tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13522238.post2408954004382534056..comments2024-03-14T11:50:14.761-04:00Comments on DarwinCatholic: A Tragic Sense of HistoryDarwinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08572976822786862149noreply@blogger.comBlogger8125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13522238.post-1653347305680028882014-09-19T11:54:50.031-04:002014-09-19T11:54:50.031-04:00Kate,
I'd never run into him, but he sounds i...Kate,<br /><br />I'd never run into him, but he sounds interesting. I'll have to try to look his writing up some time. <br /><br />Must be a case of intellectual convergence...Darwinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08572976822786862149noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13522238.post-8692122051266897492014-09-19T11:53:53.550-04:002014-09-19T11:53:53.550-04:00Jenny,
I think one of the other things that ends...Jenny, <br /><br />I think one of the other things that ends up springing out of a lack of tragic sense is that people feel like establishing causality establishes blame. <br /><br />So, for instance, I recall a while back a online blow up where a lot of people got offended by list of "things rich people do that poor people don't". What offended people was the sense that "poor people would be rich if only they'd do these simple things." It's true that none of these were magic talismans that would have instantly made anyone rich, buy they were generally speaking good habits that would probably help someone in the long run. They were also, it was rightly pointed out, habits that would be very hard to keep up under the pressures involved in being poor. <br /><br />I think the proper balance is to understand that yes, we contribute to our problems with our actions, but that doesn't necessarily mean there's an easy "Oh, just don't do that" fix. We have free will, we can change, but doing differently can be incredibly hard in certain circumstances.Darwinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08572976822786862149noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13522238.post-4810656209569929162014-09-19T10:45:51.714-04:002014-09-19T10:45:51.714-04:00Jenny--yes, absolutely! We've lost the sense t...Jenny--yes, absolutely! We've lost the sense that some tragedies can't be directly attributed to malice or even real neglect or irresponsibility. And I think it is because we find this sense of tragedy entirely too frightening in what it intimates about our own inability to control circumstances and protect ourselves and our loved ones. If we can find someone to blame, we can perhaps continue to believe ourselves to be immune, or at least not helpless.Katehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03787892622804373968noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13522238.post-23358028186304269712014-09-19T10:43:24.021-04:002014-09-19T10:43:24.021-04:00Unamundo was an early 20th century Spanish philoso...Unamundo was an early 20th century Spanish philosopher who wrote a book called "The Tragic Sense of Life" (which I had on my bookshelf for ages, though I don't think I ever did more than dip into it from time to time). In any case, he also felt quite strongly that history was best approached from the perspective of 'the anonymous'--considering the experiences of the ordinary man. <br /><br />Anyway, your title recalled him to my mind. :-)<br /><br />I do think you are right that moderns often confuse analysis with criticism. Certainly, much of the study of history is the study of tragedies, of tracing out the conditions and circumstances that brought about events while recognizing that much of the sweep of human events has been too large or had too much momentum to be easily swayed on the individual level.Katehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03787892622804373968noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13522238.post-62097875388823944032014-09-19T10:38:54.487-04:002014-09-19T10:38:54.487-04:00The lack of the tragic sense is also what drives t...The lack of the tragic sense is also what drives the instinct to assign blame to people who have bad things happen to them.Jennyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13472686909226073213noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13522238.post-79155353465932479322014-09-19T10:36:06.489-04:002014-09-19T10:36:06.489-04:00Excellent post. The tragic sense is also, I think,...Excellent post. The tragic sense is also, I think, a precondition of our really learning anything important from history -- without it, we find in history what we want to find, and not what we need to know to do better.Brandonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06698839146562734910noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13522238.post-6151960792890312772014-09-19T10:05:47.253-04:002014-09-19T10:05:47.253-04:00No. I'm afraid I'm unfamiliar with him.No. I'm afraid I'm unfamiliar with him.Darwinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08572976822786862149noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13522238.post-67846687453415869862014-09-19T10:00:18.035-04:002014-09-19T10:00:18.035-04:00Out of curiousity, Is your title an intentional re...Out of curiousity, Is your title an intentional reference to Unamuno?Katehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03787892622804373968noreply@blogger.com