Radical Thinking E-Book

Peter Lamont

• Herausgeber: Swift Press
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 351

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2024

Beschreibung

'Will change how you see the world' Derren Brown Radical Thinking is a book about how you view the world. It's about the things that shape your thoughts, from what you notice and how you interpret it, to what you assume, believe and want. It's also about how, if you think in a radical way, you can look beyond your limited view of the world to see the bigger picture.

Leseprobe

For my parents, who will never read it.1

Contents

The Curiosity ShopPart 1: The Window Through Which You Look Where to start?1. What we notice 2. A limited picture 3. How we interpret things 4. Our points of view 5. Local customs and habits 6. Tools of persuasion 7. How we feel 8. What we want Part 2: Thinking in a Radical Way 9. Where are we? 10. The limits of logic 11. The boundaries of science 12. You can make sense of anything Exit: Beyond the squareAcknowledgementsNotes

The Curiosity Shop

In the Old Town of Edinburgh, many years ago, there was a shop that sold curiosities.

Every day, as people walked by the shop, they looked in the window. They looked at the curious things on display. The alluring oddities, enticing knick-knacks and bizarre novelties captured their attention. However, nobody went into the shop.

Day after day, people looked in the window. They looked, from the same position, at whatever curious things were on display. They preferred some things to others. But nobody went into the shop.

Then, one day, a curious child passed by. She looked at the things on display. She saw them all through the same window. Naturally, she preferred some things to others. However, she was curious. So, after a while, she noticed something else. It was something that nobody else had noticed …

She noticed the window through which she was looking.

That was when she realised that it was displaying a limited number of things. It was presenting them in a particular way. And, being a curious child, she wondered what she was missing. She wanted to see things from different angles.

So, she decided to go into the shop.

This is a book about being more curious. It’s about noticing the window through which you look – the window that frames your view of the world.

As you try to make sense of the world around you, you begin with what’s on display. You notice a limited number of things. You see them from a particular position. Naturally, you prefer some things to others. In the process, you form a world-view.

It is, of course, a restricted view. Whatever you think – about any subject at all – it’s based on what you notice and how you interpret what you see and hear. It’s based on limited information, which is presented to you in a particular way, and on your personal preferences. Whatever your view of the world might be, this is the window through which you look. It limits your view and frames what you see. In other words, it shapes your thoughts.

Beyond this, there’s a bigger picture. To see it, you need to be more curious. You need to wonder about what you’re missing. You need to look at things from different angles. You need to realise the limits of your view.

The limits of your view are far from obvious. After all, we now have access to more information than at any time in history. However, we live in a world of urgent noise. Alluring offers, enticing pitches and bizarre claims capture our attention. We’re intrigued by the latest meme and drawn to competing truths from rival factions. The problem isn’t a lack of information. The problem is how to make sense of it all.

This requires some radical thinking.

We’re not in control of the endless noise that fills our eyes and ears. Nevertheless, whatever we see and hear, it’s up to us to make sense of it. To do that, we need to remember our limits. There are things that shape our thoughts, which aren’t out there in the world that we see. They’re in the ways that we see the world. And that is something that’s in our control. But, to realise our limits, we need to be more curious about how, in general, we see things.

We look at the world, of course, from wherever we are. I’m here. You’re somewhere else. Your view of the world is different from mine. Nevertheless, the things that shape your world-view are the same things that shape mine.

This is a book about these things. It’s about what you see, and what you miss, and how you can look farther and see things differently. It’s about what you believe, what you take for granted, what you find convincing, how you feel, and what you want. It’s a local guide to how you think about everything. In the end, it’s about how you can make sense of anything.

And it starts here.

The only question is: Are you curious?

Part 1

The Window Through Which You Look

Where to start?

The Radical Road is out of bounds. We’re told that the route is too dangerous.

The Radical Road is a rocky path. It takes you up the side of a hill near the centre of Edinburgh. It was built after the Radical War of 1820. The Radicals were fighting for the right to vote. At the time, only one in five hundred Scots could vote. The Radicals lost. The leaders were arrested, denounced as traitors, and then they were hanged and beheaded. The remaining radical rascals were recruited to create this recreational road.1 Since then, it’s been called the Radical Road.

If you walked up the Radical Road today, you would get a better view. You would be able to see farther. You would see the surrounding area from different angles. So, as you looked around, you would see your position within the bigger picture. The Radical Road provides perspective.

But not today. The path is closed. The authorities are concerned about falling rocks. At the moment, it’s considered too dangerous.2

The Radical Road may be closed, but the path to more radical thinking is not.

Radical thinking is a matter of perspective. It depends on what you take for granted. For example, the Radicals thought that all men – but only men – should be able to vote. Two centuries ago, this was radical stuff. It was considered dangerous. But not today. From today’s perspective, they weren’t radical enough.

Whatever your current view of the world – about politics, religion or anything else – you can think in a more radical way. You can look farther. You can look at things from different angles. This provides a sense of perspective. And today, in this world of competing distractions and rival truths, this is needed more than ever.

The Radicals had political aims. But the radical thinking to which I refer isn’t particularly political. It’s ‘radical’ (from radic, meaning root) because it’s about questioning the basics: the things that you take for granted. It’s about noticing the window through which you look at the world, and how this shapes your thoughts.

If you’re not curious about this, then you’ll continue to have a limited view. You’ll not see beyond your current position. You’ll be missing the bigger picture.

It’s becoming increasingly difficult to see beyond our current positions. We’re constantly telling others what we think. We post and tweet and share our views. We wear them on badges, caps and T-shirts. We express them in public and identify with them. As we do, we take sides – we think this not that – and then we defend our territory. We justify what we think and, as we reject the views of others, we fail to understand why they would think that. We accuse each other of ignorance, or bias, or bad intentions, for thinking differently. We become trapped in an endless series of arguments that reinforce our own opinions.

And yet, for over a century, psychologists have been pointing out how we get things wrong. According to psychologists, you’re flawed in your thinking. Your perception is faulty. You make bad decisions. You’re an irrational creature who’s riddled with biases. Your thoughts are dictated by your brain, that remarkable but mischievous lump of flesh over which you have little, if any, control. So, whatever you happen to think, how can you possibly know that you’re right?

The best solution, according to many, is to engage in ‘critical thinking’. This is often presented as some rules that you can follow, which will help you to get it right. For most critical thinking experts, these are the rules of logic and the methods of science. You’re encouraged to learn about the logical fallacies and the countless biases to which you’re prone – because they lead to erroneous conclusions.3

Now, the rules of logic and the methods of science are fine things to learn. However, as we’ll see, they have their limits. And you can certainly learn about the logical fallacies and the countless biases to which you’re prone. But you still won’t know if what you think is right. In the abstract world of logic, of course, where the rules are fixed, you can spot an error. In the controlled world of the scientific experiment, where the facts are known, you can spot a bias. However, you don’t live in either of those worlds.

You live in the real and uncertain world of limited information, questionable data, rival views and competing interests. Whatever you see or hear, at any given time, it’s not obvious which rules are in play or, for that matter, which facts are true. In the real world, whatever you think, you can never be sure if your conclusion is right. So, what on earth are you to think?

You need to think in a more radical way: it’s not about what you think.

Thinking is a process, not an outcome. It’s a path that you take until you reach a conclusion. Along the way, you’re guided by limited information, which is presented from a particular angle, and by your personal preferences … until, at some point, you stop. You arrive at a position. This is what you think. This is the outcome.

To think in a critical way, however, you need to think about the process. When critical thinking is pitched as a way to reach the right outcome, this itself is an error. Critical thinking isn’t about what you think: it’s about how you think.4 Whatever the outcome, it’s about how you got there. And, to make sense of the views of others, you need to understand how they got to where they are.

As we walked the path to our current positions, we were all guided by limited information, particular angles and personal preferences. It’s never just a matter of facts. Nobody knows all the facts and, whatever the facts, they must be interpreted. It’s not just a matter of bias. None of us is neutral. No wonder that we disagree.

But we needn’t agree on what we think.

If you wish to make sense of what’s going on, then you need to get past what you think. You need to understand how you arrived at that thought. You need to question what you take for granted. You need to notice the less obvious things that guide your thoughts and frame your view. You need to see your position within the bigger picture. This provides a sense of perspective from which you can make sense of everything else.

So, where to start?

We look at the world from wherever we are. I’m here. You’re somewhere else. But this isn’t about your current view, whatever it might be. It’s about how we look at things. Frankly, we could start from anywhere. But I’m here, so let’s start from where I am.

At the moment, I’m in George Square, which is near the centre of Edinburgh. From here, I can see the Radical Road. It’s less than a mile away. However, as I mentioned earlier, that path is currently out of bounds. So, I can start from here. It doesn’t really matter. As you’ll soon see, it’s not really about here.

In part one, I’m going to walk around George Square, and tell you about some local curiosities. I’m going to use these to reveal the things that guide your thoughts and frame your view. I’m going to do this because, whatever your view – however you see things – they make up the window through which you look.

In part two, I’m going to go farther. I’m going to talk about critical thinking, and offer some practical advice on how to think critically in the real world. I’m not going to offer a set of rules to help you get it right. I don’t claim to know the truth. I’m a Professor of History and Theory of Psychology at the University of Edinburgh, where I’ve taught critical thinking, and have also written about its history. This is what I know.

Throughout the history of thinking – both critical and uncritical thinking – our views have been quietly shaped by things that we rarely, if ever, notice. They’re out of sight, and they remain out of sight, because they’re in the ways that we look. So, to make more sense of the world, a more radical way is needed. We need to remind ourselves that thinking is a process, not an outcome. It’s a path that can lead to different conclusions.

This is a curious walk along that path. If you walk this way, then I hope, at the end of the road, you’ll be able to make better sense of it all.

If you’re still curious, we can start from here.

1

What we notice

Sherlock Holmes:You see but you do not observe. The distinction is clear. For example, you have frequently seen the steps which lead up from the hall to this room.

Dr Watson: Frequently.

Holmes: How often?

Watson: Well, some hundreds of times.

Holmes: Then how many are there?

Watson: How many? I don’t know.

Holmes: Quite so! You have not observed. And yet you have seen.1

I’m in my office. It’s in the Department of Psychology, which is on George Square. I’m feeling more like Watson than Holmes. However, as we’ll see, I think that this is a good thing.

There’s a stairway nearby, which leads down to the ground floor. It also leads up from the ground floor to here. This, as the comedian Chic Murray used to say, saves us from needing two stairways. I’ve gone up and down these stairs … well, some hundreds of times. However, I’ve never observed how many steps there are.

The front door of 23 George Square

Like Watson, even the things that we see, we frequently fail to notice. For example, you just read the last sentence, but you didn’t notice how many words were there. Perhaps you just went back to count them. We notice things after they’re brought to our attention. That’s when they become relevant. But we can’t notice everything. So, we filter. We select, out of everything that we can see, what seems relevant and what doesn’t. And, when you’re reading, the number of words in a sentence is irrelevant. That’s why, when you read the last sentence, you didn’t notice how many words were there.

There’s nothing wrong with that but, when we’re told this, it can sound like a criticism. That’s how Sherlock Holmes talks to Watson, who, in the original books, is the reader’s eyes and ears on what the great detective is thinking. Holmes observes all. Watson doesn’t. And we, the reader, feel like Watson, who, compared to Holmes, has inadequate eyes and ears.

We’ve been told a similar story by psychologists. For over a century, they’ve pointed out how little we notice and how inaccurately we see and hear things. Our eyes and ears are prone to deception. We fail to notice what stares us in the face. Our memories are unreliable. Our thoughts are irrational. If we hear this, then it might make us feel inadequate. But compared to what exactly?

It’s easy to point to our imperfections, because we have so many, but we’re not supposed to be perfect. We’re humans, whose eyes are not cameras and whose minds are not computers, though we invented both. After we invented them, they became metaphors for how we see, and how we think.2 However, when we compare ourselves to our inventions, we often suffer by comparison. And, when we compare ourselves to invented characters, such as Sherlock Holmes, who is more observant than us – but who is fictional – we suffer by comparison.

We’ll never notice everything because we need to focus on some things, not others. We can’t see things as they really are, or think in merely rational ways, because we’re neither cameras nor computers. We can’t be truly objective because we see things from our current position. These are our natural limits. When they’re pointed out, of course, we take notice. And then we carry on as normal, not noticing how many steps are there. Or how many words were in the last sentence.

The basic point is this: the problem of thinking in the real world isn’t that we’re inadequate, but that we forget our limits. We notice a limited number of things and interpret these things in a particular way. This is the window through which we look at the world: everything that we think is based on what we notice and on how we interpret it. Beyond this, there are all the things that we miss, and there are alternative interpretations. This is the bigger picture.

In the real world, we have natural limits, and it’s useful to be reminded of them, not because we should have superhuman powers but because, as humans, we don’t.

Holmes, of course, was a fictional character. However, the human who invented him was real. And Arthur Conan Doyle was no Sherlock Holmes.

Indeed, as we’ll see, he’s a useful reminder of our limits.

It took a couple of minutes to walk from my office to 23 George Square. I’ve walked past this doorway hundreds of times but, until now, I’ve never noticed that, in front of the doorway, there are four steps. So, when you glanced at the photograph at the start of this chapter, you probably didn’t notice this either (though, now that I’ve made this relevant, perhaps you just went back to count them). The reason that 23 George Square is relevant is this: it’s where Arthur Conan Doyle lived.

Doyle was here while he was a student. In 1876, he began to study medicine at the University of Edinburgh and then at the Extra-Mural School of Medicine. He took a course on clinical surgery, which was taught by the surgeon Joseph Bell. Bell was famous for his powers of observation in the diagnosis of patients. He became the inspiration for Sherlock Holmes.

Doyle wrote to him later: ‘It is most certainly to you that I owe Sherlock Holmes … I do not think his analytical work is in the least an exaggeration of some of the effects which I have seen you produce in the out-patient ward.’3

Doyle recalled an example of Bell’s powers of deduction, based on close observation:

At an out-patient clinic, a patient is shown in. Before the patient can say a word, Bell says:

‘Well, my man, I see you’ve served in the army.’

‘Aye sir.’

‘Not long discharged?’

‘Aye sir.’

‘A Highland regiment?’

‘Aye sir.’

‘A non-commissioned officer?’

‘Aye sir.’

‘Stationed at Barbados?’

‘Aye sir.’

Bell then explained to Doyle and his fellow students how he’d done it:

‘You see, gentlemen, the patient is a respectful man but he did not remove his hat. They do not do this in the army. He would have learned this civilian habit had he been long discharged. He has an air of authority and he is obviously Scottish. As to Barbados, his complaint is elephantiasis which is West Indian and not British.’4

A few years later, Sherlock Holmes would be demonstrating similar powers of deduction, based on close observation, by noticing relevant facts and then interpreting them in a certain way. However, according to an old friend, Bell described these stories as ‘drivel’.5 He thought that they exaggerated the limits of his powers. ‘From close observation and deduction, gentlemen, it is possible to make a diagnosis that will be correct in any and every case,’ Bell admitted, but he stressed that ‘you must not neglect to ratify your deductions [and] substantiate your diagnosis’.6 He would often tell his students of one occasion when he’d visited a patient.

He’d quickly deduced that the patient was a bandsman. He explained to his students at the time: ‘You see, gentlemen, I am right. It is quite simple. This man has paralysis of the cheek muscles, the result of too much blowing at wind instruments.’ Bell then asked which instrument the patient played, and the man replied: ‘The big drum.’7

Bell told this story to make it clear: he understood the limits of his powers.

Doyle, however, wasn’t so aware. For example, he observed many spiritualist mediums. He observed them closely and took copious notes. He observed fraud in some cases. He didn’t observe it in most. He deduced, therefore, that most mediums were genuine.8 In other words, he assumed that, if he didn’t observe fraud, then it wasn’t there. As he once told the legendary magician (and well-known sceptic) Harry Houdini: ‘I am a cool observer and do not make mistakes.’9

Doyle also observed Houdini and deduced some things about him. He observed Houdini with his own eyes, and he read the accounts of Houdini’s performances. He deduced that Houdini was able to pass through solid obstacles by dematerialising and reassembling his body. He was aware that Houdini was a magician and that it might be a trick. He observed that there were tricks in which magicians escaped from boxes, bags and handcuffs. He read how they were done. But he deduced that Houdini’s performances were different and that his relied on psychic powers. He was perfectly aware that Houdini denied this. Houdini and Doyle were friends for years and Houdini told him directly, more than once, that he had no psychic powers. But Doyle didn’t accept the denials. He deduced that, like others before him, Houdini was reluctant to admit his psychic powers.10

What Doyle thought was based on what he saw and heard (with his own eyes and ears), which he then interpreted in a particular way. That’s what we all do, though what we notice and how we interpret it is often very different. For example, having read what Doyle observed and how he interpreted it, you might think that he was wrong. You might think that the mediums were fake, and that Doyle failed to notice this. You might think that, when Houdini said that he had no psychic powers, he was telling the truth.

That’s what I think, though how we interpret what we see and hear tends to be in line with what we believe. Like Doyle, my beliefs are based on my experience, but my experience has been different. Naturally, I wasn’t there at the séances that Doyle attended. However, I’ve read hundreds of séance accounts from the Victorian period, and I know how mediums were able to fake it. I’m sure that many of them did, though I can’t be certain that all of them did. And, as a historian of magic, I know how Houdini performed his escapes.

So, it seems clear to me that Doyle forgot his limits. He thought that he was ‘a cool observer [who did] not make mistakes’. He’d created a fictional character who miraculously observed all that he saw. In the real world, however, you can’t observe everything that you see. You can’t observe anything without interpreting it. And you can’t observe what you don’t see.

Doyle was Watson but thought that he was Holmes. He didn’t realise how much he was missing. And neither do we. We need to keep that in mind.

That’s why, when I feel like Watson, not Holmes, I think that this is a good thing.

So, what was he missing? What are we missing?

I’m now back in the Department of Psychology. From the window upstairs, I can see the back of the Edinburgh Festival Theatre. It’s on the site of the old Empire Palace Theatre, once the largest theatre in Britain. When Houdini came to Edinburgh in 1914, that was where he performed. The Scotsman newspaper curiously observed that his act, ‘though not new to Edinburgh audiences, [was] if anything more interesting and mystifying at the second time of seeing’.11 They still couldn’t see what they were missing.

Magicians have performed in Edinburgh for centuries. They performed on the streets of the Old Town and in the assembly rooms of the New Town. Throughout this time, they made a living by exploiting how much we miss. With bold gestures and flamboyant patter, they distracted observers’ eyes and ears. However, by the time that Houdini was performing in large theatres, magicians had got even better at controlling what the audience noticed. They’d started to use ‘misdirection’ to mislead not only their audiences’ eyes and ears, but also their audiences’ minds.12 If you can misdirect the minds of observers, then you can direct not only what they notice, but also how they interpret what they see. The man who inspired Houdini – the French magician Robert-Houdin – had explained how this could be done.

One way was to present things so that they seemed ordinary and natural. No more bold gestures and flamboyant patter. These attracted attention and distracted the audience, but they did so in an obvious way. They were out of the ordinary and, as a result, they immediately aroused suspicion. The audience might not see what was going on, but they knew that they were being distracted. They knew that they were missing something. A better way to deceive the audience, according to Robert-Houdin, was to speak and act in natural ways.13 That way, the audience would feel that they were seeing all that there was to see.

Another way to misdirect the minds of the audience, he explained, was to suggest that what was going on was actually something else. If it was done by sleight of hand, for example, then it should be presented as technology. If it relied on a mechanical device, then it should be presented as sleight of hand.14 After all, the audience knew that there was a secret. They were looking for what they were missing. However, by directing their attention to this not that, the audience would think about this not that, which would send not only their eyes, but also their minds, in the wrong direction.

These techniques were revealed in popular books.15 These books were read by the public, who went to see magic shows, but they still didn’t see what was going on. When people are told what they’re missing, they first take notice, but then they carry on as normal. Not noticing how many words were in the last sentence. Houdini read these books, and he learned the techniques. He used them when he performed magic and when he presented his famous escapes. He also knew how spiritualist mediums, like the ones who convinced Arthur Conan Doyle, might use similar techniques.16

We can’t be certain what Doyle was missing, but we can be sure that these techniques worked, because they were used by many fraudulent mediums. For example, when mediums conducted séances, they normally did so in the dark. This made it hard to notice what was going on, which initially aroused suspicion. However, mediums spoke of the need for darkness, of the sensitivity of the phenomena to light, and compared it all to the development of a photograph. This made the darkness seem natural.

Spiritualists who visited these mediums knew that it might be a trick and often attempted to prevent fraud. But mediums claimed that the phenomena could only be produced in certain conditions and that a sceptical attitude wasn’t helpful. This became an accepted norm in spiritualist circles. Like darkness, it came to be seen as natural. As Doyle said himself: ‘you must submit in a humble spirit to psychic conditions.’17

Mediums also had to present what they did as the work of the spirits. After all, there was little about what people saw and heard that was obviously ‘spiritual’. They saw tables move and heard knocking noises. They saw words appear on blank slates. They heard the voice of the medium. But mediums presented these movements and messages as physical manifestations of the spirits. They presented themselves as mere conduits of the spirits: the medium had no control, it took great effort, and success couldn’t be guaranteed. If nothing happened, then it wasn’t their fault. But if something happened, then they could all be thankful that the spirits had decided to attend. This focused attention on the spirits, not the medium.18

By creating conditions that seemed natural, and by attributing what they did to a different cause, mediums (at least the fraudulent ones) prevented observers from seeing what was really going on. They also provided a way for them to interpret what they saw. After all, in the case of a magic trick, if you can’t see how it’s done, then you deduce that it’s a good trick. When Doyle observed mediums, he couldn’t see how it was done. He deduced, therefore, that it was real. In the process, he forgot his limits, which led him to think that, if he didn’t see it, then it wasn’t there. He thought that he’d seen things as they really were.

But Doyle was simply doing what we all do, one way or another, most of the time. Magicians and fraudulent mediums were simply exploiting the ways that we look at the world and, in the process, how much we miss.

What we miss, and what we observe, depends on a variety of things. We notice the obvious, like a loud noise, a sudden movement or a flashing light. We notice things that are bold and flamboyant. But we’re aware that these have grabbed our attention. We tend not to notice what seems ordinary or natural. We notice what seems novel or out of place. That, however, depends on the surroundings. This seems novel, but novelties wear off. After a while, once we’ve adjusted to the new conditions, this now seems novel.

What first seems novel begins to seem natural. We quickly become accustomed to the dark. As we do, we forget how little we see.

Our attention is directed by expectations. We look where we anticipate that something is going to happen … something is going to happen … something is going to … even if it doesn’t. We notice what we think is currently relevant because, in that moment, it matters. When we’re crossing the road, we observe the traffic and don’t see the pedestrians on the pavements. When watching a magician shuffle the cards, we observe the cards, the hands, the movement, but not the box on the table nearby. When attending a séance, spiritualists might initially watch the medium, but then they look for evidence of the spirits, because that’s why they’re there. When reading a book, we pay attention to what the words mean, not to how many are there. And, of course, as we stare at our phones, the real world passes us by. This is how we look at the world: we pay attention to what we think matters and miss what else is going on.

Psychologists have conducted various experiments to show how little we observe. In what’s probably now the most famous experiment, subjects were shown a video clip of two teams playing basketball. They were asked to count the number of passes made by the team in white – not the team in black. Meanwhile, a person in a gorilla suit wandered through the game. Yet most of the subjects didn’t notice this.19 This video has since been shown to countless groups as an example of how much we fail to observe (what psychologists call ‘inattentional blindness’). It’s made people wonder how they could fail to spot something as obvious as a gorilla. It’s a useful reminder of our limits. However, it needn’t make us feel inadequate. After all, nobody failed to spot a gorilla. There was no gorilla in the video.

There was a person wearing a gorilla suit, who walked like a human being. She was surrounded by others who were also dressed in black outfits – while observers were trying to ignore people who were dressed in black outfits. If there had been a real gorilla, then that would have been obvious. It would have moved in very different ways, and the basketball game would have ended abruptly. Most observers failed to spot the person in a gorilla suit because it wasn’t relevant. They were focusing on the task that they’d been given, which demanded their full attention. They would have also failed to spot the shoes that the psychologist was wearing. Or how many words were in the last sentence.

There are countless things that we fail to observe, but our limits, in terms of what we notice, are finite. They depend on where we direct our attention. That, in turn, depends on what, in any given context, we think is relevant. At the end of the day, that’s up to us. However, when our attention is directed by others, we see what they want us to see, and we fail to notice the bigger picture. This has been demonstrated by magicians and psychologists.

It has also been exploited by politicians. They make bold gestures and flamboyant announcements to direct our attention to this not that. We may be suspicious, but we nevertheless look. They make some things relevant, so that we think about those things. They send our minds in the wrong direction. They do it so often that it seems natural, and we fail to notice what’s going on. We become accustomed to the dark and soon forget how little we see. They help us to forget how much we’re missing until we think that we’re seeing all there is. We see things the way that they want us to see them, because they provide a window through which we can view things on their terms. As a result, it seems as if there’s nothing else, and no alternative view.

But there is. We just need to remember our limits. We notice only a fraction of what’s out there. Whatever we notice, we always interpret it in a particular way. However, if we direct our attention elsewhere, then we’ll see other things. And, as we’ll see later, if we take the time to consider alternative perspectives, then we’ll see things differently.

Meanwhile, when we think about how much we miss, it’s easy to miss the less obvious thing: how much we manage to see. We see faces in clouds, ghosts in shadows, meaning in inkblots and order in chaos. We see things that aren’t really there.

I learned this in Edinburgh. I was raised here as a Catholic and, as a child, I was taught the doctrine of transubstantiation. During the part of the Mass called the Eucharist, bread transforms into the flesh of Christ, yet the bread continues to look like bread, feel like bread, and taste like bread. This isn’t supposed to be a metaphor but a literal transformation of ordinary bread into the body of Christ. Nevertheless, according to the senses, nothing changes. It is, quite literally, non-sense. As a child, I didn’t understand this non-sense and so I asked my teacher. However, he didn’t understand it either and so I asked the priest. He explained that we don’t see things as they really are. We need to rely on faith.

At about the same time, in a completely unrelated context, a woman in New Mexico noticed the face of Jesus on a tortilla.20 She decided not to eat the tortilla. Instead, she called a priest. The priest was sceptical. Nevertheless, the tortilla was framed, placed in a shrine, and attracted countless pilgrims. They waited in line, with the patience that comes of faith, to witness the miraculous breadstuff. It became international news, with photographs of the tortilla appearing in newspapers all over the world, so that others could judge for themselves. Since then, the face of Jesus has appeared on pancakes, poppadoms and pizzas. It’s been found on a tree stump. It’s been discovered inside the lid of a jar of Marmite. It’s been spotted on a wood panel of a toilet door in the Glasgow branch of IKEA. And this is only part of the miracle because, every time that Jesus has appeared, his face has mysteriously changed. Nevertheless, the faithful have been able to see, in these vague yet noticeably different markings, the face of Jesus.

Can you see the face of Jesus? For an alternative interpretation, compare it to the photo on the back cover of the book.

At about the same time, in a completely unrelated context, Woody Allen wrote a profound sentence about a mythical beast: it had the body of a lion, and the head of a lion, though not of the same lion.21 After I read this sentence, I visited Edinburgh Zoo and looked at a lion. I looked at the lion for quite some time, until I managed to convince myself, just for a moment, that it was the mythical beast. In that briefest of moments, as I looked at the lion and imagined that it was more than I could see, I finally understood the power of faith to shape how we interpret the world. It was only a brief moment, however, because I then remembered that Woody Allen had been joking.

Faith is a magical window through which the mundane can be transformed into something extraordinary. But we all have faith of one kind or another, because faith takes many forms. We don’t see the world as it really is. We see it through a window that’s loyal to certain assumptions about what there is, and to certain expectations about what will be. This can lead us to notice things that aren’t really there. A missing key. The emptiness of a wallet. A train that hasn’t arrived yet.

Whatever is really out there, we notice this not that, and we interpret it as ‘this’ not ‘that’. We itnerpert waht we see in trems taht we can udnersatnd. We tarnsfrom waht is out terhe itno semothnig taht mkaes snese to us. In the porcses, we can see the fcae of Jseus – even though it’s not really there.

To make more sense of the world, then, we need to be more curious about what we’re missing, and about how we interpret what we see. We needn’t be a Sherlock Holmes to see that what we notice, and what we miss, depends on where we direct our attention. This is guided by what we think matters. We needn’t see the body of Christ, the face of Jesus, or a mythical beast, to realise that, whatever we happen to see, we interpret it in a particular way. This is shaped by what we take for granted, what we believe, and what we want.

This is the window through which we look at the world, and it limits our view. If we wish to see the bigger picture, then we need to think in a more radical way. We need to look farther than what seems obvious.

So, having returned from Arthur Conan Doyle’s former home, on the west side of George Square, it’s time to look elsewhere.

2

A limited picture

I’m now on the east side of George Square, looking eastwards. From here, I can see Nicolson Street. That’s where it began.

In the summer of 1777, the son of a baker and the son of a wigmaker decided to publish a book.1 It would be an extraordinarily large book: it would cover ‘the whole field of human knowledge’.2 It took seven years to publish the whole thing. The book first appeared in a printing shop on Nicolson Street owned by the wigmaker’s son.3 It was called Encyclopaedia Britannica.

It was an attempt to describe the biggest of pictures. However, it presented a picture of the world that was remarkably incomplete. It was limited in much the same ways that our own views of the world are limited. Indeed, it’s a lesson in why, no matter how comprehensive our world-view might seem to be, we need to look farther.

It wasn’t the first encyclopaedia. It wasn’t even the first Encyclopaedia Britannica. They’d published the first edition of Britannica a few years earlier. However, that had been a far more modest affair: just three volumes and not particularly original. One reviewer had dismissed it as a work that had been ‘ignorantly, and, upon the whole, we may add, dishonestly, executed’.4 It was also rather limited in scope. It didn’t include history. It didn’t include biographies.

But the second edition, which began to appear in 1777, was much more ambitious. This ‘greatly improved and enlarged’ edition covered all the usual things: ‘the different sciences and arts’ and ‘all the countries, cities, principal mountains, seas, rivers, etc. throughout the world’. It covered ‘matters ecclesiastical, civil, military, commercial, etc.’ However, this edition also included history and biographies. It boasted ‘a general history, ancient and modern, of the different empires, kingdoms and states’. It included ‘an account of the lives of all the most eminent persons of every nation’.5 It also featured over 300 copperplate engravings. The first instalment, which included Aberdeen, Aborigines, Abortion and Abraham, cost a shilling.