Saturday, March 17, 2012
Saturday Reflection #73
If there were no religions, there would still be superstition. If there were no armies, there would still be war. If there were no governments, there would still be tyranny. Even if there were no people, there would still be injustice. The world cannot be fixed by taking things out of it; it can only be fixed by putting in the effort to improve.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
How would there be injustice if there were no people?
ReplyDeleteThere are other living things, you know.
DeleteJustice and injustice are human concepts having to do with the rightness and wrongness of things, and conformity or not to what is just and moral. Non-human animals have no such concept or moral sense. Therefore there would be no injustice if humans went extinct. There would of course still be pain or perhaps even real suffering among other animal species, but that's not the same thing.
DeleteIf you say so. I guess you never saw a cat just play with a mouse, kill it, and not eat it.
DeleteCalling something a "human concept" just means humans gave it a name, not that it only applies when people are around.
I think I agree with Nick on this one. Cats fuck with mice, it's just the way it is. If house cats were bigger, dogs would be the mice. Even bigger, you and I might be fair play. Cats are bastards !
DeleteCats are bastards. But even without humans or cats, there would still be injustice in the world (if only because no world without cats could be just).
DeleteNature is cruel. Survival is a brutal thing.
DeleteWhen the universe achieves maximum thermodynamic entropy and we all freeze to death in eternal darkness, there is no injustice.
When your home star goes supernova, there is no injustice.
When the magnetosphere of your home planet dips and you get fried by cosmic radiation, there is no injustice.
When a volcano erupts and destroys a forest full of animals, there is no injustice.
When methane in the atmosphere ignites and kills almost all life on Earth, there is no injustice.
When a meteorite strikes the Earth and causes the extinction of thousands of species, there is no injustice.
When a hebrew deity floods the Earth and kills everyone except a few folks on a boat... well that is just a fish tale.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extinction_event
We can't be so anthropocentric in our view of the universe. The universe does't give a shit if all life goes extinct.
The universe doesn't care if I murder someone, but that's still injustice.
DeleteJustice is only relative the observer's ability to experience emotion based on the phenomenon being observed.
DeleteI agree, but if a person is murdered in the woods and no one is there to see it... it's still injustice. An act need not be consciously seen by anyone in order to be unjust.
DeleteAgreed, but realize that even now you're qualifying a hypothetical event through your emotional bias, because you are a human (at least I think) and that's how humans view the world.
DeleteJustice isn't really about emotion. That's vengeance.
DeleteBut what is viewed by humans as either just or unjust is determined emotionally.
Delete