The Prevailing Ignorance


The ignorant and unthinking attitude of certain portions of the general

public toward this class of phenomena is akin to that of a community of

blind and deaf persons, satisfied that their own "three sense" standard

is the highest possible one attainable by living creatures and that all

variation therefrom must be considered as "abnormal." In such a

community there would occasionally be born certain individuals possessed

> of the senses of sight and hearing, in addition to the common three

senses possessed by the entire community. Judging by what we know of the

tendency of human nature in such cases, we are warranted in conjuring

that the ordinary run of persons in such a community would revile the

seeing and hearing individuals as "abnormal," and their possessors

therefore to be pitied, and perhaps shunned. Only the intelligent and

thoughtful members of such a community would be able to grasp the fact

that these exceptional individuals were really not only not "abnormal,"

and inferior to type, but that they were really "supernormal," and

superior to type.



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