Oh but arguing is so much fun! ;-)

- NonE

brainjunky,

You won't make a statement supporting your claim, not even a rough outline, but you want Conrad to read a 280 page (iirc) dense foundational work instead?

Somehow I think you have over-posted.

So, please, 'waste' some time. Do me a favor and point out my errors, and I will thank you. Otherwise, explain how asking someone to read 280 pages is preferable to you writing a paragraph.

Yeah, I have never liked that "go read a book" action. It reminds me of many, many conversations with Randroids where they send me back Atlas Shrugged instead of engaging in conversation, as if that answers my question. It's a kind of "fuck you" when you say that. So, please, indulge us. I have read Branden, and even that particular book as well, yet I have NO CLUE what your position with respect to Alex's post might be.

... on the other hand, sometimes there are foundational works, or types of works, that legitimately are critical reading for a particular topic. In such a case, however, it's still the responsibility of their advocate to explain why they're so important.

BJ:In psychology, self-esteem reflects a person's overall self-appraisal of their own worth. It would seem to me that posting go read such and such is an indicator of low self esteem and might represent a fear of articulating the knowledge one has acquired with conviction.

I'm laughing at the idea that one should ignore what one person wrote because some other person wrote some other thing. !!!

I tend to want to act based upon reasonably articulable ideas which seem to make sense, not because somebody wrote something somewhere.

I don't care WHO said it. If it doesn't make sense to me then that is my authority. This is in no way intended to imply that I cannot be wrong. But there is no higher authority than myself when it comes to things which affect me. I think that is definitional, if not intuitively true.

- NonE

Alex,

Your post above is very interesting to me. I'm not sure that I follow all of it, but if the gist of it that I get is accurate, I think this is really important stuff.

I wrote an article a while back about 9/11 and the fact that it had to be an inside job, and that what was really scary to me was the fact, not that it was an inside job, but what the resultant actions revealed about humans, or citizens, or at least a large number of people living in this country. And that is this: (please read the article, if you want my thinking in more depth) The idea that people could be so evil is simply unacceptable, and people will DO ANYTHING rather than admit to themselves that someone would be capable of planning the destruction of 3,000 of their "fellow citizens" for their own strategic gains. In other words, people will willingly believe what they know, on some level, to be false, rather than to admit to themselves that the world is not as they believe (want) it to be. We will willing lie to ourselves.

I can't even imagine how that is possible, yet it seems to not only be possible, but common and integral to who we are.

- NonE

I'm looking forward to savoring that article this evening. My initial question is:

Is it that people are uncertain as to whether or not some truly evil mastermind is at work, and to avoid the possibility subscribe to a lie, or is it that we're certain about an unacceptable truth, and rather than know about our certainty, subscribe to a lie?

The reason why I wonder about that is to draw the parallel with an abusive relationship. Often there is no denying the abuse, but rather than condemn a person on whom we're dependent, we'll warp reality to excuse it, or 'balance' the abuse with invisible admirable qualities like 'potential', or 'a good but hidden heart'.

As the state is like an abusive parent, is the denial about hiding a known fact: "The state (my fellow countrymen who claim to have my interests at heart, and upon whom I depend for my protection and livelihood) is abusive and directly or indirectly responsible for this tragedy", or is it about an inability to comprehend the possibility, whether or not its true: "I cannot consider that the state has done this, because I cannot resolve whether or not they are abusive predators of my goodwill"?

Maybe there's no difference, now that I think about it...

And I agree with you that although bizarre, such reality warping seems to be one of the default human responses to power imbalance and violence.

I wrote that article almost 2 years ago. It took me two days to write it as the logic that was unfolding in my head around the events was almost to grim for me to admit to myself. Yet, there it was, and it was undeniable. As time has gone by and I've seen the unwillingness of scientists to admit that steel does not melt when you pour burning kerosene on it, and others of equal intellectual and educational standing simply refuse to see, or at least refuse to publicly own up to FLAGRANT impossibilities and contradictions with known laws of nature, as I've seen these things become so blatant that they are no longer a matter of generous excusing away, I've lost pretty much any ability to credit the human animal with rational thought where more primal issues are at play.

This leaves me to believe more that intellectual pursuits like ethics and such are meaningless aside from fun for fun's sake. For when push comes to shove, we'll nuke 'em first and think of ethics later. I really do hope that the entire world's economic system collapses for that is the only hope I see of slowing or stopping the engine of empire which, if allowed to build momentum, seems doomed to trigger those most dangerous instincts within us, within those who have the ability to destroy the world with the push of a lizard brain finger on the button.

But maybe it's just nature's reset button. Who knows?

And on that cheery note, let me wish you all a good day, lots of love, and a hearty wish that I'm totally full of shit.

- NonE

And, Alex, to answer your question... I don't know. It's a good question.

- NonE