Outreach is the Antidote to Intellectual Elitism
There is a tragic element to the acquisition of knowledge, to any experience of developing a richer understanding or experience of the world.
First, there is the curiosity. That desire to reach out for the infinite mystery whose pull can be so irresistible. It is not an easy thing to follow that curiosity. It is daunting, sometimes terrifying, to take a chance knowing that what you might find could very well cause an irreversible shift in your understanding, in your convictions, in your very being.
With enough courage (or foolishness) comes the reaching. Whatever that may be. The experiment, the reading, the contemplative meditation. The act itself of that most human of endeavors. There is no fulfillment in the reaching, though. Not yet. It is but the tilting of the canteen in the hopes of water flowing. Many times, it doesn’t. One doesn’t need to be a scientist to have the experience of a failed experiment, a dry prayer, or a frustrating attempt at contemplation.
“Eureka moments are bliss.”
But sometimes the reaching leads to something. The beauty, the splendor that flows like refreshing water and that soothes and thrills the instant that first drop of insight touches that first neuron. Eureka moments are bliss. It matters little what the subject is, what matters is the ecstasy of this new connection. This new experience is now a part of you in a way that could never go back to not existing. This moment has changed you.
No matter how long you spend savoring the fruits, that just isn’t the end of the experience. There is a yearning to do something with it. One must share it. One must use it. There is a newborn understanding, a new connection, a subtle yet incredibly meaningful new reality that is washing over you as strongly as the desire to go wherever it may lead you. Will you be going alone?
The thing about new understanding is that it is in many ways invisible. Does this experience exist in those around you? Is your new understanding but a tiny step that others have already taken, or is it a giant leap that will challenge your ability to bring others along for the ride?
In my view, that is the critical question. HOW do we bring others along for the ride? We must. It is existential not only for the knowledge itself but for our ability to relate to the rest of humanity and no least importantly, for their ability to relate to us.
“How have we lost society’s interest in science? in theology? in religion? That’s how.”
It is tempting to get lost in the bliss of the finding itself. It is easy to be discouraged when we fail to share that new bliss with others. A multitude of reasons may tempt us to retreat into more reaching, more experimenting, more contemplation, and seek more understanding. The refuge of intellectual pursuit is beautiful and intoxicating, but it is incomplete. When we emerge, we might be too many steps away from bringing anyone along for the ride. And the ride without others is a danger and a tragedy. How have we lost society’s interest in science? in theology? in religion? That’s how.
The palpable intellectual elitism within science, theology, and even spirituality is rarely the actual looking down upon the masses from the ivory towers of the intellectual elite. It is not the learned who think less of the uneducated and the “incapable of understanding”. It is often the result of the retreat of intellectuals into the task of understanding to such an extent that will not stop until we emerge with something brilliant, enlightening, world-changing. Sometimes it does become elitism and a feeling of superiority. A nonsensical delusion that comes from the presumption that understanding is accomplishment or virtue rather than the gift and the privilege it actually is.
“Personal greatness is often as imaginary as it is dangerously isolating.”
In the individualistic world we pretend to live in, it is fitting to retreat in search of the eureka moments alone. To narrow our community to those who understand and benefit our own journey. In the real communal world, the divides we have caused by our inability to bring people in are catastrophic.
We all wish to be Einstein. We all wish to be Aquinas. Those very aspirations may impact our willingness to share our insights. They set the bar at personal greatness. Well, personal greatness is often as imaginary as it is dangerously isolating.
Bring people in to your eureka moments, intellectual. With the humility to accept that your insight might not be brilliant yet, but that steps taken together are much more of what we need than great strides taken by oneself.