In 1651, Thomas Hobbes described the life of man as “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.” Indeed, the average life expectancy in England in the 17th century was 35 years (before adjusting for infant mortality). Throughout most of human history, life has been as Hobbes described it. However, today, most citizens in the Western cultures live longer and with more luxury than even the kings and pharaohs of the past. Technology has brought us unlimited access to fresh water, sewage management, air conditioning and central heating, air and car travel, television, computers, and previously unimagined medical cures, as well as an unprecedented access to information and education. To what or to whom do we attribute these life enhancing gifts? The short answer might be: human intelligence. However, all of these amenities have come to us only within the most recent millennia when human DNA has not changed appreciably. The longer answer resides in the cumulative effect of cooperative human intelligence–what we might call the “crystallized intelligence of human civilizations.” Through the process of passing acquired knowledge from one generation to the next–a process we call education–each civilization has been able to accumulate a storehouse of information. Much of the gratitude we feel during our Thanksgiving celebrations should be attributed to two factors: our capacity for rational thought that has freed us from the life described by Hobbes, and our capacity to love the friends and family with whom we share these amenities. Yet, some families will risk alienation of their closest family members by allowing the visceral elements of human nature to intrude on their celebrations.
On previous Thanksgiving festivities, siblings, cousins, and friends have engaged in political debates that evolved from gentle differences of opinion into mutual insults and lasting hostilities. If you do enter the dangerous territory of political debate, there are a few suggestions that might help you meet the challenge of allowing your rational mode of thinking to control your visceral mode.
1. Listen carefully to learn why someone believes in a principle that you perceive as flawed.
2. Avoid attributing motives to another person’s point of view. e.g. “She thinks that because …”
3. In responding to another person’s point of view, try to outline in a rational way, why you have come to believe in a certain idea or principle.
4. Apply Ben Franklin’s persuasiveness in confessing fallibility to encourage others to acknowledge the limits of their own perceptions. As stated in Poor Richard’s Almanack. “None but the well-bred man knows how to confess a fault or acknowledge himself in an error.” Employing both true humility as well as its pretense, he was able to disarm those of opposing opinions. Staying relatively quiet and rational, while others were consumed with passion, was a technique he had developed that enabled him to negotiate agreement on the Declaration of Independence where no accord seemed possible.
5. Avoid frustration when someone takes an “ad hominem” approach, denigrating you or others who share your opinion.
6. Remember that the rewards of changing the political opinions of family and friends are minuscule compared to the joy you derive from your relationships with them.
I hope these comments help you meet the Thanksgiving challenge.
