A Minute of Silence: An Inquiry on the Unbridled Polemics of an Unquestioned Question
By Alvin Tan, Department of Social Sciences
(Editor's Note: Dear Readers, this piece is something to be deeply mulled over. Look at the connotation and denotation of what are written. What may spring into your mind is the current situation of this country.May you find pleasure and profundity in reading this.)
"It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it." - Aristotle (384-322 B.C.)
If Aristotle asks, 'what makes good good?' And if Sir William David Ross asks, 'what makes right right?' It is but plausible to ask, what makes truth truthful? Are there any legitimate criteria for truth to be true? What cogent arguments can we allude to justify the truthfulness of something? Is popularity and public opinion necessary to test the truthfulness of truth? Are all truths truthful? Are religious truths logically parallel to "the truth"? Or is the latter merely a fictitious creation and mitigation of a "disturbed mind" looking for a sound and rational way to answer life's absurdities? Is there some-thing truthful about politics other than power struggle and power-play? Is academic freedom and freedom of expression still visible in the political arena, and is it merely a misnomer in the realm of religious struggle?
Nothing is good in itself in the realm of politics. It is merely good for something else. If the good is complete, self-sufficient, and choice-worthy, according to Aristotle, then man is and must be happy. To do well means to be happy. In layman's term, if you do something good, you feel good. But, is there any thing good about politics? Is politics biased-free, or is it merely an activity of a cogently mundane craftsmanship of a shrewd mind trying to pursue something, not what is good in and for itself, but for something else? Or truths advocated in politics are merely an artifice, a fabricated "tool" to pursue man's greediness to seek power and domination, either directly or indirectly? Does politics and religion elicit good taste in the public arena? Politics without religion is bad taste. However, religion with politics is bitter taste.
Blind faith leads to blind obedience. Questioning without understanding is the work of a blind mind. However, following without understanding is a reflection of a blind soul. As Leonardo da Vinci once said, "You do ill if you praise, but worse if you censure, what you do not understand."
