The Problem
Who’s right, and who’s wrong? Opinions are easy to form in 280 characters or less, but thinking is difficult, and deep reading is becoming a rare indulgence.
Why this? Why now?
Techniques for good rhetoric have been reduced to emotive statements that posit false dichotomies. The simplification of “facts” leads to lies and the loss of rational thinking, of lateral thinking, and of logical thinking. Constructive criticism has all but evaporated under the blaze of easily offended who demand that society manage their unstable emotions and delusions.
CS Lewis said, “if we read only modern books. Where they are true they will give us truths which we half knew already. Where they are false they will aggravate the error with which we are already dangerously ill. The only palliative is to keep the clean sea breeze of the centuries blowing through our minds, and this can be done only by reading old books.”He continued, “Not, of course, that there is any magic about the past. People were no cleverer then than they are now; they made as many mistakes as we. But not the same mistakes.” - Good books can help us in ways that newsreels and tweets can’t. And, in our multi-cultural access to good book, they don’t just have to be old. But they do have to be good, and deep, and worth reading.
“if we read only modern books. Where they are true they will give us truths which we half knew already. Where they are false they will aggravate the error with which we are already dangerously ill. The only palliative is to keep the clean sea breeze of the centuries blowing through our minds, and this can be done only by reading old books. Not, of course, that there is any magic about the past. People were no cleverer then than they are now; they made as many mistakes as we. But not the same mistakes.” —CS Lewis
We have skidded past the optimum without even realizing it, for thousands of years the illiterate mass of humanity had to be content to have their thoughts formed for them by those with power and access to books. In a very short space of time we are now in a situation where there are so many books we don’t have time to sort good from mediocre and mediocre from bad, and few have either time or inclination to read and to think deeply. Once again we are having our thoughts formed for us.
Books For Understanding
I was given the providential gift of a broad worldview, I grew up in South Africa and traveled in ministry in East and Southern Africa. I had the opportunity to travel as a child and relocated to the USA as an adult in the tech industry. I was exposed to books early on in life, and I have read extensively. I would like the opportunity to share what is essentially my recommended reading list. Books that have transformed my mind from a pourable slurry into concrete.
What is my worldview?
I am unapologetically a Christian, but not just by birth family, but by the process of eliminating all that is blatantly false. I believe that facts are not subjective things and the term “fact” should not be used for unproven theories. I think that science and technology have their roots in the Bible and that we need a separation of science and state.
