Friday, August 22, 2008
Friday afternoon discussion question
From The Lessons of History
Nature smiles at the union of freedom and equality in our utopias. For freedom and equality are sworn and everlasting enemies, and when one prevails the other dies. Leave men free, and their natural inequalities will multiply almost geometrically, as in England and America in the nineteeth century under laissez-faire. To check the growth of inequality, liberty must be sacrificed, as in Russia after 1917. Even when repressed, inequality grows; only the man who is below the average in economic ability desires equality; those who are conscious of superior ability desire freedom; and in the end superior ability has its way. Utopias of equality are biologically doomed, and the best that the amiable philosopher can hope for is an approximate equality of legal justice and educational opportunity. A society in which all potential abilities are allowed to develop and function will have a survival advantage in the competition of groups. This competition becomes more severe as the destruction of distance intensifies the confrontation of states.
Do you agree, or disagree? Explain.
8 Comments:
By 
D.E. Cloutier, at
Fri Aug 22, 02:40:00 PM:
I don't care about Will Durant's opinions.
Two points:
1. Will Durant became a Socialist in 1905.
Link: http://www.willdurant.com/bio.htm
2. Will Durant, the teacher, married a young student
(about 13 years his junior). From the Will Durant Foundation:
"By the time she reached the age of 15, teacher and student had fallen in love. Realizing the potential problems that would attend such a student-teacher relationship, Durant resigned his position and spoke to Chaya’s [Ariel's original name] mother about marriage ... Chaya herself almost missed the service, as she had opted to roller skate to the locale..."
Link: http://www.willdurant.com/ariel.htm
By 
, at
Fri Aug 22, 03:34:00 PM:
One of the very best historians, probably one of the top 3 of all time. The small book he wrote called "the Lessons of History" is by far the most important book a student of history can read. But, that's just my opinion.
By , at
Fri Aug 22, 04:02:00 PM:
I agree.
In my personal experience every extraordinary person yearns for more freedom, and many of the average types want government enforced equality.
My sister saw a play once where the government forced the great dancer to wear weighted shoes so she would dance no better than the others. After reading that excerpt I want to give her a call and see if she can remember the name of the play.
By , at
Fri Aug 22, 04:22:00 PM:
Equality of Opportunity or Equality of Result?
45 minutes, 2500 words.
By SR, at
Fri Aug 22, 06:27:00 PM:
Google "Harrison Bergeron" by Kurt Vonnegut.
By , at
Fri Aug 22, 06:36:00 PM:
Will Durant had quite an academic cache' regarding his writing and the interpretation of the same. I wonder if he was writing in the current era, with the Internet and a large populist commentariat, parsing his words more stringently than perhaps his academic contemporaries of his era, whether some of his ideas might get some of the same disdain that has befallen someone like Frances Fukuyama.
He wrote with some of the same determinism as others of previous eras (19th century), and the more recent present. But not to discount the basic insight that enforced equality is not consistent with real liberty. We struggle with the same idea today.
-David
By , at
Fri Aug 22, 09:38:00 PM:
Freedom and equality can be at each end of a stretched rubber band, and in a half decent democracy the two are under tension.
If freedom is pulling away there's always the possibility that it's dragging equality along with it, ie, the relationship stays about the same.
If equality is pulling freedom back from nobility, oligarchy, elitism and tyranny, then it's likewise doing a good thing.
Basically, I'm saying that there should be a tension between the two and there are times when one or the other should prevail.. but not for too long.
JC
By , at
Sat Aug 23, 12:56:00 AM:
There are two primary mistakes here. One is placing the same emphasis on equality as freedom. Equality is important as a legal distinction at birth, then much less so as a person ages. Freedom, if by that he means self-determinisn, is a lifelong pursuit valued more than equality in those democratic institutions which matter most. Secondly, biological survival in the evolutionary sense does not operate on groups, it operates at the human individual level, along with a few kin.
