Thursday, May 22, 2008

The Last Lecture

This is quite good. You may have seen it, because it's been around for a while, and it's long (over an hour) but it's worth it.

Friday, May 09, 2008

Eight Belles

You may have heard about Eight Belles, the second-place finisher of the Kentucky Derby, being euthanized after the race when she broke both her front ankles. PETA made several stupid comments after the race suggesting that the jockey should have known something was wrong, etc., etc. The trainer in an emotional speech then said some stupid comments about the horse putting her life on the line, etc. Various people started fighting about the fact that the horse didn't have a choice to race and couldn't know the risks, etc. The whole conversation was so frustrating, because no one was willing to talk about the real issue: what good is served when animals are domesticated and put to use by humans?

Is it wrong to race horses? If it is, is it wrong because the horse doesn't have a choice? Essentially, if you answer that second question in the affirmative, then you are opposed to all domestication. I see no possible ground for discussion with such a person.

An animal essentially is the creature of the moment: he may desire or not desire to run, to eat, to play, and so on, but whatever he does, it is in the now. The more developed an animal is, the better it's memory, and hence the more the past comes into play in the present. I think this is the essence of the perfection of an animal: the degree to which it is able to bring together past and future in the present. But no animal does this with anything like the perfection that humans do, humans who have history, and tell stories and pass down legends from generation to generation.

Domesticated animals, however, get to participate in the human story: think of Babe the Blue Ox, or Achilleus' horse. I still tell stories about my dog that died of cancer, and the whole world will remember the tragedy of Eight Belles, who died after coming in second in the greatest horse race in the world. Sure, Eight Belles knows nothing of this: but that's not the point. The point is, it's better to be part of a story, even if you don't know you are part of it.

102 Minutes

I just read 102 Minutes, a journalistic account of the time from when the 1st airplane hit Tower 1 at the World Trade Center to when the tower fell. It's an excellent book, not the least because it makes vivid the stories of the people inside the towers. It's really intense, however. I recommend it to all, but be warned.

I was most impressed with the story of one particular fellow who went from floor to floor in the area just below where the plane hit in the north tower with a pry-bar dislodging debris which had trapped people. He died when the tower collapsed, but his actions saved perhaps 70 people. Stories like that make me hope I would act with the same courage if I were in a similar situation.

Do you think courage is the most manly of virtues? I suspect that all the things we associate with being manly are all qualities ordered to the virtue of courage. Maybe I'll post some more on that soon.