Tag: G.K. Chesterton

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What is the Origin of the Word Data?

What is the origin of the word data? What is data? Here’s a definition I found online:

“Data is raw, unorganized facts, figures, symbols, or observations that represent details about events, objects, or phenomena. As the basic, unprocessed units of information, data can be numerical (quantitative) or descriptive (qualitative). Once collected, structured, and interpreted, data is transformed into valuable insights used for decision-making.”

However, if you look up the etymology of the word data, you will see that it means “something given” — a gift. It comes from the Proto-Indo-European root do-, “to give,” and belongs to a whole family of words related to giving, such as donation, dowry, Pandora, Theodore, and even дар (gift) in Russian.

The difference between the modern understanding of data and its original meaning is subtle but telling. In our time, data is all about collecting information, as if it were simply there for the taking. In the past, however, data meant a gift — and gifts must be recognized.

For example, when I look at my legs, I can collect all sorts of data about them, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that I have recognized them as a gift. Recognizing a gift is always a matter of awareness, not calculation.

Even if I collect all the “data” about my legs — length, weight, width, and so on — I still don’t truly know what they are. I only know what they are when I become aware that they have been given.

“When we were children we were grateful to those who filled our stockings at Christmas time. Why are we not grateful to God for filling our stockings with legs?” — G.K. Chesterton

My legs are a given — datum. But my knowing what they are is not a given — not datum. Properly speaking, data is a gift recognized. All measurements and calculations made prior to this recognition diminish knowledge rather than increase it.

True knowledge is born from the awareness of a gift. The modern approach to data leads to the diminishment of true knowledge because it is not rooted in wonder — the awareness that we possess nothing yet have been given everything. Without awe and wonder, data becomes anti-knowledge.

What is anti-knowledge? It is a husk of knowledge, devoid of substance. Unless I recognize the gift of legs in my stockings, I live under the illusion of knowing. To know my legs is to experience the awe of having them. That is true knowledge — true data.

True data grants joy, not control or power. When I become aware of the gift of legs, I am struck by the joy of walking on them. If I believe I possess them by right, I will feel no joy. Joy is the overflow of awareness that I dwell within a gift.

Data is a given, but we cannot take it for granted. If we do, we fail to understand that it has been granted. Awareness of a gift is the only antidote to taking things for granted.

We speak of “harvesting” data, “processing” data, “owning” data. The language reveals the posture: reality is no longer a gift but a standing resource. And once reality becomes a resource, wonder goes. What remains is manipulation.

But gifts cannot be manipulated without ceasing to be gifts. To know the meaning of data we must turn and become like little children. A child knows their legs not by measurements in inches, but by the measure of delight in using them.

A knower is a lover, not a consumer. A lover doesn’t stand outside and analyze; he stands within and is astonished.

Recovery of true knowledge begins with a conversion of attention — a return to wonder. It’s all about learning to master thinking through thanking.

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What is Asymmetrical Ethics? Emmanuel Levinas and Beauty and the Beast

What is asymmetrical ethics? The French philosopher Emmanuel Levinas, who spent four years as a POW in German camps and whose family was killed by the Nazi in Lithuania, wrote in his book Totality and Infinity (1961):

“The face of the Other comes toward me with its infinite vulnerability, its destitution, its defenseless eyes. It calls me into question and orders me: ‘Thou shalt not kill.’”

Reflecting on his experience, Levinas’s central question was: “How is ethical responsibility possible after the Holocaust?” How can one regard their torturer as human when he treats them as less than human — in fact, worse than an animal?

An experience like that “calls me into question.” Who am I? For Levinas, the answer lies in what he calls ethical asymmetry. True ethics is never based on mutuality or reciprocity; it does not depend on others treating you in a certain way. Ethics, in its purest form, is always asymmetrical — you are ethical simply because you recognize the face of the Other.

“The face is what forbids me to kill.” Ethics and Infinity (1982)

For Levinas, the main challenge was to continue seeing the face of the one who consistently and radically negates the face of others. But what is the source of ethical asymmetry? How can one keep seeing the human in someone who continually dehumanizes others?

For Levinas, ethical responsibility is not a contract; it is a response — a response to seeing a face. Our capacity to see the Other’s face, regardless of their actions, depends on whether we ourselves have experienced ethical asymmetry. To love, we must have someone who has seen our Face.

I can only treat others as human if I have experienced being treated asymmetrically — loved without condition, regardless of what I do. It is this experience of ethical asymmetry that forbids me to dehumanize others. That is why Beauty and the Beast remains one of the most powerful mythical archetypes of all time.

As G.K. Chesterton puts it,

“There is the great lesson of ‘Beauty and the Beast,’ that a thing must be loved before it is lovable.’”

The 1977 Soviet romantic comedy Office Romance is one of the most beloved films of the Soviet era. A shy, divorced statistician, Anatoly Novoseltsev, unexpectedly falls in love with his stern, irritable, and lonely boss, Ludmila Kalugina. Wounded by a past betrayal, Ludmila has closed herself off from love and prefers to be seen as “an old maid.”

But the moment she realizes she is loved despite all her harshness, something within her breaks. The next day, she arrives at work transformed — the old maid is gone, and everyone in the office is stunned by the beautiful woman they had never truly seen before.

A thing must be loved before it is lovable. No wonder the Hebrew word rachamim (רָחַם), used in Exodus 34:6–7 and usually translated as “compassion” or “mercy,” literally means “womb.” According to the Torah, we exist in the womb of God — we are “en-wombed” in a loving Presence.

When we become aware of that Presence, we are changed. Someone has seen our Face, and we begin to seek the faces of others. It’s our response to being seen. Love is not something we manufacture; it springs from a heart that has been touched by ethical asymmetry.