Friday, February 17, 2006
English 314's Next Top Model
As moderator and chief waffler, I'd like to propose something.What we are arguing about is essentially a question of human nature. I think we can agree that we will not be able to "prove" anything about the essence human nature in definite terms. What we can do is look at what humans do and try to apply a "best-fit" model for explaining why they do that voodoo that they do.
Our competing "models" for this discussion can never be right or wrong, they can just fit better with the data we have or they can be more persuasive in their arguments.
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I'm glad you disagree; I figured this wouldn't be as easy as I originally stated it. Someone from the "Metaphysical" side of things should really pipe up here.
I tend to think human behaviour can always be interpreted in many different ways.
Let's say we look at your example of the US, more specifically, say the war on Iraq. We could easily say the US acts in the Hobbesian tradition of using the means it has to gain self-interest (in terms of economic benefits such as control of oil resources). In this sense, there is no external moral arbiter (the UN or God) to say that what they are doing is wrong; they just exercise their free will.
Now we can just as easily say that the US was acting to spread the good word of democracy to the Arab world and protect the rest of us from dirty rotten terrorists; they feel a moral obligation out of the goodness and love in their hearts.
If the latter arguement didn't convince you, don't throw out liberalism just yet. Maybe the Bush administration are still a bunch of good guys that have been corrupted by the evil institutions, the mainstream media, the blogosphere, and the devil. Maybe we need to share the love.
I see this coming down to a realist vs rationalist/liberalist argument... especially if it gets into politics.
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I tend to think human behaviour can always be interpreted in many different ways.
Let's say we look at your example of the US, more specifically, say the war on Iraq. We could easily say the US acts in the Hobbesian tradition of using the means it has to gain self-interest (in terms of economic benefits such as control of oil resources). In this sense, there is no external moral arbiter (the UN or God) to say that what they are doing is wrong; they just exercise their free will.
Now we can just as easily say that the US was acting to spread the good word of democracy to the Arab world and protect the rest of us from dirty rotten terrorists; they feel a moral obligation out of the goodness and love in their hearts.
If the latter arguement didn't convince you, don't throw out liberalism just yet. Maybe the Bush administration are still a bunch of good guys that have been corrupted by the evil institutions, the mainstream media, the blogosphere, and the devil. Maybe we need to share the love.
I see this coming down to a realist vs rationalist/liberalist argument... especially if it gets into politics.
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