Award for Kindness

[Brant Gaede]

Speer was very smart. He played his captors like a violin. He played the readers of his book the same way. I'm sorry to say that included someone I admire very much who went ga ga over it. (Don't ask me if it was so and so or so and so; I won't answer.) Hitler played him and he played Hitler. Hitler had a grossly distorted integrity. Speer had none and was less than Hitler. The Speers of Germany made Hitler possible--that is WWII and the Holocaust. Evil is evil is small potatoes. Sanctioning evil is everything else--the true evil. The evil that made evil work. Ayn Rand got that right--in spades. That was the heart of her magnificent integrity. However else she messed up was not that important except to those directly affected.

"Capitalists" have no morality unless constrained by law or religion. There were conservatives who supported Ayn Rand intellectually and politically between The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged. After her magnum opus they were gone. I suspect that many of them went to church on Sunday. "Capitalists" have yet to be constained by Objectivism with only a few known exceptions. They make both Zykron B and defraud investors at will. Some go to jail. Some who go to jail are innocent and the people who send them to jail are not. GM and Ford begging for government bailouts. No capitalists there. Just "capitalists."

--Brant

[BaalChatzaf]

One could make the case that Speer was not better than the rest of the Nazi hierarchy, but worse. The demented Hess, the drug-addicted Goering, the sadistic Himmler-- these men had neither the intelligence nor the talent of Speer. It was

Yup. Speer -knew- better. On the guilt scale I would put Speer higher than Hitler. It is the Speers of the world that make the Hitlers of the world possible. Hitler was a crazy evil bastard, and Speer was one of his enablers.

There was another one like Speer, the famous Werner von Braun. Von Braun knew better but he had his technological ambitions and delusions to lead him astray. Like Speer, von Braun knew in detail how many people were worked to death at the Dora Camp, building his god damned rocket ships. Unlike Speer, von Braun never served a day in jail. Do you know why? Because our "Speers" had some uses for him.

Ayn Rand had these types dead on right. Her Robert Stadler character caught them exactly.

Ba'al Chatzaf

I aim for the stars, but sometimes I hit London and Antwerp --- W. v. Braun

[Chris Grieb]

Baal; Isn't your quote really from Tom Lahr's song about Von Braun.

[BaalChatzaf]

Baal; Isn't your quote really from Tom Lahr's song about Von Braun.

Yeah. But I like to pin that tail on von Braun's ass. The line was from one of Mort Sahl's comedy schticks.

Von Braun's early ambition was to lead an expedition to the Moon.

But he never got farther than Huntsville.

Ba'al Chafatz

[Chris Grieb]

I suspect that Von Braun died just before things got hot for. I am remembering that one of his associates had to give up his American citizenship when some of his activities from '39-45 were discovered.

On another note can you still find Tom Lahr Cd's?

Edited October 4, 2008 by Chris Grieb

[Dragonfly]

He, an intelligent, educated man, did not protest the growth of the secret police and its reign of terror, he did not object to the Nuremberg laws; he walked non-judgmentally past the broken panes of Jewish shops and the broken bodies of Jewish men during Kristallnacht; he stood supportively beside Hitler as Hitler launched his wars against defenseless European countries; later, he willingly used concentration camp prisoners as slave labor in the factories he controlled.

I think it's too easy to make such absolute judgements with our perfect hindsight. Would we have behaved differently if we'd been in a similar situation under those circumstances? It's of course easy to forcefully assert that we would never have behaved like that, but I'm a bit skeptical about that. I found the stories my mother told me about the years she spent in a Japanese POW camp (not exactly a holiday resort) during the 2nd World War enlightening in that respect. It's easy to be a hero in words or on paper, but reality may be sometimes a bit different.

[Dragonfly]

Ayn Rand had these types dead on right. Her Robert Stadler character caught them exactly.

I've never understood what was so wrong with Robert Stadler. His greatest sin seems to have been that he accepted government money for his research. Well, without government money there wouldn't be a large hadron collider. Without government money there would never have been an Apollo program, about which Rand was so lyrical. Sure, in her article Apollo 11 she briefly pays lip service to her own principles: Is it proper for the government to engage in space projects? No, it is not - except insofar as space projects involve military aspects, in which case, and to that extent, it is not merely proper, but mandatory. Scientific research as such, however, is not the proper province of government". But that is presented as a mere detail, not as some evil principle that would invalidate the whole enterprise. She then continues to sing the praises of all the people who made that project possible. That would also imply Wernher von Braun who was one of the great motors behind the American space program.

It's easy to be principled in novels and in theory, but reality is sometimes a bit more stubborn.

[Barbara Branden]

Dragonfly: "I think it's too easy to make such absolute judgements with our perfect hindsight. Would we have behaved differently if we'd been in a similar situation under those circumstances? It's of course easy to forcefully assert that we would never have behaved like that, but I'm a bit skeptical about that. I found the stories my mother told me about the years she spent in a Japanese POW camp (not exactly a holiday resort) during the 2nd World War enlightening in that respect. It's easy to be a hero in words or on paper, but reality may be sometimes a bit different."

Are you then saying -- you seem to be-- that there are no heroes in reality, that we are all Albert Speers? Reality flatly contradicts this view -- as witness all those men and women, even during the worst horrors of the Nazi regime-- who daily risked their lives to defy the regime, through acts of sabotage, through hiding Jews, through working for the underground, etc. Yes, they were a small minority, but they are fully as real as those who capitulated without a murmur.

Barbara

[Dragonfly]

Are you then saying -- you seem to be-- that there are no heroes in reality, that we are all Albert Speers?

No, that's not what I'm saying. There are heroes in reality and they deserve our praise.

Yes, they were a small minority, but they are fully as real as those who capitulated without a murmur.

And that's the point: they were a small minority. Do we belong to that minority? I think that's hard to say as long as we aren't put to the test. Therefore I think we should be a bit careful when we condemn people for their behavior in such difficult circumstances. It's easy to say that we'd do better, but words are cheap.

[BaalChatzaf]

Ayn Rand had these types dead on right. Her Robert Stadler character caught them exactly.

I've never understood what was so wrong with Robert Stadler. His greatest sin seems to have been that he accepted government money for his research. Well, without government money there wouldn't be a large hadron collider. Without government money there would never have been an Apollo program, about which Rand was so lyrical. Sure, in her article Apollo 11 she briefly pays lip service to her own principles: Is it proper for the government to engage in space projects? No, it is not - except insofar as space projects involve military aspects, in which case, and to that extent, it is not merely proper, but mandatory. Scientific research as such, however, is not the proper province of government". But that is presented as a mere detail, not as some evil principle that would invalidate the whole enterprise. She then continues to sing the praises of all the people who made that project possible. That would also imply Wernher von Braun who was one of the great motors behind the American space program.

It's easy to be principled in novels and in theory, but reality is sometimes a bit more stubborn.

Stadler (the novel character) was like Speer (in reality). At just about every juncture the two sold a bit more their souls to The Devil. Each rationalized his lack of integrity. What makes the Stadler/Speer types particularly obnoxious is that they -knew better- and still made the wrong choices. They are examples of rational people Gone Wrong. Rationality is no guarantee of goodness.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[Brant Gaede]

Are you then saying -- you seem to be-- that there are no heroes in reality, that we are all Albert Speers?

No, that's not what I'm saying. There are heroes in reality and they deserve our praise.

Yes, they were a small minority, but they are fully as real as those who capitulated without a murmur.

And that's the point: they were a small minority. Do we belong to that minority? I think that's hard to say as long as we aren't put to the test. Therefore I think we should be a bit careful when we condemn people for their behavior in such difficult circumstances. It's easy to say that we'd do better, but words are cheap.

What tests do you think we haven't been put to, DF? I'm 64 years old. If words are cheap, what value should we give to yours? Generally, in reality, the younger you are the cheaper your words because the young have to substitute imagination for experience. But then, should we really call their words "cheap"? That's their only coin paying their fare and paving their way to possible heroism. They imagine what they'd do, then (some of them) do end up doing it. Walter Mitty is completely under-rated and denigrated. "Words are cheap" are cheap words used to keep Walter bottled up inside his head with his you-know-what cut off.

"Words are cheap" is a logical fallacy. It's a way of saying everything is refuted both because of and by words. It's splitting the mind from reality. "Words are cheap" is like saying "human life is futile." Give up. We don't tell Chimps "words are cheap." Or our dogs. So why tell people? Words are precious. Words are diamonds.

--Brant

[Barbara Branden]

Dragonfly: "Therefore I think we should be a bit careful when we condemn people for their behavior in such difficult circumstances. It's easy to say that we'd do better, but words are cheap."

I can say with certainty that if, in a difficult situation, I had behaved as badly as Speer, I would condemn myself for it. Wouldn't you? Should we not then have the right to denounce Speer? Does difficulty justify anything? Even Speer condemned himself, if not as fully as he deserved; he knew damn well he oould and should have behaved differently.

I just saw Brant's last post, and I liked his statement:"What tests do you think we haven't been put to?" So I'll say what I've hesitated to say: I would not have behaved as Speer did. And I have the evidence of a lifetime with which to back up that statement.

Barbara

[Robert Campbell]

Chris G,

Tom Lehrer's albums are all available on CD. Pretty impressive, considering how long it's been since he made the last one:

http://www.amazon.com/That-Was-Year/dp/B00...7794&sr=1-2

Robert C

"'I just send zem up

Who cares vere zey come down?

Dat's not my department,'

Says Wernher von Braun"

[BaalChatzaf]

"Words are cheap" is a logical fallacy. It's a way of saying everything is refuted both because of and by words. It's splitting the mind from reality. "Words are cheap" is like saying "human life is futile." Give up. We don't tell Chimps "words are cheap." Or our dogs. So why tell people? Words are precious. Words are diamonds.

--Brant

Words, (fraudulent words) are also vapor-ware.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[Chris Grieb]

Chris G,

Tom Lehrer's albums are all available on CD. Pretty impressive, considering how long it's been since he made the last one:

http://www.amazon.com/That-Was-Year/dp/B00...7794&sr=1-2

Robert C

"'I just send zem up

Who cares vere zey come down?

Dat's not my department,'

Says Wernher von Braun"

Is he still alive? Is he still teaching?

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Barbara,

I speak from my own experience.

The mark of an immoral man in a situation like that of Speer is not that he got himself into a privileged situation in a rotten structure. That can happen to anyone who is young and ambitious. It is the fact that he did not change anything fundamental (either about himself or about the situation) once he was in it. On the contrary, he worked very hard at making the rotten structure work and preserve its rottenness, while basking in the benefits, knowing full well they came from the rottenness.

In short, he sold out.

I fully agree with your position. Even looking back at my own twisted path in life, I am proud to say that I, too, would not have behaved as Speer did. The critical decisions I have made in life are proof enough of that.

If Objectivism means anything, it means not selling out. It actually means a bit more than not selling out. It means choosing with full awareness to not sell out.

Michael

[BaalChatzaf]

Is he still alive? Is he still teaching?

Yes. He was born in April of 1928. At age 80 he is not likely to be teaching. He made more of a career in show biz than in mathematics (where he got his doctorate).

Who made me the genius I am today,

The man they most often quote,

greatest mathematician to live

to ever get chalk on his coat --- From Lobachevsky by T. Leher.

I grew up in the chalk board age so I think this is hilarious.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[Paul Mawdsley]

Are you then saying -- you seem to be-- that there are no heroes in reality, that we are all Albert Speers?

No, that's not what I'm saying. There are heroes in reality and they deserve our praise.

Yes, they were a small minority, but they are fully as real as those who capitulated without a murmur.

And that's the point: they were a small minority. Do we belong to that minority? I think that's hard to say as long as we aren't put to the test. Therefore I think we should be a bit careful when we condemn people for their behavior in such difficult circumstances. It's easy to say that we'd do better, but words are cheap.

What tests do you think we haven't been put to, DF? I'm 64 years old. If words are cheap, what value should we give to yours? Generally, in reality, the younger you are the cheaper your words because the young have to substitute imagination for experience. But then, should we really call their words "cheap"? That's their only coin paying their fare and paving their way to possible heroism. They imagine what they'd do, then (some of them) do end up doing it. Walter Mitty is completely under-rated and denigrated. "Words are cheap" are cheap words used to keep Walter bottled up inside his head with his you-know-what cut off.

"Words are cheap" is a logical fallacy. It's a way of saying everything is refuted both because of and by words. It's splitting the mind from reality. "Words are cheap" is like saying "human life is futile." Give up. We don't tell Chimps "words are cheap." Or our dogs. So why tell people? Words are precious. Words are diamonds.

--Brant

Brant, great post! Words are precious!

The only thing is, I think you are talking at crossed meanings to DF. When we don't find a common context for our words their value becomes that of Monopoly money. Or more precisely, the value of words is lost because there are two different currencies with no way to establish an exchange rate.

There are many ways in which words are cheap. When words are used for lies, deception and fraud, they are cheap. When words are used for rationalization of our wishes, they are cheap. When words are used as absolute pronouncements about realities we cannot fully imagine, they are cheap.

Given the context of everything I know, I would not behave as Speers did in any reality I can imagine. At least I wouldn't have been able to maintain it and grow into it. This is a fact. To say I would never have behaved as Speers did is pure speculation. It is fantasy posing as fact. Words used to express fantasy in the guise of fact are cheap. I think this is what DF was meaning and I don't think you would disagree.

Words are currency and rotten words drive out good ones, just as rotten money drives out good. A reputation of integrity is necessary for any currency to have value. When words don't express our meaning with some standard of good precision, they lose value. When words do not have the same meaning, when they are not used from a common subjective context, they lose meaning. Your exchange with DF is based on misinterpretation. Intended meanings were not exchanged. In this context your words were cheap. In a more general context your post was excellent.

And people keep telling me I don't know the meaning of my words! B)

Paul

PS-- There are other posts from earlier in this thread that I want to respond to (especially from Barbara and Mindy) but what I want to say requires a little creativity and I don't have the time to be creative on OL right now. I'm involved in a project that's taking all of my resources: time, attention, creativity, etc. It will be temporary.

(Edit for typos)

Edited October 5, 2008 by Paul Mawdsley

[BaalChatzaf]

Are you then saying -- you seem to be-- that there are no heroes in reality, that we are all Albert Speers? Reality flatly contradicts this view -- as witness all those men and women, even during the worst horrors of the Nazi regime-- who daily risked their lives to defy the regime, through acts of sabotage, through hiding Jews, through working for the underground, etc. Yes, they were a small minority, but they are fully as real as those who capitulated without a murmur.

Barbara

I have a rule of thumb (so take it for what it is worth). Mankind is divided into three categories:

1. Unconditional saints -- those who will do the right thing regardless of the circumstances in which they find themselves.

2. Unconditionally Wicked and Evil Folk -- Those who will invariably behave in evil and destructive ways because they are Bad Clean Through. Their wickedness comes from within and not because of circumstances.

3 The Rest of Us -- Folks who, when not provoked by fear or undue social and economic pressure will tend to be decent. However when the press is on, some of these folks will cave into the pressures (and lies) and do things they wish they hadn't done or wish the didn't "have to do". The fact is we don't "have to do" anything except eventually die.

Most of us, we who live in Group 3 can be perverted by circumstance. Some will cave in easily, some will hold out for a moral principle longer, but all of the Group 3 folk have a limit to their basic goodness and decency. For those of us in Group 3, we can only hope and pray we can avoid the circumstances which will turn us in to Sons (or Daughters) of Bitches.

I reckon the proportions are something like 5 - 90 - 5 going from 1 to 3.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[Brant Gaede]

Given the context of everything I know, I would not behave as Speers did in any reality I can imagine. At least I wouldn't have been able to maintain it and grow into it. This is a fact. To say I would never have behaved as Speersdid is pure speculation. It is fantasy posing as fact. Words used to express fantasy in the guise of fact are cheap. I think this is what DF was meaning and I don't think you would disagree.

Paul,

When I said I wouldn't have acted as Speer (edit: thx DF) did it was mostly out of how I have always basically related to other people which is with much more empathy than your typical or average male in my experience. If I had been a German architect in the 1930s Hitler would have hated my designs. Have you ever seen Speer's inhumanely monumental excrescences? Now in the context of such a person as myself growing up in that German culture as a young man I might have been seduced by Hitler into being part of his inner circle, but there would have been problems: my Jewish friends. I can go on and on with this type of exposition. Did Speer write about his Jewish friends? The ones he turned his back on? If he had none obviously he would have had no problem with that. You see, it's a matter of basic psychology, not the heroic application of philosophical ethical principles. I can't see Speer and people like him as anything but sociopaths. Remember the movie about running a factory with slave Jewish labor? Speer wasn't the only one. Note the difference in psychology. But between Schlinder and Speer were thousands of typical businessmen and industrialists making the German war machine go, many making use of slave labor. The real question is not whether I'd have been a Speer--just impossible--but how I as a German would have comported myself in the 20s, 30s and 40s. No way to know. The grip of circumstances and culture is powerful. Culture can power bad people to do good things too. In the U.S. my anti-Semitic Father, working for a major travel agency in NYC, prepared phony documents that enabled a German Jewish family get out of Germany. (They went to Vladivostok and then to Shanghai where they presumably spent the war interred by the Japanese along with other Jewish refugees. A boy named Blumenthal who became U.S. Secretary of the Treasury spent the war in Shanghai.) If a man is at his best morally a dollar, that was no more than a nickel, though obviously even a penny might save somebody's life. My Father did nothing heroic and if you analyze this story in more detail in a way it speaks less well of him. For instance, he was told to prepare the documents. He instigated nothing. Not being a sociopath in a way makes one more morally accountable for it seems sociopathy is hard-wired in.

This just scratches the surface of how the sanctioning of Hitler was the gasoline that made the Nazis go. The real and uncomfortable question is how we as Americans are sanctioning what is wrong right here at home now.

--Brant

Edited October 5, 2008 by Brant Gaede

[Paul Mawdsley]

Words used to express fantasy in the guise of fact are cheap.

This is the root of so many evils. Hitler's power was based on this root of cheap words expressing fantasy in the guise of facts. His cheap words were not taken to task clearly enough to expose their cheapness and evil. If the underlying meaning of his words were exposed for all to see, people would have stopped him. People were seduced by their ego inflating, self-glorifying misinterpretations of reality which were captured in words.

Paul

[Dragonfly]

Dragonfly: "Therefore I think we should be a bit careful when we condemn people for their behavior in such difficult circumstances. It's easy to say that we'd do better, but words are cheap."

I can say with certainty that if, in a difficult situation, I had behaved as badly as Speer, I would condemn myself for it. Wouldn't you? Should we not then have the right to denounce Speer? Does difficulty justify anything? Even Speer condemned himself, if not as fully as he deserved; he knew damn well he oould and should have behaved differently.

I didn't say that we should not condemn him, but that we should be a bit careful in condemning people in such circumstances. It's easy to fall into a black and white pattern: us (moral/heroes/Űbermenschen) vs. them (immoral/villains/Untermenschen), leading to the notion that the majority of the population in a dictatorship must be inherently bad and that it's morally admissible to kill them indiscriminately (as some Objectivists in fact propose).

I just saw Brant's last post, and I liked his statement:"What tests do you think we haven't been put to?" So I'll say what I've hesitated to say: I would not have behaved as Speer did. And I have the evidence of a lifetime with which to back up that statement.

I only can say that I am myself not so sure. I've had to make difficult decisions in my lifetime and I think I don't have to be ashamed of my choices, but I've never been in a situation which even remotely may be compared to living in Nazi Germany. My middle name is Skeptic.

[Dragonfly]

There are many ways in which words are cheap. When words are used for lies, deception and fraud, they are cheap. When words are used for rationalization of our wishes, they are cheap. When words are used as absolute pronouncements about realities we cannot fully imagine, they are cheap.

Thanks Paul, at least someone who can read. When I reread what I wrote, I can only conclude that the context in which I said that was clear enough. I was wondering whether I wasn't wasting my time by posting on this forum, as I'm getting tired of spelling out the obvious everytime.

Given the context of everything I know, I would not behave as Speers did in any reality I can imagine. At least I wouldn't have been able to maintain it and grow into it. This is a fact. To say I would never have behaved as Speers did is pure speculation. It is fantasy posing as fact. Words used to express fantasy in the guise of fact are cheap. I think this is what DF was meaning and I don't think you would disagree.

One point: it is not Speers, but Speer.

(Edit for typos)

You didn't get them all...

[Brant Gaede]

Thanks Paul, at least someone who can read. When I reread what I wrote, I can only conclude that the context in which I said that was clear enough. I was wondering whether I wasn't wasting my time by posting on this forum, as I'm getting tired of spelling out the obvious everytime.

Well DF, sometimes persistence causes the payoff, not a simple factual statement open to interpretation or a one-time statement of a logical proposition. In this case the context simply had to be deepened and expanded. Rowing a boat ashore means you keep rowing, not give a few tugs and wonder why you aren't there yet.

--Brant

[Paul Mawdsley]

Thanks Paul, at least someone who can read. When I reread what I wrote, I can only conclude that the context in which I said that was clear enough. I was wondering whether I wasn't wasting my time by posting on this forum, as I'm getting tired of spelling out the obvious everytime.

I too have been frustrated by this problem. I think we all are. We try to present an idea that is clear in our own minds only to have it radically misinterpreted because others are applying a different subjective framework in their interpretations. The ideas become invisible and everything becomes a matter of arguing over definitions, meanings and which position is right.

I don't think the disagreeableness is intentional, at least not in most cases. I actually believe that all the people I choose to interact with here have good intentions and a desire to understand. It's just that paradoxical lenses produce contradictory conclusions. If we can't step back from the particular lens we are using to process the information, all we see is an adversarial position. We don't come to see that each person's larger perspective is usually in agreement at a deeper level of understanding.

I tend to look through a lens of what is possible or potential within the context of what is actual. Since I have a basic sense that existence is good, I tend toward optimistic realism. I think we are starting to close in on a fundamental human problem here. No matter how frustrating this is, it is not a waste of time. Clarity and precision of communication is fundamental to so much in life. When you don't have it, it stops the flow of information and causes the breakdown of relationships that otherwise are based in goodwill. Personally, I think the ability to be able to shift perspectives is of vital importance. The ability to stand back and generate a perspective of perspective, that separates one's ego from any particular position so all sides can be evaluated without bias, is key to solving these issues.

Hopefully, the good people here on OL can work through these issues. It would be a major breakthrough.

One point: it is not Speers, but Speer.

Correction noted. Thanks.

(Edit for typos)

You didn't get them all...