Posted on 02/19/2009 10:01:40 AM PST by Ernest_at_the_Beach
What kind of society do we want? "Let the free market decide!" is the often-heard response. That response, a prominent capitalist argues,undermines the very values on which open and democratic societies depend.
IN The Philosophy of History, Hegel discerned a disturbing historical pattern -- the crack and fall of civilizations owing to a morbid intensification of their own first principles. Although I have made a fortune in the financial markets, I now fear that the untrammeled intensification of laissez-faire capitalism and the spread of market values into all areas of life is endangering our open and democratic society. The main enemy of the open society, I believe, is no longer the communist but the capitalist threat.
The term "open society" was coined by Henri Bergson, in his book The Two Sources of Morality and Religion (1932), and given greater currency by the Austrian philosopher Karl Popper, in his book The Open Society and Its Enemies (1945). Popper showed that totalitarian ideologies like communism and Nazism have a common element: they claim to be in possession of the ultimate truth. Since the ultimate truth is beyond the reach of humankind, these ideologies have to resort to oppression in order to impose their vision on society. Popper juxtaposed with these totalitarian ideologies another view of society, which recognizes that nobody has a monopoly on the truth; different people have different views and different interests, and there is a need for institutions that allow them to live together in peace. These institutions protect the rights of citizens and ensure freedom of choice and freedom of speech. Popper called this form of social organization the "open society." Totalitarian ideologies were its enemies.
(Excerpt) Read more at mtholyoke.edu ...
"...The open society offers a vista of limitless progress. In this respect it has an affinity with the scientific method. But science has at its disposal objective criteria — namely the facts by which the process may be judged. Unfortunately, in human affairs the facts do not provide reliable criteria of truth, yet we need some generally agreed-upon standards by which the process of trial and error can be judged. All cultures and religions offer such standards; the open society cannot do without them. The innovation in an open society is that whereas most cultures and religions regard their own values as absolute, an open society, which is aware of many cultures and religions, must regard its own shared values as a matter of debate and choice.
As C.S. Lewis observed in "The Abolition of Man", the human mind can no more invent a new value than create a new primary color. Underneath the Mr Soros' subterfuge of replacing "absolute values" with "debate and choice" lies the contradiction that that "debate and choice" are just a different set of "absolute values", which just so happen to be so much more conveniently malleable to the ambitions of self-annointed moral 'innovators' like Mr. Soros for the propagation of the society of his choice.
Cordially,
Such folk laugh at us for saying such things. But it seems to me, God always has the last laugh in such matters. And so, as you say, quite possibly "it will not end well for them."
But so are the Clintons, bush/Bush, mcQueeq, and O'bama..
I take your point about the contradiction that "debate and choice" would constitute just a different set of "absolute values." As mentioned earlier, all Soros has done in this article is to propound a new "dogma," or "doctrine" which, as such, must necessarily stand as a new "absolute value." Dogma, doctrine always deals with "absolutes" and imposes them wherever possible.
Plus not only "debate and choice," but also the "scientific" standard of "true and false" ascertained by "trial and error" are fundamental to Soros' argument. Both methods are evasions unless they can show the objective ground or standard of truthful judgment by which they are rationally to be assessed — which ground both seek to show is irrelevant to human purposes in the first place. So — where does that leave us? Where does/can reason, ratio, figure into this style of thinking?
C.S. Lewis judged matters exactly right when he said that the human mind can no more invent a new value than create a new primary color. The universe did not begin on the day we were born. It has an actual history; and that history testifies to the fact that although human beings are creative actors in nature, they did not create nature, but are creatures within nature. Nature itself gives every evidence of being a constituted single order which is lawful in its behavior. It was presumably such before we now-living human individuals got here, and will presumably continue to be such when we are no longer here.
People like Soros are trying to persuade us that reality is not actually what it plainly is, but that it should be re-conceived according to Soros' preferences. He can try that all day long. Maybe he will even enjoy some success in persuading ignorant people to agree with him. Still, all that follows from such an enterprise would be, not the successful re-creation of Reality, but a severe reminder that human beings do not re-make reality by having "innovative" opinions about it. No matter what they do, as finite, contingent creatures who are parts and participants of Reality, they're stuck with it, no matter what. There is no way to "rise above it" in a god-like way....
Or as the great poet T.S. Eliot so eloquently put it, "Only the fool, fixed in his folly, thinks he turns the wheel on which he himself turns."
Well, just some thoughts, dear brother in Christ! It is such a delight to hear from you! You and your dear ones are always in my prayers....
wampum
Underneath the Mr Soros’ subterfuge of replacing “absolute values” with “debate and choice” lies the contradiction that that “debate and choice” are just a different set of “absolute values”, which just so happen to be so much more conveniently malleable to the ambitions of self-annointed moral ‘innovators’ like Mr. Soros for the propagation of the society of his choice.
Spirited: Soros follows the wellworn highway-to-Hell taken by all who have usurped the throne of God. From Nimrod to the Pharoahs and Nero, and to Comte, Marx, and Nietzsche-—all of these men resorted to Orwellian double-speak, misapplication, word-magic, spell-binding, etc., in pursuit of their singular object: godhood. Soros is a liar who, believing as ‘true’ his own lies, has recast them as authoritative revelation.
Soros says, “IN The Philosophy of History, Hegel discerned a disturbing historical pattern — the crack and fall of civilizations owing to a morbid intensification of their own first principles”
Spirited: Hegel was not only a gnostic-pantheist but a magus, who by way of word-magic, subsumed God into history. Hence Hegel’s immantized History assumes the guise of Nemesis and foretells the doom of Christendom. And for what reason? The ‘morbid intensification” of ‘belief in’ Christendom’s ‘first principle’-—God, which obviously offended Hegel the gnostic.
Soros says, “IN The Philosophy of History, Hegel discerned a disturbing historical pattern — the crack and fall of civilizations owing to a morbid intensification of their own first principles”
Spirited: Hegel was not only a gnostic-pantheist but a magus, who by way of word-magic, subsumed God into history. Hence Hegel’s immantized History assumes the guise of Nemesis and foretells the doom of Christendom. And for what reason? The ‘morbid intensification” of ‘belief in’ Christendom’s ‘first principle’-—God, which obviously offended Hegel the gnostic.
I so agree with you, dear sister in Christ!
On the other hand, to speak this language would be to leave a whole heck of a lot of people clueless. I mean, those people who have been "lovingly conditioned" (usually at great taxpayer expense) to accept the premise of a godless universe.
To me, the great appeal of Soros' message is the "temptation to believe" that man is really, really "in charge" of what happens in the universe. (Sounds like the same spiel that Satan used to seduce Eve, and then Adam.) Which is the same thing as saying that Man is the Measure of All Things.
But since no part in isolation can exhaustively give an account of the whole of which it is a part, this line of reasoning will not do. If we want to have a countering social effect to the sputem that Soros routinely ejaculates as a facsimile of rational thought, we need better metaphors than appeals to "Pharoahs and Nero, and to Comte, Marx, and Nietzsche," even if we toss in George Orwell for good measure.
I'm not criticizing you here, just saying that we have to draw the proper conclusions. And those will be found "proper" if they can resonate with the American people, as they are, where they stand, right now at this juncture in history, in ways that help advance and secure our national survival and prosperity.
Do not depend on the idea that your average American these days has received a proper, liberal (as it used to be called) education. Ever since John Dewey, publicly-financed education has had little if anything to do with the cultivation of the individual human mind by exposing it to the history and culture of the human past, and training it in critical, logical thinking skills. It has not been about encouraging "independent thinking" at all. It has been — after the Prussian model that Dewey found so conducive to his purposes — singularly devoted to the making of "good citizens" — people with marketable skills who make for good, quiet, reliable taxpayers — while persuading them that certain problems of human existence ought properly be taken out of their hands and vested in the "wise, expert state" to handle on their behalf.
Such a view of the purpose of education in a civilized society, however, is wholly inimical to the American understanding of the human person and his rights and duties as a citizen in a society founded on the rule of law and his natural privileges as a God-created creature endowed with inalienable rights.
Just to remind folks, an "inalienable right" cannot be granted by a government. For what a government can grant, a government may rescind. Therefore, a "right" established in this way cannot in principle be "unalienable."
Which is why the universal unalienable human rights that the Declaration of Independence declares, of life, liberty, and property ("pursuit of happiness") must either be grants of God, or perfect fictions....
I guess we are all fast reaching the point when we better have greater clarity of thought, and a greater sense of purpose, if we wish for our American way of life to survive....
Just some thoughts, just thinking aloud here.... Thank you ever so much, dear spirited irish, for sharing your thoughts with me (with us)!
A government can only inhibit rights..
Rights are given by God..
Inhibiting God given rights is what government does..
My point was that Engels was not poverty stricken, he was by all accounts one of the wealthiest industrialists in Germany. Were it not for Engels poor old Marx would have starved to death and the world would never have heard of Marxism. Engels was one of these guys with lots of money and time on his hands, just like Soros. The worst enemy of capitalism throughout the 19th, 20th and now the 21st century has proven to be capitalists themselves.
So it would seem, dear brother in Christ. For even if a God-given right cannot be abolished in one swell foop, it can still effectively be destroyed by entailing it in some other "civic" obligation that must be performed before the right will be acknowledged by the State. Such as, for instance, making the exercise of the unalienable right to keep and bear personal arms subject to the private obligation to purchase liability insurance — at a time when no private insurer on the face of this planet can be found to issue such a policy.
I can't wait to see Eric Holder — our new attorney general — get into full stride on this question. I'm sure he's highly motivated to destroy the Second Amendment. So let us do pay attention to his forthcoming antics. And scream and yell bloody murder when he traduces our natural right to self-defense, even defense against a constitutionally illegitimate government, when it all boils down to that.
Thanks for the comments.
Charming. The man behind the curtain pontificates.
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There is nothing, and I mean N-O-T-H-I-N-G you can purchase that does not involve directly or indirectly some type of governmental tinkering; be it our government or another government, or some nebulous internationalist NGO setting the policy.
So, you really agree with me then!
Free trade is good. Government meddling is bad.
If you think government meddling with trade is bad, it's nothing compared to government-enforced protectionism.
LOL!
Ok, so your argument boils down to, "Free Trade is really protectionism"?
This is hilarious!
According to you, our trade is REALLY protectionist, and we live in the wealthiest nation the world has ever seen. Then it seems we're on the right track with that!
If what we're doing has made our nation so wealthy, what's the problem? What ever you want to label it, or blame for it, it's working.
Dead on target, hose. Way to go.
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