This morning I heard Kofi Annan speak on Meet the Press. I can’t think of a more noble and dignified human being alive today. What do you say?
nobel.se/peace/laureates/2001/annan-bio.html
un.org/News/ossg/sg/pages/sg_biography.html
Michael
2b honest i cant remember him speaking. But it seems to me that head of the UN is a pretty easy position 2 be in. Deplore war, respect the weak ect. But having no real political necessity to do moraly questionable acts means that he is a pretty easy position 2 be in.
Having said that, i cant think of anyone better lol
I agree with you Luke. But I still really look up to the guy.
he fucking pisses me off. in many respects, luke is right. it is sooo easy in peacetime to go around to bunch of different countries advocating giving more money to poor countries, end to violence, etc. etc. etc. but you know what? when the guy was head of the security forces or whatever, he completely ignored the fax from romeo dillarie saying that an impending genocide would occur in rwanda.
essentially, anin seems to be a strong moralist (which is good) who doesn’t really want/can do anything (which is bad). the result, in my view, is to not be in that position or change the position, so as to execute the necessary plans. it is my view that ultimately, a good person who does nothing is far worse than an evil person on a rampage.
Wha???
Seriously, you think that? Doing bad is better than doing nothing?
I… I … just can’t … I… I’m trying to see it from your point of view, but … uhh.
I can’t.
Help me? I don’t understand.
unlike what some others think, i’m convinced bein head of UN has got to be one hell of a job, …
UN and this guy do very good things, but get little attention because they don’t use big armies and big guns…
i think this place would be far worse without Kofi Annan, i’d like to see the UN built out more… give it a more central place…
but on the other hand, the more power you give it, the more it’ll be corrupted…
you heard about the corruption thing?
well, i don’t think that’s reason to give up on UN or Kofi Annan, because they do many good things and the concept deserves a chance…
gotta love the guy 
willem
Nelson Mandela?
i can see you’re struggling, don’t worry, just breath.
the thing is, i think that all actions are just actions. the contingencies upon which they occur, i feel, are themselves dependent on perspective. in any event, to perform an action is, in my opinion, harder than abstaining from an action. ultimately, of course, both are acts – william james said that choice occurs in both making and not making decisions. its very easy to allow many things occur without allowing ourselves not only to act, but also emotionally react to the events. one could say it’s almost an essential survival skill. i live in a big city, for instance, i could not get through my day if i was bogged down with emotion every time i say a homeless person on the street. on the other hand, for me to kill all the street people that i see because i am troubled by their presence, conversely takes a lot of energy/effort that i will not sacrifice. so, i think it’s very easy not to act. further, something extraordinary must prompt a person to act. as political scientists say, participation in an event requires the incentives to outweight the costs – a classive collective action problem.
that said, i think it is an accurate statement to say that evil in the world occurs because good people do nothing. the problem is that good people aren’t necessairly nice people…they are unwilling to burden themselves with the cost of helping others, because they can’t see a feasible benifit for such action. and there might not be any, that can be arguable. the pyschologist whose spent his entire life studing ‘evil’ and more specifically, genocide and instances of mass hate, publishes articles and establishes centers teaching people how to be nice. it’s the most incredible thing, to see his article published in an anthology of works all trying to explain the technical responses needed to stop war (i.e. give the un a standing army, make a correspondant report to washington so american can take action, etc etc etc) and this pyschologist basically says, ‘we need to raise nice people’ we need to do that.
any action taken requries an individual to be a certain point where committing that act is percieved to be as more valuable than not committing. this perception is hard to change, mainly because often many are unawear they hold it. when bad occurs, this decision has been made. how it has, and how to prevent, is such a fundamentally complex picture that i cannot forsee us ever reaching a point where it can be completely eradicated.
what is possible, however, is for people to react against such actions. and they don’t. and this is why evil happens. we need to raise nice people.
anin is not nice. he’s good, but not nice. and at the end of the day, being good might mean you can write nice speechs and obviously look very handsome in pictures, but it’s not exactly helping the 800 000 dead because of anin’s inaction.
Uhhh, but…
Doing evil is doing something.
What if I want to do this term you label evil, but instead, decide not to.
Am I being worse or better than if I had commited that act?
It’s fair to say that the only reason evil happens is because good people do nothing…that is… if there is more good in this world than evil.
Let’s momentarily define evil as that which is ultimately 100% self serving with zero regard for the future thoughts or emotions of others and those that interact with others (this is a loose definition, I know, but you yourself have yet to distinguish between good and evil).
Now, let’s say that you want to kill someone, but instead decide to do nothing. This would be considered good to most all as murder is generally considered bad… especially to the family of the victim.
From a personal perspective (which is, as I’m sure you’d agree, where my decisions and the decisions of this morgan freeman looking fellow come from), there is a good-do-nothing and a bad-do-nothing.
If I can choose to do nothing when I wish to do bad, this is good. When I choose to do nothing when I wish to do good, this is bad.
(Remember- bad people would not do bad things if they did not wish to do them in the first place)
So, when you state that doing bad is always better than doing nothing, I strongly disagree, as clearly, there are two types of doing nothing and you have constructed what appears (to me at least) something of an either/or fallacy.
Thoughts?
EDIT: Yes, I’m sure there’s SOME philosopher SOMEWHERE in the 3k+ years of philosophy that has said exactly this very thing. No I do not know his or her name. Yes, I want to know their name. No I do not care to hear a quote from this person. Yes, I want to know the reactions to this person. No I do not care to hear a quote from the reactions.
oi, doin nothing may hurt people, but the cause usually lies elsewhere, so without people doin evil, doin nothing would …(except in accidents and so, but doin evil then would be even worse) … doin nothing wouldn’t hurt people except yourself…
willem
an ‘evil’ action = 0
a ‘good action’ = +1
no action = -1
if a person chooses to do inaction, yes, he is worse than if he were to do an act of evil.
what does it mean to be at a position where you want to do evil? let’s remember what i said:
so, not taking action means that this perspective goes unchanged, and likely will only be exhausterbated. to act from this perspective is to demand that society takes action, in some form…prison, rehab, etc. i would rather see a person go through life acting from his perspective than continually not acting. to not act, i think, facillates others to accomplish evil. so, in my equation, of course both good and bad people are in the wrong when they are confined to inaction. the point is, that being good or evil to yourself doesn’t really ‘count’ for much unless you are willing to act on this – and this requires that steps need to be taken to prevent acts of evil from occuring.
your arguement that inaction from being good vs inaction from being bad raises metaphyiscal implications that i am weary of. first, i reach my conclusions because i really don’t believe there is a self that is a prior, or one that we must listen to/cultivate and exist in, to be. rather, the self is defined laregly by actions and intent, and with intent comes history/upbrining/roots/genes. aristotle said that a person’s acts are like throwing a stone in the lake, you can’t recall it, can’t control it (really) but have only the ability to determine how/why you’ll throw it. all inaction is ultimately the worse thing that one can do. for good people, it means that they are not good, but by allowing evil they are participating in the evil to a certain degree. for the bad, inaction means allowing one’s views/persepctive to cultivate to a hieghten degree – action would be required to change such stance.
basically, if you believe you don’t want to kill anyone, let’s accept that you’re ‘good’ – +1. let’s assume you’re standing by a person who’s about to shot another person. if you don’t try to push the shooter away, where does that leave you? the idea that being good but taking inaction just produces neutrality is absurd unless you accept some a prior notion of the self, in which perserving this inner self ranks about the actions that one performs. in that case, all the witness to the shooting would have to do would pray for forgiveness, etc. acts need to define the self if one does not accept the concept of the a priori soul.
evil has been defined by me, rafa, as an action. it is a vague term because it is heavily embedded with contigencies.
but, i do think it can be seen to exist on a continuum of actions, based mainly on intent (the latter seems to be the basis of your defintion). the idea would be, for someone to hold an evil idea without changing allows that view to be held. i would further stipulate that it is perferable for people to hold on such views that risk action, which would likely mean that they would have to revise such views. as i previously said, people like to hold on to their persepectives and not challenge them, so they perfer inaction to action.
let’s use an example of a resturant owner who hates a certain race. but, because of the 14th amendment, etc, etc, etc, has to serve members of that race. holding this perspective without action allows the owner to feign a sense of self-righteousness and justification, probably using observed flaws of the customers to support his world view (i.e. ‘oh, those blacks are loud’ ‘oh, they never leave good tips, they’re stingy’ etc). however, if he were to chase the customers out of his resturant, shouting racist slurs and yelling like a fool, he would have to be dealt with. his world view would have to be altered. and this is ultimately a better thing then the world view not changing, which can feasibly lead to him murdering a person because of their race.
This still doesn’t solve the problems I showed.
What if the world is evil?
What if racism is acceptable?
While change often happens in the positive direction, it is mostly through the complacency of the evil minds and the motivation of the good minds that this occurs, yes?
It’s going on 50 years later and blacks are still feeling racism in the U.S. because it’s there.
So do you see the dilema?
One can describe a lot of a function through its extrema. Let’s look at the extrema of your argument. Here’s a few questions I have.
What would be the morality of an act that prevents any further acts from occuring. In other words, if I could build a machine that would freeze movement of all energy and matter in the universe (time would continue, mind you), the nothing would happen. No change, no movement, no good, no evil. Would this be an evil act, a good act, or something entirely different.
What if it came down to me either using a machine that could freeze motion in the universe or the man next to me using a machine that could destroy the universe. Would I be doing good then? Would I be doing evil? Would I be doing more evil than the man next to me?
I know, it sounds like gibberish and mental masturbation, doesn’t it? However, when you think about it, that is what you’re saying when you define evil as being a subsect of action. What defines evil then (since you disregard intent and perspective)? It would be that which leaves objects in a state of post-facto-interpreted disarray. It would be to bring chaos to order (please, correct me if I am wrong, misunderstand, or am being too simple). If this is the case…then wouldn’t every evil act we do contribute to the destruction of the universe? Wouldn’t every good act we do contribute to the construction of order in the universe? Wouldn’t every act we choose not to do (which is INFINITE) make no difference?
Is man in his most evil when he sleeps?
i’m curious as to know how you don’t think my resturant owner example doesn’t address the current state of racism in america. it was made specifically with that issue in mind. before the voter rights act (1965) about 30% of americans believed that it was right to have interracial schools – now, about 90% believe this is to be the case. this change didn’t come about without a very vocal 70% of the population expressedly voicing their disapproval at such a state…using hoses, police dogs, signs, stones, and just full out violence. if that’s not acts of evil, i don’t know what is. martin luther king would later go on to say that while he could forgive those who choose to hate, but he couldn’t forgive the good people who choose to do nothing. of course racism still exists, but the kind that exists now is worse than the one post 1965 because it fails to be clearly exhibited, and therefore addressed. it probably won’t be until an explosive situation arrises that will prevent it from being ignored.
as to your question of what if the world is evil. then it is. all we can do is display acts of said quality, and continually strive to address them (to alter the views held). this place, this continuos evolution towards going from evil to good, is an inheriently superior position than remaining evil but surpressing the desired acts. this is because in this state of supression, the possibililty to change one’s views is fundamentally less than if one were to act on them.
as for the freeze thing. yes, rafa, i’ll agree that the person who destroys the world is better than one who simply freezes it. this is because the one who destroys it allows for the possibilty that it can later be rebuilt, reformed or something else made in its place. to just freezxe the world does not offer this possibility.
i suspect that the reason that you’re perfering the freezing of world is that it leaves open the possibility that the person can unfreeze the world, and everything can go back to how it was/is. this is a highly suspect assumption, especially if we compare it to the internal psychology of one who wants to committ evil. a person in such a state perceives the world in a ‘corrupted’ way – different from the generally accepted views. not acting is similar to freezing the world with the machine. acting is similar to destroying the world. once someone is in the state of perception that is radically different, the supression of one’s acts do not allow (i.e. does not give anyone any reason to) change the state. why, if you went to the trouble of making that bloody machine and then freezing the world, would one want to undo it? such a prompt must mean that the evil person’s perception will change. i think that it is a fundamental part of human nature not to change unless there is reason to … i.e. unless the world is destroyed.
how could you ask that when i’ve posted:
when i was talking about actions, i meant also evil acts. also, perspective is the basis of intent, i think. i just use perspective because there is something to liebniz’s principle of identity that i find inheriently more compelling than locke’s. how? maybe i like crackpot theories, i don’t know.
i think there might be a difference between acts and the values that we assign to the acts. the values that i have constructed might differ from the comp-sci ‘actual’/technical values. yes, in comp language, no action might =0, but that gives no reason not to assign a different value. especailly because such acts only measure the result, and leave out the intent or rational behind it. values (certainly not mine) don’t have to.
i’ve never said that inaction was evil; just that’s it’s inheriently worse than any action. i think inaction is on a completly different plane than good and evil acts – good and evil would be opposites, while inaction would be the contrary to good and evil acts. the difference is that while certain acts that are considered evil in one situation can be considered good in another, never can action in one instance be considered inaction in another. in other words, good and evil are only acts performed by a person, while action and inaction are states. to be in a state of action doesn’t mean that one always has to act, a to be a nice person doesn’t mean that you have to restructure your life to best actively help those who need it (i.e. i’m not arguing that everyone should chuch their lives away and become missionaries). rather, to be in a state of action means that one would always choose to perform action for the convinctions that he holds over not acting from such beliefs. to what degree depends on how strongly he holds the beliefs. sleep, one can and should believe, is important so it should and needs to be done. not all the time though.
but i will agree that this theory/belief of mine does place action above inaction, leads to the quasi-religious/spiritual/metaphysical conclusion that it is better to be alive than dead.
I may be starting to agree with you, but it still hurts my head.
If you say that good and evil are polar opposites, why don’t you assign them polar opposite values?
If you’re going to say the world is (good vs. evil) vs. nothing, wouldn’t it make more sense to say that:
|Good = +1x |
| Evil = +1y |
|---|
| Nothing = -1x,-1y |
Good and evil are separate vectors working on each other, it seems. Nothingness is a third, unseen vector that works in the opposite direction of apparent good and apparent evil.
To do an act of evil is to move the morality vector into evil space (the y-coordinate in the euclidean plane). To do an act of good moves the morality vector into good space (the x-coordinate in the euclidean plane). Nothingness, though, is the translation vector of the parametric system of good and evil. Nothingness not only doesn’t help good and doesn’t help evil, but it hurts both of them. If you plot these over three-space as a linear function with time being a function of the z-axis, as time constantly increases, every good act and bad act would be a plot in the x/y plane. If you do nothing, you turn reality from a one-to-one onto function into a function that has no reasonable inverse. Not only do you do that, but you also “waste time” as it’s like taking a step forward and a step backward, but time itself is increasing constantly and is limiited.
This is probably why it bothered me so much. I want strongly to pit good versus evil, and what you said DOES allow for that. … I was just caught up on the system for calculating the relative goodness or badness of a system.
One could just as easily ask He-Man why he didn’t save Eternia as one could ask Skeletor why he didn’t try to take it over today.
Doing nothing is wasteful of time, which in the end, is the most precious commodity known to man.
Thank you, Trix.
well said. i’m impressed about how you’re able to connect action vs inaction to something vs nothing. also, your number values are more appropriate, i don’t know man, i just didn’t think of using the absolute value signs. or the z plane. 3 years sans le mathematics does that.
i was approaching it from a moral pyschology perceptive, not a metaphysical one. mainly because the dilemma that one might run up against if we don’t poist action on the imparative to define the self, creates that ‘sophia’s choice’ problems. that is, there are situations where it seems that doing nothing is a perferable option over performing anything (i.e. having to choose which child would be spared from death). making such a choice seems to leave the person in an inheriently worse place than if they did act on something. ultimately though, one must realize that it is the acts themselves that define a person, not the outcomes.
which brings me back to anin. he doesn’t do anything because he doesn’t believe he should – rather, he spends his time exaulting other countries to take up the moral systems to govern their foreign policy. such urges are not only inappropriate, but they are also doing nothing. instead, he should be working to make the un itself more powerful, within the parameters of such moral beliefs, so that it can ethically act in all situations. otherwise, as it currently is, it is an inheriently worse place than if it were to do anything.
I’m a firm believer that everything, from ethics, to asthetics… from epistimology, to ontology…
It’s all Metaphysics. People tend to get confused. Professors have asked me before, “Why are you brining up metaphysical questions in an ethics class”…
I always responded, “There’s no difference”.
Hell, the Randian I tried to lambast a few months ago, he got frustrated because I brought up “epistimological” questions that at first, seemed totally unrelated to his philosophy, but in the end, after much struggle, wound up destroying his arguments.
Which is why I this Ayn Rand sucks… her ethical ideology isnt supported by her metaphysical ideology. On the most base level, they are opposed. In other words, she sounds great, but it’s…well, it’s inconsistent.
“A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds.” ~ Emerson
what’s foolish is the word “hobgoblin”.
i would agree that following something just for consistency/habit/dare i say custom? can be foolish IF:
the perception of acts remains unaltered in the face of contradictory experience.
atlas, the problem then isn’t with action or inaction, but with perception.
anin, in my opinion (and i take it yours) has fairly solid perception. his inability to act on this, is where his immorality is rooted.
I wanted to look up the full text of that quote to get a grasp of what Emerson meant by foolish consistency, but he doesn’t seem to elaborate. I rather like the full passage, though, so I’m just posting it…
I think this conversation has gone far beyond one man who does nothing, Trix.
“A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines. With consistency a great soul has simply nothing to do. He may well concern himself with his shadow on the wall. Speak what you think now in hard words, and tomorrow speak what tomorrow thinks in hard words again, though it contradict everything you said today. “Ah so you shall be misunderstood.” Is it so bad, then, to be misunderstood? Pythagoras was misunderstood, and Socrates and Jesus, and Luther, and Copernicus, and Galileo, and Newton, and every pure and wise spirit that ever took flesh. To be great is to be misunderstood…”
- Ralph Waldo Emerson, from “Self-Reliance”
the progression from custom/habit/hobgoblin to ‘enlightenment’ does rest with the examination of such acts as defined at that moment and after. ermerson seems to be saying that what is foolish is to not examine these things, and accept them unquestionably. which is what i think i pointed out in my last post.
but, i did not realize, and take issue against, emerson’s implication that the ‘great’ souls are somehow naturally constituted. it seems only an assumption though.
self-reliance. pah. what happened to duty to oneself? or even older, self-control? americans always take old shit and put new words on them. not as bad as pythagoras, who i believe is thought to have taken all the ideas attributed to him from his students (including euclid, if i remember correctly).