authority

A fish is not like a bicycle, but they’re not mutually exclusive. You can have both.

Part of our culture admires reason. It celebrates learning. It seeks out logic and coherence and an understanding of the how and the why.

At the same time, there are other people who seek out influence and authority. Either to exercise it or to blindly follow it.

Sometimes, they overlap. Sometimes, power is guided by reason. But that’s not required, not in the short run.  And sometimes, reasonable, informed people wield power. But again, as a visit to a university’s English department will show, not always.

It’s tempting for the powerful to argue with those that admire reason, pointing out how much power they wield.

And it’s tempting for the well-informed to argue with those that have power, pointing out how little reason they possess.

But just as a fish isn’t going to stop you from riding a bicycle, these arguments rarely work, because power and reason don’t live on the same axis. Listening to someone argue from the other axis is a little like watching TV with the sound off. It might look normal, but it is hard to follow.

Before we engage, we need to agree on what’s being discussed.

-Seth Godin