Wednesday, July 06, 2011
Power and Benevolence
Agreed, people are not "evil" - Socrates said that "all people by nature desire the good" for no one ever says "A is better than B. B is inferior so therefore I choose B over A. People like bin Laden actually believed that they are doing something pleasing to Allah. Even during the Spanish Inquisition, they believed that a Jew or Muslim would spend an eternity in torment BUT if after only a few hours of torture they would confess the one true faith and be baptized, then they could be executed and go to paradise for eternity. I spent literally 50 years watching Sci-Fi/Horror when suddenly a few years ago it struck me like a bolt of lightening that any species that could develop a technology to travel light-years and enslave or destroy Earth MUST of necessity developed the compassion and equanimity to use such Godlike power for benevolent rather than malevolent ends otherwise they would have long ago destroyed themselves.
