My Podcast, Contemplation in Action, is up and running with an introductory episode and one on bees and beekeeping (“The Bee Side”) with David Newman. The introduction (“Episode 0: What and Why”) was done with Paul Chernogorec, who in turn had me on his first podcast recording the other day. It was on the topic of Evolution, the contemplation of which I came to realize the offense of scientific theory is not that it precludes Deity, but refute’s Man’s central role in Creation, both in time and space.
Doing all this is challenging me to finally use and reevaluate my knowledge. Some of the things I have oft repeated were learned at a very early age, and not always correctly understood by my younger self (ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny, for example). Some of my knowledge is hidden away in books or lost in the mind of professors, not to be verifiable on the later medium of the World Wide Web. In other words, I find it hard to fact check myself, as my knowledge appears to be deeper than what can be found online currently.
This brings me to my reading list. There are so many important works I failed to read but should have. Only last year did I read the entirety of “Plato’s Republic”. I reread (or rather thoroughly read for the first time) Hannah Arendt’s “The Human Condition”. I just finished the autobiography of Ben Franklin (listening to an audiobook version after finding an old physical tome at a thrift store), and now I am reading Adam Smith’s “The Wealth of Nations”. Reviewing these works makes me acutely aware that I am not as well-read as I should be — I have a polymath’s interests but feel the depth of many subjects has not been realized more than necessary to BS my way through conversations. I fear I may be transparently pedantic to some. And I feel the space between what I want to read and my expected lifetime narrows with each day, wondering what will be the point if I can’t take such knowledge with me.
That’s one reason I need to podcast, but there’s another. I pontificate all too often in my conversations and need to get it out of my system. It’s like writing down a story so I will stop telling it over and over, often to the same people. But I still feel it will be a contribution to society in some way.
I am thinking to brand the idea of a “thought warrior”, someone who rises above the cock-fighting of debate to an artful dialectic dance. I’m not talking about intellectual prowess alone, but intertwined with intellectual virtue. That is what I want to teach, much like I desire to pass on my martial arts. I think I can contribute to these in very personal ways, giving of myself even after this life has passed.