Imagine being stuck in an elevator with a man who looks
ordinary to you; maybe even gentle, well behaved, refined and classy. You talk
to each other and before long, he starts to complain about someone he knows that
is bugging him no end. He escalates the verbal attacks on the one he now calls
his enemy, and paints a picture which says to you that the one out there is so
evil, you conclude on your own, he should be labeled enemy number one of all
mankind.
You make that suggestion to the man in the elevator, and lo
and behold, he breaks down, drops to the floor and weeps uncontrollably like a
crybaby. You console him and ask what is wrong. He says that the contrary has
happened in that the evil man out there is loved by the whole world, and that
he is the one who is hated by everyone.
What an unbelievable story, you say. No, it is not so
unbelievable. If you want to read about it as written by the crybaby himself,
go to the op-ed page of the November 29, 2012 issue of the Wall Street Journal.
You will find there an article written by Ron Prosor who is the Israeli
ambassador to the United Nations. He wrote the article under the title: “What
Kind of Palestinian State?” and the subtitle: “The U.N. should consider whether
the world needs another nation that imports weapons and exports extremism and
terror.”
Having read the article, you now ask: How can something like
this happen? You think about it and find an angle through which you manage to
shed a little bit of light on the subject. The angle has to do with “moral
relativism,” a concept that some people find difficult to understand even
though it is a simple thing.
People find the concept difficult because when they hear
about it, they think of something complicated. They look for a hidden meaning
in every word that is uttered while paying little attention to what is actually
being said. Here is the problem: The core idea being relativism, the concept is
often discussed in conjunction with the principles of morality. And this
combination of the two is what leads to the concept of “moral relativism,” the
expression that ends up confusing people.
As to those who bring up the concept in the first place,
they do not always clarify what they mean because it is as difficult for them
to explain it as it is for the others to understand it. But in actual fact,
there is a simple way to explain the expression; it consists of doing a thought
experiment. To this end, imagine standing by a counter on top of which rest
three washbowls. The one on the left is filled with water at 50 degrees
Fahrenheit. The one in the middle is filled with water at the room temperature
of 70 degrees. The one on the right is filled with water at 90 degrees. You
place your left hand in the left bowl, and place your right hand in the right
bowl. You wait a few minutes then dip both hands in the middle bowl at the same
moment. What will you sense?
You will sense confusion. The left hand will sense that the
water in the middle bowl is warm. At the same time, the right hand will sense
that the same water is cold. Why is that? Because when sensing is done by an
organism, it is done in relative terms not in absolute terms. That is, one hand
will sense that this water is warmer than the one from which it came. As to the
other hand, it will sense that this same water is cooler than the one from
which it came. Two signals, one being that the water is warm, and the other
being that it is cold will go to the brain at the same moment and confuse it.
What this experiment says is that if we want to sense the
state of something such as a body of water or anything else without using an
instrument, we can do so only to compare the state of one body relative to the
state of another body. That is, we can only determine if one body is warmer or
cooler than another. What we cannot do with accuracy is determine the true or
absolute value of either body. To do this, we need a thermometer that will
measure the temperature as being 50 or 70 or 90 degrees, or what other value it
may be.
The important idea to retain from this thought experiment is
that where the hand comes from will make the difference as to what we sense.
With this in mind, we should be able to see and accept that the same will apply
in matters that deal with morality. It ought to be clear that in moral matters,
the judgment that a person makes with regard to a happening will ultimately
depend on where that person comes from.
For this reason, a current happening that is acceptable to
one person may be objectionable to another because each will compare it to past
happenings with which he or she is familiar – depending on where he or she came
from. That is, each person will measure what they see now with the yardstick
they came with, even if the yardsticks were constructed differently. And if the
matter being measured or assessed concerns morality, which is almost always the
case, then “moral relativism” will be seen as the concept that separates the
position of one person from the position of another.
Whether or not we believe in the evolution of the species in
the Darwinian sense, we all agree that being the organism that we are, we
continually experience a sort of physical alteration because we see ourselves
grow in size from a fertilized egg to a fetus, and from a newborn baby to an
adult. We also see ourselves go through a series of moral alterations because
we continually sense the need to learn new skills and adapt to a changing
environment so as to stay alive.
And so, no matter what our position may be with regard to
the evolution of the species, we all agree that a complex process of
evolutionary changes affect us continually whether or not we provoke it. Those
changes take the individual from a beginning that is no more than a sperm and
an ovum to the end of one's natural life – which can be several decades away.
And what this says ultimately is that everything which is natural about us is
relative, and that nothing about it is absolute.
Yet, we can say with certainty that everyone of us sees one
or more things as being so inviolable, we consider them to be absolute and not
subject to alteration. Why is that? To answer the question, we need to look
closely at who we are not only as an individual or a species but as a live
organism. We must also accept the argument advanced by the narrative of
Darwinian evolution which is that a species will not remain in existence for
long if the individuals of whom it is made ignore a prime directive telling
them to behave in ways that protect their own survival and that of the species.
The reason here being that if the directive is violated, the species will
ultimately perish, as many have throughout the ages, leaving behind only their
fossilized remains.
Thus, it is the prime directive concerning survival which
ultimately determines what we consider to be an absolute taboo that cannot be
violated. And what this does to organisms – especially those of the higher
species including humans – is that it motivates them to cobble up a “culture”
based on rules that serve to maintain their survival and defend it when
necessity. This happens when we have an encounter with the unknown, at which
time the different experiences of the various individuals and cultures make up
the different yardsticks by which assessments are made as to whether a
situation is hot or cold; whether it is acceptable or objectionable.
So then, where do Israel and the “Jewish people”
stand in the face of all this? Well, what we have here is the sad story of a
crybaby in the elevator making matters worse for him and for all of humanity
the more that he tries to put down the Palestinians he robbed, beat up, stole
their possessions then asked the world to love him because he was chosen by God
to rule over humanity.
When this is the kind of culture you are fed with your mother's
milk, you grow up to be as sick as the Israeli ambassador. And there is nothing
that will cure you; not even the concept of moral relativism.
You are doomed unless you change for good; change once and
for all.