Saturday, February 6, 2016

I prefer boiled eggs! Preferences are not objective.

The breeze was so gentle and it didn’t urge the person breathing the air to wear heavy clothes. The chilly sensation it imparted upon the skin was so subtle that it was making you feel that you shall experience a chilly cold but you don’t feel it. The cup of coffee they were sipping seemed to balance the equation making it not get skewed towards one direction.
“So you think we humans like to hang around those who are similar”, she asked, opening her bright eyes, and touching her cup as she finished her sentence.
“Yeah, we find security around those who are so similar, for that actually allows our brains to save energy of not probing in the differences of others. Some studies show that even people who marry try to find those who share a lot of things with them, including political stands”, he replied.
“But I think that being around people who are not so similar to me, allows me to reflect more upon myself, as I get to know how people holding different values think of me. I think that gives me the capacity of being reflective upon myself from different perspectives other than my own, or that of people who think like I do”, she added after short seconds from listening to what he said.
“I think people of different perspectives cause stress”, he told her.
“But why would they cause stress”, she replied.
“Because you might find them to be holding certain things which you find so absurd and when you try to point at the absurdity of those beliefs which lead to certain behaviors, they might find you to be the one who is absurd”, he said, “that’s how I feel”.
“But should we build a certain form of resilience to not be stressed”, she replied back.
“I think they stress me because they look at my words as a threat rather than a different perspective”, he said, “Variety of ideas is nice but when someone holds an idea of aiming to change you then that person is a threat. I like people who have different ideas on matters but they don’t deem yours wrong and theirs right. For example, if I am married and my bro is married and I think that it is cool to play table-tennis with my wife while he finds it to be not preferable, then that is normal, but if he thinks that he has the objective of correcting me telling me that what I am doing is wrong without presenting valid reasons then that is absurd.” He sipped a little of his coffee and continued, “I think it is a preference and I could talk with my brother on the benefits of playing with her or not but mere presentations of preferences without underlying reasons to be discussed seems not right for me”.
“Yeah, it is a matter of preference and having preferences is not wrong or right”, she replied with a smile as she was amused by the example.
“You know, if I just say I like boiled eggs over “shakshouka” ( eggs with tomato cooked I don’t know how but it is easy) and you say the opposite and we just debate on our likings without expressing why, then we would waste time”, he added another example to make his point clearer and amuse her further.

“hahahaha, your comparisons are adorable and apropos”, she uttered the words mixed with a laugh. 

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