Philosophical Education Teaches Us How To Think Ideological Indoctrination Tells Us What To Think

Transcript

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in our lives. Thank you. Philosophical education teaches us how to think.
Ideological indoctrination tells us what to think. We all talk, but that doesn’t mean we know how to talk meaningfully or effectively. Similarly, we all think, but that doesn’t mean we know how to think meaningfully or effectively.
To be able to think better and deeper, philosophical education is important. When we read the great books of philosophy, we learn how those great thinkers have thought, how they addressed difficult questions, how they developed answers and how to integrate those answers into a coherent view of reality. By such study, we all feel stimulated and guided to think more effectively.
In contrast to such philosophical education, ideological indoctrination tells us what to think. Such indoctrination reduces reality to a set of predefined truths and then reduces and rejects everything that doesn’t fit into that set as misleading, deceptive, misinformed, bad data and so forth. Whereas philosophy expands our thinking to take in all of reality.
Ideology reduces reality and reduces our thinking to conform, to agree with that reduced vision of reality. Consider an ideology such as communism. It promised equality for all.
While portraying those who had risen high as exploitative and manipulative without considering that they may have got there by their talent or commitment. Communist explanations for complex social, economic and political phenomena were radically reductionistic. For example, it blamed all problems on capitalism, capitalists and capitalism, but it ended up creating far greater problems.
Those who bought into communist ideology ended up causing 100 million deaths in less than a century. Far more than what any other ideology, secular or religious has caused throughout human history. The point here is not to condemn communism or to commend capitalism.
Capitalist indoctrination has also led to its own set of evils. The point here is to recognize the ideological indoctrination. Steering clear of such an ideological indoctrination, the Bhagavad Gita demonstrates an ethos of encouraging philosophical thinking.
After it outlines its view of reality, the Gita concludes by urging us to deliberate and decide. This open-minded call to deliberate and decide, not a commandment to parrot a pet ideology or offer pet explanations, swallow pet answers. This is an example of deeply thinking on ethos that can help us today too, as we grapple the many difficult issues confronting humanity today.
Thank you.