Binary thinking

[m_cobweb]

We live in a binary culture. We are taught as children to think in terms of on/off, either/or, good/bad, black/white. Life, of course, is not binary. Thinking of it in those terms is unnecessarily reductionist and leads to missing out on important nuances and shades of meaning.

It didn't take all that many years for me to recognize my tendency toward binary thinking and work to expand my thinking. But it's harder for me to expect that other people have realized this too. I don't suppose I give them enough credit a lot of times.

Comments

[vulture23.livejournal.com]

It's hard to expect other people to realize it too, because there's so many who *don't* realize it. Sometimes even intelligent, thoughtful people. But there are also a fair number of us who do see all those shades of grey. Identifying who they are can be tricky, though. :)

[elizabeth-eon.livejournal.com]

Interesting. This is a topic of conversation that has surfaced several times for me recently. I tend to see the gray and then feel like I'm being 'wishy-washy' for lack of a better term because I can't get my thinking back to the black and white squares. What it comes down to for me, is that life and people and all these experiences are too complicated for just black and white, what's important is balance so gray is a very necessary color.

[creatrix777.livejournal.com]

i'm not sure that we're necessarily *taught* to think about things in terms of on/off, black/white, etc., so much as this is how we perceive our experiences with our untrained minds as babies and children.

maybe it's part of the natural evolution of thought processing to, first, think singular thoughts (hungry, tired, soft), and then to discover a contrasting emotion or thought. if so, it wouldn't be too far of a reach beyond that to *assume* there are only two states... the two that you've experienced.

and since we all began our lives as small, inexperienced beings, it's easy to see why many of us would tend toward this simplistic style of thinking at times.

as we grow and experience more, and our minds evolve (mature) over the course of our lives, that's when we begin to realize nuance and levels of detail. self-awareness and reflection upon our experiences = maturity ... which seems to be the key to perceiving beyond the binary.

[m-cobweb.livejournal.com]

I think that's part of it. But I also look at our media and the messages we receive. Look at superheroes, fairy tales, simplistic sitcoms. I don't think our popular culture particularly encourages moving out of that black-and-white thinking, and it is easy to feel out of step when you reach that stage of thinking.

[creatrix777.livejournal.com]

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... it is easy to feel out of step when you reach that stage of thinking.
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so true!

'thinking different' isn't normally encouraged, that's for sure (except by Apple, of course, who has targeted the intellectual l33t among us, for the purpose of selling us computers). lol.

[creatrix777.livejournal.com]

btw, thanks for friending me. i'm enjoying our discussions. :-)

[vulture23.livejournal.com]

Even there, though, the message is "Apple good, any other computer bad", instead of the more realistic idea that different machines have different strengths and weaknesses, and you should choose one whose strengths match your desired usage. In this case, "think differently" means only "Think like *we* tell you, not like *they* tell you" ...

The media and mass-culture definitely discourages non-binary thinking, though. Think about how many people (gay and straight) assume that there's something wrong with being bisexual -- you're expected to be *either* gay *or* straight, but being in-between is not allowed, and those who *are* in-between are assumed to be on the verge of becoming one or the other. This even applies to our political system -- you're allowed to be Democratic or Republican, Liberal or Conservative, but any position that can't fall into one of these simple categories is frowned upon and marginalized. Think of the number of jokes about "There's two kinds of people in the world..." The examples go on and on. And many binary thinkers *do* become very hostile towards those who refuse to fit into their categories, especially those who keep pointing out flaws in the categorization.

[m-cobweb.livejournal.com]

Thanks for adding me too!

I'm all about shades of Gray.

[ex-maxmin919.livejournal.com]

Or is it Grey?

Synchronicity (http://www.livejournal.com/talkread.bml?journal=cyberpunk&itemid=214124)

Re: I'm all about shades of Gray.

[m-cobweb.livejournal.com]

Heh.

I kind of like "grey," myself.

Re: I'm all about shades of Gray.

[vulture23.livejournal.com]

Heh heh.

For all that most British spellings (colour, centre, etc) just look odd to me, I really prefer grey over gray. Not sure why that is.

:)

Re: I'm all about shades of Gray.

[vulture23.livejournal.com]

Maybe it's just an example of me refusing to be categorized as using either British or American spellings. ;)