#889 Self-Inflicted Immaturity?

Brain Food for Pioneering Spirits: is staying silent on immaturity itself a sign of immaturity? In Room #889 of the Deep Talk Club, under our overarching theme “Pioneering Spirit with brAIn,” the group digs into Kant’s original definition of self-inflicted immaturity, the difference between comfort and cowardice, a project someone walked away from on principle, and why courage might be the missing ingredient nobody names. Listen in on the examples that came up and the perspectives that emerged in dialogue…

Note: This session was recorded live in German as part of the Deep Talk Club, so the video above is German-language audio only. What follows is an English translation of the conversation, lightly edited for readability — the back-and-forth between the moderator and participants is preserved, but the original timestamps and speaker names have been left out.

A wonderful good morning to you all. Today we’re talking about self-inflicted immaturity. Question mark. What is self-inflicted immaturity, and to what extent do we ourselves actually contribute to it arising, viewed both individually and societally? That’s the topic we’d like to talk about today. And accordingly you’re all very warmly invited to join and bring in various impulses together in the exchange, so we can take a look. We currently have the overarching theme Pioneering Spirit with brAIn, and have opened up various rooms with different technologies we’ve looked at, all the way to opening a first level of discussion on the societal and political level too, which we’ll continue with in the coming days. And today we want to look at this self-inflicted immaturity. First, what do we even understand by that, let’s look at what first associations and thoughts come together, to then look at it from different perspectives accordingly. And in that sense, again today a brief reminder that the room is recorded the whole time, and anyone who joins automatically agrees that it’ll be published afterward too, and then we have three small room rules. First, a profile photo where you’re clearly recognizable, last name, and at least a sentence in the bio. Anyone who doesn’t want that for whatever reason, or can’t speak right now, of course also has the option to use the chat, to bring in questions or thoughts here, and then I can look in between and pick that up at one point or another, if it fits. Yes, and please remember that this is a reflection space. We can reflect together in dialogue, in exchange. Accordingly it’s important that people really keep joining in the mornings, to bring in various impulses too, and that’s why the warm invitation. So dare to, in inverted commas. It’s not at all about being an expert in a certain subject area, but about the exchange. It could also be questions that occupy you, or similar, that we pick up and accordingly work our way through in exchange here, to then see together where we end up at the end of the room. That’s always limited to 60 minutes, then we come out of it too. Right, with that I’ll gladly mute myself first and see who’d like to join this morning. I’ve already seen a message in the chat. Jürgen writes, good morning, I’m currently a bit inhibited, in quotation marks. I don’t quite know how to interpret that right now, Jürgen. I’ll just leave it as is. Right, and regarding maybe a few more impulses from my side. We’ve talked again and again about what the educational mandate actually is. It’s about enabling self-determination, self-organization, self-efficacy, and in that sense then to look at how that’s possible. How can you accompany one thing or another, to establish this self-determination, so leading a self-determined life, life competence and so on. That’s not given to us at birth, so to speak. And on the other hand we’ve also often picked up on the school system, for example. In contrast to that, in inverted commas, because the school system is structured differently, and historically viewed too, if we look at it, has a different origin, and accordingly we can’t necessarily speak of education here. I like to be a bit provocative about this, but it’s primarily about certification, so to speak, so preparation, qualification, that might be the more correct way to put it, qualification, so you can then attend the next school level, or have a corresponding degree, to then complete training or a degree afterward, and so on. Accordingly, the term education is often used in the context of school, but if we understand education and the educational mandate as self-determination, self-organization, self-efficacy, then we can relatively quickly recognize that this can’t be overlaid here, at least not the way it’s currently lived today. So, and to what extent, we also talked in the meantime about the Bologna Process, for example, that because this comparability was supposed to be established with the degrees, a certain standardization was carried out here, which is understandable per se from the idea, but at the same time also brought the disadvantage that it’s more, compared to how universities used to be structured, a move toward an increasingly schooled system, so to speak, so clearer timetables and so on. And what we observe in this context, for example, from stories but also from our own experiences, is that, in inverted commas, the behavior of students has also changed in that they basically, for example in lectures, rather expect, in inverted commas, I’ll call it now, to be spoon-fed, instead of somehow being active themselves. And there we’re already coming a bit into this immaturity, so self-inflicted immaturity. That would be one aspect where we can look at this from the educational context. And then we can maybe also look at this whole topic from a political context, because we currently have very, very many discussions, very increasingly or more strongly perceptible, I find personally, since the start of the Corona pandemic it’s massively increased, that a lot is controlled from outside, with regard to what’s all regulated, what’s prescribed for us, what measures are taken. And the more others make decisions for us, in inverted commas, or set the guardrails, which are sometimes a bit narrower and sometimes a bit wider maybe, that results to some extent in whether we are mature or become immature, and to what extent that might be self-inflicted, as a question mark, at this point to discuss together. And yes, now there were a few impulses in there too. We could open this up the same way in the corporate context. I don’t know who of you might know this too. Sometimes it’s well-intentioned, that you maybe, for example, double-check or review certain things, especially when you have a leadership role. But that can also backfire, that through this excessive control that takes place, for example, a certain leaning back happens too. In the sense of, someone will check that again anyway. So you can maybe handle that a bit more relaxed too. And all these aspects that have now been mentioned as examples, the question is to what extent that leads to a self-inflicted immaturity too. Caused by others, self-inflicted. We can gladly open up this distinction again too, if you want, and with that you’re all very warmly invited to join and bring in your thoughts.

Yes, Jürgen, I don’t know. Is the silence on this topic itself a sign of self-inflicted immaturity? Question mark, question mark. I can’t judge that, could well be. Sabine possibly can’t speak, because she’s traveling. I could imagine that. For everyone else, I don’t know what it’s due to. Let’s see. And we have three minutes left now. You know, it would be a shame if we closed this room today, because I think this is a highly exciting room, and once we start getting into these aspects in exchange, this will certainly be a stimulating exchange today too. However, you know, at quarter past I’ll close the room too, if nobody joins, because I don’t feel like giving a monologue.

A wonderful good morning, dear Erik, glad you’re joining.

Yes, good morning. I’ll probably be picked up by my colleagues any moment, so I don’t know exactly how long I’ll be able to stay. But yes, let me just jump right in. Yes, a difficult topic, let’s say, with a difficult starting point probably, because it sounds and feels a bit abstract. I just quickly did a Google search and found that this is actually a term that was even coined in Kant’s philosophy. And as far as I could interpret it in my first two-minute research attempt, I think it’s meant somehow that you, so immaturity in the sense of your mind and your cognitive abilities, let’s say, that you don’t use them, or not to the full extent, but not because you’re unable to for some reason, but if you’ve decided, however, through omission, that can also be a decision, not to use these abilities. And I don’t know if I’ve reproduced that correctly. Everyone can of course look it up themselves again. I then saw somewhere a page where someone asks about this, and someone else chimed in with “that means you’re to blame yourself if you don’t have your own opinion” or something like that. Then I didn’t read further, because that goes a bit in the direction, or a typical direction, like with the categorical imperative too, that you determine that a bit yourself, what might be meant by that. Right, those were my first findings on that. And yes, maybe that’s already triggered someone.

Yes, wonderful. Thank you, thank you so much. Yes, that’s great, as a first approximation actually, to use search engines like Google, so to speak, and also look into it a bit, to maybe see, I just did that too, and I’d like to pick up on what you started with, so to speak. In Wikipedia we find, for example, under the term maturity from philosophy. Since the philosophy of the Enlightenment, maturity has been associated with an inner and outer capacity for self-determination and self-responsibility. Maturity is a state of independence. It states that you can speak and care for yourself. Maturity is often connected with the term emancipation. And here we have, through this Enlightenment, this connection again to our education topic. That means the educational mandate crystallized out of this Enlightenment over time, so to speak. And here you see that these connections are simply there everywhere to this idea of education, what’s understood by that, when we talk about self-determination and such. It historically goes back to this age of Enlightenment. And so that you can speak for yourself and so on. Maturity, this occurs to me now in this context too, we also have legally, from when, for example, when it comes to offenses and punishments, sanctions and so on, when is that possible and so on. Here too it’s brought in line with, in the sense of, from when are you then, for example, actually able to understand what you’ve done, and also expect a sanction accordingly. And that presupposes certain things, or on one hand developmental states, which are first described in upbringing with various phases and so on, and various phases are opened up here too. And on the other hand it’s also to some extent about being able to speak for yourself, to think for yourself. We all think, ultimately, but also this, for example, critical thinking, questioning and so on. And we’ve already opened up various rooms on this too, under different overarching themes we’ve looked at, and these aspects flow in here too. And since that’s not given to us at birth, it needs corresponding guidance, so to speak. That’s not innate to us or anything, but it’s something we may learn. Accordingly we’re at a learning process here, that needs to be accompanied in some form too. That’s one side. And then we can also, I’ll just call it “unlearn” certain things again now, that doesn’t mean that something gets deleted or anything in our memory storage, but it’s there per se first, or the possibility is there, to also access it or use it too. But depending on how intensively we make use of that, and then we’re also at the aspect of responsibility. It also has a lot to do with responsibility at this point. Maybe we also want to look at this term again. Whether we go into self-responsibility there too, take responsibility, or simply to some extent just take an observing stance and maybe just consume. Those are all terms we’ve already opened up in this context. And here we can nicely bring them back together at this point. It somewhat raises the question, especially because more and more is controlled or regulated from outside too. We consume, at this high speed of information flood, also very, very much information, have, with all the technologies, the challenge that we might sometimes not really be able to distinguish what’s fake news and what are really facts. And here we come to various challenges that might also favor an immaturity, in inverted commas. And then the question is, what’s the difference between self-inflicted and maybe also caused by others. Yes, Erik, would you like to continue on this, or should we directly bring in Jürgen first?

Go ahead, Jürgen.

Alright. A wonderful good morning, dear Jürgen.

Good morning, dear Yasemin, good morning Eric and everyone in the room. I hope you can hear me. I’ve changed location a bit locally now and am definitely getting signs that it’s working. The topic is appealing in that, I think, because it can again be looked at from two views, starting from the terminology, namely immaturity defines a status. I am immature. The precursor to immaturity is disenfranchisement. A process leading to this disenfranchisement. And dear Yasemin, as so often, it’s really incredible, one of your last remarks is an argument for me as to why it’s really important, and a sign of our times, that right now, on a gigantic scale, everything is being done by various authorities to lead us into a state of increasing immaturity, namely with the means of overloading and flooding us with information. Because immaturity, and thank you dear Erik, I heard your research and reference to Kant. He explains immaturity through the non-use of the mind, completely value-free now let’s say. And he defines immaturity, to put it a bit more simply from my point of view, by saying, there is mind present, but it’s not used. And that’s why it’s self-inflicted. With the term other-inflicted I currently have a bit of an issue, dear Yasemin. But maybe on that, I hope I can come back to it later, so that I would indeed have the ability, cognitively, to prove myself mature in the sense of a definition, an education, as we’ve already done several times, namely to act self-determined and self-realized. The “other-infliction” has the goal, goal, of covering up, switching off this self-responsibility, responsibility, also a term you used, Yasmin, and now I close the circle to your intro to the topic yesterday, Professor Hütter, in my view, put it very well, this endeavor and undertaking to turn us as subjects into objects. That basically means, with the exclusion of our mind, which says, actually something should be done here, to say, no, I won’t do it, I’m either too comfortable, I’ve been told that there are other more comfortable positions for me, or the other position, as Kant also explains it, I’m afraid to use my mind. Kant sees these two motivations anyway. So far so good, hopefully for that, and as I said, I hope to be able to stay with you. Thank you very much for listening.

Wonderful. Thank you, thank you so much. And maybe once more in addition, a question about this other-infliction. So other-inflicted, in that possibly, for example, we’ve also brought up the term education and the educational mandate on one hand and the school system, on the other hand, depending on how the school system is structured, in inverted commas, that could also fall under it being other-inflicted too, in inverted commas, because maybe there’s a different goal behind it, or maybe there’s no other goal at all, but at least the design of the system contributes to, well, for example, not questioning, not using the mind, in inverted commas, the way you just described it, and so on. Could you also see that under this other-inflicted category, from your view Jürgen?

You certainly can, or I think even yes, I’ll fully agree to that 100 percent. I only intervened slightly with regard to other-infliction because of blame. My understanding is that this blame is also objectively recognized and seen by the other, the third party, as blame, so as a negative. And that’s not the case with many positions, including in the educational context, because the underlying orientation of our, deliberately underlying, orientation of the educational system had a very concrete state-supporting background, and was accordingly good, at least from the view of those who pushed this system forward and still maintain it today. You could argue splendidly about this, I find. But that’s why I have a slight discomfort with this other-infliction with regard to immaturity, because I think that the majority of preventing immaturity certainly lies in the responsibility of the individual, because we’re not objects, we’re subjects by nature. We all have a mind, and regardless of how educated it is, we have a self-understanding, and thereby the basis for an education. So, dear Yasemin, thank you.

Thank you, thank you so much. Here too we can look at it from different perspectives again. On one hand we say that something like self-determination, self-efficacy, self-organization isn’t given to us at birth and needs to be learned to some extent too. That means it needs a corresponding accompanying process. That means per se I’m with you that ultimately, in inverted commas, so to speak, the responsibility lies with us, and accordingly the blame here can’t simply be transferred. And at the same time, if we say that this process may not be, so this, that it needs to be learned and requires a corresponding accompaniment, then we can already speak of an other-inflicted immaturity in this context too. That doesn’t mean that it doesn’t eventually come to an end, at a certain age, when you start to question and start certain things maybe with your own mind, that you might still not be able to enter into maturity, and here too the responsibility lies with the subject, so to speak. However, it plays out differently, how quickly that works or doesn’t work, depending on the way we accompany this process too. Because we know this, for example, from, this might be a nice example for this, we know this for example with people who’ve finished school and then first don’t know at all what they want to do, or in which direction they want to develop, and first come into a search mode and self-discovery to some extent, maybe just to find out at all how things should continue now. And that can be very differently pronounced for everyone, how long that takes, in inverted commas. And that’s why this shows that this process can represent an acceleration or a deceleration with regard to this maturity, or the formed immaturity. So that would be one perspective. The second one I still had in mind was what I said before with this example. Classically, someone who leads a team for example, who might per se be shaped in their manner in such a way that they keep controlling, doing quality assurance again or similar, there doesn’t even need to be an intention behind it, in inverted commas, to make someone immature or anything like that. But the behavior, so to speak, that’s displayed, ultimately also contributes to the other maybe behaving a bit more comfortably at this point. That doesn’t mean giving up the blame or transferring the responsibility to someone else either, from the other perspective too, of the one implementing it, implementing a task. But nevertheless these are partly processes that also happen partly unconsciously here too, and might need a corresponding reflection too, to make one thing or another conscious and realize it in this context in the first place, and accordingly consciously counteract it too, insofar as the need is there accordingly. Erik, Jürgen, would either of you like to continue on this?

Yes, gladly, Erik. Yes, that depends a lot, so the question of blame naturally depends a lot on the understanding of blame, and whether it happens indirectly or directly, possibly. So what I was thinking of too, and you elaborated on that too, is targeted disinformation, for example, to prevent someone from recognizing a certain connection or fact, I’d see that as a self-inflicted or an other-inflicted immaturity of that person, and possibly, exploiting psychological effects or manipulation techniques, to basically bypass their maturity, to establish an immaturity in a certain context. And that can also apply to groups. And yes, so there I’d possibly say an other-infliction. Otherwise you could also take other-causation or other-caused immaturity as a term, and include more, so especially unconscious or unintentional generation of immaturity under that too.

Yes wonderful, thank you, thank you so much. I also like this term “other-caused” at this point, and exactly, and that doesn’t always have to be accompanied by an intention either, but can also happen unconsciously. And then we have, Mia also added to the chat, but if alienation occurs, you’re simultaneously both subject and object. Jürgen, would you like to continue on that too?

I unfortunately can’t right now, sorry.

Alright. Erik, can you do something with that?

Not concretely right now. I wanted to draw a bit of a connection toward new technologies and progress in general. You’d already hinted at that a couple of rounds back too. That also fits a bit with our overarching theme, when it comes to technologies now being applied and developed that are also life-changing. For example self-driving cars or similar things, smart city solutions. There I’d also see a kind of immaturity, at the moment when you have no idea about these technologies or what exactly works in the background, if you have no clue, or no, well you don’t have to be an expert in anything, but have such a basic idea of why, for example, it’s suddenly possible for a car to recognize a duck or something. And I don’t mean the lemon duck now, but the animal. Things like that. And if you’re not, so to speak, in inverted commas, staying on top of it, or at least have a basic understanding of it, then that can also lead to an immaturity in connection with, well, with developments and possibilities and how society generally functions and life proceeds, yes, that can also lead to an immaturity in this context.

Yes, thank you, thank you so much. And there are quite a lot of examples we can pick up, which are often discussed or were discussed in the past. Starting with navigation systems, for example, so that you no longer need to operate the map yourself somehow, but have a navigation system instead. With the consequence that people have maybe ended up in some lake with their car, because they no longer “think along” and engage their mind, but just execute what the navigation device says here. All the way to, and these are discussions taking place too, that the more we, so to speak, about technology and so on. On one hand these are great tools that support us in daily life, and at the same time, the less we ourselves become active with our brain, that also leads to certain neural pathways maybe being broken down again too, because they’re not trained. So something like, the more often I use the calculator out of convenience, the harder it becomes for me to add, multiply, divide the simplest numbers, for example, and whatever else. And that has, viewed in the overall context, effects again, so to speak, in this context of maturity or immaturity as a consequence, if that doesn’t just happen in one area, but especially against the background of these technologies that are increasingly used, applied in an increasing number of areas, so to speak. All the way to, now we could of course also pick up the technology, so the tool for example, ChatGPT. There too we have a lot where we can get support. And on the other hand we of course also get into a certain comfort to some extent through that. So with the simplest things, not to think about how I could formulate the email or similar, but instead first transfer this task to a bot that supports us with it. And of course that’s efficiency-increasing, and at the same time, just like the advantages that are incredibly there, and the opportunities that arise from that, it also has disadvantages that come with it at this point, which you can also see here. Then I’d like to pick up something from Sabine too, who also brought this into the chat. Especially education-wise, you often have to stand against something to go your own way. The child starts school at six, has to take the school in whichever school district, depending on where you are. That’s the catchment area. The subjects are prescribed, all subjects have to be taken, etc. And she sends warm regards from her vacation. A nice vacation to you, dear Sabine. Yes, and accordingly the frame here, for example what can be recognized with regard to school, the frame is already very, very strongly set. That means, you usually can’t choose the class, in inverted commas, the classmates, especially primary school has a catchment area prescribed too, so nearby, these are all understandable thoughts behind it too, so the child can easily get to school and so on. All the way to the subjects that are prescribed as a framework here, so that you have few choices at this point. And accordingly we’re back at this aspect, so to speak, of how far do I even have the possibility in the first place to get into this self-responsibility. Am I even offered the framework, in inverted commas, to take responsibility in this context. You could discuss that further too. Erik, Jürgen, would either of you like to continue on this?

I’d like to come back to an aspect, dear Yasemin, that can certainly also be transferred to the school system and everything else. Let me pick up again on this classic reasoning and the questioning, why does the acceptance of immaturity even happen? And there I mentioned two positions. One is comfort, and the other is cowardice. And we’ve already mentioned very many essentially relevant terms, especially like responsibility and influence. But one aspect, I think, that’s very important, is still missing in this context, and that’s courage. The courage to stand up, the courage, and you mentioned this in your last remarks, if the framework is prescribed, yes, but if I notice that this framework no longer fits, to stand up and say, this can’t continue this way, and make an effort to find corresponding fellow campaigners, because the need for change and the insight into a change of this prescribed framework is often so powerful, but latent. And it needs, and this is also experiential knowledge, at least my experiential knowledge, it needs a pioneering spirit who steps forward and says, listen people, it can’t continue this way with how our children are forced into a compulsory schooling, but not a compulsory education. And something needs to change there. So for me courage is one of the key terms in dealing with immaturity. Thank you.

Yes, thank you, thank you so much. That’s a really, really important aspect. And yes, the, let me call it cowardice now, in inverted commas, that you mentioned, that results also then. We’ve talked about how it’s always about existential security for our brain too. That means, possible consequences are often attached to this here too. That means, what’s the price, in inverted commas, that I may pay for that? So the comfort on one hand, not expending energy, that’s also explainable from the brain’s perspective. If there’s no necessity, then I’m in the comfort zone. Then the aspect of existential security, so what’s the price I may pay, or what’s the consequence I have to bear, if I step out of this fear and then courageously, for example, “stand up.” And standing up courageously often also means, yes, maybe also enduring a certain degree of suffering, in inverted commas. And we can, if you want, pick up as an example, precisely the example with the Corona pandemic. There were also, in this context, very many people who were of the opinion, relatively from the beginning, that, for example, the measures being taken were disproportionate, or however you want to put it, that there was no justification for it, whether that was doctors, whether that was scientists, whether that was people from the population. And here you see, for example, that for those who stood up at that point, and now regardless of evaluating whether that was justified or not. But we could observe very interestingly what happened then, how, for example, stigmatizations took place too, how people were, in inverted commas, partly, from my personal point of view, silenced too, how it was handled, to this day by the way, that’s not yet resolved or clarified from my point of view. And we observe this not just in the context of the pandemic, but we’ve observed this now, right now too, in the context of the Ukraine war. So this thing, whoever isn’t for something specific is automatically somehow against it, so these polarizations are also opened up. And currently we’re observing it now with all these climate discussions too. So it’s relatively irrelevant which events from the last approximately three years we pick up, I find it very, very strongly observable how it’s handled on one hand, and what consequences that then has, and leads to, yes, we could now say, well that’s cowardly not to stand up. On the other hand, if we look against the background of our brain, it’s about existential security, for many that’s also connected with what effects it has for me professionally and so on and so forth, and there the existence is actually threatened, and then it’s understandable that one person or another doesn’t stand up, for example, even though they might have a different view, or how would you assess that, Jürgen? Can you hear me?

Yes, we hear you.

Yes, you’re of course completely right. Absolutely thumbs up on that. But on the other hand, I think, there’s also the flip side, if someone is threatened, or feels threatened, or the threat is obvious, in that I have to expect consequences that another obtrudes on me, and thereby achieves my immaturity, then for me the counterweight I need to weigh is actually the threat of giving myself up as a subject, dear Yasemin. So it is and remains, in my view, that we’re actually spared in any conflict situation from making a decision. And this decision can be courageous, or it can be cowardly. And which way this pendulum swings depends, in my view, on the evaluation of the consequences. Whether I bow and go along with the mainstream, or on the other hand, whether I put myself in the situation of walking around with the awareness, I actually have a mind, and my mind tells me, this isn’t correct, what’s happening here, and I do nothing about it. That’s the opposing position for me, namely the threat to my self-determination. I hope I could convey reasonably well what I wanted to say. Thank you.

Yes, thank you, thank you so much. I think so, and here too the question then arises, we’ve seen this in many contexts too, in inverted commas, that there’s not just one extreme or the other. I’m totally with you that it’s ultimately about making a decision here too. And at the same time the decision then, for example, in the form of how it’s shaped, so to speak, you can always make new evaluations too. So we’ve observed people in recent years who maybe went very vehemently into one position or another, and thereby also went public and so on. But there are certainly also positions that might be less vehemently visible. And nevertheless that doesn’t mean the position isn’t there, or that the position isn’t lived or implemented in some way. So there’s not just one extreme or the other here, but you can shape that differently in the design, so to speak, and make it experienceable or visible for others, just as for yourself too. Would you like to continue on this, Jürgen?

I’m sorry. I can’t connect to that right now. Please excuse me for that. But I’m thinking about it.

Alright. Okay, wonderful. Good. While you’re thinking, so we now have no further comments to consider. We now also have a few minutes before nine. Erik has said goodbye. He’d already announced that he’d be picked up and couldn’t exactly judge how long he could stay. He was with us relatively long for that though, I find that great, and has now said goodbye to us. We now have ten to nine. Are there further aspects or points we haven’t picked up yet, Jürgen, that you’d like to bring in too? Otherwise I’d say let’s move into the closing round for today.

Yes, I think so, or I’d prefer that, that I say for myself, this topic really affects me, especially in the connection again that you created with the topic of connection, and also from my area of experience, I once had to draw the consequence at a big project to leave this project, because I stood up. I know, I know that’s difficult. And I know that often the pendulum swings in the other direction, to accept, out of fear all the way to loss of existence, and courage in particular fades away. But I said that with full awareness and pride too, that has consequences and that has repercussions. And if someone asked me today, which was your most successful project, I’d name this project among the first, because exactly in this project, this has nothing to do with the topic of the project now, but with this project I stayed true to myself. And that’s also why this is a topic that really affects me. And when the subject of immaturity and the confrontation with it obviously and increasingly, in my view, affects the development of our children and the development of an education, in that we lack courage, and I include myself in some sub-areas too, then that always makes me very concerned. And still, heartfelt thanks for this room. And I wish you all a nice day still.

Yes, thank you, thank you so much also for sharing openly at this point. And yes, I’m also always, in inverted commas, torn, because on one hand you need rooms like this one, to pick up certain topics too and talk about them. And at the same time, through the reticence in the room, in inverted commas, quite generally, I also get the impression that it might also be difficult for one person or another to talk about it, or actually go into this courage, to get into the exchange here too. Which I can certainly understand, but at the same time it makes it all the more difficult or challenging to pick up such topics too, especially when they’re taboo topics, for example, to openly talk about it here in a trusting framework. And at the same time we of course also know that this room gets published too, through the podcast episodes we have too. So accordingly it’s very, very exciting to observe that too. And I can assure you that it’s also always a weighing for me too, to consider which topics we pick up, from which perspectives we open them up, how we can set the guardrails accordingly, to really hear perspectives in a nice exchange, in a dialogue, and meet each other eye to eye too. And all the way to, now we’re going a step further, considerations especially with experts or authors who are invited, and so on. So there’s a huge, in inverted commas, tail behind that. And making these decisions again and again. With aspects that, and I notice this very, very strongly right now, at least I can share this from my perspective, with aspects that, in inverted commas, exclusively concern us, in a matter that concerns us personally, where maybe there’s no polarizing opinion in one direction or another from external sources yet, it’s significantly easier maybe to make decisions too, and stand by this decision for yourself, because then, well, different reactions can come from outside, but overall it’s not accompanied by a massive evaluation. Whereas when these are aspects, we just picked up a few examples from the last three years, whether that’s the Corona pandemic, the discussions that took place about it, whether that’s the war situation within the EU, how you feel about it, or whether that’s in the climate context. We could also pick up the gender topic here and include it. Then it suddenly becomes clear that there are certain challenges here that suddenly play out on a different level. And accordingly I find it totally exciting to observe that too, also in ourselves, so also in the sense of self-reflection. What does that do to us? How do we personally deal with it? And maybe also, at one point or another, to consider, when we notice certain reactions in ourselves in this context, to reflect on that too, and consider whether it doesn’t take even more courage at one point or another, for example to pick up taboo topics, to talk about them, to get into exchange, and not go into cowardice here, in inverted commas, regardless of which position you represent with a certain opinion at this point. So accordingly I find this really, really exciting. Right, let me just look into the chat again. So Sabine also writes, you often have to look for detours or bypasses. The normal path is easy. Exclamation mark, great topic, great day. Thank you again for the feedback, and thanks Jürgen again too. I thank you very, very warmly too. I’m curious how it continues tomorrow. And namely tomorrow we have labor market developments. I see right now, I’m not sure, Jürgen, whether you’d like to join again. Let’s try it now. Maybe you’d like to… I’ll send out the invitation. So if you’d like to add anything else, you’re warmly invited to join again. If you don’t follow the invitation, then I’ll know that you maybe don’t want to right now. Or you write briefly in the chat. I can already make the announcement for tomorrow. So we definitely want to look at labor market developments tomorrow. To what extent are labor market developments, skilled labor shortage, and unemployment interdependent? We want to focus on that tomorrow and see where the room leads us tomorrow. And then we have a few more rooms planned on various levels for the coming days. So Deep Talk is there for you every day at 8am. Feel free to join if the topics interest you. And just make sure you use the opportunity to join too, to promote this exchange further in that direction, since we can open up various examples and also various perspectives through that. That’s simply important, that we have these different perspectives here, to get new impulses through the exchange, new thoughts, and thereby also get the opportunity to sort our thoughts at this point. Right, and let’s see. I’m already getting the first comments on tomorrow’s topic. No, we’ll discuss that tomorrow. So in that sense, I wish you a wonderful day, and I’m looking forward to the next round tomorrow. Until then.