There are three stages for understanding a concept:
Stage one: Ignorance
Here you don’t understand the concept, it doesn’t make sense, you don’t see how it matters.
Stage two: Belief
Now you understand. You believe. You see that it does make sense, that it does matter, perhaps how it can be applied to everything.
Stage three: Relevance
Here you understand the concept, yet you also see where it doesn’t apply. That it’s useful when it’s relevant. That the concept may be vital to understand in one situation while other concepts may be important in other sitations.
People in earlier stages don’t realize that the later stages exist.
For someone in the first stage, they may hear people claiming that the concept is important, but it sounds like nonsense. They don’t realize that there is a second stage, one where the concept actually does make sense.
And for someone in the second stage, who thinks the concept applies to everything, when they hear someone in the third stage saying, “Hmm, I don’t think that applies here, in this particular situation”, what they see is someone in the first stage. Someone who doesn’t understand.
Typically, it’s the people in the second stage who promote a concept most vigorously.
People in the first stage don’t care, and people in the third stage have a bunch of different concepts to talk about.
Thus, when you hear about a concept, often (not always, but often), you’ll be hearing about it from someone in stage two.
How to tell if someone is in the second stage?
There are several clues.
One, they may tell me. If they say that it applies to everything, that it’s universal without exception, that’s a sign that they may be in stage two.
Another possible clue is how they react to my saying, “Hmm, I don’t think this concept applies in this particular situation.” If they can conceive that the concept might not apply, they’ll respond with particulars: this is how I’m wrong about this particular case, this is how the concept does apply in this particular situation.
If they can’t conceive that the concept might not apply, they’ll proceed with the assumption that I’m in stage one, ignorant (or clueless or blockheaded or reactionary or evil).
They may, for example, tell me about the twenty other examples of how the concept applies, how it applies to everything, because then it would of course apply to this particular situation as well.
On the other hand, sometimes I may actually be ignorant. There are of course many, many things that I don’t know about.
Someone in stage three will, if they’re willing and have time and so on, often be happy to explain or point out where I misunderstand.
For someone in stage two, simply knowing about the concept is enough. There’s no need to get into the particulars, I should simply be willing to learn about the concept.
I can learn from someone in stage two, it just tends to be more… unpleasant.
Those in stage two are most often the ones who want to defend a concept.
It’s certainly possible for someone in stage three to defend a concept for something they think is important, but usually they won’t be doing that all the time. It’s those in stage two who tend to be the most invested in the concept.
The unifying nature of a stage two belief, it’s universal applicability, is appealing. It’s simplifying, it’s easier when every problem can be addressed in the same way.
Disputing a stage two belief, even for one particular situation, can be threatening because if the belief isn’t universal that calls into question its applicability to everything else as well.
Thus questioning a stage two belief can be seen as an attack. Since there’s no conception of the third stage, everyone who isn’t on board with the concept is either ignorant or an enemy.
And so the fiercest culture wars may be fought between people who hold incompatible stage two beliefs.
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