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Rereading Crime and Punishment last days, got me thinking about Raskolnikov's thesis: do great mens like Napoleon, Alexander The Great or any others had moral right or even more, obligation to act in way they acted? Or Pasteur, Koch, Champollion, Einstein - what if something or someone could destroy their work? Would they have obligation to humans to remove someone who is jeopardizing their work?
Fascinating part of the book, eh? Difficult one to answer ;)
Try.:)
Napoleon?Alexander the Great? No,I don't think so.Quote:
Originally Posted by bazarov
I guess an argument could be made for the others you listed though...Generally,if their discovery is to help millions of people in the following years,maybe that is worth a couple of lives early on if the discovery is in danger.Let's say someone found the cure for AIDS,but for some reason,there are a few people seriously jeopardizing the cure - would it be morally correct to remove those threats for the sake of helping millions of others?Yes,I think so.
It is pretty clear though,that the cause must really be a great one in order to justify this way of thinking.I don't know what's so great about men such as Napoleon though.
Well, I think that book is giving the answer. Like Dostoevsky wrote in "The Brothers Karamazov":" If God does not exist then everything is permitted." He said that because he was assured that God does exists. And if God does exist, no man can give himself right to take others humans life in ANY circumstances. But I think it is morally wrong in any case,(exist or not) because if there is one exception, precedent, even for Einstein, to break that dogma that Nobody Has Right To Take Somebody's Life, it would have dangerous consequences anyway. Also, people makes mistakes very often, even genius like Pasteur, Koch, Champollion, Einstein. And of course people are in general too much inclined to do things for selfish, egoistic reasons and to embrace that in some great slogans.
To me it is interesting how Dostoevsky is explaining casuistry issue. In conversation with Sonia, Raskolnikov FINALLY admits that he did not killed old woman because of some great cause or as though he was hungry and didn't have money, etc...he says that he wanted to be a "Napoleon" kind a people, special, different. First there were great slogans, but in fact that were just selfish, egocentric and shallow motives. See what Raskolnikov says to Sonia in Chapter 30:
"I wanted to murder without casuistry, to murder for my own sake, for myself alone! I didn't want to lie about it even to myself. It wasn't to help my mother I did the murder--that's nonsense --I didn't do the murder to gain wealth and power and to become a benefactor of mankind. Nonsense! I simply did it; I did the murder for myself, for myself alone, and whether I became a benefactor to others, or spent my life like a spider catching men in my web and sucking the life out of men, I couldn't have cared at that moment. . . . And it was not the money I wanted, Sonia, when I did it. It was not so much the money I wanted, but something else. . . . I know it all now. . . . Understand me!"
In that part of book you can see that all that stuff about helping mother and mankind was just a casuistry. It is interesting that Raskolnikov was specifically upset by his sister's decision to help him by marrying a Luzhin, and he interpreted that as his sister's casuistry. I read that most psychologists agree that people mostly hate at other people, acts, behavior and doings, which they see inner themselves. And that is one of many examples how detailed and perfectionist was Dostoevsky.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by johann cruyff
Yes, yes, you got me correct; and I have to agree with you, my conclusion was the same.:thumbs_up
I used Napoleon because Raskolnikov used it also.
Indeed, the rational Razumihin tells Dounia, early on, that she and Raskolnikov seem like clones in the way each thinks. You're so right!Quote:
Originally Posted by Miner
Ivan said that and he believed that there is no God. But, there is Alyosha who believes that there is God. So, which one of them is Dostoevsky? I think it's Alyosha; with Ivan he gives us his perception of smart intelligent atheist. He never tells us which one of them is right and which one is wrong.Quote:
Originally Posted by Miner
Do you personally like more people who are much different then you, or those few smart people who are similar to you? I think you probably like more those few. I do.Quote:
Originally Posted by Miner