On Wed, 3 Oct 2001, Nick Arnett wrote: > > The reason you're stating and restating the obvious is that you're > > countering an argument that nobody made. Neither Friedman's essay nor > > Gautam nor I have argued that wealth is evidence of moral superiority. > > Friedman absolutely did so. He wrote, "American power and wealth flow > directly from a deep spiritual source." It is a simple cause and effect -- > the cause is spiritual strength and the effect is wealth and power. Or, if > you will, the reward for America's virtue of spiritual strength is wealth > and power. I don't see any failure of logic in reading it the other way > around, that wealth and power are the reward for spiritual strength.
Uh, what John said. But, as you yourself have pointed out, there are lots of avenues to wealth and power, some including violence and deceit (which the US has occasionally used, make no mistake, despite our other virtues). As you've pointed out, it's totally obvious that the mere existence of wealth and power do not imply virtue. So, the failure of logic in reading Friedman's assertion "the other way around" is likewise totally obvious. It means attributing to him that which he neither said nor by logic implied. Moreover, as John pointed out, Friedman selected certain particular secular spiritual (if that's not too much of an oxymoron) strengths and established a relationship between them and the wealth of a society. He did not assert that "money comes" as some ostensibly religious bumper stickers say, as though God rewarded prayer and generosity of spirit with material wealth (which he doesn't, I agree). That is not what Friedman said or implied at all, and if you insist on reading that assumption into his little essay, and you and I were taught two completely different versions of the English language. Not to mention different rules of logic. > The only way I can see this as anything other than unjustified arrogance > would be if he said that spiritual strength -- and thus its rewards -- is an > undeserved gift. But I don't see any hint of such an attitude in the piece. > > Spiritual strength is, indeed, a gift, not something to show off and lord > over others. And yet, "a city on the hill cannot be hid." Christ exhorts us to let our lights shine. While I've always argued that our alleged city on the hill needs a hell of a lot of work, that's no reason to deny that in certain areas, we are a hell of a lot better than al Qaeda and the Taliban, and those things are worth fighting to preserve. I think our chief weapons must be knowledge and, I agree, some cultural humility, rather than sheer military might. But you know what? The values that will make it possible for us to craft a humane strategy for fighting terrorism, a strategy that respects the innocent and understands cultural differences -- if we succeed in crafting such a strategy -- will be exactly the virtues Friedman extolled. In truth, these secular values of tolerance, openness, and so on, are merely the classical religious values writ large and without respect for religious territorialism. But unless we recognize them as fact, seize upon them, and use them knowingly, we just as surely damned as if we forget them altogether and rest in the assurance that the presence of money implies the presence of the Good. Mother Theresa may hold herself a sinner before God, but it doesn't mean she doesn't know the right thing to do, and it doesn't mean that she doesn't *know* that she knows the right thing to do. Marvin Long Austin, Texas "If you will not grant me victory, then grant me vengeance!" Conan the Barbarian "Blessed are the peacemakers." Jesus Christ
