My son and I had a conversation nearly 2 months ago now about the most influential people in the world. I do not remember what precipitated the discussion, but it was not in a vacuum. When he was young our family had watched an A&E program named “The 100 Most Influential People of the Millennium”. It began with #100 and built up as they approached their #1 pick for the years 1000 to 2000 A.D. (If you want to see the list, click here. And if you are not really interested in my commentary but want to look at my list, scroll to the bottom.) After much discussion, my son suggested that we challenge the extended family, with whom we would be gathering in a little over a month for Thanksgiving, to make their own lists so we could discuss it after dinner. The A&E list is ranked and we said that each person could decide if they wanted to do that. Additionally, we purposely stated that each person should interpret what kind of influence, who was influenced, and when they were influenced, in making his/her list. I wrote these things in an e-mail to the family e-mail group, not mentioning the A&E list but admonishing participants to not confer with others so that the lists would be more varied and produce more discussion. When I saw the good-hearted discussion on the e-mail replies, I took the additional step of asking two colleagues at my work, who I knew to have different worldviews than my family, to make their lists for the purpose of contrast.
I am happy to say that the whole scheme brought about significant discussion. It was interesting to watch the phases of interaction. After a brief explanation on my part as to how the challenge had occurred, with inclusion of the A&E list, family members began comparing who was on most lists. Next there was a discussion of the rationale behind various member’s lists (more about that in a moment). Then we progressed into names we supposed to be possibly unique to our own lists, asking others if they included them, and if not, why not. It occurred to me that in order to make a really good list you would need a plethora of perspectives. I made the mistake of mentioning that this procedure would work best in a committee. There were some of the strongest opinions about the pitfalls of committees, like slow and argumentative, but they also have the advantage of collaboration and consensus. Since the whole of this blog entry is commentary, I would also add that collaboration is an overused buzz-word and politically correct requirement of public interaction these days. Frequently, isolated, deep contemplation, followed by sharing is more efficient and brings better results, but woe be unto the educational ‘facilitator’ who broaches that perspective.
The rationales for selecting candidates for the 100 lists varied with as many people as participated. My oldest son, who completed his list mostly in his head while working, stated that he did not know enough about the East and confined his list to people who influenced Western Culture. He also said that most lists would not sufficiently include the influence of Christians for now and eternity, so his list is heavy (not meant to imply too heavy necessarily) on Christians. He also said that he had trouble limiting his list to 100 people so his first list had 211. Actually it had more than that because in certain listings he put multiple names, for example the founding fathers of the U.S. His brother added accomplishments onto his list, persuaded him to reduce his list to 200, but then added 25 he thought his brother had left out. It was a collaboration within the individual lists.
I also found mulitple listing unavoidable on some subjects so that I have Watson and Crick for DNA, and Wilbur and Orville for the airplane. But I opted to try to find one revolutionary idea or execution of an idea as representative of a thought or influence, for example, Philo Farnsworth invented the scanning television. His was not the very first or the exact one that number in the millions by the time I was a child, but he broke ground toward a practical, modern TV. I also tried to include significant people from the East. I too am largely ignorant of the East, but I think that it helps tremendously that we were limited to 1000 to 2000 A.D., because many of the formative, significant names in the East are more ancient. For all of this, it is curious that we chose to emphasize what affected our culture, our time, and ourselves the most. Compared to the A&E list, I think we were more far-reaching and inclusive than they were. Some of their picks were simply politically correct, narrowly influencing idealogues and icons of cultural fad. It is good to realize that you are being narrowly focussed on what surrounds you, but be more inclusive tends to adding people that were not really influential, just an influence on some small group you don’t want to leave out.
The chore of ranking these people was the hardest part, and I gave up after #31, because it began to seem ridiculous to me. The whole exercise of ranking may be equally so. I did find it much easier to rank within groupings of types of influencers, for example, spiritual, inventors, scientists, leaders and politicians, literature and the arts, and philosophers. And this is the list I have included below.
I found the whole process stretching, challenging, and enjoyable, with the discussion with family particularly so. If you have a few minutes, peruse my list and give some feedback on why you think certain people should or should not be on my list. Happy listing.
Leon’s Most Influential People of the 1000-2000 AD (ranked within Groupings)
Spiritual Leaders
- Martin Luther (started the Reformation)
- John Calvin (Reformer and Theologian)
- William Tyndale (English Bible)
- Hudson Taylor (Missionary to China)
- Billy Graham (Worldwide Evangelist)
- George Whitfield (Early American Evangelist)
- Charles Spurgeon (Prince of Preachers)
- Luis Palau (Latin American Evangelist)
- John Wyclif (English Reformer)
- Mahatma Gandhi (Indian Holy Man)
- Ignatius Loyola (Jesuit founder)
- Mother Teresa (Nun to poor of India)
Inventors
- Johannes Gutenberg (Moveable Type Printing Press)
- James Watt (Inventor of the Steam Engine)
- Thomas Edison (Inventor)
- Guglielmo Marconi (Wireless)
- Jean Joseph Etienne Lenoir (Internal Combustion Engine)
- Orville and Wilbur Wright (Airplane)
- Henry Ford (Assembly Line, affordable car)
- Werner von Braun (modern rockets)
- Henry Bessemer (economical steel process)
- Charles Goodyear (Vulcanized Rubber)
- Alfred Nobel (High Explosives; Nobel Prize)
- G. LeTourneau (Earth Moving Equipment)
- Christiaan Huygens (Pendulum Clock)
- Bartolomeo Cristofori (Piano)
- Jacques Cousteau (Aqualung, ocean preservation)
- John Bardeen, Walter Brattain, and William Shockley (Transistor)
- Alexander Graham Bell (Telephone)
- William Cullen (Refrigeration)
- Theodore H. Maiman (LASER)
- Philo Farnsworth (Scanning TV)
- Bill Gates (Software Developer)
- Alexander Parkes (Thermoset Plastic)
- Daguerre (Photography)
- George Washington Carver (Agriculture)
Scientists
- Isaac Newton (Laws of Motion and Gravity)
- Michael Faraday (Electromagnetism: motor)
- Albert Einstein (Relativity)
- Charles Darwin (Evolution)
- Louis Pasteur (Germ Theory and Vaccination)
- Gregor Mendel (Genetics)
- James Watson/Francis Crick (DNA)
- James Clerk Maxwell (Electromagnetic Equations)
- Galileo Galilee (Motion and Astronomy)
- Johannes Kepler (Elliptical Orbits)
- Nicolaus Copernicus (Heliocentric Solar Sys)
- Rene Descartes (Philosopher, Mathematician, Scientist)
- Roger Bacon (Sci.Method, gunpowder to West)
- Dmitri Mendeleev (Periodic Table of Elements)
- Niels Bohr (Atomic Model/Quantum Mech)
- Edward Jenner (vaccination)
- Alexander Fleming (Penicillin)
- Pierre and Marie Curie (Radioactivity)
- William Harvey (blood circulation)
Government/Political Leaders
- William the Conqueror (Conquered Britain)
- Mao Zedong (Chinese Communist Revolution)
- Suleiman The Magnificent (peak of Ottoman)
- Gustav II Adolf (Supported Protestant States)
- George Washington (General/President)
- Genghis Khan (Mongol Empire)
- Adolf Hitler (Nazi Germany)
- Simon Bolivar (Liberator of South America)
- Pol Pot (Mass murder in Cambodia)
- Queen Elizabeth I (Queen of England)
- William Wilberforce (Ended Slavery in Britain)
- Napoleon Bonaparte (Defeated Europe)
- Vladimir Lenin (Russian Revolution)
- Peter the Great (Modernized Russia)
- Thomas Jefferson (Declaration of Independence)
- Fredrick the Great of Prussia (Peak of Prussia)
- Mustafa Ataturk (Liberalization of Turkey)
- Abraham Lincoln (Civil War)
- Martin Luther King Jr. (Civil Rights Movement)
Explorers
- Christopher Columbus (rediscovery of New World)
- Marco Polo (European trade with China)
- Ferdinand Magellan (Explorer)
- Hernan Cortes (Conqueror of Aztec Mexico)
- James Cook (Explorer)
Literature, Music and the Arts
- William Shakespeare (Playwright, Writer)
- John Bunyan (Pilgrim’s Progress)
- John Milton (Paradise Lost, Writer)
- Johann Sebastian Bach (Baroque Composer)
- Dante Alighieri (Divine Comedy)
- Leonardo da Vinci (Inventor, Sculptor, Painter)
- Charles Dickens (Novelist)
- Michelangelo (Painter/Sculptor)
- Wolfgang Mozart (Composer)
- Ludwig van Beethoven (Composer)
- Fyodor Dostoyevsky (Writer)
- Leo Tolstoy (Novelist)
Philosophers
- Thomas Aquinas (Christianity &Greek thought)
- Carl Marx (Marxism)
- John Locke (Social Contract)
- Sigmund Freud (Psychoanalysis)
- William Blackstone (Law)
- Immanuel Kant (Transcendentalism)
- Soren Kierkegaard (Existentialism)
- Jean-Jacques Rousseau (Political)
- Friedrich Nietzsche (Nihilism)
CreatorWorship 
Basis of Civil Debate
Posted in Change, Civil Debate, Cultural commentary, Fears, General, Implications, Respect, Society, tagged Being heard, Civil Debate, Discussion, Fear, Open-mindedness, Respect on June 2, 2020| 2 Comments »
What is the way forward for our country in this time of crisis?
Awhile back I was having a discussion with two people, who we will call Mr. L and Mr. S, that turned into an argument. They were on one side of a position and I was on the other. I do not like to get drawn into arguments for reasons far deeper than the immediate discomfort, but I dislike even more when truth is being trampled. Well, from my perspective, things got worse, because I was no longer concerned about the statements being made. I agreed in principle with them, but I did not like the fact that I was never heard. Mr. L and Mr. S would tell you that they fully understood me and could see that I was patently wrong, but that is simply not true. The evidence I would give is that I was never allowed to state my point, so that I was never truly heard, and therefore, they could not have known if I was wrong or not.
And this is the reason for this blog entry*. The basis for civil debate is the requirement that the views of the parties** in the debate be heard, truly heard. If not, there has not been debate, but there has been monologue, haranguing, putdown, and dismissal. This does not mean that the two or more parties must come to agreement, though that would be a further needed step for legislative progress. But they must hear each other in such a way as to believe that the other party, at the very least, thinks that their position is reasonable. The end result will be some change in all of the parties. They will have seen, I mean really seen, that is heard, another perspective. The result may well be that they have more evidence for why they don’t agree, but it might also mean that they come to see a reason to modify their own position, even if ever so slightly.
This basic tenet of civil debate and discourse has another underlying prerequisite. In order to really hear someone, you must have some minimal respect for that person or party. When that is lacking then the monologue and so forth commences. I highly suspect from watching this scenario play out numerous times and being party to this mis-step myself, that the reason for the lack of respect, and therefore lack of listening, is essentially fear. If you believe that the other party holds some wicked position or intention that will undermine your worldview, status quo, or comfort, you are apt to attack it vociferously. But if you are confident that the truth will win out, either in the short-term or long-term, you may feel at ease enough to hear the other party out for the purpose of learning or modifying your own position.
Take note that those who least hold to what is true most vehemently avoid listening to their opponents. And be doubly aware of those who feign listening but never really hear what their opponents say.
What I have essentially just defined is open-mindedness. Some who claim to be the most open-minded, the kind who will not hold to one or any particular point of view, listen the least and are the most closed-minded. Why? Frequently they are unwilling to commit to a position, not because they don’t know (agnostic), but because they don’t want to know (stubborn). Other people wear closed-mindedness as a badge, thinking that they uphold the “real” truth. Their fear of straying from their understanding of the truth causes them to cling to a shallow truth at best. These two problems reign on both extremes of political and belief perspectives and in the middle as well. In reality, their close-mindedness is of no value to anyone, including themselves. And I do not ascribe to the definition of open-mindedness that believes that there is no truth, and therefore everyone has their own truth. That is counter to Western thought, logic, and any view of the society that works.***
A listening ear is not a rejection of truth, but a confidence that there is truth and that it appears in surprising places and can instruct and benefit the hearer from wherever or whomever it comes, and that it will win out in the end.
In summary, here are the points I made: 1) Civil Debate requires that all invested parties are really heard. 2) Really hearing someone requires a little respect for the person, even if not for their position, 3) Lack of kindly respect for your debate opponent points to fear that your position might be overcome, and 4) Open-mindedness is good and beneficial for debate.
I hope that you have heard me and benefited.
*What happened to Mr.s L and S? Stay tuned. That description will come soon, but I do not want to distract from my main point.
**Modern liberal thought that absent parties must be in the debate don’t work since that means that people no longer alive, non-citizens, non-vested interests, and others not party to the debate run the debate. Equity is not that non-parties to the debate rule the debate, but that they be allowed to become parties to the debate through involvement in the process and vested interest in the debate. That involves allowance to include other parties and commitment on the part of all parties to be involved and invested. Certain parties cannot be allowed into the conversation, because their purpose and presence is disruptive.
*** Why society without truth will not work is a topic for another day, but a worthy one.
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