Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site rtech.ARPA Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxr!ihnp4!zehntel!dual!unisoft!mtxinu!rtech!jeff From: jeff@rtech.ARPA (Jeff Lichtman) Newsgroups: net.politics,net.religion,net.flame Subject: Re: A Question! Message-ID: <206@rtech.ARPA> Date: Mon, 4-Mar-85 04:32:01 EST Article-I.D.: rtech.206 Posted: Mon Mar 4 04:32:01 1985 Date-Received: Wed, 6-Mar-85 05:54:02 EST References: <776@decwrl.UUCP> Organization: Relational Technology, Berkeley CA Lines: 26 Xref: watmath net.politics:7968 net.religion:5871 net.flame:8690 > > A person who, not so long ago was the idol of millions poised a question > that I would like someone to answer please. > > "Why shouldn't human beings be as cruel as nature is?" > > - Adolf Hitler > > Ken Arndt Nature is neither cruel nor kind. It doesn't have the capacity. Cruelty implies intent, which implies conciousness. Human beings have conciousness, whereas nature as a whole doesn't. One might interpret "cruel" in the above statement by Mr. Schickelgruber to mean "giving pain to others" without any component of intent or conciousness. In this case my answer is that the world is more pleasant if we aren't cruel; since our conciousness gives us the ability to make choices, why not choose to be happy instead of miserable? The obvious answer to this is that cruelty causes unhappiness in others, not in the one who is cruel. My rebuttal is that this ignores the pleasure and satisfaction one gets from loving one's fellow human beings, and also that a cruel person is likely to suffer cruel retaliation. -- Jeff Lichtman at rtech (Relational Technology, Inc.) aka Swazoo Koolak