MIND MEETINGS

OK, I am new to this thing--bloggery if you will--so, lacking a firm footing, I will start by merely priming the pump with a few kernels of speculation and ideation trusting that when properly planted they will grow into fruition. (How's that for a thoroughly mixed metaphor?) For want of inspiration I will call them:

MIND MEETINGS

1. The conventional wisdom that faith and idealism cannot survive exposure to experience is not only wrong it is wrong-headed. Experience, correctly comprehended as an educational tool, should teach us that in the so-called real world our only hope for salvation is a devotion to--and belief in--personal goodness, civic virtue, and humanitarian duty. Anyone who propounds the contrary view is either a fool (and an easily misled one, at that) or a rapaciously predatory knave who survives by feeding on the despair generated by the sense that all is lost.

2. But even the Cynic recognizes that the practice of virtue will only improve the practicer. The practice of virtue to improve the character and/or conduct of others is a time-wasting activity. The expectation of other-centered change as the result of such effort will inevitably lead one into actions and attitudes which cannot be described as even remotely virtuous.

All right, so it's not a particularly auspicious beginning, but--what the hell--it is a beginning. Anything further in this vein I will label "Mind Meetings" also, so that if one wishes to avoid reading more of my equine fecal matter it will be a snap to do so. If I ever come up with any red meat I shall probably save it for my weekly column in "The Bulletin" but if not, I'll figure out a different label for such at this venue.

Thanks for visiting.

Papa Goat