In this pattern, you may notice, no argument great or small is ever wasted. It is just neatly put away for another day, like schoolchildren do their wads of chewed up chewing gum.

Okay, I admit that we sometimes fail to behave like Plato in the conduct of an argument — listening politely to the other point of view before coming up with a reply, and that sort of thing — but why should that be a problem when we happen to be right? Take Delhi motorists. It has been scientifically established that 90 per cent of deaths of motorists in the city are caused, not from accidents, but from parking lot brawls. Nah, I’m just making this up — but, seriously, one in two motorists in Delhi are high on high-octane arguments, and sometimes even spontaneously self-combust before your eyes. But this should not lead de Bono to conclude that they are engaging in primitive activity. They are merely arguing in defence of their right to lateral mobility — and immobility.

Of course, ever so often we argue in chorus as part of a big, fat Indian mob that has all the characteristics of a gaggle of Neanderthals. I would concede that a lively mob composed of articulate, intelligent, argumentative Indians — say of the kind that made news in Bihar lately — can engage in a rigorous cycle of argument and counter-argument that can sometimes reach life-threatening proportions. But do not conclude from this that brute unreason has got translated into brute force. On the contrary, such action is in fact driven by the need to maintain the highest levels of law, order and justice delivery — something that Bihar’s chief minister and his bureaucrats are too busy arguing over, to be able to do anything about.

... contd.