A New Way Of Seeing Things

"You relentlessly mock, but it's not for self-aggrandizement; it's because ideas are bigger than feelings"

Doctor Taube speaking to Doctor Gregory House, episode "Gut Check", Spring, 2012


What does that mean?
I have written that sometimes it takes me a long time to understand films: there is so much to see and understand! It can be the same way with television shows that are well done. So what were the writers trying to state here?

Ideas are bigger than feelings is intended to de-emphasize not just feeling, but the source of feelings: the emotional intelligence. In its essence, Dr. Taube is saying that Ideas are bigger than the emotional generators of ideas: humankind.

Humankind tends to identify with its ideas and not let go of them; they wrap themselves in them and hold them close to give their lives meaning and identity. But ideas go beyond their embryonic human birth and seek to stand on their own two feet. One thing most of us have not learned how to do is to cut the apron strings of even the most sublime of our Ideas!
Look at our notions of God! How trivial we make religion! We laud children who write books about visiting heaven during their illness, and we invest value and meaning in the fact that a child sees a God who is exactly like those described in childrens' stories.
Or we inflate the idea of divinity with our own prejudices and judgements...
Or we force God into our newly discovered cleverness of Intelligent Designer....! That's a step forward, isn't it?!

The idea is greater than ourselves.
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