Not that I wish to reinforce the State or its money, but yesterday my bill came to $52 and change at a store where I’m friendly with the cashier, a lady of about 40. As I pulled out 3 twenties, I impulsively asked her “Do you know who’s on a twenty?” “No,” she said. An older man of 65 was there and he had been joking around, so I asked him, and he didn’t know either.
Interpret this as you will, perhaps as a healthy disregard of reverence to the money and its symbols, or a disregard for irrelevant information, or as a lack of basic knowledge. I choose the latter. People are alert to what concerns them, but they can’t be alert when they lack basic knowledge, both facts and understandings working together. Then they can only have vague and confused feelings. And then they will fail even to spot the things that are affecting them that should concern them.
6:08 am on September 3, 2012
