We are Socrates’ condemned

Last Friday, over a typical drunk meal of chicken fingers and fries, a conversation with my friends took a philosophical turn when one friend offhandedly noted how “people here always want to talk about things even when they don’t know what they’re talking about.”

In my own insecurity, I wondered if he was talking about me. The more I thought about it, though, the more I realized that this peculiar behavior was not unique to me. And the more I listened, the more I noticed this behavior in my peers.

It’s an old observation. In 399 B.C., Socrates gave a speech known as "The Apology" in which he argued that men with the "highest reputation" in society — the poets, the politicians, the writers — were actually the most deficient. Because of their success in one area of expertise, these men considered themselves to be wise in most other subjects as well. This false sense of intellectual confidence overshadowed what wisdom they did have and made them not only ignorant, but also harmful to society.

Socrates’ observations are timeless and applicable. Princeton students live in an environment that is conducive to creating exactly the type of people Socrates condemns. We are the poets, the politicians, the writers — and sometimes the ignorant.

We don’t want to be the only one in the conversation that doesn’t understand the framework of the Iran nuclear deal, so we deliberate anyway.

We don’t want to be the only one who is uninformed about the platforms of the Democratic presidential candidates when our friends start comparing, so we compare anyway.

We don’t want to be the only person in class who raises their hand when the professor asks "Is anyone here unfamiliar with the Nuremberg Trials?" So we don’t raise our hand, and we discuss anyway.

What causes our refusal to admit our intellectual shortcomings? You could probably come up with a list of reasons, each with some validity. Perhaps it is because admitting a lack of knowledge on a subject would be admitting an insecurity, and in an environment as competitive as Princeton, insecurities are magnified. Perhaps it is because of our innate desire to be accepted by our peers on all fronts — not excluding intellectual conversation. Perhaps, though, it just stems from our desire to be heard.

Now, this is not to say that everyone here at Princeton is unwilling to concede when they’re not knowledgeable in a certain area of expertise or about a certain topic, and it is also not to say that there aren’t people who actually do know everything about everything, but they are the exceptions to the rule.

So I’m not advising you to silence yourself, and I’m not claiming that discourse is a bad thing. Discourse is great — it is how we become that kid who knows everything about every subject. The point is, we’re not "that kid" now, and most of us probably never will be. The pressure to pretend to be that kid isn’t helping anyone.

I know what you’re thinking: This sounds like someone I know, but I don’t do that.

Yes, you do. And so do I. But perhaps if we become more conscious of this phenomenon, we can curb it. Don’t let the wisdom you do have — whatever it may be — become overshadowed by your false sense of wisdom in other areas.