"'The world is as it is,' he said. 'We've got to live with that - not with the world as we think it should be.'" (p. 162)
That has to be one of the most ambiguous statements ever made. Every other species on Earth has adapted to its existing environment whereas human beings are differentiated by the fact that they have changed their environment and themselves in the process. We inhabit artificial environments surrounded by one natural environment and, assuming that we do survive current crises, this world-transforming activity has only just begun.
Having constructed not just one but many diverse societies, men and women can legitimately ask not only how those societies are but also how they should be. Preserving any given status quo serves some sectional interests as against others.
No doubt basic laws like entropy have to be accepted but how much freedom of action do such laws allow us? For the foreseeable future, a very great deal.
5 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
Unless in indisputably bad situations, socio/political changes for either merely making changes or for correcting alleged should not be recklessly undertaken. because the most likely consequences of hasty, radical changes are so unlikely to be good. An issue discussed at great length recently, on how best to abolish slavery.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
Nothing should be done recklessly.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
And ever since the horrible French Revolution we have seen all too much recklessness.
Ad astra! Sean
As the philosophers put it, there is no connection between “is” (description) and “ought” (prescription).
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
And those philosophers were right!
Ad astra! Sean
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