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One of the most common benedictions of the anointed is the use of the word “science” to describe notions which are consonant with their vision, but which have neither the certainty nor the intellectual rigor of science.
The Vision of the Anointed
Thomas Sowell
I am thinking of something I saw on the subway in the early 80s, maybe 1982. I was sitting at the end of the last car on an express train and saw three or four African-American boys (in my memory they were 11-13 years old, maybe younger), grouped around the back window, staring out of it with pure absorption. Curious, I stood to look over their shoulders and saw what they were so raptly taking in: the piercing combination of speed and density as the train gathered momentum and hammered through the massive concrete and metal tunnels, our view herking and jerking with the cars, snatching bits of burning light in metal casement, underground signage, the track flashing and going dark as we clangored through stations, past dozens of waiting humans, personalities firing off bodily messages that our eyes saw before our minds could read them. It was beautiful and the boys were radiant with it, this wordless amazement of things.
The Hidden Life of Stories
Mary Gaitskill
Deliberate action or planning at the individual level is by no means precluded by the constrained vision, just as individuals choose their own words and writing style, within the scope and rules of language. What is rejected in both cases by the constrained vision is individual or intentional planning of the whole system. Man, as conceived in the constrained vision, simply is not capable of such a feat, though he is capable of the hubris of attempting it. Systemic rationality is considered superior to individual or intentional rationality.
A Conflict of Visions
Thomas Sowell
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