The importance of consistent rationality

The importance of consistent rationality is almost self-evident if you consider what rationality means. Rationality is, in essence, the act of staying in focus of reality as per your capacity and acting only on your grasp of reality. Note that every concept exists in a context; I shall make the context of the concept “rationality” clearer later. I say “later” because while theory is essential as it integrates concretes and helps us grasp their nature in a broader context, it would help us to grasp the context with some concretes first since concretes are the basis of any theory. Hence, consider: is it possible to rationally take your focus away from something? If you do so rationally, it means you act on your grasp of its unimportance or at least its relative unimportance in your context. Also, consider: is it possible to rationally rest your mind, i.e. unfocus from reality for a while? If you do so rationally, it means you act on your grasp of the value or even (if such is the case) the sheer importance of rest, and further, you act on your grasp of the fact that, in your knowledge, nothing more important needs your focus for a while.

To make my point clearer, consider: what is rationality apart from one’s grasp of the facts? Nothing, as it is self-contradiction. Hence, in both cases, we see that it would evidently be irrational not to take your focus away from something or not to rest your mind if the facts you grasp are in favour of such action. Consider what would be the result of refusing to do so. Here are some stark examples: obsession over contamination (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, i.e. OCD), fixation on arbitrary threats (e.g. paranoia, phobias, etc.), disproportionate concern for social approval or the avoidance of social disapproval (disproportionate with respect to one’s hierarchy of values), disregard for physical health and well-being (e.g. sleep deprivation, which degrades the ability to focus, to regulate mood and, in general, to be rational), etc.

Relevance is key to consistent rationality

Taking support from the above discussion, I shall now expand more theoretically on the context of the concept “rationality”. Note that since rationality is based on one’s conscious grasp of the facts, and since an essential fact of consciousness is its finite capacity, relevance is integral to rationality. To disregard relevance while focusing on the facts is to disregard your grasp of what is or is not important within your context. In other words, to disregard relevance is irrational. The demand to “focus on the facts” cannot by itself be rational if it is out-of-context, i.e. isolated from the facts that give it meaning. The demand to “focus on the facts” exists and can exist only in the context of a variety of facts (especially facts related to consciousness), such as: (1) consciousness has a finite capacity, (2) consciousness exists integrated with the mind and the body as a part of an inseparable whole, (3) consciousness has needs in both the short-range and the long-range, (4) a conscious being can only act effectively within a hierarchy of values, etc. In short, rationality demands relevance, which means it demands selectivity in focus and effort.

NOTE: Importance presupposes a purpose with respect to which importance can exist. Such purpose is natural, since a conscious existence and life as such are inherently purposeful, i.e. goal-driven. Hence, by extension, rationality, which is the function of a consciousness to sustain its grasp of reality so as to sustain its efficacy in reality, is also inherently purposeful. Rationality’s purposefulness also follows from the fact that cognition as such is purposeful (see: “Unpurposeful abstraction fallacy” from Contextual Clarity).

“Acceptable” irrationality

Now, consider: what if you unfocus from reality without seeing if the facts that you grasp are in line with such action? Evidently, then, you have no grasp of the importance of what you are unfocusing from since you disregard it to begin with. Is such a policy in favour of your life? Can any person who wishes to stay in existence truly rest knowing he is evading the reality in front of him? Can he truly rest assured by essentially burying his head in the sand while it is self-evident to his mind that doing so would not make what is real in front of him unreal? Moreover, can any person who wishes to stay in existence truly find enjoyment in the moment if he — as a policy — refuses to see what is important to his life as well as his enjoyment of it? Even if a person focuses on and acts according to reality but only from time-to-time, he cannot but internalise a disregard for reality as such by the nature of his policy. In essence, it is like driving drunk or walking unarmed into a jungle: you might be alright in the end, but you have devalued your life and its potential and would likely degrade or destroy it by your own choices.

Consistently being rational is, in essence, consistently valuing your own life. Now, note that to value your life inconsistently as a policy is a self-contradiction: life is an integrated whole and no part of it exists in isolation, which means to actively devalue parts of it would be to actively devalue the whole of it. In other words, you cannot value your life if you devalue it as a policy. Hence, either you are consistently rational and thereby value your life, or you are inconsistently rational and thereby devalue your life, be it actively or passively. In the second case, there are two options: (1) You are inconsistently rational as a fault rather than a policy, in which case such inconsistency is necessarily a transition either from fault to virtue or from fault to vice. (2) You are inconsistently rational as a policy, in which case you do not and cannot value your life as such. Of course, man has free will, which means neither virtue nor vice are fixed states of existence, but as long as he chooses to stay in vice, he cannot value his life as such.

As a cap on the discussion so far, consider the sheer contradiction in the idea that “some irrationality” is “acceptable” or “necessary”. If “acceptability” or “necessity” is based on the facts of reality, then the idea amounts to the contradictory statement: “some irrationality is rational”. To make the contradiction clearer, consider what it means: “to think and act with disregard for some relevant facts is to think and act with regard for all relevant facts.” Needless to say, to the extent you disregard the relevant facts, to that extent you are irrational and certainly not rational at the same time. Moreover, to the extent that you are irrational, to that extent you disregard your life and its potential; even doing so only time-to-time but as a policy is sheer irrationality. To put it briefly, rationality permits no compromise with irrationality.

NOTE 1: To say “relevant facts” in the above paragraph is redundant, because as we have seen, to regard facts as a whole is to regard them in the context of the nature and finite capacity of consciousness, which necessarily implies the regard of facts by relevance, since to disregard relevance is to disregard the facts that give rise to cognition in the first place. Nonetheless, I have said “relevant facts” for clarity’s sake.

NOTE 2: When I say “relevant facts”, I mean relevant facts within the context of your capacity in the given situation. I take this context as a given, seeing how relevance has been defined and what the need for relevance is.

NOTE 3: To re-emphasise the key point, rationality is indispensable to one’s efficacy in life: rationality as a consistent practice is the most effective way to deal with reality as a whole since rationality is the fundamental basis of long-range efficacy in life. Here, note that the long-range does not exist apart from the short-range and necessarily integrates it in some way. Hence, in essence, being rational is the only effective way to deal with reality.