One of the major problems with our cultural philosophy these days is that failure is bad.
This was lesson was first illustrated by the response to the Columbia Disaster and how it differed in quality from the response to the Apollo 1 Disaster.
There are two major flaws with a philosophy of existence premeditated on failure avoidance. We can start with the fact that it is a fundamentally reactionary philosophy. There is no striving for growth, hope becomes a secondary emotion and all goals of progress are hampered by the fear of regress. Without a generative force within this philosophy, cultural motion is destined for stagnation. The second major flaw stems from the fact that it is wrong. Failure is one of the fastest and best teachers the world supplies us with. A child must be told many times not to touch a hot stove in order to remember that touching a hot stove is bad, but a child need touch a hot stove only once in order to know that doing so again is a bad idea. In science more has been learned in understanding why things fail to work the way they are expected to than has been discovered when someone confirms that they are indeed correct. As with any idea concerning culture, there is considerable nuance to be considered before exiling this idea, but I shall consider the current problem of over-application before investigating a new set of proper boundaries.
The problems posed by such a reactionary philosophy are many, but the question of stagnation is foremost. Action cannot occur when we fear the results of our endeavors. It is commonly accepted that it is impossible to predict the full ramifications of what we do, but the effort to do so is a losing game. Each action taken to mitigate another's effects will have further unintended consequences requiring further mitigating actions ad infinitum. Caught in such a loop, it becomes impossible to progress, as any potential action becomes bogged down by its own implications, never fully realized.
Paired with the question of stagnation is fear. When failure becomes verboten actions that could lead to failure are avoided, as this fear increases, all action effectively ceases.
Even if there were a generative force behind this philosophy and people were not inhibited by fear, there is no reward for success. Any action taken is expected to succeed, so success is not worth mentioning,
To be edited tomorrow.
1 comments:
I would state it somewhat differently: the appearance of failure is to be strongly avoided. Actual failure is still acceptable - as long as it can be spun (or covered up) to resemble success.
This is actually worse, as it encourages people (and organizations) not to admit failure, and hence to avoid learning from it. This in turn leads to further failures...
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