I got my info about Alexander the Great (compared to Hitler) from this podcast:
I can't confirm or deny it. But I would defend the idea that culture has evolved to a better place than ever. The ultimate will be a one-world government of sorts, the only way I think to eliminate nukes. We are seeing movement towards that with the EC and other joint groups. Obama is also making movement towards working with other national leaders as peers, unlike Bush.
All the major blunders in history (Crusades, Stalin, Hitler, etc.) were probably necessary in order to learn from them (evolution of cultural/religious memes). Since the Holocaust, we say "never again." But it does still happen (on smaller scales). Example: Rwanda. We haven't learned 100% yet. It is just like a child falling off a bike in order to learn how to ride one. You have to fall in order to learn. But the end result is a better world, eventually, and gradually. Our only threat now is nukes. Our technology meme has evolved faster than our cultural/religious meme, so our cultural/religious meme may end up killing us all (the entire earth) via the technology meme.
Obama is on top of that, trying to reconcile the USA with the world again. ;-)
...Bernie
-----Original Message-----
From: asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu [mailto:asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu] On Behalf Of Murray Hogg
Sent: Tuesday, October 20, 2009 12:00 PM
To: ASA
Subject: Re: [asa] morals/ethics
Dehler, Bernie wrote:
> People say Hitler was the worst, but I heard Alexander the Great (long before Hitler) was much worse. Alexander killed villages for the vain glory of killing, while Hitler had, what he considered, a noble reason. The reason was wrong, but at least it was a better reason than just killing to show off or have fun or to prove what a big man he was.
>
As so often, Bernie, we have been over this ground and you insist on making totally spurious claims for no other reason than doing so advances your rather curious personal agenda.
So I will AGAIN offer the challenge that I put LAST TIME: Can you please cite ONE instance in which Alexander behaved in the manner you here assert?
The three obvious candidates are the destruction of Thebes, Tyre, and Gaza. But what you choose to ignore is that all three were destroyed because they broke the rules of ancient politics/warfare. Thebes rebelled against their recognized ruler, Tyre and Gaza chose to oppose Alexander under siege rather than submit. I don't condone Alexander's behaviour - but he certainly wasn't acting on a vain glorious whim.
Now, I know you don't like actually research - so much easier to go on what "people say" or on what "I heard" - so let me lay it out for you. There are NO - repeat NO - instances on record of Alexander "[killing] villages for the vain glory of killing."
So could you please refrain from claiming that Alexander acted for "vain glory".
I'd also appreciate if you refrain from honouring Hitler's motives as "noble" - there IS no "noble" reason for genocide, Bernie - full stop.
I realize that in all of this you want to promote the thesis that human morality has evolved past the point of needing a religious crutch. It's just unfortunate for you that the thesis is wrong and that the two greatest despots of history - Hitler and then Stalin - are such overwhelming evidence of the fact.
But despite the need to explain away their behaviour in order to maintain your thesis of moral evolution, I really think you should consider just impression you give when you attempt to defend Hitler's motives as "noble". Frankly, NOTHING could be better guaranteed to convince me that, when it comes to morality, you just don't get it.
Blessings,
Murray
To unsubscribe, send a message to majordomo@calvin.edu with
"unsubscribe asa" (no quotes) as the body of the message.
To unsubscribe, send a message to majordomo@calvin.edu with
"unsubscribe asa" (no quotes) as the body of the message.
Received on Wed Oct 21 12:15:20 2009
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.8 : Wed Oct 21 2009 - 12:15:20 EDT