double-edged word
cuts both ways
cuts the cutter cutting
as well as the
cut cut
Critical thinking about critical thinking.
How to criticize? What are the grounds?
Accuracy/Inaccuracy? Good/Bad?
Beautiful/Ugly? Nice/Nasty?
& more.
To “criticize” and to “decide” have origins
in two different Indo-European roots that
nevertheless sound similar and convey the
same exquisite & excellent violent
action: natural election..
skai- (to strike and cut) generated
“Caesar”
“chisel”
“scissors”
“circumcise”
“concise”
“precise”
“decide”
skei- (to cut and split) makes
Latin scire: “to know by separating
one thing from another”
“science”
“conscience”
“conscious” are
offshoots. Kin. Also
“nice,” from ne + sciere –
not knowing, ignore-ant, and silly.
What produced “criticize” however,
is the Indo-European skeri (to cut,
separate, sift) which gives us Latin
scribere: to scratch, scribble: “scribe”
and “scripture” reflect and evolve
from this action, also “discriminate”
(sifting, separating, deciding) and
“certain”
“concern”
“decree”
“discern” as well as
“excrete,” “excrement,” & “shit”
(from Old English scitan, the
Germanic skitan, & Old Norse’s
skita)
And “crime.”
Deciding, criticizing:
first cut and then choose,
discarding and sometimes
ignoring the remains. Attention
deficient, naturally: a bloody
business and violence against
the whole..
Every discriminating action rejects
what won’t fit my business. All the
left-outs and left-overs, the castaways
and rejects, exiled and abandoned: psychic
waste, and hazardous if not properly recycled.
No wonder my ongoing guilt:
walking through a field or mall,
wading through a newspaper:
grasping a significance,
interpreting a relationship
explaining a reason why
blaming an axiom of evil:
moving violations ripping-off what
catches my I & efficient attention,
suits my agenda, strategic planning
& tactics always paving my roads
with good intentions: my original spin,
benefit & liability analysis. It costs.
I owe.
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