The questions about fundamentals - cooking, reading. I would of course agree that these are useful to the individual. Now coding - again the skill is neutral. But what you code might not be. Why do you code what you code? Should you code in a bank, a facebook algorithm, etc? Are you actually undertaking your life in a positive way, or are you making gains at another's expense?

Do you think training is a neutral act? Is it possible that training can be subversive to the trainee?

Perhaps you will see my position as a political, anti-statist one. I see it as an individualistic perspective. If an individual is trained in academic philosophy, in order to provide 'production of well argued original works of academic philosophy' why is that valuable? To me, there is no value there at all. As an individual, I want to uncover the innate understanding we all already have.

Have you ever heard about people who go through half their life, having trained to be doctors, or solicitors, only to then realise that they didn't want to do that? I would say that these are the lucky ones - they have wasted only half their lives, and though they have much to undo, they at least they are honest enough to change their position and try to find something authentic and innate to them. Most people do not do that. That is the power of training and education, IMO. In it for the money, sell your granny.

In my view, this is what training at a higher level is to train people NOT to look inside themselves for answers, but to refer to an external authority. This applies to academic philosophy as much as any other area. Love of wisdom, becoming oneself, makes way for the production of 'original works of academic philosophy'. Beyond the basics, education seems to me about disempowering the individual, for the benefit of some imagined 'collective'. In fact, that collective is so individual who has their hands on the levers of governance, but let's not think too closely about that.

Once again I am getting the message that I am posting too fast. I think its when I am flagged for my 'contentious viewpoints'. Last time it was 3 hours before I could post, but I will submit this when I can. HN can be very frustrating.

Whether we agree or not, if you appreciate my taking the time to reply and provide you my thoughts, feel free to upvote me - I think a higher score may help in allowing me to respond in a more timely manner!

Back to your post.

Strangely (or perhaps not so strangely given my 'feralimal' handle) I was thinking about feral children and their inability to speak.

I think you would say they live a worse life than you. But why? How do you know? You do not.

You and I live in our classification systems - we probably share a very similar type. We were taught our classification systems at school and they are self-evident, right? Eg: "A whale is not a fish, its a mammal.", "this is a tree, not a bush", "tomatoes are a fruit", "peanuts are a legume", etc. This is an example of how we live in the ideas that we were given.

Think now about the feral child. This child will also have some sort of system to interpret the world. But its system would be very different to ours. It would have developed it on its own. The feral child wouldn't necessarily see a distinction between itself and the nature it lives in.

Now step back and apply some value to that. Which is the better way of living?

Is it better to live in your head, with layers and layers of classification systems filtering your engagement with the world? Going to work, coding, making some money to be able to pay your mortgage, and afford some takeaway?

Or is it better to feel a connection with the external reality, even if you can't talk about it?

I honestly don't know.

I can say that trying to engage more deeply with 'reality'. I suspect I am forever separate. Maybe feral children are too. But, I think innately, connecting to whatever is the source is what I yearn for. And I suspect it is the same for everyone else.

And then, my assessment is that the education we receive is about making that possibility almost impossible to even conceive of.

I just realised I didn't answer your question: "Who decides what is neutral? What if you are trained by masters or schools with conflicting thoughts? What if you read all sides of an argument? Is this information not valuable to the informed choices of an individual?"

You decide. You are free to view all information, and consider it. You can judge for yourself whether the argument you are presented with is sound or not. Whether all the assumptions are stated and whether the conclusion that follows is rational. If you don't have all the information, that is fine - you can work with your best hypothesis. I think the key thing is whether you are acting in good faith. If someone presents some information that you can't reconcile easily, that is likely an indication that you need to investigate further. You may get some data that will better inform your understanding.