click here.

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The Idea Emporium - why and what

One of my lifelong concerns has been trying to make sense of reality. What is happening? Why is this happening? And with that I come to ideas - ideas about reality, ideas that need to be checked against reality, not just believed in like the tooth fairy is accepted by a child. But how does one check them? What qualifies as proof, as evidence?

And why, so often, is evidence of no interest to people? We have masses of evidence of how good many people are at denying evidence when it goes against what they believe. Millions have denied, and continue to deny the equality of women and men, of Jews and nonJews, of atheists and Muslims, gays and heterosexuals. People are incredible experts at denying reality - what is seen, experienced. Of course we need to interpret reality - we do not know it "pure" but through our limited senses, our limited memory, our limited ability to perceive and make sense of the amazing array of information that does gets perceived.

Still, it boggles the even slightly rational mind - how can so many people be so utterly blind to, let's say, findings about nutrition? It amazed me to find out, when I was growing up, that there was evidence for the health benefits of whole grains over refined products - because masses of people stuck with white flour, white rice, white sugar. How could they be so closed to evidence? Somehow they had a wall against the evidence.

The ideas I want to explore are those that go with, not against, the evidence, that try to make sense of evidence.

So, the Idea Emporium - a place for ideas.
The Idea Emporium - a place where ideas are explored.
The Idea Emporium - a place where ideas are entertained , played with,
looked at from many angles.
The Idea Emporium, a place where ideas are evaluated.

What is an idea, by the way. I hadn't thought of that when I chose the name of The Idea Emporium. It just seemed the obviously right name. It was months before I realized I had a hard time putting into words what I meant by idea. I began to think about the word. Sentences with the word, idea, floated into my mind. Like, "I have an idea. Why don't we order pizza?" That was an eye-opener for me.

My guess is that most of us use the word without knowing exactly what it means. "I have an idea of what we might do. Maybe we could go out for Chinese food. But It's just an idea" - meaning this need not come to pass, but we think it might be fun. That is obviously not what I meant by idea.

"I have an idea. Maybe you left your hat in the car." Again, no

""My idea is that we go in together and talk to her." No.

These are all legitimate uses of the term, idea, but it's not what I meant when I came to name The Idea Emporium. And I'm sure it's not what people might expect if they click on The Idea Emporium - because it's not what most people mean by the word "idea."

Word has a built-in dictionary. This is what it says:

Idea -
a personal opinion or belief;
a thought to be presented as a suggestion;
an impression or knowledge of something;
a realization of a possible way of doing something or of something to be done;
the aim or purpose of a plan or project;
the gist or précis of something such as a book, report, project or plan;
a thought about or mental picture of something such as a future or possible event;
a concept that exists in the mind only;
a mental image that reflects reality.

The last is what I'm most interested in - ideas that reflect reality as well as possible. But I've decided that I like it that idea is such a wide term.

Here I am taking idea to mean (and I think this is what most of us think of when we think of the meaning of the word, idea) some thought one has about something. "I have an idea" - meaning, I am not sure this concept fits reality, but it is a hypothesis I have formed.

I also think that, when I named The Idea Emporium, I was blurring words together in my mind - idea, concept, conception, understanding, hypothesis.

The Idea Emporium - a place for all these things.

This is not the same as people having "an idee fixe" - meaning, a fixed idea, a rigid belief that something is one way or another.
The sooner people get rid of such ideas, the better. The Idea Emporium is not a place to set out rock-hard beliefs and stone people with them, hurling them like missiles at all and any that come within striking range.

That is not The Idea Emporium.

The Idea Emporium - a place to present and explore ideas - for now my ideas.

That does not mean the idea need to be timidly set forth, all hemming and hawing, tentative even when the evidence is strong.

The Idea Emporium – the goal is smart opinions, critical thought, perception, good analysis.

The Idea Emporium. Smart opinions - meaning, drawing on every resource possible, rather than "it's my opinion, that's why I believe it, and it's as good as yours any day. Who are you to say blacks can do math, women can learn to read, Jews deserve to live. I have every right to my opinion." Personally, I'd rather do my best to think well, but many others are clearly proud of their avowed right to be thoughtless.

That's not The Idea Emporium.

The Idea Emporium. Critical thought - that means we do our best to think well, to apply logic, information, all our capacities.

The Idea Emporium. Good analysis. Again, that means we try to ensure that we use valid arguments - not, "because it's my opinion," "because I say so" "because I know that's right" "because my god says so" "because everyone knows that's right" . We both draw conclusions from evidence (so there may be evidence showing patterns and tendencies in certain groups (for instance, I've done lots of research on the impact of rights movements on those who get involved, and have found lots of evidence for patterns of response) - and at the same time we are careful not to generalize, to draw conclusions beyond what we have evidence for, and even contradicting the evidence ("Women are ..." "Muslims believe ..." "everyone this happens to ..." "Jews are..." "Gays are ..."

The Idea Emporium. Perception. Not easy to perceive. We each do it through a filter of experience, memory, assumptions, and so on. We have all learned not to perceive many things - denial - and to magnify other things. The goal at The Idea Emporium (and this should be the goal everywhere) is to be as perceptive - taking in as much information - as possible.

The Idea Emporium. i could go on and on. But this is enough for a start. More important now to put it into action - because it's ideas came first, surging inside me, wanting to find a place to be heard.

I'm (among other things) a college teacher, so my teaching gives me one outlet for my ideas, to express them, modify them, listen to other ideas, test the evidence, the power (or lack thereof) of different arguments.

But that hasn't been enough for me. One small class at a time.

I have a sense that I have some ideas that could be valuable to many people - ideas many people don't have (many have very different ideas), ideas where my ideas may help other people struggling with some of the same concerns, and so on. I think these ideas could help make some kind of positive difference in the world, reach people who are reachable, maybe even break through some shells many people live inside, shells that stop them from perceiving things.

There will be space for the ideas of others as well. Right now I am starting with a few ideas of mine. But I envisage that The Idea Emporium is a place that will grow, enriching both others and also myself - that I and my ideas will grow from some of what comes back.

Elsa
July 30, 2006

copyright © Elsa Schieder 2006
publishing house - FlufferDuff Impressions 2006

Questions - on rage, hatred, narcissism, empathy, caring, peace.
Good thinking and analysis. Logic plus emotion.
The Idea Emporium - facts, ideas, conclusions.
Plus stupid opinions exposed.

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IDEA * EVALUATION * CONCLUSION * INSIGHT * COMMENTARY * CONTROVERSY * INTELLECTUAL CONFLICTS * CONFLICTING VERSIONS AND CONCLUSIONS * DIFFICULT AREAS * OPINION * WELL-REASONED OPINION * UNFOUNDED OPINION * STUPID OPINION * THEORY * THEORIZING * FEMINIST THEORIES * PERCEPTION * PERCEPTIONS * PERSPECTIVES * PSYCHOANALYTICAL THEORIES *
ENVORINMENTAL CONCERNS * ANALYSIS * DISCOVERING UNDERLYING CAUSES * AMBIVALENCES * AMBIGUITIES * FEAR OF AND RAGE AGAINST IDEAS * FEAR OF EXPRESSING IDEAS *
ANTI-THINKING TORRORISM * ANTI-INTELLECTUAL TERRORISM * FALLACIES * FLAWED REASONING *
THE RAGE AGAINST UNWANTED IDEAS * THE RAGE AGAINST UNWANTED VISONS OF REALITY *
BLINKERS AGAINST PERCEPTION * BARRIERS TO THINKING * BARRIERS TO REASONING *
INTELLECTUAL STIMULATION * STIMULATING IDEAS * FERTILE THOUGHT * VIEWPOINTS * UNDERSTANDINGS * COMPLEXITIES * UNCERTAINTIES * GUESSES * HUNCHES *
FACTS * GUT FEELINGS ABOUT THINGS * EXPLORING IDEAS * EXPLORATIONS OF IDEAS *
EXPERIMENTS TO VERIFY IDEAS * REALITIES * REASONING * IN-DEPTH ANALYSIS *
THOUGHT OF THE DAY * PERCEPTION * PERSPECTIVE * DATA * INFORMATION *
OPINION PIECES * LOGICAL THINKING * CRITICAL THOUGHT * INTELLECTUAL LAZINESS * IDEA

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comments, responses, further thinking, more ideas
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