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February 13, 2007
Reality Based
The "reality based" movement has morphed into the Net Roots. Obviously they have decided that reality is too much of a burden and now references to reality are no longer required. All that is required now is belief. No pesky facts can in any way intrude. Breath of the Beast has an interesting look at the origins of this kind of attitude in human mass psychology. He starts out with a quote from Louis Menand. I am also reminded of the Christian philosopher Tertullian who may have said "I believe because it is absurd." Which is the way of madness.The mysterious part of totalitarianism's appeal--and here we return to the Problem of the Loyal Henchmen--is that its official ideology can be, and usually is, absurd on its face, and known to be absurd by the leaders who preach it. This is because the mob is made up of cynics; for them, everything is a lie anyway. And the masses' hostility is free-floating. It has no concrete object: the masses are hostile to life as it is. The more extreme and outrageous the totalitarian ideology, therefore, and the more devoid of practical political sense, the more ineluctable its appeal. Totalitarian rule, Arendt argued, is predicated on the assumption that proving that a thing is true is less effective than acting as though it were true. The Nazis did not invite a discussion of the merits of anti-Semitism; they simply acted out its consequences. This is why documents like the memorandums for which Alfred Dreyfus was convicted of treason and "The Protocols of the Elders of Zion" continued to be believed even after they had been exposed as forgeries, and why the Moscow Trials were defended even by people who knew that the "confessions" were fraudulent. It's why some of the defendants in those trials went uncomplainingly to be executed for crimes they had not committed.The idea that the anger and disenfranchisement of the "Arab street" is in some way a comprehensible rationale for the callous barbarity of the attack on innocent civilians is an offense to humanity. Ironically, the very enormity of the crimes they commit and the wildness of the pretext they do it under, are taken by those who do not understand the game they are playing as proof of the authenticity (even righteousness) of what they do. In direct opposition to the Catholic Church's current position that faith and reason are not in opposition. Their little to do with Galileo seems to have cured them (mostly) of their opposition to science. This conflict has been going on for a very long time. In fact we use Greek names for the opposing philosophies. Dionysian and Apollonian. Ecstasy vs. Reason. My position in all this? I get my ecstasy from reason. Much more difficult than ecstasy alone. So much more worthwhile. It also avoids embarrasment when reality does not match faith. Since there can be no contradiction in my philosophy, then I simply modify my faith. The faith based people have no such luxury and thus are bound to smash into the wall of reason. Me? I prefer to brush lightly against it and change my course. American Thinker weighs in on the subject of Islam's embrace of faith over rationality. Muslim reformers of the past century - such as Mohammed Abdu, Refaa Al-Tahtawi, Taha Hussein, Ali Abdel-Razik and others - sought and unfortunately failed to modernize Islam. The militants, led by Hassan Al-Banna and his partisans, won this battle, and forced their vision to "Islamize" modernity on the people. They created a certain pattern - a mindset and a lifestyle - and promoted it as "The Valid Islam," Al Islam al-Sahih.So now you know why we are in a war of civilizations. Except it is not really a war of civilizations. It is the age old war of reason vs. unreason. A war that is much older than Islam and Christianity. The two main political parties in America mirror this age old conflict. The left aligning (mostly) with the Dionysian and the right aligning (mostly) with the Apollonian. Which is why these days I side mostly with the right where reason has more sway, despite the frequent lapses. Cross Posted at Power and Control posted by Simon on 02.13.07 at 05:13 PM
Comments
I don't know how you engage with totolitarians who wish to enslave you, kill you, or convert you to their religion or else. How do you negotiate the non-negotiatable? That is why we have wars. To decide whose culture prevails. Perhaps taking as a historical example you might with to explain how we might have done better with the Nazis. So what do I think needs to be done? Thwart them in every way possible until they change their minds or die. And, I'm not against accelerating the dieing process. You don't negotiate with totolitarians, you defeat them. Sic semper tyranus. Which is the predictive power of the essay. There is nothing to negotiate, except in the short term for temporary advantage. M. Simon · February 13, 2007 06:22 PM Wonderful essay! Tertullian was a piece of work, wasn't he? We're still eating some of the mistakes from that period. http://www.classicalvalues.com/archives/000691.html But as you say, the Catholic Church changed. Islam has a lot to learn. Eric Scheie · February 13, 2007 07:38 PM "The only thing I note in seriousness is that your hyper-reductionist thesis, such as it is, just an alibi for a failure to engage meaningfully with the Islamists." Boy, why do you folks have such a love for logical fallacies? You follow this statement with a massive strawman. You cannot reason with the irrational. Why can nobody like you realize that? The rational realize that you cannot deal with the irrational as you do the rational - no amount of logic or debate will allow them to see anything but the world they want. "Engaging" with the Islamists is surrender to a philosophy stuck in the Middle Ages. You are admitting the failure of Liberalism (which gave rise to the West as the world's power) when you say it's fine to allow these people to exist and run the show. Shawn · February 15, 2007 11:57 AM Post a comment
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This 9th grade, I-read-too-much-Hesse thesis is funny enough on its own, but it's really its superimposition on American politics that's truly hilarious.
The only thing I note in seriousness is that your hyper-reductionist thesis, such as it is, just an alibi for a failure to engage meaningfully with the Islamists. "Look, those brown people are like animals, all instinct and desire." Being a South Park fan, I leave being outraged to someone else, but I will point out that this alibi, in addition to being flatly wrong, is simply useless. In the spirit of our American tradition of epistemic pragmatism, its lack of prescriptive or predictive power renders it a dead letter.