pete wrote:
>
> "Brad McCormick, Ed.D." <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
> >In any case, however, if our society was run by experts,
> >it *might* look like the noble vision of H.G. Wells'
> >film "The Shape of Things to Come", but it might
> >also be an autistic idiotocracy (using "idiot" in the
> >classical Greek sense, not of having a low IQ, but
> >of being unable to participate meaningfully in the
> >life of the polity / "polis").
>
> Would it be too cynical to suggest that that sounds a lot like what
> we already have? Well, maybe not to such an extreme, but perhaps
> it is just a matter of which kind of idiot. A lot of politicians who
> successfully access public office seem to me to have an outlook which
> is insular and elitist, occupying a sort of separate public policy
> makers culture. I fear I would feel better represented by the expert
> idiots, who might presumably inhabit the academic science culture
> which at least overlaps the idiosyncratic cultural synthesis I
> embody.
[snip]
It's the old problem of? [for all cosequential X's] who will [X] the
[X]ers?
I'd love to see the world run by the late Air Force Col. John R. Boyd,
who was the only working hermeneuticist I've ever met, and who stated
flatly that: "The reason the United Sttes lost the war in Vietnam was
that
it violated the first principle of fighting a guerrilla insurgency,
which is to seize the high moral ground and offer the people genuinely
better prospects for their lives." Roger Boisjoly, the engineer who
tried to keep the Challenger Space Shuttle from going on its doomed
mission, would probably be another fine leader. And the only
true moral giant (i.e., martyr) I've ever known is a Computer
Programming manager I ouce worked for.... But then there were the
engineers who concocted Zyklon-B, etc.
On the other hand, there is no evidence to my knowledge that King
Solomon had any technical competence in anything.
My opinion? We must start from where we are, and try to build
humane community in our immediate families, neighborhoods, work
groups, *and*, if we have social power, in the areas over which
we have that power (obviously, both Donald Trump and Bill Gates
could do a lot in regard
to this mission, were they to choose to accept it...)....
\brad
--
Mankind is not the master of all the stuff that exists, but
Everyman (woman, child) is a judge of the world.
Brad McCormick, Ed.D. / [EMAIL PROTECTED]
(914)238-0788 / 27 Poillon Rd, Chappaqua, NY 10514-3403 USA
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