Another great point, Dr. Sanity.

As Dr. Peter Kreeft (Professor of Philosophy at Boston College) says, It is Man's Essence to choose his Essence.

Man is the only entity that can fail to live up to its nature. One's humanity is not a given, but a goal, a mission. That is why we can call people 'Inhuman.'

To use the theological term, it is a consequence of the Fall of Man.
Truth Junkie | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 7:59 am | #

Possible to look at this in utilitarianterms: Imad Mughniyeh is dead and because he's dead, many valuable human lives will be saved. If he had lived many valuable human lives would have been lost. His life for many others who were innocent of wrongdoing--that was the choice.

Of course there was Toni Morrison's approach (I think it was her) after 9/11, that if only bin Laden could be made to see the value of the lives he took he would never do it again. I suppose that sort of thing is possible, but only in the sense that it's possible that Lucy Lawless could be about to ring my doorbell and ask if she can come up and get out of these wet clothes.
Alex Bensky | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 8:29 am | #

Today would seem to be an appropriate day to compare the passing of two very different people: Bill Buckley, and the
terrorist. One added to the richness of humanity by demonstrating the heights to which man could attain. The other showed the depths to which a human could
stoop.
The sad thing is that there will be those who will confuse which is which,
because they subscribe to faulty standards, and are addicted to perverse
( twisted/wicked! ) thinking processes.
My prayer is that Mr. Buckley is enjoying both His creator and a well deserved rest.
DC | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 8:58 am | #

Truth Junkie: it is a consequence of the Fall of Man.

It is not a fall that man can choose his own character. That ability and freedom to choose is the source of mankind's glory. There could be no possibility of choosing the good if choosing the bad were not possible. A man would be no different from Dunne's clod his our continued being would be determined by forces outside ourselves.

A child is not born fallen. He is born full of potential and struggle to find his way. A man can fall but he does it by choice and is therefor responsible for it.

To choose evil is to be evil. By that choice, you have abandoned all claim to be treated as worthy of continued existence. The rest of us can properly choose what to do with you.
A. Rational Human | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 9:07 am | #

Hello A. Rational Human,

I didn't mean that the ability to choose is a consequence of the Fall of Man, quite the contrary! The ability to make moral choices is part of The Image of God.

The fact that it is such a struggle to make the right choice is the consequence of the Fall of Man.

Also, how many times of choosing evil does it take before one has 'abandoned all claim to be treated as worthy of continued existence'?

I admit I have made evil choices before, haven't you?
Truth Junkie | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 9:46 am | #

The intern's fuzziness springs from two influences:

1) The Marxist/socialist left's insistence on equality of result (which absolves officially declared victim classes from responsibility for their actions), rather than equality of opportunity (which puts the emphasis on personal choice, and responsibility for those choices).

2) The left's casting of morality as a narcissistic experience - all I need to be a moral person is have the "correct" feeeeeeelings: pity for the Palestinians, anger at corporations, embarrassment at American success.

By both these means, the left has subverted young people's very idea of morality and moral judgement.
Ben-David | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 10:14 am | #

Father Jonathan has an equally eloquent explanation of Baker's celebration on the Fox News website. Paraphrased, while not rejoicing at the loss a human life, you can rejoice that that human can no longer make evil decisions to take evil actions that harm many others.
anom4 | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 10:41 am | #

This sort of thing worries me, because at some point -- whether in the next few years or a generation from now -- there will be a reaction. And if the fools have so closely identified genuine human empathy and reverence for life with this idiotic moral equivalence and coddling of evil, what will that reaction bring? Will we throw out the baby with that filthy bathwater? I hope not, but every idiotic liberal attempt to link morality with suicide makes me fearful.
Trimegistus | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 10:42 am | #

anom4, Good point.

I think the mourning should have been done in the past, when the terrorist lost his humanity and gave himself over to Evil.

The rejoicing is proper because it is rejoicing because of the ending of an Evil career.

The one does not cancel out the other, as Pascal said "Nothing presented to the soul is simple, and the soul never applies itself simply to any subject. That is why the same thing makes us laugh and cry."
Truth Junkie | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 11:11 am | #

Moral equivalence is really a misnomer of what liberals do. Notice how the death of Ken Lay was much celebrated, yet this terrorist death was not.

What we have in modern liberals is an academia taught self hatred on a humanity wide affirmative action mission.
SteveH | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 11:22 am | #

I am glad that a terrorist's career is ended. Unfortunately for the terrorist, the end of his career usually means his death.
R S | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 11:33 am | #

Hey - wait a minute! Even a cancer - as a living thing - has a right to survive!

[Just kidding!! I had to say that, because this whole topic reminds me of some Leftist insanity from before the Iraq War. If you remember, they were touting that absurd concept of how Saddam's govt had the *right* to exist. So much for "...Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed." Yet, they still call themselves "patriotic".]
Optimizer | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 11:45 am | #

Dr Sanity; good post. Amen I say to the end of your post. But for the comments: one, two,......
T_C_Mits | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 12:22 pm | #

Just from reading John Donne's argument, it sounds like one from a raging, "raving" narcissist, beset with an overwhelming fear of death to the point of it being an incapacity in respect to the matter of self-defense against manifest evil, which then results in bringing about the condition being feared.
J. Peden | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 12:31 pm | #

Institutions of government and religion that encourage, condone and excuse terrorism must be modified or eliminated. I have no sympathy for this human waste product. The sooner he and his friend assume room temperature, the better the world will be.
Arch | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 1:20 pm | #

In all fairness to Mr. Donne, I really wonder whether he meant to be taken so literally. On the positive side, "No man is an Island" is at the core of the moral justification of capitalism, is it not ARH? It is entirely for this reason individual rights - especially property rights, and the right to be able to trade freely - are so important. There's also a certain optimism, in declaring individuals as being of worth, not (as the lefties would have you believe) as being parasites who greedily consume the natural resources of Mother Earth.

It reminds me of Jefferson's "all men are created equal", which was written at a time where they apparently really only were referring to free landowners (and women were excluded).

Not to be a killjoy, but I think this guy's really just saying that the lives of the average Joes matter too - it's not just about the aristocracy, or the wealthy. I really doubt he was intending to say that "mass murderers are part of our Human family, too".
Optimizer | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 1:24 pm | #

John Donne..."I die, I die" and I was done with this guy's works 45 years ago!

Muyghniyeh's death was welcome news for me. I suspect also for those American families who lost loved ones via his evil efforts. But alas, in his neighborhood there most certainly are teats of sorrow for their lost "warrior" at the hands of the evil Western infidels!

Perhaps if we were able to read this guy's life story, a very detailed life story...we might get that glimpse into how he became the deadly asshole he was! We could share a few tears for his internal struggle, then begin a thankfulness at his departure.

There will always be those who mourn the loss of evil and those who lived within it...always.

How would we ever come to know good without having old evil next to it?

Really pissed off people have got to have someplace to go and live out their miserable, evil lives, right? Too bad it always seems to be right next door, in our neighborhood.

Where would Dr. Sanity be without those who need such help? Perfection is sought, but not present in our life form, only in our minds and those creations we ponder.

Bring me the head of Bin Laden! Not the words of John "I die, I die" Donne!
RJ | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 1:25 pm | #

Truth Junkie: The fact that it is such a struggle to make the right choice is the consequence of the Fall of Man.

No. Its simply the consequence that one must actively identify what is good and choose it. Its not a given. Its not easy to discover. One must constantly seek what it is and work to achieve it. You must do what is right because its right and not because of how easy or hard it may be. Making a mistake is not evil but you must work to correct your mistakes and to refrain from making them again.

Do do evil, all one must do is stop thinking, evade the consequences of your actions, and never make restitution for the negative consequences of them. Saying "I am sorry" when caught is not enough. You are responsible for taking thought and action to correct the damage you caused.

To be good, one must always strive to do the good and you must honestly strive to correct the mistakes you make. To be evil, all you must do is evil once.
A. Rational Human | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 1:43 pm | #

Optimizer: It is entirely for this reason individual rights - especially property rights, and the right to be able to trade freely - are so important.

NO. The "no man is an island" statement is not even a minor justification.

The justification for capitalism (that social political system in which all property is individually owned and the government is used only as a protector of individual rights) can be sketched as follows:

1. Reality is what it is. No amount of wish, whim, fantasy, or magical incantations can change that fact.

2. Man must live by reason meaning: Man must have and use knowledge to live. His only path to knowledge is by his own logical processing of what his senses tell him about his environment and his actions upon it.

3. The capacity to reason cannot function by force. The use of force is an attempt to force another to act counter to his knowledge of what is and what is best for him. As a consequence, mental processing is irrelevant. The process of reason is stopped.

3. Man must consume to live. He must produce to consume. It takes knowledge to know what to consume, what to produce, and how to produce it. As a consequence, the introduction of force in the transaction stops production which stops future consumption.

4. It takes the use of prior production to produce anything more than a simple hunting and gathering expedition can find.

5. If you don't have the right to own what you produce, you cannot either continue producing or long continue to live.

As a consequence of your fundamental right to your life you must also have the right to own property and the right to own the right to the product of your life and your property.

Then as a final crosscheck, ask your self how can a person who does not produce a good have the right to take by force a good produced by another? That is a proof by reduction to an absurdity. This would mean there is a right to violate rights.

As can be seen from the above, the achievement of a capitalist society is in the selfish best interest of each individual - one at a time. It is not that its best for others that counts. Its that its best for YOU!

Obviously many volumes can and have been written about each point I make. They can inform you of much omitted detail. However, if this brief discussion does not convince, no amount of additional writing can suffice.
A. Rational Human | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 2:10 pm | #

Optimizer: I really doubt he was intending to say that "mass murderers are part of our Human family, too."

Without a direct interview being possible, we must take his words at face value. Otherwise we are putting words in is mouth. If he did not mean what he said, nor said what he meant, the quotation is nothing but a word salad with a fancy information free salad dressing - aka bullshit.

I know it is popular, in "literary" circles, to read between the lines of poetic statements, then to continue to read between imagined lines until another paper can be written. This is nothing but building wishes, on top of conjecture, informed by fantasy and dreams. It has little if anything do to with what the man actually meant by what he said.

The analysis of a work of art tells more about the analyst than it does the artist.
A. Rational Human | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 2:19 pm | #

ARH,

Your statements, taken together are very disturbing.

#1. You said "To choose evil is to be evil. By that choice, you have abandoned all claim to be treated as worthy of continued existence."

#2. You said "[T]o do evil, all one must do is stop thinking, evade the consequences of your actions, and never make restitution for the negative consequences of them."

#3. You said "To be evil, all you must do is evil once."

Exactly how many people would be left living after a year under this Justice System?

ARH, the main thing that your statements convey to me is that your System of thought is internally non-contradictory, but woefully incomplete.
Your pronouncements seem reasonable enough, but they don't take into account the effects of people actually implementing them as policies.

To once more quote Blaise Pascal (more people should read him, he is amazingly applicible today): "Reason's last step is the recognition that there are an infinite number of things which are beyond it. It is merely feeble if it does not go as far as to realize that. If natural things are beyond it, what are we to say about supernatural things?" - Pensee 188

I'm sure that you will agree with Descartes that Pascal was a highly intelligent and reasonable man...

Or if not, please prove it wrong - if you are A Rational Human, that is.

Disagreeing without a reason isn't rational after all...
Truth Junkie | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 2:51 pm | #

Dudes, this guy Donne is totally wrong, because Simon and Garfunkel song clearly goes "I am an Island." So there you go Doc, you were right about that Donne dude.
Boom Shaka Laka | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 2:56 pm | #

"But there are some human beings who willfully and deliberately betray their humanity, and because of that betrayal, their continued existence diminishes me and every other human being who remains involved in mankind. This happens, not in some theoretical or abstract sense of the concept of 'mankind', but in the real lives of real human beings living on planet earth. "


Sounds like what my moral theology prof described as the results of sin!
Don L | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 3:00 pm | #

The statement "No man is an island" was written by a very devout Christian who was reminding the 17th century reader of his devotional poems that man does not thrive divorced from God's creation--the earth and other men.

In the Bible, when Cain killed Abel (a story Donne would of course have known), God does not kill Cain and good exegeses explain this by noting that God didn't do so probably to protect the sanctity of the family (Zondervan Quest Study Bible). But a bit later in the Bible (in Deuteronomy 19), we read that it is proper to kill a killer. In the Quest Bible's explanations about this, we are informed that "God made it clear that if people tolerate murder, the whole community would share the guilt and suffer the consequences. . . God held life in high esteem and required severe payment for those who callously snuffed it out. . . Murder is particularly offensive to God because it destroys a person created in the image of God. In this context, capital punishment promotes the sancity of life and the inherent value of every person because people bear God's image."

To "A Rational Human", it is NOT popular in literary circles (except maybe post-modern ones) to read anything into lines of text. Literary analysis is a discipline, and the discipline teaches people the constraints that delimit a fair/honest/accurate reading of a text.

Because Donne was a Christian, it is fair to assume he accepted the standard interpretations of Genesis, Deuteronomy, Exodus, etc. And these interpretations conclude that murderers must be punished, and the punishment may include death. It is worth noting, that according to modern Islamic leaders, the Abrahamic Bible (that's what they call the Old Testament) is accepted by them as a valid precursor to the Koran. So Moslems should have no problem accepting the killing of a murderer, like Mughniyeh.
Gloria | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 3:05 pm | #

Truth Junkie, while you're waiting: are you saying, via Pascal, that all things beyond reason/rationality are "supernatural"?

Just to get to what I'm trying to, in my useage "supernatural" is a self-contradictory word on the bases of, 1] the fact that the Universe is infinite, and, 2] my own terminology which makes all things 'within' it "natural".

Not that we need to argue about it.
J. Peden | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 3:10 pm | #

Truth Junkie,

Morality has to do with the things about which you have choice. If choice is not possible, the consequences might be bad for you but it does not make you evil.

I have clearly distinguished the difference between making an honest mistake, recognizing it, and working to correct it vs choosing not to think, to evade the consequences, and never attempting to make amends. The former is not evil. The latter is. I suggest if the shoe fits, wear it.

Pascal was smart about math but not wise about philosophy nor morality. His morality was filled with bullshit floating abstractions. His wager was totally bogus in that it was based upon false premises and drew false conclusions from them.
A. Rational Human | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 3:18 pm | #

Gloria,

Please note that I put "literary" in quotes. That implies I in fact was referring to post modern literary analysis. There is a legitimate ground for literary analysis but that requires more context than simply imagining lines between lines and asserting "prove me wrong".

If Dunne's statement is taken in context of his 17th century religious indoctrination, its irrelevant to anything in reality. He does not refer to real humans in a real universe with real lives to live and lose. It is founded on a floating miasma of incomplete and inconsistent subjective notions with no more connection to the profound than a common fart.

Most of all, even though his statement was meant imply one, it is not an absolute out of context moral imperative that each man loses if any man, no matter what his character, dies. Nor do we partake of the evil character of the dead person if we fail to morn his passing.
A. Rational Human | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 3:40 pm | #

ARH,

If 'never making amends' is a requirement for evil, then no man is ever evil until after his death!

Your system doesn't work. Unless you can come up with an Objective Standard for exactly how long one must refuse to make amends before one is considered Evil. Failing that, you can never ever call anyone evil until after they have died!


In that case, your own statement about 'The rest of us can properly choose what to do with you' will NEVER be applied to any living human.

How can you resolve this contradiction?

And as to your vitriol, please contain yourself.

It is not rational to scatalogically condemn a man's life's work if he was really trying to do good even if, according to YOUR definition, it was mistaken, because you just said that it is 'not evil' if one is 'making an honest mistake.'

Your reasonableness seems to break down when you talk about spiritual things, that is sad but not unexpected.
Truth Junkie | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 4:14 pm | #

The death of a murderer is, in a real sense, an affirmation of how valuable society considers life to be. In the rule-set of crime and punishment, the punishment should fit the crime -- and the ultimate crime should receive the ultimate punishment, n'est-ce pas?

Likewise, Mughy's death should be celebrated by all those who love life.
Jeff Hasselberger | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 4:19 pm | #

Truth Junkie,
I have liberal friends that i know are not evil, and i don't really think they grasp the dark side their actions may ultimately lead to.

We somehow have to sort out the kingpins of a destructive movement with the merely fooled and decieved.
SteveH | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 4:44 pm | #

I do not think Dr. Donne was addressing people like Mughniyeh. I think he was addressing the easy ability to say "I won't get involved because it is none of my affair," or since he was a churchman, answering the question "Am I my brother's keeper?"

Killing someone like Mughniyeh is a good thing. It protects the innocent, those others that I am tied to by shared humanity. The loss of the innocent affects me as a loss, the loss of a Mughniyeh is a gain to the innocent and a gain to me. A metaphor was being used, and like all metaphors can only be run with so far, or analyzed beyond the context of the sermon or meditation, which was the Tudor-era in England.

The tolling of the churchbells for the passing of another (IIRC my Sayers, the tailors, then the teller-strokes) would not have been for the brigand, who was beyond the pale of the law, beyond the pale of humanity, but for a member of the shared community of being human.

It does not include Mughniyeh.
Mikey NTH | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 5:04 pm | #

J. Peden,

To understand what Pascal meant, you could substitute the term "spiritual" for the term "supernatural."

I am certain that for Pascal, being an orthodox Christian,"supernatural" meant reality which transcends the physical.

It is a uniquely Judeo-Christian doctrine that there is a Creator who is Independently Transcendent of His Creation, and so there must exist things that transcend physical reality.
Truth Junkie | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 5:27 pm | #

J. Peden,

Also, you are using the converse. Pascal didn't say that all things beyond reason/rationality are supernatural. He said that there are things both natural and supernatural that are beyond human reason. His point seems to have been that it is arrogant to think that you have the entire universe 'figured out.'

It reminds me of something my psychology professor once said: "If our minds were simple enough for us to understand, we would be too simple to understand them."

It is kind of like Godel's Incompleteness theorem.
Truth Junkie | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 5:33 pm | #

Truth Junkie,

You are reaching by distorting what I said. This is at least the third time you have done so. If you cannot or will not present the point being argued correctly, you are not interested in conversation. You only want argumentation for the sake of argumentation. Its pointless to go much further in this discussion with you.

Now, go back and discover what I really did say and address the point.
A. Rational Human | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 6:33 pm | #

I kinda work on both sides of this. I'm put in mind, particularly, of OJ and his trial.

While I have no real doubt that he Did It, I still believe he had to be acquitted, and, were I on the jury, I would have done so.

The reasons for this are multifold, and are the reasons I suggest caution in that which you suggest in your missive:

1) I firmly believe, for the most part, in "Better ten men go free than one innocent be punished" (please note the later caveat regarding this statement, however) -- this is because
A) I believe sufficiently in God that He will take care of it in the end
B) I do not believe that a hundred "rights" justify a "wrong". That may be the only choice, but it should be a choice forced upon you, not one voluntarily chosen.
2) I do not believe we should EVER allow our police to tamper with evidence, no matter how guilty they believe he perpetrator to be. They should be -- must be -- utterly terrified of tampering with evidence,since they have such intimate contact with it. They are, in fact, the guardians of the facts, in this case, and if we cannot trust them to provide our juries with facts and facts alone, then we will find that our juries cannot produce anything resembling law, much less justice. Hence, any time -- every time -- they have been found to fail to follow defined procedure, even by accident, then the case should be dismissed. The reliability of The Law is far, far more important than any single application of it. The Law is the chief thing which differentiates us from animals.
3) The above leads me to take a measure of issue with regards to "That’s the point where I no longer feel a moral obligation to worry about how they are treated.". I feel that part of this is the dividing line between citizens of the USA and non-citizens. Citizens have a contract with the US Federal Government called The Constitution. As a result, they have the right to be protected from certain actions and behaviors which "foreigners" do not have a claim to. This is one of my key issues with The Patriot Act -- it does not differentiate between citizens and foreign nationals. Between "freedom fighters" and terrorists. A US Citzen, acting against his government, may be in the right. A foreign national acting outside of uniform against the US government is a spy and has no rights under the Geneva Convention *OR* the U.S. Constitution. I do believe that we should strongly frown on actions which constitute "cruel and unusual punishment" against all we oppose, but I'm far less concerned with obvious spies and terrorists in this regard than I am with "people of suspicion" and particularly of U.S. Citizens. There is a distinction there, and it's a damned important one.

=================
Now, the caveat -- "Better ten guilty..." this does presume to a certain extent that one is dealing with criminals and not with people out to wreak havoc and mayhem, which means that one guilty goes free and perhaps hundreds or thousands of innocents suffer.

Here, the need is to err on the side of caution, but which side is caution on is always a quandary. I think we have to keep the rules such that anyone who violates them better be right or they lose their career and livelihood, if not their freedom.

If we are to allow someone to proceed with the kind of power involved in torture and serious bodily harm, then ONE ERROR should be enough to cashier and perhaps reasonably imprison anyone who does so in error.

If the person in question is not sufficiently sure of the facts that they have the right person to risk their OWN future, then they should know better than to proceed.

This hesitation is important, as it is a reflection of the difference between a despotism and a humane society -- a concern that one must be correct as to the victim of such extreme coercion if one is to employ it.

This is not a power we should grant lightly nor take errors in use lightly.

Because, if an error is made, then we have allowed the torture and created intentional suffering of an innocent. This may be an unavoidable accident, but it should never be taken as an "acceptable thing". It's a major f***-up whenever it happens, and it inevitably will.

I concur with the notion that terrorists have given up their claim to just and humane treatment by their choices. I don't believe it is a good idea to follow them into hell, nor to inflict the same on anyone who has made no such choice.

And therein lies the rub.
OBloody Hell | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 6:34 pm | #

"Spiritual"

This word has no objective definition, and is therefore meaningless. Reasonable people don't use it.
Brett | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 8:17 pm | #

Truth Junkie: "His [Pascal's] point seems to have been that it is arrogant to think that you have the entire universe 'figured out.'"

No doubt! And, thanks for the response.
J. Peden | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 9:43 pm | #

OBloody Hell,
I've personally had my fill of the politically correct hyper sensitivity of possibly wronging someone in an imperfect world. If taken to its extreme, which ain't far from where we are, nobody can do a goddamn thing to get the scum like OJ Simpson off the streets. The whole idea that America or any other humane society has to be perfect in its actions in order to be morally whole is blatantly unrealistic and absurd.

Brett,
The word Spiritual can have no meaning to some people. Sort of like Palm Tree has no meaning to an Eskimo.
SteveH | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 10:07 pm | #

ARH (Re: your 2:10 pm) -

It sounds like you're trying to disagree, but if we take it point-by-point:
1) Consistent
2) Consistent
3) Not Applicable
3) This is part of what I was getting at. We are specialized these days - with none of us producing for ourselves (as individuals) all of what we need to survive (as individuals). We produce, and trade what we produce *with others* to survive. Obviously (to us, anyway), property rights and the right to trade freely are critical here. Less obvious is the notion that when one of our trading partners perishes, it has a negative impact on us because it is trade with such individuals that is crucial to our material well being. It represents the loss of someone who might have produced something (that you could trade for) that might have benefitted your life. Think of the countless thousands (or millions!) of individuals who were involved in some way in producing everything you use on any given day. It's mind-boggling!
4) Consistent
5) This is also part of what I was saying. (see comments for #3, above).

Speaking of absurdity, how can you carry on at such length about the importance of individual rights, and then (apparently) deny that the whole reason you NEED such a thing is BECAUSE THERE ARE OTHER PEOPLE IN THE WORLD THAT YOU HAVE TO DEAL WITH!! In other words, because "No man is an Island". Geez!

As to your literary commentary (later), Gloria contributes the kind of context I'm talking about. I don't know if she's even right, but it sounds to me like Donne is being taken entirely out of context, to make political fodder out of his words when he isn't even alive to defend himself. Does anybody here really know what this guy was about, philosophically?

BTW, I'd be the first to disagree with him if he was being literal - if he meant that *every* single human death is inherently a negative, although I would certainly consider the exceptions to his rule to be tragedies unto themselves (for the reasons outlined above).
Optimizer | Email | Homepage | 02.28.08 - 11:33 pm | #

Another great post with awesome comments from all. Oh, how I love this site...
Loyal Eagle | Email | Homepage | 02.29.08 - 12:19 am | #

Brett: 'This word has no objective definition, and is therefore meaningless. Reasonable people don't use it.'

What about the word 'Beauty'?

It also has no objective definition.
Does that mean Reasonable people don't use it?

Also, the word "I." It means VASTLY different things depending on the person who says it. Therefore it has NO OBJECTIVE DEFINITION.

Are you advocating that we banish the word "I"? If so, you should read this great short story I know called "Anthem"...
Truth Junkie | Email | Homepage | 02.29.08 - 7:23 am | #

ARH,
I will try to address "the point being argued." Please let me know if I see it.

It seems to me that you are differentiating between a mistake and an evil act. You say there are three components to each.
1) The mental awareness of the person doing the act. For a mistake, by implication, it is a lack of mental awareness. For an evil act, it is 'refusing to think.'

2) The consequences of the act. For a mistake, it is recognizing and 'owning up to' the consequences of the act. For an evil act it is 'evading the consequences.'

3) The actions toward the victims of the act. For a mistake, it is making restitution. For an evil act, it is refusing to ever make restitution.

Is that your point? Please let me know if I understand you rightly.
Truth Junkie | Email | Homepage | 02.29.08 - 7:33 am | #

Truth Junkie,

You did make an attempt but missed the mark. I don't really care if the missing was a mistake or your usual way of doing things. End of discussion.
A. Rational Human | Email | Homepage | 02.29.08 - 9:22 am | #

A. Rational Human,

I tried to restate your point, you say I missed the mark. Could you please correct my error so that we can continue our discussion?

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Truth Junkie | Email | Homepage | 02.29.08 - 9:50 am | #

I just say "spirituality" is self-knowledge, because it's all there within you - everything - including the defects which Dr.S. describes so well and The Fall, which I don't even take as bad things but instead necessary in some way.
J. Peden | Email | Homepage | 02.29.08 - 3:14 pm | #

"in some way", a mysterious way, importantly...
J. Peden | Email | Homepage | 02.29.08 - 3:17 pm | #

"The fall," to me , just refers to the arrival on the scene, in Man, of the faculty of awareness of self, as separate from the rest, and the ability to reflect and so to choose and to "miss the mark," vs. the unreflective group mind of the animals.

"Spiritual" refers to the part(s) of the self that aren't tangible(the self being a physical/energetic unity). The intangible parts, of course, are invisible and unquantifiable, like "mind," with the brain as the physical counterpart. The unity of "the opposites" defies conceptualization, instead bringing thinking to a standstill at its' own limits. In other words, E=MCC.
Katina | Email | Homepage | 02.29.08 - 7:44 pm | #

Truth Junkie,

No. I will not. I am not your intellectual therapist and don't intend to be even if I could. Figure it out on your own or forget it.
A. Rational Human | Email | Homepage | 03.01.08 - 12:26 pm | #

My problem with the cancer analogy is that it was widely used by Nazis to describe the Jews and others. And it is still used today by some Muslims to describe the Jews.

Progressives during the early part of the 20th century used it as well to describe people they did not like (see Jonah Goldberg's Liberal Fascism).

It is probably not a good analogy to use about human beings.
Bilbo | Email | Homepage | 03.02.08 - 8:49 pm | #

And thus we see that ARH is not rational at all. Or rather, he is like the rest of us humans and rational only to the limit of his bigotry and discrimination.

Listen up, buddy, reason can only progress from the acceptance of axioms and logical progressions from those axioms. The fact is, axioms by definition cannot be proven. They are First Principles and DO NOT REQUIRE PROOF.

When two conflicting axioms collide, THEN you go about seeing which one is more acceptable. Your axiom is that there is no god, no spiritual world beyond this one. Mine is that there is God, and He came in the form of Jesus Christ. The fact is, because we proceed from different axioms, on certain matters we are both bigots and appear unreasonable to each other.
Gregory Kong | Email | Homepage | 03.03.08 - 9:41 pm | #