Why It Would Be Bad if Jesus Was Here

Published on September 20, 2017 (↻ August 1, 2024), filed under Philosophy and Everything Else (RSS feed for all categories).

Later I pushed this metaphor to the limit and teamed up with artificial intelligence to produce a book about the problems with everything: The Problems With All the Good Things.

Arguing is something we have to learn. I observed this particularly in recent years when I started studying philosophy and went through courses for logic and argumentation theory. These courses have not made my own arguments all valid, sound, flawless, but—they made me realize that arguing is something we have to learn.

They also led me to look at common discussion culture a little differently. On YouTube, for example, on Transfermarkt, indeed, in blogs. One doesn’t need training to tell that in some fora, there’s no argumentation, no discourse, often not even a conversation. It’s more like everyone decided to yell at the same time. Verbal noise.

In some threads, the discussion culture is so terrible that all that’s being done is destroying. This song is sh_t, that player deserves to be kicked out of the club, this coding technique is from the 1700’s, the other commenter is a moron, who says something critical is a hater, and anyway, whoever reads this is stupid.

This is not arguing. It is: destroying.

Now the curious thing about this, then, is not the questionable approach. Even if we disagree, why wouldn’t we take the time to understand the other party; to take it that we could make a mistake; to still disagree respectfully?

No, the curious thing is that we can always destroy.

We can always destroy.

Even if Jesus came into the door right now, there would be people saying, “what are you doing here, don’t have you more important things to do, people are dying in Africa, Trump is still in office, and in the oceans, there are still microplastics everywhere.”

And they would have a point.

One can always make a point, and that may be easiest by being destructive.

But does that have value?

It may have insofar one argues that emotional abuse is useful to harden people.

But it may not have otherwise, because even if one makes a point, it’s not saying anything. Anyone can make a destructive point. As such, destroying is neither a sign of character nor of great intelligence.

What may be of more character and of more intelligence, and my point here is not to present a bulletproof argument but to merely raise awareness for conversation, is to try to understand the other side; to be respectful; to perhaps not attack (destroy) the other view but present (create) one’s own view; and if none of these is within one’s reach: to remain silent.

Update (November 14, 2017)

I wonder if accidentally, this turned into an argument against skepticism. And one for our absolute freedom.

About Me

I’m Jens (long: Jens Oliver Meiert), and I’m a frontend engineering leader and tech author/publisher. I’ve worked as a technical lead for companies like Google and as an engineering manager for companies like Miro, I’m a contributor to several web standards, and I write and review books for O’Reilly and Frontend Dogma.

I love trying things, not only in web development (and engineering management), but also in other areas like philosophy. Here on meiert.com I share some of my experiences and views. (Please be critical, interpret charitably, and give feedback.)