Simplistic Thinking

I hate simplistic thinking. And I have identified a hatred to this "simplicity" with Voltaire's "Candide". I have valid reasons for such hatred and I think I am justified in such hatred.

I hate simplistic thinking because leaders who make policy must think through their goals and think about how best to implement them. Simplistic thinking in leadership does not take into account the vast complexity of such goals, if these goals are set in complex networks and situations. The world itself is such a context. Those that follow such leaders are prone to pay the costs of such "simplicity".

I hate simplistic thinking because it leads others to follow uncritically. These people are bound to "pay the costs" without realizing it. But, they are pawns to the deceptive manipulation or lack of forethought of their leaders. Such people are simplistic themselves and are uncritical to life, the world, and its politics.

I hate simplistic thinking because it isn't based upon real problems in the real world, but pacifies these problems with platitudes of "answers" that fall short of coherency. "God" is used in such a way.

I hate simplistic thinking because I and those I love have paid a price for such thinking. This is how I have learned to not think simplistically. Simplicity is navete'.

Simplicity is the way children think, but this way of thinking must be outgrown, if we are to be good for the real world.

Philosophy is Not Palatable to the Fundamentalist

Philosophy is how we understand or our ability to know what we know. Some think that one aspect of understanding is "all there is". But, there are many aspects of understanding and knowing about the world.
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Knowledge is understood as reason's ability to grasp or understand the real world in investigation and analysis. This is where the Academy excels and explores. But, reason is not the only avenue of understanding or analyzing the world.

Experience is the common person's understanding of life. Experience give wisdom to those that are open to grasp and grapple with life. But, wisdom is not an absolutist position, but a tenuable one, because experience helps to temper and tame the most ardent ideologues. But, experience without knowledge is blind in some ways and cannot speak in terms that are more palatable to larger audiences.

Religion understands itself through texts, and tradition. These help to form the culture of a society. But religion's knowledge can be damaging to others without understanding experience's wisdom and the Academy's knowledge. Religion creates the environment of society's social norms and values. Without religion then, there is little or no ability to appeal to a "higher authority" to gain a 'ear" or exert a moral influence in society in maintaining social control.

Philosophy is understanding that knowledge itself is created or formed within certain frames of reference, vision, passion, and concern. These ways of reference and vision should never be seen as absolute, otherwise, we create an environment shorn of the diversity that enlarges the world and its complexity. And whenever we limit the world and human beings in this way, we cultivate a climate that dismisses the humane for the "ideal" in "two-dimensional" universe.