The U.S. Goverment

[jorb]

They never had any true scientific understanding or methods being used to justify a new system.

Precisely my point. But that was nevertheless what they believed themselves to have.

No idea how you come to this conclusion, but I find it to be dangerous. Denying the existance of a universal morality (which you then do again in the Edit) is far more likely to create such systems as Nazi Germany than a critical theory ever could.

Is it, though? In my personal case it has obviously lead to a fair amount of tolerance for difference. I do not wish to throw myself off to war just because some country on the other side of the globe has a different form of government than my country, yet that seems to be almost a national sport in democracies. If they wish to reform their institutions then let them. I do not consider it to be any of my business. I could very well argue that it is precisely the belief in universal morality that lends itself to intolerance. You will notice that the Abrahamitic religions in general believe firmly in universal morality, and their reputation for tolerance isn't exactly legendary.

Those are big words you are just throwing out there.

That's what we do here, isn't it?

I would say the exact opposite is the case. There is nothing more scientific and more rational than the philosophy of Enlightenment. It is the very essenceof every rational thinking that has ever occured wether the ones thinking it knew that or not.

I consider it erroneous to believe that you can a priori reason your way to a good system of governance. I believe that the forms of governance that are generally good are those that have been proven so by experience. One would be hard pressed to find a more stable, peaceful and lasting order than that of Monarchy. One would be hard pressed to even identify a democracy that has lasted more than a few hundred years. Switzerland, perhaps.

[jorb]

Oh, no need to, I'm quite familiar with the argument. One hears it repeated time and time again. It is used all the time when people want to argue for going to war in far flung places of the world to spread the gospel of democracy to them by force of arms. I've used it to precisely that effect myself.

Maybe that isn't what the argument was intended to be used for when it was first presented, but I again make the observation that it can easily be used to that effect. Democracy leads to universal peace, thus we should spread democracy. The rest is just a question of what means one employs to achieve the end, no?

[burgingham]

You should start to distinguish those interested in providing theories as a tool to get close to the truth of understanding human nature and systems created by humans and between those abusing such systems to graft their ideologies on top of them to justify questionable actions.

I think this sums it up pretty good then. Just because the Nazis or whoever pretended to use some sort of critical thinking to justify their system, doesn't make a critical theory bad per se. Just because some religions that are not very open-minded believe in a universal morality doesn't mean that there is no such thing as a universal moral code.

That is what I am arguing about: We need to use the methods I presented as exactly that: Scientific methods or tools. In an unbiased and rational context they can only help to discover truth and that is all I am striving for.

[jorb]

This is, in my mind, a depiction of the triumph of civilization over barbarism, and by that I do not mean to imply that France is barbaric and Germany civilized, but that I believe it to be a wondrous thing that these two people could sit down and have a discussion with each other, free from hatred, even after having fought a war. Would something similar even be imaginable today, in the era of international courts and criminal tribunals set up to impose the victor's "justice" on the losing side?

After the battle of Wörth, two correspondents of the Paris journals were brought into the presence of the Crown Prince, who ordered them to be set free; and the interview is thus described by one of them :--

"Prince Frederick William, heir to the crown of Prussia, is a man of tall stature, thin, with a calm and placid countenance; but in the curve of his aquiline nose and his dilating nostrils (lol) there are evidences of energy, while the rapidity of his glance convinces you of his decision. A full fair beard softens the somewhat stern expression of his features. He has great simplicity of manner, and affects rather a kind of bourgeois style of speaking, thinking, and general behaviour. He speaks French with great purity, without foreign accent beyond a slight German intonaton and occasional hesitation at certain words. 'Do you speak German, Sir?" said he to me. 'No, Prince, not sufficiently.' 'I am sorry for it, as otherwise you would have heard in what manner our troops speak of yours, and in what esteem they hold them.' 'I thank you very much for that opinion.' 'Oh! it is quite deserved. We have all admired the tenacity and the courage which have been evinced by even the humblest of your soldiers.' Then, with much delicate consideration, and almost making excuses for mentioning the facts to us, he told us that they had taken between 3000 and 4000 prisoners, thirty guns, six mitrailleuses, and two eagles. 'Among the prisoners', said he, 'is General Raoult. I went this morning to see him at Reichshofen, where he lies wounded, his hip and thigh being broken; I fear that he is now dying. He is a brave officer, and he has given me som addresses in Paris, to which he wishes letters to be sent.' 'But, Prince,' I observed, 'the other prisoners also have families.' 'I have thought of that. I have had them supplied with writing materials; the letters will be sent unsealed to our Consul at Geneva, who will forward them to France.' 'Prince, we thank you on behalf of the mothers whose grief you are about to assuage.' 'I do not like war, gentlemen. If I should reign I would never make it. Now, despite my love of peace, this is the third campaign I have been compelled to make. I went over the battle-field yesterday. It was frightful. If it only depended upon myself this war would end here."

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/c ... C_1870.PNG

That is what Europe, and the West in general, used to be.

The Marine Corps is promising to investigate a disturbing video that appears to show Marines in Afghanistan urinating on the bloody corpses of alleged Taliban fighters, officials at the Pentagon said Wednesday.

http://www.airforcetimes.com/news/2012/ ... eo-011112/

This is what it has become.

Perhaps I am wrong, perhaps democracy, rationalism, nihilism, egalitarianism and the death of God has nothing to do with it. Perhaps there isn't even any "it". Perhaps I see the past through some rosy colored lens of cultural nostalgia. I am very open to those possibilities. I could very well be dead wrong. It just strikes me as something worth thinking about, and I often do.

Scientific methods or tools. In an unbiased and rational context they can only help to discover truth and that is all I am striving for.

You and me both, then. Let us hope we find it, or at least some part of it, and let us hold on to it dearly if we do.

Most of the world is a mystery. Consciousness is a little clearing in a vast forest; every individual has his own special relation to the area of mystery, his own little discoveries to impart. Discovery is by definition unpredictable, and it is absurd for the state to foreclose the process of learning. There are moods when we are too exhausted to imagine that there is still more to be learned; an ideology is a system of ideas that wants to end the explorations we are constantly making at the margin of consciousness, and to declare all the mysteries solved.

[Potjeh]

So people had spin doctors back then. I don't see the big difference.

[jorb]

So people had spin doctors back then. I don't see the big difference.

Did they? It's from an English newspaper. And calling him a dictator sadly only serves to illustrate your complete ignorance of the Prussian constitutional tradition. The man was widely regarded in Europe.

[burgingham]

Would something similar even be imaginable today, in the era of international courts and criminal tribunals set up to impose the victor's "justice" on the losing side?

No, you are right it wouldn't be since those two countries have cultivated a deep friendship over the past 50 years and don't need to go to war again

[jorb]

No, you are right it wouldn't be since those two countries have cultivated a deep friendship over the past 50 years and don't need to go to war again

I guess we'll see about that when the euro collapses.

[Potjeh]

When did I call him a dictator?

Also, it's amazing what money can get you. Though, I guess I should give him the benefit of the doubt and assume he didn't bribe the journalists. Instead he might've simply put up a show for them. I've seen some officers who were supposedly rescuing enemy civilians in news reports get exposed as war criminals later on. And naturally, when the peace was finally being brokered every side tried to present itself as reasonable and amicable.

My point is that "civilized war" is an oxymoron. All war is hell, and all armies rape and pillage. And you shouldn't believe everything you read.

[jorb]

Apologies. I read "had to spin dictators" instead of spin doctor.

No one is denying that war is hell, least of all the man I just quoted.

EDIT: And all armies may rape or plunder, but some seem to do it more than others, or are, say, the eastern and western fronts of WWII equivalent in your mind?

You should, indeed, not believe everything you read, but does this statement apply any more to me than it does to you? I mean... it's hard to have a discussion on the subject when any historical datum I might point to will simply be dismissed off-hand because "I shouldn't believe everything I read". At some point I have to decide to believe some of the things I read.