Majoring on Minors

During my years in Bible college and Seminary (seriously, you don't want to know), one recurring phrase kept popping up from time to time: "Majoring on minors." This was because, as a devout fundamentalist, I made a big deal out of some things that weren't really that important, including hair length for men, whether women should wear pants or not, or whether or not the King James Version of the Bible was the one that was divinely and inerrantly inspired. Real important stuff.

It seems as if the threads on the web fora that get the most attention, and the most posts, and the most hurt feelings and insults are at about the same level of quality.

To Seal or Not to Seal

Foliar Feeding - Myth?

And the one I started to prove this point:

Perched water tables-myth?

Does Superthrive work? Will water droplets burn the leaves of your plant like a magnifying glass? Haven't these things received enough attention over time that we can agree that they mean nothing with regard to producing beautiful bonsai?

Why is the attention these topics receive in inverse proportion to their actual importance to the art of bonsai? One of the problems is the type of interest they receive. Picture this scenario: an article or web post is written specifically to inflame or excite others. Statements are made as to the finality and universality of the opinions expressed, with no room for dissent. Others take issue with some of the statements made, authors defend by appealing to "authority" in the most condescending terms possible, others take offense and the flame wars are on.

I spent much of my youth believing wholeheartedly that I believed the entire truth. If I was right, that meant others were wrong. And I stated so. This often left me with what I might consider "won" arguments but no one to argue with. In the passing of time, I had cause to read the Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin. I saw many lessons in his writing from which I could learn, not the least of which was his penchant for disputation.

As he grew older and wiser, he changed his method of arguing and,

retaining only the habit of expressing myself in terms of modest
diffidence; never using, when I advanced any thing that may possibly be
disputed, the words certainly, undoubtedly, or any others that give the air of
positiveness to an opinion; but rather say, I conceive or apprehend a thing to
be so and so; it appears to me, or I should think it so or so, for such and such
reasons; or I imagine it to be so; or it is so, if I am not mistaken. This
habit, I believe, has been of great advantage to me when I have had occasion to
inculcate my opinions, and persuade men into measures that I have been from time
to time engag'd in promoting; and, as the chief ends of conversation are to
inform or to be informed, to please or to persuade, I wish well-meaning,
sensible men would not lessen their power of doing good by a positive, assuming
manner, that seldom fails to disgust, tends to create opposition, and to defeat
every one of those purposes for which speech was given to us, to wit, giving or
receiving information or pleasure. For, if you would inform, a positive and
dogmatical manner in advancing your sentiments may provoke contradiction and
prevent a candid attention. If you wish information and improvement from the
knowledge of others, and yet at the same time express yourself as firmly fix'd
in your present opinions, modest, sensible men, who do not love disputation,
will probably leave you undisturbed in the possession of your error. And by such
a manner, you can seldom hope to recommend yourself in pleasing your hearers, or
to persuade those whose concurrence you desire.

This had a great effect on me for years since. I've often wondered how anyone might convince someone of the rightness of their position without such a hedging of bets, as it were. Working through some words of Pope and comes up with this adage:

Immodest words admit but this defense,
that want of modesty is want of sense.

Of that we can be sure.