Dear Scott,
You replied 3/5 10:36 -0700 to my 1/5 23:52 +0200 post with:
'Unless I'm reading this incorrectly there is a definite equivocation of the
social and the
intellectual here. Social = Intellectual such that "major advances in
social progress" = major advances
in intellectual progress.'
My 1/5 23:52 +0200 post, being addressed to Roger, referred to the
distinctions I (we) made earlier in our discussions about progress.
Especially to those between primary and secondary social and intellectual
progress in my 4/4 23:00 +0200 post to Roger. I don't think I was mixing up
social and intellectual progress given that context. Do you think so (if
necessary after rereading that post)?
I don't equate social with collective and intellectual with individual, like
you seem to do. I see closer correlations of social with unconscious and
intellectual with conscious. You can check the '3rd level blues' thread back
in January and February for an explanation of those correlations.
I don't agree with you 'that the farther removed the governing body (i.e.
supra-national entity) is from the individual, the less
individual/intellectual sovereignty there is'. Supra-national entities can
protect individuals against intermediate entities (e.g. states denying their
citizens basic rights). They don't necessarily do, but even if they are 'at
best indirectly democratically constituted' they are not necessarily worse
at protecting rights of individual citizens than are more directly
democratically constituted (less far 'removed') bodies. There are other
(intellectual rather than social) patterns of values besides representative
democracy that can induce a governing body to respect their citizens' basic
rights. E.g. in a situation in which one's basic rights are especially
infringed if you belong to an ethnic minority, you can benefit from less
national sovereignty (if 'your' nation primarily serves the interests of the
ethnic majority) and more supra-national sovereignty (the supra-national
entity having to serve impartially the interests of a lot of ethnic groups
of which none has a majority). It is all a matter of balance: we need both
supra-national governing bodies, national governing bodies, regional
governing bodies, local governing bodies etc. and the province of each
should be those subject matters that can best be organized at that scale.
Maybe Israel should be offered membership of NATO and European Union under
the condition that it integrates Palestinians as citizens with equal rights?
With friendly greetings,
Wim
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