Re: virus: Against reason
Paul Prestopnik (pjp66259@pegasus.cc.ucf.edu)
Fri, 31 Oct 1997 14:54:12 -0500
> Since my worthy opponents have apparently withdrawn from the great
> faith debate I'm going to switch sides and argue against reason.
>
> Thus ethics in power quickly turn into a religious dictatorship.
> Common sense couldn't help but subside into pessimistic
> confusion, as if wallowing in the mud. Creativity into anarchy.
> Memory into the worst sort of monarchical dictatorship.
> Intuition into the rule of base superstition. And reason, as we
> have seen over the last half-century, into a directionless, amoral
> dictatorship of structure.
>
> John Ralston Saul -- The Doubter's Companion
>
> Agree or disagree?
I don't see this as an argument against reason, simply as an argument
against using reason to the exclusion of ethics, common sense, imagination
or creativity, memory or history or experience, & intuition. I agree that
reason would not function as well as a belief system without representation
from these other 4 ethics, but if I society were to be ruled by only one, I
would still choose reason. Although I don't see how it could function
without some sort of memory.
-paul