Heaven forbid! No more than I ignore the faculty of vision.
Nevertheless, if you ask me what is the true good of man, I can only say to you that it lies in a certain disposition of the will.
Perhaps it is peculiar to my own experience, but I find that, right behind appealing to unclear terms, the next most common mistake in thinking is the assumption of a false dichotomy. It’s bad enough that I might not even be able to define what I am talking about, and then I compound the error by insisting on contradictions where none need to be present.
“Ignatz, do you love me more than Imogen?”
“I don’t love you any more or any less than I love Imogen.”
“Hah! I knew you didn’t love me!”
So when Epictetus says that training in logic isn’t the most important part of being a philosopher, the rationalist may see red, and he takes it as a claim that dialectic is unimportant. A red herring can’t be far behind. As a rationalist, he should know better.
It certainly matters, for example, if we are able to see, and yet what matters more will be what we choose to do with what we see. You can show me all sorts of wondrous things, but it won’t make any real difference unless I decide to engage them. The eye is only as good as the hand that follows through.
The skills of reasoning provide the form, while actions make up the content—thinking well is ordered toward living well. The most profound reflections and sublime demonstrations are empty without putting them into practice.
In middle school, I had a teacher who was understandably growing frustrated with my newfound adolescent stubbornness, and she constantly had to remind me to complete the simplest of tasks.
“Yes, I know, I know!” was always my reply.
One day she looked at me firmly but calmly and gave me an excellent lesson. “If you really knew, you would already be doing something about it.”
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