utterly absurd wrote:
ToughDiamond wrote:
But I'd rather meet a person than a tiger.
I can agree with this. But if a tiger kills you it's because they need to eat, while if a human kills you it's because they decided to despite knowing it's wrong. That's more how I was thinking of it. But I've also been feeling very cynical lately so maybe that's affecting my view. I want to think we're as good as other animals, but I'm finding it hard to believe that.
Also, more humans are killed by humans than by tigers. But of course other factors go into that.
Somehow the idea (that the animal didn't know any better) doesn't much enter into it for me. I guess that's partly because I don't think it's easy to know for sure what the (human) assailant is thinking and feeling at the time. I tend to think everything is predetermined, in which case the human has no more choice than the tiger. When it comes to things that attack me or my loved ones, I'm rather cold and calculated about it, and am mostly concerned with neutralising the material danger. If I probe the motives and mindset of the assailant, it's likely to be for the purpose of figuring out whether there's any way of talking my way out of trouble, of appealing to the assailant or to others.
Moral indignation is an interesting subject, and most societies have criminal justice systems that express or sanction moral indignation to a degree. The book, "A Clockwork Orange" springs to mind.
25 Nov 2024, 12:45 pm
