Thinking Citizen Blog — The Exchange of Orions and Israel-Palestine (Re-Visited) — Taking The Bull By The Horns
Thinking Citizen Blog — Friday is Education and Education Policy Day
Today’s Topic: The Exchange of Orions and Israel-Palestine (re-visited) — Taking the Bull by the Horns
What is the most important thing to teach? Critical thinking. What is the hardest thing to teach? Israel-Palestine. Today, my goal is to teach you how to think critically about Israel Palestine.
The hope is to generate the first serious dialogue about Israel-Palestine at Harvard in the last half century or perhaps in the world, ever. And to illustrate what is the essence of critical thinking — collaborative, iterative, distillation. Call it CID.
Quantified the process can be distilled into Muresianu’s Three Rules: the rule of seven, the rule of three, and the rule of one. In other word, what are your seven most important points? Of these which are the three most important?
Of these three, which is the one most important.
Today, we focus just on point #1 — the “Alnilam” (ie. the central star of belt of the Orion constellation).
Experts — please chime in. Correct, elaborate, elucidate.
THE GREATEST BARRIERS TO CLEAR THINKING ARE OMISSIONS, DISTRACTIONS,AND PERIPATETIC GOALPOSTS (see first footnote below if this last term is unfamiliar to you).
1. The solution is an exchange of Orions. What is an Orion?
2. A list, simple but complete, organized and prioritized. Of your seven most important points. This enables the discussion to begin with the most important point of each side. Who starts? Let a coin toss decide.
3. I have thrown down this gauntlet for years now — without a single taker. Sometimes, I confess, somewhat egotistically, I do feel like Diogenes with his lamp.
Hope springs eternal. So here I go — again.
NO EXCHANGE OF ORIONS — NO SERIOUS DIALOGUE
1. The exchange of written Orions must occur prior to the beginning of the dialogue.
2. The Orion should ideally fit on one page.
3. The Orion should ideally include one to three images that best illustrate the points made. Why? Pictures are worth a thousand words — on average. But pictures are distributed in a bell curve. The really good ones, the ones at the end of the right tail, are worth trillions.
NB: The Orion should ideally include numbers. Why? Numbers, like pictures, are worth a thousand words — on average. But numbers, like pictures are distributed in a bell curve, with the really good ones, the ones at the end of the right tail, worth trillions.
THE EXCHANGE OF ORIONS SHOULD BE PART OF A SERIES, LEAVING ROOM FOR EDITING BY EACH SIDE, ACKNOWLEDGING THE POTENTIAL FOR CHANGE
1. So visualize the seven-star hour glass shape at the heart of the Orion constellation.
2. The name of the central star of the belt is Alnilam, which is arabic for string of pearls.
3. Give that central star the number one.
NB: That is your first point. What is your Alnilam?
MY ALNILAM IS THE FACT THAT THERE ARE 22 ARAB COUNTRIES, 50 MUSLIM COUNTRIES, 157 CHRISTIAN COUNTRIES, AND 7 BUDDHIST COUNTRIES, AND ONLY ONE JEWISH COUNTRY — What is your Alnilam? What is your Orion?
1. And yet Islam and Christianity owe everything to Judaism. No judaism, no christianity. No judaism, No Islam. Remember: Moses is mentioned 137 times in the Quran. Mohammed? 4 times.
2. And yet Jerusalem is to Judaism as Mecca is to Islam. The wailing wall is to Jews as the Kaaba is to Muslims.
3. And yet countless Christians, Muslim, and even many Jews feel that even 1 Jewish country is a travesty.
NB: Below an article by Eric Hoffer, the “longshore man philosopher” from the LA Times of 5/26/68. No article on the subject is more worth re-printing and being read by every Harvard student before they graduate. If you disagree, well, please not only share your Orion — but share the best article ever written on this topic — from your perspective.
“The Jews are a peculiar people: things permitted to other nations are forbidden to the Jews. Other nations drive out thousands, even millions of people and there is no refugee problem. Russians did it, Poland and Czechoslovakia did it, Turkey threw out a million Greeks , and Algeria a million Frenchmen. Indonesia threw out heaven know how many. Chinese — and no one says a word about refugees. But in the case of Israel displaced Arabs have become eternal refugees. Everyone insists that Israel must take back every single Arab. Arnold Toynbee calls the displacement of the Arabs an atrocity greater than any committed by the Nazis.
Other nations when victorious on the battlefield dictate peace terms. But when Israel is victorious it must sue for peace. Everyone expects the Jews to be the only real Christians in the world. Other nations when they are defeated survive and recover but should Israel be defeated it would be destroyed. Had Nasser triumphed last June he would have wiped Israel off the map, and no one would have lifted a finger to save the Jews. No commitment to the Jews by any government, including our own, is worth the paper it is written on. There is a cry of outrage when people die in Vietnam or when two Negroes are executed in Rhodesia. But when Hitler slaughtered Jews no one remonstrated with him.
The Swedes, who are ready to break off diplomatic relations with America because of what we do in Vietname, did not let out a peep when Hitler was slaughtering Jews. They sent Hitler choice iron ore, and ball bearings and serviced his troop trains to Norway. The Jews are alone in the world. If Israel survives, it will be solely because of Jewish efforts. And Jewish resources. Yet at this moment Israel is our only reliable and unconditional ally. We can rely on Israel more than Israel can rely on us. And one has only to imagine what would have happened last summer had the Arabs and their Russian backers won the war to realize how vital the survival of Israel is to America and the West in general. I have a premonition that will not leave me; as it goes with Israel so will it go with all of us. Should Israel perish the holocaust will be upon us.”
See attachments 4 and 5 below for a.) a one page summary of the strongest case for each side in this debate, and b.) my first stab at an Israel-Palestine Orion from May 2023. I shared the first handout with heads of the Harvard Islamic Society and leaders of Hillel with no specific alterations recommended by any. But I’m open to your edits.
The construction of Orions should be a “Bayesian” process — open to change as either the facts change or your premises change as a result of deeper reflection. In this game of life, the fastest learner wins and the keys to learning acceleration are an open mind, an open heart, and open eyes.
Shall we dance?
Moving the goalposts — Wikipedia
QUOTE OF THE MONTH
“Make your own Bible. Select and collect all the words and sentences that in all your readings have been to you like the blast of a trumpet.”
- Ralph Waldo Emerson
My spin — then periodically review, re-rank, and exchange your list with those you love. I call this the “Orion Exchange” because seven is about as many as any human can digest at a time. Game?
LAST FOUR YEARS OF POSTS ORGANIZED THEMATICALLY
#1 A graphic guide to justice (9 metaphors on one page).
#2 “39 Songs, Prayers, and Poems: the Keys to the Hearts of Seven Billion People” — Adams House Senior Common Room Presentation, (11/17/20)
NB: Palestine Orion (Decision) — let’s exchange Orions, let’s find Rumi’s field (“Beyond all ideas of right and wrong, there is a field. Meet me there” Rumi, 13 century Persian Sufi mystic)
YOUR TURN
Please share the coolest thing you learned in the last week related to education or education policy. Or the coolest thought however half-baked you had.
Or the coolest, most important thing you learned in your life related to education or education policy that the rest of us may have missed.
Or just some random education-related fact that blew you away.
This is your chance to make some one’s day. Or to cement in your own mind something that you might otherwise forget. Or to think more deeply than otherwise about something that is dear to your heart.
