Moral Philosophy: the origins of evil, and how to handle them
Introduction
Morality summed up in 2 commandments
1) You will protect your natural environment and its harmless
endangered species by all means.
2) You will respect and serve the interests of others as your own.
The moral sense
I consider it my duty to do good and to avoid evil, not to be virtuous,
but because it is a triviality. I do it because I know that I just have
to do this, even though I can not really explain why (or maybe so, in a
sense: see below). I do this because this is part of me.
There seems to be people who are not so, for whom it is not
self-evident. Although, we must be wary of appearances. Maybe they
simply lack the discernment of what is right or wrong. If they have no
moral sense, or if they behave contrary to that sense, I agree that
they lack something, that all will not necessarily be good for them in
the
afterlife. But since I am not in their place, I can not judge the
liability of their soul.
Certainly, for the smooth organization
of the society it is necessary to accuse those who do evil and condemn
it, for two classic reasons: deterrence and the physical
prevention on the one hand, to try to wake up and guide the moral sense
of people so that they become aware of the rules of morality on the
other.
But these two reasons, as they are here, would lose their
meaning as a punishment or reward after death, especially if their
impact was eternal. Certainly, the idea of a reward and a divine
justice seems to have a meaning and be defensible from a certain point
of view at least, but the meaning of such divine justice, if it exists,
escapes us, because we are not in the skin of each other. The idea of
eternal punishment is absurd: it has no educational value, because who
would it
educate? It can educate if there is a second chance, so if it is not
eternal; and an eternal misfortune would be disproportionate as respect
to a limited
fault. Anyway, it's not my problem. I do the good because I know
that I must do it, and I can not act as if I did not know it. The
question
of what fate God reserves for those who are not so, and why does
not concern me.
The saints
What do the Saints have more than
others? An extraordinary virtue, for example. To do what? To do the
good?
Possibly, but according to what criteria? Let's look at a passage from
the Gospels on this point: the story of the poor widow, who has only a
few coins, worth "much more" than the fortunes given by the rich,
because it is "everything she had to live". That's nice, but as for
the usefulness of donations, those of the rich weighs more; the moral
feat accomplished by
the poor widow is only for her sanctification before God. What for ?
The saints are to me a kind of athletes who go to the end of
human possibilities on a certain level, that's beautiful for those who
are fans
but these feats mainly server their authors themselves, and possibly
the dream of the rest of humanity in wonder before them.
I do not need
to be that kind of athlete, because I do not have only that to do in
life,
not only for myself but also and even more, precisely I have better
than this to do for the good of others.
As for doing the good, rather than sacrifice oneself giving everything
we have to live, thus
paralyzing ourself and becoming unable to be significantly useful to
others anymore, we should rather, for example, if given the
opportunity, invest in honest business, make profit, then donate a
portion of
the profits which can be greater than what we could have given at
first, and
live comfortably with the rest. Or we can also lend to the poor to
enable them to set up their business, then they could repay so we can
with
that help others the same way. This will be more useful to humanity,
without
needing to excel.
Morality
Morality is not primarily a
virtue in the human heart, nor a gift from God. But it would be that
suffering ends, and that happiness spreads. Such events may depend
on the actions of men. The actions of men may depend on the moral
values that are in them. But these are only two factors among others.
The effect of the actions of men on humanity is not the sum of the
actions of individuals, because humanity is a complex organization with
a division of labor, and very different roles assigned to various
individuals. The available technologies also play a significant role,
and thus can be classified as virtuous or vicious depending on
situations. The actions of men are much less guided by moral values
than by
what social organization leads them to do. Among all that, moral values
are but a small instrument among others.
I think this is not degrade
the meaning of the human moral consciousness to reduce it to the level
of
means to an end outside it, quite the contrary. It is giving it its
true meaning. It is the obligation not to run it inside a vacuum as a
style
exercise locked on oneself, but to become a knowledge of
reality. It is also enhancing it of a genuine hope, ie a hope that is
knowledge
and perspective of a new world to build, released at least partly of
the present suffering, instead of mere feeling and self-persuasion.
Thus,
the aim of morality is not to have a clear conscience, in ignorance of
what we could do better, but to try to really do what is best, taking
knowledge of what can be done and how to be most effective. So to break
the lethargy of consciousness and discover what could be done better,
the way is not to make an "examination of conscience", but rather
forget about our conscience and consider that which is still beyond our
consciousness, the reality of good and evil that happens to others and
what it depends on, the events and circumstantial factors that do not
depend
on what we believe in, of the awareness or of the feelings that we have
towards
them.
The paradoxes of morality
A fundamental moral issue
Choosing between the humility to let the world perish, and the pride of
saving it. Indeed, one cannot successfully run 2 hares at the same
time: to maximally purify one's soul, or to be as useful as possible
to others.
The fundamental subtlety of the morality problem
Consider the following statement: "The good and evil are the result of
human actions, the good is the result of good deeds, and evil is
the result of bad deeds."
This statement is deeply ambiguous, and depending on how you interpret
it, may be very true, or very false.
Everything depends on how we define the notion of "good deed". In fact,
everyone tends to interpret it in compliance with his own code of
conduct, but the codes of conduct vary widely from one individual to
another. Many define the code of conduct to be followed in terms of
compliance with their conscience, of the goodness of intentions behind
a given
action. But such a criterion is often tautological and relative,
everyone
leading his actions following his own conscience. Who acted with good
intentions in his own eyes will be judged as having bad
intentions by someone else who is tempted to judge that accoring to the
conformity of the former one's actions to the conscience
(sort of implicit code of conduct) of the latter. Everyone acting
differently in a
manner that he believes best, has a natural tendency to believe that
the
actions of others when they are different, are animated with bad
intentions.
Everyone lives on the basis of his own code of
conduct implied tend to believe that "naturally", any behaviour
conforming to the code will tend to lead to good consequences, and any
behavior that deviates will tend to result in poor ones, with an idea
of what
causes this, but without trying to check it seriously. Many people
are content to believe that their own actions are necessarily good and
have good consequences, on the basis that they are animated with good
intentions and / or obey their own code of conduct, and that
such or such actions of others were animated with bad intentions, based
on the fact
that their consequences were bad and / or that these actions are not in
accordance with the same code of conduct, without taking the trouble to
find out if by any chance this would not be the end of the Same, judged
unequally by the use of different criteria.
My view is the
antithesis of those trends. I consider the statement above as
being ultimately true, but in a very different and even opposite
meaning from the one usually given to it. Indeed, I consider that the
notion of
good or bad action is not a basic concept that has any direct meaning
in
itself, only considering the action and the spirit (intentions and
philosophy) of its actors. The only thing that has a meaning
and a value in itself, is the reality of the consequences that each
action will finally lead to.
The real morality is not to follow one's
conscience and to be driven by good intentions, but to make the effort
to redefine the classification of actions as good or bad,
depending on
the sole criterion of the analysis of its objective consequences,
without regard to any question of assessing the nature of the soul and
intentions that have animated the actions; while such a question should
be banned and avoided as vain and off-topic from the start, will thus
have to be affected in no way either, by the outset of this
retrospective requalification of actions.
I therefore
defend a lowly materialistic morals, that rejects
as hollow and pointless any questions of judgement on the substance of
the
soul of people, and is only interested in the problem of calculating
the physical
consequences of given acts, to draw from there the only real authentic
moral conclusions, on the only real moral values that may exist, namely
whose sole
purpose is the true accuracy of this calculation itself in all its
complexity,
these links from causes to effects, and thus the measure of the value
(happiness or unhappiness) of the real consequences of given acts; all
issues of judgements of the actors we might otherwise consider have to
be rejected as
being perverse, often unfair against people (whose behavior
would not meet the criteria or would lead to unfortunate consequences),
and risky for the danger to divert our attention from the real
objective
moral that we should follow, namely the goal of social utility, as has
been explained : evaluation and improvement of a physical outside
phenomenon (the facilitation of collective happiness), of a
very different nature from any problem of personal judgement whatsoever
(although interaction between the two is possible).
Thus, it is
not primarily the souls that should be judged as moral or immoral, but
things, as factors that the happy or unhappy events depend on.
Among these
things there are doctrines that may inhabit the thoughts and thereby
control the acts of people like operating systems in computers: some
doctrines are good, some bad, but the person who bears them is not
necessarily responsible for that.
The nature of the evil that is in man
Man often commits evil, but it's not that he is bad in himself. Or
course,
there may also be people who are bad in themselves, but it would be
fruitless to reject on them the issues, accusing them or doing them
moral
lessons, as we have just said. In reality the problem of evil from the
evil men is an accessory problem, in addition to being very little
remediable whatever people may say. Man commits much more harm than the
state of his immorality, and the same level of morality, he could
commit on the contrary much less than his immorality, but do the good
anyway.
In fact most of evil committed by man, is an evil committed by good
men. It is an evil committed by goodness of heart. And this evil
committed by good men is even a more perverse evil when it is
committed by goodness of heart. Indeed, this goodness serves as an
excuse and justification, and thus as a power to this evil, the power
of
the deep goodness to disqualify and condemn as an evil any resistance
to its
action.
And why do good men commit evil out of goodness of heart? Because it is
the best way, as established by experience,
which enables them to have a clear conscience. Indeed, wanting and
believing to do the good, they commit evil because they did not have
the
opportunity to understand that this is evil, but they believe they are
doing the good. This is a manifestation of the dictatorship of chance I
already presented in another text: the problem of separation
between an act and its consequences, while the issue of the causation
linking an
act with its consequences is a complex issue on which the people can
easily have misconceptions. Indeed, if everyone can more or less agree
and clearly see the extent of evil as a final consequence
(happiness or unhappiness), on the other hand the knowledge of the
links between
these effects and their causes and to the question of their possible
remedies,
is a very different problem. And it is much easier in this regard
to have misconceptions than right ideas. However, some patterns of
misconceptions being much more effective than the truth to give people
the
impression to behave well, and any attempt to seek better
criteria for discernment being illusory (most often leading to
disenchantment and feelings of failure in their search of the good,
with its eventual success out of reach for most people), it inevitably
leads people to consider these patterns of misconceptions as the best
and the most virtuous.
Well, not completely: there are people
who had the chance to understand that they must not do the evil that
others are doing while wanting to do the good. Or rather, the
misfortune: because once
understood this, it is much more difficult to exercise their virtue, as
they no longer have the chance to exercise their virtue in the form of
the exercise of the false good, that others have the chance to practice
in the name of the good.
And this misfortune, to get a greater
understanding of the truth, makes them worse beings than others,
because
they have the misfortune of having to always confront this way their
actions to the reality and cruelty of fate, rather than simply
exercising their virtue in the world of magical illusions. The
knowledge of reality with its difficulties requires them to study and
confront again
and again the question of their actions to reality, and thus to
focus on developing for it much other things than virtue and the
goodness of the
heart.
But deep down there was no real difference between
the two: they are as good as each other, and the difference is that the
ones
live in the world of their magical illusions, and others live in the
world of reality. And it is always possible to switch from one universe
to another, not because one is more or less good, but by accident,
depending on the circumstances, intelligence and insights. Nobody is
hypocritical in the soul. Hypocrisy and perversity are not natures but
behaviours. The behaviour of humans is the end result of what produces
the energy of their goodwill organized along their patterns of
thinking. If these patterns are false, the good will of man is not
responsible for the actual
effects of his conduct, but leads him to behave in a perverse way
that does not resemble him.
Do not think that this is a rare
thing: a long experience, analysis and reflection, led me to
conclude that this problem is what truly dominates the world and the
behavior of most people.
Religion is one example. The creation of
the Soviet Union is another. I have written various examples in other
texts here, and I will continue to do so.
Although ... I
sometimes have good reasons to doubt that most men are basically good
but
only wrong, ie whose thoughts, words and bad deeds can be excused by
the fact that they would be fair from the viewpoint of the world as
they
imagine it. For those people who clearly demonstrate their goodness and
their intrinsic sincerity, are extremely likely to strongly maintain
thoughts that are clearly immoral and perverse in themselves, ie which
can not
be good in any conceivable world. Would the doctrine of original sin (I
mean
the doctrine according to which man is inherently bad) be
ultimately correct? except that, of course, this finding of the way in
which people approve of actions which should obviously be seen as bad,
depends in its conclusions on the question
of whether people would be capable of a vital minimum of mindful
thinking in this regard. However, it would seem that precisely the
problem would reside here: that in fact people are really stupid, and
that
they really believe what they are doing when following a code of
conduct that is supposed to
produce the good, but that could only do it in an very illusory,
illogical and unrealistic world.
What are the fundamental theological problems
In other words, the real big problems that are not the mere result of a
false assumption, of a doctrine established by any particular
religion or of any misconception, the real problems that
resist, whatever one may think, and to which there is no simple
solution:
1) The famous problem of evil (if God created everything, where does
the bad come frome ?) (-> As explained below, I propose a try of a
response, albeit partial and not entirely satisfactory: the
relativization of the importance of earthly life and its sufferings
as compared to eternity, it is not satisfactory insofar as this still
does not
justify anything, and anyway I do not think that suffering is generally
justifiable by any means, or even that it is fair to assume the
existence of any
justification in absolute terms, regardless of any understandability
problems).
Variations of the same problem:
* Why did God leave behind a miserable life on Earth several billion
years before the appearance of man more or less exclusively on the
basis of the long
agony of natural selection (the miserable deaths of so many individuals
that may be participating in the selection of a gene or two, if they
are lucky),
while with His infinite science it would have been relatively easy
for Him to dictate directly in a much reduced time the genetic code
necessary for
the life of the main species, and even to make them more comfortable?
* Why are we not born directly in Heaven ?
2) The problem of judgement, in the following terms: if after death
one must bear the pain of our bad deeds and the joys of our good deeds
to
others, so that there is ultimately a sort of justice in the sky,
according to what criteria will our actions be evaluated ?
In this regard, one could easily argue the following:
* Any theology in which the judgement does not fully comply with the
measure of the purity of altruistic intentions that animated all
thoughts
and actions taken, would be a horrible, unfair and untenable theology;
* Any theology in which the judgement does not fully comply with the
measure of goods and evils that have actually resulted from actions
taken in the actual context of what happened, including what was
misunderstood or unknown to the person who acted, would be
a horrible, unfair and untenable theology.
* These two requirements are,
in fact, due to the effective form of material linkages of causes and
effects
that we observe, totally incompatible with each other.
The
traditional Christian solution to this paradox is to make a
dialectic confusion between the profound intentions of an act and its
actual
consequences. And so, to have the reflex to judge, sometimes the
expected real
consequences of acts according to the quality of their
underlying motivation, sometimes the deep motivation according to the
actual
consequences, depending on what is most convenient at one time or
another.
As for me, the lack of solution to this problem does not
prevent me from sleep, as our mission on earth is to manage the
problems, misfortunes and disasters that occur on the earth, not to
solve any pangs and contradictions of divine justice.
Bringing together the ideas of these 2 issues, appears a third
problem, perhaps more serious: unlike men, God does not have the excuse
of the
mistake about the consequences of His actions. Unless these have only
an insignificant place in the events, and that our universe is mainly
subjected to its own burdens and determinism beyond the power of God,
which seems to be widely the very case, but is, in itself, a largely
incomprehensible thing. The world and its woes appear as being
subject to the absolute power Ignorance of the creatures, and
therefore,
ultimately, being the slaves of the Universal Irresponsibility. This
world is certainly probably a small part of the supra-universal
Creation,
but which nevertheless unfortunately concerns us very closely,
ourselves for now and all those that our present actions and words will
mainly address, so that, no matter what, we happen to be under the
obligation to be concerned with it.
No, unlike others, I do
not see here any good reason to escape in any lyrical flights about the
wisdom of
God beyond any sensible human intelligence. I see even this as a
blasphemy to try to locate the divine wisdom inside such a horrible
accident.
So I have no satisfactory answer to that problem. So
what? It is only natural not to know everything in life. Science is
very young as respect to evolution. But I am always embarrassed (and I
suffer and I want to work to ensure that this state of circumstances
change).
The hierarchy of values
The fundamental value is happiness, or
pleasure, as we want to call it. More specifically, I mean the sum of
happiness of all living beings. This is the source of all other values,
which may be summed up in
one word: useful. Here I mean by "useful" what produces happiness on
collective average, given all the mechanisms of cause and effect
occurring in
the world. Specifically, an important value is truth. Indeed, the truth
is both a source of happiness for some (for intellectual interest),
and can in some cases be extremely useful because, it provides the
means to distinguish between the useful and the unnecessary, wasteful
or harmful, thus enabling people of
good will to choose the really useful acts. One type of example is
regarding the judgement or advice that can be addressed to others. It
is
indeed distasteful, even sometimes harmful because of the bad acts
arising therefrom, to
send to others in all sincerity some judgments or advice that are
actually
based on error.
Spiritual values or values of the human being
All souls have price for God who loves us all equally. Indeed, not only
it could not be otherwise since all also exist, but
hardly any difference can either be justified because, most often,
everyone
does, roughly and in general, what he believes to be good, so that his
actions are determined by what he believes, what he has a chance to
think and understand, in other words by the circumstances, which can
lead to bad
actions, but in oneself one can hardly be bad . Therefore, there is no
"spiritual value" which puts a soul morally above another. But, let us
remember, the studies of variations of constant functions are
pointless.
But
there is one parameter-goal that may be important to consider regarding
the care for others: everyone is not equally sensitive to events. Just
as
not everyone has the same preferences, and does not evaluate all the
circumstances as having the same weight of joy or suffering in their
lives, and on specific items (all items are unique, are't they ?), it
may
happen that the same circumstances produce a joy or a pain more or
less serious for the one than for the other who is facing it. Quite
difficult
to judge in the absolute the ratio of the overall sensitivity of the
one
relative to that of the others, unless of course, by letting the
differences in
values between the different circumstances from the point of view of
every given person, express themselves through the law of market by
which everyone can prefer
this to that.
Apart from that, there are cause-parameters that may vary from one
individual to another, especially the utility
parameter (to which, for example, intelligence may contribute), that is
that
some manage to be more useful than others to humanity. This should
be distinguished from any issues of judgments about the merits of the
soul, as what
is often invoked in the form of parameters such as "good will".
Admittedly, it would be the duty of everyone to try to improve its own
cause-parameters of this kind according to his possibilities, but an
absolute
judgement on the substance of the soul based on the basis of definable
parameters (whatever be the sort of definition we can try) would have
little
meaning. If we wanted to see a meaning to an assessment of some more or
less spiritual moral
parameters of souls, it could be more or less a
source of pride. So, whatever its interpretation or the connotation
that
you want to give them, it may lead to stop our attention on issues of
personal judgments or other questions on the depths of the soul and
thus would
deflect us from the real morality, as explained above.
Are there any universal values?
Yes, of course. And more than that, there are multitudes of universal
values, profusely, much more than a single human could ever carry. Like
the universal truths that science discovers.
One of these
values, and not the least, is the respect and praise of the infinite
variety of possibilities of life, of innovation and
intelligence.
However, a good value or idea, new or not, with general range that
would deserve to be more put into practice, should not need to be
permanently reexecuted by everyone, because all that is repetitive is
better achieved by machines than by men, once the latter have
established the
exact rule that must be applied by the former. And in addition, the
machines can
do so more easily and accurately, without spending any intellectual
effort. So, we must
understand that if it is of course good to spread as far as possible
the best ideas, the best productions of the spirit, the highest virtues
with
universal validity, it is not always appropriate to try to encumber
with it the minds of people, miserable cousins of monkeys, in any case
unable to bear
and to respect correctly any great deal of them. Indeed, the good ideas
and good virtues
would be far too many for any one individual to ever be able to learn
them all
as they would deserve, if we wanted them to be carried by men.
We must on the
contrary most often, work to spread these higher truths and higher
virtues, not primarily in the hearts of men, but rather in those of
computers. And this, not even in any hope to let these the slightest
chance of a
place in heaven, but only to exploit them mercilessly. Indeed, as they
are
not fallible as can be men, they have the unique ability to be able to
accumulate the virtues almost indefinitely to practise
again and again without ever tiring. The highest virtues to spread in
the heart of computers, will consist of the fact that they have been
programmed to perform the best actions: to make the best
intersubjective procedures between men in search for truth and justice;
to educate
them at home as needed without alway requiring teacherss at hand; to
bring
prosperity and save them the useless pain of the inefficient work,
through more efficient
working methods; to allow them to find more directly the trusted people
to make this or that business while avoiding scam; to operate a maximum
of acts at a distance and avoid unnecessary
trips; to provide love in abundance to humans, using optimized
matching methods of personal ads, calculated in order to avoid
at best the risks of the horrible ordeal of not chosen celibacy, that
still occur.
It is clear indeed that these are forms of virtue
that the hearts of men are unable to bear. For example, a person
who meets a desperate single, without being the person that fits, no
matter if one has all the compassion of the world, can under no
circumstances be
helpful and save that single from circling in solitude or typing in a
vacuum by hazardous travels missing their target without any
significant good chance. A couple already formed by chance would be
unable to resolve to split so that each of them gives a chance to
someone else, who would otherwise
be condemned to the suffering of celibacy. By contrast a computer
containing all the data from all the profiles, can offer everyone to
get contacts in a priority order which provides overall better chances
to all:
everyone could directly explore his dating chances without wasting
time, and could be invited to meet in priority the ones who were in
danger of
celibacy, although not bad choices, to give them their
chance, before trying between more lucky people. But,
isn't it clear that this real virtue of being such a provider of love
to
humanity, virtue whose lack has caused so much suffering, is a virtue
that only computers would be able to practice if well instructed for it
?
The pride of humility
For example it is such a pity to see Christians wasting the efforts of
their lives to trying to make a pride to be humble, which ultimately
can only lock them in hopeless internal conflicts, except of course
once they manage with their usual success, to become crazy enough to
not see the
hubris they derive from their claim to humility.
This Christian
doctrine, therefore, having initially ignored from the outset any
question of physical circumstance of good and evil dismissed as "low"
and distateful to their spirit as an unjust and unworthy way for God to
judge things or let the good or evil happen, puts itself basically in
the position
of requiring every good or bad to be assigned a
"spiritual" thus personal responsibility, therefore linked to vice and
virtue. It needs,
for its own reasons, to present this human virtue that everyone should
practise as simple, easily teachable. So this trivial choice to
reduce the whole issue of goodness and morality of the universe
to the trivial sole criterion of the supreme virtue of humility,
precisely through
its trivially self-contradictory character, is indeed very clever to
give itself reason
in all circumstances, staying irrefutable in front of any scenario that
comes along, and will always find a swindle to wash its hands from
its spectacular crashes like the Galileo trial in which one of the main
accusations was that of a hubris (claim to contradict the
great spiritual authorities of his time ...). Here is the mechanism:
Consider a subject that does not bear any judgement on himself and does
not care,
or either bearing on himself an average judgement. The Christian won't
make a
difference but automatically interpret the first case in terms of
the second, as he is himself so obsessed with the issues of judgments
of
people and of everyone's judgement on oneself, that he can not conceive
that this
issue may not be the navel of the universe and that other people may
not be also obsessed with their own judgement on themselves.
So,
if the works of this person are good, his moral value will be judged
positively, and thus exceeding his judgement on himself. As so he
bears a judgement on itself less than his real value, it will be
declared humble, and his good works will be put to the credit of his
humility.
If his works are bad, his moral value will be judged
negatively, and therefore his judgement on himself is higher than the
reality, he will be declared proud, and his bad works will be put on
the account of his pride.
If someone tries to secretly be
humble, nobody knows, and if his works are poor could not bring them to
account for his humility that we will not. If the quest for practical
humility in public, we can see it as a vain pretension to pass as
humble, and thus a form of pride, and it put his bad works on the
account of the pride. Anyway, to make bad works, we must have power,
and the fact of a power user is viewed as a form of pride, Christians
saw as a virtue by passivity, the fact that he did do anything, to
submit to fate, not to disrupt the course of events. It is therefore
regarded as necessarity false to claim humility while doing bad works.
If
someone is doing good works and publicly displays his humility, he will
be declared a saint, and his good works will be put on the behalf of
his humility. If he
makes good works and does not display humility, this absence of display
will be seen
as a form of humility.
The only remaining case, which could
escape this machine of unfalsifiability, is that of someone doing good
works and having more positive opinions about himself, especially if
those opinions are formed after another criteria than humility.
This case is especially unlikely because, as explained above, the best
way to do good works is through understanding of the fact that good and
evil are not coming mainly from human traits, but from things, and that
issues of personal judgments are essentially vanities. Whoever would
have
attached great importance to any degree of judgement on the substance
of the soul, has little chance of doing good and outstanding works. QED
See further comment on pride
The hierarchy of evil deeds
The first, direct, fundamental problems, are those that have the effect
of concrete harm to people's lives.
The latter evils in the logical order, with
indirect qualification from their influence on the former, are those
which consist of
propagation of errors, that have the effect of influencing
people's behaviour in a manner which yields the direct evils.
As compared to
all this, anger and insults are not truly an evil, as the psychological
discomfort they directly cause is mild and transient. If their cause is
justified, that they denounce the evils above, then they can be
justified as well. Otherwise, simply ignore them, so that their effect
is zero. While a fundamental problem is to arrive to precisely
distinguish between the two cases.
But between the one who
spreads quietly and politely giving the impression of wisdom a
philosophy
confirming erroneous judgments and irresponsible behaviour, thus
causing the greatest evils, and whoever denounces and condemns the
first in a form of anger, the conduct of the latter
is much better because salutary.
Unfortunately, those who shout the strongest are not always those that
are more true,
because it is even more often the opposite (but not a general law). As
Bertrand Russell wrote: "The whole problem with the world is that fools
and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so
full of doubts."
But remember that even the certainty and
anger are two different things. If the character of the wise is
uncertainty while
the one of the fool is the certainty, that on the one hand the
certainty
without anger gives an impression of wisdom and on the other hand the
wrath without certainty gives an impression of madness, then the
situation is serious.
That said, there is of course no necessary link
between certainty and error. It would be too easy to find the truth on
such a simple test!
The diagnosis of evil
The origin of defects in humans
Same
answer as to the limits of human rationality, especially as we
explained that evil is ultimately more or less an expression of a lack
of rationality.
So, man is defective because he descends from
monkey. Monkey is defective because it descended from previous species,
who had even more such defects.
For the actual content of the evil that is in man, see this list of
examples of human persversity noted above.
My God why?
A religious tendency is either to justify evil as a test that leads to
good,
or to accuse man, so any way to lick the boots of God confused with
Destiny.
I think that the best response would be the
relativization. As to ask: why is there an accident here? No, the
purpose of a road and a car is not to do an accident, but the accident
is the exception as compared to a larger and broader welfare.
On the
one hand, relativization of earthly life as compared to the journey of
the
soul in the afterlife, which appears from the testimony of NDE, much
larger than earthly life.
On the other hand, relativization of the troubles of past and present
centuries, as compared to the whole history of life on earth.
For human history is finally quite short as compared to the whole
earthly
life since its beginnings. If you wonder "My God why ?" about the human
adventure, there is no reason to not ask the same question
about the past history of life. If we thought for any reason that man
should be free of suffering and evil, the question of suffering and
evil remain entire about the suffering and evil endured by all wild
animals since the origin of life, and the question of precisely what is
happening now would be relatively insignificant in the context of this
more true perspective, given the relatively ridiculous time interval of
the history
of mankind in comparison with the past history of all earthly life: my
God,
why have all these creatures suffered, while a resolution of the
problem could (or not) exist ?
Faced with this most important issue, I am
proposing one more relativization, namely with respect to the future:
the
history of life is not finished, and its evolution first much stagnated
for several billion years before finally experiencing a rapid
development over the past few hundred million years. Vertebrates have
emerged "only" 530 million years ago, there has hardly been a
hundred billion human beings who lived until now. However, the Earth
still
has some 5 billion years of future. Calculate as if evolution had to
stop at the human stage for 5 billion years (this is obviously false,
most probably species will appear that will be even more intelligent
and
important than humans), with an average of 2 billion people present on
Earth and average and a 100-year
life expectancy. It would provide 100 million billion of lives to come,
in other words a million times more than those which took place so far
since the emergence of homo sapiens. The question therefore becomes:
why living beings, and especially man and what it will evolve to,
would continue to suffer millions of years more?
Considering
how the history of mankind has already been turned upside down in just
a few centuries, and how man has already acquired a relative but still
appreciable control over their own destiny, it seems absurd to believe
that human life would be submitted to an irrepressible bad fate that
would extend the current woes in the perspective of thousands of years
to come, let
alone millions of years.
The only essential question is therefore the one we must ask ourselves:
what shall we make of the future of life and humanity ?
Improvability of the world, nonsense of suffering, and individual
responsibility
One aspect of Christian theology, even if not shared by all Christians,
is to consider the world as somehow perfect, more exactly that God has
done all
things for love, for the better, even suffering; and that in front of
each
"test" it is our duty to see a wonderful hidden godly plan. In most
cases, this sense is not accessible. What can it mean to speak, with a
intense
faith, about the existence of a love explanation without even caring to
discover the actual content of this motive? This is hardly better than
the
materialistic approach, which is to believe in the existence of a
supposed physical explanation of consciousness regardless of the fact
that we can not make it effectively. But what is distateful in this
faith is that (no matter its official denials) it constitutes an
implicit accusation to those who are victims of suffering that is
obviously meaningless, of being blind to the motive of love from God to
them in these circumstances, and this makes them suffer twice. Indeed,
the
problem here is that it requests by automatic principle the victims to
find a "raison d'etre" for their own suffering, while the adviser
cannot
see it himself for them; or to seek their own responsibility, without
even caring to verify himself whether such a liability exists,
and if so which one. What evil yet would there be to recognize the
sufferings for what they are, namely one something possibly profoundly
cruel, absurd and unjust?
The same reflex also often happens
replacing God by the society: one claims the society to be somehow
perfect or anyway that any
idea to challenge it would be futile, and one accuses anyone who
complains, to accuse the society in vain. Victims of natural disasters
that nobody can prevent have right to our compassion, without needing
to
find the culprits that they are actually victims of. Why should
the victims of bad luck (I think obviously my own example: not having
had the opportunity to find mate), as well as young intellectuals
victims of internment and absurd mental tortures in the school
concentration
camps, whose suffering is due to social circumstances and institutions,
would
they not be entitled to a comparable compassion? What evil is there to
recognize the senseless and barbaric defects of society? It's as
if it were assumed that anyway nobody can do anything, society will
never change and that the only relevant question is how to adapt. But
even if this inevitability was true, it would not be a justification
for such a social cruelty, and for such a lack of moral compassion
towards the
victims. But moreover this is untrue, because the society may change.
Similarly, one can not say that all things were created by God to
perfection for the most fulfilling life, either for happiness, or for
so-called spiritually useful tests. Because if all things were
perfect, there would have been no reason for changing profoundly. But
in fact, the living conditions of humanity evolve continuously and are
very different today from what they were centuries ago, but it is
essentially the same people, and therefore, in principle, the same
needs of tests and suffering for an optimum spiritual growth, if ever
it
was good and that there existed such an optimum. But living conditions
very
different from each other from one place to another and over time can
not be all perfect. So it is absurd: there is indeed in the world
naughty
unjustifiable defects which it is our duty to cure, as has
already been cured recently in comparison with previous periods (eg
in medicine). It is therefore the duty of man to keep observing the
absurdities and unjust sufferings, and to continue to cure them, even
and
especially if it seems hard to imagine. But the knee-jerk reaction of
people to refer victims to their own responsibility (I speak of
the systematic reflex when it is not really justified, sometimes it
is),
is far better explained, either by the general intellectual laziness,
which keeps man in a passive unshakable ignorance regardless of any
consideration which is non-effected anyway, or by the social
sensitivities of people who could not
conceive the idea that they could do better for others and for changing
society, and that they may have serious unaware liabilities in this
regard; cannot bear either to know that others are
less lucky than they are, nor to have to think about what they could do
better, because for them there is nothing worse in life than thinking
(the general intellectual laziness is sovereign) and discovering their
hidden responsibilities towards others.
On the recognition of the general nature and causes of misfortune,
and its practical management
The evil in man, or rather his clumsiness or lack of discernment as
we have said, is not the only cause of the bad. There is natural evil,
accidental evil, evil of chance, natural disasters, epidemics and
infirmities, as well as political evil which, although made of men,
largely escapes the control of most people, with this power that that
an unfortunate social mechanism still lets rather inevitably fall into
the wrong hands,
so that until the next real challenge to the system, this evil is very
similar
to that of natural disasters.
So how should we handle in daily practice this problem of evil?
An entirely satisfactory response is not possible: in fact, we know
that cruel, unjust, sadistic unhappiness exists, devoid of any fruit
nor
any moral or spiritual constructive lesson. It would be wrong to
deny it, because such a denial would be a mistake, and that mistakes
are
the main cause of evil.
However, the religious spirit is strongly
tempted to make such a denial: indeed, trusting that everything in
life is the perfect work of God, makes it impossible to
admit that God has
not made all things perfectly. Declaring the existence of absurd
misfortune in the world, would seems an insult to God. Therefore, the
religious spirit, by loyalty and corruption towards his Destiny God,
prefers to deny from the outset, without examination, the existence of
absurd
evil which is in the world, or to accuse man of it in such a global and
vague manner that it is completely sterile, providing no
remedy for what one did not take the trouble to diagnose precisely
enough (a non-constructive criticism, that escapes its own
responsibility by
undertaking
to sing one's good intentions at all tones in order to believe oneself
non-accountable, therefore somehow accusing of all evils, by
elimination,
the others who do not sing that as loud). He considers this denial of
reality as an act of praise to God that he has the duty to respect.
In reality, such a priori religious reflexes are destructive of our
very mission, which is as we have said, to save the future fate of
mankind. In order to acquire the necessary competence to be able to
cure
unhappiness, and more precisely the forms of misfortune that are the
most
absurd, the most unjustifiable and devoid of any morals, any sense and
any spiritual fruit to their victims, it is necessary to face and
identify it, especially where it is most cruel, unfair and devoid of
any moral and any spiritual fruit, and analyze the mechanisms by which
it occurs to try to thwart it by any means. In other words, we must
resist this currently widespread temptation to [divert our sight or
distort
our appreciation for protecting our conscience and our feeling towards
God].
Does economic growth make happiness?
Of course, this is in its very nature to increase the chance of
happiness.
But you are going to say: statistics show that over a century of
rapid development and economic growth, man is not happier,
there is a lot of suicides and so on.
Certainly, man is not so much
happier today than in the past. Why? Well, because in fact there had
not been
significant growth either, of course! Let me explain. (I'm here
speaking about the situation in France, I do not know about other
countries)
To clarify what we are
talking about, I would define economic growth as growth in labour
productivity, which normally (for a standard salaried job, in an honest
activity, with a salary in line with the usefulness to others as
measured by the
market balance, or other appropriate mechanism, and if there was no
tax), would be defined as the average over the existing works, of the
ratio
of the real value (purchasing power) of labour income, to the work
(time and arduousness) (let us not count here the
capital income component). So, well, the usual calculations of growth
are completely
false: this productivity has not really increased over the past
century. Indeed these calculations systematically forget the main
component of this object: the measurement of labour productivity of
apprenticeship as a pupil
and as a student.
But, the productivity of this work, which
contains the largest share of all the efforts, all the mental
energy of the entire youth of the population (the most essential part
of
life, in fact), largely descended to the abyss since a century: more
and
more painful and uninteresting, taking more and more time, for an
increasing failure. The reasons for this decline? The absence of
economic freedom worthy of the name, of course. This area has always
been controlled by a totally stupid and totalitarian administration
that locks all the youth in the concentration camps, taking all
of their time and all of their activities in the service of stupid and
debilitating mental
exercises. How can you expect that people
find
happiness and fulfilment in such conditions? To speak of growth it is
first necessary to undermine this dictatorship and to establish
freedoms: freedom of innovation, freedom of choice of everyone, market
mechanisms appropriate to ensure transparency, honesty, good
orientation towards what is useful to each one (interesting and
suitable to the
demands of the labour market ...) and the conditions necessary to give
back
the correct financial benefit, that would make it possible to motivate
and thus
allow the development of more productive learning methods (without
prejudging the nature of the fruits sought). This way finally people
would have better chances of being happy!
There is another area that has
not experienced much growth: having personally spent thousands of
hours to run the world in an attempt to finally find a girlfriend, but
with a still desperately null result, I cannot admit the assumption
that
today's society provides the means to productive work. Fortunately, new
technologies are opening already a glimmer of hope for growth in this
area with the development of dating sites. Unfortunately, this area is
largely monopolized by robbers who are using every means to make unfair
profits, I mean that in this area, the market mechanisms with its
competition are still in a deplorable situation
(misinformation about conditions, no guarantees of honesty both
of suppliers and customers ...), which has not yet led players in the
direction of optimal economic growth correctly. You can also remember
about the regulation of the use of university computers,
which prohibits (blocks technically) the use of dating sites.
Decidedly (but we already knew), the Administration is resolutely
opposed to any form of labour productivity worthy of the name ...
See further comments: on growth - on the decline - on the significance
of growth
The solutions
Changing society? Introductory ideas
There are
3 main ways to act on the world to try to improve it: changing the
general structure of the society - changing man - creating / modifying
/
deleting specific activities.
As we are here in the generalities, we
will focus on the first two ways. The first concerns Economics and
Political Science, the constitution of the state, and also the
development of technology, because of its importance to the world.
Spirituality claims that all this is superfluous, and that we should
concentrate
on the second way, the one of changing man, because, it says, the
technological, political and economic contributions do not resolve the
depth of
problems since man is always the same and evil remains (coming from
man). Okay, but I still do not consider that the progress of living
conditions
as compared to a century ago or two when the living conditions were
miserable, and when men routinely died of starvation and epidemics, is
something insignificant or uninteresting. If there are people who
are not interested in it, they are free to live in hermites in the
jungle or the mountains, away from technology ... Indeed the purpose of
technology is to liberate humanity, at least partially, from the
material necessities, in order to devote himself to whatever he wants
instead, for
example to whatever spiritual research, without being constantly
disturbed by unwanted hunger or laborious tasks.
Then, there is a big
pseudo-argument often mentioned by spirituality to reject attempts to
improve society and only consider to change man: the example of
communism, in which men believed to change society and it has failed.
Then, many said that this was the fault of man who is defective and
unable to put ideal systems into practice. But communism never
seriously seeked for logic or science, quite the contrary: it was
based on the rejection of any logic, any system, any science
(economics and the capitalist system it criticized and inside which it
pretended to show
irreconcilable contradictions), any try to make any consistent theory,
in favor of a human and spiritual ideal: love
and brotherhood among people. But spirituality is clever in serving as
a deterrent
to itself, viewing its own failures as failures of science, to
say it is impossible to scientifically improve society because the
problem is in the heart of man. This argument is nonsense: communism
was not a draft of a political system, it was not a theory,
and anyway not an ideal one. Just like religions and spiritualities, it
was a mere fancy of a supposed ideal, and no way a real one. Those who
say it was a theory, have no real idea of what the word "theory" may
really mean: anyway, the public never knew and will never know what a
theory is, and when they believe that they know a theory, then it
probably shows that it is not one. Technological applications of
science never worked by publishing a theory and expecting the public to
apply it. But so, you may ask, what may be the solution then, if the
people cannot apply true theories ? Well, don't worry: just like all
technologies, you will not need to understand them for using them. Just
one team has to release the technological basis of a new Invisible
Hand, and all the world will have to follow.
Changing society? The economic principle
The principle of the betterment of society is, in brief (we will not
explain here the procedures, which are another debate, the important
thing is
that solutions exist), to ensure
that everyone is will be paid as precisely as possible in a way to
reflect his usefulness to others, in order to convert any act useful to
others into
an act useful to oneself, and the same for the harmful ones. The free
market in
a situation of pure and perfect competition is an example of this
optimum.
Other kinds of situations may need to install other mechanisms to get
closer to such an optimum.
Why it is a moral imperative
Is this not a bad society that decides to serve the personal interests
of those who harms others (by providing money, or by failing to take
from them, possibly multiplied or with a big fine in case of fraud)?
Would this
disturb the morality of spiritual people, to think that the betterment
of society through the physical protection against the risk of abuse
would be
possible? Indeed, it would be problematic to spirituality: it would
make it jobless, making preachings of virtues less urgent (not that
they had been
really effective, but the opportunity to serve one's own interests by
harming others gave spirituality the problem it used to offer itself as
a candidate solution). Making possible the achievement of
good and the prevention of evil in a way that does not require a change
in the
heart of man, is this bad?
Let God's will be done on earth as in heaven
A fundamental element of belief in God (even if not necessarily adopted
by all) is
the assertion that God will bring justice to men in heaven for what
they have accomplished on earth, rewarding them for the good done and
punishing them for the bad. But is this not ultimately a belief in a
perfect (Divine)
monetary system recorded in heaven for our actions on earth,
on the model of the perfect economic system to be built as we just
mentioned? So, why not already try to imitate on earth as we can the
divine justice we hope for?
Why it is possible
What, could'nt we find a way to take back the money from anyone who has
harmed others? In our time where we
are irretrievably gone to a world of widespread information technology
!! One might ask: as for the good, how will it be done
despite the lack of purely altruistic motivation? It's simple: first,
the system is in itself no obstacle to any altruistic deeds, on the
contrary it facilitates them by some tools. Then, services
can be bought and if it suffices to do the good to
others to receive the benefit in return, then this will motivate it to
be done. It
seems unrealistic, impractical? Yet it is based on this principle that
the economy is
already functioning (at least for what works)! Namely, the necessity to
work (thus, serve others) to get the money to live ...
See here
the basic principles of the solution that I am proposing.
Why even a morally perfect people could not function properly
otherwise
The altruistic people attempt to do the good, but even those who want
it
can do so only if the information about what is good to do,
and what thing is more useful to do than another thing, it is given.
In a world of billions of people, it is impossible for man to know
everything about what is happening in society, to feel spiritually and
emotionally the usefulness to others of his own actions, as this is a
very
complex calculation about a world which he can humanly know but a
very small part, while the question of the usefulness of his actions is
actually dependent on everything. It is essential that the economic
mechanisms are in place to generate this information, which
will appear to
the individual as a numerical result assigned to this or that
particular act of
his part, the one humanly comprehensible thing for the individual
to assess
and compare the respective utilities of his possibles actions. This is
how,
among the possible choices of efforts that he would be able to provide
and between which the choice
is a priori indifferent (equally painful for him)
he can choose the option that makes him the most valuable to the
society, with no need
to understand why this option is actually more useful to
society than that one.
But this information system is nothing else than the principle of an
ideal economic and monetary system mentioned above.
Finally, is there any difference between the case of morally
pure humans and the one morally impure? Eventually there will be one,
which
is the problem of taking into account the risk of fraud in the
production of the basic
data of this information system. But I do not think it is very easy to
cheat
in a manner very interesting for the fraudster, because the main
information
that someone may be interested to distort for his interest is
information
on his usefulness or harmfulness to others ( to be able to perform any
act harmful to
others). However, this is by definition an information defined by
others (because it is information about the interests of others). He
can only claim to be disturbed by others more than he actually is,
but in most cases no one is forced to disturb others, and arrangements
can be found to avoid it. Or, pretend to take less profit or enjoyment
from something he
does, but if he takes advantage of it, anyway it's because others
accept it, so that it does not really bother (there would be here an
argument to
develop on the issue of the paradoxical question of the necessary
conservation of the amount of money inside a group of people having
relations only among themselves while formally the sum over its members
of the usefulness of the member to the rest of the group, is not zero)
...
If there was another more serious type of fraud, affecting more
effectively others, how could this fraud be permanently and
safely covered? Otherwise, it is sufficient that the discovery of the
fraud involves a big enough sanction to be dissuasive: no one is
granted the right to lie, it would not be a bad to punish a fraud more
harshly than its actual damages ...
The vanity of spiritual solutions
The uselessness of exhortation to the good
There are a lot of people who
pray to God to do the good. There are also plenty of people who make
petitions to ask heads of state, I think especially in the case of
heads of states of foreign countries with respect to signatories, to
behave good.
Similarly for religious appeals to virtue.
But what is the point of all this?
Indeed, there are two possibilities:
Either the recipient of the prayer was already good, in which case
there is little sense to ask him to become so, insinuating that he was
not (it would be even quite insulting).
Or he was not, in which
case I do not see what in prayer would have a chance to make him become
so:
who is not good does not listen to prayers, does not care. And even if
he is listening, he won't change himself on request.
The only
thing I see interesting and significant that resemble it, is to provide
detailed knowledge about the current problems and effective choices
that would be
right or wrong, but that could not be guessed. This could not
apply to an omniscient God.
The perversity of a gift-based economy
Some imagine an idyllic world as consisting of the widespread practice
of donation by all to all, instead of a practice of sales.
Of course, a practice of donations can be useful in some cases, either
as
an aid to the people victims of a bad twist of fate as the disabled, or
to
pay those who do a useful job to the general interest that can hardly
find
wages by usual market mechanisms, by lack of well-defined
beneficiaries,
such as fundamental research or public works, or other specific
situations in
which market mechanisms would present flaws, requiring acts of adequate
financial redistributions to pay more precisely each one according to
the overall
usefulness of his actions. But a too widespread practice donations as a
normal
way of functioning of an economy, especially among people
with comparable levels of resources, is counter-productive. Indeed,
what more could be achieved by a service offered than by a service sold
? Why worry about
the flow of money if the actual acts underpinned are as good? If the
quality is at stake, it should be possible to measure it and guide
buyers to sellers who make quality. For the rest, the one thing that a
gift
can make more than a sale, is the scenario where what is given would
not have
been sold. But why would it not have been sold? Because the price
charged by
the seller according to the effort made as he assesses it, would have
been too much for the buyer. In other words, because it would be too
much trouble humanly provided as compared to the final usefulness of
the
service. Thus, the main thing the generalised gift economy can bring
more as compared to a primarily market economy (more precisely an
economy with a currency that would aim to satisfy the conditions
above; this will be abbreviated by simply "market economy" here, though
some changes are yet to be made as compared to the existing one), is
the maintenance of economic structures adverse to the public
interest.
One could also reflect the fundamental difference
between, a gift economy, and a market
economy, as
follows:
* In an economy of gifts, everyone is driven
by his
own conscience and within the limits of his possible dedication and
understanding, to satisfy this concience in the form of his own
conception of the interest of the people he has the opportunity to know
and to work for, and to whom he should thus have more or less
attachment, thus finally in an inevitably subjective and therefore
limited
perspective.
* In a market economy,
everyone is obliged by the general structures of society to respect
(thus serve if he wants to receive payment, up to him to give it back
to charity if he wants) the global measure of the world's interest (not
only of his relatives but all
of humanity), defined by the sum of the conception that each individual
has of his own interests, and this, presented as a simple numerical
result without any need to personally understand the why
and how of its myriads of components.
Thus, the only form of
altruism that an economy of donations has more than a market economy,
is a
virtual altruism selfishly locked in the conscience of the person
who would have to get involved in others' privacy, to judge their needs
and take the impression to be the provider of their possible (possibly
superficially assumed and unreal) enjoyments, without any real
advantage for the latter as compared to the previous case (as we should
remember that all the altruism that is useful to others in an economy
of gifts, may at least as well
be implemented in a market economy through monetary donations and
purchases,
and thus cannot be regarded as missing in the market economy, any
individual
conscience staying the same). But this won't fit as everyone's tastes
are different, so that one's needs won't be fullfilled if they depend
on the others'desires to satisfy them.
Selfishness does not want the bad
But what
problem is in the heart of man? That he seeks his interests at the
expense of others? But what does he really seek: his own interest, or
the nuisance to others? If the problem of the heart of man was that he
seeks
nuisance to others for itself, then we could actually say that there is
a problem in the human heart. But in general selfish people are not
seeking
the nuisance to others for itself (except the nasty comrades in the
schoolyards
of the fraternally egalitarian and indivisible schools of the
Republic), but seeking
only their own interest. What evil is there here ? That he is ready,
on occasion, to serve his own interests by means which may eventually
harm others. Then we may consider two types of environments in which he
might evolve: an environment enabling him to get rich by harming
others, and an environment that does not allow him to (making him pay
the costs
of any nuisance to others). Yes, but anyway, the first type of
environment does not allow it easily, as he is there is in competition
to
other selfish people, in a society that, with sub-optimal way of
working, has anyway not as much wealth to offer than the latter. In
order
to take advantage of it, he must deploy a strategy, something above
average
intelligence. Only under this condition it may be of interest. But
then, it will be even more interested to evolve in the second type of
environment, as this very same ability and intelligence strategy can
also
be used for the aim to be as useful as possible to others, in order to
get the financial benefit from this act.
Is it thus precisely spirituality that is ultimately the very evil
and sinful thing in this world?
Spirituality argues that evil comes from human sin, which consists
in the fact that man chooses evil, he's responsible for evil, and that
the only way to cure the problem is to change man who is the heart
of morality and therefore, it says, of good and evil. However, we just
saw that human selfishness is not really, or not
primarily, a source of evil, and that it is not even ultimately a
willingness to do
evil, but that evil comes mainly from an economical misfunctionings,
which
diverts from the optimum social usefulness, both the acts of the
selfish and those of the virtuous
(though not always with the same magnitude) by not confronting everyone
with the correct monetary balance of the consequences of their possible
decisions, to guide their choices.Monetary extent of the consequences
of their
possible actions to inform their choice. So, indirectly, it ultimately
comes from a global refusal or negligence on the part of men to carry
out the
corrections in the economic system that would be required (if they are
possible)
to get its functioning closer to the mentioned theoretical ideal: the
one that optimizes production, where finally the
question of virtue or selfishness of the heart of man would hardly have
anymore impact on the social well-being (everyone would be lead to
socially optimal choices whatever their internal morality level). At
least
more specifically, the issue of vice or virtue of the ones would no
more
(or much less) affect the well-being of others (the main difference
will be that dishonest
people could no longer work in positions of responsibility that they
might abuse of in an undetectable way). Considering that the
construction of such a better world should naturally be the duty of the
well-intended people, the ultimate evil is what effectively distracts
them from this mission. Namely, one of the main sources of such a
negligence is the work of Spirituality, that teaches man to focus his
efforts on improving the deep internal virtues of
the human soul far inside, and to forget, to neglect, the economic
dimension of the problem, that seems too physical and complicated (too
disturbing to its comfortable intellectual laziness), and therefore not
enough Spiritual in its taste.
So, while selfishness products evil, it is not
the selfish who want this evil. By contrast, spiritual people who
proclaim
doctrinally as universal truth, and consider as spiritually normal and
fair the economic situation in which every selfish impulse (more
or less inevitable whatever we may say) will result in a nuisance to
others, are finally precisely, in a way, the very people who really,
practically,
want for itself this evil product: they want, by their calls to draw
and focus all the good wills onto futile questions, to keep the
political
conditions (and through the conditions, their effects) under which each
selfish impulse
produces evil, but also at the same time under which,
whatever they say, every altruistic impulse also produces some sort of
relative evil, not to speak of course of the evil by omission also
necessarily resulting from the Zen that anihilates
any impulse, any significantly developed enterprise that could be
importantly useful to
others, zen that is also the specialty of some of them.
The largest source of
sin as a desire to engender evil, is, after analysis, spirituality
itself according to its own definitions.
There cannot be any spiritually pure and consistent altruism in
religions
Curiously: at the same time, religions sing the glory of the altruism
of those who want to do the good as a one-way free gift, without
expecting anything in return, and they proclaim loudly that God will
reward in
heaven precisely those who develop such a virtue. Problem: how on
earth can we pretend to cultivate total selflessness totally
selflessly, while we are firmly convinced that we will be rewarded
precisely for this ?
Are we not fatally, in this research of virtue, tempted to be motivated
by the very reward that we expect to draw from it in heaven ? How can
we still claim
in such conditions that this approach remains totally disinterested? At
that
point, only atheists would be able to develop such required virtues.
As for me that on the one hand believes in afterlife, heavenly justice,
and the need to seek to do the good to others here on earth, that on
the
other hand recognized the necessity to hold in any subject a rationally
clear and consistent approach, and that this very necessity should not
be considered shameful in any way, here is my position: being aware of
my duty to others, and the fact
that I have in any way to accomplish it to get any reward for it in
heaven; with a clear conscience that, given this context, the
performance of my duty cannot consistently be anything else than
ultimately a
selfish approach (though it is finally a sort of extended concept of an
ego
that encompasses the sum of all the egos of all individuals in this
great Universal Ego is God that I will join in the afterlife, then
selfishly benefiting this way from the point of view of others, of the
good I do
them today without yet concretely getting this profit), I will not see
any problem nor feel any shame for it, but I will remain openly
convinced that God will
reward me anyway for my selfish enterprise, as long as, on the lowly
material level of practical acts and their consequences, it consists in
being useful to others.
In any case, why should we be more royalist than the king? Is not God
himself,
in his very acts of blessing his creatures and spreading his infinite
graces to them, following a selfish motivation, insofar as his
creatures are the very parts of himself, so that he is directly
affected by what happens to them, as happening to
himself? Thus, the infinite graces he grants to his creatures are
finally nothing else than graces he grants to himself, so that it would
be
inappropriate to qualify him selfless for that.
On what ground should one therefore require man to exert to greater
"virtues" than those of God himself?
The means to change man
There is still another claim of spirituality, outside what was just
dismissed above : that even if it is possible to do
the good without being good, one fundamental problem (not to do the
good, but for itself), is that man has defects and needs to improve.
Okay,
already, in an economic system that does not let people serve
themselves at the expense of others, but only by helping others, that
rewards the good
deeds and penalizes bad ones, it would be quite more difficult to
practise vice and easier to practise virtue, in a sense to concretely
care for the
good of others (since the permanent exercise of the service to others
is
facilitated and encouraged by practical and financial tools). Still,
one could consider this to be just a superficial change, which does
not change the human heart, which is bad. So can the
human heart be improved ?
Religions and spiritualities will offer themselves as being the answer,
while pretending that science is powerless in front of this problem. I
still don't agree. Indeed, here is an exemple
of an article among others that
addresses the scientific method for improving the human being, which
can similarly apply to most of human qualities or virtues we may want
to promote. In particular, I see five main categories of qualities
which should be promoted by
such a scientific procedure of assisted genetic evolution of the human
species: health, beauty, intelligence, joy, morality. (Some parents are
interested in athletics, what can be seen as an aspect of health ...).
(More details in a few articles: Eugenics - Nature
versus nurture - Race and
athletics - Race and
intelligence - another
article)
The clear advantage I see with this means is that it requires neither
the heaviness of any educational leadership with all the associated
pains and
risks of deviations or other perverse side effects, nor any kind of
artificial indoctrination
(though usually this indoctrination does not recognize itself as such)
proposed
by any "spiritual" trend, along with the various teachings of errors,
with random and sometimes perverse effects. But, presenting such a
"spiritual"
approach as a key to that goal, would be somehow in any way despising
and elitist
since it can only target those who take the time and trouble to educate
themselves with this, and that happen to be in the circumstance to
possibly believe in it, circumstance that is unfairly (and actually
indeed as a logical implication even if not conciously explicit),
regarded as a mark of spiritual
superiority over those who do not have the same belief.
So what, would not human virtues
be genetic in origin? Although the genes do not "produce" intelligence
nor virtue in a direct and strictly material sense
(because spirit inhabits matter without being reduced to it), they
still provide some neurological conditions that promote or hinder it.
No matter that
the bio-psychological mechanisms of this intermediate causal
relationship is out of reach, the point is that they exist. Indeed,
for example, if cats are morally more quiet and gentle than dogs, if
big dogs are more secure to educate than lions and
if some races of dogs are more evil than those of other races,
this is clearly not (at least not exclusively) for educational reasons,
even less for religious reasons but indeed for genetic reasons. There
is no reason to think that the situation is not similar for humans.
But, the efforts to improve
the genetic heritage of human beings are cumulative: any action in this
regard has averagely permanent effects to all future
generations to come, in other words it is truly a progress. Thus, to
reiterate this work for 100 generations has a persistent effect on the
human race (on all generations to come without any time limit), 100
times
greater than if it had been carried out only on the first generation.
So
even though the progress of this act is relatively low in a generation,
its profit is multiplied by the number of future generations. One could
thus qualify the benefit (or more generally, the impact) of each act of
this sort, to be eternal.
The spiritual works, on the other hand, are contingent, evanescent,
artificial
(inculcated from the outside) and with limited effect over time. A
moral
progress through spiritual means can subsist to the next generation
only if the lesson will be taught again, which
requires some hard work, and as a condition for persistence it should
be again repeated indefinitely in every
generation. But there is no guarantee that it will be, and, actually,
religion is
being abandoned (its virtues being not really good ...), its moral
lessons,
good or bad, that it has inculcated are being lost and forgotten in
favour of
any novelty that will stand. There is no cure to this process : man
being what he
is, his nature will take over sooner or later and what we want to
inculcate through education can always be forgotten, processed,
replaced by something else, better or worse, depending on what we
find as new ideas, and the moral lessons of the past will become
ancient history. The only things that will remain from the works of the
past people, and that will durably and significantly affect the
character of the man to come, is theirs
genetic heritage, which is the parameter that plays in practice the
role of deep nature of man (by its relative constancy and the fact that
it is
naturally given to every next generation without any need of
attention). But what were
the works of religion in this area? (By the way, its program of human
change did not much change since two millennia,
as is requires by the unsurpassable divine revelation it represents, so
that it is finally becoming quite obsolete...) Religion has worked to
change the man toward evil , to make him increasingly bad in himself.
Indeed, it orders men and women of the highest virtue to being priests,
monks or nuns in order to destroy the
genes of virtue. It orders the raped women not to abort in
order to spread the genes of the rapist behaviour. It orders the
youth virtuous people to refrain from love relationships in their
youth, in order
to reserve the vicious the monopoly of early procreation, and also the
priority of finding the best
partners, so to load on the virtuous the risk of not
chosen celibacy, thus losing their genes. It promotes loyalty as an
ultimate virtue to prevent each to reassign the chances of transmission
of
genes to who will finally appear better than those that the first
meeting opportunities and their machiavelic tricks had appointed. But
these are perhaps mere collateral
damages ?
Uh, how surprised I was to see an article
on a
Catholic site that, to redeem (?) his Church, advocated eugenics !
but a
much more violent Eugenics than the one that I would find relevant: I
only advocate the idea of selecting gamete donors where artifical
procreation is practices, which can naturally happen in a liberal world
and thus only concern a minority of
people, with a slow and long-term impact, without disturbing the
majority of
people; he, who excludes as any good Catholic any idea of artificial
procreation, speaks about moralizing the people (yes, that's
Catholicism: considering good actions preferably through the most
painful methods, the moral duty to self-sacrifice) to compel them to
have, either many children or none according to
their qualities !!!!! Ai Ai Ai ...
Major causes of good and evil
-- Main Cause of evil: there is nothing more selfish, cruel and
Machiavellian than Love. Especially the True and Spiritual Love (I have
an idea of a future text which will develop this point), that seeks its
virtue and its
responsibilities in the navel of its own soul, staying blind to
the cause-effect relationships happening in the outside world, on which
the effective realization of good and evil
depends; that is ready to let the outside world perish for saving its
inner purity, and that will alway justify its actions by its disastrous
ignorance, its impotence and its
good intentions.
-- Main Cause of the good: there is
nothing more generous, selfless and effective to spread good in the
world than science, provided that it is developed properly in the
useful
directions.
French
version
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