Once a month I make the drive to a college library to which I have a ‘Friends of the Library’ card that allows me to borrow any book in that library. For a yearly fee of $25 I have access to a world of books. Once a month I take back 6-8 books and borrow another 6-8 books. When I get home I scan all of my new acquisitions and eventually read bits and pieces of several.
Occasionally I hit a bonanza and this last visit was, I think, such an occasion. I borrowed Matthew Arnold’s book “Essays in Criticismâ€. I have only read a few pages in the introduction but find that I cannot go two paragraphs without seeing several intellectual ‘gems’ that I must pursue with gusto.
Matthew Arnold 1822-1888 had four significant literary periods in his life. In the 1850s we was a poet, in the 60s a literary critic, in the 70s religious and educational writings, and in 80s he returned to criticism and essays.
T. S. Eliot once said “in one’s prose reflection one may be legitimately occupied with ideals, whereas in the writing of verse, one can deal only with actuality.†Arnold’s poetic efforts reflect that opinion. He records himself as a sick individual wondering in a sick and bifurcated world “one dead/ the other powerless to be bornâ€.
In one of his essays he writes “Force and right are the governors of this world; force till right is ready.†He was contrasting the French Revolution with the English Revolution. The French struggle “found undoubtedly its motive-power in the intelligence of men. And not in their practical sense;†Whereas the English Revolution found its motive-power in the questions, is it legal? or is it according to conscience?
How about force while right isn’t looking (or in our case, asleep). That is quite a gem, such utility in one phrase, where does one begin applying it amid all of today’s current issues?
I think this sort of misses the idea. I believe force represents just going and getting it done despite anything whereas right indicates a reasoned and thoughtful response. Either this or I read it wrong.
Crooked you are a massive optimist there’s a universe it’s reasonable 2/3 of the world’s population don’t die of starvation or quickly curable diseases
Reason rules - go Plato -
The illusion that the world is controlled purely by force is just some random sophist “intruding” on our beardy multi-logos all is well
reason rules
right follows LOGICALLY
OI
STOP
giggling
I’ve no interest
he’s right
let him be “right”
no one dies
well no one I KNOW
all works correctly
actually its so reasonable we can just let this thread sink like all the others
we have good avatars (of the dialectic)
and
post structural philosophy
ironically applied
but by US
the non existent subject
still kind of lonely for our non existent ego
(after all the subject we are egotistical for is a decentred one and yet EVRYONE HAS TO HEAR imafginary fractured us tell them how nothin we are over and over - even our underwear has significance)
everything is OK
thank fuck for reason
we’re saved
no
one
dies
this thread sinks
like all the others
maybe faster
given
the certain honesty that coberest injected from the get go and fair play to people that start the threads as opposed to letting them fade…
Superior force is not even the deciding factor in the outcome of all battles and civil conflicts. There are often confounding factors: the mud at Waterloo, Hannibal’s tactics at Cannae, a gentle morning breeze at the Battle of Salamis. It sometimes happens that great force founders on seemingly trivial details.
For want of a nail the shoe was lost,
For want of a shoe the horse was lost,
For want of a horse the rider was lost,
For want of a rider the battle was lost,
For want of a battle the Kingdom was lost,
And all for the want of a nail.
Benjamin Franklin, Poor Richard’s Almanac of 1757
And yet all this is a matter of history and physics. It is the historian’s and the physicist’s place to explain what happened and why things happen. It is not a duty of their profession to say what ought to happen. “Was” is the realm of history. “Is” is the realm of science. “Ought” is the realm of ethics.
“One half of the children born die before their eighth year. This is nature’s law, why contradict it?” Rousseau
Why contradict it? Because it isn’t good enough for us. Because in this world “is” is not “ought.”
The massive car-bomb that eight years ago tore apart twenty-eight, mostly women and children, at Omagh was incredibly forceful; but is there something - anything - about the sheer force of the bomb that made what happened there right? Here, for example, is a photograph of fifteen year-old Lorraine Wilson.
Lorraine had been working that morning in an Oxfam charity shop alongside her best friend. They were both killed by the blast. Was there anything in the might, the power, or the force of either the bomb or the bombers that made the killing of this lovely girl the right thing to do? We can all agree on the incontrovertible fact that whoever killed her obviously had the power to kill her. But again, that is a historical fact. It has nothing to say about whether it was right that she was killed. Right is not determined by might, by force or by history.
To be honest i was all but praying for counter arguments here!
Depends though – nature, guerilla tactics, attitude of civilian population etc are also “forces†in a general sense.
Believe me I don’t want to equation FORCE = RIGHT to be correct but unfortunately it best “describes†the way things are right now
– Maybe if right could become a “force†with people – obviously its not what I want (eg what “ought†to be) or I wouldn’t be a lefty and an activist
But when “Right” takes up force for its cause - force seems to “take it” very quickly
Anyway its cheered me up that some one has, at least, taken on the above equation (he he its Plato v Sophists round 2!)
Sorry crooked I was more than a little drunk!
Though writing rants to ILP was probably the most harmless thing I could have done.
Was some what “overwhelmed†with pessimism.
Quite alright, I wasn’t sure what your were getting at so I just let it be. Now that I see you wanted continued discourse I am sad that I didn’t speak up.
I must agree with this thought, because let’s remember the quote is: “force til right is ready”. So what we could be seeing is that right simply isn’t ready yet.
To me this makes sense because we haven’t cleared away enough of the chaff of a young society to start making decisions based on right. Until man is enlightened (more civilized?) we make decisions with force. So maybe maybe we should pose the question: If force can overpower right, then how can right ever hope to prevail?
Jake, I think what is right is ultimately a force within people, rather than might, which naturally refers to the capacity of people to apply force on other people. So it’s a matter of faith whether there is some force within us all that precludes the force of what is right, and hence directs might toward something other than what is right. There’s also krossie’s question of whether the force within us can simply be determined by the might of other people; I suppose the answer to that is ultimately faith as well.
There is something more than just hope, for if you consider today’s world an advance from the days of cavemen, we clearly are going somewhere, but are we being directed by what we believe is right?
Would you not consider these basic rights as agreed upon by the UN to be a sign of advancement.
I think that at least some ethical principles are universal and to look for those principles I turn for guidance to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights established in 1948 by the General Assembly of the United Nations.
Here are a few principles laid out in the 30 articles of the declaration:
All humans are equal in dignity and rights.
All humans have the rights of life, liberty, and security.
No human shall be enslaved.
No human shall be tortured.
All humans have a right to an adequate standard of living.
All humans have a right to education.
All humans have a right to peacefully assemble.
All humans are equal under the law.
Many of these ideas come from “Critical Thinking: Tools for Taking Charge of Your Professional and Personal Life†by Paul and Elder.
I do, although I wouldn’t say it’s beyond doubt that we’re being guided by our sense of righteousness–especially considering the UN’s lack of power today, with your particular example. Also, I don’t think those principles are ‘universal’ in a literal sense, as ethics only mean things to people.
Coberest (btw Coberest I do really mean that drunken thing about fair play to those people who do start threads up and put their thoughts out there - so well done in general!)
raises the UN principals - but the precise problem is that the UN has no FORCE behind it (or very little)
ON THE OTHER hand if it was to become a mighty international force then there are massive negative possibilities as well
in fact I think a weak crappy UN may be the best of all bad alternatives !
(well short of an anarchist society with power DEFUSED out horizontally - my “ideal” position - but can’t see that any time soon)
I think you have allowed your need to be skeptical to override your obvious good intellect. The UN started with great good intentions and a sense of need for an attempt at world right versus world force. It appears to me that if the intention of the UN is world right it can hardly begin by becoming world force at its inception.
Thanks Coberest I tend to work more emotionally then intellectualy - not good
Good intentions need force behind them to work - but force takes over everything - that seems to be the nub of my dilema
The other problem is once it comes to “right” everyone has an opinon eg the omagh bombers Michael mentions probably thought they were deploying force for “right” (PLEASE NOTE I’m not in anyway condoning or supporting that massacre!)
Well some laws are obviously very necessary and “protect” all eg against drink driving, respect for traffic lights and so on.
But I would submit that most laws actually protect the rights and property of a small rich minority. In fact law is designed by those with the monopoly of force to preserve it.
Very rarely do laws (even ones with the best intentions) protect “the weak” or grant “rights”
(some of the American constitutional ammendments are good esp the Fourth which was a last minute victory for the “radicals” amongst the founding fathers - from what I’ve heard…)
(at this stage I guess I’m moving from philosophy to my own anarchist politics - but any way!)
Int he grand scheme of things, no we haven’t. Think of the history of the world versus us and think about how long mammals have been around. I don’t believe success through evolution is exactly measurable, but I do feel we still have a whole lot of time.
