Hannah Arendt contended, and controversially, that the source of what she called “the banality of evil” is that people simply don’t, and won’t, think. The resultant evil is endemic under totalitarian and autocratic regimes. It’s only commonplace under liberal and quasi-democratic and bureaucrat institutions! But this sorry state of affairs isn’t breaking news. After all, St. Thomas Aquinas, well before the mayhem of modernity, taught that original sin plays havoc with the human intellect. (Perhaps to lessen the political fallout of our impairment, he promoted a mix of monarchic, aristocratic, and democratic principles of government.)

Critics of Hannah Arendt object to her diagnosis. Surely, they charge, malign forces and structures of malevolence conspire against “the people.” So blame the conspirators, not those conspired against. We face an enemy, but the enemy is not us! Arendt’s stance does nothing to challenge the status quo. It’s action, not reflection, that effects real change.

Who has the better analysis? Is it Arendt or her critics? Note, gentle reader, that my highlighting this question calls for, yes, some careful thinking. And why not? As a philosopher I have a vocational affinity for Arendt’s diagnosis. Nonetheless, as an activist I have no sympathy for fiddling while the world burns. But why must thought and action be at odds? Even Lenin, a terrorist who understood neither, recognized that “without revolutionary theory, there can be no revolutionary movement.” What we need is the interplay of mind (mens) and hand (manus).

Here, though, let’s focus on thinking. Real thinking is hard. To do so we need to get beneath the surface of the ordinary. Philosophical thinking, to paraphrase Wittgenstein, is like swimming underwater. It calls for strength and stamina. The point of such thinking is not to reject carte blanche the ordinary. Were we to reject the ordinary, we would have no starting point for reflection. But soon enough, once we get beneath the surface, we can see the distortions of ordinary life. Nonetheless, nothing counts as a distortion apart from the context of ordinary life.

What next? A second aquatic analogy might be helpful. Suppose we find ourselves at sea in a ship that badly needs repairs. It won’t do to deny, however loudly, that we are at risk. But we cannot fix everything at once. Are there rotten timbers? So be it. But we can only fix one problem, or perhaps a few, at a time. It’s too late to put the ship in drydock. Yet all the while, some parts of the ship must stand fast while we strategically replace others.

In these latter days, if we are to think carefully we must critically assess most of what passes for received opinion. Ditto for standard procedures. Even “best practices” merit scrutiny. Politics “as usual” is replete with such opinions and procedures. So is the news which is doled out for us to “consume.” So, too, is much of the entertainment with which we distract ourselves.

What stands fast, in contrast, are the first principles of critical thinking and reflection. Thus, the principle of identity affirms that everything is what it is and not another thing. The principle of non-contradiction affirms that a thing cannot both be and not be in the same way at the same time. The principle of sufficient reason recognizes that there is a reason or cause for everything that comes about. To these principles we must add that our human cognition begins with sense experience.

Were we to deny these first principles and to deny sense experience, we would not be able to think at all. We would simply fall silent. Affirming these principles and the deliverances of our senses, in contrast, is what enables us to develop, step by hesitant step, the richly human cultures in which we can flourish. With God’s grace, we can sustain and advance these cultures but only if we think carefully. Can we agree that our decidedly mixed record in this enterprise calls for humility and resolve?