Uncommon Truth

Here's a quote I like. One of my MySpace friends recently sent it around.

"It is proof of a base and low mind for one to wish to think with the masses or majority, merely because the majority is the majority. Truth does not change because it is, or is not, believed by a majority of the people." -- Giordano Bruno (who was eventually burned alive by the Roman Inquisition in 1600 after seven years of imprisonment for heresy)

Whether it is because of something that I realized at a young age, or just a propensity for anti-authoritarianism, I have long found that truth is generally not found in the worldviews of the masses. In fact, I often seem to find that the facts are often exactly the opposite of the public perception.

Common sense, for instance, is rarely common, especially among the common folk. This makes sense, though, since history bears out that common folk do not make history: Uncommon folk do.

On thing the masses provide is inertia. As with any great mass, it takes a great deal of energy to move the human masses. This is what leadership is, and it can only be provided by uncommon people. Once those masses are in motion, though, they can tend to stay in motion and carry things too far (think of revolutions that went too far, as in France, Cambodia, USSR, etc.) unless great deal of energy can stop them. Again, great leadership from uncommon people provides such a mediating force (maybe this is the true greatness of Franklin, Jefferson, Washington, Adams, Madison, et. al. -- not that they started a revolution, but that they were able to stabilize it).

It is hard to talk about the foibles of common folk without sounding like an "elitist." But it is the elite who make things happen. There's just no way around that. Masses do not lead themselves. Once a commoner does something uncommon, then he/she, by definition, becomes uncommon, i.e., elite.

I have tried to be a champion of "the common man," but my attempts to get common people to do uncommon things has always led to disappointment, and the stinging realization that commoners are common because they do common things.

Taking this back to Giordano Bruno's quote: If something is held as truth by the masses, there is good chance that it is, at best, incomplete and behind the times. Part of the reason that commoners are common is because they do not make the effort required to be uncommon, and keeping up with the advancing understanding of reality requires effort. What MOST people in this world believe to be reality is a result of the trickling down of fact and thought, and that inevitably lags behind the cutting edge.

So if you find, when you express your views on the world, that most people agree with you and/or nod their heads, there is s good chance that your views are either wrong or incomplete when compared to the best current understanding of the universe. You need to learn and think more.

This reminds me of a quote from Albert Einstein, one of my intellectual idols:

"Great spirits have always found violent opposition from mediocrities. The latter cannot understand it when a man does not thoughtlessly submit to hereditary prejudices, but honestly and courageously uses his intelligence and fulfills the duty to express the results of his thought in clear form." (quoted in the New York Times, March 19, 1940)

If you dare to blaze a trail, to beat back the bushes of mediocrity that is the worldview of the masses, expect to be met with opposition. As Einstein knew, and Giordano Bruno learned long before he was burned alive, believing as the masses do will only make you a part of those masses. Believing what is ahead of the knowledge of the masses will make you a part of history.