The rationality premise is difficult to believe 100%. That fact that most people are capable of discovering truth through logical analysis is a little to grey for me. When throwing out terms such as truth and logical analysis is circumstantial. We can argue that what is logical and truthful for an American Indian living in Montana is different for a 18 year old that has grown up in New York City their entire life. The environment we are raised in determines so much of what is made up of our idea of logical reasoning. I do agree that most people are capable of using their own individualistic reasoning to come to a truth. But, I think truth or logical analysis are too strong of adjectives. Off the top of my head I would say people are capable to reason or analyze. But, to say that there is truth or logic is too much of a grey area for my taste.
In looking at perfectibility I am not sure about the whole we are all born in sin thing. But, I generally agree that we are all capable of achieving goodness through effort and control. The problem is there are a few of us humans that need a tremendous amount of effort and control to achieve goodness. Even good people can become greedy and selfish. In taking a line out of the Batman movie, "Sometimes there are people that just want to watch the world burn," I guess I am more of an optimist in that I believe we are all possible of goodness. It is up to the people of our society to put forth the extra amount of time and effort to get through to those people that becomes difficult to find goodness.
The mutability premise is the easiest for me to believe. The idea that human behavior is shaped by environmental factors and we can improve people's circumstances by improving their psychological and physical circumstances in improving their environment. The other side to this argument is that some of the highest achieving people in our cultures are those who came from difficult environments and motivated them to reach a high level of success based on the difficult environment they grew up in. But, on the whole improving people's psychological and physical circumstances will change a person's images of themselves.
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Hi Chip9,
ReplyDeleteI like what you said in regards to the other side of the mutability premise argument in that some of the highest achieving people in our cultures are those that who came from difficult environments and motivated themselves to reach a high level of success based on the difficult environment they grew up in. A great example is our President Obama. He was born to a White hippie woman and a Black American father who left when he was a young child in the 1960’s. Therefore, he was raised in a single family home. Although the odds of success were against him, he was able to graduate with a Law degree and today, is the first Black American President of the United States of America
Hello,
ReplyDeleteI really think your views on this topic are dead on. Not to get into religion, but people are affected a lot by their society surroundings, and sometimes the strongest, smartest, and most moral person might do something that he/she is not proud off.
But through effort and control, we can learn to fight off the evil thoughts to do a crime, or selfish thing to somebody and be the people that we aspire to be. I noted that most people achieve the things by the type of environment they grew up in, but you made a great point on President Obama. He grew up in a single home and probably raised himself a lot of times; He could've gone astray and into the wrong direction, but he knew that he had a goal and he knew right from wrong even if he didn't grow up in an idealistic successful surrounding.