To a degree, I agree with you. There is something about the concreteness of experience which is incommunicable, at least without close analogies to draw from. Part of my point in the account of my Paris trip was to convey the sense of shock: no one who has not been to Paris quite knows what it is like, and commonplace assumptions about an urbane, affluent environment are upended. On the other hand, I can go some ways in describing these things, and conveying the impression made on an American.
In the specific case, everyone is a believer, and everyone is an unbeliever. Everyone, that is, has a fair degree of confidence in an assortment of propositions that are vital to their orientation in the world, even if they enter the caveat that they are "merely my opinion"; and everyone is incredulous of some things that "just don't make sense", given their assumptions and experiences. That in itself means that there is some basis for each side to understand the other, by analogy. There are similar ways one might seek common ground, and attempt to work from there. Understanding might be imperfect, but at least progress would be possible. |
