An apology for mediocrity

What an individual actually needs to dread is neither mediocrity nor excellence but the utter absence of thought. Mediocrity is the stepping stone of originality.

One should have a good grounding in mediocrity to graduate to originality. The articles written here are a part of my graduation process; a part of my effort to learn mediocre views-- only to ‘de-learn’ it gradually. I understand the risk that I take—the risk of getting grounded in mediocre views. But where else I have to start with?

Mediocrity results from a limited knowledge or reasoning. I don’t hold on to reason as the ultimate infallible guide. But I do believe that reason is the only way forward. Reason in my opinion is not wide and limitless. On contrary it helps chart our way and set the limits. Any effort to outwit mediocrity leads to an intellectual void—where reason is sacrificed at the altar of agnosticism. Mediocrity can only be undermined only by first learning mediocrity.

Our world is permeated with superfluous words and actions that excellence is rarely appreciated. Originality is like a pot of gold hidden in earth. One digs on till he finds the gold. The articles I write are like searching for gold. And once I recognize that I have hit the gold, I may not dig any longer. And so I fantasize that one day I will cease to write and “will go for a pilgrimage to Jerusalem or burn up a city.”( like the peasant Dostoevsky describes in Brothers Karamazov )

Bernard Shaw was once asked if he was willing to die for what he professed. His reply was: “No. I may be wrong.” Likewise, I’m under no compulsion to prove or defend my arguments. The articles are only a part of the process of my self-discovery and not the product of my enlightenment or self-discovery. The greatest mistake of the intellectual man is the false-consciousness that he is an intellectual. It is then, that he gets caught with the intellectual snare of mediocrity. So let me assume no assumptions. And let me remain a layman—simple and pragmatic.

A few words about gazing

I am reading Brothers Karamazov.I have identified so much with Dostoevsky's rendition of Dimitry Karamazov that I had intially decided to name the blog Rijo 'Karamazov' Jacob's blog or something of the sort. But equally appealing is Dostoevsky's brief of the Russian painter Ivan Kramskoy's work, The Contemplative. I have unconsciosly and compulsively feinged as a "forlon peasant," and gaze at nothing in particular.
.This blog will intermittently vent the "sensations" I have "accumalted" during the gazings.
Here is the picture (which I surfed out from http://www013.upp.so-net.ne.jp/hongirai-san/yomou/meisou.htmll) and Dostoevsky's description.
The painter Kramsky has a remarkable painting called "the Contemplator": a road with a wintry forest in the background and on the road, wearing a ragged coat and felt shoes, stands a lonely, forlon peasent who has loft his way , and who seems to think hard about something, but actually not thinking at all, but just "contemplating." If you pushed him, hewould give a start and stare at you uncomprehendingly as if you had just awakened him. True he would collect his wits right away, but if you asked him what he'd been thinking about as he stood there, he would be quiet unable to remember. He certainly would remember, however, the inexpressible sensations he exprienced during his contemplation. And these sensation would be dear to him and he would treasure them without realising it himself, indeed, without knowing knowing why or what he would ever do with them. Perhaps, having accumulated in the course of the years a great many sensations he would suddnely leave everything behind and go off on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem to seek salvation, or he might just as likely to set fire to his own village, or possibly both. There are many contemplators among simple people.