# 287: Public Thinking
Story behind the Passage
In a mentoring session today, it struck me how wrong many things are in present-day society. I mean the global society by that. Most problems nowadays are trans-national. Yes, their intensity and some reasons might differ but the outcomes are more or less the same everywhere. This also applies to the thing that hit me in the face again today: How much different would the world look like if only capable people were in positions of power? By capable I mean intelligent, hard-working, and educated — more or less in that sequence.
No, I am not going to whine about the things that make me think this. I just want to explain how I ended up choosing Arendt for today. The student today from a working-class background who manages studying and working and thinking on a high level brilliantly made me remember how much joy university studies can bring to people’s lives. But the conversation also showed me how much is wrong with this. There are indeed people who just think that getting a Ph.D. is everything the world needs and that there are certainly no people smarter than they are. And then, you have people like her who could easily do two Ph.d.s and hold a challenging job on the side but who are simply held back and demotivated by this crowd of dumb-heads — the representatives of average in any possible way — non-meritocracy.
How long it has taken me to understand this…
This also tells you again, of course, how intensely thinking rules my life. In a spiritual sense, thinking is all superfluous and the cause of suffering. The activity itself and the pleasure one can derive from it, however, does not necessarily bear negative side effects. If you love reading, writing, and questioning things — this is pleasure, not curse. So, thinking does not always have to equal suffering if you are able to control your mind and the time you invest in thinking. Still, if you happen to be a thinker who wants to bring some kind of change to other people’s thinking, you quickly run into the problem of asking yourself how on earth you are going to reach these people.
This is where “publishing” comes in.
Obviously, as this blog shows you, you do not need many resources anymore to put some thoughts into the world. Still, that matters little if nobody reads these thoughts. In order to be read, you have to be smart about marketing. No worries, I talked about marketing only a few days ago. So, it will not be the focus today. What I just mean is the decision behind all this. It takes a conscious decision to put yourself out there, to spread your thoughts, to ‘sell’ them to those who want to listen and read. This exactly takes me to what Hannah Arendt was saying in the interview.
My Learnings
“Nur wer sein Leben und seine Person mit in das >Wagnis der Öffentlichkeit< nimmt, kann sie erreichen.“ / “Only the one who takes his life and his ‚self‘ to the >venture of the public< will reach this public.“ This sentence is in many ways remarkable. The first thing is that I actually underlined it. I read this book many years ago when I was not at all into blogging and publishing at large. To make this clear from the start, I am not saying I am ever going to copy Arendt or even get close to her intellectual contribution. Still, obviously, this question of getting your word out there already occupied me back then. Now look at how carefully Arendt differentiates between her “life” and the “person.”
This statement must be read alongside the previous sentence in which she, which might sound paradoxical, says that neither “loneliness” nor “giving your work to the public” will win you “humanity.” That is so interesting because it indicates that the person and her life cannot be divided from the thought — even the work itself does not fully do the trick. Hence, the best effect of public thinking can only happen if you give yourself fully. There is no other way, actually, as soon as you confront “the public.” This is also what Arendt explains in the next sentence:
“Wenn ich auch der Meinung bin, daß man nicht auf sich selbst reflektiert in der Öffentlichkeit erscheinen und handeln darf, so weiß ich doch, daß in jedem Handeln die Person in einer Weise zum Ausdruck kommt wie in keiner anderen Tätigkeit.“ / “Even though I am of the opinion that one is not allowed to appear and act in a self-reflected manner in public, I also know that one’s self is expressed in a way that is not achieved in any other activity.“ This is what I am saying above, just with the tiny specification that Arendt here equates talking with action. In other contexts, I would challenge this. In this particular one which refers to public appearances, I share it.
“Das heißt, in einem — schwer genau zu fassenden, aber grundsätzlichen — Vertrauen in das Menschliche aller Menschen.“ / “That means in a — difficult to grasp exactly but a general — trust in the humane of all humanity.” This sentence is more striking than anything. Every day, things happen that make us doubt this human of all humans. People killing each other, people hating each other, people betraying each other. Still, if you want to “win humanity,” you just have to believe in the fact that there is humanity after all. Otherweise, you would never take the risk of “exposing” yourself, as she says further up. And if that were the case, nobody could learn about your thoughts.
Maybe learning has come out of fashion.
Maybe understanding has done so too.
Hopefully, humanity can still be trusted.
Reflection Questions
1) What do you know about Hannah Arendt?
2) How important is “understanding” for you?
3) Is it important for present-day intellectuals to gain as much public visibility as possible? What are the dangers?