[FRIAM] "All [persons] are created equal"
Steve Smith
sasmyth at swcp.com
Fri Aug 27 11:31:10 EDT 2021
I thought Glen made a good bid for "respect" over "equality". The
aphorism "we optimize what we measure" seems apropos. Equality IS (at
best?) a roll-up measure of other things. Noting inequality (of
income, of assets, of access to opportunity, of treatment by due
process, etc.) is useful to determine how well one is doing on the
factors that *lead* to (in)equaity. Treating equality itself as the
goal (not simply a rule-of-thumb estimate of how well one is doing at
other goals) can lead to focusing on the wrong things.
On 8/27/21 9:16 AM, Prof David West wrote:
> OK, curmudgeon and misanthrope that I am, I still must ask:
>
> Why this obsession with "equality?"
>
> Outside of the abstraction of math, no one thing is equal, in any
> sense, to another, let alone all members of a set of things being
> equal to each other.
>
> Narrowing our attention to human beings. it has already been noted
> that the dimensions of potential inequality are myriad. It would be
> impossible to "equalize" all dimensions simultaneously, so pick one,
> income for example, and equalize on that dimension.
>
> To what end? What outcome would you expect to see? Why would it not be
> the case that every possible outcome would result in persistent
> "inequalities" because all the other dimensions of difference would
> swamp your 'independent variable' of income?
>
> No two human beings are created equal, let alone all "men." (sic) But
> the unfounded conviction that this must be 'true' demands the
> invention of myth to explain why it is not. And those myths are, in my
> opinion, harmful and divisive.
>
> I agree with Pieter (and probably everyone else on this list) that the
> current state of income inequality is evil and untenable. But, I would
> disagree with any means of rectifying the situation that is grounded
> in any kind of myth of individual human "equality."
>
> davew
>
>
> On Fri, Aug 27, 2021, at 1:34 AM, Pieter Steenekamp wrote:
>> If you just look at the world then "all [persons] are created equal"
>> is just nonsense. What I like to focus on is what can we as a society
>> do, and what can I personally do to move towards making all more
>> equal? It's obviously not practical to expect heaven on earth, but
>> IMO the current state of inequality is just not acceptable, but
>> that's no reason to do nothing. For now I just address the first one,
>> what can we as a society do?
>>
>> The current state of politics is to a large extent driven by ideology
>> and I would like to see a movement towards a more practical, and
>> humble approach. Like an approach based on the philosophy behind the
>> 2019 economic Nobel prize winners Banerjee, Duflo and Kremer. Their
>> approach to reduce global poverty is experiment-based, taken from
>> science.
>>
>> I quote from
>> https://www.forbes.com/sites/camilomaldonado/2019/10/14/nobel-prize-in-economics-won-by-trio-tackling-global-poverty/
>> <https://www.forbes.com/sites/camilomaldonado/2019/10/14/nobel-prize-in-economics-won-by-trio-tackling-global-poverty/>
>> :
>> "Their work, which tackles one of humanities most pressing issues, is
>> based on the idea that to battle poverty, the issues should be broken
>> down into smaller pieces and studied via small field experiments to
>> answer precise questions within the communities who are most affected."
>>
>> Another quote:
>> "Poor people are supposed to be either completely desperate or lazy
>> or entrepreneurial but people don’t – we don’t try to … understand
>> the deep root and interconnected root of poverty." - Esther Duflo
>>
>> I don't mind if anybody wants to understand the deep root and
>> interconnected root of poverty, it's just that I personally, like
>> Esther Duflo, like to focus on what to do about it.
>>
>> Pieter
>>
>> On Fri, 27 Aug 2021 at 05:07, <thompnickson2 at gmail.com
>> <mailto:thompnickson2 at gmail.com>> wrote:
>>
>> Dave,
>>
>>
>>
>> This is, of course, exactly the opposite of my creation myth in
>> which the slate is wiped clean after every generation. But it
>> would explain a belief system in which well-being was the
>> deserved reward of having lived well in a previous life.
>>
>>
>>
>> While I am here, please let me point out that “equal in law”
>> seems a rather constrained understanding “born equal”, given
>> especially that the passage goes on to add equality in law (well
>> rights, actually) as an additional endowment.
>>
>>
>>
>> “… and they are endowed by their Creator by certain rights,
>> including life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
>>
>>
>>
>> Where is John Dobson when we need him. Could somebody please
>> forward this note to him. I don’t have his email address here
>> with me.
>>
>>
>>
>> Thanks,
>>
>>
>>
>> Nick
>>
>> Nick Thompson
>>
>> ThompNickSon2 at gmail.com <mailto:ThompNickSon2 at gmail.com>
>>
>> https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/
>> <https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/>
>>
>>
>>
>> *From:* Friam <friam-bounces at redfish.com
>> <mailto:friam-bounces at redfish.com>> *On Behalf Of *Prof David West
>> *Sent:* Thursday, August 26, 2021 10:17 PM
>> *To:* friam at redfish.com <mailto:friam at redfish.com>
>> *Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] "All [persons] are created equal"
>>
>>
>>
>> Purely from my academic understanding of the subject; the Nick
>> that is, at this moment / in this incarnation, is a product of
>> karma accrued and shed over multiple instances of existence.
>> Hence, what you are now is precisely what you _deserve_ to be.
>> All persons may have been created equal some untold incarnations
>> ago and before they had any opportunity to accrete karma.
>>
>>
>>
>> davew
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On Thu, Aug 26, 2021, at 2:04 PM, thompnickson2 at gmail.com
>> <mailto:thompnickson2 at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> Sarbajit,
>>
>>
>>
>> If I understand the shape of the globe correctly, you are
>> waking up pretty soon, and I would like to pick up the
>> conversation about caste, if you don’t mind.
>>
>>
>>
>> I believe the proposition in the subject line. Given the
>> many ways that proposition can be understood as plainly
>> false, I feel that my belief in it must be defended.
>>
>>
>>
>> In what sense equal? Not in genes. Not in uterine
>> environment. . Not in early nutrition and cognitive
>> stimulation. Not in social capitol. Not in financial
>> capitol. Not in access to health care. Not in exposure to
>> future parasites. Not in almost anything that I can think
>> of. So, why is the aphorism not just nonsense.
>>
>>
>>
>> I find, that if I examine my thinking in this matter, a very
>> primitive metaphysics about the moment of an individual’s
>> creation. What follows is flagrantly silly, but here it
>> is. On my account, at the moment of birth a soul is taken
>> out of storage and assigned to a body. By “person” in the
>> aphorism, I mean the combination of a particular soul with
>> the particular body. These assignments are at random. So,
>> for good or ill, no soul deserves the body it gets. I
>> cannot claim credit for my genes, my good uterine
>> environment, my social capitol, my financial capitol, my bad
>> hip, the draft deferment it provided, my getting a phd at
>> absolute peak of demand for phd’s, my good education, even my
>> FRIAM membership. They are all consequences of that initial,
>> random assignment. Now YOU may credit me in some ways,
>> because knowing that all these advantages have been assigned
>> to me may make me useful or pleasing (or the opposite) in
>> many ways, and that may bring me the advantages of your
>> association. But è I ç do not èdeserveç those advantages.
>>
>>
>>
>> This odd metaphysics leads me to enormous gratitude for the
>> life I have been allowed to live and great sympathy for
>> rigorous taxation of the advantaged, so that so much a soul’s
>> future is not determined by that moment of assignment.
>>
>>
>>
>> I have no idea what happens to this primitive metaphysics if
>> I try to integrate it with my monism. The religious scholars
>> among you might recognize as some backass weird perversion of
>> Calvinism.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> Nick Thompson
>>
>> ThompNickSon2 at gmail.com <mailto:ThompNickSon2 at gmail.com>
>>
>> https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/
>> <https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/>
>>
>>
>>
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