Comments on: Lila Watson’s Quote, well sort of. http://djterasaki.wordpress.com/2007/12/19/lila-watsons-quote-well-sort-of/ Yes, Just another WordPress.com weblog Fri, 02 Oct 2009 05:26:38 +0000 http://wordpress.com/ hourly 1 By: haygis brewster http://djterasaki.wordpress.com/2007/12/19/lila-watsons-quote-well-sort-of/#comment-151 haygis brewster Fri, 27 Mar 2009 13:59:38 +0000 http://djterasaki.wordpress.com/2007/12/19/lila-watsons-quote-well-sort-of/#comment-151 that kids argument reminds me of ayn rand's entire foundation for promoting selfish exploitation of people and the environment. people are a diverse bunch and the realists are only one perspective within that bunch. unfortunately, the realist stance produces people like stalin, hitler and CEOs who have no value for emotional appeal. we arent all the same and we arent all selfish--included in human nature is the tendency toward and need for community and concepts like justice, poetry/art, harmony and balance, etc. i think realists like to promote their view because they have a hard time understanding these concepts and to operate from an offensive/defensive position is safer to them. i also think they mix up what altruism means. what it means is not that someone doesnt "get a payback" for doing something for others (his mother teresa analogy is a good one---she "gets" to heaven for acting selflessly on earth. but there are religions that have no afterlife whose proponents' adherence to the moral precepts of these belief systems is just as devoted as hers)---its that the "payback" does not hurt others. in mother teresa's situation she benefits yes, but the actions she takes to "get" that payback are not harmful/destructive and do not require subjugation or exploitation of the weak and poor to make her wealthy, powerful or feared. all altruism and realism are, are perceptual/conceptual orientations: if we believe that people are truly good and everyone matters and we are all related in a communal experience of life then it makes sense to use our gifts, talents, abilities, power to help our relatives in need. if we believe that people are inherently self-motivated and out to make profit and think only of how they can use someone else to get where they want to be without consideration for their well-being then it makes sense to take up a defensive/offensive "realist" stance...they way we believe self-fulfills and self-perpetuates. that kids argument reminds me of ayn rand’s entire foundation for promoting selfish exploitation of people and the environment.

people are a diverse bunch and the realists are only one perspective within that bunch. unfortunately, the realist stance produces people like stalin, hitler and CEOs who have no value for emotional appeal.

we arent all the same and we arent all selfish–included in human nature is the tendency toward and need for community and concepts like justice, poetry/art, harmony and balance, etc.

i think realists like to promote their view because they have a hard time understanding these concepts and to operate from an offensive/defensive position is safer to them.

i also think they mix up what altruism means. what it means is not that someone doesnt “get a payback” for doing something for others (his mother teresa analogy is a good one—she “gets” to heaven for acting selflessly on earth. but there are religions that have no afterlife whose proponents’ adherence to the moral precepts of these belief systems is just as devoted as hers)—its that the “payback” does not hurt others.

in mother teresa’s situation she benefits yes, but the actions she takes to “get” that payback are not harmful/destructive and do not require subjugation or exploitation of the weak and poor to make her wealthy, powerful or feared.

all altruism and realism are, are perceptual/conceptual orientations: if we believe that people are truly good and everyone matters and we are all related in a communal experience of life then it makes sense to use our gifts, talents, abilities, power to help our relatives in need.

if we believe that people are inherently self-motivated and out to make profit and think only of how they can use someone else to get where they want to be without consideration for their well-being then it makes sense to take up a defensive/offensive “realist” stance…they way we believe self-fulfills and self-perpetuates.

]]> By: kate http://djterasaki.wordpress.com/2007/12/19/lila-watsons-quote-well-sort-of/#comment-54 kate Mon, 31 Dec 2007 19:16:49 +0000 http://djterasaki.wordpress.com/2007/12/19/lila-watsons-quote-well-sort-of/#comment-54 good stuff, dell :) good stuff, dell :)

]]> By: koreanpower999 http://djterasaki.wordpress.com/2007/12/19/lila-watsons-quote-well-sort-of/#comment-39 koreanpower999 Thu, 20 Dec 2007 01:01:10 +0000 http://djterasaki.wordpress.com/2007/12/19/lila-watsons-quote-well-sort-of/#comment-39 This post reminds me of a discussion I heard in a college class. I took a political science class about international security. A ROTC student was discussing why China was the biggest security threat to the US. He mentioned that his worldview was from a "realist" point-of-view which espoused that no person or no nation/state has totally altruistic motives, but are mainly motivated by their own self-interests. This was in contrast to the "liberal" view where individuals or nations/states have the capacity to accept and strive for universally agreed upon values and norms that are for the best of the whole community. The ROTC student then said, "even Mother Theresa wasn't fully altruistic. She had selfish motives to help the poor. She wants to go to heaven and that's in her self-interest, not any purely altrustic motive. And that set off a firestorm of debate as other students interjected with their objections. He was trying to say that having selfish motives was not good or bad. That is how the world worked and thus you shouldn't put a value judgment on it. This is different than what we are taught. Striving for a higher purpose or some nebulous, abstract value is what is good and anything that is in your self-interest is bad. But we live in a world of gray that causes us to rethink if anything we do is not motivated by something in our self-interest and if so, is that ok? Maybe if we think of things this way, maybe when people are trying to do good in the world, it won't seem so contrived or trendy. This post reminds me of a discussion I heard in a college class. I took a political science class about international security. A ROTC student was discussing why China was the biggest security threat to the US. He mentioned that his worldview was from a “realist” point-of-view which espoused that no person or no nation/state has totally altruistic motives, but are mainly motivated by their own self-interests. This was in contrast to the “liberal” view where individuals or nations/states have the capacity to accept and strive for universally agreed upon values and norms that are for the best of the whole community. The ROTC student then said, “even Mother Theresa wasn’t fully altruistic. She had selfish motives to help the poor. She wants to go to heaven and that’s in her self-interest, not any purely altrustic motive. And that set off a firestorm of debate as other students interjected with their objections. He was trying to say that having selfish motives was not good or bad. That is how the world worked and thus you shouldn’t put a value judgment on it. This is different than what we are taught. Striving for a higher purpose or some nebulous, abstract value is what is good and anything that is in your self-interest is bad. But we live in a world of gray that causes us to rethink if anything we do is not motivated by something in our self-interest and if so, is that ok? Maybe if we think of things this way, maybe when people are trying to do good in the world, it won’t seem so contrived or trendy.

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