{"id":11601,"date":"2010-03-21T12:01:08","date_gmt":"2010-03-21T19:01:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/?p=11601"},"modified":"2010-06-26T07:58:22","modified_gmt":"2010-06-26T14:58:22","slug":"splendorquest-redemption-is-egoism-in-action-even-if-other-people-are-criminal-i-am-not-but-i-will-not-cause-them-to-become-good-by-becoming-a-criminal-myself","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/11601\/splendorquest-redemption-is-egoism-in-action-even-if-other-people-are-criminal-i-am-not-but-i-will-not-cause-them-to-become-good-by-becoming-a-criminal-myself\/","title":{"rendered":"SplendorQuest: Redemption is egoism in action:<\/u><\/em> Even if other people are criminal, I am not — but I will not cause them to become good by becoming a criminal myself."},"content":{"rendered":"

I wrote this a dozen years ago, and I’ve posted it here before. It’s apposite today, because, to all indications, we are all about to be involuntarily inducted into a cannibal cult. My question for you: Will you choose to be devoured by your neighbors, or will you elect to devour them instead? –GSS<\/em><\/p>\n

 
What I want to discuss is Socrates’ question about whether it is better to inflict an injury or to have an injury inflicted upon you. It’s a favorite of sophists and sophomores, I know, but I think it strikes at the very core of justice. The justice I seek and seek to defend is not “out there”, apart from myself. Justice (or injustice) is not what others do to me, it’s what I do to myself and to others. Where I find myself availing myself of the fallacies tu quoque<\/em> or two wrongs make a right, I am rationalizing injustice, and the worst<\/em> havoc I am wreaking is upon my own ego.<\/p>\n

The Nazarene’s answer to Socrates was this: It is better to have an injury inflicted upon you, because redemption is still possible to one who has not inflicted injury upon another. I don’t believe in an afterlife and I don’t believe redemption hinges upon any one event. But I do<\/em> believe that a “justice” that is itself unjust is vain at best and evil at worst.<\/p>\n

We can make a joke by saying, “Political philosophy is the means by which ethical systems betray themselves.” There are actually a host of reasons for this, and all of them are amusing to me. For one, a political system has a meta-goal apart from the ethical system in which it is rooted: It must function in the real world.<\/p>\n

Moreover, the political system itself has a meta-ethical or even extra-ethical goal in that its proponents will tend to imbue it with what they view are essential survival characteristics even if these betray the ethical system in which the political philosophy is putatively based. Any form of argument that the polity can or should or must do what it would be immoral or Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I wrote this a dozen years ago, and I’ve posted it here before. It’s apposite today, because, to all indications, we are all about to be involuntarily inducted into a cannibal cult. My question for you: Will you choose to be devoured by your neighbors, or will you elect to devour them instead? –GSS  What […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_crdt_document":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[251,24,29],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-11601","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"hentry","6":"category-big-mother","7":"category-egoism-in-action","8":"category-group-therapy","10":"no-featured-image"},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":3824,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/3824\/redemption-is-egoism-in-action-in-support-of-mike-farmer-even-if-other-people-are-criminal-i-am-not-but-i-will-not-cause-them-to-become-good-by-becoming-a-criminal-myself\/","url_meta":{"origin":11601,"position":0},"title":"Redemption is egoism in action: In support of Mike Farmer, even if other people are criminal, I am not — but I will not cause them to become good by becoming a criminal myself","author":"Greg Swann","date":"August 9, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"Not completely off topic, but well above the normal fray. I wrote this ten or twelve years ago: \u00a0What I want to discuss is Socrates' question about whether it is better to inflict an injury or to have an injury inflicted upon you. It's a favorite of sophists and sophomores,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Egoism in Action"","block_context":{"text":"Egoism in Action","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/egoism-in-action\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":16180,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/16180\/he-blinded-them-with-science-taking-up-the-vocabulary-of-self-adoration-at-the-21convention\/","url_meta":{"origin":11601,"position":1},"title":"He blinded them with science: Taking up the vocabulary of self-adoration at The 21Convention.","author":"Greg Swann","date":"August 29, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"This is me speaking at The 21Convention earlier this month in Austin. The title of my talk -- \"Ontologically-Consonant Teleology\" -- was a joke, an early intimation that I intended to be dry, pedantic and boring. In reality, I gave them my pure schtick, hard-core egoism delivered with a garage-band\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Egoism in Action"","block_context":{"text":"Egoism in Action","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/egoism-in-action\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":16387,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/16387\/rock-me-mama-egoism-in-action-the-link-from-art-to-human-values-and-back\/","url_meta":{"origin":11601,"position":2},"title":"Rock Me Mama Egoism In Action: The link from art to human values and back.","author":"Greg Swann","date":"September 3, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"Everything is all one thing, so this is a video essay about art about music about morality about song-writing about marriage about redemption \u2013 simple stuff. This is egoism in action, me being me. This video connects directly to the argument I made on Friday about \u2018conservative\u2019 art, and all\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Egoism in Action"","block_context":{"text":"Egoism in Action","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/egoism-in-action\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":15781,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/15781\/egoism-in-action-the-face-of-splendor\/","url_meta":{"origin":11601,"position":3},"title":"Egoism in action: The face of Splendor…","author":"Greg Swann","date":"March 25, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"My friend Jim Klein fingered this video this morning: Forget the context. It doesn't matter. What I want for you to see is that young man's face just as he finishes playing. This is the face of Splendor. This is egoism in action. Gavin M. George is a virtuoso pianist\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Egoism in Action"","block_context":{"text":"Egoism in Action","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/egoism-in-action\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2653,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/2653\/egoism-in-action-what-should-you-do-when-a-half-assed-sock-puppet-makes-a-half-decent-joke\/","url_meta":{"origin":11601,"position":4},"title":"Egoism in action: What should you do when a half-assed sock puppet makes a half-decent joke?","author":"Greg Swann","date":"February 25, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"Laugh, of course:What\u2019s the difference between BloodhoundBlog and a porcupine? With the porcupine the pricks are on the outside.It's quoted from Dustin Luther's High Temple of Unidirectional Virtue. (\"Where poking fun at other people is always wrong, except when we're doing it.\") The joke is stolen, of course, but it's\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Blogging"","block_context":{"text":"Blogging","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/blogging\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":11672,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/11672\/splendorquest-redemption-is-egoism-in-action\/","url_meta":{"origin":11601,"position":5},"title":"SplendorQuest: Redemption is egoism in action","author":"Greg Swann","date":"March 26, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"This is clipped from a book I wrote in 1988 -- a book I really need to write anew. It's an epistolary novel, so the writing is kind of affected. I expect you can worry your way through it. \"Madness,\" as the term is used here, is an attempt to\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Egoism in Action"","block_context":{"text":"Egoism in Action","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/egoism-in-action\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11601","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11601"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11601\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12426,"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11601\/revisions\/12426"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11601"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11601"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11601"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}