Young CS Lewis made the mistake of forming an opinion without any actual thought or knowledge behind it. Bu he’s not alone.
We all have a tendency to form opinions prematurely based on little more than our feelings or intuitions. Have you noticed that a lot of people express their opinions, more often than not, by declaring “I feel,” rather than “I think,” and why most Americans have an opinion on everything from gas prices to artificial intelligence without knowing much of anything about any of it? I bet some of you have some pretty strong opinions about homework, school uniforms, the rules of the games you play in PE, and so on. But here’s the funny thing: those probably aren’t really even genuine opinions in the first place:
The etymology of the word opinion goes back to early 14th century French, and means “a judgment formed or a conclusion reached, especially one based on evidence that does not produce knowledge or certainty.”
In other words, a real opinion is a conclusion we draw grounded in evidence, but that we acknowledge is not definitive or certain. But somehow, we seem to have gotten it backwards—our opinions are usually our absolutely definitive views, which are grounded in little more than how we feel about something.
C.S. Lewis’ teacher helped him see the difference. But it is important that we learn to see own our own error, even when a good teacher is not there to correct us. So how can we know?
Well, Proverbs 18:2 is a good place to start: “A fool takes no pleasure in understanding, but only in expressing his opinion.” Put another way, when it comes to our opinions, do we tend to ask questions, or do we just keep arguing our point?
Have a wonderful day.