[FRIAM] "All [persons] are created equal"

Fri Aug 27 15:45:54 EDT 2021

During WW2, while my father was serving in the Pacific, my mother and I
lived with her parents in a little village in the mountains of rural New
Mexico.  We lived in a two bedroom house with running water but no
bathroom.  Heat was provided by a wood burning stove that was used for
cooking as well.  There was a battery powered console radio.  I was between
4 months and 30 months old.  I was bathed in a galvanized washtub and I
remember that.  We had no shortage of food nor clothing.  My grandfather
worked for the Santa Fe Railroad as a section foreman and had a secure
salary.  I remember being happy but, for the most part, I was oblivious.  A
kid that age isn't happy if the adults, particularly his mother, aren't
happy.  After my mother and I moved away from there after the War we
visited often until I was five.  I remember my grandparents enjoying life
for the most part.

To live like that today would require me to give up almost everything I
have.  But I feel nostalgic for that time and fond of those memories.

---
Frank C. Wimberly
140 Calle Ojo Feliz,
Santa Fe, NM 87505

505 670-9918
Santa Fe, NM

On Fri, Aug 27, 2021, 1:23 PM <thompnickson2 at gmail.com> wrote:

> So, of the privileges you enjoy and list, how many would have to go away
> before you life would be no longer “decent”?
>
>
>
> To be honest, Idon’t know what I am fishing for here, but for some reason
> the answer to that question seems important to me. I guess, I am thinking
> that the notion of a decent life, like that of a essential worker, hides
> some caste implications within it.  That some of us are of a nature that
> they SHOULD be satisfied with less than would satisfy me.
>
>
>
> N
>
>
>
> Nick Thompson
>
> ThompNickSon2 at gmail.com
>
> https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/
>
>
>
> *From:* Friam <friam-bounces at redfish.com> *On Behalf Of *Pieter Steenekamp
> *Sent:* Friday, August 27, 2021 3:06 PM
> *To:* The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <
> friam at redfish.com>
> *Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] "All [persons] are created equal"
>
>
>
> Nick,
>
> Thanks for asking how I would characterize the life I'm leading. My life
> is just great, I'm satisfied with my life. My need for food, safety, love
> and self-esteem are to a large degree met. Actually, I would rate myself on
> the self-actualization level on Moslow's hierarchy.
>
> It's not about me, there are many people in South Africa who's basic
> physiological needs like food and safety are not met.
>
> Pieter
>
>
>
> On Fri, 27 Aug 2021 at 20:28, <thompnickson2 at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Pieter,
>
>
>
> If, in your ideal world, their lives are “decent, ” how would you
> characterize the life that you are leading.  The way you talk sounds a bit
> like the way we talk about “essential” workers here.
>
>
>
> N
>
>
>
> Nick Thompson
>
> ThompNickSon2 at gmail.com
>
> https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/
>
>
>
> *From:* Friam <friam-bounces at redfish.com> *On Behalf Of *Pieter Steenekamp
> *Sent:* Friday, August 27, 2021 1:49 PM
> *To:* The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <
> friam at redfish.com>
> *Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] "All [persons] are created equal"
>
>
>
> Dave wrote  *Why this obsession with "equality?"*
>
>
>
> I totally agree. But in South Africa we have a large portion of the
> population that do not have food on the table every day and I simply don't
> think it's right.
>
> So, my view is that instead of obsessing with "equality", we should obsess
> that those on the bottom of the economic ladder should at least have decent
> lives.
>
> Pieter
>
>
>
> On Fri, 27 Aug 2021 at 19:11, <thompnickson2 at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Dave,
>
>
>
> I think of mathematical abstractions as aspirations.
>
>
>
> Thanks for meeting me on my own ground, here.  You will recall that my
> original project was to try and discover what the metaphysical foundations
> might be for my  strong negative  response to the idea that castes are
> tolerable.  What MUST I assume in order to think as I do.   I have for many
> years suspected that the fundamental difference between comfortable BHL’s
> like me and comfortable conservatives is that we liberals see our comfort
> as arising from good luck, and they see their comfort as arising from their
> merit.   Now, all metaphysics is non-sense, except insofar as it explains
> and encourages an approach to other people that is … um …. Good.  I think
> than mine encourages me to approach people less wealthy than I,  not as
> people deserving of their fate but as people who have, in some sense, made
> me a gift.   Thus if there is kharma, it should be that the fortunate
> “should” pay for the correction of any absence of randomness that
> intergenerational transfers might inflict on the children of the poor.
>
>
>
> I lay this out in this naïve way because I thought it might provoke a
> strong (and perhaps equally naïve) reaction from Sarbajit which would make
> it immediately clear what different places we are coming from.  Sarbajit
> may not answer, in which case I am left having revealed my naivete
> metaphysics to you bozos with all the consequences that must follow.
>
>
>
> Now remember, nobody ever claimed that all [persons] are created equal.
> I think that we all will agree that all persons are created equal [ in] and
> that  they are endowed … with certain unalienable rights …” “– i.e., they
> should be equal before the law.  Our differences lie between these two
> poles.  I take the “and” seriously, and think that, above and beyond the
> legal rights implied by the “endowment” conveyed by the second clause, they
> have an obligation of humbleness and gratitude to all those what have their
> good fortune possible, and that, at the very minimum that obligation should
> be expressed in an overtly redistributive tax policy.
>
>
>
> But even if you don’t accept the further implications of severing the two
> clauses in the way that I do, the notion of equality before the law demands
> much more of the rich than they currently pay.  For instance, when J. P.
> Morgan IX runs over the faithful k-9 companion of the homeless Max Morgan
> and Max decides to sue, J.P. can pay the requested amount, including Max’s
> court costs and be done with it.  If he decides to contest, then both
> parties should pay into the court costs in proportion to their wealth and
> the lawyers should be assigned at random.
>
>
>
> To the extent that the list is laced with libertarians, I don’t expect
> much sympathy from the list for any of this.  If one thing unites
> libertarians, I would wager, it is the idea that people get what they
> deserve, or at least, that they have the right to hang on to whatever they
> get.
>
>
>
> So, Dave:  What is your naïve metaphysics?
>
>
>
> Nick
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> Nick Thompson
>
> ThompNickSon2 at gmail.com
>
> https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/
>
>
>
> *From:* Friam <friam-bounces at redfish.com> *On Behalf Of *Prof David West
> *Sent:* Friday, August 27, 2021 11:17 AM
> *To:* friam at redfish.com
> *Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] "All [persons] are created equal"
>
>
>
> 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/
> :
>
> "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> 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
>
> https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/
>
>
>
> *From:* Friam <friam-bounces at redfish.com> *On Behalf Of *Prof David West
>
> *Sent:* Thursday, August 26, 2021 10:17 PM
>
> *To:* 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 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
>
> https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/
>
>
>
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