Probably the biggest mistake made by the scientifically industrializing world has been the idea and requirement that individuals must specialize into one expertise of work in order to have value. Experts get paid more than dilettantes. Besides, we are told, it takes a lifetime of concentration to learn to do anything well.
Perhaps at one time that made sense. At one time, so did raising monoliths, leveling forests, and slaughtering anyone not in your tribe. But civilization also evolves to meet new conditions, and expertise has become a residual anomaly which can quickly turn cancerous.
The professional disease of expertise is the proverbial “rabbit hole,” obsessively concentrating on one facet of thought as the rest of existence vanishes. It’s not new _ theologians have always been prone to the issue. But in a world filled with experts, its ramifications are becoming calamitous.
We are composed of discrete and expert chemical interactions. But we transcend all that. We are able to focus to accomplish tasks. But our lives are _ or should be _ much more than tasks fulfilled. Rabbit holes may bring prestige, but rob us of true human happiness.
The old adage to “smell the roses” remains as true as ever. And it does not mean to start a perfume factory.
HuntingtonHarborThoughts 