When it comes to the disposal of holy books, there is a problem; how to do it with respect. For burning a Holy Bible or Holy Quran or Holy Torah, is sure to inflame passions amongst the devout as a disrespectful action.

In Pakistan they have a solution. All the old and damaged Qurans are sent to the Mountain of Light, where two miles of tunnels have been dug to become the a respectful resting place for holy books, of any religion.

Quite right you might think, for the disposal of any kind of books cannot be taken lightly. At various times in history, libraries have been deliberately destroyed. Probably one of the worst examples was the ancient Library of Alexandria in Egypt. Sacred and secular texts from around the world were destroyed as heresy by the Christian ruling elite.

The Nazi’s in 1930’s Germany, were particular fond of literary bonfires. The more bigoted the ruling power the greater the purge of books, eliminating the ‘unsafe’ from the ‘safe’ reading material, which of course, was most of it.

Such is the power of books, as the custodians of knowledge, that we might be disturbed in our own day by the demise of libraries and book reading. Measure the time the average person spends reading today compared to fifty years ago and I expect the reduction is dramatic.

No longer do children learn poems in schools by heart in the West, any more than they do their mathematical tables. Reading and learning went hand in hand in the pre-internet world.

But it’s not all a sorry tale. Books have been replaced by electronic reading tablets, and audio books extend the audience to those who prefer not to sit for long periods of time reading.

Authors can now by-pass the old ‘publishing houses’ and the editorial dictates of literary agents. As a result, there is a wider range of reading material available than ever before.

And yet, and yet…

Where have our critical faculties gone? In this excess of electronic information, a serious amount of ‘dumbing down’ has taken place. The book readers have become a minority in place of audio and video.

Just take a look at a Saturday evening television schedule and you will see programmes featuring so called celebrities, unskilled game shows and the raising of the cult of sensual pleasures (like food programmes) to high fashion status.

As a society we are making decisions about personal preference using, what I call, emotional reasoning. This is the part of the brain that makes an appraisal in a few seconds when we meet a stranger. Sometimes it is spot on, but we all can think of instances in which it was just plain wrong. When we get to know people better, we use our intellectual reasoning – rational thought – to come to a more balanced appreciation of a new friend or enemy.

Should we be surprised then, that politics around the world, has moved into this area of emotional reasoning. You no longer need a degree in politics be required to work through the complexities of national problems in search of solutions. You no longer need to read broad sheet newspapers, specialist journals or books on the subject. Instead you listen to a report on the television news and if you agree with it – that’s what you think!

Why has this happened? Well I would suggest that complexity can a be a real downer – history proves this point. Mistakes are repeated over and over and over – whether it is trade, war, education, religion, distribution of resources, medicine, agriculture. The list is as endless as the mistakes of mankind. Although we have the capacity to think complex thoughts and make balanced judgements based on a deep and extended examination of a subject – for the emotional reasoner, this is a waste of time. After all – a meal is a meal whether prepared by a three star Michelin chef or a fast food joint.

‘I was hungry before I ate, now I am not.’

This is the power of ignorance. This is how being dumb hands over power to the State to do what it likes, without a single placard of dissent being waved. How bright did the audience in the Colosseum have to be to enjoy the sick spectacles the rulers had arranged for them? Caesar’s – who were slavers, dictators, corrupt, debauched, ruthless hedonists – had their populace worked out and under control.

Compare this, however loosely, to the present day. Are we now making reasoned choices or emotional choices?

The heart can become the master of the head, but if the heart is not focused on love and love alone, it is an ignorant and malign master.

And the first symptom of this taking place, is the burning of the books; the burning of reason, the burning of expertise, the burning of a common good. Amongst the ashes, the powerful and ignorant will dance a shallow, thoughtless dance that just makes them ‘feel good’. That’s enough reason, isn’t it?

But it might not end that way. Some people may climb the Mountain of Light and open up those tunnels and start handing out the Holy Books. Some people may find the digital versions of national libraries, once thought lost. Some people may discover light after the darkness that ignorance brings, just may.