And the pleasures and rewards of the intellect are inseparable from angst, uncertainty, conflict and even despair.
Interpretation
Intellectual fulfillment comes with struggles and challenges that can lead to emotional turmoil.
Christopher Hitchens highlights the dual nature of intellectual pursuits, suggesting that the joys and rewards derived from deep thinking and understanding are inherently linked to difficult experiences such as anxiety, doubt, and even desolation. This juxtaposition implies that true intellectual gratification is not free from pain and challenge; rather, it is often through these very struggles that one gains profound insights and a deeper appreciation for knowledge.
In practice
This quote can be used as a thought-provoking introduction to a discussion on the cost of intellectual endeavors.
In a public dialogue with Salman in London he [Edward Said] had once described the Palestinian plight as one where his people, expelled and dispossessed by Jewish victors, were in the unique historical position of being 'the victims of the victims': there was something quasi-Christian, I thought, in the apparent humility of that statement.
What can be asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence.
Never ask while you are doing it if what you are doing is fun. Don't introduce even your most reliably witty acquaintance as someone who will set the table on a roar.
[E]xceptional claims demand exceptional evidence.
The worst days are when you feel foggy in the head - chemo-brain they call it. It's awful because you feel boring. As well as bored. And stupid. And resigned.
Let me tell you something: for hundreds of thousands of years, this kind of discussion would have been impossible to have, or those like us would have been having it at the risk of our lives. Religion now comes to us in this smiley-face, ingratiating way β because itβs had to give so much more ground and because we know so much more. But youβve got no right to forget the way it behaved when it was strong, and when it really did believe that it had God on its side.
Remember this: When you cross my doorstep, you have already been raised. With what you have learned...you know the difference between right and wrong. Do right. Don't anybody raise you from the way you have been raised. Know you will have to make adaptations, in love, in relationships, in friends, in society, in work, but don't let anybody change your mind.
Forgiveness, that noblest of all self-denial, is a virtue which he alone who can practise in himself can willingly believe in another.
Over the years I have developed a picture of what a human being living humanely is like. She is a person who understand, values and develops her body, finding it beautiful and useful; a person who is real and is willing to take risks, to be creative, to manifest competence, to change when the situation calls for it, and to find ways to accommodate to what is new and different, keeping that part of the old that is still useful and discarding what is not.
While I am in this world, I am resolved that no vexation shall put me out of temper if I can possibly command myself. Even old age, which is making strides towards me, shall not prevail to make me peevish.
A million people can call the mountains a fiction, yet it need not trouble you as you stand atop them.
I feel like role models today are not meant to be put on a pedestal. But more like angels with broken wings.
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