Balance Of Power :: essays research papers

The Balance of Power      byout the semester, a theme that has get hold ofd our thoughts has been the idea that the self is the capacity to have capacities. Through what we have read, written about, and discussed, we have been trying to come up with our own answers to the questions about the self what a capacity is, how we find them, which ones argon essential to mankind flourishing, what we do with them once they are found? Yet all of these questions lead us to answer that final and defining question of "what is the truth?"     A capacity is a capability or a realized power in a person. Some of the authors that we read throughout the semester believed that these capacities must be implanted into us, and then nurtured and trained. C.S. Lewis says that, "The assess of the modern educator is not to cut down jungles, entirely to irrigate deserts."(1-p.27) However, in this statement he contradicts his own belief. In order for irrigation to work and establish things grow, there must be something there beneath the surface to begin with. This is exactly my belief. I agree with Lewis that our capacities must be trained and educated, but those that are essential to human flourishing are inside our hearts waiting to be uncovered.      But how then, do we go about uncovering these capacities? The answer is so simple, and yet far to complex to completely explain in one paper. It takes thought. In fact, thought is the best example of a capacity. No one shtup teach thought. It is an innate quality of all human beings. However, thought is not complete in its original state. We must train and educate our ability to think. We burn train it to be analytical, critical, evidential, logical, careful, clear, subjective, objective, etc. The list could go on and on. We can irrigate it and watch it grow. But that is assuming that it is there in the first place. Kierkegaard was on the honorable track t o uncovering what is inside of us. He believed that it would take subjective thought about ourselves, not being detached from our feelings, but letting our emotions be our guide to what we truly believe.           However, subjective thinking alone cannot decipher what capacities are essential to our lives. It gives us a place to start from with what really matters to us in our hearts, but it is clouded by our biases and prejudgements.