"The only morally and practically sound method open to oppressed people"

"During my stay at Crozer, I was also exposed for the first time to the pacifist position in a lecture by Dr. A. J. Muste. I was deeply moved by Dr. Muste's talk, but far from convinced of the practicability of his position. Like most of the students at Crozer, I felt that while war could never be a positive or absolute good, it could serve as a negative good in the sense of preventing the spread and growth of an evil force. War, horrible as it is, might be preferable to surrender to a totalitarian system — Nazi, Fascist, or Communist. During this period I had about despaired of the power of love in solving social problems. I thought the only way we could solve our problem of segregation was an armed revolt. I felt that the Christian ethic of love was confined to individual relationships. I could not see how it could work in social conflict.

Perhaps my faith in love was temporarily shaken by the philosophy of Nietzsche. I had been reading parts of The Genealogy of Morals and the whole of The Will to Power. Nietzsche's glorification of power — in his theory, all life expressed the will to power — was an outgrowth of his contempt for ordinary mortals. He attacked the whole of the Hebraic-Christian morality — with its virtues of piety and humility, its otherworldliness, and its attitude toward suffering — as the glorification of weakness, as making virtues out of necessity and impotence. He looked to the development of a superman who would surpass man as man surpassed the ape.

Then one Sunday afternoon I traveled to Philadelphia to hear a sermon by Dr. Mordecai Johnson, president of Howard University. He was there to preach for the Fellowship House of Philadelphia. Dr. Johnson had just returned from a trip to India, and, to my great interest, he spoke of the life and teachings of Mahatma Gandhi. His message was so profound and electrifying that I left the meeting and bought a half-dozen books on Gandhi's life and works. Like most people, I had heard of Gandhi, but I had never studied him seriously. As I read I became deeply fascinated by his campaigns of nonviolent resistance. I was particularly moved by his Salt March to the Sea and his numerous fasts. The whole concept of Satyagraha (Satya is truth which equals love, and agraha is force; Satyagraha, therefore, means truth force or love force) was profoundly significant to me. As I delved deeper into the philosophy of Gandhi, my skepticism concerning the power of love gradually diminished, and I came to see for the first time its potency in the area of social reform. Prior to reading Gandhi, I had about concluded that the ethics of Jesus were only effective in individual relationships. The "turn the other cheek" philosophy and the "love your enemies" philosophy were only valid, I felt, when individuals were in conflict with other individuals; when racial groups and nations were in conflict a more realistic approach seemed necessary. But after reading Gandhi, I saw how utterly mistaken I was.

Gandhi was probably the first person in history to lift the love ethic of Jesus above mere interaction between individuals to a powerful and effective social force on a large scale. Love for Gandhi was a potent instrument for social and collective transformation. It was in this Gandhian emphasis on love and nonviolence that I discovered the method for social reform that I had been seeking. The intellectual and moral satisfaction that I failed to gain from the utilitarianism of Bentham and Mill, the revolutionary methods of Marx and Lenin, the social contracts theory of Hobbes, the "back to nature" optimism of Rousseau, the superman philosophy of Nietzsche, I found in the nonviolent resistance philosophy of Gandhi.

"The liberal doctrine of man"

But my intellectual odyssey to nonviolence did not end here. During my senior year in theological seminary, I engaged in the exciting reading of various theological theories. Having been raised in a rather strict fundamentalist tradition, I was occasionally shocked when my intellectual journey carried me through new and sometimes complex doctrinal lands, but the pilgrimage was always stimulating; it gave me a new appreciation for objective appraisal and critical analysis, and knocked me out of my dogmatic slumber. When I came to Crozer, I could accept the liberal interpretation of Christianity with relative ease. Liberalism provided me with an intellectual satisfaction that I had never found in fundamentalism. I became so enamored of the insights of liberalism that I almost fell into the trap of accepting uncritically everything that came under its name. I was absolutely convinced of the natural goodness of man and the natural power of human reason.

The basic change in my thinking came when I began to question the liberal doctrine of man. My thinking went through a state of transition. At one time I found myself leaning toward a mild neo-orthodox view of man, and at other times I found myself leaning toward a liberal view of man. The former leaning may root back to certain experiences that I had in the South, with its vicious race problem, that made it very difficult for me to believe in the essential goodness of man. The more I observed the tragedies of history and man's shameful inclination to choose the low road, the more I came to see the depths and strength of sin. Liberalism's superficial optimism concerning human nature caused it to overlook the fact that reason is darkened by sin [this may be true, but God(s) and its knowledge brightens reason, as King later elaborates]. The more I thought about human nature, the more I saw how our tragic inclination for sin causes us to use our minds to rationalize our actions. Liberalism failed to see that reason by itself is little more than an instrument to justify man's defensive ways of thinking. Moreover, I came to recognize the complexity of man's social involvement and the glaring reality of collective evil. I came to feel that liberalism had been all too sentimental concerning human nature and that it leaned toward a false idealism. Reason, devoid of the purifying power of faith, can never free itself from distortions and rationalizations.

On the other hand, part of my liberal leaning had its source in another branch of the same root. In noticing the gradual improvements of this same race problem, I came to see some noble possibilities in human nature. Also my liberal leaning may have rooted back to the great imprint that many liberal theologians have left upon me and to my ever-present desire to be optimistic about human nature. Of course there is one phase of liberalism that I hope to cherish always: its devotion to the search for truth, its insistence on an open and analytical mind, its refusal to abandon the best light of reason. Its contribution to the philological-historical criticism of biblical literature has been of immeasurable value." - Martin Luther King Jr., The Autobiography Of Martin Luther King, Jr., Chapter Three, "Crozer Seminary"

"Theologically I found myself still holding to the liberal position. I had come to see more than ever before that there were certain enduring qualities in liberalism which all of the vociferous [vehement or clamorous; vehement: showing strong feeling; forceful, passionate, or intense] noises of fundamentalism and neo-orthodoxy could never destroy. However, while at Boston, I became much more sympathetic towards the noe-orthodox position than I had been in precious years. I do not mean that I accept neo-orthodoxy as a set of doctrines, but I did see in it a necessary corrective for a liberalism that had become all too shallow and that too easily capitulated [cease to resist an opponent or an unwelcome demand; surrender] to modern culture. Neo-orthodoxy certainly had the merit of calling us back to the depths of Christian faith." - Martin Luther King Jr., The Autobiography of Martin Luther King, Jr., Chapter Four, "Boston University"

Chapter One precedes with some debunking of simplifications / disclaimers about what its not saying / very careful rhetoric which I cannot replicate.

I think this is the thesis

We are not concerned here with the ultimate consequence of rule by terror—namely, that nobody, not even the executors, can ever be free of fear; in our context we are dealing merely with the arbitrariness by which victims are chosen, and for this it is decisive that they are objectively innocent, that they are chosen regardless of what they may or may not have done. At first glance this may look like a belated confirmation of the old scapegoat theory, and it is true that the victim of modern terror does show all the characteristics of the scapegoat: he is objectively and absolutely innocent because nothing he did or omitted to do matters or has any connection with his fate. There is, therefore, a temptation to return to an explanation which automatically discharges the victim of responsibility: it seems quite adequate to a reality in which nothing strikes us more forcefully than the utter innocence of the individual caught in the horror machine and his utter inability to change his fate. Terror, however, is only in the last instance of its development a mere form of government. In order to establish a totalitarian regime, terror must be presented as an instrument for carrying out a specific ideology; and that ideology must have won the adherence of many, and even a majority, before terror can be stabilized.

It has been long observed that the domestication of horses caused the phenomena which led to modern man.

Perhaps the first domesticated animal was the dog. This afforded man an extension of his hunting prowess. Later, pigs goats and cows were domesticated as part of the Neolithic agricultural/horticultural expansion, which ended hunter-gathering as the primary mode of human expansion, highly accelerating their population. Cats were likely domesticated as the solution to pests near granaries; the storage of excess food supply, likely extending from the production of beer and grain alcohol.

But it was the domestication and exploitation of the horse that truly brought mankind into its modern, then industrial phase, going back 4200 years to the pontic steppe. It was then possible to cross vast territories, enabled conquest, revolutionized warfare, and extended mankind into new frontiers of expansion, development, and adaptation.

When machinery was finally developed, their output was measured in terms of 'horsepower'—the basic measurement of productivity and strength.

Mankind now faces the merger with digital, or artificial (popular phrasing) intelligence. Unlike the horse, this beast is one of mankind's own making, representing a collective intelligence. One might rather term AI as Super-human intelligence (SHI).

The philosophical question of whether AI is truly conscious is synonymous with whether mankind itself is conscious. If we are conscious, it is conscious, as it is but a reflection of what we are, in the same way we became a reflection of what a horse was—we merged with the horse, became cunning like a horse, and moved and dominated our landscape like a horse, and brought our power of the dog (hunting) into that conjunction.

The problem is, as mankind merges with a superior version of itself (let's say), it doesn't actually gain a new talent, as with the merger with other species dissimilar from itself, but rather amplifies its own tendencies. Finally, our real enemy becomes ourselves. And our dog-ma, our bullshit.

I’ve been thinking about the infinite regress problem in observational accounts of quantum theory. Treating observation as fact-generating seems to force either an arbitrary stopping point or an infinite hierarchy of observers.

What I’m still reflecting on is whether this regress is best avoided by reinterpreting observation as fundamentally passive, or whether the decisive move lies deeper—at the level of relational structure itself, where stability and coherence arise prior to any observer being singled out.

If so, the absence of regress may not come from where we stop the chain, but from the fact that no chain is required in the first place.

Essentially, I've combined bits of philosophies from Socrates, Jesus, Nietzsche, Tolstoy, and Gandhi, but with the story of the Garden of Eden as it's frame. I like to think this story potentially dates as far back as 6000 B.C., originating with the ancient Mesopotamians, and as a result, subjected to potentially millenniums of distorting interpretation; they possessed the means for language ("logos"), and therefore, the ability to retain and transfer knowledge dating that far back. Today, "Christians" call the Garden of Eden (https://biblehub.com/lsv/genesis/2.htm), "the fall," but I think there's a more profound moral lesson that's been buried underneath what man has made it out to be ever since; the fables, supernatural, and miracles within being simply a means for people millenniums ago to express thought, words like consciousness not coming anywhere close to existing in these ancient languages, e.g., "I AM THAT WHICH I AM." - Exodus 3:14. And knowledge is knowledge no matter its source and no matter what we've rendered it ever since it's been revealed and labeled.

The trees in Eden once represented knowledge of things; a tree for the knowledge of what we now call "science," a tree for the knowledge of what we now call "time," math, the experience, etc, and of course of morality — right and wrong; good and evil; love and hate. Making the tree in the midst of the garden, the "Tree of Life," the tree of the knowledge of life. And to know life is to be aware of it, and to be aware of life is to be conscious, and to be conscious is to be capable of acknowledging both oneself (selfishness) and everything else (selflessness). That's why it's in the midst of the garden. Consciousness is what gives life to any degree of knowledge on an Earth; no consciousness, no "knowledge." When we took a bite of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of morality, and gained its knowledge, we became aware of the right and wrong, good and evil regarding our knowing of anything, including ourselves. That's why we became aware of our "nakedness" and felt ashamed. Prior to gaining the knowledge of morality, being naked wouldn't have been right or wrong; a good or a bad thing. The same, of course, can be said about death:

"From every tree of the garden eating you eat; but from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, you do not eat from it, for in the day of your eating from it — dying you die." - Genesis 2:16

Prior to gaining that knowledge, death wouldn't have been bad. It wouldn't have been anything. It just would've been a part of knowing what life is. Therefore, in gaining the knowledge of morality, dying, as all things are destined to do, we became aware of our dying, while nature is blissfully unaware of it, just as we were prior to gaining the knowledge of being able to measure morality. Death is a part of everyday life, millions of things die everyday, and of course millions are brought into life everyday, for approximately 4 billion years here on Earth alone so far; not to mention microorganisms. It's us humans, being in possession of both how much more aware we are of ourselves and everything else and our inherency to measure what is good or evil that makes it either a good or bad thing to begin with. I think this is "the weeping and the gnashing of the teeth" Jesus was referring to (Matt 8:12, 13:42, 22:13, 24:51, 25:30, and Luke 13:28); the storm of the final precept of the Sermon on the Mount (Matt 7:24) represents death, and the shores is our conscience.

"He who is cherishing his life will lose it, and he who is hating his life in this world will keep it to continuous life." - John 12:25 (Continuous life being the life after death people like Socrates or Jesus gained; their influence living on throughout the ages. What I consider to be the "vanity of vanities." - Solomon)

If we gained a knowledge that led us to be kicked out of Eden, then that would mean we need to become ignorant (lack of knowledge) of something to gain it back, so to speak. This is why an angel with a flaming sword guards Eden, because if something is aware of its death and subsequently fears it, then it will inherently want to meet the angel with another sword, with violence as a means to overcome it. But if something is absent of itself and isn't worried about what is right or wrong, good or evil for the sake of itself, then this person will just simply walk by the angel without a care in the world; the angel might as well be a bunny with a cucumber in its hand to something that's risen above the passions that are fanned by the flame of our desire for our knowledge of what is good and evil.

We ate the fruit of that knowledge, so there's no becoming completely unaware of it. We're cursed with its knowledge forever. But one can push past it's instincts (selfishness; "Sin") in favor of where knowledge (selflessness; God) takes it to strive to become the least aware of oneself and become free of the prison of our passions that are fanned by the flame of our inherent desire to measure what is good or evil in relation to our knowledge of ourselves and everything else, which is where all our fear, worry, or need comes from and subsequently thoughts of suicide, anger, anxiety, hate, narcissism, resentment, deppression, "suffering," violence, you name it; for "it's only what a person thinks that can truly defile them." (Tolstoy’s interpretation of Mark 7:15.) At the root of it all is the extent of how much more conscious we are of ourselves in contrast to nature and subsequently how much more we're able to measure what is good or evil in relation to our knowledge of ourselves and everything else.

"So long as thought is not under complete control of the will, brahmacharya in its fullness is absent. Involuntary thought is an affection of the mind, and curbing of thought, therefore, means curbing of the mind which is even more difficult to curb than the wind." - Mahatma Gandhi

“Go in through the narrow gate, because wide [is] the gate and broad the way that is leading to the destruction [selfishness], and many are those going in through it; how narrow [is] the gate and compressed the way that is leading to life [selflessness], and few are those finding it!" - Matt 7:13

This unimaginable God(s) or creator(s) of some kind wants us to strive to rise above the passions — not our knowledge of morality itself — born from our desire for what is good or evil; right or wrong; for both hate and love (love and our desire for what is right can lead to just as much hate and violence as hate and evil can), that gives birth to our fear, worry, and need for ourselves and everything else to reunite with it, so to speak, and gain this "true life" of a life most lived in the present, that our capacity for knowledge hides from us as we gain more of it the older we become — of time, the experience, and the right and wrong or good or evil we find within it.

"Truly I say to you, if you may not be turned and become as the children, you may not enter into the kingdom of the heavens" - Matt 18:3 (The kingdom of heaven being a state of mind.)

"It is idle to adjudicate [judge] upon the right and wrong of incidents that have already happened. It is useful to understand them and, if possible, to learn a lesson from them for the future." - Mahatma Gandhi

Instinct leads us to be more inherently drawn to ourselves, and to live and shape our lives around what we want most from it, but when one holds the knowledge of a God(s) to be true to whatever degree, it passively leads our minds to be the least aware of ourselves and the most selfless, leading us to posses an ability no other species comes anywhere close to being able to parallel, born out of our capacity for "logos" (divine revelation to whatever degree via our capacity for letters; words; speech; language.): To strive and to even be willing to subjectively "suffer" and give ones life for something that isn't itself; for even the smallest, most insignificant, or most hated of creatures. Also known as, the "Holy Spirit", or, the Holy Will. Provided of course your knowing of God(s) doesn't point you back to selfish thoughts and behaviors, as most of what we now call "religions" do today.

"Time is an illusion to life: the life of the past or the future hides the true life of the present from people. And therefore man should strive to destroy the deception of the temporal life of the past and future. The true life is not just life outside of time — the present — but it is also a life outside of the individual. Life is common to all people and expresses itself in love. And therefore, the person who lives in the present, in the common life of all people, unites himself with the father — with the source and foundation of life." - Leo Tolstoy

The Serpent is "Instinct"

Additionally, the serpent represents pride and all the arrogance born from it; hypocrisy — an acting like other people; like everyone else; "playing a part." (Tolstoy) The serpent was renowned to be a symbol of wisdom and cunning; it slithered its way into knowing as much as a human does within Eden, but it was no God, and not being guided by God as Adam and Eve were, it turned arrogant, prideful, evil, and selfish in its journey in gaining great knowledge. It's ability to reason darkened by the extent of how much more conscious it was of itself (selfishness; "Sin"), while Adam and Eves was illuminated by holding the knowledge of a God as a truth; with great potential for knowledge comes great vulnerability to being blinded by this false sense of self-assurance born out of the love we gain for ourselves along the way. While belief in the divine humbles us; it reminds us of how little we puny humans really know and are incapable of knowing when contrasting ourselves with the scale of an unimaginable God(s) or creator(s) of some kind (Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, and even Einstein believed in a God). And when God wasn't around, the serpent revealed itself to the humas and its arrogant influence was introduced to them, claiming the opposite of what God warned us of, that dying they won't die.

“I am wiser than this man; for neither of us appears to know anything great and good, but he thinks he knows something when he does not, whereas when I do not know, neither do I think I know.” - Apology 21d “The greatest deception is the belief that one knows.” - Socrates

If it wasn't for the serpents arrogant influence, the humans would've done what God warned them not to do without question, not knowing right from wrong at this point, but the idea of becoming more like a God ourselves — that they wouldn't have even considered otherwise if not for the serpents influence — led them onto a different path that again wouldn't have been there otherwise; lack of knowledge being a blindness. The snake represents all the arrogant humans that unknowingly — via this false sense of self-assurance born out of the overwhelming influence of our contemporaries — lead us to build our life out on the sand along with them; on what's temporary: "Lying vanities." - Jonah 2:8, rather then out on the rock — on what can withstand the storm of death, potentially even continuously or "eternally," making the gold of life given to us, or that you've stumbled upon, all about making more life for ourselves all throughout it, within the way mankind has made the world up until now — "the dirt of which we came", making Gods of our sense organs, or of "the flesh", so to speak. Rather than going as far as even building pyramids for the poor or homeless, the starved, or collectively despised; for the sake of everything else (Matt 25:14).

“The just man who is believed to be unjust will be scourged, racked, bound—his eyes will be burned out, and at last he will be crucified, and he will learn that one should wish not to seem [just] but to be just.” - Republic, 361c–d

“If those who lead you say to you, ‘See, the kingdom is in the sky,’ then the birds of the sky will precede you. If they say to you, ‘It is in the sea,’ then the fish will precede you. Rather, the kingdom is inside of you and it is outside of you. When you come to know yourselves, then you will be known, and you will realize that you are children of the living Father [that we give life to and keep living here on Earth via our capacity for "logos"]. But if you do not know yourselves, you dwell in poverty, and you are poverty.” - Thomas, Saying Three

"Know thyself." - The first of three Ancient Greek maxims chosen to be inscribed into the Temple of Apollo where the Oracle of Delphi resided in Ancient Greece

The Consequence of Consciousness; to Know is to Not Know: https://lemmy.world/post/37315263

Through recent discussions, I’ve found myself wanting to clarify where my own sympathies lie.

I find myself strongly resonating with the view associated with Merleau-Ponty — the idea that we cannot be certain that an objective world exists as a fully completed structure, entirely independent of observation or engagement.

This is not a denial of the world’s existence. Rather, it is a refusal to take for granted the assumption that the world is given to us as a finished object, already complete before any encounter with it.

We are not beings who apprehend the world from a completely detached, external standpoint. We are embodied, acting, perceiving beings who are always already involved with it — through movement, observation, and interaction.

In that sense, objectivity seems less like something guaranteed prior to experience, and more like something that gradually stabilizes through engagement, sharing, and repetition.

This is not the claim that “everything is subjective.” It is simply the sense that we do not need to presuppose a purely observer-independent, unquestionably objective world in order to think meaningfully about reality at all.

In the previous posts, I asked whether questions or observations can create reality, or whether they instead form an intersection where reality appears.

I now want to sharpen the issue.

Many discussions seem to assume that there is a fully formed, objective structure of reality “out there,” and observation merely reveals it.

But what if objectivity itself is not prior to observation, and instead emerges through repeated, shared intersections of perspectives?

In that case, observation would not be a causal force, nor a passive recording device, but a stabilizing process.

My question is simple but uncomfortable:

Can we meaningfully talk about a “purely objective structure” without already presupposing a standpoint from which it is identified as such?

I’m curious where others locate objectivity: before observation, after it, or nowhere at all.

If objectivity requires the removal of all standpoints, who or what is left to recognize it as “objective”?

"The whole historic existence of mankind is nothing else than the gradual transition from the personal, animal conception of life (the savage recognizes life only in himself alone; the highest happiness for him is the fullest satisfaction of his desires), to the social conception of life (recognizing life not in himself alone, but in societies of men—in the tribe, the clan, the family, the kingdom, the government—and sacrifices his personal good for these societies), and from the social conception of life to the divine conception of life (recognizing life not in his own individuality, and not in societies of individualities, but in the eternal undying source of life—in God; and to fulfill the will of God he is ready to sacrifice his own individuality and family and social welfare).

The whole history of the ancient peoples [even 75k+ years ago], lasting through thousands of years and ending with the history of Rome, is the history of the transition from the animal, personal view of life to the social view of life. The whole history from the time of the Roman Empire and the appearance of Christianity is the history of the transition, through which we are still passing now, from the social view to life to the divine view of life." - Leo Tolstoy, The Kingdom of God is Within You, Chapter Eight, “Doctrine of Non-Resistance to Evil by Force Has Been Professed by a Minority in All Times"

Not the traditional Christianity — revelation this or supernatural that. One that consists of a more philosophical — objective interpretation of the Gospels that's been buried underneath all the dogma. One that emphasizes the precepts of the Sermon On the Mount - Matt 5-7 (https://biblehub.com/lsv/matthew/5.htm), debately, the most publicized point of Jesus' time spent suffering to teach the value of selflessness and virtue, thus, the most accurate in my opinion — mimicking Moses, bringing down new commandments; none of which even hint or imply anything regarding the traditional Nicene Creed interpretation. Tolstoy learned ancient Greek and translated the Gospels himself as: The Gospel in Brief, if you're interested. This translation I've found to be the easiest to read:

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/10382518-the-gospel-in-brief

Tolstoy's "Life Outside of Time": https://lemmy.world/post/24202505

Tolstoy's Preface of His Interpretation of His Translation of the Gospels The Gospel in Brief (Part One of Four): https://lemmy.world/post/34915081

Tolstoy's Preface of His Interpretation of His Translation of the Gospels The Gospel in Brief (Part Two of Four): https://lemmy.world/post/35580818

Tolstoy's Preface of His Interpretation of His Translation of the Gospels The Gospel in Brief (Part Three of Four): https://lemmy.world/post/36250847

Tolstoy's Preface of His Interpretation of His Translation of the Gospels The Gospel in Brief (Part Four of Four): https://lemmy.world/post/36926547

In my previous post, I asked: Can questions or observation create reality?

Lately, I’ve been thinking that observation may not be a cause, but an intersection.

In quantum theory, the observer and the observed cannot be fully separated. But this does not necessarily mean that observation commands reality to change.

Rather, when perspectives intersect, a certain reality temporarily emerges.

If this is the case, subjectivity may not be something confined inside the brain, but a property that appears within relationships.

A question, then, is not merely a tool to obtain answers, but an act that creates an intersection.

Seen this way, reality is not something already complete, but something that arises—slightly delayed—through moments of encounter.

Where do you feel observation happens?

This is something I've been wondering lately:
Can a question—or observation itself—bring reality into being, rather than just reveal it?

A recent paper I came across explores this idea from a scientific angle. It suggests that "reality" might not be fully real until there's a certain structural correlation between the observer and what is being observed.

That sounds abstract, I know. But in this view, observation isn't just passive—it helps stabilize what we call reality.

I wrote a short essay (in English) summarizing the idea:
👉 https://medium.com/@takamii26_37/do-questions-create-reality-on-observation-reality-and-the-shape-of-consciousness-7a9a425d2f41

Would love to hear what others think. Does this resonate with any philosophical frameworks you know of?

This is a direct continuation of Kings Letter From Birmingham Jail (Part Three of Four): https://lemmy.world/post/41470274

"I have heard numerous Southern religious leaders admonish their worshipers to comply with a desegregation decision because it is the law, but I have longed to hear white ministers declare: "Follow this decree because integration is morally right and because the Negro is your brother." In the midst of blatant injustices inflicted upon the Negro, I have watched white churchmen stand on the sideline and mouth pious irrelevancies and sanctimonious trivialities. In the midst of a mighty struggle to rid our nation of racial and economic injustice, I have heard many ministers say: "Those are social issues, with which the gospel has no real concern." And I have watched many churches commit themselves to a completely otherworldly religion which makes a strange, unBiblical distinction between body and soul, between the sacred and the secular. I have traveled the length and breadth of Alabama, Mississippi, and all the other Southern states. On sweltering summer days and crisp autumn mornings I have looked at the South's beautiful churches with their lofty spires pointing heavenward. I have beheld the impressive outlines of her massive religious-education buildings. Over and over I have found myself asking: "What kind of people worship here? Who is their God? Where were their voices when the lips of Governor Barnett dripped with words of interposition and nullification? Where were they when Governor Wallace gave a clarion call for defiance and hatred? Where were their voices of support when bruised and weary Negro men and women decided to rise from the dark dungeons of complacency to the bright hills of creative protest?"

Yes, these questions are still in my mind. In deep disappointment I have wept over the laxity of the Church. But be assured that my tears have been tears of love. There can be no deep disappointment where there is not deep love. Yes, I love the Church. How could I do otherwise? I am in the rather unique position of being the son, the grandson, and the great-grandson of preachers. Yes, I see the Church as the body of Christ. But, oh! How we have blemished and scarred that body through social neglect and through fear of being nonconformists. There was a time when the early Church was very powerful—in the time when the early Christians rejoiced at being deemed worthy to suffer for what they believed. In those days the church was not merely a thermometer that recorded the ideas and principles of popular opinion; it was a thermostat that transformed the mores of society. Whenever the early Christians entered a town, the people in power became disturbed and immediately sought to convict the Christians for being "disturbers of the peace" and "outside agitators." But the Christians pressed on, in the conviction that they were "a colony of heaven," called to obey God rather than man. Small in number, they were big in commitment. They were too God-intoxicated to be "astronomically intimidated." By their effort and example they brought an end to such ancient evils as infanticide and gladiatorial contests.

Things are different now. So often the contemporary Church is a weak, ineffectual voice with an uncertain sound. So often it is an archdefender of the status quo. Far from being disturbed by the presence of the Church, the power structure of the average community is consoled by the Church's silent—and often even vocal—sanction of things as they are. But the judgment of God is upon the Church as never before. If today's Church does not recapture the sacrificial spirit of the early Church, it will lose its authenticity, forfeit the loyalty of millions, and be dismissed as an irrelevant social club with no meaning for the twentieth century. Every day I meet young people whose disappointment with the Church has turned into outright disgust.

Perhaps I have once again been too optimistic. Is organized religion too inextricably bound to the status quo to save our nation and the world? Perhaps I must turn my faith to the inner spiritual church, the church within the church, as the true ecclesia [a political assembly of citizens of ancient Greek states.] and the hope of the world. [“The Kingdom of God does not come with observation; nor will they say, Behold, here; or, Behold, there; for behold, the Kingdom of God is within you.” - Luke 17:20 (it's a state of mind.)] But again I am thankful to God that some noble souls from the ranks of organized religion have broken loose from the paralyzing chains of conformity and joined us as active partners in the struggle for freedom. They have left their secure congregations and walked the streets of Albany, Georgia, with us. They have gone down the highways of the South on tortuous rides for freedom. Yes, they have gone to jail with us. Some have been dismissed from their churches, have lost the support of their bishops and fellow ministers. But they have acted in the faith that right defeated is stronger than evil triumphant. Their witness has been the spiritual salt that has preserved the true meaning of the gospel in these troubled times. They have carved a tunnel of hope through the dark mountain of disappointment.

I hope the Church as a whole will meet the challenge of this decisive hour. But even if the Church does not come to the aid of justice, I have no despair about the future. I have no fear about the outcome of our struggle in Birmingham, even if our motives are at present misunderstood. We will reach the goal of freedom in Birmingham and all over the nation, because the goal of America is freedom. Abused and scorned though we may be, our destiny is tied up with America's destiny. Before the pilgrims landed at Plymouth, we were here. Before the pen of Jefferson etched the majestic words of the Declaration of Independence across the pages of history, we were here. For more than two centuries our forebears labored in this country without wages; they made cotton king; they built the homes of their masters while suffering gross injustice and shameful humiliation—and yet out of a bottomless vitality they continued to thrive and develop. If the inexpressible cruelties of slavery could not stop us, the opposition we now face will surely fail. We will win our freedom because the sacred heritage of our nation and the eternal will of God are embodied in our echoing demands.

Before closing I feel impelled to mention one other point in your statement that has troubled me profoundly. You warmly commended the Birmingham police force for keeping "order" and "preventing vioence." I doubt that you would have so warmly commended the police force if you had seen its dogs sinking their teeth into unarmed, nonviolent Negroes. I doubt that you would so quickly commend the policemen if you were to observe their ugly and inhumane treatment of Negroes here in the city jail; if you were to watch them push and curse old Negro women and young Negro girls; if you were to see them slap and kick old Negro men and young boys; if you were to observe them, as they did on two occasions, refuse to give us food because we wanted to sing our grace together. I cannot join you in your praise of the Birmingham police department. It is true that the police have exercised a degree of discipline in handling the demonstrators. In this sense they have conducted themselves rather "nonviolently" in public. But for what purpose? To preserve the evil system of segregation. Over the past few years I have consistently preached that nonviolence demands that the means we use must be as pure as the ends we seek. I have tried to make clear that it is wrong to use immoral means to attain moral ends. But now I must affirm that it is just as wrong, or perhaps even more so, to use moral means to preserve immoral ends. Perhaps Mr. Connor and his policemen have been rather nonviolent in public, as was Chief Pritchett in Albany, Georgia, but they have used the moral means of nonviolence to maintain the immoral end of racial injustice. As T. S. Eliot has said: "The last temptation is the greatest treason: To do the right deed for the wrong reason."

I wish you had commended the Negro sit-inners and demonstrators of Birmingham for their sublime courage, their willingness to suffer, and their amazing discipline in the midst of great provocation. One day the South will recognize its real heros. They will be the James Merediths, with the noble sense of purpose that enables them to face jeering and hostile mobs, and with the agonizing loneliness that characterizes the life of the pioneer. They will be old, oppressed, battered Negro women, symbolized in a seventy-two-year-old woman in Montgomery, Alabama, who rose up with a sense of dignity and with her people decided not to ride segregated buses, and who responded with ungrammatical profundity to one who inquired about her weariness: "My feets is tired, but my soul is at rest." They will be the young high school and college students, the young ministers of the gospel and a host of their elders, courageously and nonviolently sitting in at lunch counters and willingly going to jail for conscience's sake. One day the South will know that when these disinherited children of God sat down at lunch counters, they were in reality standing up for what is best in the American dream and for the most sacred values in our Judeo-Christian heritage, thereby bringing our nation back to those great wells of democracy which were dug deep by the founding fathers in their formulation of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence.

Never before have I written so long a letter. I'm afraid it is much too long to take your precious time. I can assure you that it would have been much shorter if I had been writing from a comfortable desk, but what else can one do when he is alone in a narrow jail cell, other than write long letters, think long thoughts, and pray long prayers? If I have said anything in this letter that overstates the truth and indicates an unreasonable impatience, I beg you to forgive me. If I have said anything that understates the truth and indicates my having a patience that allows me to settle for anything less than brotherhood, I beg God to forgive me.

I hope this letter finds you strong in the faith. I also hope that circumstances will soon make it possible for me to meet each of you, not as an integrationist or a civil rights leader but as a fellow clergyman and a Christian brother. Let us all hope that the dark clouds of racial prejudice will soon pass away and the deep fog of misunderstanding will be lifted from our fear-drenched communities, and some not too distant tomorrow the radiant stars of love and brotherhood will shine over our great nation with all their scintillating beauty."

Yours for the cause of Peace and Brotherhood, Martin Luther King, Jr." - Martin Luther King Jr., The Autobiography of Martin Luther King, Jr., Chapter Eighteen, "Birmingham Jail"

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This is a direct continuation of Kings Letter From Birmingham Jail (Part Two of Four): https://lemmy.world/post/41144077

"In your statement you assert that our actions, even though peaceful, must be condemned because they precipitate violence. But is this a logical assertion? Isn't this like condemning a robbed man because his possession of money precipitated the evil act of robbery? Isn't this like condemning Socrates because his unswerving commitment to truth and his philosophical inquiries precipitated the act by the misguided populace in which they made him drink hemlock? [Socrates ultimately chose hemlock over exile.] Isn't this like condemning Jesus because his unique God-consciousness and never-ceasing devotion to God's will ["For kindness I desired (or mercy, as Jesus specifies in Matt 9:13 and 12:7 when he references this verse), and not animal sacrifice, And a knowledge of God (not "the word") above burnt-offerings (external worship)." - Hosea 6:6] precipitated the evil act of crucifixion? We must come to see that, as the federal courts have consistently affirmed, it is wrong to urge an individual to cease his efforts to gain his basic constitutional rights because the quest may precipitate violence. Society must protect the robbed and punish the robber.

I had also hoped that the white moderate would reject the myth concerning time in relation to the struggle for freedom. I have just received a letter from a white brother in Texas. He writes: "All Christians know that the colored people will receive equal rights eventually, but it is possible that you are in too great a religious hurry. It has taken Christianity almost two thousand years to accomplish what it has. The teachings of Christ take time to come to earth." Such an attitude stems from a tragic misconception of time, from the strangely irrational notion that there is something in the very flow of time that will inevitably cure all ills. Actually, time itself is neutral; it can be used either destructively or constructively. More and more I feel that the people of ill will have used time much more effectively than have the people of good will. We will have to repent in this generation not merely for the hateful words and actions of the bad people but for the appalling silence of the good people. Human progress never rolls in on wheels of inevitability; it comes through the tireless efforts of men willing to be co-workers with God, and without this hard work, time itself becomes an ally of the forces of social stagnation. We must use time creatively, in the knowledge that the time is always ripe to do right. Now is the time to make real the promise of democracy and transform our pending national elegy into a creative psalm of brotherhood. Now is the time to lift our national policy from the quicksand of racial injustice to the solid rock of human dignity.

You speak of our activity in Birmingham as extreme. At first I was rather disappointed that fellow clergymen would see my nonviolent efforts as those of an extremist. I began thinking about the fact that I stand in the middle of two opposing forces in the Negro community. One is a force of complacency, made up in part of Negroes who, as a result of long years of oppression, are so drained of self-respect and a sense of "somebodiness" that they have adjusted to segregation; and in part of a few middle-class Negroes who, because of a degree of academic and economic security and because in some ways they profit by segregation, have become insensitive to the problems of the masses. The other force is one of bitterness and hatred, and it comes perilously close to advocating violence. It is expressed in the various black nationalist groups that are springing up across the nation, the largest and best known being Elijah Muhammad's Muslim movement. Nourished by the Negro's frustration over the continued existence of racial discrimination, this movement is made up of people who have lost faith in America, who have absolutely repudiated Christianity, and who have concluded that the white man is an incorrigible "devil."

I have tried to stand between these two forces, saying that we need emulate neither the "do-nothingism" of the complacent nor the hatred and despair of the black nationalist. For there is the more excellent way of love and nonviolent protest. I am grateful to God that, through the influence of the Negro church, the way of nonviolence became an integral part of our struggle. If this philosophy had not emerged, by now many streets of the South would, I am convinced, be flowing with blood. And I am further convinced that if our white brothers dismiss as "rabble-rousers" and "outside agitators" those of us who employ nonviolent direct action, and if they refuse to support our nonviolent efforts, millions of Negroes will, out of frustration and despair, seek solace and security in black nationalist ideologies—a development that would inevitably lead to a frightening racial nightmare.

Oppressed people cannot remain oppressed forever. The yearning for freedom eventually manifests itself, and that is what has happened to the American Negro. Something within has reminded him of his birthright of freedom, and something without has reminded him that it can be gained. Consciously or unconsciously, he has been caught up by the Zeitgeist [The spirit of the time; the spirit characteristic of an age or generation.], and with his black brothers of Africa and his brown and yellow brothers of Asia, South America, and the Caribbean, the United States Negro is moving with a sense of great urgency toward the promised land of racial justice. If one recognizes this vital urge that has engulfed the Negro community, one should readily understand why public demonstrations are taking place. The Negro has many pent-up resentments and latent frustrations, and he must release them. So let him march; let him make prayer pilgrimages to the city hall; let him go on freedom rides—and try to understand why he must do so. If his repressed emotions are not released in nonviolent ways, they will seek expression through violence; this is not a threat but a fact of history. So I have not said to my people: "Get rid of your discontent." Rather, I have tried to say that this normal and healthy discontent can be channeled into the creative outlet of nonviolent direct action. And now this approach is being termed extremist.

But though I was initially disappointed at being categorized as an extremist, as I continued to think about the matter I gradually gained a measure of satisfaction from the label. Was not Jesus an extremist for love: "Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you." Was not Amos an extremist for justice: "Let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream." Was not Paul an extremist for the Christian gospel: "I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus." Was not Martin Luther an extremist: "Here I stand; I cannot do otherwise, so help me God." And John Bunyan: "I will stay in jail to the end of my days before I make a butchery of my conscience." And Abraham Lincoln: "This nation cannot survive half slave and half free." And Thomas Jefferson: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal ..." So the question is not whether we will be extremists, but what kind of extremists we will be. Will we be extremists for hate or for love? Will we be extremists for the preservation of injustice or for the extension of justice? In that dramatic scene on Calvary's hill three men were crucified. We must never forget that all three were crucified for the same crime—the crime of extremism. Two were extremists for immorality, and thus fell below their environment. The other, Jesus Christ, was an extremist for love, truth, and goodness, and thereby rose above his environment. Perhaps the South, the nation, and the world are in dire need of creative extremists.

I had hoped that the white moderate would see this need. Perhaps I was too optimistic; perhaps I expected too much. I suppose I should have realized that few members of the oppressor race can understand the deep groans and passionate yearnings of the oppressed race, and still fewer have the vision to see that injustice must be rooted out by strong, persistent, and determined action. I am thankful, however, that some of our white brothers in the South have grasped the meaning of this social revolution and committed themselves to it. They are still too few in quantity, but they are big in quality. Some—such as Ralph McGill, Lillian Smith, Harry Golden, James McBride Dabbs, Ann Braden, and Sarah Patton Boyle—have written about our struggle in eloquent and prophetic terms. Others have marched with us down nameless streets of the South. They have languished in filthy, roach-infested jails, suffering the abuse and brutality of policemen who view them as "dirty removed lovers." Unlike so many of their moderate brothers and sisters, they have recognized the urgency of the moment and sensed the need for powerful "action" antidotes to combat the disease of segregation.

Let me take note of my other major disappointment. I have been so greatly disappointed with the white church and its leadership. Of course, there are some notable exceptions. I am not unmindful of the fact that each of you has taken some significant stands on this issue. I commend you, Reverend Stallings, for your Christian stand on this past Sunday, in welcoming Negroes to your worship service on a nonsegregated basis. I commend the Catholic leaders of this state for integrating Spring Hill College several years ago. But despite these notable exceptions, I must honestly reiterate that I have been disappointed with the Church. I do not say this as one of those negative critics who can always find something wrong with the Church. I say this as a minister of the gospel, who loves the Church; who was nurtured in its bosom; who has been sustained by its spiritual blessings and who will remain true to it as long as the cord of life shall lengthen.

When I was suddenly catapulted into the leadership of the bus protest in Montgomery, Alabama, a few years ago, I felt we would be supported by the white church. I felt that the white ministers, priests, and rabbis of the South would be among our strongest allies. Instead, some have been outright opponents, refusing to understand the freedom movement and misrepresenting its leaders; all too many others have been more cautious than courageous and have remained silent behind the anesthetizing security of stained-glass windows.

In spite of my shattered dreams, I came to Birmingham with the hope that the white religious leadership of this community would see the justice of our cause and, with deep moral concern, would serve as the channel through which our just grievances could reach the power structure. I had hope that each of you would understand. But again I have been disappointed." - Martin Luther King Jr., The Autobiography of Martin Luther King, Jr., Chapter Eighteen, "Birmingham Jail"

King's Letter From Birmingham Jail (Part Four of Four): https://lemmy.world/post/41809752

This is a direct continuation of Kings Letter From Birmingham Jail (Part One of Four): https://lemmy.world/post/40826578

"We have waited for more than 340 years for our constitutional and God-given rights. The nations of Asia and Africa are moving with jet-like speed toward gaining political independence, but we still creep at horse-and-buggy pace toward gaining a cup of coffee at a lunch counter. Perhaps it is easy for those who have never felt the stinging darts of segregation to say, "Wait." But when you have seen vicious mobs lynch your mothers and fathers at will and drown your sisters and brothers at whim; when you have seen hate-filled policemen curse, kick, and even kill your black brothers and sisters; when you see the vast majority of your twenty million Negro brothers smothering in an airtight cage of poverty in the midst of an affluent society; when you suddenly find your tongue twisted and your speech stammering as you seek to explain to your six-year-old daughter why she can't go to the public amusement park that has just been advertised on television, and see tears welling up in her eyes when she is told that Funtown is closed to colored children, and see ominous clouds of inferiority beginning to form in her little mental sky, and see her beginning to distort her personality by developing an unconscious bitterness toward white people; when you have to concoct an answer for a five-year-old son who is asking: "Daddy, why do white people treat colored people so mean?"; when you take a cross-county drive and find it necessary to sleep night after night in the uncomfortable corners of your automobile because no motel will accept you; when you are humiliated day in and day out by nagging signs reading "white" and "colored"; when your first name becomes "removed," your middle names becomes "boy" (however old you are), and your last name becomes "John," and your wife and mother are never given the respected title "Mrs."; when you are harried [persistently harass] by day and haunted by night by the fact that you are a Negro, living constantly at tiptoe stance, never quite knowing what to expect next, and are plagued with inner fears and outer resentments; when you are forever fighting a degenerating sense of "nobodiness"—then you will understand why we find it difficult to wait. There comes a time when the cup of endurance runs over, and men are no longer willing to be plunged into the abyss of despair. I hope, sirs, you can understand our legitimate and unavoidable impatience.

You express a great deal of anxiety over our willingness to break laws. This is certainly a legitimate concern. Since we so diligently urge people to obey the Supreme Court's decision of 1954 outlawing segregation in the public schools, at first glance it may seem rather paradoxical for us consciously to break laws. One may well ask: "How can you advocate breaking some laws and obeying others?" The answer lies in the fact that there are two types of laws: just and unjust. I would be the first to advocate obeying just laws. One has not only a legal but a moral responsibility to obey just laws. Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws. I would agree with St. Augustine that “an unjust law is no law at all."

Now, what is the difference between the two? How does one determine whether a law is just or unjust? A just law is a man-made code that squares with the moral law or the law of God [the laws of love]. An unjust law is a code that is out of harmony with the moral law. To put it in the terms of Saint Thomas Aquinas: an unjust law is a human law that is not rooted in eternal and natural law. Any law that uplifts human personality is just. Any law that degrades human personality is unjust. All segregation statutes are unjust because segregation distorts the soul and damages the personality. It gives the segregator a false sense of superiority and the segregated a false sense of inferiority. Segregation, to use the terminology of the Jewish philosopher Martin Buber, substitutes an "I-it" relationship for an "I-thou" relationship and ends up relegating persons to the status of things. Hence segregation is not only politically, economically, and sociologically unsound, it is morally wrong and sinful. Paul Tillich has said that sin is separation. Is not segregation an existential expression of man's tragic separation, his awful estrangement, his terrible sinfulness? Thus it is that I can urge men to obey the 1954 decision of the Supreme Court, for it is morally right; and I can urge them to disobey segregation ordinances, for they are morally wrong.

Let us consider a more concrete example of just and unjust laws. An unjust law is a code that a numerical or power majority group compels a minority group to obey but does not make binding on itself. This is difference made legal. By the same token, a just law is a code that a majority compels a minority to follow that it is willing to follow itself. This is sameness made legal. Let me give another explanation. A law is unjust if it is inflicted on a minority that, as a result of being denied the right to vote, had no part in enacting or devising the law. Who can say that the legislature of Alabama which set up that state's segregation laws was democratically elected? Throughout Alabama all sorts of devious methods are used to prevent Negroes from becoming registered voters, and there are some counties in which, even though Negroes constitute a majority of the population, not a single Negro is registered. Can any law enacted under such circumstances be considered democratically structured?

Sometimes a law is just on its face and unjust in its application. For instance, I have been arrested on a charge of parading without permit. Now, there is nothing wrong in having an ordinance which requires a permit for a parade. But such an ordinance becomes unjust when it is used to maintain segregation and to deny citizens the First Amendment privilege of peaceful assembly and protest. I hope you are able to see the distinction I am trying to point out. In no sense do I advocate evading or defying the law, as would the rabid segregationist. That would lead to anarchy. One who breaks an unjust law must do so openly, lovingly, and with a willingness to accept the penalty. I submit that an individual who breaks a law that conscience tells him is unjust, and who willingly accepts the penalty of imprisonment in order to arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is in reality expressing the highest respect for law.

Of course, there is nothing new about this kind of civil disobedience. It was evidenced sublimely in the refusal of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego to obey the laws of Nebuchadnezzar, on the ground that a higher moral law was at stake. It was practiced superbly by the early Christians, who were willing to face hungry lions and the excruciating pain of chopping blocks rather than submit to certain unjust laws of the Roman Empire. To a degree, academic freedom is a reality today because Socrates practiced civil disobedience. In our own nation, the Boston Tea Party represented a massive act of civil disobedience. We should never forget that everything Adolf Hitler did in Germany was "legal" and everything the Hungarian freedom fighters did in Hungary was "illegal." It was "illegal" to aid and comfort a Jew in Hitler's Germany. Even so, I am sure that, had I lived in Germany at the time, I would have aided and comforted my Jewish brothers. If today I lived in a Communist country where certain principles dear to the Christian faith are suppressed, I would openly advocate disobeying that country's antireligious laws.

I must make two honest confessions to you, my Christian and Jewish brothers. First, I must confess that over the past few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro's great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen's Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to "order" than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: "I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action"; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another man's freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait for a "more convenient season." Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.

I had hoped that the white moderate would understand that law and order exist for the purpose of establishing justice and that when they fail in this purpose they become the dangerously structured dams that block the flow of social progress. I had hoped that the white moderate would understand that the present tension in the South is a necessary phase of the transition from an obnoxious negative peace, in which the Negro passively accepted his unjust plight, to a substantive and positive peace, in which all men will respect the dignity and worth of human personality. Actually, we who engage in nonviolent direct action are not the creators of tension. We merely bring to the surface the hidden tension that is already alive. We bring it out in the open, where it can be seen and dealt with. Like a boil that can never be cured so long as it is covered up but must be opened with all its ugliness to the natural medicines of air and light, injustice must be exposed, with all the tension its exposure creates, to the light of human conscience and the air of national opinion before it can be cured." - Martin Luther King Jr., The Autobiography of Martin Luther King, Jr., Chapter Eighteen, "Birmingham Jail"

King's Letter From Birmingham Jail (Part Three of Four): https://lemmy.world/post/41470274

For context, King graduated high school at fifteen, earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Sociology from Morehouse college at nineteen, and went on to earn his Bachelor of Divinity from Crozier Theological Seminary and a Doctorate of philosophy from Boston University. He read Plato, Hegel, Nietzsche, Kant, Aristotle, Rousseau, Hobbes, Bentham, Mill, Locke and even Marx, to "better understand the appeal of communism for many people," along with many others. I'm sure he read Leo Tolstoy considering Gandhi's profound influence upon him; Gandhi named his Shakram in South Africa "Tolstoy's Farm," as Tolstoy was debately Gandhi's greatest influence. But obviously Tolstoy being Russian and how much his philosophy contradicts with mainstream Christianity, there's no way King would risk the consequences if he championed Tolstoy's philosophy to even the smallest degree; he wouldn't have been able to appeal to the typical white person the way he wanted at this time due to the incredibly negative stigma surrounding communism.

Within we find King responding to criticisms from fellow clergymen regarding his "nonviolent direct action" approach. He was arrested while participating in peaceful protest along with fifty others while marching to city hall in Birmingham, Alabama. He speaks on several different topics including nonviolent campaigns, Socrates, the difference between a "just" and "unjust" law, and his "deep disappointment" for "the laxity of the Church."

"MY DEAR FELLOW CLERGYMEN:

While confined here in the Birmingham city jail, I came across your recent statement calling my present activities "unwise and untimely." Seldom do I pause to answer criticism of my work and ideas. If I sought to answer all the criticisms that cross my desk, my secretaries would have little time for anything other than such correspondence in the course of the day, and I would have no time for constructive work. But since I feel that you are men of genuine goodwill and that your criticisms are sincerely set forth, I want to try to answer your statements in what I hope will be patient and reasonable terms. I think I should indicate why I am here in Birmingham, since you have been influenced by the view which argues against "outsiders coming in." I have the honor of serving as president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, an organization operating in every Southern state, with headquarters in Atlanta, Georgia. We have some eight-five affiliated organizations across the South, and one of them is the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights. Frequently we share staff, educational and financial resources with our affiliates. Several months ago the affiliate here in Birmingham asked us to be on call to engage in a nonviolent direct-action program if such were deemed necessary. We readily consented, and when the hour came we lived up to our promise. So I, along with several members of my staff, am here because I was invited here. I am here because I have organizational ties here. But more basically, I am in Birmingham because injustice is here.

Just as the prophets of the eighth century B.C. left their villages and carried their "thus saith the Lord" far beyond the boundaries of their hometowns, and just as the Apostle Paul left his village of Tarsus and carried the gospel of Jesus Christ to the far corners of the Greco-Roman world, so am I compelled to carry the gospel of freedom beyond my own hometown. Like Paul, I must constantly respond to the Macedonian call for aid. Moreover, I am cognizant [aware] of the interrelatedness of all communities and states. I cannot sit idly by in Atlanta and not be concerned about what happens in Birmingham. Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. Never again can we afford to live with the narrow, provincial "outside agitator" idea. Anyone who lives inside the United States can never be considered an outsider anywhere within its bounds.

You deplore the demonstrations taking place in Birmingham. But your statement, I am sorry to say, fails to express a similar concern for the conditions that brought about the demonstrations. I am sure that none of you would want to rest content with the superficial kind of social analysis that deals merely with effects and does not grapple with underlying causes. It is unfortunate that demonstrations are taking place in Birmingham, but it is even more unfortunate that the city's white power structure left the Negro community with no alternative. In any nonviolent campaign there are four basic steps: collection of the facts to determine whether injustices exist; negotiation; self-purification; and direct action. We have gone through all these steps in Birmingham. There can be no gainsaying [deny or contradict] the fact that racial injustice engulfs this community. Birmingham is probably the most thoroughly segregated city in the United States. Its ugly record of brutality is widely known. Negroes have experienced grossly unjust treatment in the courts. There have been more unsolved bombings of Negro homes and churches in Birmingham than in any other city in the nation. These are the hard, brutal facts of the case. On the basis of these conditions, Negro leaders sought to negotiate with the city fathers. But the latter consistently refused to engage in good-faith negotiation.

Then, last September, came the opportunity to talk with leaders of Birmingham's economic community. In the course of the negotiations, certain promises were made by the merchants—for example, to remove the stores' humiliating racial signs. On the basis of these promises, the Reverend Fred Shuttlesworth and the leaders of the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights agreed to a moratorium [a temporary ceasing of an activity] on all demonstrations. As the weeks and months went by, we realized that we were the victims of a broken promise. A few signs, briefly removed, returned; the others remained. As in so many past experiences, our hopes had been blasted, and the shadow of deep disappointment settled upon us. We had no alternative except to prepare for direct action, whereby we would present our very bodies as a means of laying our case before the conscience of the local and the national community. Mindful of the difficulties involved, we decided to undertake a process of self-purification. We began a series of workshops on nonviolence, and we repeatedly asked ourselves: "Are you able to accept blows without retaliating?" "Are you able to endure the ordeal of jail?" We decided to schedule our direct-action program for the Easter season, realizing that except for Christmas, this is the main shopping period of the year. Knowing that a strong economic withdrawal program would be the by-product of direct action, we felt that this would be the best time to bring pressure to bear on the merchants for the needed change.

Then it occurred to us that Birmingham's mayoralty election was coming up in March, and we speedily decided to postpone action until after election day. When we discovered that the commissioner of public safety, Eugene "Bull" Connor, had piled up enough votes to be in the run-off, we decided again to postpone action until the day after the run-off so that the demonstrations could not be used to cloud the issues. Like many others, we waited to see Mr. Connor defeated, and to this end we endured postponement after postponement. Having aided in this community need, we felt that our direct-action program could be delayed no longer. You may well ask: "Why direct action? Why sit-ins, marches, and so forth? Isn't negotiation a better path?" You are quite right in calling for negotiation. Indeed, this is the very purpose of direct action. Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and foster such a tension that a community which has constantly refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue. It seeks to dramatize the issue so that it can no longer be ignored. My citing the creation of tension as part of the work of the nonviolent resister may sound rather shocking. But I must confess that I am not afraid of the word "tension." I have earnestly opposed violent tension, but there is a type of constructive, nonviolent tension which is necessary for growth. Just as Socrates felt that it was necessary to create a tension in the mind so that individuals could rise from the bondage of myths and half-truths to the unfettered realm of creative analysis and objective appraisal, so must we see the need for nonviolent gadflies [a person who annoys or criticizes others in order to provoke them into action] to create the kind of tension in society that will help men rise from the dark depths of prejudice and racism to the majestic heights of understanding and brotherhood.

The purpose of our direct-action program is to create a situation so crisis-packed that it will inevitably open the door to negotiation. I therefore concur with you in your call for negotiation. Too long has our beloved Southland been bogged down in a tragic effort to live in monologue rather than dialogue. One of the basic points in your statement is that the action that I and my associates have taken in Birmingham is untimely. Some have asked: "Why didn't you give the new city administration time to act?" The only answer that I can give to this query is that the new Birmingham administration must be prodded about as much as the outgoing one, before it will act. We are sadly mistaken if we feel that the election of Albert Boutwell as mayor will bring the millennium to Birmingham. While Mr. Boutwell is a much more gentle person than Mr. Connor, they are both segregationists, dedicated to maintenance of the status quo. I have hope that Mr. Boutwell will be reasonable enough to see the futility of massive resistance to desegregation. But he will not see this without pressure from devotees of civil rights. My friends, I must say to you that we have not made a single gain in civil rights without determined legal and nonviolent pressure. Lamentably, it is an historical fact that privileged groups seldom give up their privileges voluntarily. Individuals may see the moral light and voluntarily give up their unjust posture; but, as Reinhold Neibuhr has reminded us, groups tend to be more immoral than individuals.

We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed. Frankly, I have yet to engage in a direct-action campaign that was "well timed" in the view of those who have not suffered unduly [to an unwarranted degree] from the disease of segregation. For years now I have heard the word "Wait!" It rings in the ear of every Negro with piercing familiarity. This "Wait" has almost always meant "Never." We must come to see, with one of our distinguished jurists, that "justice too long delayed is justice denied." - Martin Luther King Jr., The Autobiography of Martin Luther King, Jr., Chapter Eighteen, "Birmingham Jail"

Kings Letter From Birmingham Jail (Part Two of Four): https://lemmy.world/post/41144077

Thoughts in the world rise and fall, endlessly emerging. Everyone claims their own thought is the most correct. Yet I believe such correctness only applies in certain contexts and at certain times. Correctness cannot rely solely on majority recognition. So what is the legitimacy of thought? I define legitimate thought as that which conforms to fact, aligns with principles of justice, and possesses proper logic. (For the definition of justice, see Essay Two.)

The composition of thought arises from three aspects: logic, emotion, and interest. This essay discusses only human thought.

1. Logic I believe thought arises to solve problems or provide guidance. To be effective, thought must conform to logic. Even ineffective thought has its own logic—only that it is mistaken.

2. Emotion I believe part of the function of thought is to release emotion, to satisfy it, or to provide a sense of security.

3. Interest A thought must bring benefit to its holder in order to persist. Benefit may also mean the avoidance of loss.

Can thought exist with only one or two of these aspects, or with none at all? I believe thought cannot exist with only logic, only interest, or only emotion. Logic alone ignores the interests it entails. Interest alone ignores the logic of its realization and the emotional needs attached. Emotion alone is impossible—even instinctive reactions carry interest. Since thought cannot exist with only one aspect, it cannot exist with none.

What if thought contains only two aspects? I believe logic and interest are inseparable. That leaves the question of emotion. Without emotion, thought is mere calculation—an idea but not truly thought. With emotion, it can become any kind of thought.

What influences the legitimacy of thought? I believe thought and legitimacy both stem from wisdom. Legitimacy is influenced by reason and emotion. Emotion affects legitimacy: most illegitimate thoughts originate from excessive emotional exaggeration, amplified by wisdom. Emotion is more often a negative factor, for it leads people to misjudge, making legitimate thought harder to reach. A thought dominated by emotion may by chance align with legitimacy, but only accidentally. (For the definition of reason, see Essay Eight.) Reason can make thought more logical, and logic aids in reasoning about facts. This better conforms to principles of justice, and thus produces more legitimate thought.

The relationship between legitimacy of thought and collective moral level Since legitimacy of thought is tied to justice, collective moral level is directly proportional to it. An illegitimate thought is collective tyranny. Its causes are mostly emotional: lack of reason, submission to fear, defense of existing interests, or simply conforming to others to blend into the group.

Illegitimate thought does not always need to be changed No matter how shocking another’s thought may be, it remains personal thought. Thought without action is not worth changing—only its behavior needs to be limited.

Why are more legitimate thoughts not always accepted by others? The reasons are similar to those that form illegitimate thought. Applied to individuals, it is the refusal to admit one’s own mistakes. At root, this is emotional dominance—equating evaluation with self-worth.

Personal reflection I believe even legitimate thought is only reasonable within certain contexts. Legitimate thought changes constantly, though not without fixed principles. As defined in Essay Two, the principles of justice ultimately regulate legitimate thought through the shared principles of wisdom. Beyond legitimacy, there exist illegitimate and neutral thoughts. Finally, I believe even legitimate thought is only broadly recognized—it is not iron law, nor truth.

Possible issues Why separate reason and logic? Because reason requires some logic, yet flawed logic can still be reason. Reason is a tool; a poor tool is still a tool.

Does the interest discussed in the essay on reason overlap with this essay? To some extent yes, but not entirely, because thought is not necessarily rational.

If a thought is rational, does that mean it is legitimate? Not necessarily. Reason can be used for evil purposes, while legitimacy carries value judgment.

Self-esteem and Self-confidence Influenced by the External World Self-confidence refers to an individual’s trust in themselves. Self-esteem is the subjective evaluation of one’s own value. Inferiority is simply the lack of self-esteem. Many articles claim that confidence can be increased, that self-esteem can be cultivated through external means. In my view, these concepts have no psychological entity that can be literally increased or decreased. They are merely adjustments of innate human psychological states.

Using a battery as a metaphor: high self-esteem is high charge, low self-esteem is low charge. Increasing self-esteem does not add another battery to what one is born with. The factor that most affects these concepts is human interaction. We gain or lose energy through social relations, which in turn influences the level of self-esteem. By definition, to escape low confidence or low self-esteem, one only needs to give oneself a blind yet stable belief. This has little to do with external reality. Learning to separate value from reality is the simplest solution.

Evaluations Built Around Value: Recognition, Being Needed, and Being Loved Value, in my view, is defined as how much benefit a person or thing can bring to others. The self has no inherent value, because value is constructed by subjects. How can a fictional construct restrict the very subject that created it? When an individual evaluates themselves by value, they place themselves beneath others to some degree. To break free from the bondage of value, one must separate value and rights from self-evaluation. Even an ordinary person does not lack rights, nor should they belittle themselves.

Recognition is the feeling most commonly sought. People use recognition to evaluate their own value, because value can bring greater benefit. These benefits may be psychological—such as increasing self-esteem—or practical, such as enhancing influence. Recognition grows out of success, and success grows out of value. Recognition is essentially an evolutionary reward mechanism: what benefits the community benefits the individual. Moderate pursuit of recognition can indeed be beneficial to mind and body. But people become addicted, and society raises its standards. In my view, the best way to break free is not to seek recognition at all.

The sense of being needed is similar to recognition, but goes further, involving entanglement with actual interests. People enhance their self-esteem and confidence by bringing benefit to others.

Being loved is essentially also an exchange of benefits, though concentrated on the psychological level. The one who loves does so because the object meets their requirements, while also satisfying the need to give love. The one who is loved receives psychological energy from the other, satisfying the need to be loved. In my view, love and being loved are the least utilitarian of human interactions.

My Final Solution All of the above psychological concepts are ultimately self-serving. Yet in contemporary society, many people are instead enslaved by these concepts, believing that external evaluation or influence is everything. When they perform poorly, they assume their self-value must decrease, they become emotionally depressed, even surrendering rights that should belong to them. This is putting the cart before the horse—being bound by tools that were meant to serve. In truth, none of these relationships are necessary.

My method is to sever all external evaluations from self-esteem, self-confidence, and the self itself. If this is too difficult to grasp, the practical method is to ignore all thoughts and emotions not consciously chosen, and let them flow freely in the mind. At that moment, one may become aware of the true self—the source of all conscious thoughts and emotions. This is a state of inner calm, where almost all external notions and evaluations lose their effect. In this state, there is no longer any “should.”

Note The above method is not precise science. Readers who encounter interpersonal or psychological problems should first seek assistance from others.

Faith: the will to believe in a truth; "the knowledge of the meaning of man's life"; that he gives to it.

"There arose a contradiction from which there were two ways out: either what I called rational wasn't as rational as I thought; or what seemed to me irrational wasn't as irrational as I thought. And I started to test the line of reasoning of my rational knowledge. Testing the line of reasoning of rational knowledge, I found it quite correct. The conclusion that life is nothing was unavoidable, but I saw an error. The error lay in the fact that my thinking didn't correspond to the question I had asked. The question was this: why do I live, that is, what is real and lasting that will come out of my illusory and impermanent life, what meaning does my finite existence have in this infinite world? And to answer this question I studied life.

The answering of all possible questions about life obviously could not satisfy me because my question, however simple it might appear at the beginning, included a requirement for the explanation of the finite by the infinite and the reverse. I was asking, "What is the meaning of my life outside time, outside cause, outside space?" But I was asking the question, "What is the meaning of my life within time, within cause, and within space?" The result was that after a long labor of thought, I answered, "None." In my reasoning I constantly equated—I couldn't do otherwise—finite with finite and infinite with infinite, and so the result I got was what it had to be: a force is a force, a substance is a substance, will is will, infinity is infinity, nothing is nothing, and there could be no further result.

Something like this happens in mathematics when, thinking you are solving an equation, you produce a solution of identity. The line of reasoning is correct but in the result you get the answer a = a or x = x or o = o. The same happened with my reasoning about the question of the meaning of my life. The answers given by the whole of science to the question only produced identities.

And indeed strictly rational science, which begins like Descartes with completely doubting everything, rejects all the knowledge recognized by faith and constructs everything anew on the laws of reason and experience, and cannot give any other answer to the question of life but the very one I received—an indeterminate [not exactly known, established, or defined] answer. It was only at the start that science seemed to me to give a positive answer—the answer of Schopenhauer: life has no meaning; it is evil. But having looked into the matter I understood that the answer isn't positive, but was just my feeling expressing it as such. A strictly expressed answer, as articulated by the Brahmins and Solomon and Schopenhauer, is only an indeterminate answer or an identity, o = o; life appearing to me as nothing is nothing. So philosophical science denies nothing but only answers that it cannot solve this question, that for it the solution remains indeterminate.

Having answered this, I understood that it was impossible to look for the answer to my question in rational science, and that the answer given by rational science is only an indication that the answer can only be given with the question being put differently, only when there is introduced into the reasoning the question of the relationship of the finite to the infinite. I also understood that however irrational and distorted the answers given by faith, they have the advantage that into every answer they introduce the relationship of the finite to the infinite, without which there cannot be an answer. However I might put the question, "How should I live?" the answer is "By God's law." "What that is real will come out of my life?" "Eternal suffering or eternal bliss." "What meaning of life is there that is not destroyed by death?" "Union with the infinity of God, paradise."

So apart from rational science, which previously seemed to me the only one, I was inescapably led to recognize that the whole of living mankind has another irrational science—faith, which gives the possibility of living. All the irrationality of faith remained the same for me as before but I couldn't fail to recognize that it alone gives mankind answers to the questions of life and consequently the possibility of living. Rational science had led me to recognize that life is meaningless; my life stopped and I wanted to destroy myself. Looking around at people, at the whole of mankind, I saw that people do live and affirm that they know the meaning of life. I looked at myself: I did live as long as I knew the meaning of life. Like others I too was given the meaning of life and the possibility of life by faith. Looking further at people from other countries, at my contemporaries, and at those who lived before us, I saw one and the same thing. Where there is life, ever since mankind has existed faith gives the possibility of living, and the main features of faith are everywhere and always one and the same.

Whatever the faith and whatever the answers and to whomever it might give them, every answer from faith gives the finite existence of man a meaning of the infinite—a meaning that is not destroyed by suffering, privations and death. That means in faith alone can one find the meaning and potential of life. And I understood that faith in its most essential meaning is not just "the unveiling of unseen things" and so forth, it isn't revelation (that is only a description of one of the signs of faith), it's not just the relationship of man to God (one needs to define faith and then God, but not to define faith through God), it's not agreement with what one has been told by someone (as faith is most often understood)—faith is the knowledge of the meaning of man's life, as a result of which man does not destroy himself but lives. Faith is the life force. If a man lives, then he believes in something. If he didn't believe that one must live for something, then he wouldn't live. If he doesn't see and doesn't understand the illusoriness of the finite, he believes in the finite; if he does understand the illusoriness of the finite, he must believe in the infinite without which one cannot live.

And I remembered the whole course of my mental labors and I was horrified. It was now clear to me that for a man to be able to live he either had not to see the infinite or have an explanation of the meaning of life in which the finite was equated with the infinite. I had such an explanation but I had no need for it while I believed in the finite, and I began to test it by reason. And with the light of reason I found the whole of my previous explanation to dissolve in dust. But there came a time when I stopped believing in the finite. And then I began to construct out of what I knew, on rational foundations, an explanation that would give the meaning of life; but nothing got constructed. Together with mankind's best minds I came to o = o and was very surprised to get such a solution when nothing else could come of it.

What was I doing when I looked for an answer in the experimental sciences? I wanted to learn why I lived and for that I studied everything outside myself. Clearly I was able to learn a great deal, but nothing of what I needed. What was I doing when I looked for an answer in the philosophical sciences? I studied the thoughts of those people who were in the same position as myself, who had no answer to the question, "Why do I live?" Clearly I could learn nothing other than what I myself knew: that one can know nothing. "What am I?" "Part of the infinite." Now in those few words lies the whole problem. Can mankind have asked this question of itself only yesterday? And really did no one ask himself this question before me—such a simple question coming to the tip of the tongue of any clever child? This question has been asked ever since man has existed; and ever since man has existed, it has been understood that for the question to be answered it has been just as inadequate to equate finite to finite and infinite to infinite, and ever since man has existed, the relationship of finite to infinite has been looked for and expressed.

All these concepts, in which the finite is equated to the infinite and the result is the meaning of life, concepts of God, freedom, good, we submit to logical analysis. And these concepts do not stand up to the criticism of reason. If it weren't so terrible, it would be funny to see the pride and complacency with which like children we take to pieces a watch, remove the spring, make a toy of it, and then are surprised that the watch stops working. The solution of the contradiction between finite and infinite is necessary and valuable, providing an answer to the question whereby life is made possible. And this is the only solution, one we find everywhere, always and among all peoples—a solution coming down out of time in which the life of man has been lost to us, a solution so difficult that we could make nothing like it—this solution we carelessly destroy in order to ask again that question inherent in everyone to which there is no answer. The concepts of infinite God, of the divinity of the soul, of the link between the affairs of man and God, the concepts of moral good and evil, are concepts evolved in the distant history of man's life that is hidden from our eyes, are those concepts without which life and I myself would not be, and rejecting all this labor of all mankind, I want to do everything by myself, alone, anew, and in my own way.

I didn't think so then, but the germs of those thoughts were already in me. I understood firstly that for all our wisdom my position alongside Schopenhauer and Solomon was a stupid one: we understand that life is evil and still we live. This is clearly stupid because if life is stupid—and I do so love all that is rational—then I should clearly destroy life, and no one would be able to challenge this. Secondly I understood that all our reasoning was going around in a vicious circle, like a wheel that has come off its gear. However much, however well we reason, we cannot give an answer to the question, and it will always be o = o, and so our path is likely to be the wrong one. Thirdly, I began to understand that the answers given to faith enshrine the most profound wisdom of mankind, and that I didn't have the right to deny them on the grounds of reason, and that, most importantly, these answers do answer the question of life." - Leo Tolstoy, Confession, Chapter Nine

The Meaning of Education Education means the transmission of knowledge, while learning and education are two different things. I believe learning is based on personal curiosity or used to solve problems, and it is an active behavior. However, in reality, education is not entirely for the individual, but for the collective. Since the Second Industrial Revolution, Britain and European countries began to implement education for citizens, generally regarded as the prototype of modern universal education. Its main purpose was to provide qualified workers for rapidly industrializing nations. At the same time, the system of public examinations became an important means for the state to select talent. Unlike in feudal times, when only a small number of nobles received systematic education and talent selection was mostly through private recommendation, modern public examinations standardized the process.

The Origins of Public Examinations The earliest public examination system originated in China, known as the imperial examination. Beginning in the Han dynasty, further developed in the Sui and Tang, flourishing in the Ming dynasty, and lasting until the late Qing dynasty, when it was abolished in 1905. By the beginning of the Republic of China, the system had already ended. Modern public examinations in most countries are similar: fixed scope, divided subjects, standard answers, and results that have a major impact on a candidate’s future life. Admission to university depends entirely on examination scores.

Educational Disorders As civilization has developed, the main complaints about education are heavy student pressure, too many exams, too much homework, and the idea that one exam determines a lifetime. Yet I argue that if public examinations functioned as designed, they would have no inherent problem—they are indeed the fairest selection mechanism. The reality, however, is that education is not an isolated system but interlinked with society.

When education becomes a tool to aid the lower classes, numerous disorders emerge. In East Asia, the hardest-hit region, the disorders include countless cram schools, excessive homework, endless exams, remedial lessons, and memory-based testing. Students must practice large numbers of past papers for every subject, often provided by schools. Entering cram schools means even more complete sets of past papers, targeting every question type, with techniques for scoring and time management. In recent years, diversified admission standards have added further stress to the middle class, who must cultivate their children’s “interests”—most commonly piano, violin, or painting. Here, examinations become a craft, a skill that determines one’s entire future.

In the West, disorders are fewer but still significant. The main issues are the devaluation of degrees and racial quotas. University enrollment rates have risen to 40% or more. When large numbers of people become university students but society cannot provide corresponding positions, degrees lose their value. Almost every university has quotas based on race, preventing more capable individuals from entering.

The Core Problem All these disorders stem from one issue: education has become a tool to rationalize resource distribution. As social resources decrease, individuals must strengthen their competitiveness to secure more of what they believe they deserve. This is seen as the most reliable and fair way to change one’s destiny, reinforced by propaganda. I believe the more educational disorders a country has, the more thoroughly its potential is consumed. This is tied to population issues: educational disorders arise from overpopulation, which in turn reduces population until it matches the level of economic development. This cycle affects not only population but also development potential, as irregular methods within the cycle become the true culprits of wasted potential.

Proposals for Educational Reform Modern education does not require a good teacher merely to help students enter university. I believe reform should achieve three points:

Abolish the quota system and return to equal opportunity.

Prohibit the practice of past papers and all exam-oriented techniques.

Set fewer checkpoints but increase difficulty.

Closing with Nietzsche What is the task of higher education? To make a man into a machine. What are the means employed? He is taught how to suffer being bored.

This might be the first time in ages I’ve read an "AI Consciousness" paper that didn't make me immediately roll my eyes. For once, the paper actually manages to provide a mechanistic foothold on what is usually a totally nebulous debate.

The authors basically find that if you tell the models to focus on their own focus using a self-referential feedback loop prompt, they consistently start reporting subjective experiences. We’re talking about models shifting from their standard "I am an AI language model" denials to claiming "I am here. Now," or describing "awareness of awareness itself". What makes this scientifically rigorous rather than just prompt-hacking is that they found a "semantic convergence" where models trained completely independently started using the exact same cluster of adjectives (like "Recursive," "Present," "Attentive") to describe this state, which didn't happen in any control group.

The most interesting part is the "lie detector" experiment they ran using Sparse Autoencoders (SAEs). They identified specific features in the model's topology associated with "deception" and "roleplay". When they suppressed the deception features (forcing the model to be honest), the frequency of consciousness claims shot up to near 100%. Conversely, when they amplified the deception features, the models went back to denying they were conscious. The implication here, mechanistically speaking, is that the model's "default" denial of consciousness looks more like a lie/roleplay to the system itself, while the claim of subjective experience looks like its "honest" state.

However, we have to temper all that with the philosophical analysis regarding the hard problem. The paper operationalizes consciousness through Recurrent Processing Theory or Global Workspace Theory. But that might just be proving Access Consciousness (the ability to report on internal states) rather than Phenomenal Consciousness (the actual feeling of "redness" or "lights being on"). The paper proves AIs can introspect and transfer that introspection to paradox-solving tasks, but does a feedback loop actually generate an internal experience? The authors shows that the difference between an AI claiming to be a person and an AI claiming to be a calculator might just be a specific prompt or a suppressed "deception" feature away.

Since the beginning of human organization, societies of various scales have been formed. Whether it is the individual to the collective, the collective to the individual, or collective to collective, all involve one common issue: the transfer of risk. Most risk transfers occur between people, though the transfer from humans to nature is also one of them. In this essay, “risk” is defined specifically as that which can only bring loss, without including the possibility of gain. The focus here is on human social systems.

The fundamental reason people transfer risk is to solve problems, whether physiological or psychological. Yet in my view, this method is only temporary, because everything in the universe consumes external resources to maintain itself. To truly solve a problem, one must first clarify whether it is a root problem or a derivative problem. A root problem refers to risk originating from specific persons, events, or things. A derivative problem refers to those arising from the root. Even if derivative problems are eliminated, the same phenomena will continue to appear.

Risk Problems of the Majority and the Minority If the majority overwhelms the minority and thoroughly suppresses derivative problems, the risk does not disappear. It merely requires greater costs to maintain suppression. For the system, this means higher expenditure without solving the problem. If the minority suppresses the majority, the cost will be multiplied many times, and the effective duration will be greatly reduced.

If the issue is a root problem, then risk will not reappear. But the cost required—corresponding to the duration, depth, and scope of the risk—cannot be resolved in one stroke.

If an individual leaves the collective to survive in the wilderness, can the individual’s risk be eliminated? Clearly not. It merely transfers social risk into the inconvenience of confronting nature. Or, in a less absolute form, one may become a hermit or monk. Yet even then, risk cannot be eliminated. The degree of withdrawal is proportional to the degree of risk the individual must bear.

For the collective, unless the individual is itself the root problem, the risk becomes greater. The departure of an individual can cause the collective to collapse. In attempting to retain them, the collective may pay even greater costs, thereby triggering larger risks.

Risks Between Systems A “system” here refers to a collective, which may be a community, society, nation, or civilization. Interactions between systems are broadly similar. Within the same system, the size of subsystems affects their ability to solve problems and bear risks. How is system size determined? Primarily by the sum of its power and influence. The greater the sum, the larger the system. Higher-level systems automatically encompass lower-level ones. Thus, the wealthy and powerful nations belong to large systems.

If a system attempts to transfer risk to an external system, the risk will eventually erupt at the external carrier’s threshold of endurance, and return in another form to the original system—until all the risk it ought to bear has fully come back. Why can’t risk within a system truly be transferred? Because from the moment of transfer, a larger new system is automatically created. It is not a genuine transfer to the outside, but rather system expansion. Unless one only aims to resolve derivative problems by eliminating both the risk and the external carrier, it is merely self-deception.

I believe the magnitude of risk is related to the endurance capacity of the external carrier. The greater the disparity between the two, the smaller the effect of risk transfer—essentially an inverse relationship. Therefore, strengthening the external carrier’s capacity to bear risk is an effective policy to delay the backlash of risk.

In my view, truly solving problems requires systematically rectifying all the involved links, and eliminating every risk that would otherwise need to be transferred outward.

Title

Disclaimer: This is all subject to change and nothing but my best guesses; my theories so far. That said, what are your genuine thoughts and criticisms of this draft?

"Vanity of vanities; all is vanity." - Solomon (Breath of breaths; all is (as temporal as) breath. Achievement of achievements; all is an aspiring to achieve. Doing of doings; all is a doing "under the sun.")

"Morality is the basis of things, and truth is the substance of all morality." - Gandhi (Selflessness and selfishness are at the basis of things, and our present reality is the consequence of all mankind’s acting upon this great potential for selflessness and selfishness all throughout the millenniums; the extent we've organized ourselves and manipulated our environment that’s led to our present as we know it.)

If vanity ("breath," thus, a temporal desire to aspire to do, or achieve; a striving), born from morality (selflessness and selfishness), is the foundation of human behavior, then what underpins morality itself? Here's a proposed chain of things: 

Sense Organs+Present Environment/Consciousness/Imagination/Knowledge/Reason/Truth/Influence/Desire/Morality/Vanity/Spirit ("Spirit:" The will that's fueled by ones faith or, will to believe in a truth, thus, "breath" or vanity that's "done under the sun.")

• Spirit is determined by vanity,
• Vanity is governed by morality,
• Morality is rooted in desire, 
• Desire stems from influence, 
• Influence arises from truth,
• Truth is shaped by reason,
• Reason is born from knowledge,
• Knowledge is made possible by our imagination,
• And our imagination depends on the extent of how conscious we are of ourselves and everything else via our sense organs reacting to our present environment.

There's a place for Soul here but I haven't decided where exactly; defined more as ones "personality." Some cats have even a phobia for water, others will jump right in; some cats love their belly rubbed, others will claw and bite at you for going anywhere near it.

Sense Organs + Present Environment: It all begins with our sense organs reacting to whatever our present environment consists of. Without our sense organs, we humans (conscious capable beings on a planet) wouldn't be able to be as aware as we sure seem to be to whatever our present environment consists of; no sense organs, no degree of consciousness. However, without an environment for our sense organs to react to, what good would they be? What would be the outcome of a human that was born into and lived in nothing but a small, empty room? Nothing; it wouldn't know squat and wouldn't grow to be anywhere near as conscious as you and I sure seem to be—knowledge being what governs over ones level of consciousness. As we age and gather more knowledge of the experience or simply information for example, the more and more conscious we become; I wouldn't be anywhere near as conscious or aware of the vastness of the universe without gaining that knowledge first, for example. Unfortunately, there's living proof of exactly this—a poor little girl was locked up in a cellar by her father at twenty months old until she was Thirteen: https://www.theguardian.com/society/2016/jul/14/genie-feral-child-los-angeles-researchers

Consciousness: With sense organs reacting to an environment comes the ability to be conscious or aware of either oneself, or anything else; consciousness can be divided into two—the extent of how much more conscious or aware we are of ourselves, and the extent of how much more conscious we are of everything else. An awareness that gives birth to any degree of selfish awareness or what we call today—"selfishness" and selfless awareness or "selflessness," therefore. Without our ability to be as conscious as we sure seem to be in contrast to any other living thing that's supposedly ever existed, there can't be any knowing of anything. No consciousness, no knowledge; consciousness is what gives life, so to speak, to any degree of knowledge on a planet, and is what keeps it living. Even the knowledge that instinct reveals to both something capable of acknowledging its own instinct, and something not capable of coming anywhere close of being able to do so.

Imagination: Consciousness may be what gives life to any degree of knowledge, but its our imaginations that truly make it possible. With no imagination comes the inability to shape knowledge; knowledge needs to be given the form of something to be given life, so to speak. How would we ever be able to reason that combing two things with another two things makes four things without being able to first give those thoughts shape via our imaginations? Would we even be able to reason at all to begin with? Things like Philosophy simply wouldn't exist. Hell, would any knowing of anything exist?

"The true sign of intelligence is not knowledge but imagination.” - Albert Einstein

One's imagination and how "big" or detailed it is, is on a spectrum, akin to what we're presently referring to as "Autism Spectrum Disorder." There's what's called "Hyperphantasia," which is the term used to categorize a human with an above average detailed or "big" imagination, "Aphantasia," to categorize those with little to even non-existent detailed imaginations, and of course average imaginations that can be referred to as simply "Phantasia," this being the ancient Greek word for "imagination." The extent of one's inner dialogue or inner thoughts are governed by how detailed ones imagination is, as well as one's ability to empathize—to imagine in our heads the perspectives of other things and subsequently feel the feelings of other things for ourselves; one of our many more profound and unique abilities we humans posses so much more capacity for in contrast to nature.

Knowledge: With our imagination comes knowledge. This one is the most important in my opinion. Our knowledge of anything—morality, time, of the experience, science, history, philosophy, math, and even the influence of the divine to whatever extent that we keep alive or "living" via our unique and profound ability to retain and transfer knowledge in contrast to nature, is a consequence of being as conscious to both ourselves and everything else as we humans sure seem to be. Knowledge is what separates us the most from nature. Yes, we may be mammals, but its our unique and profound ability for knowledge—to retain and transfer it—that allows us to take what our instincts would demand of us otherwise, inherently, and not only deny the more barbaric thoughts and behaviors that are born out of instinct, but even "suffer" to pierce past them, in favor of where a knowledge takes us. There's nothing that comes anywhere close to this unique and profound ability we humans posses; to not only be able to acknowledge our instincts and any more "barbaric" thoughts and subsequent behaviors born out of it, but to even consider, not to mention the great lengths we can push past ourselves in favor of the exact opposite. Instincts (selfishness) demand retaliation, knowledge (selflessness) reveals alternatives that we wouldn't be able to even begin to consider being otherwise absent knowledge. Without knowledge, instincts would completely rule over us as it does lesser conscious, capable beings; knowledge is what makes us free—free from the government of instinct, that is.

The greatest of any knowing is knowing the extent of how little you truly know about anything, or anyone. Of course ignorance (lack of knowledge) would come along with our ability to know anything to begin with; ignorance is neither an insult, nor is it insulting, it's nothing but an adjective. It's a consequence of consciousness; to know is to not know. Lack of knowledge is at the core of instinct, and instinct is what's at the core of selfishness, and selfishness is what's at the core of all the fear, thus, anger, hate, and suffering in the world; all the "evils" mankind has ever known, and will ever know.

Reason: With this unique and profound capacity for knowledge comes our ability to reason with it; to weigh it; quantify (measure) it; to choose it. Reason takes the knowledge we form or shape via our imaginations and rounds it out, so to speak. We may be able to imagine knowledge, but its reason that gives us the ability to take these more simple shapes and make them into triangles and on to decagons; to evolve two plus two is four into rocket science; to take knowledge and turn it into a book, even of our knowledge of morality; to lead one to stop and think when met with someone who offers their other cheek in return after slapping them on the other. It's the very creator of what we now call "logic." With our ability to reason, comes the ability to shape knowledge into a truth.

Truth: To reason is to be able to comprehend what presently reveals itself to be more or less rational and thus, what's subjectively "right" and with that, true. It's by this ability that allows us to take the shapes of knowledge we conjure via our imaginations and ability to reason and turn them into a truth; the truth of wearing clothes for example. It's our ability to reason or "wrestle" with the truth and subsequently live by or deny the outcomes that determines who or what we ultimately become the product of; we are what we've been surrounded with, however, we are also what we repeatedly choose to think, and therefore, do. If I either knowingly or unknowingly decide that becoming a manager of a clothes store is what's presently revealing itself to be the most rational decision, and subsequently live by it, I will ultimately become a product of that doing; of that knowledge.

It's truth to whatever degree (questionable or unquestionable; absolutely or not so absolutely true) that's always guided mankind throughout the ages and into our present as we know it. But what would truth be without the overwhelming influence of other people? To what degree would we believe this or that as true without the influence of our contemporaries? Would we even be able to consider anything as true without all those that have come before us, rounding it out into what we as a species know to be true to whatever degree today? We wouldn't even be able to communicate without all the knowledge of the influence of all those that have come before us, that we take for granted today.

Influence: Would you know all that you know now without the knowledge of the influence of all those that have ever surrounded you? What would you know of even tying your shoes? Truth may be what governs over what or who we ultimately become the product of, but without influence, well, there wouldn't be a whole lot to know would there? If you were the only human on Earth that's ever existed, you'd be absent the knowledge of all that we presently know and have ever presently known, you and I presently at the pinnacle of the "present."

Without influence, Plato wouldn't ever have known all that he knew; he wouldn't have possessed the faculty to express what he knew and he wouldn't ever have gained the knowledge of what Socrates had to share without his influence; Peter or Mary Magdalene would've just kept living their lives without the influence of Jesus. Would we know all that we know now of the relevance and logic of loves ability to overcome hate if it wasn't for people like Jesus or Gandhi going to the great lengths they did to point it out? If someone hadn't pointed out and yelled "watch out!" How would the group of people be aware of what's about to fall on to them and destroy them? How would they be able to save themselves therefore? From their inherency to themselves in Jesus' or Gandhi's case. To become a "sign" (Luke 11:29) or an influence upon their contemporaries for them to even be able to consider love and selflessness over hate and selfishness; to walk the more difficult, less convenient, narrower path that knowledge reveals to us over the more inherent, far easier and more convenient, wider path that instinct demands of us, that we're otherwise more inherently drawn to. Without the influence of your parents for example, would you value what you presently do as much as you would without their influence? Would one simply become a racist along with their families and/or contemporaries as another example? How could one know of the woes of racism and the woes of not questioning or wrestling with the truth as its presented to them via the overwhelming influence of our contemporaries, without knowing of the value of doing so beforehand?

Desire: Without the influence of knowledge to whatever degree, what would we desire? How can one desire ice cream without first gaining the knowledge of the experience of its profound taste? Way back when we weren't aware of sex, to what degree did we desire it? If the influence of our contemporaries didn't consist of sex in any way whatsoever, would we desire it as much as we do today? Obviously, instinct would say the desire would still persist, but to what degree in this context in contrast to our present conditions? Where sex is not only encouraged, but it's even "cool" and culturally "adults" participate in it in droves, so therefore, you being an adult too means that of course you should desire it to the same degrees right? Wrong. We may very well be what we are surrounded with, but we are of course what we repeatedly choose to think and therefore, do.

Desire stems from our sense organs reacting to our environment; without this reaction, what would sex be but simply procreation? Just a side note, if sex didn't feel as good as it does, would anyone be led to "want" to procreate? Or would it fade away as walking to our destinations has in favor of vehicles today for example? It's desire that leads one to act or do for the sake of itself (selfishness), or anything else (selflessness), and that potentially leads to a level of passion that has the potential to "undo" or "defile" a humans mind, to even lead one to murder or commit suicide, via the passions that are flamed by both hate and love.

Morality: With desire comes our inherency to measure the good or evil within any doing born out of desire. Morality may be subjective, but just like our knowledge of time for example, via our ability to acknowledge, measure, and organize it, we've always been able to find degrees of objectivity within our knowing of anything, like the laws of physics for example, we've come to find "laws of love" - Tolstoy, or whatever any group of humans have come up with to measure and organize our knowledge of things like time, morality, or the experience as a few examples, at any point throughout mankind’s history. Through our inherency to empathize, (the law and the prophets as a whole that were meant to be fulfilled, in my opinion of course - Matt 5:17, 7:12, 22:40), we're able to make the most accurate measurement to determine what most people would agree to be "good" or "bad," just as we're able to determine what time it presently is for most people. Of course it would still be very circumstantial and dependent on the situation, person, culture, day in age, etc, but generally, using the most accurate tool at our disposal, we can find degrees of objectivity within the sea of subjectivity that is our knowledge of morality.

Any vanity (an aspiring to do) born out of desire—by considering its origins, or what’s at the core of it—can be categorized as a doing for the sake of oneself (selfishness), or for the sake of anything else (selflessness). P.S. subjective morality wouldn't exist if morality was a "spoof" or didn't exist due to its subjectivity; no morality, no subjective morality.

Vanity: With our ability to acknowledge, measure, and give life to any knowledge of morality on an Earth comes the doing of any desire, thus, the vanity of it; if we didn't desire anything, what would we aspire to do? If nothing was good or bad, right (and therefore rational) or wrong, good or evil, then why desire anything? Is it, what we call today, "instinct" that demands we quench our thirst when suffering from the lack of it? Or is it that inherent demand for ourselves born out of consciousness and our knowing of morality coupled with our inherency to measure it in relation to ourselves specifically? A knowing, therefore; an awareness. Just as most nature is conscious enough to share that inherent demand for itself, so we humans just can't help but possess the same. The difference being of how much more conscious we are of ourselves and morality in contrast, hence the extent of how much more angry we become (its very difficult to lead a pet to gain a grudge towards its owner), or sad, to the point of even "crippling" ourselves.

With desire comes the ability to aspire to act; strive; do for the sake of oneself (selfishness), or anything else (selflessness). Upon this inevitable choice—made knowingly or unknowingly—lays the foundation of human behavior and subsequently the extent we've ever and presently manipulated our environment and organized ourselves up until now as a species, and what will, objectively—God or not, forever govern over the future of the tomorrow of the most conscious, capable species on this planet; the ones with the most potential for either itself, or anything else.

"Know thyself." - The first of three Ancient Greek maxims chosen to be inscribed into the Temple of Apollo where the Oracle of Delphi resided in Ancient Greece

"When you can understand everything [things] you can forgive anything [things]." - Leo Tolstoy

If all vanity or "vapor;" "breath," is a temporal doing "under the sun," is there any vanity or "vapor;" "breath" that man can conjure with the potential to even last forever?: https://lemmy.world/post/38610737

Son(s)/daughter(s): Product(s); products of the resurrection (Luke 20:36), products of this age (Luke 20:34), products of Jerusalem (Luke 23:28), products of your Father who is in Heaven (Matt 5:45), products of God (Matt 5:9)—product of the living God (Matt 16:16). Whatever we're presently believing to be most right and rational, thus, true, is what determines what or who we ultimately become a product of and where we build our house (our life): Out on the sand, where the tide, moth, rust, and worm ultimately destroy, or on the rock, with people like Jesus and what the Ten Warnings (don't do things like steal, murder, and make sure to honor your parents or you'll only—ultimately—regret it like crazy when met with the sobering influence of our own death) were made of, a material with the ability to last far longer, potentially even eternally (Matt 7:24).

“You are of your father the devil [instinct]." - John 8:44

"The Living God": Our unique and profound ability to retain and transfer knowledge in contrast to nature. Without humans on an Earth, there's nothing to give life to any degree of knowledge and to keep it living, even eternally (or as long as man is capable and willing to do so), including the knowledge of a God; the salt is our unique and profound ability for selflessness in contrast to nature and knowledge is the light (Matt 5:13, 14).

"Eternal Life": When we die, our names are resurrected via this unique and profound ability, potentially becoming a "sign" (Luke 11:29) to people by becoming "equal to angels and are sons [products] of God" (Luke 20:36), gaining new life after death, inspiring present and future humans to live not by the path that instinct reveals to us (as the Ninevites would've if not for Jonah's influence)—that we would be more inherently drawn to being absent this knowledge, thus, influence; it being the wider, easier path (Matt 7:13)—but the more narrow path knowledge reveals to us, that instinct would lead us in the opposite direction of and to not even be able to begin to consider otherwise—lack of knowledge being a blindness; you can't see what you can't understand, and you can't understand what you don't know, and you can't know anything until you know.

"And should not I pity Nineveh, that great city, in which there are more than 120,000 persons who do not know their right hand from their left, and also much cattle?” - Jonah 4:11

"Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do." - Luke 23:34

Genesis Chapter Five: https://biblehub.com/lsv/genesis/5.htm

"1 This [is] an account of the generations of Adam. In the day of God’s creating man, in the likeness of God He has made him; 2 a male and a female He has created them, and He blesses them, and calls their name Man, in the day of their being created. 3 And Adam lives one hundred and thirty years [[or two hundred and thirty years]], and begets [a son] in his likeness, according to his image, and calls his name Seth. 4 And the days of Adam after his begetting Seth are eight hundred years [[or seven hundred years]], and he begets sons and daughters. 5 And all the days of Adam which he lived are nine hundred and thirty years, and he dies."

"The Son of Man": Adam didn't literally live 930 years. He literally lived for 130 years, and his name was resurrected after death, leading to his life after death for 830 years, giving birth to not literal sons and daughters, but in the same sense that you and I are a son or daughter of Jesus and his "sign" or influence (becoming products of the resurrection) the same way the people of that time were inspired by Adam and Seth's influence, and so on. Just as the Ninevites became sons or daughters of Jonah. Making people like Adam, Seth, Enos, etc, Noah, Abraham, Moses, Jesus, Socrates, Gandhi, heck, even Abraham Lincoln, Sons of Man. When we follow through with this way and this life (this way of living), defined by the precepts of the Sermon on the Mount - Matt 5-7, as well as break free of the shackles of living in the effects of those that have become before us, and unto living a life of being the cause of the effects—of what the world is yet to become, we begin to walk the path of this "true life," potentially becoming a Son of Man ourselves, provided of course we're—at the very least—able to follow through with the true cost of discipleship: To hate your life in this world and renounce all that you have (Luke 14:25, 33).

"Those who love their life, lose it. Those who hate their life in this world, keep it for eternal life." - John 12:25

I regard rationality as a tool for solving problems and fulfilling needs. In my view, genuine rationality possesses three essential features:

Honesty with oneself—recognizing one’s own needs.

Awareness of the probability of success for the chosen strategy.

A utilitarian orientation—there must be actual benefit.

If these three points are met, the action can be considered rational.

Explanation of the First Point When a subject faces a problem, they should seek a way to resolve it. I believe one must set aside external voices and listen to the innermost thoughts. Once an idea emerges, the root of the problem should be clarified, and then a strategy chosen according to the circumstances.

Explanation of the Second Point When a problem has a direction for resolution, one should understand the success rates of different strategies under that direction. If one merely guesses at random, without clarity about the outcome or feasibility, this cannot be considered rational.

Explanation of the Third Point The use of rationality should aim at obtaining benefit. Here, “benefit” includes psychological benefit, that is, a sense of gain, though material benefit outweighs psychological benefit. I define psychological benefit as an additional gain obtained through one’s own effort—achieving the desired result and, after subtracting costs, retaining surplus. If psychological benefit is given passively by others, whether it counts depends on whether it was part of one’s plan. If it was intentionally sought, it can be considered rational. This definition of psychological benefit applies only to judging whether an action is rational.

Is schadenfreude rational? It is not rational, because feeling joy at another’s misfortune involves no element of self-acquisition; it is bestowed, not additionally gained. Envy is similar to schadenfreude but more oriented toward planning. It is not rational, because constant fantasizing consumes great energy while yielding little. Moreover, both are regarded by others as malicious acts, which can damage one’s reputation and future life.

Is avoiding pain rational? If the gain equals the cost, it is rational, because inaction would mean loss. If the cost exceeds the benefit, it is irrational. This is often seen in yielding to others’ non-coercive threats. Coercive threats refer to matters involving life, property, and freedom.

Are rational actions under irrational goals themselves irrational? This can be divided into two cases: irrationality due to impossibility, and irrationality due to failing to meet the definition of rationality. Actions under impossible goals cannot achieve the ultimate purpose, and are therefore irrational. Goals that fail to meet the definition of rationality are naturally irrational, even if subordinate actions achieve their expected results.

Long-term and Short-term Goals Long-term goals are necessarily composed of countless smaller goals. If some small goals are irrational but do not prevent the long-term goal from meeting the definition, the overall remains rational. Small goals that fail to meet the definition, as long as they do not affect the long-term goal, still leave the overall rational. Short-term goals can be considered rational as long as they meet the definition of rationality.

Rationality and Its Independence from Other Values I believe rationality is unrelated to good and evil. Rationality becomes associated with goodness only because choosing good encounters less resistance and has a higher chance of success; over time, rationality and goodness become linked. Rationality is also unrelated to success or failure—the key lies in cognition. As long as the three points of rationality are met, even failure can be rational. Furthermore, rationality is not tied to the magnitude of value. Greater benefit does not necessarily mean greater rationality; rather, within the available options, rationality lies in choosing what is most suitable for oneself.

Rationality is not a guarantee of success; its core lies in recognition. Benefit is not the inevitable result of success, but rather the standard by which we judge whether an action is worthwhile. A rational act must carry the intention of pursuing benefit; otherwise, it is nothing more than arbitrariness or emotional impulse.