What kind of social order do you desire?
- There is no ruler, all humans equal
- All people of one belief are equal, the priest is primus inter pares
- The best of us shall rule
0
voters
…
Social Order is a very large animal, mites on an elephant. Us mites, we will eat our elephant to death --but that’s another matter. The mites can hardly decide that the best mite should rule the elephant. And if the mites were all equal, the elephant would still do as it does. This mite just wants to survive and do the best for itself that he can; its only interest in mite organization is that the order does not hamper it. Where it does, this mite migrates to another part of the elephant where a more favorable social order may prevail.
biologically or creationism were equal. What makes us different is our values and personality. However, were all born w/ wat we have and hopefully die with what your born with.
And by “best” I mean people like Ghandi who will wear simple clothes, eat simple food, sleep on a mat, meditate, etc.
Definitely not violent people.
^^Isn’t that worst?
…
Sorry, your overly simple poll made the choices vague. If “best” means “egomaniacs” then I withdraw my vote.
We might hold that all people are equal on a basic moral level, but that does NOT mean that all people are equal in terms of what they can accomplish and contribute to humanity. There are definite advantages and disadvantages of majority rule, and of any form of democracy. On one hand, there is a good amount of control, so that Hitler-esque dictatorships are almost impossible to form. On the other hand, we’re entrusting the election of the world’s most powerful person to, honestly, a bunch of idiots. Why do those who voted for Bush get the same say as those who didn’t? Ideally we’d have a system that would more efficiently put the best man in a place of power. Of course, that begs the question “who would design the system”? A somewhat valid question - but I’m not trying to propose an alternative to democracy. I’m trying to point out that the ideal, in a perfect world, may well not be democracy. The most capable should lead.
…
I think so, actually. Abstractly, I’m a huge fan of the Philosopher King. Now, would such person be an ego-maniac? This might just be a question of definitions. To me, an ego-maniac is NOT someone who thinks that he’s one of the most advanced humans ever to live. After all, it is possible to think that and be perfectly correct.
An ego maniac is someone who is so emotionally attached to believing that they are incredible that they believe it without good reason. This person is necessarily somewhat divorced from reality, and so possibly dangerous.
If Tom Cruise believed that he was one of the smartest people in history, he would be ego-maniacal. If Einstein believed it, he was just perceiving things accurately.
A good Philosopher King would be an absolutely phenomenal person, and would know it. He wouldn’t dissemble behind pretenses of humility - he would tell the truth as he saw it, and if someone said “what do you think of yourself”, he would say “I am one of the greatest humans ever to live”.
…
You can say that you think the ‘best’ of us should rule,
But ‘best’ implies a personal opinion rather than a fact.
Best at what?
Since this option seems to be winning, you could do another poll asking the same question but differently :
Who should rule?
The most intelligent of us?
The most organized of us?
The most educated of us?
The most physically strong of us?
The most beautiful of us?
And so on and so forth. Set some parameters.
One person may prefer a leader with military background.
One person may prefer a leader with professional/business/economic strong points. Or someone may want all of these characteristics in varying degrees. That is why we have elections, I think, to see what the ‘majority’ wants in a leader. At least, theoretically that is how it is supposed to work, though opinions are such fragile things against the strong campaigns, scandals, and media, quick to be influenced and change.
But back to the original poll, I also selected ’ the best of us’ - merely because I rejected the other two ideas as not functional. Restricting the rulership to one particular belief system would make all people outside that system outcast and cause uncountable problems and unrest. Likewise, saying that we will have no structure and everyone does everything for themselves as ‘equals’ is very akin to anarchy. I think that the equality option would work in a Utopian environment, but it would require each individual to take responsibility for that rulership and doing things that the ‘government’ typically does : You’d accept individual responsibility for keeping the roads you travelled in good condition, for supporting the schools your children go to and personally delivering your share of the mail, so many things that a ‘government’ does and provides would now be left in the hands of people. And equality also means equally sharing the ‘work’ - not just having equal ‘rights’. And when a decision must be made, every man and woman would have to give their voices for true equality to reign, and so forth. Its very impractical, though if it could be put into practice I do feel it would be the most ‘fair’. But the fact of the matter is that people are not - and do not want to be - equal. Many people in this world want others to work so that they may profit, many want to do nothing at all but accept money from those who do work. Many people don’t want to be bothered with responsibility and leadership. People have different talents, strengths, weaknesses, opinions - its just so impractical XD.
Democracy -“The best of us representing the rest of us” also has its flaws as a system, but from the alternatives listed in this poll I think it is the best choice.