Steve Sack FTW

[swong19104]

7. Hans Christian Anderson

made famous the Emperor's New Clothes. In his story, the emperor was duped by two swindlers. In our case, the emperor was duped by himself and his yesmen (and yeswomen) were too chicken to say otherwise.

I suspect Aesop had a fable about this, and I'm sure many other writers and playwright made stories of this sort, so it's not unique to us. (I'll bet there's a story in the bible of such a story arc.)

What I don't understand is why haven't we learned from all those past stories. History is rife with swindlers and vain narcissists. But we should expect life to merge towards a sane social compact because it is evident that such a social compact is the most efficient. It's like how all modern cars have a similar shape. It's not because there's little originality among the designers, but because the modern shape is very aerodynamically efficient while also being safer for those inside and outside the car.

We expect that, over time, we will move closer and closer to a sane, workable beneficent political philosophy because the alternatives all suck for the majority.