Sunday, October 9, 2016

this slogan or that slogan

Not the best example I have noticed today,(October 9, 2016) perhaps, but this headline from the Nautilus newsletter, seeks to interest readers in an article with this headline:
We like to think modern man is inherently different, better somehow, than our ancient forebears. But is that just wishful thinking? 

Newsroom wise that headline must be pretty good--- it got my attention. Even so, just a little thought reveals these sentences to be total gibberish.

Yes, we like to think modern man is inherently different;
yes that is is just wishful thinking.

But man IS different, and alike both, both now, and then.

We inherit the realm of wishful thinking every morning, at least til we have coffee. And then we wishfully think, along with many other thoughts. and we still arrive at work, and valid conclusions, regardless of the hue of our thinking.

My point is these thoughts AND their opposites are equally appropriate.

To pick one, ANY ONE, of these options, yes or no, is to lose a reality which might be glimpsed.

What I am pointing to is the plausibility of that headline. It sounds learned and intriguing; who notices it is ridiculous? That is, if one can stand apart from the ordinary thinking process.