Quillette Reviews The Goodness Paradox

It's a dangerous publication reviewing a book with "a dangerous idea." Some of you will want to see what they think.

6 comments:

douglas said...

Like the pig released into the wild, man reverts to his animal nature quickly when he either desires it or circumstances force it on him. The animal nature is always there, ready to be the default when we give it no guidance, or desire to let it guide.

Grim said...

My sense of it, to be fair, is that civilization is a weapon pointed at men like me. In a state of nature, I could do whatever I wanted. The whole of these structures of control is aimed at stopping that.

So read this again:

The master said, "Why do crows fly away when they see a man?" The hermit was at a loss; finally he put the same question back to the Chan master. The master said, "Because I still have a murderous heart."

So do you. And so do I, and know it. For which cause I set guards on myself, chains of chivalry and courtesy, forgiveness in spite of anger. Our ancestors knew it, for which cause they learned to fight duels instead of wars, and make laws that legitimized violence in defense but not aggression.

I think I was right, long ago. I think I set those chains on myself for good reasons; but now, also, I think that the whole of civilization is bent on killing men like me.

Maybe I'm more like Conan the Cimmerian than ever I thought. And so was Robert Howard, perhaps. Maybe the world isn't made for people like us; maybe it's made against us.

Well, for all of that, I wouldn't hurt a child or a lady. I took my chains willingly. I set them on myself, to keep from doing harm.

Christopher B said...

Grim - It seems to me the thrust of the book, at least according to the review, is that you'd only have been able to do what you wanted until a group of 'civilized' males decided they no longer wanted you to be able to do it.

The problem we have now, which the way the book had to be written makes clear, is that we've decided we have always been 'civilized', and no carrots are required to make you or any man cooperate with another.

Grim said...

...able to do what you wanted until a group of 'civilized' males decided they no longer wanted you to be able to do it.

That's the point I was trying to make with the Conan/Howard reference. Howard seems to have resented civilization largely because it existed to stop him from doing what he felt was natural, healthy, and vigorous. Conan frequently enters his stories having just killed some magistrate who thought to impose some law on him, or in flight from an army that has destroyed his band of rovers, or having killed some authority figure for one reason or another. It's generally not that Conan was up to anything per se immoral, and he treats women with what Howard describes as 'a rough chivalry' that is native to his character. It's that the laws exist to control people like him, to keep him restrained for the convenience of others.

douglas said...

There is an eternal pull between the need for order and the need for freedom. It's inevitable that we are unable to walk the line perfectly, but instead wobble from one side to the other, constantly attempting to correct our path.

E Hines said...

instead wobble from one side to the other, constantly attempting to correct our path.

A metaphor for our basic unordered, if not necessarily free, nature.

Or: entropy is alive and well in the human species.

Eric Hines