Self-inflicted
blindness is a widespread sickness. Those who suffer from it become
blind to opportunity, wallow in their misery, and become incapable of
looking beyond the obvious. Unfortunately, as it can be ascertained
by anyone who cares to examine the question, millions of people are
suffering from this condition.
Despite
the fact that these people could take action to improve their situation, they remain passive and inert, waiting for someone else to
solve their problems. This sad situation is not circumscribed to the
population of a certain age or nationality. On the contrary, we are
talking about a phenomenon that can be observed in all age groups and
countries of the world.
If
you want to witness how self-inflicted blindness works, you can take
for instance the question of unemployment. At the time of his
writing, in September 2014, the unemployment rate in Spain has
reached 20%, and in some Spanish provinces, whose economies are
particularly depressed, unemployment is as high as 25%.
The ravages of self-inflicted blindness
The
percentage of the population who cannot find a job in Greece and in
some parts of Italy is not far behind. And some other countries only
manage to report lower unemployment rates because their statistics
are made differently. For instance, in United States, people who have
been unemployed for longer than a year are removed from the
statistics.
In
any case, it is incontestable that unemployment remains high in many
areas of the world. Millions of people are affected by this problem.
Day after day, month after month, and all too often, yet after year,
they continue to search for jobs that are simply not available.
Unemployment
has dire consequences, not only economically, but also all
psychologically. Individuals who have been unemployed for a long time
tend to lose their ambitions, qualifications, and self-respect. These
situations are regrettable, but in many cases, what really aggravates
the problem is the victims' self-inflicted blindness.
As
I said, unemployment in Spain affects 20% of the population. At the
same time, the unemployment rate in Norway is only 4%. Such a low
rate is almost equivalent to zero in practical terms, since 4%
amounts just to those who are between jobs, those who have just
graduated from university, and a few more. When a country has an
unemployment rate as low as 4%, it means that anyone seriously
looking for a job is going to succeed in finding one.
There is never a good reason for passivity
Now,
everyone who has studied physics at school is familiar with the
principle that communicating vases always tend to achieve an
equilibrium level. If two communicating vases are each filled with
water to a different level, the water will automatic pass from the
higher-filled vase to the lower-filled vase until the water level has
been equalised in both vases.
The
principle of equilibrium between communicating vases, which is
well-known in physics, also applies to communicating markets.
If you have a country where oil is very expensive, and a neighbouring
country where oil is very cheap, the oil price in both countries will
tend towards an equilibrium level in the long term, since traders are
going to take advantage of the situation, and export oil from the
cheap to the expensive country, until the price difference vanishes
from the market.
In
my example about the different unemployment rates in Spain and
Norway, one should ask the obvious question: Why are the unemployed
people in Spain not moving to Norway? Why do millions of Spanish
people continue to look for jobs where there aren't any, while at the
same time, they overlook the thousands of open vacancies that are
advertised in Norway? This is an interesting question that the media
rarely address.
Of
course, you could argue that there is a linguistic barrier between
Norway and Spain, since anyone desiring to work in Norway would have
to learn Norwegian. Fair enough, but this is only partially true,
since knowledge of Norwegian is only needed for 30% of the jobs
advertised in Norway.
On
many occasions, a good command of English is sufficient to perform
those jobs, provided that the applicant possesses the required
educational qualifications. Norwegian companies are constantly hiring
engineers, graphic designers, software programmers, cooks, and truck
drivers who don't speak a word of Norwegian. Anyway, even if an
unemployed Spaniard had to learn Norwegian to get a job in Norway,
that would be an investment that he would be able to recoup in a few
months.
In
this sense, the self-inflicted blindness seems all-pervasive when you
realise that, Spain, a country of 35 million people, does not even
have language schools that teach Norwegian. An unemployed Spaniard
who decided to look for a job in Norway would not be able to find a
language school, public or private, where he could learn Norwegian to
facilitate his job search. How is it possible that millions of people
have become so blind to opportunity?
The low cost of high opportunity
Besides,
the distance between Spain and Norway is not that large. A flight
from Madrid to Oslo takes about four hours. For someone who wants to
improve his career opportunities, a four-hour flight is nothing. You
can buy a plane ticket from Madrid to Oslo for a few hundred dollars.
Anyone
determined to find a job in Norway would be certainly able to borrow
sufficient money from his family and friends to pay for his flight,
accommodation, and meals during his initial weeks in Norway. And
anyone willing to make the effort would certainly succeed in learning
Norwegian, with or without teachers.
I
could give you dozens of similar examples that show that
self-inflicted blindness is affecting large numbers of individuals
all over the world. More often than not, those people have fallen
prey to the human tendency to remain immobile, for instance:
- People fail to change their lifestyle even if the change could cure their sickness.
- They fail to get away from destructive relationships, even after it has become clear that those relationships have no future.
- They also fail to move abroad even when there are unmistakable signs that a war is about to break out in their home country.
Self-inflicted
blindness constitutes one of the main sources of human misery. It
makes people poor, tired, and psychologically vulnerable. It deprives
them of their opportunities and motivation, and renders them
unable to find solutions to their problems. The nightmares caused by
self-inflicted blindness are everywhere, but unfortunately, there are
no signs that the situation is going to improve in the near future.
The
problem is more serious and deeper than it seems at first sight.
Since the beginning of civilisation, since human beings began to live
in tribes, the cases of psychological passivity have increased
exponentially. While individuals living alone cannot ignore that
problems cannot be solved without taking action, people who become
members of a tribe tend to replace their initiative by group
thinking.
This
process of psychological decay can be observed in any country,
culture, or ethnic group. Its outcome is always lethal, even if the
process can take thousands of years to unfold. Those who suffer from
self-inflicted blindness will end out losing everything they have,
despair, and starve.
A simple, but difficult solution
Luckily,
there is a solution to this problem, even if it's difficult to
implement. The solution has been tested and confirmed thousands of
times during the last century. On every occasion where it has been
tried, it has delivered good results. People who have adopted it have
been able to solve their problems, and those who have ignored it have
wasted their opportunities.
The
first complete formulation of the solution was made at the beginning
of the 17th
century by the English philosopher Francis Bacon (1561-1626). As we
will see, Bacon was able to overcome different forms of
self-inflicted blindness, figure out solutions to his problems, and
implement them successfully in his professional and private life.
The
three principal sources for understanding Bacon's philosophy are his
“Essays” (whose first edition was published in 1597), his
treatise “On the Advancement of Learning” (1605), and his
manifesto “Novum Organum Scientiarum” (1620). The latter was
subsequently expanded and republished under the title “De Augmentis
Scientiarum” (1623).
Bacon
wrote those three books during his busy professional life as a
lawyer, public prosecutor, and member of the English Parliament. It
was usual for him to spend ten hours working in his job, and then
write for another two hours in the evening.
It
was by exerting himself in this fashion that Bacon managed to write
each of his books in only a few months. He was a man of action who
took his time to consign his thoughts to paper in the hope of
becoming a major philosopher, a goal that he deservedly achieved.
Inconsistency with reality
One
of the central points of Bacon's philosophy is the theory of the
idols. The best presentation of this theory can be found in the
“Novum Organum Scientiarum,” which Bacon composed when he was at
the top of his career as a lawyer and public administrator. Bacon
defines the idols as “products of the human imagination that are
inconsistent with reality.”
In
this sense, you could very well replace the word “idol” by the
words prejudice, delusion, or wishful thinking. When an
individual falls prey to those idols, he does stupid things, and
fails to take action to improve his situation.
Bacon
classified the idols in four categories, namely, the idols of the
tribe, the idols of the cave, the idols of the marketplace, and the
idols of the theatre. This classification is largely irrelevant,
since the different types of prejudice and delusion overlap each
other. Nonetheless, it's interesting to pass review to Bacon's four
categories because they typify the mistakes that are preventing
millions of people from thinking logically.
By
“idols of the tribe,” Bacon refers to forms of prejudice that
affect almost every human being at some point in his life. In this
category, Bacon includes all forms of false perception, wishful
thinking, and illogical conclusions. The victims thereof tend to pay
more attention to the delusions inside their minds than to the facts
of reality.
People
who suffer from this form of self-inflicted blindness are going to
create imaginary worlds, where they can take refuge from reality. As
a result, their delusions are going to prevent them from taking
action, while their problems get increasingly worse.
In
our example of the unemployed Spaniards, it seems clear that millions
of them actually believe that the Spanish economy is going to recover
in the near future, and create large numbers of jobs, even if this
belief is so manifestly unrealistic that one could not find any
credible argument to support it.
Nonetheless,
millions of unemployed Spaniards remain convinced that a solution can
be found in the near future: a solution coming from nowhere, based on
nothing, and requiring no effort to implement. Sadly, the
consequences of such unrealistic beliefs tends to be catastrophic:
the victims become paralysed, and by the time they realize their
mistake, they will have become too weak to recover.
The adherence to old-fashioned patterns
Under
the category “idols of the cave,” Bacon groups the prejudices and
logical errors that are unique to each individual. The term “cave”
used by Bacon refers to Plato's myth of the cave, where Plato
compares the human mind to a man living in a cave who only perceives
the outside world through the shadows reflected on the cave wall.
Similarly,
Bacon argued that individuals who adhere to dogmas and old-fashioned
patterns tend to become victims of the idols of the cave. These
victims can be recognized by their blind respect of authority, their
narrow-mindedness, and their conviction that they can only succeed in
life by imitating other people.
The
blindness and passivity inflicted by the idols of the cave are almost
incurable. When someone becomes firmly convinced that his only choice
in life is to remain loyal to worthless ideals, no matter how crazy
they are, it's extremely difficult to reverse his condition.
Narrow-minded people rarely change their views, even after it has
become obvious that those views are wrong. The idols of the cave tend
to deprive their victims of the capacity to recognize mistakes.
In
our example of the unemployed Spaniards, it seems that many of those
are being victims of the belief that they would be worse off
if they moved abroad to find a job. Such a belief is deeply
irrational, since many countries in the world possess higher living
standards than Spain. Regrettably, this prejudice continues to
prevent millions of unemployed Spaniards from finding a job.
The
prejudice is so ingrained that, even if you could convince these
individuals to find a job in Norway, their narrow-mindedness would
not allow them to adapt to the Norwegian lifestyle, language, and
environment, with the result that, after a few weeks, these people
would be quitting their job and returning to Spain. Unless they rid
themselves of the idols of the cave, they are never going to be able
to summon the determination they need to solve their problems.
Creating fear for the sake of fear
The
third category of faulty ideas identified by Bacon are what he called
“idols of the marketplace,”
by which he meant the falsehoods that people pick up from their
social and professional environments. In particular, Bacon stressed
the danger of using words and concepts that have no existence in
reality.
This
phenomenon is known in philosophy as “the reification of the zero.”
When a concept that has no connection to reality is invented, it only
serves to confuse people, lead them to error, and waste their
opportunities.
The
reification of the zero is a problem that also affects unemployed
Spaniards, Greeks, and Italians. It is only during the last hundred
years that people have become obsessed with the concept of social
integration, without realizing that such concept was virtually
unknown in previous centuries.
Even
as late in history as in the 1910s, it was possible to travel from
country to country without a passport, settle down in the city of
your choice, find a job, or start a business without having to meet
any particular requirements, and without having to bother about your
social integration.
Regrettably,
social integration is a recently-created idol of the marketplace that
is discouraging large numbers of people from moving from one country
to another. As a result, the discomfort associated with emigration
has been magnified to such an extent that many individuals have
become paralysed.
In
the case of our unemployed Spaniards, Greeks, and Italians, who
should have been actively looking for work in countries such as
Norway, the idol of the marketplace called “social integration”
(or fear of social isolation) has created a psychological barrier
that is preventing them from moving abroad to look for a job.
Such
exaggerated fear constitutes a good example of an idol of the
marketplace. While its victims are blowing the potential difficulties
out of proportion, the truth is that it's neither too difficult nor
too expensive to adapt yourself to living in a new country.
In
the case of unemployed Spaniards, Greeks, and Italians considering to
emigrate to Norway, the difference in salaries between Norway and
those three countries is so large that the discomfort associated with
emigration should prove an excellent investment for anyone seriously
interested in finding a job.
Discarding prejudices and misconceptions
The
last group of false beliefs identified by Bacon are “the idols
of the theatre.” Bacon uses this term
to refer to prejudices and misconceptions generated by culture and
civilisation. This category includes superstitions, social myths, and
erroneous generalisations.
Idols
of the theatre typically prevent people from taking action in areas
that could dramatically improve their lives. Superstitions tend to
restrain people's initiative because they support the belief that
it's practically impossible to venture beyond certain limits.
In
the case of our unemployed Spaniards, part of the problem is that
many of them are convinced that Spain is the best country in the
world. If you believe this kind of superstition with respect to your
country, it's no wonder that you'll feel reluctant to look for a job
abroad.
The
idols of the theatre come in many variations, but they all
have the effect of instilling fear into people. The
exaggerated concern generated by the idols of the theatre renders
people passive, and blind to opportunity.
The
best thing about Francis Bacon is that, in addition to providing
theoretical solutions to self-inflicted blindness, he also put them
into practice. On one occasion, he defined philosophy as the commerce
of the mind with the facts of reality with the purpose of bringing
into sight what is hidden. Truth is what reveals itself after
false opinions have vanished into smoke.
Let false opinions vanish into smoke
Bacon
had acquired in his infancy the habit of thinking for himself, since
he only started to attend school after his 12th birthday.
Before that time, he had been learning at home by reading books,
listening to his tutor, and taking lessons from his mother, who was
fluent in Latin and Greek.
By
the time Bacon was sent to college in Cambridge (1573), he had
already read dozens of books in English and Latin. This achievement,
which seems incredible by today's educational standards, is not to be
regarded as so extraordinary if you take into account that, by being
educated at home, a child does not need to waste time every day
commuting.
Nowadays,
children often have to spend an hour a day commuting to school. This
daily travel time represents a substantial amount of waste, which
could have been put to better use, for instance, by allowing the
children to read dozens of books at home.
When
Bacon turned fifteen, his parents sent him to London to start
training as a lawyer. Fifteen is a young age indeed, but that measure
of youth was not unusual in the 16th century. Bacon was
admitted as a student at the Grey's Inn, and began to learn about
torts, contracts, civil and criminal procedures.
Despite
his talent for legal studies, it took him six years to qualify as a
barrister, since he interrupted his training to take up a succession
of jobs in England and abroad. He eventually passed his exams, was
admitted to the Bar, and started to look for a suitable job.
Tough beginnings due to inexperience
The
beginnings of Bacon's career were tough, since he made all kinds of
mistakes due to his inexperience. At that time in history, all high
administrative positions in England were appointed by Queen
Elizabeth. Bacon should have been aware of this, but he made the
Queen mad at him by publicly opposing her plan for a tax increase. Of
course, Bacon was right on the principle, but since he was still
trying to establish himself, it was not clever of him to take the
leadership of the resistance against the Queen.
The
Queen did not forget Bacon's opposition, and effectively banned him
from high public office. The employment ban brought Bacon into
financial difficulties to such an extent that, in 1598, he was
arrested for debts, taken to prison, and incarcerated for a short
period of time.
During
the next years, Bacon did everything possible to ingratiate himself
with Queen Elizabeth. To his shame, he went as far as leading the
prosecution for high treason against his former friend the Earl of
Essex, who ended up sentenced to the maximum penalty.
After
the fall of the Earl of Essex, Queen Elizabeth was somewhat indebted
to Bacon's legal expertise, but she did nothing to remove the ban
that excluded Bacon from occupying high offices in England. As a
result, Bacon had to wait until Queen Elizabeth's death to obtain a
suitable job.
It
was only in 1603, after the coronation of the new king, James I, that
Bacon began to obtain appointments in line with his capabilities.
During the next twenty years, he would be appointed Solicitor
General, Attorney General, member of different high tribunals, and
Chancellor of England. He became King James' close friend, trusted
counsellor, and primary policy executor.
The metaphor of the bee
During
those years, the busiest of Bacon's career, he continued to write
about theoretical philosophy and practical wisdom. “A philosopher,”
he formulated, “must not be like an ant that takes material from
the ground and uses it without transformation. Nor should he resemble
a spider that makes cobwebs out of its own substance. A philosopher
should be like a bee that gathers material from flowers, and
transforms it into something better.”
Bacon
wrote hundreds of pages to record his philosophical reflections
because he was convinced that “a man who reads can gain knowledge,
a man who debates can gain clarity, but only a man who writes can
gain precision.” If his essays, he passed review to the theories he
had learned in Cambridge, and to the books he had read on his own,
criticizing ancient dogmas, and proposing a new methodology to
ascertain truth.
Bacon's
love of philosophy, which consumed his evenings, did not prevent him
from handling a heavy workload of legal cases during the day. As a
judge, he passed many sentences, and prepared the way for reforming
the English legal system. However, in his work, he not only made
friends, but also accumulated enemies, some of them, like the Duke of
Buckingham, extremely powerful.
Eventually,
in 1621, the Duke of Buckingham pushed a faction of the English
Parliament to bring charges of bribery against Bacon.
The accusers were claiming that Bacon, in his position as judge of a
high court, had accepted presents from litigants.
The destruction of a lifetime reputation
When
Bacon was confronted with the accusations, he reacted calmly and
cleverly. He assessed his chances of winning and losing, and
discussed his conclusions with his friend King James. The
result of that discussion is that Bacon became convinced that, even
if he was convicted, King James would protect him from the
consequences.
And
that was precisely what happened. Parliament found Bacon guilty of
bribery, and condemned him to imprisonment in the Tower of London,
and to pay a £40,000 fine, a sum that exceeded Bacon's lifetime
savings. The jail sentence was immediately executed, but just as
Bacon expected, King James set him free after only a few days, and
exempted him from paying the fine.
During
the trial, Bacon admitted that he had accepted presents from
litigants, as it was the custom in English courts, and that those
presents should not be regarded as bribes. In civil cases, he argued,
judges were often acting as arbitrators without receiving any fee for
hearing the case, and any presents made by the litigants should be
regarded as a legitimate source of income for the judge.
Bacon
also argued during his defence in Parliament that, in his judicial
decisions, he had never been influenced by any gifts received from
litigants. To support this statement, he cited several instances
where he had actually decided the case against the party that had
given him a present. Nonetheless,
Parliament did not stop until they had destroyed Bacon's reputation,
and forced him out of his official appointments.
A new goal for a new life
At
the time of his release from prison, Bacon was sixty one years old.
Even after the £40,000 fine imposed by Parliament had been
pardoned by King James, all that Bacon had left was a small estate in
St Albans, where he retired to a life of reflection.
As
a result, he was able to devote the last five years of his life
almost exclusively to writing. He set himself the goal of formulating
a manifesto that would refute the mistakes of ancient philosophers,
and provide the basis of a new way of thinking, but the five years
proved insufficient to accomplish such an ambitious project, and
Bacon died of pneumonia in 1626.
His
main contribution to philosophy is contained in his essay “On the
Advancement of Learning,” published in 1605. I am talking about the
method of induction, the practice of drawing conclusions from reality
after having examined the facts, instead of basing those
conclusions on preconceptions and second-hand sources.
A
philosopher needs to overcome the apparent chaos of nature, and look
for truth and order. A wise man learns to overcome his fears by
looking at the facts, and discards the idols of the tribe, the cave,
the theatre, and the marketplace.
It
is only by focusing on reality that a man can overcome prejudice,
falsehood, and superstition. “Nature, to be commanded, must be
obeyed,” wrote Bacon to indicate that, if you want to achieve your
goals, you have to see what actually works in reality, so that you
can use the right principles to guide your actions.
Historians
love to recount that Bacon died of pneumonia as a result of his
having performed a scientific experiment to preserve meat with snow.
One afternoon, when he was travelling by coach in the middle of the
winter, he had the idea of getting out of the coach, taking snow with
his hands, and filling a dead chicken to see if its flesh would
remain uncorrupted as long as the snow didn't melt.
For
a sixty-six year old who had never enjoyed a strong health, the
experiment was extremely foolish. As a result of his playing with
snow, Bacon got a severe cold, which became worse when he was
subsequently lodged by a friend in an unheated room. Two weeks later,
an acute pneumonia put an end to his life.
The real solution to the problem
Not
all of Bacon's ideas are equally practical for overcoming
self-inflicted blindness. The theory of the idols, for instance, can
provide interesting insights, but those are difficult to apply in
real life, since human beings, even in the best circumstances, are
rarely free of prejudices, inconsistencies, and misconceptions.
If
you examine your ideas and convictions to see if you should regard
them as idols of the tribe, cave, theatre, or marketplace, you'll
have to spend a large amount of time, and probably never reach
a definite conclusion. Bacon's theory of the idols is a valid
philosophical tool, but not something that you can use effectively on
a day-to-day basis.
Fortunately,
his essays, which went through three editions in his lifetime,
provide us the critical element for overcoming self-inflicted
blindness. The antidote to psychological paralysis is called
audacity, which Bacon defined as “a man's ability to create more
opportunities that he finds.”
Bacon's
prescription is essential for overcoming discouragement and fear,
irrespective of your age or profession. “You'll always lose much
more by not trying, than by trying and not succeeding,” he wrote.
And he was perfectly right. This piece of advice is the most valuable
in all of Bacon's writings.
It is time to take decisive action
The
unemployed Spaniards, Greeks, and Italians, who wallow in their
misery are wasting their opportunities. Similarly, people who stay in
destructive relationships are refusing to face the truth. And
patients who suffer from self-inflicted sickness are lacking the
determination to change their lifestyle for the better.
Audacity,
the willingness to take bold action to overcome obstacles, is the
cure to a large part of human misery. And it doesn't require a long
explanation to demonstrate that, if you want to improve your
situation, you have to take decisive action. This is the only way to
solve problems effectively and relatively quickly.
Bacon
himself showed great audacity in his professional and personal life,
even if it took him a while to recommend this course of action in his
writings. You can see Bacon at this best when he was 36 years old,
and proposed marriage to a 20-year old wealthy widow, who on top of
that, was a renowned beauty.
The
widow rejected Bacon's proposal, something that he lamented for
years, but this did not prevent him, after his 45th
birthday, to marry Alice Barnham, a pretty girl who at that time was
14 years old. Apparently, she got to love Bacon so deeply that she
was still mourning him twenty years after his death.
Individuals
who lack initiative are going to profess an exaggerated respect of
traditions and superstitions. Audacity, the ability to challenge constrains and create opportunities, is the answer that they should
be embracing.
Theoretical
debates can never solve anyone's problems. This is why you can learn
more from Francis Bacon by looking at what he actually did than by
reading his books. You must discard prejudice and narrow-mindedness,
and instead, create your own opportunities, and let audacity become
your driving force.
[Text: copyright John Vespasian, 2014]
[Image by o palsson under Creative Commons Attribution License. See the license terms under http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/us]
[Image by o palsson under Creative Commons Attribution License. See the license terms under http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/us]