@Deaths:
well He (Hitler) did bring Germany back from a Great depression, and was widely popular not only in his country but others as well. of course this was in 38, b4 he went insane
I don’t think Hitler “went insane” at all. There is what I consider this consistent, stupid, and dangerous view of things. And yes, that is inflammatory. But to my mind, shock value is appropriate and necessary to a navel-gazing collective consciousness. Others are dismissed as “insane” by those that are themselves insane!
1. Why worry about insanity?
2. Defining insanity
3. Popular conception of insanity
4. An insane world
5. Identifying self as insane through induction
6. Relativism and Pope Benedict XVI
7. History, and why we are doomed to repeat it
8. Personal responsibility
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1. Why worry about insanity?
So you go around in your every day life, pointing fingers, calling this insane or that insane. But what if you yourself are insane? Of course you don’t think of yourself as insane. But then again, not thinking of oneself as insane does not mean one is not insane. So the question is really, is self-knowledge important to you or not? If you don’t care about self-knowledge, or if you happily accept the label of insanity for yourself, then fine. But if you claim self-knowledge, if you claim to be sane, and if you claim others are insane, then you are a delusional hypocrite.
2. Defining insanity
Insanity is by definition the inability to function in society. Society and individuals are two different things, so it is natural that there will be some conflict between the two. That is, it is perfectly natural that any given individual will to some degree be unable to function in society. So insanity then becomes not a question of black and white, but simply a question of degree.
Now consider the fact that different societies will have different requirements for an individual to function within them. Combined with the observation that insanity is a question of degree of disparity between individual and society, it is directly consequent that what is considered sane in one society will be considered insane in another society, and vice versa.
Clearly, insanity is subjectively defined. So why is it inappropriate to simply slap a label of “insanity” on anything?
3. Popular conception of insanity
There is a popular conception of insanity, that, as Plato would say, it is “the bad” or “the stupid”.
Insanity has already been defined as subjectively defined by one individual, often relating to another individual’s relation to the first individual’s conception of social norms. But considering there is a popular conception of insanity as well as the definitional conception, titling something as “insane” goes beyond simple relativism. It attaches an absolute value judgment of “the bad” and “the stupid”.
That is to say, what is actually subjectively defined has gained the color of absolute definition. This doesn’t seem so bad when put in abstract terms. But let us put forth a practical example.
_Let us say that I like Caucasians more than other ethnic groups. That is a subjective judgment, by stating a preference I do no more than state a preference.
Now let us say that Caucasians are superior to other ethnic groups. Other ethnic groups are bad and stupid when compared to Caucasians. When measured in terms of being Caucasians, other ethnic groups simply fall short. It isn’t just a question of melanin production in the skin. Questions regarding the cultural background of Caucasians tend to be answered incorrectly by non-Caucasians far more often than Caucasians. It is therefore clear that non-Caucasians simply lack the ability to make finer contextual judgments like Caucasians do. Furthermore, questions regarding value judgments depending on Caucasian norms are similarly incorrectly answered. I therefore say, with scientific evidence, that Caucasians are superior in every sense, and that non-Caucasians are stupid and lack morality.
You might get a bright “darky” every now and then that imitates its Caucasian superiors. But such mimicry is just like that of a very bright monkey._
So now that I start attaching absolute judgments to subjective preference and demonstrating it in practice, the distasteful stupidity hopefully becomes apparent.
4. An insane world
To this point, I have demonstrated that “insanity” is a stupid term, because of the attachment of absolute values to subjective preference. But there are still going to be those, like lemmings, that point to others and claim it must be okay because everyone else is doing it. But I deny this stupidity.
One’s understanding of the world largely comes about not through direct observation, but from inference and indirect observation. To support this, there are not a lot of people that go through life firing loaded shotguns into their skulls or jumping naked from suspension bridges. This is clearly not because such people have directly observed that doing so is dangerous. It is because such people (just about everyone) has been instructed in the danger of doing so.
Similarly, people tend to associate with certain particular groups, and their views become normalized to those groups. For some people, it is normal to purchase a $6 purse. Others will regard such expenditure as low-class, and will not spend less than $600 on a purse. Yet others draw the bottom line at $6,000, or $60,000. To spend outside a certain range is stupid and wasteful. That is, some will think spending $6 on a purse is a complete waste of time - not that the $6 is significant to them at all, it’s simply that the time spent buying such a piece of crap is wasted time. Others will think spending $60,000 on a purse is completely insane, when they could pay for their child’s college education with that money. The same is true for other subjective judgments, like “insanity”.
You associate with a particular group of people that all have certain common value judgments. Though they may differ on some points, or even wildly on some important points, they have an understanding of what is “appropriate” and what is “inappropriate”, and that which meets certain criteria will be defined by you and these others as “insane”. Since they share and support your judgments for the most part, even if there are individual dissenters, by and large your view of the world is static.
But the fact is, there are other groups of people that also have certain common value judgments, only THEIR common value judgments are quite different to your groups. So certain things that you consider distasteful or even insane, they view as normal, while certain things you do that you consider normal they consider distasteful or insane.
Among these I number - eating the flesh of a cow, having sexual intercourse with those under 10 years of age, drinking alcoholic beverages to intoxication, usage of heroin, eating the flesh of a human being - each of these is normal to some groups but considered aberrant or insane in others.
My earlier point was that insanity is correctly understood as a subjective and relativistic. My point later was that insanity is in practical terms understood as an absolute, and that this is problematic.
My point here is that conception of insanity as an absolute comes from continued association with a particular group of people or even of a number of like-minded groups. Continued exposure to a consistent worldview convinces the individual that the subjective group opinion is actually objective fact. Although a consistent group worldview will usually naturally include actual and real objective facts (such as the danger of loaded shotguns or jumping naked from suspension bridges), one must distinguish between subjective and objective.
5. Identifying self as insane through induction
Insanity is not only a judgment that one makes about oneself and others, it is also a judgment that others can make of you. Since there are so many differing groups, it is certain that your particular viewpoints are considered aberrant or even insane.
To be clear. Others think you are insane, and they are perfectly correct.
6. Relativism and Pope Benedict XVI
This brings me to someone I am a great personal fan of, Pope Benedict XVI.
http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/speeches/2005/june/documents/hf_ben-xvi_spe_20050606_convegno-famiglia_en.html
ADDRESS OF HIS HOLINESS BENEDICT XVI
TO THE PARTICIPANTS
IN THE ECCLESIAL DIOCESAN CONVENTION OF ROME
Basilica of St John Lateran
Monday, 6 June 2005
Today, a particularly insidious obstacle to the task of educating is the massive presence in our society and culture of that relativism which, recognizing nothing as definitive, leaves as the ultimate criterion only the self with its desires. And under the semblance of freedom it becomes a prison for each one, for it separates people from one another, locking each person into his or her own “ego”.
With such a relativistic horizon, therefore, real education is not possible without the light of the truth; sooner or later, every person is in fact condemned to doubting in the goodness of his or her own life and the relationships of which it consists, the validity of his or her commitment to build with others something in common.
What I have done with “insanity” is what I do with many moral and ethical judgments, which is to bring it into the debate of relativism. Pope Benedict XVI’s answer to the question of relativism is to, in essence, step beyond it and provide a fundamental answer to an even more fundamental question. If he had done nothing else with his papacy, for that alone I would consider him one of the truly great popes.
But even so, it does not answer what I consider to be the real danger.
7. History, and why we are doomed to repeat it
As George Santayana wrote, “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” To put it more fully,
Progress, far from consisting in change, depends on retentiveness. When change is absolute there remains no being to improve and no direction is set for possible improvement: and when experience is not retained, as among savages, infancy is perpetual. Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it. In the first stage of life the mind is frivolous and easily distracted; it misses progress by failing in consecutiveness and persistence. This is the condition of children and barbarians, in whom instinct has learned nothing from experience. In a second stage men are docile to events, plastic to new habits and suggestions, yet able to graft them on original instincts, which they thus bring to fuller satisfaction. This is the plane of manhood and true progress. Last comes a stage when retentiveness is exhausted and all that happens is at once forgotten; a vain, because unpractical, repetition of the past takes the place of plasticity and fertile readaptation.
I say similarly that there is far more necessary to progress than simple recollection of past events. It is comprehension of past events that leads to progress. The confusion of subjective and absolute conditions when attached to such concepts as “insanity” obliterates comprehension. It obliterates progress.
I have four pans, each made wholly of iron, with handles of red, blue, yellow, and green, respectively. Now I put the blue handled pan over a bonfire for ten minutes, then firmly grasp the handle. A burn! I therefore conclude that blue is a problem, a troublemaker. Everything blue can hurt me. I start to hide from people in blue uniforms. When athletic teams take to the field wearing blue uniforms, I am frightened. Blue Man Group takes me to new levels of horror and fright. But blue will not harm me again, because I avoid blue. I am smart. In the meantime, I put the red handled pan over a bonfire, so it will be ready for someone else to pick up . . . since there isn’t anything blue around, nothing could be harmful . . .
That is what it is to call Hitler insane. People avoid the color blue, because they associate it with harm. From that association, some will go so far as to call blue itself harmful! And to be truthful, avoiding blue is often not overtly problematic. It could cause one some degree of inconvenience, but it does not actively lead to harm. So everyone avoids blue, and it becomes commonly accepted that blue actually is harmful! Likewise as for calling Hitler insane. Hitler is dead, so who does it really harm? Then it becomes accepted that Hitler was insane. After all, everyone else thinks he was!
And now we come to this time, in which everyone “realizes” blue is “the problem”. But red, yellow, and green are all right. This continues to be the case, until someone picks up the red handled pan from the bonfire and burns him/herself. Then, sudden shock! There is a new evil that has appeared in the world, and it is “red”! The red menace! And a new pan is put over the fire, maybe not the blue one, but what harm could there be in touching green or yellow? And so it goes, until one day everyone knows green and yellow are certainly evil, but that blue and red are no longer dangerous, so the blue pan goes back on the fire again . . .
So you see, this is why I object to calling Hitler insane. The exact same circumstances will no longer repeat, but SIMILAR circumstances will. As long as people are hysterically focusing on “blue” (i.e. calling Hitler “insane”), they are not focusing on the real problem, so the general situation continues.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethnic_cleansing
Butchery of particular ethnic groups predated Hitler, and POSTDATES him as well. It is stupid simplification to classify all such incidents as simple insanity. How incredibly convenient it is to say that groups of people collectively go insane, on a regular basis! It allows one to deny all personal responsibility! After all, what could you really do to stop groups of people from collectively going insane? If someone wants to go and drink the Kool-Aid, well, what could you possibly do about it? So you wring your hands and point fingers and call others insane, and make no progress.
8. Personal responsibility
By calling others insane and denying personal responsibility, a collective mindset is created that (such and such) is SOMEONE ELSE’S PROBLEM. This is understandable. After all, nobody wants to deal with the stress of personal responsibility. So what ends up being done is delegation of responsibility and decision making power to others. But if those others are themselves disinterested, or worse, exploitative, you end up with an even worse mess. This is how you end up with wage slavery and any number of other social ills; this explains also and is corroborated by the increasing disparity in wealth between the rich and the poor. What is taught in schools is language, mathematics, and particular cultural norms, because that is the system that everyone has an immediate interest in perpetuating - the rich, because they need others to exploit (even though such exploitation is typically consensual, particularly with the expanding roles of taxation and government and decreasing personal liberties), and the poor because it is only through serving the rich that they can put bread on the table. And certainly, there is some degree of movement between rich and poor; there are poor that can become rich, or rich that can become poor. But the mobility of particular individuals within society do not point to the tendencies of individuals within the society as a whole, and the only conclusion that makes sense with continual denial of personal responsibility is inevitable systemic failure.
The key to change in the future is not simply the alteration of curriculum on the personal level - that is, teaching new students how to simply “survive” in society, or how to use instruments and tools, or even scientific methods for technological advancement, and so forth. Curriculum needs to advance on the social level, and there needs to be social advancement, so individuals do not merely survive in society, but prosper.
