vael:
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… Though I have reason to believe that, in fact, voting doesn’t even matter; but that’s nothing provable and a matter aside from this.
Apparently, not so, if the politician on a recent Extra Credits episode is to be believed. For those who’d rather not watch the video, he notes that a lot of ridings in the US elections are very, very close and that a concerted effort could easily change the results.
Regarding the selfish nature. You will find as much evidence for my belief as you will to the contrary. My belief is typical with “objectivists” that understand how selfish us sentient creatures are. It’s my belief that life itself thrives: that it is hard to eradicate life completely once it exists. I believe this relates back to our internal mindset to look out for ourselves, and just as pigs do, we can be very social about it. We are social. Societies are the only reason we’re having this conversation. We crave social attention, but it is to fill our own need. I don’t believe this is erasable from the gene of life, but I believe that as a society, we should be doing more to discourage biases and to employ logic and efficiency to as many aspects of our lives as we can. I’m not hoping for Vulcans, I’m hoping for enlightened individuals who can have conversations just like you and I are having now.
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I realize that I’m not anything like an expert just because the topic has come up in a few of my classes (most notably in my cognitive psychology class… go figure), but your absolute certainty pains me. You’re showing your own bias towards believing in “the selfish gene.” I can’t say whether you’re right or wrong, but I don’t feel like you speak from the position of authority that your tone implies. I’m not saying you shouldn’t make strong statements - I’m saying you shouldn’t make them without compelling evidence. With only weak evidence, or in the face of a lot of contrary evidence, you should only make a weak claim.
Aside from that, I hope you can see the trouble with writing from a biased point of view and then claiming bias should be discouraged.
The reason utopianism changed from “the world” to “yourself” is because it was jejune - childishly naive, even arrogant - to believe that we could just simply “better the world”. Well, Hitler thought he was bettering the world. We could agree that picking up trash along the highways and volunteering at soup kitchens is a good thing, but there is no way I could be attempting to posit this “belief system” as a genuine belief system and claim some ways that would objectively be better for the world. It is a subjective matter, but in the newest revision of utopianism’s article, it’s noted that one should attempt to be a positive force in all that they do. Push the world forward. A utopian villain would not be utopian, and yet again, here I am trying to define what a villain would be. Am I a villain for believing that I should ignore the world and let the virus cure itself, that I should just strive to have this “utopia” of ignorance and feel I did a good thing? I don’t know.
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I’m of the opinion that being a “better person” implies making things around you better on some small scale. At a bare minimum, improving the lives of the people closest to you. When you can, do the same for random strangers (or at least don’t be a miserable jerk, even if there are no consequences). There’s much more you can do, but at least you can do that. But I suppose “improving yourself” doesn’t always mean “being a better person.” I think it’s important to do both, though. That’s my own interpretation, anyway.
Oh! No, the voting comment didn’t regard the macro aspect of voting. That is very interesting what the politician’s said, but whether it’s true or not isn’t really what I’m concerned with.
You may be familiar with the concept of weighted voting. That is what I’d like to see, ideally. No, I’m not a political scientist. I don’t claim this is the best way to do it. But, I have a problem with my vote counting the same as a person who doesn’t pay attention to debates, or really care to know any candidates and just votes for the person representing their party. Worse, someone who’s racist and won’t consider the person because of that. Because of this, I’d like to see a basic test to earn yourself some weight on a vote. Again, not claiming to be a political scientist who knows how to best make these tests, but they should only reflect what’s important to make a decision on the candidates.
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When I say “objectivists understand that”, I’m not suggesting we’re absolutely correct. What I’m saying is that merely we understand: we could be wrong, just as anyone could understand a man who is wrong but explaining himself properly. There will never be an answer on this, I’m happy to say it’s one of life’s unprovable beliefs that I hold. In my experience, what I understand of the world, yes, it appears as though we’re very selfish and terrible creatures that care for self-preservation more than anything. And I want to unlearn these behaviors as a society.
I really don’t understand your “bias” remark, what have I done? Believed in something that will not be proven? Or is it that you thought I claimed I know people have selfishness in the gene? (rather than an honest belief)
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Yes, Demi, bettering the world should come with the territory of being utopian. However, at its core, I wanted to keep the belief to the enhancement of one’s self and through that, improving others should come forth as a byproduct. (providing inspiration, helping others overtly)
I’m going to post the rest of this response in another post, as it’s going to be tangential.
(Source: obiwanjacobi-blog)