Great people and not-so-great people

All of us meet and talk to people all the time. Any such meeting may last a few seconds (e.g. passing someone by in a corridor and just saying hello) or much longer (e.g. hanging out with friends). However, most, if not all, meetings leave me with some kind of an impression - either positive or negative. Being a person who ends up spending a lot of time random things like this, I thought I would try to categorize the people I meet in two extreme categories. Of course, I do not think that only one meeting is sufficient always to categorize someone in either of these two buckets. Also, I must add that being extreme categories as they are, there will be many people who I will not be able to put in either category. So these categories are mutually exclusive but not collectively exhaustive. In addition to this, it might be useful to keep people in your professional circles out of this because their actions are prone to a lot of other things, such as, conflicts of interest, workplace politics, etc.

Great people and not-so-great people

1. Have a positive outlook towards life and society. They are more likely to focus on things for improvement rather than despairing about the sorry state of affairs or things wrong with the world.
2. Will always play down their achievements and take your achievements in a positive and encouraging light. NSGP will always try to make their (usually small) achievements look great, while ignoring or playing down your achievements.
3. Talk to you at your level vs. NSG will talk down to you from their "supposedly" elevated pedestal.
4. Will always encourage you to achieve more. NSGP will always discourage you simply because they feel insecure about their own position.
5. GP will talk about your great qualities and achievements. NSGP cannot stop talking about themselves (will constantly want to show how great they are).

Another very interesting quote

“The foolish and the dead alone never change their opinions.”

- James Russell Lowell

Well, James Russell here succinctly put into words what I had taken a whole blog post to discuss in Hurdle to Free Argumentation. Many people don't like arguments only because they're afraid of changing their opinion at the end of it. I hope they change their opinion now! :)

Hurdle to Free Argumentation

Argumentation sounds like a very negative word. I don't know how many times I would have heard the phrases "don't argue with me", "let's not argue on this", "you are very argumentative" and almost always (I certainly do not remember even one case to the contrary but I don't claim to know everything either!) these phrases are said to give out negative meanings. So just as I started to write this post and titled it "Hurdle to Free Arugmentation", I wanted to make sure whether the dictionaries out there agree with me or argumentation has in fact a definitive negative import, while I assumed it to be a positive word suffering with unwarranted notoriety.

Here is what I found from the two sources I normally refer to on the Internet:

www.m-w.com defines argumentation as:

1. the act or process of forming reasons and of drawing conclusions and applying them to a case in discussion
2. DEBATE, DISCUSSION
   

www.dictonary.com defines it as:

1. the process of developing or presenting an argument; reasoning.
2. discussion; debate; disputation: The lengthy argumentation tired many listeners.
3. a discussion dealing with a controversial point.
4. the setting forth of reasons together with the conclusion drawn from them.
5. the premises and conclusion so set forth.
6. argument (def. 5).
   

As anyone knowing basic english could see, the above definitions do not seem to give the word any negative tone even though dictionary.com does give an example with a slight negative tinge.
And the reason why I am discussing this simple word so much is precisely the same - people see argumentation as something negative. Instead of seeing argumentation as a "process of forming reasons and of drawing conclusions and applying them to a case in discussion", they see it as something that might lead them to change their stance. And this is what people do not want to do. Most people tend to know what they know and do not want to know something that changes what they "know" (if you know what I mean!).

Changing their views on something or rethinking what they know brings people out of their "comfort zone" (MBA-speak, but it does seem to fit here) and this is something which they do not want to do without resistance. And when prompted to do so, you again get to hear those fabled phrases I mentioned above or a careful distortion of their stance making it difficult for the argument to go ahead.

Well, I know I have rattled a lot - or beaten around the bush - whatever you prefer to call it but the main point I want to make is that arguing is not bad, it is good. So feel free to argue and if you do, do it with an open mind. That is, do not be afraid to find out you changed your stance. In fact, I would rate an argument to be great if I went into it with some stance and came out with a totally different one. Just reading a related post that I wrote sometime earlier, "Laws of Argumentation", I find that I summarized this thought in the very first "law". Seems like I have a habit of repeating myself or I have run out of things to say. So, I will just finish with the following piece of dialogue:

"Do you believe in the existence of UFOs?" Pat came the reply: "I believe in the existence of extra-terrerstrial intelligent life". End-of-discussion, or rather ... argumentation!

Chicken Soup for the Soul

Chicken Soup for the Soul - the first thing that came to my mind as I cursorily glanced over the book's title was - it must be something to do with cooking recipes. But, wait, the title says something about the soul... so there must be a spiritual undertone to the book. On reading the book, I found that it contained short stories about normal people going about in their lives. Each story had someone helping the other person showing kindness of the kind that is isn't very common these days. (Not that the people earlier were any kinder!)

Each story about hope and kindness was meant to be some kind of a soup for the soul. Just as a chicken soup makes your body feel good, these stories were meant to make your soul feel better. This was a well-intentioned comparison but it irked me a little. What about the chicken that was killed only to be put into the soup? Didn't that chicken also have a soul when it had life? What about that? Or is a chicken soul so low in the hierarchy of things that it can be sacrificed only to provide some moments of pleasure and a little nourishment to the human body?

Please don't think that I am some kind of a propagator of vegetarianism or one of the founding members of PETA. I am neither. In fact, I enjoy eating chicken (and without feeling guilty, if I might add!). Then, why, you might think, am I making such a big deal of the issue? Chicken Soup for the Soul makes me think about the larger issue of how human society divides things into moral and immoral, ethical and unethical. Most people in the West are non-vegetarian and chicken forms one of the items of daily consumption. So, in the West, there is nothing wrong per se with killing a chicken to eat it. It was always meant to be this way. And in that sense the book conveys its meaning pretty well. However, in India, there are many vegetarians. Most of these people do not consume meat because it comes from killing an animal (that has a life and a soul) and is therefore considered a sin. Now, try explaining to any such vegetarian in India that Chicken Soup for the Soul is a book that is meant to make you feel good by teaching good morals and you will get weird looks. The title would be so contradictory. Something like - Adolf Hitler's Essays on Benefits of Non-violence!

So the dichotomy is clear. While most people in the West easily understand the meaning the book's title delivers, the same is not so obvious to a large number of Indians who are vegetarian. In general, in India, I do not think such a title would strike a direct chord with the people. The point is that there is a difference in the way different people consider what is ethical and unethical - even when living in the same age. Now, let me make things dirtier. Morals and ethics, to most people, are ways of walking the path that God has told them to walk on. It is the right way of doing things. Most people in the West and in India believe in some God - I can't cite a source right away but I read somewhere that a survey concluded so. Also, in most religions, not doing something that God preaches brings you one step closer to hell. This means while Indian vegetarians do not eat chicken so as not to disobey their ethics (and their God), many in the West do so regularly without ever feeling so -- implying that their ethics do not consider it wrong. Now, how can one God consider something wrong (punishable by hell) while the other choose to remain neutral, if not positive?

I guess there is something wrong somewhere. Either morals are not given to us by God or most people in the world are deliberately committing sin each day of their lives by consuming meat! If the latter is not the case it means morals are man made. And they might have been conceived by "wise" people who have already thought of the consequences the society would have to face in the absence of these morals.

Laws of Argumentation

I must confess I like getting into arguments. Not of the violent, virulent kind. Just pointless (or sometimes with a point) debates that keep both sides entertained during the time they last. If it provokes further thoughts and leads to further arguments, even better. Thankfully, it is surprisingly easy to start one. Whenever I'm in the mood (for an argument that is), I just have to throw a harmless stray comment on anything and there would be someone in the audience ready to take up arms against my "stand".

I generally prefer that useful arguments should lead to a conclusion - a set of ideas agreed upon by both sides and possibly another set on which they have agreed to disagree (Ideally this set should be null if the brainstorming has been sufficient and egos are not involved).

1. It is not jihad. So take it easy and do not involve your egos if you want to have fun!
2. An argument is valid if it does not contradict what you have agreed upon earlier. OR. If the new argument contradicts a previous stance, you choose to forgo the earlier argument in light of new knowledge.
3. Disagreement without valid reason is not allowed. If you have an opinion, you have a reason. No opinion without reason.
   

I believe these rules should almost always result in arguments that end with some common ground. Of course, if you don't agree with the rules, we can sit down for a lively argument :D