Individual Truth

In the search for truth many people look to philosophers like Plato to find a truth that is unreachable and impersonal, Crawford’s argument that truth is physical and can be reached by all is correct because it reveals that truth is not something that only educated people can find, it is something that every man encounters.

In “The Case for Working With Your Hands” Crawford writes that working with material things has been grossly underappreciated by society, and he’s right. He says that “A gifted young person who chooses to become a mechanic rather than to accumulate academic credentials is viewed as eccentric, if not self-destructive” (Crawford). Every person is looking for truth in their lives, some reason to live, and most people will tell us that this comes from being an abstract thinker but the fact is that the most undeniable truth is what we can see in front of us. A person working multiple jobs to put food on the table for his/her children does not find truth in thinking about shadows in caves, this person finds truth in seeing their children fed.

Crawford goes on to say that while working a corporate job he was taught to be a person of “rationality but not to indulge in too much actual reasoning.” While deep abstract thought might be rational it is not reasonable. There is little practical application in this kind of behavior. Deep thinking is obviously necessary for many aspects of life but without the ability to produce something it is useless. Reasoning is what makes us human, not out of the box thinking. Self-examination, while important, is not as important as meeting our basic needs.

Truth is not something that is universal, it is something that is tailor-made to each individual. Crawford illustrates ...

... middle of paper ...

...cess of Plato is leaving out a major chunk of the story. It complicates truth, something that is, in reality, simple. We do not need to be scholars to find truth; we need to create something, to do something, to see something. We need to work with our hands and be practical. We need to use astute thinkers as resources to better our products. Truth is what is in front of us, we only need to unshackle ourselves from the idea that it is far away.

Works Cited

Crawford, Matthew B. "The Case for Working With Your Hands - NYTimes.com." The New York

Times - Breaking News, World News & Multimedia. 27 Sept. 2011. Web. 27 Sept. 2011. .

Matthew. The New Internation Version. Print.

Plato, and Socrates. The Human Experience: Who Am I? Sixth ed. Littleton, MA: Tapestry, 2009.

Print.