Three kinds of minds—and how they can learn to work in kind.
AN ENGLISH teacher I once had would frequently proclaim to our class, “Education is about teaching children how to think, not what to think!” (Rather ironic, then, that this assertion was itself something we, the children, were supposed to blindly accept at face value.) His point is well-taken, but I might even go a step further. No doubt education is about showing youngsters how to think, but crucially, it is also about helping each child uncover which type of thinker they are.
There are three sorts of thinkers: the analytical, the experimental, and the visceral. The analytical thinker dissects, compartmentalizes, examines, reasons, and computes her way to a solution. She is procedural and clear-eyed, utilizing her powerful gifts for careful study to scrutinize a poor argument or to find X. The analytical thinker might be a young, detail-oriented accountant or a half-mad philosopher ruminating on the nature of humankind, united by the common view that every problem can be distilled to its core theory and puzzled out in the abstract.
The experimental thinker avoids such superfluous theory. After all, any theoretical notion or conjecture worth pondering could instead be subjected to rigorous, real-life investigation. Trial and error is the experimental thinker’s bread and butter. Failure is immaterial to the experimental thinker, for she well knows the untold insights gleaned from her hits and flops alike. Of all the cognitive tools at her disposal, a superior intuition for how the world works is, to the experimental thinker, crème de la crème—unparalleled in its usefulness.
The visceral thinker is not unlike a Maoist—in that she lives in a world of constant revolution. The visceral thinker is always rethinking, reframing, reimagining her state of mind as she is exposed to new experiences and stimuli. She hence develops a penchant for swift, yet perceptive, assessments. The visceral thinker knows within three seconds whether she finds a new city to her liking, or whether a person is trustworthy, or whether she is in love with that handsome fellow across the coffee shop. The visceral thinker’s greatest intellectual (as opposed to gastrointestinal) asset is her gut.
Society benefits from having all three kinds of minds in abundance. The academy is abuzz when analytical and experimental scientists collaborate to develop and test a new, radical hypothesis. An experimental teacher is best equipped to harness the raw genius of a visceral student. A pair of analytical and visceral newlyweds has the best shot at navigating the complexities of marriage—its blend of pragmatism and passion. And at the intersection of all three of these types, you enter a hall adorned with humanity’s best works of art, music, architecture, and poetry.
But this beautiful symbiosis is under siege by society itself. Schools place analytical minds on a pedestal and pooh-pooh the equally important contributions of experimental and visceral ones. The arts and humanities are deprived of funding and confined to the sidelines. Punitive, right-or-wrong grading policies discourage experimentation and push away aspirational young women from studying science and mathematics. Spirituality, a visceral experience if ever there was one, is taught through an exclusively analytical lens in public schools.
Problematic policies are the products of problematic mindsets. The boy who spends his math class tapping out elaborate rhythms for his upcoming song; the girl who struggles to analyze Othello but has a deep, precocious understanding of the Bible; the woman who tried and failed seven times before finally founding her small business; the retired army cook who goes back to school to fulfill his dream of being a chef in New York City; their talents and unique intellects deserve acknowledgement and validation. Conversely, by dismissing the validity of someone’s intelligence, you are reinforcing narrow, reductionist views of what “intelligence” is, thereby stepping into a philosophical and moral minefield. Tread carefully, and beware the hegemony of analysis.
Admittedly, I am an analytical thinker. I didn’t feel or experiment my way to the above conclusions; I reasoned them out. I am not so bold, however, as to claim that analytical minds do not have their place. There is a real, abundant need for incisive, analytical thinkers, especially in S.T.E.M., politics, and academia. But all of us are worse off if we lose touch with the bigger picture. Not everyone is born with the analytic skills to become a professor—but in an intellectually inclusive society, each and every human being has the potential to be brilliant.
Discourse in a Discordant Society is a monthly column on society and politics.
