ArtsAutosBooksBusinessEducationEntertainmentFamilyFashionFoodGamesGenderHealthHolidaysHomeHubPagesPersonal FinancePetsPoliticsReligionSportsTechnologyTravel

A sense of perspective

Updated on October 6, 2013

So is the grass greener?

A sense of perspective is one of the most valuable things that a person can have. This is a statement that I am happy to make almost categorically. Having a broad sense of perspective means being able to see things from both sides of the argument. It enables one to have an opinion whilst being open to debate - open to understanding and empathizing with a differing point of view. Without a good sense of perspective there can be no true dialogue - only people taking turns to say conflicting things.

The reason I am writing this hub is because I feel that broad perspective (which too often has been a luxury of the well educated middle classes) is an under appreciated thing. People seem happy to rail against closed mindedness without encouraging and celebrating its opposite.

What is perspective?

So, let us begin by being clear with our terms. By perspective I mean an individual view point - a subjective understanding of a set of circumstances or state of affairs.

One of the reasons that people shy away from celebrating 'perspective' is the threatening shadow of relativism and subjectivism. These are philosophical positions which in their basic form posit the world and reality as a purely subjective experience - i.e. there is no truth but your own truth. This makes a lot of people very uncomfortable.

Critics would say that, ethically this leaves you on dodgy ground. If each 'personal truth' is correct then if your personal truth is that killing people for fun is fine, then that is just fine because that is that person's subjective ethical 'truth'. Where I think that this criticism falls down is that it doesn't recognize the fact that morality is for the most part a social phenomena. Ethical decisions are in a very real way, a social transaction whereby the parties involved agree upon a mutually beneficial code of behavior. In this situation the belief of the one (clearly deranged) individual that clocking off people at random is ok - is clearly unethical because it is not a mutually beneficial behavior. Thus, one person can have an entirely correct personal perspective that is socially and ethically unacceptable. Their opinion in and of itself is not wrong... but in the context of society it is very wrong indeed.

I think to clean this up conceptually we should go as far as to say this: Perspective is never correct or incorrect objectively - an individuals perspective is the set of beliefs that individual holds about a state of affairs. Prior to engagement in dialogue the beliefs cannot be considered right or wrong - they are the starting point from which the individual shapes their interaction with that set of circumstances. They are almost a thinking tool by which the individual tailors their reality in that situation.

Upon engagement in dialogue proper each party's perspective is put under scrutiny by comparison. However, the individual perspective remains objectively unjudgeable - it can only be judged and altered by the one who holds that perspective based on their subjective evaluation of the alternative perspective compared to their own.

What's the good of that then?

So... now we've cleared up what we actually mean by perspective... what is it for? Why is having a broad and malleable one a good thing?

When it comes down to it, perspective is a mental technology - a tool of thought. It enables you to ascribe value and perform mental triage with your experiences. What things in your life should you expend how much attention and energy on? Your sense of perspective is that thinking process that allows you to weigh up one experience against another and decide which is the more important.

Unfortunately - we do not always ascribe value in ways that are actually most beneficial for us. This is mostly the result of social conditioning. The most obvious example of this is money-orientated materialism - an endemic issue in capitalist societies. We mistakenly ascribe objective value to money - which is is nothing more than a social convention. We confuse real wealth, with money - which is a mere abstraction.

When perspective is at its best, it enables us to make the decision to take our kids to school in the morning rather than stay in bed, take that night-school course that leads to a higher paid job, save for the future rather than blowing our wages on fashionable clothes and clever gadgets. In other words - it gives us the bigger picture.

The other place where this un-sung hero of our mental landscape comes to the fore is in debate and negotiation. A broad and flexible perspective is the enabler of progress because it gives two opposing schools of thought the space to meet, blend and reach compromise. The ability of one party to understand another's point of view and let it inform and evolve their own point of view... is essential for progress. Without this broader, unegoistic way of interacting with opposing points of views both parties might as well be talking to the wind.

working

This website uses cookies

As a user in the EEA, your approval is needed on a few things. To provide a better website experience, hubpages.com uses cookies (and other similar technologies) and may collect, process, and share personal data. Please choose which areas of our service you consent to our doing so.

For more information on managing or withdrawing consents and how we handle data, visit our Privacy Policy at: https://corp.maven.io/privacy-policy

Show Details
Necessary
HubPages Device IDThis is used to identify particular browsers or devices when the access the service, and is used for security reasons.
LoginThis is necessary to sign in to the HubPages Service.
Google RecaptchaThis is used to prevent bots and spam. (Privacy Policy)
AkismetThis is used to detect comment spam. (Privacy Policy)
HubPages Google AnalyticsThis is used to provide data on traffic to our website, all personally identifyable data is anonymized. (Privacy Policy)
HubPages Traffic PixelThis is used to collect data on traffic to articles and other pages on our site. Unless you are signed in to a HubPages account, all personally identifiable information is anonymized.
Amazon Web ServicesThis is a cloud services platform that we used to host our service. (Privacy Policy)
CloudflareThis is a cloud CDN service that we use to efficiently deliver files required for our service to operate such as javascript, cascading style sheets, images, and videos. (Privacy Policy)
Google Hosted LibrariesJavascript software libraries such as jQuery are loaded at endpoints on the googleapis.com or gstatic.com domains, for performance and efficiency reasons. (Privacy Policy)
Features
Google Custom SearchThis is feature allows you to search the site. (Privacy Policy)
Google MapsSome articles have Google Maps embedded in them. (Privacy Policy)
Google ChartsThis is used to display charts and graphs on articles and the author center. (Privacy Policy)
Google AdSense Host APIThis service allows you to sign up for or associate a Google AdSense account with HubPages, so that you can earn money from ads on your articles. No data is shared unless you engage with this feature. (Privacy Policy)
Google YouTubeSome articles have YouTube videos embedded in them. (Privacy Policy)
VimeoSome articles have Vimeo videos embedded in them. (Privacy Policy)
PaypalThis is used for a registered author who enrolls in the HubPages Earnings program and requests to be paid via PayPal. No data is shared with Paypal unless you engage with this feature. (Privacy Policy)
Facebook LoginYou can use this to streamline signing up for, or signing in to your Hubpages account. No data is shared with Facebook unless you engage with this feature. (Privacy Policy)
MavenThis supports the Maven widget and search functionality. (Privacy Policy)
Marketing
Google AdSenseThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
Google DoubleClickGoogle provides ad serving technology and runs an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
Index ExchangeThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
SovrnThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
Facebook AdsThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
Amazon Unified Ad MarketplaceThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
AppNexusThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
OpenxThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
Rubicon ProjectThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
TripleLiftThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
Say MediaWe partner with Say Media to deliver ad campaigns on our sites. (Privacy Policy)
Remarketing PixelsWe may use remarketing pixels from advertising networks such as Google AdWords, Bing Ads, and Facebook in order to advertise the HubPages Service to people that have visited our sites.
Conversion Tracking PixelsWe may use conversion tracking pixels from advertising networks such as Google AdWords, Bing Ads, and Facebook in order to identify when an advertisement has successfully resulted in the desired action, such as signing up for the HubPages Service or publishing an article on the HubPages Service.
Statistics
Author Google AnalyticsThis is used to provide traffic data and reports to the authors of articles on the HubPages Service. (Privacy Policy)
ComscoreComScore is a media measurement and analytics company providing marketing data and analytics to enterprises, media and advertising agencies, and publishers. Non-consent will result in ComScore only processing obfuscated personal data. (Privacy Policy)
Amazon Tracking PixelSome articles display amazon products as part of the Amazon Affiliate program, this pixel provides traffic statistics for those products (Privacy Policy)
ClickscoThis is a data management platform studying reader behavior (Privacy Policy)