I only have a few minutes, here, before I go to bed...but I wanted to write again and get a chance to flesh out some of the ideas that I am working on publishing (as well as share about my life:):):)...
I am of renewed and secure liberal faith, as of late:):):)...I am totally confident in the ideas that I'm working on, now, which means a lot in my life since ideas are THE stuff of life, I think:):):)...the stuff that guides life:):):)...as Federal Reserve Board Chairman Alan Greenspan recently told a British audience, empires come and go...but ideas are the building blocks of history:):):)...in other words...power is here for an instant...good ideas are here for an eternity...
The principles I'm working with right now I have developed a modified name for to avoid as much confusion as possible:):):)...
The principle I am working with is "least possible necessary aggression"...I am sure, as with other ideas, that this one can be and will be distorted...but good ideas are embedded in reality as much as they are in our own minds and imaginations...so reality will help people find their way toward better development and realization of this and other ideas that grow out of this principle:):):)...
The jist of the principle is that aggression sometimes necessary...when it is, the least possible necessary amount of aggression is most likely to accomplish the best results...and it does so because of a principle that is much more fundamental to human nature...the need for freedom...
Abraham Maslow discussed this need as fundamental to peoples' more self-actualized development in his work...I would especially recommend his final writings gathered together after he died in his book The Farther Reaches of Human Nature...
My work seeks to integrate Maslow's work with other relevant policy insights that can help us steer wiser courses in the development of more self-actualized people and self-actualized cultures...and, in the course of doing so, to create policies that will more effectively deal with the threats that free societies and peoples' face...
My thesis is that the least possible aggressive responses to aggression and to problems that face more and less free societies are more fundamentally in line with our nature as human beings and thus more likely to respect that nature and achieve ends that are relevant to the happiness, health, and well-being of all of us:):):)...
The reason for this, I believe, is that though aggression is a natural human and animal instinct when animals, humans as well, face a real or perceived threat to their health and well-being...but that it is an instinct that, ultimately, betrays us...and that learning to let go of it is critical to our individual and cultural development...aggression blinds us to realities that need better lenses in the form of better ideas and understandings to navigate those realities...and those better ideas and understandings are needed in all dealings that we have with other human beings and to the challenges, threats, and opportunities that face humanity, individually and in our collaborations with one another:):):)...
The unique quality that humans have that allows them to change this instinct is the power of insight and intelligence, and established cultural institutions -- schools, libraries, etc. -- which allow us to learn to navigate our shared social and physical reality more effectively...
And the most critical understanding to help each and all of us to navigate that reality more effectively is the understanding of our natural and often flawed tendency towards aggression to handle individual and common problems, threats, and opportunities and our ability to choose differently to navigate those realities more effectively:):):)...
I write all of this at a time when humanity is at a particularly important crossroads, I believe:):)...when humanity is reinforcing its ultimately flawed tendency to use force and aggression in attempts to solve problems that are much more effectively navigated without aggression and with more engagement, communication, ideas, brainstorming, and -- most importantly -- freedom...
The principle of least possible necessary aggression can help point us in a better direction, I believe, which is why I write about it:):):)...
I'm going to take a break, for now...but that's a decent introduction to the idea:):):)...
I am doing better now...but better than what many people who read this may not know since I haven't written in so long:):):)...
But I'll just say, for now, that the more I live and work and relate with people, the more clear this principle and other ideas I've been working with become to me and, I hope, to others:):):)...
I'm going to take a break:):):)...I hope everyone is doing well:):):)...talk with everyone later:):):)...
Love,
Ben
