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There is No Good and Evil, Just Smart and Dumb (Part 1 of 2)

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Tower of London

This is part 1 of a 2-part post. The second half is here.

Disclaimer: Controversy rating: 8/10.  This post contains unconventional views.  Some readers may be upset.  Some may unsubscribe.  Que sera sera.

There is a famous quotation that most people seem to love, which I dislike.  In fact, I find it quite worrisome, because of how quickly even reasonable people seem to jump behind it.

I am a staunch defender of ideas, and people’s rights to express them, even if I disagree.  I don’t think ideas themselves can be harmful; any harm comes only from the actions they inspire.  For example, I do not believe in laws against ‘hate’ speech; but I do support laws against deliberately inciting violence.  It isn’t the speech that’s dangerous, it’s the actions.  As far as I’m concerned, when a hateful person is allowed to speak his mind, he only reveals himself as petty and foolish.  I think that’s a good thing.  Let idiocy shine a light on itself, that’s what I say.  If you tape its mouth shut, we might not recognize it.

But there is one idea, encapsulated in a well-loved quotation, that I think is at the root of every institution of war and genocide.  Of course it does not always lead to those dark places, but it contains a fallacy that can delude even a good-hearted person into committing atrocities.  And I want to expose its insanity.   Read More

by David on April 18, 2009
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9 Thoughts Worthy of Immortality

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Halls of immortality

The smallest bookstore still contains more ideas of worth than have been presented in the entire history of television. ~Andrew Ross

I am indeed prone to hyperbole, but I’ll go ahead and say it: the advent of writing is by far the greatest tipping point in all of civilization.  Often I think about the instant in which it happened, that very first moment when a primitive person scored a few strokes on a rock face, in order to demonstrate some idea, however simple, to another cave-dweller.

It floors me that there was a specific point in time (maybe at seventeen minutes after sunrise on the 25th day of the year 42,128 B.C.) when a few people convened to attempt to relate something to each other with markings on a wall.  They could never have imagined the epic, world-changing sequence of events triggered by this tiny, innocuous act, but I suspect that each of those individuals left that little gathering with an as-yet-unprecedented sense of understanding and closeness to their peers.

That first instance of symbol-scrawling unlocked an incalculably powerful ability in humans.  Suddenly, knowledge was no longer confined to an individual’s memory.  It could be transferred, replicated, stored and accumulated.  It could be displayed in a public area, for an entire community to see and absorb into their own personal knowledge.  Each individual could now contribute their own exclusive insights and experiences to a collective, whereby everyone could gain from them.

Whatever happened that day exactly, it marked the point in time when knowledge became bigger than any one person.  Finally we could accumulate information and insight outside of our addled, vulnerable brains.  Writing made thought permanent, immortal.

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by David on April 13, 2009
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