From J. S. Mill.
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My previous post sparked the following quote from John Stuart Mill’s On Liberty:
“It is a piece of idle sentimentality that truth, merely as truth, has any inherent power denied to error, of prevailing against the dungeon and the stake.”
Indeed, truth does not have any inherent power over the minds of humanity, and certainly not over the actions of the powerful.
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@JohnSF:
(Of course, that doesn’t help the poor sods sent to the dungeon or the stake in the meantime…)
Exactly.
The snarky voice in my head is saying, “my, what a cheerful topic,” while the rest of me is saying, “shut up, the grownups are talking. Go eat your froot loops and watch the tele.”
No, seriously. Steven, thanks for co-hosting this group, and John, thanks for reminding me that we’re not all crazy. In trouble, but not crazy.
Indeed. It’s the just world fallacy.
I sometimes wish George W. Bush would die. Not so much out of malice, although he did do horrible damage to the world, but because, even if only for only a few minutes, it would feel good to believe justice somehow prevails.
@gVOR08: ” it would feel good to believe justice somehow prevails.”
He’s going to die rich, respected, and surrounded by a loving family. I’m not seeing a lot of justice there.
@JohnSF:
Yes, reality has a way of catching up to BS. Perhaps the best recent dramatic portrayal of that can found in HBO’s Chernobyl series, but woe to those who think the Dark Side has no power.
@dazedandconfused:
Yep.
As I posted in another thread; a quote from my late father:
“The scales of law may tend toward justice. But you need to watch out for the sneaky Tory bugger trying to put his finger on the scales.”
Or, heard somewhere 🙂
“Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty”
@gVOR08: The arc of the moral universe may well bend toward justice, but most of us who might hold that as a long-term view are disqualified from having opinions by believing in an imaginary sky daddy and being hypocrites. As things are now, it’s pretty depressing.
