Changes
Ok, so after resuming the whole livejournal thing, I’ve reached the conclusion that I like it. Plus, some people actually read it. I HONESTLY didn’t think that would happen. If you ever want to reply to me privately or so extensively that you don’t feel like a posted reply could be big enough, you should be able to contact me via email and I’m trusting that you probably have some way of finding out what that email address is.
In the beginning of one of the Wayne’s World movies, Wayne goes into a monologue with the audience and says that lately he’s been going through some really weird changes. He begins to talk about how hair has grown in some weird places. Although I think I went through those kind of changes a while back, I can’t help but notice that everyone around me has been going through some changes lately too.
While I was in Jan term, my primary teacher (Dr. Sansom) said that it was his opinion that with the exception of the first four years of life, the 4 years that a person spends in college are the ones that invoke the most change. He might be right. I noticed this semester that I am not the only one who has changed a lot among all my friends. Last year I gained some freshmen friends who are completely different people now than they were this time last year. The funny thing is that most of these changes are not ones that our parents would love to know about. Another teacher (Dr. Holloway) said that he thought that the purpose of a Liberal Arts education was to get students to begin to think differently. Anyone who has had him can attest that this seems to be one of his major goals in teaching. If I am wrong about this, I offer to him my apology. The point is though, that we’re all changing. But this raises the question WHY.
Are the students around me changing so fast because of the age that we’re in or because of the school we attend or what? One of the things that first attracted me to Jennifer (the love of my life... aka gishygoo) was that she made it clear that she thought there is NOTHING that anyone is incapable of doing, starting with herself. I am sure this is right. The first person who posted a reply to my last journal entry said that he is sure that all of our theologies will change drastically at some point in the future from what it is now. I agree. Furthermore, it is very humbling for me and causes me to be very cautious to think about how strongly I argue certain things when I’m aware that in only a little bit into the future I might completely disagree with whatever I used to believe. Whether or not you believe in species evolution, you have to admit that as individuals our ideologies are evolving.
I don’t think that age is what causes these changes because I took off a year of school before attending college and the only way that I changed was I became a lot more calm and less crazy and even more reserved. I used to be NUTS in high school. (If you don’t believe this, just ask Jennifer or friends who knew me back then.) But as far as a progression in thinking, none too drastic occurred.
Age doesn’t seem to be the culprit either. I’m older than just about everyone here getting an undergrad degree at Samford and I’m still changing. It appears to me that education has a large role to play. This belief is also based upon another observation I have made:
When I started college, I was pretty conservative as were many of my friends. They went to either state schools or more conservative Christian schools. The ones who went to state schools were just as conservative when they graduated as they had been but not too much more conservative than before. The ones who went to conservative schools came out even more conservative. [When I use the word conservative, I’m being overly simplistic in describing the political beliefs as well as the theological ones of those individuals. These terms are relative to their previous condition.] Yet, a lot of people who come conservative to Samford leave with drastically different beliefs and most leave Samford with at least slightly altered perspectives.
So, I think education is what is responsible for these changes. If this is true, is this a good or bad thing or is it neither? I’d REALLY like some feed back on this question so PLEASE don’t read this and think of it as rhetorical. My reason for asking is because I’m afraid that if we’re still just a result of our education, then how have we changed? If I was conservative because of my upbringing, is that any worse that being more liberal because of my education?
In case you think this is completely absurd argument, consider this fact that I read in a sex book recently: Based upon statistics, there seems to be a correlation between the level of education a person receives and the variety of sexual activities that they will be willing to engage in. If this bothers you that I stated this, I’m sorry, but I was blown away to learn how with each level of education a person receives, how much more likely they are to engage in oral sex. I can’t recall the exact numbers off the top of my head, but people with Doctorates or PHD’s are much more likely to practice such “deviant” behavior. [I use the word deviant only to refer to any sexual practice other than intercourse.] Moreover, I recently attended a speech an ethical researcher and professor gave that said that the more conservative someone’s education was, the more ethically inferior they turned out to be.
So how can we escape this being a result of our environment? Although I agree with many of the teachers that I have on the conclusions that they’ve reached on many issues, I am afraid that I’m still just a ventriloquist’s dummy who was handed over to a more liberal ventriloquist. Will we ever be able to think for ourselves? (Again, that’s not a rhetorical question.) I fear that the sad answer is no.
Before I end this hypothesis, I want to respond to one possible argument against my conclusion. There might be those who would argue that the rebels or the free-spirits or free-thinkers are the exception. Hmmm... In other words, if someone reaches different conclusions than those influential people who surround them, are they independent thinkers? I think not. I think that often times, the independent thinkers come along as a result of either one of two occurrences. Either they are rebelious because it is in their nature to resist authority or the influences of others OR they see the flaws in their authority’s thinking. The second or latter one is as close to a free thinker as I think that we can get. Yet, can this kind of thing be called independent thinking? Maybe, but that would mean that if a group of people were put under some OBVIOUSLY absurd teaching from someone who was not influential at all, then most people would be independent thinkers.
So, what’s the deal? How different are we from our current and previous teachers and why?
One last side note should be mentioned. This issue has HUGE historical implications. One of my professors (Professor Scrivner) said that just about ALL ideologies that are found in the bible can be traced back to either their earlier bible roots or roots that are external to the canon. If this is true, then I guess that we will only be the product of our teaching based upon whether we respond negatively or positively to that teaching. Please let me know how you feel if you so wish.