There are a number of contemporary philosophers / political thinkers who argue for open borders. Chris Bertram at Crooked Timber is one, and it has been the subject of a number of discussions there if you’re interested.
Rationalism has limits. Upon discovering that, society has retreated to “emotions”. Thinking emotions are a better guide than rationalism.
But them we have people like Trump that can ride bad emotions using obvious fat lies one after another.
Can we go back to rationalism? emotions are neither good or bad. Sometimes emotions can be correct, but also can flow in the other direction and make huge mistakes. With all his flaws, rationalism is a better guide.
Lets rebuild society to one where a liar can be called liar, denounced, and have everyone ignore him from that point. Lets have a society where science and technology trump’s beliefs and sentiments. One where your feelings are less important than the facts.
“Oh scary foreign people” is a legit feeling. But is not what must guide a society, because emotions sucks.
Rationalism doesn’t give you the right answer either.
Rational thought can still take you to a lot of dark place, such as Euganics (started by Galton, cousin of Darwin, who wrote about how a group can be more accurate than an individual).
It’s not the tools you use, but your starting point.
Besides Rational thought is irrational. We are emotional creatures with the ability to override emotional responses. We are the Rising Ape, not the Fallen Angel.
Nice formulation, is it yours?
Okay, you have to be joking. Did I paraphrase that incorrectly, or is it just too common these days.
I didn’t think it was something deep, just a point of view.
This. What you say. Is what the people that is against rationalism uses to avoid it.
It may be at the center of the problems we have.
The pendulum have swim too much in the direction of emotions. With emotions we are only animals, subject to fear, angst, and other feelings. We are powerless. With rationalism we can decide to act on feelings,… or ignore these feelings.
Rationalism is something we can share, and we can form agreements. We can also build technology and science, on rationalism. But on emotions we can only find disagreements, and is normal for a person to feel one thing, and the next to feel the opposite.
Rationalism is not perfect, but is the best tool we have, and much better than emotions.
So, you’re saying we need a Cygnus.
Prog-rock references aside, I almost always agree with the argument that we’re better off with a balance instead of extremes. It certainly seems to apply here.
No I really liked it!
Thank you. You know what they say. Good writers borrow, great writers steal.
It was one of the many quotes I first heard about reading books by Terry Pratchett, and I am sure it predates him.
But Terry Prachett has the benefit of being funny.
LOL this operation will most certainly be “scaled back” over the coming weeks to nothing.
Operation 300 Million Dollars Worth of Tent Makers.
All we need is a snarky tweet pointing out that Jared Kushner owns a majority share in a tent company.
Completely false dichotomy. Rationalism isn’t the opposite of emotionalism. Rational just means sensibly assessing the context for all factors to determine the actions that will lead to desired outcomes. Note that “factors” and “outcomes” in that sentence can both refer to emotions.
“Send troops to the border to stop migrant caravan” is deeply irrational if the context is unarmed largely-harmless migrants and the desired outcome is to prevent them harming America.
“Send troops to the border to stop migrant caravan” is completely rational if the context is “looming elections not looking great, voters may not be sufficiently fearful to vote against their economic best interests” and the desired outcome is to create a sense of fear.
Well said.
Elections didn’t go too well for ICE, apparently:
Voters around the country put ICE on notice on Tuesday, restricting the federal agency’s law enforcement reach in several states and counties.
“People showed up yesterday because they want their local communities to revolve [around] their values, even if what happens in Washington does not for the foreseeable future,” Elizabeth Alex, the senior director of community organizing at CASA, an immigration advocacy organization, told The Appeal about elections she was tracking in Maryland.
ICE relies on the cooperation and assistance of local law enforcement officials, many of which enter into formal partnerships with the agency. One of the strongest relationships that a jurisdiction can have with ICE is a 287(g) deal, which deputizes local officers to directly investigate the status of the people they detain. As of today, ICE reports that 78 law enforcement agencies are part of 287(g) agreements. That’s a small number relative to the nation’s thousands of counties—and it is likely to drop once officials elected on Tuesday take office.
In at least three populous counties, voters elected candidates who pledged to withdraw from the 287(g) program.
Now this is a caravan I can get behind.
This would all be hilarious if it wasn’t so expensive – and these poor troops spending time in lousy conditions away from family for Thanksgiving.