Don't Confuse Means With Ends

The following is an excerpt from A Fool's Folly.

PART III: Getting There With Means More Feasible

Chapter 12: Don't Confuse Means With Ends

Let us begin by imagining two blokes fresh out of high school. Let's imagine the first bloke acts on the following advice; Whatever you do, go to university and use your degree to build a career. The second bloke acts on advice to the contrary; Whatever you do, don't go to university as institutions cannot provide an education.

We could proceed by arguing over which of the two blokes is more likely to become educated. However, the more interesting point is that both of these blokes will pursue the same human ends (food, sleep, shelter, health, friendship, family, achievement, self-esteem, creativity, spontaneity, etc.), using completely different sets of means. Opposite sets of means even.

Wisdom is the mark of an educated man, and a fitting definition goes as follows; Wisdom is knowledge and its due use, knowledge of the best ends and best means. A bloke who is open to all possibilities, who does not disregard ends and means based on advise but rather on experience is bound to become sufficiently educated.

Further, this definition of wisdom is insightful for it allows us to observe the world and its participants. We can observe another and see where his focus lies. Through observation we can see that the approach of the vast majority is to pursue a single set of means and ignore all else - to treat means within their ability as of no use in the profession to which they belong. Furthermore these means become confused with their ends.

Allow me to illustrate this. A commonly stated goal is obtaining a degree. Over a period of years, what often is achieved is another set of means whilst many real ends go unrealised. Access has been gained, but what does that mean when you can bypass the gatekeeper with ease? This sort of approach is totally insufficient in dealing with our humanity -it is like attempting to bake a cake by hoarding flour whilst suffering a strong and inarticulate yearning for cake.

A bloke living in a million dollar mansion and a bloke renting a cheap room have both met their human need for shelter. The most contented man of the two is he who has also met more of his other human needs. Has the bloke who owns the million dollar mansion met many of his higher needs? Or is his house merely a symbol of his focus on accumulating means and his disregard for ends? Is it possible that the man living in the cheap room is writing the next "Great American Novel", and experiencing all those higher human ends derived of such an undertaking?

What are your experiences? Has a seemingly trivial undertaking become an experience of fulfilling higher needs; of accidentally deriving ends you had yet even articulated? Has the seemingly important left you feeling empty; as frustrated as a man with a fork in a world full of soup? Do you ever feel that you are over catering for your basic bodily needs whilst neglecting your higher human needs?

What are we to do about it? How are we to derive better ends if we suffer constraints? And this is the point of this communication - that we can create a domino effect that leads us nearer to those ends we desire, even those currently on an inarticulate level. The minute you evaluate the ends that you currently pursue, and attempt to define those ends that you truly desire, you have knocked over the first domino. The second is a realignment of values (a reevaluation of one's means), especially on a unconscious level. The third domino? Those more elegant actions derived. And of course these changes generate feedback which allow us to refine our desires, values and actions based on actual experience. And the cycle repeats until the bucket finds itself kicked.

Auto-didacticism is the goal; to become skilful in knowing what you need to know when you need to know it.

This book is a philosophical documentation of my experience in inadvertently creating such a domino effect. It is a side effect of living in this manner. It is the result of why I do what I do - which is to manifest those human ends that I desire and which are mine alone. However, from your perspective this book could become a powerful set of means in your possession; providing a recipe for those ingredients you have available, so that you can have the cake that you long for.

$100 spent on a Saturday night aims to improve your experience of the night, often at the expense of Sunday. Through this book, I aim to improve your experience of all the remaining days of your life. Your ends too will grow out of an honesty about your experience of life. Life begets life, passion begets passion.

In time your means become ends in themselves. Then ends beget ends.