I lean towards people being either naturally neutral or good. — Tzeentch

Then why would they act badly? A good person will only act in a good way, so it’s only the neutral people doing all the damage? If they have no side of them that is no good then where does this bad behaviour spring from?

Their misery clouds their perception, to the point that they believe hurting their children will improve their situation. — Tzeentch

Improve in what way?

Isn't that an artist's statement? — unenlightened

Most definitely.

Do you mean explain it? Because “defend yourself” sounds like you disagree.

What I mean is that they use the artist statement to justify a work that has very little substance.

Defend what?

Actually let’s say the artist statement justifies the work itself.

morality is something that only concerns humans. — Tzeentch

That may be so. But there is evidence of primates murdering. I don’t imagine they think in terms of morality. But if the killing was unnecessary then it’s probably regarded as murder.

https://www.newscientist.com/article/2119677-chimps-beat-up-murder-and-then-cannibalise-their-former-tyrant/

I’m 100% in agreement with you remember. These people don’t have much of an imagination, they’re not really spontaneously creative. They have to construct a work of art from a “concept”. Then they have to explain it because only they know what it’s about. That becomes standard practice once you leave uni.

Non taken.

Man is somewhere in between the gods and the beasts" - Plotinus — IvoryBlackBishop

That’s a tough performance.

I think it’s become a style of sorts. It’s like all exhibitions have a title. Academia has totally influenced things, because so many artists come through uni., as do the curators, etc.

Edit: it’s packaging.

You think it isn't bad??? — ssu

No, I couldn’t understand the context. Now I do.

Edit: by the way why do you think I’m American?

Though the statement is an integral part of the work because that’s how the work was constructed.

Agree 100%.

Edit: artist statements are an academic notion.

Excuse my confusion, but doesn’t that graph indicate a higher spending by government on people than other countries? I don’t see what’s so bad about this graph.

Perhaps our natural tendencies are balanced between good and evil and we're morally ambiguous creatures. In such a world free will would certainly assure responsibility for both our good deeds and bad deeds. Such a world would have good and evil. — TheMadFool

I should clarify what meant earlier by natural in reference to evil. It sounds like I meant evil exists in nature. What I meant was that evil is one of our tendencies, that it is not introduced to us through ignorance. The issue of serial killers has been raised and how their childhood condition contributed towards evil acts. But not all children mistreated go on to become serial killers.

We have both evil and good tendencies, we can act on either of them. We are not faultless angels programmed for only good. But our good tendencies create more benefits for us than our evil tendencies. It’s in our interests to chose good over evil. But that doesn’t mean everyone will act that way, and nor does it mean we ourselves don’t sometimes behave badly.

Our culture, built on our moral principles, constrains and conditions us in terms of behaviour. Our parents introduce us to ways of behaving. Part of that is making choices, living with consequences. The overriding factor in this melange of good and bad tendencies is free will. Free will is proof of us having these tendencies. If evil was introduced to us from outside, ignorance or abuse, then it means we are empty vessels, without good or bad tendencies. We would never have to chose, never think freely. And where would the idea of evil come from, even if it did come from outside? Culture might manage our tendencies but it didn’t create them.

My problem is trying to establish how and when, in evolution, we developed free will. Or was just it just simple choices that became more sophisticated as we evolved, the development of consciousness.

There's a third option, which is that you give out of a feeling of obligation because it's your duty. I'd submit that is the highest option and the one you summarily reject. — Hanover

The trouble is, Hanover, that there’s nothing for them in that. They want immediate satisfaction, not a better world down the line. Maybe they don’t even know what they want. They reject the past and everything about it forgetting how they got here.

What next from the Democrat Dancing Troupe, self immolation? Whatever it is it’s going to have to be very big, a real spectacle.

Perhaps. Like I said before, I don't consider animals to be capable of evil or good. — Tzeentch

I didn’t say animals, I said primates. If you don’t think they’re capable of evil or good then how would you define good, is it something only humans are capable of?

“When asked if he believes in God, Peterson responded: "I think the proper response to that is No, but I'm afraid He might exist". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jordan_Peterson

So less religion and more that he disagrees with someone.

I would generally say that "power" involves going outside of codified institutional norms and this can still be accomplished in a democracy because those rules can either be hacked or worked around or interpreted strangely so we always need to be on guard for this. — BitconnectCarlos

It is a risky business, and in some ways a democracy is the only place to give power figures a bit of free reign because of those checks and balances. American society, for instance, is nothing like Germany and The USSR. America has always been a democratic state. It’s never been riddled with the same tensions that existed in the USSR or Germany. It’s the very environment that can handle power figures because the individual is the cornerstone of that success, it can and has absorbed the shock of the new.

The hate is somewhat excessive, don't you guys think? — Wallows

Of course it is. And I don’t get it. What exactly is going on with that?

Which I why I do not agree with the notion that humans are naturally evil. — Tzeentch

Does this then mean humans are naturally good?

This OP has got me thinking about power figures and conformity. Power figures are individualists, maybe you could call them rebels, anyway they chose to work outside of orthodox practice. We rarely see this today. It’s like the individual has been smothered, as if there’s some perceived threat in their personality.

There seems to be an incredible conformity to things now. Individuals thrive where they’re allowed to, like sports or the arts, but they’re still performing within a system that controls the effects of their individuality. Theres no way they could actually transform the environment they perform in, and perform is the operative word, so maybe they’re not individuals just roll models.

I think there’s something very frightening about these power figures and I don’t think it’s just because of Hitler or Stalin. I’m beginning to think we’ve become a very homogenised culture, more so than ever before, and any sign of the individuals is jumped on. The last really powerful individual I can think of was Martin Luther King. I’d be interested if anyone can think of others.

This goes back to my point about consensus. Real change, progress, isn’t made by committees, it’s made by individuals who push through to their objectives. They might push the envelope as far as they can, they may break the rules, they may change the rules, but something will happen, and it seems to me that’s history itself. This was also my point about the gains of consensus. Are they real gains? Has our progress slowed down? Have we become fearful of risk?

The millennials have grown up under this homogenisation, this conformity. They believe they’re individuals but that’s just marketing. Sheeple is the right term for them. So someone like Trump us very frightening to them, they’ve never seen this before and they believe power figures are Hitler and Stalin, but Martin Luther King is not. Despite cries for diversity and the rights of the individual this could be the most conformist and fearful age we’ve ever had.

Can you support that opinion with a fact? — ZzzoneiroCosm

No I could not, but time will tell.

If it’s instinctive then I assume it’s natural. Therefore evil exists without the cause being ignorance. And why would murder be instinctive?

Well how do you theoretically move to some desolate place where government has no say over you?

First of all I would need to know if you know what theoretically means.

But lets say, for the sake of argument, that they do commit evil acts. — Tzeentch

Would you regard that, then, as a natural tendency and not one of ignorance?

I just don't consider evil to be a natural tendency, but a tendency born out of ignorance. — Tzeentch

Would you agree that some primates commit evil acts?

Couldn't I theoretically move to some desolate place where no government has a say over me, without bothering anyone else? — Tzeentch

Theoretically you can do anything you want, including living in a vacuum.

As You Came From the Holy Land
of western New York State

You came from your pilgrimage, where you sort resurrection, the assurance of God. Did you find what you went looking for?

were the graves all right in their brushings

Was it as it should be, everything in its place. Was death locked in place, where it should be. Was it as you expected? it? Did you get your answers?

was there a note of panic in the late August air
because the old man had peed in his pants again

Or did you feel the doubts, the decay in the air, did you see that there is only this life and it ends not in glory but in slowly wasting away.

Was it relevant any longer. was there turning away from the late afternoon glare
as though it too could be wished away

Did your faith fail you, or did you ignore that as well?

was any of this present
and how could this be
the magic solution to what you are in now

You found nothing. So how could you believe there us a future in it? How could that be the way to live, how could it solve your problems?

whatever has held you motionless
like this so long through the dark season

This thing, the thoughts, this idea that you believe, that stops you moving, growing, is darkness a solution to darkness?

until now the women come out in navy blue

You had believed in the healing power of God.

and the worms come out of the compost to die
it is the end of any season

And now you know there is no God, no heaven, nothing. Nothing comes from death, after death there’s nothing, never has been, never will be.

It always ends the same way.

I'm agnostic, almost atheistic. — TheMadFool

I’m trying to work out whether you’re looking at this as God having given us free will? Is that right?

Imposing one's will upon another is, in my opinion, illegitimate, whether one does it on behalf of other people or not.

My point is that governments have no right to rule over people who do not want to be ruled by it. — Tzeentch

So what form of government would you prefer instead?

What else could it be, unless you reject representative democracy, and then you’re imposing your view on others. And I assume you’d feel justified.
— Brett

Rejecting something does not equal imposing it on others. — Tzeentch

If you reject one form of government than you must presumably have another preference in mind. You can’t just rid yourself of a government you don’t like and exist in a vacuum. So unless 100% of the population supported your new government how would you deal with those who didn’t want your form of government?

As a matter of interest.

Kissinger picks the seven most powerful people in history.

“In order to list the seven most powerful people in history, it is necessary to define the term "power." I use it here in the sense of a vision of the future coupled with a capacity to bring it about. Vision without power is an intellectual exercise. Power without vision often turns on itself. For this reason, I have excluded religious figures whose power is spiritual, not military. With these qualifications, here is my list.”

Julius Caesar, Qin Shi Huang, Peter the Great, Mahatma Gandhi, Napoleon Bonaparte, Theodore Roosevelt, The American president since 1945.

https://www.forbes.com/2009/11/09/kissinger-roosevelt-gandhi-leadership-power-09-history_slide.html#4960a7e46585

But there is always an enormous risk inherent in that. What happens after the threat is gone? — BitconnectCarlos

A example of that might be Churchill during the war years. When the war was over he was voted out. In terms of leadership he was what was no longer needed, he’d served his purpose.

Historically centralised power has not worked. And these power figures seem to be associated with centralised power. But I’m not sure that if we looked at things more carefully we might find that there are examples where power figures didn’t necessarily pivot towards some of the horrors we’ve seen.

Your point about someone seeking power for the sake of it and imposing their will is worth considering. The populace still require something in return for that person to hold on to their position.

A very clear example of this would be when Hitler declared a state of emergency upon being elected and suspended the Constitution because there was some supposed existential threat facing the state — BitconnectCarlos

Hitler and Germany is complicated, but still it’s generally referred to as an example of the power figure and the dire consequences. But in fact there was an existential threat to the state and that was Communism. It’s very possible if it had not been for the aggression of Hitler and the right that the Communists might have won the day. So as I say, complicated.

Here in Australia there was a referendum on becoming a Republic. The public rejected the Republican idea because they wanted to be able to chose the President and the referendum did not allow for that. My point here is that I’m looking at the idea of power figures within a democratic process. Can they achieve things in that system, does it work against them, and can they destroy and usurp it?

I think it’s interesting that as a species we did live under this idea of power figures. Somewhere along the way things changed. There are obviously reasons for that change, and I’m presuming they didn’t happen overnight. Because of that we might tend to look on the idea of power figures as primitive and savage and so reject any consideration of them. You can see how the very mention of the word power sends people spinning off into rants about right wing ideology.

Power is personal and it’s about the individual. So it seems a little odd in these times of individuality and diversity that we shy away from this. What’s the point of the strength and autonomy of the individual if power isn’t going to be part of it. If individuals can’t rise up through the masses, to aspire to all sorts of unknown potential, then what’s the point of believing in the individual. And is the opposite worth it in terms of progress and success in survival.

Or is it as I suggested just fear of the individual?

Where exactly is modern society's morality documented?
— alcontali

Why would it be documented?

One reason why such society does not want to document it, is because they want to keep changing it as it suits them. The lack of of documentation points to its fundamentally deceptive and manipulative nature.
— alcontali — Brett

I don’t think society wants to keep changing morality. There are people who have a relativist views of morality, but strangely enough it doesn’t seem to change their behaviour which we might tie to morality. It’s not as if everyone out there is suddenly choosing to behave like Raskolnikov.

And anyway we document laws and those laws can be changed or removed over time. So it’s not as if, as a society, we don’t document things so that we can change them as we want. And you might find our morality actually documented in our laws, which are punishable if broken.

I must learn to ignore your posts, they serve no purpose at all.

This is my original post.

“If you’re really open minded you might consider the idea that though traditional tribal societies were collectives and socialist they still had a chief who called the shots. Try and balance that in your over heated mind”.

You’ve gone and revised my quote and then tried to make me defend that.

Here’s your post.

“Could you cite some enthongraphies which detail the extent to which chiefs in nomadic hunter-gatherer communities ignored consensus to dictate what would happen.”

I didn’t say the chief ignores consensus in the tribe.

Then in your first point you question the validity of Levi’s finding, as if that might make my point invalid.

Then when it suits you go and use Levi’s findings to support your points, #2and #3.

Finally your posts confirm what I’d already said, that the chief in his position of power only holds it by the benefits the tribe gains.

Which is largely my point about power that I made in the OP.

As to your hysterical rant about the right and left, and this being

another boring right-wing moan. You guys are always trying to dress up your basic unexamined conservatism in some higher sounding philosophical rhetoric - — Isaac

let me remind you that these power figures occur just as much, if not more, in leftist states.

What evidence do you have to support that conclusion? Could you cite some enthongraphies which detail the extent to which chiefs in nomadic hunter-gatherer communities ignored consensus to dictate what would happen. Or is 'evidence' just another one of those things which gets in the way of 'progress'? — Isaac

My actual post;

“If you’re really open minded you might consider the idea that though traditional tribal societies were collectives and socialist they still had a chief who called the shots. Try and balance that in your over heated mind”.


“A World On the Wane”. C. Levi. Strauss, 1961.

Men, Women and Chiefs. ( p. 303)

“He it is who organises their departure, chooses their itinerary, and decrees where and for how long they will stop. He decides on the expeditions - hunting, fishing, collecting, scavenging ... He determines the time and the place for the sedentary life. He supervises the gardens and says what crops are to be planted.”