Here is how I see it (in as few words as possible): fiction is entertainment; whether it is a book; film; or work of art. It is not supposed to shape us, but when it does, there are often more bad than good consequences. I expect that, proportionally, writers of fiction bank far more money than non-fiction writers. That is only MY hunch, of course. I don't plan to do any hard research towards writing a book on the subject. Not worth the effort, I think. Non-fiction writing is for academics who have particular credentials---club members, uh, if you will. You asked another key question in your post: Can it (fiction) make us better than we were before? As an addendum (or amendment) to what I asserted above, I'll say: sometimes; the caveat being it depends upon the values; the core character of the reader(s)/observer(s).

FICTION?S PATHS
In every way, except one, concerning my conscious-self, I am today at age 69, the same person I was at 16. The one exception is that I have learned one more truth since then: ?There are many paths.?
How did I learn this one idea? As our hosts point out, by practice. Self-fashioning, self-realizing, and practicing changes, and exercising my self-changing chops, in response to all the stuff around me, and to appealing ideas in sources such as fiction, among other sources.
But it takes practice, practice, practice, and much exercise, of self-changing abilities, to be able to make changes ? to find other ?paths.? Doing this, I call ?B12K1,? or ?Be One to Know One.? If you want to understand Catholicism, say, as a ?path,? don?t just read about Catholicism; try to see what it would mean to be Catholic by finding in yourself what the sources of such a belief might be, and practicing upon that belief as best you can ? now you are coming closer to real understanding.
Only philosophers could be expected to be good at B12K1, because only philosophers are professionally interested in, and open to, considering the worthiness of various paths. The hosts struggled with the idea of the impact of fiction, in the show: but it is a struggle only philosophers are practiced in, and it is only of interest to them. All other readers read for the ?entertainment? of ?viewing? other paths from afar.

Hey Paul- I posted mine before I saw yours. Must be some "truth" for us both to have had such a similar experience; I wish I had been aware that it could help me with girls! But I always say "There is only one thing I have ever done that didn't have as its intended object to "get" girls: play golf." Very few women are impressed with a guy's ability to play golf.

To Paul and Mirugai----and anyone who believes in things they don't understand: There is this ephemeral, unquantifiable thing called synchronicity, as named by Carl Jung. After reading about it, I realized I had experienced it---although,my contemporaries called it coincidence. Clearly, fiction shapes us-like it or not---changing paradigms are a part of cultural evolution, or, to repeat a tired aphorism: progress. Some learned thinkers are questioning the whole progress thing. Philosophy asks questions. All good. Science asks questions, and, eventually, arrives with answers---some good; some, not so much.
So, what about that synchronicity thing? Is that fiction---or something else? Tell me something good,
Respectfully, Neuman.

SYNCHRONICITY, HOW TO ?
I think I know what it is, but a much more valuable exercise is to think about how a philosopher might go about finding out what it is. In other words, what is the philosophical method for addressing the question: ?What do you think about synchronicity??
Philosophy is rational thinking about thought. The duality (though MJA and the Buddhists say, quite correctly also, there is no duality, only unity) is 1. Matter and 2. Consciousness. Matter is the realm of science; demonstration and illustration are the methods of proof (and I contend, the more dramatic (in a theatrical sense) the demonstration, the more convincing -- the more ?true? ? the conclusions).
Consciousness is the realm of philosophy, and through metaphor, poetry. Rational thinking about thought is the method of philosophy. How to practice this method? A while back, a poster to the blog said: ?Without neuroscience, philosophy is just endless speculation.? She is correct (though she was seeking to disparage): Neuroscience is in the matter realm, and has no place in philosophical inquiry. But the best way to do philosophy is to endlessly speculate, rationally. There are in fact two ways to end the speculation, with either ?I agree with A,? or ?I think it is A; you think it is B, but we agree to disagree.? Only philosophers train themselves to rationally consider both A and B (and the other ?many paths?); and these considerations are done by solitary thinking in a comfortable chair, or in dialog with other philosophers (I think it was Plato who said that all writing is one-sided advocacy, whereas dialogue is a better route for exploring propositions).
Keep in mind that you are not looking for ?explanations.? That is the realm of science (matter). It is tempting to be led into the abyss of explaining something, but the process of finding causation obscures and obviates the doing of philosophy: for instance, I am sure some neuroscientists can pinpoint certain nerves and genes and molecular and cellular structures that ?make? a person an optimist, say, or a Jew, say (I have heard talk of ?the Jewish gene?), but that ?fact? still doesn?t describe the consciousness states that are optimism and religious belief. The philosopher Scott the Gardener says: Do an MRI of a running-engine automobile, and the image will have blue and red and orange colored sections, but that won?t tell you how the car works. And a very clever quantum physics philosopher asked Ken and John ?Why do you think everything needs to be explained?? Use endless speculation as your method, not explanation.

I'd like to thank Mirugai, Michael and Dave (that uneducated carpenter guy). First, Michael: you stick to your Buddist-sounding roots. I respect that immensely, even though "being" and "oneness" do not apply to every discussion and/or argument about aspects of philosophy and metaphysics. Mirugai takes a logical pragmatic approach in pointing out that Michael's unity consists of a duality, whether he likes it or not. Finally, Dave appears to have an experiential foundation with which we may take issue and find fault. I do not sense that he cares. He is what many of us are still seeking: comfortable in his own skin.
Diversity of experience and opinion are part of what makes us conscious beings. Bully to all, and to all, a good night,
Neuman.

Funny, I always thought quantum much more understandable than Archetypes of the Collective Unconscious. Synchronicity is a stubborn insistence upon seeing a pattern even where there is none. The most moving novel I ever read was Jude the Obscure, but I sincerely hope that synchronicity does not hold.      
Mirugai,
Not Exactly. The Plato dialog you hint at is the Phaedrus. In it, Socrates lampoons a written text as incapable of responding to a simple question. In his lifetime writing, rather than recitation, became the dominant form of literature, and he was ruing the loss, not so much of immediacy as responsibility. The most concrete form of the proposition is, before after all, the statement. Take the person out of it and something is lost indeed. Reading is missing that something. Dialectic takes two, at least. The written text, including the novel, is undialectical.

Been awhile since I have thought about the premise(s) of this post. But, inasmuch as it remains a current and pervasive influence on civilizations all over the world, I thought I'd offer another idea or two on the notion of fiction as a shaper of human thought and actions. There are, of course, many forms of and alleged purposes for propaganda. In the final analysis, however, the foundational aim of propaganda (often fictional in nature) is the control of humans; the minimization of anarchy; and maintenance of a status quotient, with the intention of keeping the gears greased and the machinery running smoothly. All tellers of stories, proponents of propaganda and founders of fiction have their particular social, political and/or religious goals as they present half-truths, obfuscations and outright lies, with the hope of swaying their audiences to their ways of thinking. And, make no mistake about it, they will employ all manner of artifice to achieve the goal(s) at hand.
Point of Illustration: I was recently moved when the new head of the Catholic Church praised an individual whose name is well known as an "angel" of something or other. The personage named did not in my best recollection seem at all angelic. I was moved, however. Moved by disbelief. Many people of a certain age now disbelieve almost anything they are told by experts, authorities and others who have been endowed with the public trust. Much of this fringe group (a public that once trusted most everything) now trusts no one. To them, everyone now must pay cash---no checks; no money-orders; no credit cards---no exceptions. Lying to get one's point across; to gain and keep others' attention and trust; to sell the impossible dream. is the new normal and engenders no shame or trepidation. Remember Michael Valentine, the hero protagonist of that old sci-fi novel by Robert Anson Heinlein ? If you do, perhaps you should grok in fullness what is happening. It is all about control at any cost. Good luck, pilgrims. HGN.

Imagination is the door to fiction. I believe that we all might have passed through this door back and forth in an attempt to experiment with inner thoughts, feelings, perceptions, and so forth. As we grow, evolve, or learn, this willingness to experiment changes, but if we did not have the raw material to imagine built in us, experimentation would be in vain or non-existent.  Aren?t we naturally drawn to empathize with certain characters or abhor others? We might perfect, by means of the learning/reading process, our personal ways to empathize, but the willingness to empathize was there in first place. To me, it is pretty much left to disguising oneself momentarily, as in a Venetian carnival, and going back to your roots next day. For example, I abhor Lolita?s Humbert Humbert prior to reading the novel, but in the end I wonder ? have I learned to empathize with him? I can put myself in his position via my ability to imagine, and I can consider this question. So what just happened in my reading? Then, after some time, I realize I do not actually empathize with that character. Still, the piece opens up the door to thinking about these matters, leaving one, as might be said, with the effects of a hangover.

FICTION?S PATHS
In every way, except one, concerning my conscious-self, I am today at age 69, the same person I was at 16. The one exception is that I have learned one more truth since then: ?There are many paths.?
How did I learn this one idea? As our hosts point out, by practice. Self-fashioning, self-realizing, and practicing changes, and exercising my self-changing chops, in response to all the stuff around me, and to appealing ideas in sources such as fiction, among other sources.
But it takes practice, practice, practice, and much exercise, of self-changing abilities, to be able to make changes ? to find other ?paths.? Doing this, I call ?B12K1,? or ?Be One to Know One.? If you want to understand Catholicism, say, as a ?path,? don?t just read about Catholicism; try to see what it would mean to be Catholic by finding in yourself what the sources of such a belief might be, and practicing upon that belief as best you can ? now you are coming closer to real understanding.
Only philosophers could be expected to be good at B12K1, because only philosophers are professionally interested in, and open to, considering the worthiness of various paths. The hosts struggled with the idea of the impact of fiction, in the show: but it is a struggle only philosophers are practiced in, and it is only of interest to them. All other readers read for the ?entertainment? of ?viewing? other paths from afar.

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