I think it is extremely rare that people think they need to be governed, as if they had no conscience, manners, or instinct. — NOS4A2
I don't feel like this is the way I want to live, considering that human beings have their own internal morality and, especially as adults, already know how to live and how to behave. — Silvia parmigiani
The community, to use Toennies' term, changed into a "society." "Contract" seemed to be the only bond that held men together--the contract based on the purely rationalistic' relation of service for service the do ut des, the "Contraf Social" of Rousseau. A "society" would thus: appear to be a union of self-seeking individuals who hoped through combination to obtain their personal satisfactions, Aristotle had taught that the State had developed, by gradual growth, from the family group. The Stoics and Epicureans held individuals formed the State--with this difference, that the former viewed the individual as being socially inclined by nature, and the latter that he was naturally antisocial. — Oppenheimer, The State
The first man who, after enclosing a piece of land, got the idea of saying This is mine and found people simple enough to believe him was the true founder of civil society. What crimes, what wars, what murders, what miseries and horrors would someone have spared the human race by pulling out the stakes or filling in the ditch and crying out to his fellows, “Stop listening to this imposter. You are lost if you forget that the fruits of the land belong to everyone and the earth belongs to no one.” But it appears very likely that by this time things had already come to the point where they could no longer continue as they were. For this idea of property depends on many previous ideas that could only have arisen in succession and thus was not formed in the human mind all at once. A good deal of progress was necessary: men had to acquire significant industry and enlightenment, and transmit and increase them from one era to the next, before arriving at this last stage in the state of nature. So let us take up these matters from the beginning and try to gather from a single perspective this slow sequence of events and knowledge in their most natural order. — Jean Jacques Rousseau, translated by Ian Johnston
(15) One must not confuse amour propre with amour de soi-même, two very different passions in their natures and in their effects. Amour de soi-même is a natural feeling that inclines every animal to see to its own preservation and which, guided in man by reason and modified by pity, produces humanity and virtue. Amour propre is only a relative feeling, factitious and born in society, which inclines each individual to be preoccupied with himself more than with anyone else, which inspires in men all the evils they do to each other, and which is the real source of honour.
Once this is well understood, I say that in our primitive condition, in the true state of nature, amour propre does not exist. For since each individual man looks at himself as the only spectator who observes him, as the only being in the universe who takes an interest in him, and as the only judge of his own merit, it is impossible that a sentiment that originates from comparisons, which he has no inclination to make, could spring up in his soul. For the same reason, this man could have neither hatred nor desire for vengeance, passions that can arise only from the feeling of some offense he has received. And since it is scorn or the intention to harm and not the evil itself that constitutes the offense, men who do not know either how to assess or to compare themselves can commit a great deal of violence against each other when there is some advantage to them in doing so, without ever offending each other. In a word, since each man hardly looks at his fellow men except in the way he would look at animals of a different species, he can carry off the prey of the weaker man or yield his to the stronger, without seeing these acts of plunder as anything other than natural events, without the least impulse of insolence or bitterness and without any passion other than the pain or joy at a good or a bad outcome. — ibid.
Why must you be governed? — NOS4A2
Is it the case that this kind of political discussion hinges mostly on a judgement made about human behavior? — Tom Storm
that he was not being honest? — Paine
anyone tempted to give this thread an ounce of respect — Baden
Where do you think conscience and manners arise from? Do you think they're magic universals breathed into our beings by sole virtue of us being human? Isn't it obvious they're socially contextualized with part of that context being that we live in highly structured states? The Plains Indians were about as close to stateless as described by your delusional utopia. As it happens, they tortured their enemies to death as a matter of routine. Yes, they had consciences and manners, just not any that someone like yourself, riddled with state morality, would recognize.
It is interesting though to poke at this sentiment: Why must you be governed? I have manners and conscience, which are constant and impregnable, you clearly do not. Isn't this self-righteous "I", reflected in the social, the kernel of all "us" vs "them" mentalities? No doubt many of the rioters that attacked the Capitol believe they don't need to be governed, that they have manners and consciences, and were doing only what was necessary to protect themselves from the corrupt "other" and its "state morality". Sweep them back in time and they are a tribe of Plains Indians or Vikings, fully equipped with manners, consciences, and compassion (for their own), securing and protecting their interests; the torture, rape, and terror only a different level of necessity. We may even turn NOS's thesis on its head and say those who say they don't need to be governed, demonstrate the need for governance most as their projection on themselves of a false exception proves most pointedly the need for common rules. Of course, I don't need to be governed, I am of divine moral purity and have no need for state morality; it is you, the plebs, the evil ones, who require external constraints...
they have fully developed moralities — NOS4A2
What is a "fully developed morality" and where does it come from under your view? Do you see it as present in most human adults in roughly equal proportion regardless of historical, cultural and political context? — Baden
It is interesting though to poke at this sentiment: Why must you be governed? — Baden
I wish. There's not even that. So far, utterly devoid of arguments. Says stuff, doesn't know what he's saying, can't back it up. Two-dimensionally political from every angle. That's why his threads are generally a waste of time.
I just want to talk about this stuff. — NOS4A2
What is a "fully developed morality" and where does it come from under your view? Do you see it as present in most human adults in roughly equal proportion regardless of historical, cultural and political context?
— Baden
Address the role of social, political and historical context re morality. Address its origin. — Baden
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