++> Exchanges between Frank Masingill & D. Martorana on
 ++> Vicarious Murder
 
 DM>> Seemingly!!! philosophy has not been able to achieve
 DM>> much in the past 2500 years .....but then things
 DM>> might have been worse without it?
 
 FM> I believe you are in error.  I view philosophy through its
 FM> various differentiations has achieved amazing clarity.
 
     I agree. It has achieved some clarity of notions, but in
     doing so has also clarified that almost any position can
     be justified. We now have "better clarification" of the
     same confusions we started with 5000 years ago. Perhaps-
     one day philosophically derived clarifications might light
     a way .....I do heartily hope so,  I'm not holding my breath?
 
 FM> It is possible to hold that it is we PEOPLE who have been
 FM> lacking in adequate response to that which has been
 FM> representatively revealed since Parmenides.
 
 Like Gorgias (father of sophistry) said, if people are not
 convinced to action, the knowing is meaningless. Of course
 Plato, not being a realist, put him down and Hitler came
 along and ran it into the ground.
 
 FM> Have you READ Goldhagen?
 
      Not yet .......Somewhere in the middle of a VERY long list!
 
 FM> He claims to have documentation for the assertion that men who
 FM> served in the police battalions were normally given a choice of
 FM> whether or not to participate in the directed massacres of innocent
 FM> Jews.  Some actually did exercise their choice to be excused
 FM> from participating.  Most, obviously did not.
 
   The entire issue is bigger than a few anecdotal possibilities,
   and although I would toy with understanding such national insanity,
   I will also ponder this *heinous "happening* for the rest of my life.
 
 DM>> I believe we are essentially a killer species and one way
 DM>> or the other, will find a way to feed that hunger when it
 DM>> comes upon us.
 
 FM> That is a bleak picture.
 
     Yes it is! ....but we have survived near of five thousand
     years as so recorded and probably ............long before.
 
 FM> Why should we not simply succumb to it, then, as individuals
 FM> and use that excuse to follow the Adolph Hitlers, David Dukes
 FM> and other rabble-rousers (users of the lumpen proletariat) to
 FM> go ahead and carry out out dark purposes?
 
     We seem, as humans, to have a tiny window of opportunity
     to be other than the dark obsessions that weigh upon us-
     Whether this is just a bit of pepper that nature allows for
     Her fun or agenda, we cannot presently know .....but I'm all
     for giving it a best shot! Remember, I use the word "seem"
     quite often. I cannot command any fist of truth, only the
     product of my reasoning which I "sort of" trust .....at
     least as much as I might trust any others. Where mind is
     concerned, opinion dominates, .....truth reigns relative.
 
FM> Why play around with Republics and representative governments.
 
     Because we both hope I'm wrong!
                     ^^^^
 FM> Perhaps, with Hobbes,
 FM> it would be better to just get ourselves a divinely appointed
 FM> king and cede to him the responsibility for keeping ourselves
 FM> at bay.  Saying that we are essentially killers comes close to
 FM> saying that the summum bonum is a mere chimera but that the
 FM> summum malum is the only reality - in fact, that seems to be
 FM> what you ARE saying, David.  Do I interpret you wrongly?
 
     In a general sense you interpret me correctly but I am not
     committed to my view, only committed to the rationality it
     is endowed with. There _ARE_ pressures in my thinking that
     make it difficult to see the dark of "no meaning" and its
     implications into the affairs of our species. It is, I
     believe, some easier for the committed positivists, regardless
     that their basis is invented, than for the "nihilist" working
     in the "all dark" (perhaps even plotting an escape from nature).
 
 FM> Why not just sum it up along with the "Church" theologians who
 FM> took Christianity and invented the symbol of "original sin?"
 FM> I have a friend who phrases it as "all of us are criminals -
 FM> some are more stupid than others and therefore lack the shrewdness
 FM> to avoid getting caught and jailed."
 
     Irrelevant!  What I speak of is not a "man-in-the-middle"
     scene having to do with religion, original sin, criminals
     and jails. We are here exploring within a universe of human
     unimportance.  That "unimportance" is my extended understanding
     of the "NIHIL"  ....an emptiness that can take your breath away
     to dwell upon (its no wonder, rarely approached or examined).
 
     I believe there may be some truth in all views and do keep a
     an eye open for any light that might illuminate more than I know.
     Like I said, the only mind that touched me was old Teilhard and
     even he only touched the poetry parts hidden in my chemistry. I
     salute any reach for knowing and spend some of my own effort
     in it because it is fun and "feels" in doing so.
 
 DM> Our species' half hidden hunger for the dark star remains in our
 DM> evolutionary junk box, a leftover from past, the means to a present
 DM> end, or for some as yet unannounced destiny. History has shown that
 DM> the DM> essential question of man's ugly side has NOT yet been asked
 DM> in DM> constructive terms.
 
 FM> How logical is that?
 
       Reality is NOT all that logical and may not need to be-
       unless one adopts some favorite algorithm and defines it so.
 
 FM> If we have not asked the question then how do we know about an "ugly
 FM> side" or how to distinguish it?  I assume it is your reasoned judgement
 FM> that Plato-Socrates, Jeremiah, Amos or "Jesus" had no knowledge of
 FM> "man's ugly side."  But you qualified it by "constructive."
 FM> This means, does it not, that not only Plato but the "Christian
 FM> fathers" who formulated the Christian epiphany as a further
 FM> differentiation of the "opening" begun by the classical Greek
 FM> philosophers had nothing constructive to offer regarding humanity.
 FM> Plato has Socrates say on the occasion of his murder that "others
 FM> will come."  This, I gather, you would see as a meaningless
 FM> forecast and even Aristotle did not "come."   Or what DO you
 FM> mean, David?
 
    I do *NOT* see "murder", vicarious, reasonable, waring or in any
    other dark light, ""*any less*"" brutal, or common to the life
    experience because of Plato, Jesus, Allah, the Christian fathers,
    or any of the other enlightment stars. If anything, time and
    effort has enhanced murder, increasing both the opportunity
    and means to it.
    Now! What do I mean?     What I mean is that I cannot find that
    man knows anything significant of his being; and builds endless
    house-of-cards constructs to pass serious time while he lives
    his allotted happenstance.
 
 > "Metastatic faith is one of the great sources of disorder, if not the
 > principal one, in the contemporary world; and it is a matter of life and
 > death for all of us to understand the phenomenon and to find remedies
 > against it before it destroys us.  If today the state of science permits
 > the critical analysis of such phenomena, it is clearly a scholar's duty to
 > undertake it for his own sake as a man and to make the results accessible
 > to his fellow > men...."
 
 > " Ideology is existence in rebellion against God and man...."
 
 DM> I think it all sounds like more than it says! ......but I'm still
 DM> thinking on it. "Ideology" is a factor of everyday life, up and through
 DM> to nationhood and religion. In a relative world, it plays its roles
 DM> .....stronger or weaker, sometimes good and sometimes bad.
 
 FM> David, in all of the seriousness I can muster, the man who wrote those
 FM> words could hardly have enjoyed the luxury of being as blase'
 FM> about this as you enjoy.  He was on the verge of having his books
 FM> and his passport confiscated (most of the books were) when he fled
 FM> Austria for Switzerland with
 
   From my ant hill I am not blase' and can feel for him and his
   message. From my mountain he is lost in the snow. Anecdote can contain
   strong wisdoms and clearly defined truths but cannot qualify by the
   raw virtue of intensity. I accept your friends experience as true
   and valid but I don't see it explaining more than I know, nor rendering
   it dressed for constructive future remedies. As too often the known and
   stated truth-  """We have seen the enemy and it is us""" and we sure do
   love us!!!!! I remember a question once (about 2500 years ago) asked
   over and again in one of Plato's clever "setup" dialogues-
 
    "Did your action make someone a better person?"  (most especially
    one that was not already better).
 
 FM> ............if your acceptance of ANY opinion as just as valid
 FM> as another then I wonder where you would find any "humanity" lurking
 FM> ANYWHERE.  WHAT other forces and agendas are active in our choices?
 FM> Perhaps that would clarify what you're appearing to suggest.
 
 Hidden in the evolutionary process (or even creationism) seems
 evident a sequentially organized mechanism we know because it is
 expressed as experienced in time. The agenda or sequence seems to
 progress with or without our species and has toyed with many variations.
 Likely we would pass out much as other species have. If there is any
 logic to this "happenstance" we are not (yet) privy to it with no
 reason to believe (beyond our inventive notions) that we ever will.
 We might be instrumental as an aid to a process, an accident-ish
 passing through or even something "other" An agenda is assumed because
 we move along *IT*.
 
 As to "lurking humanity", you'll have to let me think on that some.
 I'm not near as clear on my life positions as you are, though I
 can't quite see any more foundations under your views.
 
 DM>> I believe our steps through history are rare effected serious by
 DM>> philosophers. If anything, like the Bible,  we can always find some
 DM>> quote (or bend one) to justify almost anything.
 
 FM> Your argument IS important, David, for it does warn us that we
 FM> should expect no rapid or easy responses to the amount of reality
 FM> that IS clearly visible even to those who only participate in it
 FM> without knowing its outcome.
 
     I hopefully agree....
 
 FM> Perhaps I should apologize for my experience, first of the reality
 FM> of Gerald L.K. Smith (Huey Long's lieutenant for propaganda) and
 FM> then the reality of having to fight the nazis.  Smith demonstrated
 FM> to me in a sleepy little North Louisiana town RIGHT BEFORE MY EYES
 FM> the REAL face of fascism and I am grateful for it. I can possibly
 FM> be cowardly before the phenomenon but RESIGNED or BLIND I could
 FM> NEVER be.  With the witnesses to the Christian theophany I think
 FM> I have learned SOMETHING of "what is in man" but thankfully what
 FM> is there has its counterpoint in the pull of the golden cord. If
 FM> that is misleading then as George Schweitzer (a physical scientists)
 FM> remarked once in my presence "we place our lives in a test tube
 FM> when we elect for genuine faith (not the evangelical ASSURANCE).
 FM> Perdition MIGHT WELL BE ALL THERE IS.  Then the nihilist would
 FM> have been right and LOOK WHAT HE GAINED!!  Many in 19th century
 FM> Russia committed suicide and perhaps they were right.
 
  ......Most appreciate your serious significant experiences, your
  life formed views, and your very robust means to share and express
  them.  Like said in previous postings, I don't have good or many
  answers but have come to find it rare that anyone else does. Though
  that significant "nothing"  is a primal reference in my thinking,
  I do some looking around toooooo (mostly for fun!).
 
                         oo ... Dave
--- Maximus/2 3.01
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