Uncritical Theory 2: Praxis & Axioms: Praxioms

Easy to follow steps to adopt a quixotical weltanschauung

Critical thinking is “how could this be wrong”. Uncritical thinking is “how could this be true”.

Critical thinking is saying “what he us saying is wrong, because x y z”. Uncritical thinking is saying, “what did he mean by this?”

Critical thinking is assuming you are the smartest guy in the room, and the smartest guy in the world, and the smartest guy in history. It is addressing the reader as the stupidest-possible-reader, the lowest common denominator. It is speaking to the back row of the room, to the widest possible audience, by speaking down to them, and using the widest terminology available to you.

Uncritical thinking is assuming the smartest possible reader, someone who already knows what you are about to tell him. It is trusting the reader to understand what you are saying.

Critical thinking is a distrust in the reader, and assuming the reader is an idiot.

Uncritical thinking is telling a joke.

Critical thinking is explaining a joke.

Uncritical thinking is the method of learning a foreign language. You do not “doubt” that a native speaker is right about “stuhl” meaning “chair”. You infer it, from him pointing at a chair and making the sound “stuhl”. The mental process of connecting the dots between him pointing at the chair, and saying the noise “stuhl”, is a creative act, in which you connect two parts into a coherent whole. You do not do this by the use of reason. You could never logically reason your way to certainty, that the signifier “means” the signified. You can apply logic to it later, after the fact, and deduce all kinds of things about it, etymologically and anthropologically. But the act of “getting it”, of connecting the dots, is, uncritical. You simply let it wash over you. It is revealed to you, not deduced.

Uncritical thinking is the act of playing a musical instrument. The music “flows”, you “get caught up in it”, it “jams”, the moment you accept it unconditionally, and don’t relate to it through formulae and abstraction. You learn the scales and the skills with the left side of the brain, but you put them together into music with the right side of the brain.

Uncritical thinking is the runner’s high, it’s zen, it’s grace. Focus. It is also being “immersed” in a movie, a book, or a video game, although to a somewhat lesser degree. It is reacting in real time to the world, without reflection, without internal judgement and deconstruction, without second guessing. It is taking the world at face value. It is taking life seriously.

Critical thinking is to consider life an elaborate practical joke, and worrying about when someone is going to pull the rug out from under you as the punchline.

Uncritical thinking is having fun.

Uncritical thinking is about entertaining wild crazy interpretations of things, because it’s fun. It’s fun to believe in UFO’s and secret underground hyperborean civilisations in Antarctica. It’s a stretch, but it’s fun to stretch. It’s fun to run around, and use your body, and jump and lift heavy things. It’s fun to be strong.