I'm currently halfway through War and Peace ( I feel like I'm never going to finish this book. Is it worth it?) and I got pretty bored, so I flicked to the back and found Tolstoy's notes on the text, which actually put forth some interesting points. I also flicked through the second epilogue. He makes a lot of rhetorical questions he seems to explore, but not answer. So I put it to you
What force do you think drives nations? What would cause millions of people to kill millions of others? Are people just manipulated into doing it? So then if we were eternally vigilant against war could we maintain world peace? 'If you want peace, you must prepare for war.' What about that?
Of what significance are world leaders in the events that actually happen?
Tolstoy makes the point that within our lives it seems like we have complete control of everything that happens, but in retrospect it all seemed so inevitable. Do you think we have control of our lives, or are we in fact controlled by destiny?
Quotes from Tolstoy's Notes on War and Peace
'I can undoubtedly commit an act or refrain from it if the act relates to me alone'
'We cannot but see that the more abstract and therefore the less connected with the activity of others our activity is, the more free it is; and on the contrary, the more our activity is connected with other people the less free it is.'
So does true freedom lie in complete isolation from society? If that is so, then it makes sense to assume that society does in actual fact control us and the ideal of freedom that so many people hold is in actual fact an illusion. I find this idea pretty interesting.
What do you think?
Actually, on a slightly related topic, the other day I was watching a documentary of some street kids in Bucharest. Some of them ended up drug addicts because they ran away from an orphanage that had a director who beat them. They don't have that much chance in life, but people are always talking about how much better the modern world is in comparison to the past because people nowadays are supposed to have so much more freedom; they are not doomed to spend their whole lives in the social class they are born into as in the middle ages, or generally the past. But a lot of people are precluded from receiving an education or healthcare because of their position at birth. Conversely, rich people generally happen to have -wait for it- rich kids who could probably buy their way into any university regardless of intellect. How true is it that people nowadays can do whatever they want in their life? How true is the idea of freedom?
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Originally Posted by Dick Diver
I need to hope- that freedom may be life one day- a pathetic hope, maybe- but at least it keeps me going. :-?
I'm nobody, who are you?
)
