Taking unimportant things seriously is important. It’s often unknown that something is important, or known that it isn’t, and that doesn’t matter for the way in which it’s appropriate to work on details of what’s going on with it. General principles of reasoning should work well for all examples, important or not. Ignoring details is a matter of curiosity, allocating attention, it shouldn’t impact how the attention that happens to fall on a topic treats it.
general enthusiasm for even rather dull and tedious and unsexy work
This is the distinction between “outer enthusiasm”, considering a topic important, and “inner enthusiasm”, integrity in working on a topic for however long you decide to do so, even if you don’t consider the topic important. Inner enthusiasm is always worthwhile, and equivocation with outer enthusiasm makes it harder to notice that. Or that there should be less outer enthusiasm.
Taking unimportant things seriously is important. It’s often unknown that something is important, or known that it isn’t, and that doesn’t matter for the way in which it’s appropriate to work on details of what’s going on with it. General principles of reasoning should work well for all examples, important or not. Ignoring details is a matter of curiosity, allocating attention, it shouldn’t impact how the attention that happens to fall on a topic treats it.
This is the distinction between “outer enthusiasm”, considering a topic important, and “inner enthusiasm”, integrity in working on a topic for however long you decide to do so, even if you don’t consider the topic important. Inner enthusiasm is always worthwhile, and equivocation with outer enthusiasm makes it harder to notice that. Or that there should be less outer enthusiasm.