The Damn Ideas

You may have the greatest ideas in the world, but without love they are powerless.

something on education:

I want to talk about something I have been struggling with personally. Relating to the issue of passing knowledge to another human being, the subject of TEACHING! Specifically, I have been extremely frustrated with my Rhetoric.

First in relation to Gorgias, I agree there is pleasant and pain simultaneous while one who is perceived as ‘good’ pursues a good cause. In relation to the lectures of economics of happiness that was presented last year. A sudden raise in income produces pleasure, but not sustainable. Then later, through diminishing marginal return of income (my theory), that individual may experience less degree’s of ‘happiness’ with each rise in income. So the ‘good’ do not find the greatest pleasure in accumulation of pleasurable things, but seeking after that which is good, despite pains and harmful circumstances – they are all apart of the greater cause.

Now – this is hard for me to explain – in relation to rhetoric vs. dialect and the ‘greater good’ we discussed earlier. . .

“Do you think that orators will always speak with regard to what’s best? Do they always set their sights on making the citizens as good as possible through their speeches? Or are they also bent upon the gratification of the citizens and do they slight the common good for the sake of their own private good, and so keep company with the people trying solely to gratify them, without any thought at all for whether this will make them be better or worse?”

I have found, despite how great and marvelous your ideas and passion is about something, you cannot pass that knowledge to ‘impassion’ someone else without something else. There is no teaching moments until a degree of . . . lets say – ‘feeling for the other person’. And what is problematic with Rhetoric is that one person is accountable to himself. He is only thinking of the things inside his head at the moment to pass onto the next (or he is more easily susceptible to knowing his audience. – the level of frankness in a dialogue goes down). What Rhetoric lacks is a genuine passion for the audience. Before a speaker gets up to speak, he must identify the greater goal, and if that greater goal is in the idea or in relation to the idea or knowledge in relation to himself then it will not be for a sustainable good for the people. It could quite possibly make the audience feel warm and fuzzy on the inside. The speaker must identify what the greater good is and work to his best capacity to maintain that through the art of speech.

Dialogue is less premeditative and requires more spontaneity which correlates with more frankness and honesty. Dialogue allows someone to truly see someone else. And that greater good can be pinpointed within the motives of that individual through the conversation.

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Ok. forget the philosophy talk,
greatest idea -- no love -- worthless. with me, love seems to correlate with my prayer. the more i pray the more i love live and people.

the greatest among you will be the least. the greatest among you is the servant.
--Jesus said it allthetime.
so whenever you got ideas to save the world, what are you going to do when you sit down with an old ftiend for lunch, is you mind going to be preoccupied with the ideas of how to save the world, or are you going to have a genuine concern for your friend?