I am always perplexed the very complex, complicated and convoluted biochemical pathways that make cells, tissues, organs, organisms stay alive and function properly. Analyzing such things is 100 times more complicated than what a politician has to process. And yes, it is true that many doctors and in general medicine ends up treating symptoms and not causes...
But I think what is missing in this nice essay, as in most of the essays is a presentation of the intent. I will explain myself and I think I raised the issue before.
The sense ones gets from Aurelien's recounts and from his long experience working for government in UK is that everything works in a reactive mode. Certainly, many a time that happens, there are events, natural and man-made that overtake us, we are not prepared or we are ill prepared, never saw that happening, whatever. But other events, oh we work so hard to prepare for them. For instance, the US has developed the ultraheavy, deep penetrating bombs allegedly used in Iran specifically for Iran's facilities. This IS intent and this is something that Aurelien seldom talks about, especially when it comes to the West's intentions. Sometimes, I think that the "Yes Minister" captures much better this issue than my words can describe. See for instance why is the UK in the EU scene: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZVYqB0uTKlE
I had a little jolt reading this:
"The first is that intelligence agencies (and organisations like the IAEA and for that matter various technical NGOs) give very precise answers to very precise questions, and these answers are generally highly nuanced and caveated."
I don't remember IAEA ever indicated who is actually bombing the Zaporojie nuclear power plant, the largest in Europe. Because they don't know? Nah, there is intent there.
So, please, next time, when the issue of nuance and complexity is broached again, please include some thoughts and comments on what are the current priors and policies, written and unwritten about an issue. And maybe we will be better able to distinguish between nuance, complexity, and actual obfuscation... Like Thomas Picketty was saying about poverty: "The persistence of extreme inequality will depend, primarily, on the effectiveness of the apparatus of justification." Obfuscation.
Maybe an idea for a future essay, eh?! Just saying.
Exactly! I was thinking the same intent logic thread with Israels Hezbolla Pagers and infiltration of Iran with hundreds of agents, truckloads of equipment etc.
There are things where there is clear planing involved for "certain contingencies" months ahead before events imply that there is complicated and nuanced information.
In many cases, information releases are post decision and not the real input for the decision making, but are still presented as such like the IAEA report.
I agree with much of this BUT before you take sides on any controversial issue you have to analyse it in the round and that takes time and study of its complexity. To do that effectively does demand some knowledge and experience in raising yourself up above your prejudices. That's sometimes the difficult bit. It helps if you have experience in having to analyse information as a basis for making decisions but then more often than not in formal politics and large organisations this tends to be about justifying acceptable courses of action - in other words fashioning an 'acceptable' policy which is resource possible and effective and limits conflict as much as possible.
Experience helps which is why (in my view) our national politics is so poor. As I recall the irascible Robin Day saying to the hapless Minister of Defence at the time of the Falklands War ' Why should we listen to you - here today and gone tomorrow' at which point the MInister - (John Nott I think) - ripped of the microphone and walked out of the interview. So many politicians genuinely think they understand and want to understand - but don't. My gut instinct at the time was that the Falklands war was barmy but I kept quiet. Looking back at it I wish I hadn't. We 'won' but it would have been much better for the country in every sense if it had never been fought. A complete diversion and waste of resources that sent us up a cul-de-sac we still haven't got to the end of. Last year we bought the 'Iron Dome' off Israel to protect it!
"We 'won' but it would have been much better for the country in every sense if it had never been fought. A complete diversion and waste of resources that sent us up a cul-de-sac we still haven't got to the end of. "
From the point of the view of the rulers, none of this matters. Their personal fortunes, safety and sinecures all are safe, and the war was a complete success from their perspective.
Since the elites aren't paying for any diversion of resources, they don't care and have no reason to care.
If we look at the history of humanity, we could actually interpret the whole of it as the result of the constant struggle for the control of the human being between the thalamus and the frontal cortex areas of the brain. What explains Empires, if not the Thalamic Victory of a simplified idea (Native Americans/Africans/Asians/Aboriginals/Barbarians are less-then-human and we have the God-given Responsibility to "bring civilization" to them) over nuanced, Frontal-Cortex ones (like we don't own the planet, it is the planet to own us, etc)? An amazing overture on this is Graeber & Wengrove's "The Dawn of Everything".
Nowadays (at least compared to the Education I received in the 70s) it is all about Speed hence Thalamic responses hence Simplification hence Non-Understanding hence Tribes hence War.
According to Hindu texts, the Universe cycles from Total Truth to Total Untruth until it is burnt in its entirety on the banks of the Ganges (sic) before starting anew.
Surely nowadays it feels like Kali Yuga is quickly approaching its end - the question is whether it makes any sense at all clinging to the losing propositions of the Butler.....but maybe it's more complicated than this LOL.
Just as a counterpoint to the anecdotal evidence of declining book reading: I use my smartphone a lot while traveling, but almost entirely to read. This includes a wide range of non-fiction and fiction--and I suspect (purely upon anecdotal evidence!) that quite a few other smartphone users are doing precisely the same thing. What we read varies, but we shouldn't be turned invisible solely upon the basis of a General Belief.
1. "All of which is depressing in that it suggests that we are moving towards a post-literate culture, and reinforces the worries I have expressed recently about the declining ability to see arguments in all their complexity, and the transformation of political positions into football chants."
Why do you think I call the two US legacy parties "Team R" and "Team D"? To be frank, I hear more reasoned and fact-based rationales from the average frustrated football fan as to why they support a given team or player, than I hear from most supporters of a given political party.
2. Concerning Iran and Russia, the real goal is not exactly regime change, but to turn these countries into failed states, much like what was done to Iraq, Libya and Syria. Breaking things is faster, cheaper and easier than replacing the government with one more to the West's liking.
This of course, cannot be said out loud.
But since there are no consequences for the rulers, they paid and pay no price for their deeds, it doesn't matter.
"2. Concerning Iran and Russia, the real goal is not exactly regime change, but to turn these countries into failed states"
Yeah. It's going so well, so far. Russia (and possibly Iran, if they get their act together) come out of this much stronger militarily than before, and both have enhanced internal cohesion.
Meantime, it is the US that is becoming a failed state - rapidly crumbling infrastructure, declining military capacity, disappearing industrial capacity, incompetent and delusional political structures etc. etc.
Well, some research into the state of US roads, bridges, sewage systems, and into the reasons for the numerous failed or cancelled weapons systems might provide a little more insight into that subject.
Well said. The flash flood in Texas was immediately blamed on the reduction of Weather Service personnel by the Trump administration by those who especially loathe the Trump administration. Simple and satisfying for partisans but if explanatory at all,. which looks increasingly doubtful, is marginal. In the days since the flood explanation and analysis added both complexity and nuance and painted a picture, subject to further modification, of the limiting factors of time, terrain, and technology. I suppose the simple answer was the warning system considered but not built because of its cost. "For want of a nail, the shoe was lost." and so forth.
What is being done and who is doing it and what are are the aims of the reshuffling in the Caucasus? Identify one course of action and ten contingencies pop up each throwing off contingent possibilities. "It's complicated." I submit that uncomplicated decisions tend to be ones involving safety and survival. There is only one course of action and that must be taken immediately without conscious thought. Beyond that lies ever exfoliating levels of complaxity and nuance.
It's a mistake to think that people (governments) who don't care about you care enough to actively plan mini-plots to harm you. Mere indifference and neglect is usually enough.
As usual I am going to pick on one small aspect of the essay - to do more would require a counter-essay. Plus it allows me to indulge myself in a little (focussed?) invective to round off the day. I suspect that many of the replies here, and even the lead essay, are coming from a similar position. Or am I being needlessly cynical? I probably will never know.
”But more widely, traditionalist Catholicism, often of pre-Vatican 2 vintage, has retained its force, as has evangelical Christianity. Although part of the attraction of such systems is that they have retained the magical and dramatic aspects that religion used to display, the principal reason is surely that they are not afraid to tell worshippers The Truth and ask them to believe it.”
I can hardly give the latter part of this statement much credence. Asking anyone to ‘believe’ rather than to analyse and come to a reasoned belief cannot contribute to credibility - only to emotional surrender - which is hardly conducive to a true belief, although of course it can lead to a blissful ignorance. My experience of this process when first introduced to it was to come to the conclusion that the ‘truth’ was both ridiculous and a parcel of poorly formulated archaic lies and contradictory demands. (Although on the other hand it seems true that “few of us actively enjoy living in a meaningless universe”).
This rather suggests that while religious belief arguably may provide societal cohesion, and is certainly valuable thereby, it is very often poorly designed for the purpose. For those who want to argue that this was not so for medieval Europe when belief was supposedly comprehensive, there are in fact records of belching, farting and sarcastic, mocking remarks and hostile questioning during sermons in England at that time. Presumably this was the same in other countries. (The only religion [if it is a religion] to invite verification by trial rather than belief, is Buddhism).
As for the following comparison of Catholicism to Stalinism, no doubt people who had a psychological need for a place within a rigid hierarchy would be drawn to either scheme, but that really doesn’t say anything very meaningful about the ideologies behind each one, or their validity (not that, as previously noted, I am concerned for the validity of Christianity (or for that matter, Stalinism).
The paragraphs following the above quote dredge up, as is often the case in these essays, various straw men for the author to take a pop at. Eventually he blames those “who had learned Marxist slogans without ever engaging with the actual theory”. I disagree. The blame for the vacuousness of the people referred to lies with the neo-liberal policies forcibly introduced by Thatcher and her worship of Hayek, and vigorously promoted by the commercial press, the ‘right’ and the capitalist [is threre any other kind] establishment.
I think it is absolutely crazy how leftists have been rejecting Christianity for centuries but quickly embraced Islam. Islam, at its base (I don't even talk about practice) is way more "right-wing" religion. Christianity explicitly says "it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God". In Islam, the rich man should pay tax and that's it. Merchant is the most revered profession. Most Christianity denominations glorify poverty (just like the Communism), Islam is at best neutral about it.
Quickly embraced Islam? I mean, if you think that the left not wanting to see muslims blown to pieces and having their countries taken over by Western Oligarchs.
Its the same with Aurelians comments on the Iranian revolution, ironically lacking nuance in a post about nuance.
The nuance being, at least this is Iran regaining control of their own nation and deposing the Western backed Shah. We'd have prefered if Mossadegh had stayed in power or if it was a socialist revolution, but we'll take what we can get when a country can escape the clutches of the American Empire. And yet I still don't like Theocracies.
" Most Christianity denominations glorify poverty" but in practice follow Mammon as if it was the redeemer returned.
Like most adherents to a particular religion, you can see the faults in the other ones, but are blind to those in your own chosen one. Remember the 'mote' and 'beam' parable.
And here the respected author could not do without Stalin. Still, the magic of this name is curious.
Last week, my youngest son asked me to go to Red Square and visit Lenin's mausoleum. He had heard a lot about Lenin, and he was curious. But he and I were more impressed by Stalin's grave near the Kremlin wall. This is a very amazing place with a very strong energy. It is unlikely that you will have the opportunity to visit it, but I regret that I have not been there before. As Stalin himself once said, "this thing is stronger than Goethe's Faust." And I'm not even kidding.
This is another excellent essay, thank you Aurelien. Nuance and complexity are certainly unwelcome elements in the process of taking decisions at political level, as is the insufficient level of available information. The example of the Iranian nuclear program is paradigmatic, and also shows how information is manipulated. But I wanted to add another element to the discussion, and this is the law. Decision making by political actors should also consider the boundaries provided by the law. So the question could be: we are not sure about the extent of the Iranian nuclear program advancements, the Iranians have not attacked us. Given these premises, would a preemptive strike be legal? Since the clear answer is no, the decision is taken. What I am trying to say is that current international politics is completely disregarding international law, and this not only is, obviously, illegal, but adds unpredictability and uncertainty to international relations.
Try quoting Bible verses to an armed robber. He already knows that robbery violates pretty much every law of God and man and yet he does it anyway. If that robber is in cahoots with the police, the judge, the D.A., you have no recourse.
Now, suppose you have a Colt Python, a big motherfucker magnum, held to that robber's head. Now he will be the one tearfully quoting Scripture, and he doesn't care in the slightest whether or not you have the legal right to spatter his brains on the wall, as long as he thinks you have the stones to do it.
Well, so much for 'law' then. In your scenario 'law' is a meaningless concept. But if it was really so meaningless it would never have been invented. Law in both national and international aspects, has a purpose - to stop the participants from destroying each other in a self-defeating exchange of violence in which either one, or both, may be completely destroyed. If you don't see the sense in that, you are either a seven foot over-muscled karate expert (who can always be beaten by a larger weapon in the hands of a six stone weakling) or a psychopath.
The fact that laws are disregarded is not an argument for disregarding them - it's an argument for enforcing them.
Count Alexander Benkendorf said, "Our laws are written for subordinates, not for superiors, and you have no right to refer to them in explanations with me."
And, amidst all of the subtleties, nuances, twists and turns at all levels taken into consideration at any one point is the added complexity of new conditions, new opinions and further nuances once the former have been digested and formulated into an opinion.
An interesting aspect of the question that would need ot be explored is axiomatic thought. These are the basic premises upon which we build opinions. They are primary, and as such cannot be logically deonstrated: they cannot be proven.
Yet they are essential to establishing all further opinions and judgments, and thus to making decisions.
What i believe and what the person I am talking to believe are factors that need to be considered....
It seems that you really don't get that the position of LFI supporting Muslims is anti imperialist and anti racist. It has contradictions inherently with Islamist movements, which are conservative and mostly nationalist, but it's not some useful idiot position welcoming the islamisation of Europe. I'd hope that the BSW has some influence going forward more generally with the European left, but I also doubt it because well, things are awful.
Complexity and nuance has always been with us.
I am always perplexed the very complex, complicated and convoluted biochemical pathways that make cells, tissues, organs, organisms stay alive and function properly. Analyzing such things is 100 times more complicated than what a politician has to process. And yes, it is true that many doctors and in general medicine ends up treating symptoms and not causes...
But I think what is missing in this nice essay, as in most of the essays is a presentation of the intent. I will explain myself and I think I raised the issue before.
The sense ones gets from Aurelien's recounts and from his long experience working for government in UK is that everything works in a reactive mode. Certainly, many a time that happens, there are events, natural and man-made that overtake us, we are not prepared or we are ill prepared, never saw that happening, whatever. But other events, oh we work so hard to prepare for them. For instance, the US has developed the ultraheavy, deep penetrating bombs allegedly used in Iran specifically for Iran's facilities. This IS intent and this is something that Aurelien seldom talks about, especially when it comes to the West's intentions. Sometimes, I think that the "Yes Minister" captures much better this issue than my words can describe. See for instance why is the UK in the EU scene: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZVYqB0uTKlE
I had a little jolt reading this:
"The first is that intelligence agencies (and organisations like the IAEA and for that matter various technical NGOs) give very precise answers to very precise questions, and these answers are generally highly nuanced and caveated."
I don't remember IAEA ever indicated who is actually bombing the Zaporojie nuclear power plant, the largest in Europe. Because they don't know? Nah, there is intent there.
So, please, next time, when the issue of nuance and complexity is broached again, please include some thoughts and comments on what are the current priors and policies, written and unwritten about an issue. And maybe we will be better able to distinguish between nuance, complexity, and actual obfuscation... Like Thomas Picketty was saying about poverty: "The persistence of extreme inequality will depend, primarily, on the effectiveness of the apparatus of justification." Obfuscation.
Maybe an idea for a future essay, eh?! Just saying.
Exactly! I was thinking the same intent logic thread with Israels Hezbolla Pagers and infiltration of Iran with hundreds of agents, truckloads of equipment etc.
There are things where there is clear planing involved for "certain contingencies" months ahead before events imply that there is complicated and nuanced information.
In many cases, information releases are post decision and not the real input for the decision making, but are still presented as such like the IAEA report.
Nice!
I agree with much of this BUT before you take sides on any controversial issue you have to analyse it in the round and that takes time and study of its complexity. To do that effectively does demand some knowledge and experience in raising yourself up above your prejudices. That's sometimes the difficult bit. It helps if you have experience in having to analyse information as a basis for making decisions but then more often than not in formal politics and large organisations this tends to be about justifying acceptable courses of action - in other words fashioning an 'acceptable' policy which is resource possible and effective and limits conflict as much as possible.
Experience helps which is why (in my view) our national politics is so poor. As I recall the irascible Robin Day saying to the hapless Minister of Defence at the time of the Falklands War ' Why should we listen to you - here today and gone tomorrow' at which point the MInister - (John Nott I think) - ripped of the microphone and walked out of the interview. So many politicians genuinely think they understand and want to understand - but don't. My gut instinct at the time was that the Falklands war was barmy but I kept quiet. Looking back at it I wish I hadn't. We 'won' but it would have been much better for the country in every sense if it had never been fought. A complete diversion and waste of resources that sent us up a cul-de-sac we still haven't got to the end of. Last year we bought the 'Iron Dome' off Israel to protect it!
"We 'won' but it would have been much better for the country in every sense if it had never been fought. A complete diversion and waste of resources that sent us up a cul-de-sac we still haven't got to the end of. "
From the point of the view of the rulers, none of this matters. Their personal fortunes, safety and sinecures all are safe, and the war was a complete success from their perspective.
Since the elites aren't paying for any diversion of resources, they don't care and have no reason to care.
If we look at the history of humanity, we could actually interpret the whole of it as the result of the constant struggle for the control of the human being between the thalamus and the frontal cortex areas of the brain. What explains Empires, if not the Thalamic Victory of a simplified idea (Native Americans/Africans/Asians/Aboriginals/Barbarians are less-then-human and we have the God-given Responsibility to "bring civilization" to them) over nuanced, Frontal-Cortex ones (like we don't own the planet, it is the planet to own us, etc)? An amazing overture on this is Graeber & Wengrove's "The Dawn of Everything".
Nowadays (at least compared to the Education I received in the 70s) it is all about Speed hence Thalamic responses hence Simplification hence Non-Understanding hence Tribes hence War.
According to Hindu texts, the Universe cycles from Total Truth to Total Untruth until it is burnt in its entirety on the banks of the Ganges (sic) before starting anew.
Surely nowadays it feels like Kali Yuga is quickly approaching its end - the question is whether it makes any sense at all clinging to the losing propositions of the Butler.....but maybe it's more complicated than this LOL.
Just as a counterpoint to the anecdotal evidence of declining book reading: I use my smartphone a lot while traveling, but almost entirely to read. This includes a wide range of non-fiction and fiction--and I suspect (purely upon anecdotal evidence!) that quite a few other smartphone users are doing precisely the same thing. What we read varies, but we shouldn't be turned invisible solely upon the basis of a General Belief.
1. "All of which is depressing in that it suggests that we are moving towards a post-literate culture, and reinforces the worries I have expressed recently about the declining ability to see arguments in all their complexity, and the transformation of political positions into football chants."
Why do you think I call the two US legacy parties "Team R" and "Team D"? To be frank, I hear more reasoned and fact-based rationales from the average frustrated football fan as to why they support a given team or player, than I hear from most supporters of a given political party.
2. Concerning Iran and Russia, the real goal is not exactly regime change, but to turn these countries into failed states, much like what was done to Iraq, Libya and Syria. Breaking things is faster, cheaper and easier than replacing the government with one more to the West's liking.
This of course, cannot be said out loud.
But since there are no consequences for the rulers, they paid and pay no price for their deeds, it doesn't matter.
"2. Concerning Iran and Russia, the real goal is not exactly regime change, but to turn these countries into failed states"
Yeah. It's going so well, so far. Russia (and possibly Iran, if they get their act together) come out of this much stronger militarily than before, and both have enhanced internal cohesion.
Meantime, it is the US that is becoming a failed state - rapidly crumbling infrastructure, declining military capacity, disappearing industrial capacity, incompetent and delusional political structures etc. etc.
Settle down. We've been hearing about an imminent American collapse since before my eyes opened.
I suspect that it's mostly cope, combined with a way for humans to tell themselves that the end of the empire is inevitable so no need to do anything.
Well, some research into the state of US roads, bridges, sewage systems, and into the reasons for the numerous failed or cancelled weapons systems might provide a little more insight into that subject.
We've been hearing that one for decades as well.
A poor reply, FF. I refer to facts, which are on record and can be verified. Try doing a bit of work here, instead of a facile dismissal.
We've been hearing similar recitations of facts for decades.
Well said. The flash flood in Texas was immediately blamed on the reduction of Weather Service personnel by the Trump administration by those who especially loathe the Trump administration. Simple and satisfying for partisans but if explanatory at all,. which looks increasingly doubtful, is marginal. In the days since the flood explanation and analysis added both complexity and nuance and painted a picture, subject to further modification, of the limiting factors of time, terrain, and technology. I suppose the simple answer was the warning system considered but not built because of its cost. "For want of a nail, the shoe was lost." and so forth.
What is being done and who is doing it and what are are the aims of the reshuffling in the Caucasus? Identify one course of action and ten contingencies pop up each throwing off contingent possibilities. "It's complicated." I submit that uncomplicated decisions tend to be ones involving safety and survival. There is only one course of action and that must be taken immediately without conscious thought. Beyond that lies ever exfoliating levels of complaxity and nuance.
It's a mistake to think that people (governments) who don't care about you care enough to actively plan mini-plots to harm you. Mere indifference and neglect is usually enough.
As usual I am going to pick on one small aspect of the essay - to do more would require a counter-essay. Plus it allows me to indulge myself in a little (focussed?) invective to round off the day. I suspect that many of the replies here, and even the lead essay, are coming from a similar position. Or am I being needlessly cynical? I probably will never know.
”But more widely, traditionalist Catholicism, often of pre-Vatican 2 vintage, has retained its force, as has evangelical Christianity. Although part of the attraction of such systems is that they have retained the magical and dramatic aspects that religion used to display, the principal reason is surely that they are not afraid to tell worshippers The Truth and ask them to believe it.”
I can hardly give the latter part of this statement much credence. Asking anyone to ‘believe’ rather than to analyse and come to a reasoned belief cannot contribute to credibility - only to emotional surrender - which is hardly conducive to a true belief, although of course it can lead to a blissful ignorance. My experience of this process when first introduced to it was to come to the conclusion that the ‘truth’ was both ridiculous and a parcel of poorly formulated archaic lies and contradictory demands. (Although on the other hand it seems true that “few of us actively enjoy living in a meaningless universe”).
This rather suggests that while religious belief arguably may provide societal cohesion, and is certainly valuable thereby, it is very often poorly designed for the purpose. For those who want to argue that this was not so for medieval Europe when belief was supposedly comprehensive, there are in fact records of belching, farting and sarcastic, mocking remarks and hostile questioning during sermons in England at that time. Presumably this was the same in other countries. (The only religion [if it is a religion] to invite verification by trial rather than belief, is Buddhism).
As for the following comparison of Catholicism to Stalinism, no doubt people who had a psychological need for a place within a rigid hierarchy would be drawn to either scheme, but that really doesn’t say anything very meaningful about the ideologies behind each one, or their validity (not that, as previously noted, I am concerned for the validity of Christianity (or for that matter, Stalinism).
The paragraphs following the above quote dredge up, as is often the case in these essays, various straw men for the author to take a pop at. Eventually he blames those “who had learned Marxist slogans without ever engaging with the actual theory”. I disagree. The blame for the vacuousness of the people referred to lies with the neo-liberal policies forcibly introduced by Thatcher and her worship of Hayek, and vigorously promoted by the commercial press, the ‘right’ and the capitalist [is threre any other kind] establishment.
I think it is absolutely crazy how leftists have been rejecting Christianity for centuries but quickly embraced Islam. Islam, at its base (I don't even talk about practice) is way more "right-wing" religion. Christianity explicitly says "it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God". In Islam, the rich man should pay tax and that's it. Merchant is the most revered profession. Most Christianity denominations glorify poverty (just like the Communism), Islam is at best neutral about it.
Quickly embraced Islam? I mean, if you think that the left not wanting to see muslims blown to pieces and having their countries taken over by Western Oligarchs.
Its the same with Aurelians comments on the Iranian revolution, ironically lacking nuance in a post about nuance.
The nuance being, at least this is Iran regaining control of their own nation and deposing the Western backed Shah. We'd have prefered if Mossadegh had stayed in power or if it was a socialist revolution, but we'll take what we can get when a country can escape the clutches of the American Empire. And yet I still don't like Theocracies.
See, nuance!
" Most Christianity denominations glorify poverty" but in practice follow Mammon as if it was the redeemer returned.
Like most adherents to a particular religion, you can see the faults in the other ones, but are blind to those in your own chosen one. Remember the 'mote' and 'beam' parable.
Yeah most religions and ideologies are more or less hypocritical, but we're talking about ideas that lie in their foundation.
And here the respected author could not do without Stalin. Still, the magic of this name is curious.
Last week, my youngest son asked me to go to Red Square and visit Lenin's mausoleum. He had heard a lot about Lenin, and he was curious. But he and I were more impressed by Stalin's grave near the Kremlin wall. This is a very amazing place with a very strong energy. It is unlikely that you will have the opportunity to visit it, but I regret that I have not been there before. As Stalin himself once said, "this thing is stronger than Goethe's Faust." And I'm not even kidding.
This is another excellent essay, thank you Aurelien. Nuance and complexity are certainly unwelcome elements in the process of taking decisions at political level, as is the insufficient level of available information. The example of the Iranian nuclear program is paradigmatic, and also shows how information is manipulated. But I wanted to add another element to the discussion, and this is the law. Decision making by political actors should also consider the boundaries provided by the law. So the question could be: we are not sure about the extent of the Iranian nuclear program advancements, the Iranians have not attacked us. Given these premises, would a preemptive strike be legal? Since the clear answer is no, the decision is taken. What I am trying to say is that current international politics is completely disregarding international law, and this not only is, obviously, illegal, but adds unpredictability and uncertainty to international relations.
Law is meaningless. Enforcement is the only thing that matters.
You mean, I suspect, that "Law is meaningless without impartial enforcement"?
Try quoting Bible verses to an armed robber. He already knows that robbery violates pretty much every law of God and man and yet he does it anyway. If that robber is in cahoots with the police, the judge, the D.A., you have no recourse.
Now, suppose you have a Colt Python, a big motherfucker magnum, held to that robber's head. Now he will be the one tearfully quoting Scripture, and he doesn't care in the slightest whether or not you have the legal right to spatter his brains on the wall, as long as he thinks you have the stones to do it.
Well, so much for 'law' then. In your scenario 'law' is a meaningless concept. But if it was really so meaningless it would never have been invented. Law in both national and international aspects, has a purpose - to stop the participants from destroying each other in a self-defeating exchange of violence in which either one, or both, may be completely destroyed. If you don't see the sense in that, you are either a seven foot over-muscled karate expert (who can always be beaten by a larger weapon in the hands of a six stone weakling) or a psychopath.
The fact that laws are disregarded is not an argument for disregarding them - it's an argument for enforcing them.
Law is very useful, as a cover, a pretext. That's why it was invented. Otherwise, as a social pact, it is only as effective as its enforcement.
Hell, some ancient Greek had it figured out, that laws are spiderwebs that catch the weak but that the strong can safely ignore.
Count Alexander Benkendorf said, "Our laws are written for subordinates, not for superiors, and you have no right to refer to them in explanations with me."
Every other country too, as Feral Finster would affirm.
The rise of the long form podcast gives us hope.
And, amidst all of the subtleties, nuances, twists and turns at all levels taken into consideration at any one point is the added complexity of new conditions, new opinions and further nuances once the former have been digested and formulated into an opinion.
An interesting aspect of the question that would need ot be explored is axiomatic thought. These are the basic premises upon which we build opinions. They are primary, and as such cannot be logically deonstrated: they cannot be proven.
Yet they are essential to establishing all further opinions and judgments, and thus to making decisions.
What i believe and what the person I am talking to believe are factors that need to be considered....
'Time wins more arguments than persuasion'
My usual italian translation:
"Il succo della questione.
Ovvero, in difesa della sfumatura."
https://trying2understandw.blogspot.com/2025/07/il-succo-della-questione-ovvero-in.html
It seems that you really don't get that the position of LFI supporting Muslims is anti imperialist and anti racist. It has contradictions inherently with Islamist movements, which are conservative and mostly nationalist, but it's not some useful idiot position welcoming the islamisation of Europe. I'd hope that the BSW has some influence going forward more generally with the European left, but I also doubt it because well, things are awful.