You Act Like You Listen. (Part 2)

I think that everyone will be a fan of this artist or at least familiar with the group. So, for this post I will be evaluating .... Hold on to What You Believe by Mumford and Sons. First, if you have not heard this song, take a listen below, its beautiful really. And who doesn't love a mandolin?

 Really anthem-like right? But moving on...

I started off with this particular song because I think it embodies several philosophical points, ones that we have particularly studied and ones that have been wrought up by conversation. Lets begin with the chorus.

 "But hold on to what you believe in the light

           When the darkness has robbed you of all your sight"

The strongest point I think that comes with this couplet, is that we should not allow "darkness" to change our vision. What do I mean by that? Well for example, in our discussion of Credibility and Discrimination by Fricker we spoke of how our "rose-tinted" glasses (to borrow from Kant) portrayed a characteristic on someone by generality, that is probably untrue. If you need to remind yourself of that conversation, reread it here. I think that in perfect clarity, we know that everyone is an individual, but in everyday life we can walk in darkness provided by the world around us. So, then it is our goal to recognize the darkness and make our own light, whereas light is truth and knowledge.

“Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.”
― MLK Jr. 

Moreover, I think that these lines speaks volumes on the fact that we have a "frame of reference" (aka darkness) created by interactions in our lives. These "frame of references" can completely blind us from truth, because our own misconceptions. It is like Dr. Oliver's analogy of the glasses. Our own glasses have been weathered with time, have scratches, and color the world in wrong ways. For me, I think that I have to realize that the glasses that I have on are misleading, but behind them I have my own eyes to see from that are untouched by the world. 

I also love the line,

 "This city breathes the plague of loving things more than their creators"

Okay, you can think of the religious connotation of this line, but I am digging deeper. I am going to go with the fact that love is the highest power, it created us. I think that the biggest problem we have is that we would rather hate than love. Its almost a sickness we have developed (plague... see I am making it relate). We forget to love each other and instead finds reasons to hate, even to the point of making them up. Even worse than hate sometimes is indifference, in that there is no care or emotion for one another at all, but that is for another day.


Overall, I think that listening to this song is a good thing for me personally. A good dose of medicine for the soul (and heart!) (and mind!). It reminds me that the world as it seems, is just my perspective. So I need to "hold on to what I believe" even though I may be persuaded by my "frame of reference" otherwise. Also it reminds me that to put aside love for all worldly things, and instead love those inside my world.