Christoph Reuss wrote:
>
> On Sat, 10 Jul 1999, Brad McCormick wrote:
> > I am generally as suspicious of "virtue" as I am of vice.
>
> This is basically a wise attitude, but it shouldn't turn into paranoia. ;-)
It is not paranoia to be afraid in a threatening situation (-:
>
> > The self-styled "simple living"
> > movement is one of those things of
> > which I am a priori suspicious. I
> > certainly would not deny that there are
> > probably some persons who live
> > under that banner who are genuinely
> > decent (etc.). But as far as
> > the movement as a whole is concerned,
> > I would like to see how well
> > these simple livers would like to
> > live in a world in which there
> > was only their own kind, and no
> > high technology system to
> > covertly help them live out their ideas.
>
> There are surely many shades/facets/flavors/etc. of "simple living", but
> I'm not sure what your point is here. The basic idea of s.l. seems to be
> to minimize unnecessary/harmful consumption of resources, and I wonder
What is unnecessary? What is harmful? When a physician excises a
melanoma from a person's body, the physician is doing harm to
the melanoma --> the physician is killing the cancer! Clearly,
to do this is not *necessary*.
> what should be wrong with that. Maybe you are confusing two things:
> (a) choosing a lifestyle/ideology for oneself, vs.
> (b) forcing a lifestyle/ideology onto others.
>
> > Gandhi is one good exmple here: As a
> > lawyer, he had the freedom to live rich or
> > poor or whatever. He *chose* "voluntary simplicity":
> > and he also chose it for his family, who
> > *did not* like it.
>
> If the other family members didn't like it, then it wasn't _voluntary_
> simplicity (for them) -- so how can this be an argument against voluntary
> simplicity ?
That is *precisely* my point: The verb "to volunteer" is often
used in a surreptitiously transitive way: "I volunteer you to [do
whatever I want you to do]!"
If anyone wishes to live without any dependence on unsimple
things, I think they should have the right to do so.
If we could get the population under control, maybe we
could move all the people and industrial infrastructure
off Australia, and let simple livers colonize it????
>
> > In the "simple life" -- the world of the
> > peasants who lynched Martin Guerre,
> > and whose besotted bodies litter
> > Breughel's paintings (my
> > prejudices are showing, n'est pas?) --
> > there is no "high culture",
> > no rigorous science
>
> Aren't you confusing "simple life" with "simple minds" ? Or in other words:
> Confusing material simplicity with mental simplicity ?
A non-trivial question is what level of material base is required
to permit the development of a particular level of superstructure
(a.k.a. "culture").
> I think the goal of
> most "simple lifers" is the former, and quite the contrary of the latter:
> The goal is to get rid of all that mindless material consumerism, in order
> to have more time and "muse" to *think* and to grow in a non-material way.
I am opposed to "mindless material consumption" -- actually, I am
opposed to *all* mindlessness, including that of the so-called "natural
world". The aim of technology (in my opinion) should be to
transform to the greatest extent possible all that which
merely happens to exist, into caring responsiveness to each
person's (and, insofar as they participate in awareness, each
animal's, ghosts's, diety's, etc.) hopes and needs.
But what about
the mindful connoisseurship of such material things as a Matisse
painting
(not made with a charred stick applied to a cave wall), La Tache wine
(not the result of simple peasant grape growing), a Louis Kahn
building (which is not "vernacular architecture"), etc. --> Heck? Let's
start with the eyeglasses I may need to see anything at all, the
hearing aid I may need to hear anything at all, or the antibiotics
and vaccines without which I would either be already dead or perhaps
crippled???? (Nietzsche was wrong: What doesn't kill me may irreparably
impair the quality of my life.)
>
> > We know that some of the simple livers
> > believe that of all the
> > species on earth, it is OK for lions to eat
> > gazelles, and for orcas to eat
> > penguins, etc. --> but it is not
> > OK for humans to -- exist.
>
> Have you personally met such a person, or is this a prejudice from the NYT ?
I've known a couple fairly militant vegetarians (with rich
parents...). But, yes, I admit to
having read a lot more in such unsimple things as The New York Times.
> (or are you just confusing "the right to exist" with "the right to overconsume
> and to trash the planet, i.e. to deny other creatures the right to exist" ?)
Reasoned human *selfishness* clearly -- given our current
knowledge -- mandates that we treat many lower life forms (lower
in terms of their level of apparent self-reflection, a.k.a.
"Cartesianism") and inanimate resouces of planet
earth with much and technologically sophisticated
care, because our ability to live and, a fortiori, to live well,
is dependent on them (e.g., we need trees to turn carbon dioxide into
oxygen). But what level of "right to exist" should I grant
to a mole on my chest which is bleeding and pieces breaking off of it?
(This is not from the NYT, but from my lived childhood -- since I am now
52 years old, obviously a physician successfully killed that
bit of life.)
[snip]
>
> Greetings,
> Chris
>
Greetings to you, too! P.S.: Is the computer you use to
engage in this discourse part of the simple life?-:)
\brad mccormick
--
Prove all things; hold fast that which is good. (1 Thes 5:21)
Brad McCormick, Ed.D. / [EMAIL PROTECTED]
914.238.0788 / 27 Poillon Rd, Chappaqua, NY 10514-3403 USA
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