People share a lot of things via facebook status message. Many people also share certain statemens which were told once by well know philosophers, scientists, celebraties and so on. Some of them share their personal problems direclty some of them indirectly. Some simply post for fun, some with a real intension. Whatever, might be the intension, is it right to quote someone on a forum like facebook? was the question raised.
There were two answers to the question which led to a healthy argument.
1. No, it is not fine to quote.
2. Yes, it is fine to quote.
Arguments supporting "No, It is not fine to quote":
Without understanding the inner meaning of the statement quoted, if someone quotes it, the statement will loose its value. One must not quote, rather must introspect and practice before they say anything. So, if you really want to live a meaningful life "DO NOT FOLLOW", because you have not gone through what they have gone through. First you experience, do something in life then people would listen.
Argument supporting "Yes, It is fine to quote":
Accepting the argument of "understanding the quote before posting", yet rejecting that the statement will loose its value based on ignorant posting. The arguers supports this rejection by considering the person who de-value the statement based on the ignorant's posting as "not open". The argument further continues by noting the difference between "gifted" and "not gifted"
To someone who is gifted with observational capabilities and intelligence that are enough to formulate his/her own path and purpose of life; "DO NOT FOLLOW" does make sense. But on the other hand, for common man who is not gifted with these qualities for unknown reason, will need a supporting wall to stand up and learn walking, OR they will need a teacher to teach them. So, for a common man "DO FOLLOW INITIALLY" should be the formula.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
People are at liberty to post comments here without disclosing their identity. This does not give room for any personal wars if in case it happens.
ReplyDeleteLets all have a healthy discussion.
@Anweekshaki
ReplyDeleteThank you for posting an article on this blog after a long time. It is a nice and important topic to discuss
First, I am confused with certain phrases you have mentioned in the article "DO NOT FOLLOW", "DO FOLLOW INITIALLY", follow whom?
Anyway considering only this topic in hand. Following are my points
1) Facebook (FB) like any other social networking site has people with varied competencies and backgrounds.
2) It has been common on FB to share personal experiences/learnings
3) Sharing quotes of great individuals may/may not be correct. It can get mixed response
- Some may know the intention behind the quote. They appreciate sharing the quote
- Some may know the real meaning of the quote but may not know why was it shared. They appreciate it as they know the real meaning behind it
- Some may take that quote just like any other personal experience you share, which may dilute the purpose of the message and it may also damage the personality of the individual (in their perspective) who shares such quotes
- Some may anyway not know the meaning of the quote nor who said it nor why was it said. They just read it, ignore it. Here the message is just a dumb sharing which is of no use. This in fact creates only negative influence
4) Considering that the above are some of the responses that might arise for a quote sharing, an ideal solution would be to
- Share the intention behind mentioning a quote - Who is it addressed for
- What is your interpretation of the quote(if you know)
- What is its significance and how it can solve a problem(if any)
When It was said "DO NOT FOLLOW" the arguer who is arguing for "No it is not right" means to say:
ReplyDeleteDo not follow the quotes said by people, but learn by your own experience and only then you will be able to achieve something in life.
I agree with Arya about the way people might consume the quote. But, I have a simple argument for this.
ReplyDeleteI am coming from a positive side of the posting. I have seen that people who are open enough in learning will surely analyse it and will surely try to understand the truth, either by questioning or by introspection. While those of them whose mind is closed and those of them who have preconceived prejudice, will however even after explaining will never understand it.
Then there are certain set of people who are between the first and the second type. These will surely have preconceived opinion, however, if they find some truth about it after explanation will surely understand.
Third type are people whom arya is talking about. For them, YES, your solutions holds.
One simple question at all
ReplyDeleteWhat is the use of sharing such quotes without mentioning the intention/meaning behind it?
I guess the reason to quote the statements as status message might be because of various reasons. Some of which might be
ReplyDelete1. For Fun
2. For sharing with pupil about a information which was found useful
3. Might be to provoke people to think
4. Might be to ignite a discussion
5. Might be the quote is matching with the state of mind the person currently is in
All might not post it with a intention and wanting some benefits out of it. Some however, who want to ignite, provoke, a discussion (like in this case), they will succeed to some extent only if they have clarity on what they are wanting out of the discussion and what is the quote all about.
ReplyDelete@Arlagada
ReplyDeleteSo if the reasons which you have mentioned are some of the intentions, imagine how individuals can take a shared quote on a social networking site.
There is a mismatch in the way a person who shared the quote and a person who will read the quote take it. It is difficult to say that 100% of the reader take it seriously (as you have said).
It is always optimal to share your intention along with the quote rather than simply sharing the quote. This will clearly indicate what is in your mind.
Its good to see more people joining this discussion and sharing their views.. Let me take a step back and share my thought process which would broaden this discussion...
ReplyDeleteWhen these philosophers existed, they had no technology like what we have today... They used to roam cities, villages and talk to many people to gain knowledge. Many things have changed now...
Keeping the circumstances in mind we just cannot take the literal meaning of whats been said.. We have to adapt these things into our life and experience it to get a new meaning which is more suitable to our way of living.
Now, getting back to the discussion what we were having.. I did mention something about these statements loosing value..I would like to focus on it to make it more easier to understand.
You watch a movie you like it and you watch it again and again and again until you get bored of watching it. Now you get an offer from some company to buy the same movie DVD for 99Rs. Will you purchase it? Even if you purchased it how many times will you watch that movie? The point I am trying to make here is... When you keep on telling people that these philosophers said these many things and this should be like this etc etc etc.. : This might work well to create an initial impression ( A person who doesnt know you might get impressed on the subject you spoke) but as the time gone by everyone would realize what you are.
Let me ask you few more questions:-
1. How long do you spend for self assessment?
2. When you realized that it was your mistake, what did you do about it?
3. Are you giving the importance for things which deserves?
4. Can you really differentiate between a machine and human being?
I dont want answer to these questions.. give it a thought..
Nice discussion Anweekshiki. Long time since I wanted to have a discussion like this
ReplyDeleteDear Brutaltruth,
You said
"When you keep on telling people that these philosophers said these many things and this should be like this etc etc etc.. : This might work well to create an initial impression ( A person who doesnt know you might get impressed on the subject you spoke) but as the time gone by everyone would realize what you are."
Do you think people need to be motivated again and again ?
As far as I know, once motivated they need no more motivation. Those of them who are motivated now, and loose there motivation in few days, I am sure will get motivated again and loose it again whatever effort you might put.
A kid will be motivated to be a astronomer by seeing sky, it will be motivated to be a biologist when introduced to biology. Only when it is mature enough to decide it will decide one among these. Similarly, whatever, might be the quoting one posts, people are mature enough to take what they want and leave what they dont want.
Yet, Sony Bravia is the most desired Television purchased :) ha ha
I spoke about Sony Bravia with a reason.
ReplyDeleteMany companies advertise their product, we see those every day on TV.. But, we never care for those. But, when we find the need, we analyse, we study only later we understand that Sony Bravia is good among rest and go for it. But, if you never advertise how will people know, there is a company called Sony
Intentions can also mislead Arya.
ReplyDeleteSay you go to a hotel with your friends and make a comment on food not being good. Some them might call it arrogance, some might call it honest opinion. Your intention was to make a point to make them all be aware of the dish which you found out not good.
So, posting intentions along with the quote I guess will spoil the game even more.
Dear Boss, Arya, Brutaltruth, Arlagada
Thanks for responding and taking the discussion in a proper way.
Boss, You have made a nice point about maturity.
ReplyDeleteI agree that maturity plays a major role in looking at anything in this world. I would like to add one more point which goes hand in hand with maturity. "NEED". Your Sony Bravia example explains the relation between NEED and MATURITY in a nice way.
@BOSS : Talking about products...Have you seen a Porche advertisement in India? Have you seen any Advertisement for Apple Notebooks? How many months or years since you have seen an advertisement for Pulsar bike? People still buy these.. not because they are not being advertised but because they are reputed.. similarly.. any of our great philosophers need no introduction or publicity. What they have said and written is not just a day or two's work. Its the work of their lifetime.. they worked real hard to give us wisdom, respect is all we can give.. I have commented many more things why are you choosing the one which is not relevant to what we are discussing? ( I'm sorry folks for making an individual comment but this discussion was taking a new route which I had to stop).
ReplyDelete@Anweekshiki:
ReplyDeleteYou are wrongly putting things here, without clarity.
When you share a quote and the intention behind it, the following can be the reactions
1) If the intention and the quote have a connection, everybody appreciate it
2) If the intention and the quote do not have any connection
- Some may debate and give suggestions
- Some blindly reject your view
- Some who do not understand the intention and quote ignore it
There is no question of arrogance here because intention is already mentioned. The analogy you have taken of food is not compliant with the subject in hand
@brutaltruth
ReplyDeleteTwo questions to you
1) Should we not share any knowledge until we have experienced it?
2) Does the above question confine to internet medium or broadly to any discussion?
@Brutaltruth
ReplyDeletePlease do not get stuck by the examples. Its just an example. An example is given to give some light on one concept. The same example can be interpreted in various way
Here, in this example, I was not stressing on advertising. I was stressing on "NEED". I have mentioned it explicitly as well.
Anyway, I shall try to be more clear next time onwards.
Arya, Might be the illustration given was a problem. The point I wanted to make here was
ReplyDeleteJust like the quote, Intention is also a statement.
Suppose I write it something like this
Quote: "Purpose of life is to have a Purpose"
Intention: "Want to show that I have a purpose"
Showing that he has a purpose is not a wrong thing(Or do you think so?). Atleast I when I read it will have a question again "why does he want to show it?" OR some one else might say "what is he gaining out of showing?"..
Its just an example again, do not go by the example. Point I want to make is Intentions again can raise questions and confusions.
@Anweekshiki
ReplyDeleteI think i did not clearly convey what is intention in this context
I will take your example since it is a real world example
Quote: "Purpose of life is to have a Purpose"
Intention for this could be the following
"I recently found a purpose for my life. The purpose is XYZ. I found out this purpose after i studied the book ABC. Hence i felt I should share this quote"
The intention you have given is very abstract again. You want to show that you have a purpose, but you are not telling what purpose is that!
Hope i clarified what i mean by intention
Yes Arya, You have made it clear. However, length of the status message is to be kept in mind, which obviously is out of the scope of discussion.
ReplyDeleteI am waiting for Brutaltruth's answer for Arya's question
Answering Arya's Questions...
ReplyDelete1. Sharing knowledge is good.. now we have to go back and understand what is knowledge. According to me Knowledge is not what you read, its how you interpret what you have read.. so its a combination of your skill and Intelligence. When you have knowledge and when you apply it in your life thats when you will get wisdom.I hope this answers your first question.
2. Yes this discussion is all about posting somebody's saying anywhere.
Point what I am trying to make here is..
Lord Krishna in the bhgawadgeetha said " Just because you are born as brahmin, you will not become one. Just because someone is elder to you doesn't mean that you should accept all their mistakes. You can be anything in this world its all depends on your action, so always give importance to action not to human being" On the same lines.. our life mainly depends on actions you can speak 100 quotes and give 1000 speeches If it is not making difference in anybody's life whatever you have done is just task and tasks have no value.
@ Arya: The example you quoted is not something which has a deeper meaning to analyze. The quote could only take you in one direction. I dont even consider these quotes as a knowledge sharing cause this is not knowledge its the common sense.
ReplyDeleteOnce I did comment.. if you think broadly " Yesterday's rocket science is today's common sense " Let me quote an example..
Long ago.. when scientists invented bulb it was a revolution but today the bulbs have been improved to be CFL's.
These improvisations will not come at the cost of what was done before these inventions would come at the cost of evolution. These are the byproduct of human evolution.
If you ask your dad or your grandfather I dont think they ever had the kind of discussion what we are having now in this age. We were able to have it because we have the maturity to understand it. How did we mature so early its all because of evolution..
@brutaltruth
ReplyDeleteThank you for answering my questions
I agree with you that, knowledge is not what you read. But it cannot be what you interpret!
According to me RIGHT knowledge is gained in two ways
1) Through qualified Guru
2) Revelation
I agree that you get wisdom when you apply right knowledge
You said "I dont even consider these quotes as a knowledge sharing cause this is not knowledge its the common sense.". This is your personal opinion. There is no harm in having such opinion because such quotes may be common sense for you. People who are incompetent to understand such quotes may not feel it as common sense
You have said "If you ask your dad or your grandfather... " again is this your personal opinion? Today there were/are discussions which are more matured and serious and by people who are far younger than us. We know Sri Adi Shankaracharya, Sri Madwacharya, Swami Vivekananda, Sri Chandrashekara Bharati swamiji and numerous other individuals. Can we still think evolution has brought maturity? In fact it is turning other way round!
1) How many of us are spending time for spiritual growth?
2) How many of us are learning right knowledge in the traditional way?
3) How many of us are qualified to tell that we are spiritually matured?
Dear Brutaltruth,
ReplyDeleteYou have explained Knowledge is a very nice way. "Application of the acquired knowledge" is been your core point. I agree with you, one should surely use once intelligence after he/she has acquired knowledge. But the question is, where from do you get the knowledge?
Arya has answered to this; knowledge is something which is gained either by books or by teacher or by some learned person. Later, based on the intelligence of the X, X will apply it into action in his/her life.
I completely agree with you the one must not quote without experiencing. Now, after this, I have a question to ask you
How do I know, weather the person quoting statements has experienced OR has he not?
@Arlagada: The core discussion is that.. copying and pasting the quotes which has been said and written is wrong or right.
ReplyDeleteIf you have experienced such quotes then you wouldn't copy paste the something instead, you would right it in a much more sophisticated way which common people can understand.
There are some quotes like " Every man on this planet should get married because happiness is not the only thing in life ". If you look at this quote this is something majority of the people go through and experienced. This has been formulated in a very funny way...This quote is the best example of what and how you need to quote. Instead of saying this I can also say..
" Marriage is the "karma" of life everyone must go through it as it helps evolution of humanity - Upanishad " Does this really get carried to common man? I hope you got my point.
SO, if I am understanding it right
ReplyDeleteWhat you are saying is "never to quote someone but compose one of your own based on your experience and post it".
Is that what you are saying?
A personal and a simple question.
ReplyDeletebrutaltruth, are you married? I need to understand this because you spoke about marriage. And, If you are so strongly suggesting that marriage life is not happy. I guess you must have experienced it. Have you?
@brutaltruth
ReplyDeletePlease correct me if I am wrong
You are trying to say the following
1) Learn the right knowledge
2) Apply it to your life
3) Understand the tentative in-depth meaning a quote and verify your understanding with your past learning
4) After validating the understanding, if you feel it is correct, then share it with your understanding/comments
@Arlagada
I think brutaltruth should be thinking as mentioned above. If not let he/she correct it. I assume from brutaltruth's comments that there should not be any restriction on posting other's quotes
@Arya: Rightly said.. You have understood well.
ReplyDelete@BOSS: I am unmarried. I do not want to start another conversation on that.. learn from your experience.
Understanding that we have come to certain consensus, I have tried to summarise it. Please find the article in the below link
ReplyDeletehttp://aquitedanswer.blogspot.com/2011/03/we-had-good-discussion-about-sharing.html