{"id":8025,"date":"2014-04-14T14:36:22","date_gmt":"2014-04-14T14:36:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2014\/04\/14\/he-who-goes-it-alone-runs-the-risk-of-a-dead-end\/"},"modified":"2014-04-14T14:36:22","modified_gmt":"2014-04-14T14:36:22","slug":"he-who-goes-it-alone-runs-the-risk-of-a-dead-end","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2014\/04\/14\/he-who-goes-it-alone-runs-the-risk-of-a-dead-end\/","title":{"rendered":"On Independent Thinking"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: georgia,palatino;\">Properly enacted, independent&#0160;thinking is not in the service of self-will or subjective opining, but in the service of submission to a higher authority, truth itself. &#0160;We think for ourselves in order to find a truth that is not from ourselves, but from reality. The idea is to become dependent on reality, rather than on institutional and social distortions of reality. Independence subserves a higher dependence. <\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: georgia,palatino;\">It is worth noting that thinking for oneself is no guarantee that one will arrive at truth. Far from it.&#0160; The maverick&#39;s trail may&#0160;issue in a dead end. &#0160;Or it may not.&#0160; The world is littered with conflicting opinions generated from the febrile heads of people with too much trust in their own powers. But neither is submission to an institution&#39;s authority any assurance of safe passage to the harbor of truth. Both the one who questions authority and the one who submits to it can end up on a reef. &#39;Think for yourself&#39; and &#39;Submit to authority&#39; are both onesided pieces of advice. <\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-family: georgia,palatino;\">And you thought things were easy?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><a class=\"asset-img-link\" href=\"http:\/\/maverickphilosopher.typepad.com\/.a\/6a010535ce1cf6970c01a73da9dc5c970d-pi\" style=\"display: inline;\"><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"IMG_0392\" border=\"0\" class=\"asset  asset-image at-xid-6a010535ce1cf6970c01a73da9dc5c970d image-full img-responsive\" src=\"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.typepad.com\/.a\/6a010535ce1cf6970c01a73da9dc5c970d-800wi\" title=\"IMG_0392\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<fieldset class=\"zemanta-related\">\n<legend class=\"zemanta-related-title\">Related articles<\/legend>\n<div class=\"zemanta-article-ul zemanta-article-ul-image\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; overflow: hidden;\">\n<div class=\"zemanta-article-ul-li-image zemanta-article-ul-li\" style=\"background: none; list-style: none; margin: 2px 10px 10px 2px; padding: 0px; width: 84px; text-align: left; font-size: 11px; vertical-align: top; float: left; display: block;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/maverickphilosopher.typepad.com\/maverick_philosopher\/2013\/08\/montaigne-on-chess.html\" style=\"padding: 2px; border-radius: 2px; text-decoration: none; display: block; box-shadow: 0px 0px 4px #999;\" target=\"_blank\"><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"\" src=\"https:\/\/i.zemanta.com\/194430480_80_80.jpg\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px currentColor; width: 80px; display: block; max-width: 100%;\" \/><\/a><a href=\"http:\/\/maverickphilosopher.typepad.com\/maverick_philosopher\/2013\/08\/montaigne-on-chess.html\" style=\"padding: 5px 2px 0px; height: 80px; line-height: 12pt; overflow: hidden; text-decoration: none; display: block;\" target=\"_blank\">Montaigne on Chess<\/a><\/div>\n<div class=\"zemanta-article-ul-li-image zemanta-article-ul-li\" style=\"background: none; list-style: none; margin: 2px 10px 10px 2px; padding: 0px; width: 84px; text-align: left; font-size: 11px; vertical-align: top; float: left; display: block;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/maverickphilosopher.typepad.com\/maverick_philosopher\/2013\/08\/philosophy-debate-and-dialog-can-philosophy-be-debated.html\" style=\"padding: 2px; border-radius: 2px; text-decoration: none; display: block; box-shadow: 0px 0px 4px #999;\" target=\"_blank\"><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"\" src=\"https:\/\/i.zemanta.com\/190661318_80_80.jpg\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px currentColor; width: 80px; display: block; max-width: 100%;\" \/><\/a><a href=\"http:\/\/maverickphilosopher.typepad.com\/maverick_philosopher\/2013\/08\/philosophy-debate-and-dialog-can-philosophy-be-debated.html\" style=\"padding: 5px 2px 0px; height: 80px; line-height: 12pt; overflow: hidden; text-decoration: none; display: block;\" target=\"_blank\">Philosophy, Debate, and Dialog: Can Philosophy Be Debated?<\/a><\/div>\n<div class=\"zemanta-article-ul-li-image zemanta-article-ul-li\" style=\"background: none; list-style: none; margin: 2px 10px 10px 2px; padding: 0px; width: 84px; text-align: left; font-size: 11px; vertical-align: top; float: left; display: block;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/maverickphilosopher.typepad.com\/maverick_philosopher\/2013\/02\/the-strange-world-of-simone-weil-god-does-and-does-not-exist.html\" style=\"padding: 2px; border-radius: 2px; text-decoration: none; display: block; box-shadow: 0px 0px 4px #999;\" target=\"_blank\"><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"\" src=\"https:\/\/i.zemanta.com\/145881803_80_80.jpg\" style=\"margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px currentColor; width: 80px; display: block; max-width: 100%;\" \/><\/a><a href=\"http:\/\/maverickphilosopher.typepad.com\/maverick_philosopher\/2013\/02\/the-strange-world-of-simone-weil-god-does-and-does-not-exist.html\" style=\"padding: 5px 2px 0px; height: 80px; line-height: 12pt; overflow: hidden; text-decoration: none; display: block;\" target=\"_blank\">The Strange World of Simone Weil: God Does and Does Not Exist<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/fieldset>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Properly enacted, independent&#0160;thinking is not in the service of self-will or subjective opining, but in the service of submission to a higher authority, truth itself. &#0160;We think for ourselves in order to find a truth that is not from ourselves, but from reality. The idea is to become dependent on reality, rather than on institutional &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2014\/04\/14\/he-who-goes-it-alone-runs-the-risk-of-a-dead-end\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;On Independent Thinking&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[413,133],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8025","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-mavericks","category-photographs"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8025","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8025"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8025\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8025"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8025"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8025"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}