Modern Dark Ages – Harmonia Philosophica

With respect to the dead… [The Coronavirus Sweden example]

Coronavirus crisis has helped in revealing the true nature of people and of states. Crises of such proportions do have the tendency of doing so.

Within the crisis people feared death, people laughed at death, people showed ignorance of epic proportions for basic scientific facts, others just chose to worry about everything while some of their friends were totally cut off from the crisis itself while sipping coffee.

And while dancing in the shadows.

Each man showed his real face…

States over the world similarly exhibited varied reactions to the coronavirus, with some imposing strict lock-downs, others doing nothing and then imposing lock-downs, while others imposed no or very limited measures whatsoever.

And while dancing in the shadows…

Some states revealed a monster.

And unlike fairy tales, monsters in this case were beautiful and clean. Even happy. One could never believe they are monsters anyway. Unless they hear the silence beyond their laughter…

Sweden once again startled the world. By choosing not to impose any measures or general lockdown (with the exception of banning big gatherings/ large events). Sweden and Swedes believe that their strategy was great and successful. They claim that they have managed to keep deaths at a low while not imposing a devastating lockdown which would collapse the economy.

First of all, the claim that they kept deaths low is wrong. The deaths in Sweden due to coronavirus per million are much higher than comparable nations which did much better at containing the new virus (e.g. Greece). Secondly, there is a price for keeping the economy happy. That price is death. And Sweden has a long tradition in doing so.

In the case of the coronavirus, the price is paid not by the people going out for coffee or drinks (without keeping safe distances by the way – no, the cause of the “success” is not in the obedience or the responsibility of the Swedes), but by the elderly. They are the ones who die in the nursing homes for the rest of Sweden to be able to go out and cry “Success!”…

This is not a secret either. It is known to everybody. It is just that there seems to be a prioritization of the economy over life, especially when that life is the life of a person in his late 70’s. As a restaurant owner said “With respect to the people who died, life goes on”.

With respect to the dead…

Sweden kept on doing business with Hitler during WW2, while other countries paid a huge death toll while fighting against the… business partner of Sweden. (See “Allies trading with Hitler – Economic games during World War II” for details)

With respect to the dead…

Sweden had eugenics long before Hitler even considered them. (Check “Evil Sweden strikes back… (or: How to sterilize “inferior” people)” for details)

With respect to the dead…

Sweden chooses to put a price on human life and leave everything uncontrolled because anyway it is the elderly who will die. Elderly who are anyway in nursing homes, so why care right? (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7)

Because at the end what is under question here is not the effectiveness of that measure of the other, but something much more fundamental: The value of human life itself. And Sweden has chosen to answer that question. No, don’e be fooled. It is not that the answer Sweden has given is wrong. The problem with questions is that they contain the answer as Aristotle said. And when you ask the value of human life, you will inevitably give an answer somehow. And this answer will have effects.

And measures will not be taken.

And the elderly will be left alone.

And the businesses will keep on working.

And people will keep on laughing.

While an old man dies alone.

Tell me, young man.

With respect to the people who live…

How can you put a price on the dead?

PS. This is not an anti-Sweden article per se. Sweden just gave a perfect example of how modern civilization measures the value of human life in money today. There are many other nations which think the same way as Sweden. For example in Gernamy Wolfgang Schäuble advocated for a more even calculus between public health and the economic and social consequences of a prolonged shutdown, fearing an overload of state capacities. He also disagreed with subordinating all other concerns to the goal of saving lives, claiming “this in its absolutism is not correct,” as the German constitution’s right to human dignity “does not exclude the possibility that we must die”. (source) That is a great line by the way. If only it was told by the man dying…

Coronavirus: Selecting who will die. Playing God. Hubris. Punishment.

Many talk about the coronavirus. Many have opinions. Many theories. And one theory that is starting to gain a lot of followers is the one that England has decided to apply: Let’s sacrifice some to save others. Let the vulnerable groups and old men die and let the rest live. If we don’t do it, everyone will be destroyed. (1)

A very progressive view. A very advanced view. A very scientific point of view (yes, scientists were consulted on this decision – see more on herd immunity theories, impact analysis on the economy, etc).

A view – as cliché as it sounds – full of malice and evil. Malice for the fellow who dies. But what do I care for that? I will survive. Malice for those who will suffer. But what do I care about that? The economy will still be standing!

Religion has been saying it again and again but nobody wants to hear it: The biggest trick of the devil is to convince man that he does not exist. In the past, human life was priceless. Every man was a son of God. Now human life is measured in economic terms and sacrificed in front of the needs of the… fit for survival. Darwin would be very proud of England today, which puts into practice the Theory of Evolution in the most gruesome way.

But for Christianity, every human being is potentially God. We are all part of Him. And with proper preparation we can become one with Him. As Nietzsche had said, now man has killed God. And now we are just counting dollars and calculating cost-benefit differences. If the equation is solved, then it is easy for us to kill our grandfather and grandmother because this will save “businesses” or the “GDP”.

At the end, England’s policy may succeed and those who live may gain immunity and their economy potentially will not be destroyed. But it will be an economy built on death and blood. At the end, those most capable for survival may survive. But they will no longer be able to taste the fruits of their victory.

And when the noise subsides and the night comes…

The greatest punishment will not be from cries and vengeance…

But from the sweet gentle touch of your grandmother when she put you to sleep. And from the sweet goodnight she whispered to you…

Right before you killed her.

Update 2020-03-17: The UK government seems to be changing or reconsidering this policy. (source)

Italy, coronavirus, saving the younger ones: Civilization dying.

In the wake of the coronavirus pandemic, it is reported that in Italy there is a shortage in medical supplies and doctors are now making choices about who to save and who to leave unattended to die. There are reports that the selection doctors make are in favor of the younger ones. (Source)

If this is the case, then we are dealing with something worse than the death of some people. We are dealing with the death of civilization per se.

Because there is nothing worse than arrogance. Arrogance that man can ride at the level of God and play God’s role. Arrogance that someone can decide who lives and who dies.

It is such arrogance that made crimes as the Holocaust possible. Don’t be fooled. The devil always comes disguised as an angel.

Sure, there is logic in selecting the younger ones for survival. But a wrong logic altogether. What if that young person is someone terrible who commits crimes? What if the older person who is left to die is an honorable person who had devoted his life to saving others? What if that younger person you saved went on to rape children? What if that old person you killed was an experienced heart surgeon who was going to save the life of a prime minister who would in turn save the world from the next world war? What if that older person was you?

Any logic applied in selecting who lives and who dies, at the end, promotes death. Not life. Death of the ones not selected. Death of a civilization that once upon a time called for saving the weak not because they could survive, but especially because they couldn’t!

Look around.

And in the faces of the people you will not see men and women dying.

But a whole civilization crying…

PS 1. But what should we do? could someone still ask. Shouldn’t we decide something? The answer is simple and already given: we should do nothing! In the case of such life or death dilemmas men should not decide! We cannot play God. Treat people with a “first come first served” priority (and no, no two people arrive simultaneously, simultaneous events do not exist even in theoretical physics). So simple. So “irrational” with regards to our death-loving distorted logic. These dilemmas have been solved a long time ago in modern European law tradition. We are here not to play the role of fate. We are here to suffer it.

PS 2. Yes, you guessed correctly. There is no “trolley problem” as such. In such cases, one should not do anything, i.e. one should not try to play God. The solution to such infamous problems is that you try for the best, without playing the role of fate as we so much like to do these days…

Believing in anything. As long as it is not Christian.

Photo by **Spiros Kakos** from **Pexels**

I recently came up with another article on how the universe could possibly have more dimensions. (1)

This is not the first and certainly not the last time scientists make similar claims. The scientific community has been filled with theories claiming that there are more dimensions we cannot feel, multiple universes we cannot touch or new types of matter we cannot see…

You now, modern civilization has a deep hatred against anything relation to religion and especially Christianity (see French Revolution, “enlightenment” et cetera).

We are willing to believe into things we cannot and will never see (like the multiple universes) than accept the existence of a creator even as a possibility. We are willing to accept things we cannot and will never feel (like the multiple dimensions) than accept life as it is. We are willing to accept that we are nothing (e.g. just a set of lifeless matter with no free will) than accept anything remotely related to Christianity.

Most people might not realize it, but religion is much more scientific than science today. Because religion accepts what we feel (I have consciousness, I am not just a lifeless set of matter, I have free will) and it adheres to what we see (the cosmos is what we see – even miracles are accepted based on empirical evidence, in contradiction with theories like the above which are accepted based on anything but the existence of evidence).

Within our (supposedly) enlightened era, we have forgotten that light casts the longest shadows.

And even though we see the stars at the edges of the cosmos…

We fail to look at our self and deduce any meaning.

And even though we think too much about everything.

We fail to see that our thinking only generates questions.

And so we think of multiple universes. And so we look for multiple dimensions. In a world were we exist not. In a universe which just happened to be. Only because we hate the possibility of us being important. Only because we fear the possibility of us Being.

Look in the mirror.

Listen to you.

Look for the simple answers.

Sure, they look stupid.

But only because your questions are not stupid enough…

Against Abortions – Summary of arguments

Modern civilization is the civilization of “rights”. And this entails the non-existence of any “obligations”. The abortions case is the best example illustrating such a way of thinking.

Abortions are seen today as a “human right”. Never before had anything so dark been painted with so glorious colors. Never before had such an unethical action been characterized as exactly the opposite (i.e. ethical).

In short, abortion is another word for saying “kill a baby in the womb”.
There is no debate for that. It is what it is. Even the hardest of proponents of abortions cannot really refute this self-evident truth. There is a baby in the womb and then a doctor (although I would really be hesitant to call someone who does something like that a “doctor”) comes, tears the baby in pieces and then there is no baby. As simple as that. In some other cases, as it was presented during the Planned Parenthood trial in 2019, the baby is taken out of the womb alive and left out to simply die.

So again: Abortion is another word for saying “kill a baby in the womb”.

The question is: Could that be a “right” of someone today?

Modern death-loving civilization says yes. Because modern civilization is a civilization without Christianity and, thus, without ethics. Because ethics cannot be something which is based on personal opinion or on the preferences of the majority. And yet, this is what modern civilization believes. We have built our society on moving sand; what is ethical and what is not is merely the opinion of the many. And most people today do not want obligations, they want rights.

Related article: The source of ethics

A right to live your life as you wish. A right to do whatever you want. A right to kill babies. No, the modern man or woman does not even consider this as something problematic, since they have been accustomed to living within a context of total freedom. And there is nothing that the free man (or woman) has to worry about! It is his life (her life… its life… you know, pronouns don’t matter anymore… this is another great achievement of our civilization) and he will live it as he wants! (yes, men can get pregnant too, haven’t you heard about it?)

But enough is enough.

And even if Harmonia Philosophica is usually dealing with the most complex of existential philosophical and metaphysical problems, today is the day when we will deal with something much more important: Life. Life as we experience it here on this planet, as a baby experiences it in the womb of its mother (no, men cannot get pregnant!), as a baby feels it while it gets brutally torn apart because its mother does not want to have the obligation to raise and prefers to chill out drinking martinis instead. And yes, there are also more difficult cases where abortion (killing of babies) could seem as a potential option and these cases are also addressed below. Because at the end, it does not matter how good philosophers we are if we miss the evil that is sitting right next to us. At the end it doesn’t matter if we formulate a better ontological argument for the existence of God if we fail to see the babies killed right next to us.

The list below holds some arguments against killing of babies (abortion). The goal is to make it as clear as possible for everyone that abortion is evil in every sense. Again, this is just to inform of the arguments and by no means a way to impose anything; if the article here touches anyone is a whole other story. But even if it doesn’t, I care not. I just need to say this.

Summary of arguments against abortion

My body! No, it is not “your” body: The baby is not yours. It is another separate organism with its own DNA! So no, you do not have any right of life or death over it. (actually you do not have a life or death right over anyone)
What about women who get raped? Rape is a horrible crime. But the answer to it is not abortion. The answer to a rape is the apprehension of whoever did it, his trial and his sentencing to prison after he is found guilty. Not the killing of another third person (the baby) who has nothing to with the crime! Killing a baby won’t make the rape go away or the woman feel any better. Such cases are difficult enough on their own; adding the killing of a baby will not make things any better for the unfortunate woman who experienced such a crime.
It is not alive! Define “life” then. Because if something which breaths, has all the human organs and also exhibits brain function is not ‘alive’ for you, then we have a serious gap in understanding the obvious that we need to bridge. If you doubt about a baby being alive, why not doubt if you are alive too?
It is legal! Sure it is. That doesn’t make it right or ethical! Remember that the Nazis had passed a law for the killing of Jews. So all those killings of Jews during the Holocaust were done in the context of a law of the state. Does that make these killing right? Ethics is not based on what is legal. Another good example is the discrimination against black people in the US in the recent past. Again this was done with state laws! And again, this was utterly and completely unethical! No the laws are not a moral compass, they are just a snapshot of the way people in a society think at a given point in time.
Most people agree that abortions are a human right! So most people are wrong. This would not be the first time. The majority of people today are atheists and materialists as per the requirements or our deeply anti-christian era. So citing them as an argument is actually nothing more than citing Germany’s 1940’s writings as an argument for killing Jews.
What about children with disabilities? What about them? Would you kill someone for being deaf? Would you kill a baby if you learned it will be blind? Congratulations, you just killed Andrea Bocelli. Even children with Down syndrome are now able to study at the university. Is it difficult for the parents? Sure it is. Extremely difficult in most cases. I wouldn’t wish that experience to anyone. Nobody said otherwise. But facing difficulties does not justify murder. Eugenics is not the answer to problems. Unless of course you are a Nazi.
If the mother is in danger, we should abort! So you are saying essentially that when my life is in danger I can kill someone else to save my life. This could be an option for some, but not for others. And this option is getting harder when this other is your own child. If the parents are ready to kill their own children to save their lives (while the opposite should be the norm) then we are talking for some seriously dystopian era we live in. I am not saying that this is an easy option. But again my personal opinion and my personal fear of death do not define what is right or wrong here. And yes, there are cases where the mother sacrificed her own life to save her unborn child! (see here)
Babies are killed in a humane way! Well, actually there is no such argument by the abortion-lovers. I just wanted to mention this again because it is a point which makes the absurdity of the pro-abortion arguments even more cruel. Babies, as I mentioned above, are killed in the most gruesome way. To the contrary, animals are killed today in much more humane ways. How can abortion proponents know the absolutely horrible ways babies are killed and still support abortion? This is really beyond my comprehension!

It is possible that the above change the mind of someone who reads them, although I doubt that will be the case. Whoever reads such arguments in such articles, has already made his or her mind.

But even if only one person thinks differently after reading this article, that would be enough…

Because it is not your body.

And if you are really true to yourself…

It is not even “your” life…