In the marketplace of ideas, there can never be too many

Nov 23, 2013 Letters

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DEAR EDITOR,
There is a popular television programme aired on CCTV which I found to be very interesting and enlightening. It is called “Ideas Matter” where panelists share perspectives on fundamental national and international issues, some of which are diametrically opposed to each other. At the end of the programme, viewers are left to form their own opinions based on a variety of conflicting ideas and perspectives.
Ideas do matter. In the marketplace of ideas, there can never be too many. In the final analysis, it is the people who will decide which from among the competing ideas and perspectives they may wish to embrace.
The idea of asking questions and benefiting from different perspectives started thousands of years ago in Greece, with the famous philosopher Socrates who always posed the question ‘Why’? By asking the right questions, answers could be provided which could only serve to enhance the debate and in the process arriving at the right conclusions.
One sign of maturity both at the individual and at the organizational levels is an ability to tolerate and accommodate the views and opinions of others. Always make room for mistakes since there is no individual who knows it all and who is beyond making mistakes. In this regard, a quotation from VI Lenin, the Soviet revolutionary is most instructive:
“He is not wise who makes no mistakes. There are no such men; nor can there be. He is wise who makes not very serious mistakes and who corrects them easily and quickly.”
Yet there are people in our society who behave as if they have a monopoly on the truth and who, from a position of their bloated ego, are entitled to have the last word on any issue under the sun. There is a saying that a little education is a bad thing. Basking under the glory of university education, these people behave as though they have conquered the fountain of knowledge and therefore have a God-given right to pontificate and lecture to others.
Such an attitude is at best pathetic, since as we all know, when it comes to knowledge on any given subject we are only stractching the surface. The truth is that the more we know, the more we become conscious of our own ignorance and limitations. This is why we should all be humbled by education and eschew any tendency to as it were, ‘show off’ or adopt an arrogant attitude towards others, especially those who may not have the opportunity to attain higher education.
I thought of making these few observations as I watched the hundreds of students who graduated from the University of Guyana at its most recent Convocation ceremony at the Turkeyen Campus. This is quite a historic event, not only because it represented one of the largest batches of students to graduate from the University but more significantly the graduation ceremony coincided with the 50th anniversary celebrations of the University this year. As most Guyanese are aware, the university was established on October 1963 by the Jagan-led PPP administration and until this day remains one the flagship projects ever undertaken in Guyana.
Education, in particular higher education, goes beyond the mere finding high-paying jobs, even though the need to serve one’s country in a manner with which one is best suited cannot be dismissed. As the saying goes, one cannot be educated and poor at the same time. Implicit in this statement is the fact that education is a form of empowerment which allows those so bestowed to broaden their horizons and perspectives and cause people to be much more creative and resourceful in terms of how they manage their own affairs and shape their individual destinies.
This is not to say that university graduates are immune from making mistakes in life. Some of the most horrible and costly mistakes in human history were made by people with higher education. James the First of England during the period of Tudor rule in England was described as the “wisest fool in Christiandom.” The point here is that education and wisdom are not necessarily one and the same as there are so many people who never went high in school but their level of contribution to society and their analytical abilities are as good if not better than those with university degrees.
The PPP government, more particularly the late Dr. Cheddi Jagan, must be commended for his perspicacity and vision in establishing the University of Guyana at a time when the resources of the country were very limited and when there were so many competing demands for development resources. He encountered several obstacles along the way but he remaind firm and resolute in his resolve to allow Guyanese to be the architects of their own development through education and training.
Today, fifty years later, Dr. Jagan has been proven correct and the University of Guyana stands as a living monument to a man who never lost hope in his country and people and the huge potential that lies ahead which only an educated and skilled populace can effectively harness and utilize.
Hydar Ally

 

 

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