On 01-05-98 John Boone wrote to Day Brown... 
 
 JB>   Your logic follows, if any person or most people is/are not able 
 JB> to reason out "values", then they are reason deficient (do 
 JB> not think well). 
 JB>   Now, let us test this logic, from Robert H. Bork's "The 
 JB> Tempting of America" page 254: 
 JB> 
 JB>     The state of affairs in moral theory is summed up, 
 JB>     accurately so far as I can tell, by Alasdair MacIntyre. 
 JB>     After canvassing the failure of a succession of thinkers 
 JB>     to justify particular systems of morality, MacIntyre says 
 JB>     that if all that were involved was the failure of a
 JB>     succession of particular arguments, "it might appear 
 JB>     that the trouble was merely that Kierkegaard, Kant, 
 JB>     Diderot, Hume, Smith and their other contempories were 
 JB>     not adroit enough in constructing arguments, so that 
 JB>     appropiate strategy would be to wait until some more 
 JB>     powerful mind applied itself to the problems. 
 JB>     And just this had been the strategy of the acedemic 
 JB>     philosophical world, even though many professional 
 JB>     philosophers might be a little embarassed to admit it." 
 JB> 
 JB>   I -assume- you believe the list of Kierkegaard, 
 JB> Kant, Diderot, Hume and Smith were "good thinkers." 
 JB> Please notice, the list of good thinkers (not deficient 
 JB> in thinking) but were unable to arrive at a "logical" set 
 JB> of values. 
 JB>   To wit, just because, an individual or a group of in- 
 JB> dividuals can't or doesn't arrive at some "logical set 
 JB> values" doesn't mean they are deficient in thinking (don't 
 JB> "think good") unless you are willing to say thinkers like 
 JB> Kierkegaard, Kant, Dierot, Hume and Smith are deficient 
 JB> in thinking, not good thinkers. 
 JB> 
 JB>  DB> not to say that it cannot, as Aristotle provides an example. 
 JB> 
 JB>   You are correct, such evidence doesn't mean it is 
 JB> impossible.  However, from previous examples, it looks 
 JB> like it isn't likely. 
Not likely is not my problem John; if your illustrious men 
did not find their reason to be sufficient, I cannot argue 
with them either.  You do have to approach some problems 
with an open mind, and I do not know that that was the 
purpose that they had in mind in composing their systems. 
 
I did not find a lack of values in Hume, so much as a keen 
awareness of the imperfection of what passed for them in 
his time. IMHO: the 'professional philosophers' seeing the 
weakness in the foundation that values were built on, went 
to great lengths, peeling away the layers of reality to 
try to find a core to rest their whole structure on. I do 
not see that effort as fruitful for them, although I did 
experience the core directly as a manifestation of LSD and 
meditation.  And frankly, the core is not worth all that 
much; it is the journey to the center of being that is the 
clue, not the terminous of the trip. 
 
I agree that Bork has a fine mind, and has raised questions 
that needed it. But, eventually, I came to wonder why one 
point was not raised by all these fine fellows: what is the 
best way to live life? And the best answer to that question 
I have ever found is in Plato, Aristotle, and Epictetus. 
 
 JB>   As long as there are -individuals-, different geographical 
 JB> terrians, etc, the world won't be homogeneous. 
The ubiquitous experience of hollywood and McDonalds is railed 
at regularly by defenders of one cultural heritage or another. 
We have seen such defense in the old testament, of Jews trying 
to reject the influence of Persians, Greeks, Romans... and have 
seen innumerable similar efforts in all the struggles over the 
issues of imperialist colonial powers. 
 
BUT: never before has the planet seen such subtlety, and shall 
I say, *pervasive persuasiveness* behind a set of cultural 
[lack of] values. I just dunno John. 
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--- Maximus 3.01
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