1Impersonality -- treating everyone the same without regard to their individual identity --ranks near the top of good institutional outcomes in the pantheon of growth theory. Rule of law requires laws that apply equally to all citizens and judicial systems that apply the law impartially. Secure and transferable property rights require identification of ownership without respect to individual identity. Viable contracts require that any legal competent individuals enjoy the same abilities and responsibilities with respect to contractual terms. Competitive markets, competitive polities, religious tolerance, and mass education all require a society to recognize that individuals be treated the same. Lady Justice, sword in one hand and scale in the other, blindfolded so that she cannot see the identity of the persons whose fate she weighs in the balance, is an icon of the modern open access society. While impersonal relationships require blind justice and therefore formal rules, impersonality is more just a matter of law. In order to be sustainable on a wide scale, impersonality must pervade norms of behavior, notions of fairness, equity, and tolerance, and even of morals and ethics. People must find it in their interest to support and obey the rules impartially. As a result, societies with institutions that support impersonal relationships throughout society are relatively rare. The first appear in the historical record only around 200 years ago.
http://econweb.umd.edu/~wallis/Papers/Wallis.Institutions.JEBO.Feb2010.pdf — John Joseph Wallis
I think that some people are better at trying to be robots than others. At work, I can remember how so many people just used to be able to be so alike. The more people expect me to act like a mould the more chaotic I become.
Perhaps it comes down to how we are treated as children. I don't think that I was forced to conform that much. Even at school, I was considered as 'arty' and left to my own devices a lot. My close friends are mainly arts orientated and seem to have difficulty conforming and being robotic.
So, I am really in favour of the right to be a creative bohemian outsider. It will be interesting to see what other people on the site think of your thread and whether they struggle if they are not given enough scope to be unique.
Extra: I just looked under discussion and saw all your previous one. I smiled at the one about toilet paper, and I think my mum hoards toilet rolls. — Jack Cummins
When I did my degree independent thought was considered as the mark of excellence. However, in courses I have done more recently independent thinking is not about independence at all, but just backing up arguments with published opinion. I had a tutor told me, 'You might as well suggest that people fold up pieces of paper all day, unless you back it up with empirical evidence to show that what you are saying works.'
I think this probably goes back to the whole idea of post truth, which I mentioned in the discussion on relativism. Even though I have found some of the postmodern authors, such as Lacan and Baudrillard useful for helping me think through ideas, I believe that postmodernism has contributed to the erosion of individual expression and the importance of uniqueness. — Jack Cummins
Eisenhower's farewell address (sometimes referred to as "Eisenhower's farewell address to the nation"[1]) was the final public speech of Dwight D. Eisenhower as the 34th President of the United States, delivered in a television broadcast on January 17, 1961. Perhaps best known for advocating that the nation guards against the potential influence of the military–industrial complex, a term he is credited with coining, the speech also expressed concerns about planning for the future and the dangers of massive spending, especially deficit spending, the prospect of the domination of science through Federal funding and, conversely, the domination of science-based public policy by what he called a "scientific-technological elite". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eisenhower%27s_farewell_address — wikipedia
Humans is a science fiction television series that debuted on Channel 4. Written by the British team Sam Vincent and Jonathan Brackley, based on the Swedish science fiction drama Real Humans, the series explores the themes of artificial intelligence and robotics, focusing on the social, cultural, and psychological impact of the invention of anthropomorphic robots called "synths". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humans_(TV_series) — Wikipedia
we need to be treated as unique individuals — Jack Cummins
I love you for saying that! That is exactly what I wish everyone would understand. — Athena
There are two ways to have social order, culture, or authority over the people. Authority over the people, even if it is blind justice, destroys liberty, and that makes a moral culture very important. — Athena
don't think that it is about privilege but about respecting individuality and difference. But I can see that this does involve debate. However, I will let Athena discuss further as she created the thread. — Jack Cummins
If we reflect upon the various ideals of education that are prevalent in the different countries, we see that what they all aim at is to organize capacities for conduct. This is most immediately obvious in Germany, where the explicitly avowed aim of the higher education is to turn the student into an instrument for advancing scientific discovery. The German universities are proud of the number of young specialist whom they turn out every year,- not necessarily men of any original force of intellect, but men so trained to research that when their professor gives them an historical or philosophical thesis to prepare, or a bit of laboratory work to do, with a general indication as to the best method, they can go off by themselves and use apparatus and consult sources in such a way as to grind out in the requisite number of months some little pepper-corn of new truth worthy of being added to the store of extant human information on that subject. Little else is recognized in Germany as a man's title to academic advancement than his ability thus to show himself an efficient instrument of research.
In England, it might seem at first sight as if the higher education of the universities aimed at the production of certain static types of character rather than at the development of what one may call this dynamic scientific efficiency. Professor Jowett, when asked what Oxford could do for its students, is said to have replied, "Oxford can teach an English gentleman how to be an English gentleman." But, if you ask what it means to "be' an English gentleman, the only reply is in terms of conduct and behavior. An English gentleman is a bundle of specific qualified reactions, a creature who for all the emergencies of life has his line of behavior distinctly marked out for him in advance. Here, as elsewhere, England expects every man to do his duty. — William James
said is a good idea.Ken Edwards — Ken Edwards
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