ISSUE #8

ISSUE #8 ”What most human beings really want to attain is not knowledge, but certainty. Gaining real knowledge requires taking risks and keeping the mind open—but most people prefer to be reassured rather than to learn the complex and often unsettling truth about anything”

People are lazy; not necessarily by nature, but because they’re so incredibly busy with everything else. Simply “living” life, while adhering to every recommendation, pressure, and expectation that has become the norm for present-day society, is such a chore that people don’t have time nor energy to seek knowledge. Gaining real knowledge requires taking risks and possibly action. Gaining knowledge requires keeping the mind open when there is so much (overwhelmingly so) available to fill it. Therefore, unless it deals directly with their personal, daily life, reassurance will always preferred by the people.

No where is this more evident than in today’s oil crisis. People don’t want to hear that continuing to drive their car is continuing to drive the price of fuel up – they already believe this to be true. Nor do they want to hear that continuing to drive their car is continuing to contribute to global warming – again, they probably already believe this to be true. But are people driving less? Not really. Rather than consider what a large-scale boycott of fuel could possibly do to the price at the pump – knowledge of supply and demand and the financial effects of such a boycott, people pay attention to governmental reassurance – baseless claims that everything is going to be okay. 

Knowledge of supply and demand, and the implementation of a boycott of fuel, would require people to park their cars; it would require people to ride their bicycles; it would require of the people action in some form or other. But since filling up the car with gas happens, for most, only once every week and a half, it’s much easier to ignore the knowledge available, and accept the government’s reassurance. This reassurance, dolled out by an administration that desperately needs and wants to improve it’s approval ratings, allows people to be complacent and go about their lives “as-usual.” But now that higher oil prices are affecting the price of everything else – from food, to utility bills, to the clothes we wear – people are beginning to seek certainty from the government: “Are you sure everything will be okay?”

The better question would be, “what must we do to help ease the current oil crisis?”, but the answer would require some serious action and restructuring of people’s daily lives. People are lazy.