The time of criticalthinkings

Abstract

An island: there, in smaller times in a timeless sea. Stung by recent events, its people achieve consensus on the need for critical thinking. Improbable. But impossible things had happened, even there. They surprise themselves, but something had to be done. ‘As a nation, we must think more, and we must think more deeply,’ they declare through those who think up this kind of thing. ‘Our thinking must not only go deeper, it has to develop the capacity for critique,’ the people sort of learn to say. Or, as the intoning tells them, you, we, might not survive ourselves. Having got this far, they turn their half a million backs on the political groupings that had previously dulled that capacity with the rewards of loyalty, as well as on the religions that had schooled them in the rewards of faith. They are thrilled by this double emancipation. Some time is needed before the thrill can be worked off. Pragmatism, the greatest of survivors, then asserts itself. So not unreasonably they ask, ‘But who will teach us critical thinking?’