Trishanku?

It is not always possible to experiment with your outlook. But whenever a touchstone comes by, it is useful to verify or falsify the beliefs you have tenaciously held on to.

I believed that the best good that common citizens can do is to act small, do good in the immediate neighborhood without philosophizing about the society, government and humanity in general. Sen's 'The Argumentative Indian' started to change that, though I haven't even read the whole book. Act Local, think global is good, but why not talk global too? Which one is better - to preach (dharma) or to practice (karma)?

It took a hundred intellectuals to rubble-rouse for decades before the French hoi-polloi took charge and the Revolution came. While the real action would never have come from the polemicists like Voltaire, the masses would never have come together without the Enlightenment ideals. So then, we need both.

An engineering mind seeks quick, tangible results. A philosophical one revels in fuzzy, nebulous ambiguities. A management mind keeps oscillating between the two states. However, we need not be undecided about which path to take to better the world. We are equipped to both give to the society and to... "appropriate value", what?