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The Final Speech from The Great Dictator (1940)

charliechaplin.com

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Re: The Final Speech from The Great Dictator (1940)

#341

Post by concordDance »

ruszki wrote: post #60
vasco wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Eugenics and Phrenology were very relevant at the time and used as a scientific basis to justify many attrocities. It's important to remember that science evolves, and what we "know" to be part of scientific knowledge today might be debunked in the future. Specially with the state of peer review in the social sciences my feeling is many things that are said to be scientific fact today will be proven wrong later, incl…

Pseudoscience like eugenics is just feelings packaged as science.

This depends a lot on what you means by "eugenics". Some people use the word to be a normative word (a statement about what should be) others positive word (a statement about what IS or could be). E.g. "We can use CRISPR and genetic screening to make people resistant to HIV" vs "we should do so".

The former is a question of fact ("is this possible?") though often with a bunch of unspoken subquestions ("can we do this change without causing incidental genetic changes or damaging the egg?") and in the realm of science while the latter is a question of policy and feelings (how much do we want HIV resistance? What is the price we're willing to pay/risk we're willing to take? Does deliberately altering humanity open a can of worms best left unopened?).

Conflation between normative and positive meanings are quite common across a wide variety of domains and can cause substantial confusion as two people can think they're talking about the same thing but actually aren't.

Even in the "should" case there's a bunch of confusion as to what sort of things should count as "eugenics", with some people wanting the term to apply only to coercive measures and others wanting the term to apply to any deliberate changes to a population's gene pool (and theres the grey area in the middle where financial incentives happen).

Note: A lot of politically fraught words will have a number of similar but different meanings as various interest groups fight over them. From "war" and "violence" to "culture" and "science" to "person" and "rights".

Re: The Final Speech from The Great Dictator (1940)

#342

Post by concordDance »

dang wrote: post #230
concordDance wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Could you please stop posting unsubstantive comments and flamebait? You've unfortunately been doing it repeatedly. It's not what this site is for, and destroys what it is for. If you wouldn't mind reviewing https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and taking the intended spirit of the site more to heart, we'd be grateful.

Here's my attempt at a substantive and low flame bait comment on the topic: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38680523

I'd be interested in whether this meets the bar but once again you've got 5 million other users to see to so if you don't have the time you don't have the time.

Re: The Final Speech from The Great Dictator (1940)

#343

Post by hermitcrab »

jncfhnb wrote: post #289
hermitcrab wrote: post #236

"Greed has poisoned men's souls" Greed used to considered a sin. Now it seems to be seen as a virtue by some. It's not enough to have a Ferrari - you need to have a whole garage full. It's not enough to have a yacht - it's got to be a super yacht.

This may surprise you, but people were in fact greedy previously as well

Yes, but it gnerally wasn't considered a virtue.

Re: The Final Speech from The Great Dictator (1940)

#344

Post by hermitcrab »

jvm___ wrote: post #276
chopete3 wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think he is not referring to an individuals greed, for example an actor buying a few Ferrari's to satisfy their desires or a business person buying a yatch. He is referring to political/country leaders greed. Only their greed can cause violence and bloodshed at the level he is talking about. Ambition and greed both refer to the intense desire to achieve success. Sucess includes money, power, or status. The differen…

Convince someone buying a new iPhone to buy last years model or half the GB of what they can afford. That's the greed that's ingrained in all humans. "Humans take the perceived path of the most pleasure." is true in every human interaction I've witnessed or can think of. We're all greedy by default. I think Agent Smith was right when he was talking to Morpheus, humanity is a virus that consumes all the resources in t…

>We're all greedy by default.

That is a pretty bleak view of human nature. Maybe try reading "Human kind" by Rutger Bregman for a counter view.

I think we are highly social creatures who care a lot about our status. If society looks up to people having a garage full of super cars as 'successful', then that is something to aspire to. If society looks down on these people as greedy and taking more than their fair share of the world's resources, then it isn't something to aspire to. I hope society soon changes to the latter attitude, for the sake of our children.

Re: The Final Speech from The Great Dictator (1940)

#345

Post by hermitcrab »

derbOac wrote: post #298
hermitcrab wrote: post #236

"Greed has poisoned men's souls" Greed used to considered a sin. Now it seems to be seen as a virtue by some. It's not enough to have a Ferrari - you need to have a whole garage full. It's not enough to have a yacht - it's got to be a super yacht.

I think the "greed is good" speech represents a sort of counter movie speech along the lines you're pointing to: https://www.americanrhetoric.com/MovieSpeeches/moviespeechwa...

I think some people don't realize that speech was intended to be satirical. Possibly the same people that think Ayn Rand was a great thinker and writer.

Re: The Final Speech from The Great Dictator (1940)

#346

Post by keybored »

vpribish wrote: post #88

"Don't let your mind speak louder than your heart" - I think many have this so very wrong. Is support for fascism is a sensible, logical, well-thought-out policy? No, it's a heart-felt, emotional appeal to scared, proud, paranoid, crude, brutal people (who seem to be about half of our neighbors). surely the mindful decision is empathetic, constructive, and wise - not just base.

> No, it's a heart-felt, emotional appeal to scared, proud, paranoid, crude, brutal people (who seem to be about half of our neighbors)

Is “about half” an empirical, dispassionate observation? No, it’s a heart-felt, emotional...

I’m pretty sure that Jesus had something to say about seeing the [fascism] in everyone else but yourself.

Re: The Final Speech from The Great Dictator (1940)

#347

Post by raxxorraxor »

lewhoo wrote: post #104
vpribish wrote: post #88

"Don't let your mind speak louder than your heart" - I think many have this so very wrong. Is support for fascism is a sensible, logical, well-thought-out policy? No, it's a heart-felt, emotional appeal to scared, proud, paranoid, crude, brutal people (who seem to be about half of our neighbors). surely the mindful decision is empathetic, constructive, and wise - not just base.

I don't think it's so simple. Support for fascism can seem sensible and logical if you let yourself think that between you and greatness stands a minority whose sole purpose is to prevent you from becoming great. You could argue it's not emotion but a calculation coming from struggle and an easy explanation for that struggle. Not every wrong assumption comes from emotion and we have the whole history of science to pr…

One of the main motivators of people looking for strong leadership is fear and mostly a purely emotional need. Mostly fear of being taken advantage of. But yes, it also doesn't have to be irrational, it just was for the most prominent instance of fascism.

Using your mind and getting some distance and perspective would be quite beneficial here. The heart can follow the mind or the other way around. There isn't a clear cut and there cannot be a general answer which direction is the better one.

What probably is true in almost any case is that if you have an image of an enemy to put all the blame on, he probably just looks at you from the mirror.

Re: The Final Speech from The Great Dictator (1940)

#348

Post by narag »

IndySun wrote: post #280
narag wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every ideology appeals to emotions... I can't find the source right now, but someone said that believing in democracy is like believing in the metric system. And there's another (Churchill's?) one saying that it's the worst government system, except all the others. Not very exciting definitions, more like cynics' choice.

>..someone said that believing in democracy is like believing in the metric system.. I have no idea whatsoever the hidden meaning here.

I found it, it was "dying for democracy..." instead. The meaning? Democracy is a means to an end, not an end in itself. Humans can die for freedom. Democracy doesn't sound as such an epic thing to die for.

Re: The Final Speech from The Great Dictator (1940)

#349

Post by denton-scratch »

lewhoo wrote: post #104
vpribish wrote: post #88

"Don't let your mind speak louder than your heart" - I think many have this so very wrong. Is support for fascism is a sensible, logical, well-thought-out policy? No, it's a heart-felt, emotional appeal to scared, proud, paranoid, crude, brutal people (who seem to be about half of our neighbors). surely the mindful decision is empathetic, constructive, and wise - not just base.

I don't think it's so simple. Support for fascism can seem sensible and logical if you let yourself think that between you and greatness stands a minority whose sole purpose is to prevent you from becoming great. You could argue it's not emotion but a calculation coming from struggle and an easy explanation for that struggle. Not every wrong assumption comes from emotion and we have the whole history of science to pr…

I've been wondering lately how much fascist ideas derive from the time of Julius Caesar and imperial Rome. Fascists seem to love Roman architecture, huge buildings with lots of pillars and pediments. They love massed ranks of marching soldiers, and imperial conquest.

Caesar was murdered to stop him becoming a King; but the process continued, and Octavian became the first emperor. Murdering the tyrant isn't enough, and imperial Rome lasted 500 years.

I've realized that my knowledge of Julius Caesar is sorely wanting, consisting mainly of vaguely-remembered quotes from Shakespeare's play (which, I realize, I've never read through, and never seen on stage). I evidently have some reading to do.

Re: The Final Speech from The Great Dictator (1940)

#350

Post by stef25 »

kdmccormick wrote: post #159
goles wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given the amount of bad encounters I've had driving post-2020, and interacting with strangers, I think it's seeping into the real world as well. The way people act and speak in public feels noticeably different than even a few years ago, let alone 10-20. People are very short with each other now. Even more disturbing, I think I can feel the change in myself too at times.

Driving brings out the worst in people. You're all trying to get somewhere, you're all a danger to one another, and, critically, you can't see faces well. So, you end up receiving offenses against you as if they're personal (because you're you!) but commit offenses as if they're impersonal (because others look like cars, not human beings). Would you rudely shove youself in front of someone at the market to get the ne…

It's always someone distracted by his phone, trying to find first gear, stuck in reverse. I despise people blocking you from doing what you need to do. So yeah I absolutely will show myself in front of you if all you're doing is blocking the way. At the same time I'll be very courteous to people behaving correctly and give right of way every time I'm required to.
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