Every type of human being—every individual who can be categorized as a system of continuous variables within a three-pole system—every individual has a right to his own place in the system, and a right to develop according to his own constitution and temperament. And I think that this, we shall find, increasingly is a matter of very great importance in getting the best out of human beings—that is to say: recognizing the fact of their intrinsic difference, and trying in each case to work out means by which every individual can be helped to actualize his potentialities in his particular place in the general scheme of human beings.
We see throughout various histories of civilization that extremely ingenious devices have been made for protecting the introvert from his too violent fellows, and also for finding means for providing safety valves and outlets for the violent people, aggressive people, without their doing too much harm to other people.
Seeing the extraordinary rate at which pharmacology is advancing at the present time, I would not be at all surprised if within the next ten or twenty years something of this kind did become possible, and that it may be conceivable that people will be made mentally more efficient by pharmacological means.
I would regard awareness as one of the, so to say, absolute values of human life. I think it is an absolute good to increase awareness. This is an act of faith, but I think that awareness ranks with kindness and intelligence as one of the basic goods which we should try to realize.
From time immemorial philosophers have been saying, “know thyself;” nōsce tē ipsum. But it is of course very characteristic of our strange civilization that philosophic and moral precepts are given—like “know thyself” and the ideal of self-knowledge—but no means whereby this ideal can be implemented or the precept obeyed. No means are offered. And it is for this reason of extreme importance that we examine the means. I mean, we are full of high ideals and full of noble precepts, but we are extremely short on methods whereby we can fulfill these ideals and obey the precepts.
I would say that enjoyment is a categorical imperative—in this sense: that if we can be interested in things and enjoy them, we shall be free from many of the temptations of delinquency. Here again, Russell has underlined the fact that this chronic boredom in which so many people live certainly encourages the small-scale delinquency, and probably also even encourages the fact that people still tolerate the idea of war, because war is so exciting that it’s an immense relief from the boredom of ordinary life.
Truth lives at the bottom of a well, and the well is very often muddy. And we mustn’t be put off by the mud, because the truth may be sitting there.
