This is the last of the Trilogy: Start seeing, start hearing and start thinking.
It’s the hardest, because the end product of thinking is acting.
Acting means change. Change brings dissonance and discomfort.
Our faculty is quite limited: we are conditioned to respond in Pavlovian way.
Group think. Similar to Adam Smith’s unseen hand that regulates the market, there are underpinnings that regulate our thinking e.g. sub-conscious, upbringing, gene pool and the times we live in.
We find ourselves respond instinctively to rising gas price, to the latest poll and pulse.
Independent and critical thinking require courage of conviction.
Men are social animals.
The thinking man is boxed in and labeled as “philosopher”.
The image is quiet nerdy.
Reclusive and esoteric.
Who wants to hang out with all-hair guy whose response seems to have a built-in three-second delay.
Not fast enough.
We want automatic and reflexive feedback (like an vacation auto reponse email).
Preferably measurable one.
From A to B, we draw a shortest line.
Philosophers and physicists don’t necessary agree with this.
To them, there are various shades of grey.
We rather live as common people and seek comfort in numbers.
To think different is to be isolated, if not ostracized.
Yet we need thinking men and women.
They question how we should then live.
Is this the best way to look at things.
Is this THE way or just one of the many ways.
What are some other ways to skin a cat.
Unless we learn to think for ourselves, others will do for us.
Conformity by default (same with no-show during an election).
Being self-disruptive is an antidote to social decline.
Start thinking. It hurts at times.
It is lonely as well.
But it’s healthy and in the long-term, that’s the only way to survive in an age of intelligent machine.
Software will eat our lunch. But we can still use software to prepare our tomorrow’s lunch.
If we start thinking. Hard. Now. Before it’s too late. The greatest tragedy in life is wasted talent (implied THINKING).
Thang Nguyen 555 