The Philosophy of What We Do

[FeralVermonter]

Wow!

Just found this site, literally my first time clicking around, even more of an fng than you, and I know with these sorts of forums you're supposed to read first, and comment later, but what a wonderful set of questions!

I'm "even more" of an fng because I'm not even really a builder--I went to school for history and philosophy, and I've worked in auctions and restaurants (who didn't see that coming, with a degree like mine?).

Your questions are all wonderful ones, ones that I think about all the time. My wife is in education, and we have a couple of tenants studying to become teachers. Sometimes, in their more conspiracy-minded moments, they declare that the public school system is designed to produce workers, cogs in a machine, not thinking, responsible adults. But I work with kids all the time. If school's supposed to make good workers, cogs in a machine, it does a piss-poor job of it. And I've had cooks in my kitchen from culinary school, and they're no better, even if I don't have to teach them how to make a roux. To put it simply, I think the problem is this: in our culture-in our world-the End is ranked higher than the Mean.

By this I mean that people don't think about where they are, they think about where they're going. Pretty much every kid I see come through my kitchen is going to become a famous moviemaker, or musician, or, rarely, a famous chef (those ones don't work any harder or better than the others, unfortunately). I notice that people always talk about what comes next, about the next thing they're going to buy, about how they need to work out more, or eat less bacon (or gluten, or salt, or cucumbers, or whatever's poison that week). Of course you can't help but think about the future, and it's not a good idea to ignore it, but you can't live there. Gotta live in the present, warts and all. Gotta do your best in the job you're in, with the tools you have. That's all you can really do. But people don't know this any more.

I'm not sure of forum rules yet, but I'd like to suggest a book that I read recently: Shopclass as soulcraft, by matthew crawford. Beautiful book. Written by a former think-tank guy who gave it all up to be a motorcycle mechanic. To be honest, reading it a few months back I can't say exactly what the man's argument is, but I know that it speaks to your question: in this book, he mounts a fierce--and deep--defense of the manual arts. Please check it out.

Anyway, I don't really have any answers to your questions, just some thoughts on the matter...

And I accept each one of your challenges. Whole-heartedly.