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    A Natural History of Evil

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    22 visualizações15 páginas

    A Natural History of Evil

    Enviado por

    argeneparas
    A Natural History of Evil

    Direitos autorais:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Baixe no formato PDF ou leia online no Scribd
    Sinalizar o conteúdo como inadequado
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    Collateral Damage Social Inequalities in a Global Age Zygmunt Bauman polity (Side Se cece ur, oe ‘ome Lind oan nd cn Geo b MIG ose Grow Lind Rain, Cnr 1 ° Contents Introduction: Collateral damage of social inequality From the agora to the marketplace Requiem for communism “The fate of social ineqalty in liquid modern times Strangers are dangers ... Are they indeed? Consumerism and morality Privacy, secrecy, intimacy, haman boeds ~ and other collateral casualties of liquid modernity Luck and the individualization of remedies Seeking in modern Athens an answer tothe ancient Jerusalem question A natural history of evil 10. Wirarme Leu 11 Sociology: whence and whither? Notes Index » a 0 so 83 4 104 128 150 160 13 180 9 A natural history of evil Iki highly unlely that a went fescentury ear of Anatole France novel Les Dis ont sf, acginally published in 1913 won't be simultaneously bewildered and entapsured, I al ike hood, they wil be overwhelmed, 35 T have been with admiration foran author who no ony as Mian Kunders would sey. managed to tear through the curing preincerpretaton, the ‘crain egg in ot ofthe wos frat ie te ea aman onli from nave interpretation aa srgale between good an vil understanding them in the ight of tagedy= wh Kendra option ling of novels an he oat all novelwting = bu in adi designed and tex, for bent of his renders the fares enor, he ol ith sich o cut and tear the curtain nos yet woven; bur etn fo Sear being eagerly woven and hung in font othe wot all afte his novel was fined a pticlaryeaesy well art death At che moment Anatole Feance put aside bis pen and took oe ls look a his ied nove hte were ao word ike bebe. ism Yatcism, or indeed "otalitaranin’ sted in donnie, French ot any oer and no names like Sain or Hier i ay af the history books. Anatole France’ tention was fused oo Evan Gr, oven beg inthe wold of aa youngster of great talent snd promise, bt possessing yt gree Aisgst for Wateay Bouche. Fagonard and ther decals of A natural history of eit 23 popula taste, whose “bad taste bad drawings, bad design’ ‘com: plete absence of clea syle and clear line, complete unawareness Df nature and truth’ and fondaess for “masks, dolls, fipperies, childish nonsense’ he explained by thei readiness 10 ‘work for tyrants and saves. Camelin was se that ‘a hundred years hence i Warteau’s paintings wil have foted away in ates’ and pre Gictedthat “by 1893 are students wil be covering the canvases ‘of Boucher with their own rough sketches”. The French Republic Sella téndet, unsound and frail child ofthe Revolution, would {103 ro cutoff, one after the other the many heads of the hydra fof pranny and slavery, including the dearth of artis’ clear style land thee blindness co Nature, There is no mere fo the conspra Tors against the Republic, a8 there is no liberty forthe enemies of libery, nor tolerance for the enemies of tolerance. To the doubts voiced by his mredulous mother, Gaelin would respond without hesitation: We must put our tust in Robespirte; he is incorruptible. Above all we must east in Marat. He is the one ‘who really loves the people, who realizes their tue interests and Serves ther, He was always the frst ro wamask the traitors and frustrate plot” In one of his few and fae between authoral inter ventions France explains and brands the thoughts and deeds of his hero and his hero's likes a the ‘serene fanaticism’ of litle ren, who had demolished the theone itself and turned upside ‘down the old order of things. On his own way from the youth ff a Romanian fascse co the adulthood of a French philosoper, Emile Cioran summed up the lot of youngsters of the era of Robespiere and Marat, and Stalin and Pier alike: ‘Bad luck is their lot. I is they who voie the doctine of intolerance and it is they who. put that doctine inca practice. It is they who are.thirsty = for blood, rumol, barbaiy:” Wel, all the young: ster? And only the youngsters? And only in¢he eras of Robesperre or Sain? For Kang, respece and goodwill for others i an imperative of. season; which seas that if human being, + creature endowed by God or Nature with reaton, ponders on Kant’ ceasoning, she or he wil surely recognize and accept the categorical character fof that imperative and wil adope it as a precept of her or bis ondict. lait essence, che categorieal imperative in question boils ‘down: to the commandment to teat others 25 you' would wish to be treated by them in other words, to another version of che 130 A natural history of evil biblical injunction eo love your neighbour 2s yourself ~ onlin the Kantian case grounded on an elaborate and refined series of logics! arguments, and thus invoking the authority of burma reason a¢ able to judge owhat needs to be and must by instead of the wil of God deiding what ought tobe * In such a translation from sacred to secula language something cof the commandments persuasive powers is lost, howevet. The will of God, unashamedly ‘decisions’, can bestoweapodicti, "unquestionable power on the presumption of an essential preor dined and inescapable symmetry of inerhuman relations &pre- sumption indispensable for both the sacred and. the secular versions, whereas reason would have alr of rouble demonstrate dng that presumption's veracity. The assertion ofthe symaery of inzerhuman relations belongs, after all inthe universe of belie, of what is taken for granted or stipulated (and may therefore be accepeed on the grounds of “if would be bere, if..." oF "we owe ‘obedience to Goes wills but it has no place inthe universe of empirically testable knowledge ~ that domain, or rather the hnatural habitat, of reason. Whether the advocates ofthe legislative powers of reason refer to reason’ ifaliblity in its search for truth (for “how things indeed are and cannot but be), oto ea Son’ utliarian mens (that 5, its ability to sepatate reali, feasible and plausible intentions from-mere daydesmig) they Will find i diflcule to argue. convincingly for the ceaity of syrimetry, and still more difficult to prove the usefulness of prac- bing i ‘The problem is the paucity, to say the least of experiential evidence supporting the debated presumption, whereas reason fests is claim co the lase word where there is Contention ont resolution fo ground its judgements precisely i that kind of ev dence, while dismissing the validity ofall other giounds. Another, yet closely related problem is the profusion of contrary evidence: ‘ames, that when promoting the effectiveness of human under takings and humans” centri in reaching their objectives, ceason focuses on liberating its carries from constints imposed their choices by symmetry, mutsaliy, reversibility of actions and obliga ‘ions: other words, on creating situations in which the carts ‘of reason may quity strike off thelist of lactors relevant to thet choices the apprehension that the course of action they rake may rebound oa them ~ of to put it bratally yee more to the point, A natural history of evil 131 tac evilmay boomerang back onthe evders, Contrary to Kaas hhopecommn reason sems to deploy most oft time snd energy inthe service of disarming nd incapacating the demands and Drenues ofthe allegedly estore imperative. According tothe Precepts of reason, the mos seasonal, most worthy of aenson nd most commendable principles of action are those of pre Siping abolishing the symmetry Between the actors and the hws of the actions; or at least those statagems that, once deployed, reduce to a riimum the chances of reciprocation ‘whawrer ‘sands to season all too ofenBity reset stand to demands of moray At any rate, lois Rone of fs reason Shlenes then i fsa moral test "Reason ina service station of power: ei, stand foremost a factory of might (Mach, pouvoir deine ay he subject eapacy foreach objectives despite the revtance= whether of inert matter ‘Sr of subjects pursuing diferente “To be mghty’ mean, 8 ‘ther word, the ability to overcome the ineia of 2 rcaleeant hj of action ort ignore te amines of ther dts rsonae (0 wi enjoy the sole sbjetiity and the sole fle rc tcaonaly in te mules drama and so relce the ter subjets tothe stars ofthe objet of etion or iy nesta teckerop: By ts very nate, might and power are asymnccl {one tempted to sy just as nature stands mo wok, power stands to symmety). Power does nor unify and docs not level up (or owa) diferences power divides and opposes. Power ia swore tem and suppesior of symmetry, recproiy and mal. Power's might cons nits potency to man>ulateprobabiis 2h area: poss wel poral hanes AI'through sealing up the teuling divisons and fmemanising Inequalities of disibution agsnst dsen sid appeals from those atthe receiving end of the operation. Ina nuthely poner and the might tat, the production and the servicing of which ae the calling of reason, equal an explicit faction of aoting in practic ofthe presampeon which enders ints imperative categorical As vividly and poignanty-expresed by Boedrch Nictache : ‘what is good? All dhat enhances the feeling of power... Wha is bad? All that peoceds Irom weskzess The weak and the botched shall perish Ast peacple of our human. And they 132 A natural story of ev ought even be helped to perish, What is mae hac than, ‘ge? — Reacts sympathy wt all the botched and weak ‘I know joy in destuction’, Nietsche admitted, proudly. ‘Lam therewith destroyer par excelence:" Several generations of other ‘destroyers par excellence’, armed with weapons adequate £0 making che words flesh (and more t0 the point, to make the words hil the flesh), who worked hard to make Nietzsche's vision fealty, coud draw inspeston chee ~ and many among them did ‘They would find absolution for thei intention in Nietzsche's exhortation to help the weak and the botched £0 petish. AS Zarathustea, Niewsche's authorized spokesman and plenipotes- ‘ing, posits “My greatest danger always layin indslgence ard sulferance; and all humankind wants to be indulged and sul- fered. The verdies of Nature can be tinkered with only at the ‘inkerers* perl and ruin, To avoid euin humans must be feed: fhe high and mighty ffom pity, compassion, (unjustly) guiky ‘conscience and (uncalled for) serples~ and the vulgar aad lowly from hope. Efforts to crack one mystery that pechape moce than any other keeps ethical philosophers awake at night, namely the mystery ‘of unde maluon (whence evil}, and more specifically and yee more urgently of ‘how good people turn evil” (ox, more t0 the point, the secret of the mysterious transmogrifcation of caring family ‘rople, and friendly and benevolene neighbours, into monsters, ‘were -tiggered and given a fist powerlul push by the nsing fide of twenseth-century totalitarianism, sec ia feverish motion by the Holocaust revelations, and accelerated still further by ‘roving evidence ofan evee more notiveable likeness between the PostHolocaust world and a minefield, of which one knows that Aan explosion must occur sooner or later, yet a0 one knows when and where, From the start, ce efforts co crack the aforementioned mystery have followed thre different tracks; inal peobabiity, they will continue to follow al three of them for Tong time to come, 38 none ofthe cree trajectories seems to posses a final station where the explorers cam rest satisfied they have reached the intended destination of their journey. The purpose of thei explortion is ‘afterall, to catch in the set of season the kinds of phenomena A natural histary of evil 133 desiibed by Gunther Anders as ‘overliminal’(iberschwelige [Phenomena thar cannot be grasped and intellecally assimilated cause they outgrow any sensual or conceprual nets thereby sharing the fate of cheir appacent opposite, ‘subliminsl” (unter ‘chiwelige) phenomena ~ tiny and fast moving enough co escape ven the densest of nets, and to vanish befte they can be caught fad sone over to reaton for intligeneeecyling. “The fst tack (most recently seeming tobe taken by Jonatha Litll in his book The Kendly Ones? with only a fv, less than crucial, qualifications) leads to a delving into and fathomiig ‘of prychical peculiarities (or psychical sediments of biographical Decullasites) discovered or hypothesized among individuals who ie known to have commited crcl aes oF who have been caught tedshanded, these are therefore assumed co outdo average it ‘iduals in their incliacion and eagemest commit aeocites| When they are rempted or commanded 10 do so. That tack tras aid ever before the monstzous human deeds of the post- Holocause era revealed’ the fall awesomeness of the potential scale ofthe problem. le was started by Theodore Adorao’s highly {influential and memorable “authoritarian pesonality” study, pr ‘mating the idea of, x0 t0 speak, the self-selection of the evildoers ani saggesting thatthe elelection in question was determined by natural rather than urtored predispositions of individual characte, “Another, pechaps the widest and most massively trodden track, was laud along the line of behavioural condoning and led ro 20 Investigation ofthe types of social posionings or situation chat -nighe promps individuals ~ “normal under ‘edinary” or the most ‘common ireumtances~t0 jin in the perpecration of evil deed; To express it anather way, conditions awakening ev predispe- Sitions that under different concitions would have remained f asleep. For scholars following this wack, ie was society of 2 certain type, not catain individual features, cae belonged on the defen- dans bench. Siegfried Kracauer, for instance, or Hans Speen fought in the unstoppably muldplying eanks of the Angstlie (office workers) the source of the foul moral atmosphere that favoured recruitment to ch army of evi, Tat malodorous, indeed morally poisonous atmosphere was shortly afterwards ascribed by Hannah. Arend to the ‘prot-‘otalitarian’ predispositions of the bourgeois, orto the philsinism and vulgarity of classes 134 A natural history of evil forcibly reforged into masses (llsving the peincple of “Ent Kom das Fresen, dann kemnt die Mora, as Boole Brecht succinctly put i)” Hannah Arent, arguably the most prominent spokespeson foc this way of thinking sharply and uncompromisingy eran the reduction of social phenomena the individual popehe, Served that th tue genius among che Noe seduces wa inal who neither descending ros bohemanism as Goes did nor being sexual perver like Jus Srichey an advent? like Goering, a fanate fike Miter or a made the Alfed Rovenber = organized the masses int a ysem of oa domina tion, thanks (0 his (correct) assumption tha in the decve Imajoty men are not vampires or eat, but jor olden aid family provider" Where that observation ulimately ed eee can earn from her book Eman in eraem The ox wily auoted of Arends concovons washer succinct verdict ofthe Balt of evi What Arendt meant when she pronounced that vert was that montrontes Jo not need minster, eurges do ‘ot need outrageous chiacters and’ that the wowble with Eichmann ly pecs in the fact hat, according to the asso. mens of supreine luminaries of peychology and pach, be lng many fi compsions rin wap a mae _asadit, but curageouy teri trightenngly normal” Tiel wold at ea pay flow acon ete Sis instence tat Eichmann was syhing but tales, sue robot Ameng the mon recent suds following thet fing The Lifer fect by Philip Ziardo, published in 2007, hod carding and nerve racking study of bunch of gods oritary, likeable and poplar American lads and lass whe tae ie rmonses nce they had been trabsported fo sot of mowhere plac othe faraway country of ray and putin charge of Pos Stes charged with il nents ad speed of belong ton Inferior brand of hua being, or post being semen es than huthan, How safe and comforable, cosy and rendly the woeld wold fel ft were monsters and monses sone whe perpetrated sxe serous ded. Against monsters we ae any well posed, and $0 ie can res assured that we are insured gains the el decd that monsters ae capable ofan threaten to perpetat: We have poythologto spor psychopath and soiopat we have ss A natal history of evil 135 ogists tellus where they a ikaly to propagate and conse fate, we have judges to condemn them #0 coninment and Solaof and police or pychiststs to make sue they say there. ‘lag the good, ovdnary, likeable American lads and lanes were either tonsterswoe pervs, Hld ey not been assigned olor Over the mates of Abu Gia, we Wodld Rever have known (surmised, guesed, imagined, laneszed) the horying things they were capable of contving. fe wouldnt occur to any of 3 ‘hat the saling gi atthe counter might, once on overea ui trent excel a devising ever more clever and fanciful a8 well as ‘Sched and perverse cto harass mes rortre and humiite ber wards. In er and her companions’ hometown their neigh- ‘ours refuse to biieve.to this vey day that those charming ass nd lsses they have known since thelr chldnoods are the sme folk asthe monsters in the snapshots ofthe Abu Ghraib vorure chambers Bur hey ie vely ech Petree Tht conlasion of bis poychologial sad of Chip Frederick, she pected eer and pe of he Toe tacks Pip imiarlo ad to sty that there was absoltely nothing ip hs fevord that he svar abl to uncover that would have predic that Chip Frederick would engage in any form of abusive, sadnie tehavious On the sooty there wes much sn his record 10 Soest that dhe not been forced to work and live in such an formal scuaton, he igh have bees the stacy’ all Amed an poster oldie recruitment a, Indeed, Chip Fredric would have passed with Ang coloues any imapinablepaycholgial res, as well asthe most thorough Scrutiny of the record of fehavous routinely applied in selecting Candidates for he most esponible and moralysepstive service, Sout as thowe ofthe offi unformed guardians of law and order Inihe cae of Chip Fredrick and his lowest and most noroioes Companion, Lyndie England, you might al insist even icone {eractaly the they had acted on command and hd ben forced to engage atvactee they detested and abhorved = med sheep father than predatory wolves The tole charge spans them you tight then approve would be that of cowagéce or exaggerated fespect for thelr superior tthe utmost, the charge of having too tosh, without atch ab a murmur of protest, abandoned the tora principles which guided them in thar “ordinary” eat ome. But wnt about those a the top of borenuceate ladder? 136 A natural history of eit “Those who gave commands, forced obedice and pusished the disobedient? Thre people, surely mest have been monsters? “The inquicy ino the Abt Ghrab outrage never teached the £op ‘echelons of the American miliary command: forthe top, com- rmandissung people to be brought co account and tried for war Crimes, they would fre ned to find themselves on the defeated fide in the war they waged ~ which they did not. But Adolf Eichmann, presiding over the tools and procedures ofthe final solution ofthe ‘lewish problen’ and giving orders to theis opera tors, was on the side of the defeated, had been eaprured by yetors tnd brought to their courts, There was occasion, therefore, 0 fubmit the ‘monster hypothesis’ to-a most careful, indeed metic fous serutiny = and by the most distinguished members of the paychological and paychiatrie professions. The fral:conclysion {tawa ftom that most thorough and-rliable research wat an thing but ambiguous. Here itis, a conveyed by Hannah Arcade Hat» dove pyc had eid him sama — More ona ap ey tan Inn ae examining hone of hey Sortadtotnveexaimed, whessther bad ound hari we Fercelopea! locke hE tee tovacde wie and chlden, inher aed fy boty set ad fends ae ot ny foal bur som desabe™ The aooble with Eldan at recy that so mony were le ing ad cat the maby were other pemened aor ithe ty were, sda are ty tedden ol ne and our oral eandads of igen, chs nonaliy t Imo more cing han al the ato pt topeo Te must indeed have been the most terrifying of findings if ie ie mot ogres but normal people (Lam tempted to add “guys lke you and se’) who commit atrocities and are capable of acting it t perverted and sadistic way, then all he soves we've invented fan put in place to strain out the careers of inhumanity from the Fest ofthe human specie are either botched'in execution or mis ‘Conceived foam the stare and mort certainly ineffective. And so were, ro cue along story short, waprotected (one is tempted 0 add “dfenccless against our shared morbid capacity’). Employing thei ingemsity to the utmost and erying ae hard as they coold co ‘evilize’ human manners and the pacterns of human togetherness, ‘our ancestors, and also those of us who have followed their ine - —— A natural bistory of eit 137 of thought and action, are, so f0 speak, barking up a wrong ‘Reading The Kindly One atentively, one can unpacka covert critique of the common interpretation, endorsed by Arende erslf, of the “banality of ev thesis: hamely, che supposition that the fvildoee Eichmann was af “umhinking man’. From Lill poe tava Eichimann emerges as anjehing but an untifking fllower Sf orders ot a slave fo his own base passions. “He was cectainly Rot an enomy of mankind described in Nuremberg, *nor was he fn incarnation of banal ei? be was on the contrary ‘a very ta nted bureaverat, extremely competent at is functions, with = Certain stature and a considerable sense of personal iiiative'!* ‘Ks manages Eichmann would most certainly be the pride of any ‘Rputable European fir (one could add, including companies tikh jewish owners or top executives). Litellsnarrats, Dr Aves {hai that inthe many personal encounters he had with Eichmann hhenever noticed any trace of personal prejudice against, let alone 1 passionate hated, ofthe Jews, whom he sawas no more, hough fa lest ether, than objects which his office demanded to be duly processed. Whether at home o in his job, Eichmana was consis Poa the same person, the kind of person he was, for instance, ‘Shen he performed wo Brahms quartets with his SS mats: "Eichmann played calmly, methodically, his eyes riveted to the score, he didn't make any mistakes.” TT Eichmann was ‘nora’, then no-one sa priori exempt from suspicion = none of our dazlinly normal fcends and acquain~ {ances and neither are we, Chip Pedericks and Adolf Eichmanns ‘alle our stces in fll view, queue lke us a the checkouts ofthe Tne shops fil cinemas and football grandstands, rave om rains Sind iy Buses or get stuck next ro us in trafic jams. They might ive next door, or even it at our dining table. Al of chem, given propitious circumstances, might do what Chip Frederick or Adolf Eichmann did. And what about med! Since so many peole can potentially commit ate of humanity, I might easily by chance, by peers caprice of fate, become ane of thei victim. They can do ie Taleatly know that. But nt also the case that equally easly 1 myself night become one of “hem: just another “ordinary human who ca doco other humans what they have done ‘hm Mt. Steiner used the metaphor of ‘sleeper! drawn from the tecmanology of spy networks to denote an os yet undisclosed 138 A natural history of evil reson! inclination to commit acts of violence, oF & person's Colnrabilty to he tepton vo finn ache ae es Potential thc maydypeheialybeprescnein psoas noe fish long renting ive an incon thao fe bout?) sre, vsorbily that may herrea ely Under some prt propitious condone, pesasaiy see th fc theo repose ond hy id ne abropay wenkene or remove Fein Saubimated one pee) Step further, delnng both references o-parulary is Sener Proposition and Iypotenting the pser of mallee es fin mom, pes ll hurt bens El compet by ordinary pope ithe mom, ot an ep ke ae We den Know aid nese wll Know atleast never hao fe aon becsiseehre no way to pon or daprote at ere cok caly Posies ac not une chicken! they cm be ag ed sefnily counted ony nce they ae hatched ‘What do we know Jor sre The ease with which sai behaviour could te eed in ivi who mee ot eons types" wat dicot by Zimrda im hs ier opciones ‘oduct at tnd Unversity wih stuenssendoody eoeed tly th ole of prison pune tomas flow sede se ‘andomiy eatin the role of prone Stanley Migs Re Yaleexperinents with prope agin randomly chores uke wee asked inc on oh peopl sees of what hey nee ade to beleve were pun Gece ods of cealtng Mopeds found that “obelence to authori ay aunty. oped of thenatur ofthe commands piven by ha suchen ee ee ingetned behaviour endeny evn ibe bjs Re she sea, they ate tld perm tepugnant and revs Ifoos oid wo that factor such well nigh anveral eden sonsoatog 2% the aeibutesof loyalty ene of duty and dcping ee are lec kl wth lite icy teeny, oer onda 1 prod, push, sete and ence sone pean, te cose citihings Christopher R Browaing investigated he evi ye invaely for pathof men belonging othe Corman Reserve ole Btny Tot, assigned to he plc fom among conser oa bese line’ dry and: eventually delegated to paracate ta he oo turer of Jens in Plan” Those people, wit had over bo town to commit viens le lone murderous ace on ol ey A natural istry of evil 139 and gave no grounds fr suspicion tha they were capable of com Initing em, were ready (aot 100 per cen of them, but acon Sdeable mojriy co comply with the command to murder: t9 Shoot pont blangymen and women, old people an chideen, who tree unacned and obviously innocent since they had aot been ‘aged with any crime, none of sehom nurturing the aightes invention to ha them or her consader in ams, What Browning {Sands homever land published under the tall ele of Ordinary Men) was that only above 10 to 20 per exnt ofthe conscripted policemen proved to be "fore and evade, who asked t0 be Excused from carting out the orders, that there wat also ‘a tuclus of increasingly ethnic kilts who vluntered forthe Fring suede and “Jew hans” but that by fr the epee group caste pelconen plac performed the vole of aude Snd ghee clearers when i wa signed hem hough without Secking opportunites eo kil on their own ita. The most Strking sper of tha ning was in my view the amazing sae iy of Browning’ satis disibucion of elo, abstaroers and ipassioned‘neithet-nor otha ofthe reactions ofthe subjects of Zimbardo’ and Milgram’ experiments tothe asthortaiely ndored commands, al thee cates, some people ordered to Commi cocky were only ton expe leap tothe occasion and fdve vent to their evil drives, some ~ cough the same number = ‘efused vo do evl whatever the circumstances and whatever the Consequences oftheir abseony whereas an extensive "mide {roune’ was filed by peopl who were inferen,akewarm and ot particularly engaged or strongly commited to one or the ote end ofthe atin spectrum, avldingtaking any stand whether {oe mocaly or aginst and refersng send tfllw the Ene of east restance and whatever prodence diated, and unco cern allowed Tn other words, inal thee cases (as well sin innumerable cxhersin th extensive et of stds of which thes three invest {fons have been acclaimed a he most spectacular an laminae ing examples the dtbuton of probable: thet the command {Ordo el wl be-obeyed or rested has followed the standard Iowa in satis a the Gabssan curve (omeines called the Gaussian bell, Gaussian, ditbution, or Gaseian fonction, telieved to be the graph of the most common and pretoypca, {owt normal dstbution of probable We ead in Wikipedia 140 A natural history of eit that what the notin ofthe Gaussian curve refers othe endeney of result to'cster around a mean or average’ The graph of the sssocated probabil deny fenton i blshape, tna peak the mean” We lio rend that hy the cena lit theorem ny ‘ariabl ai the sm of lange numberof independent fare inlikely robe normally dirbuted Asthe probable of vrnar behavioural response by people exposed the pressure todo evshow a clear tendency to take the form of Gausan care, we ca ck the supposition eh in thee cave aswell the results were compound by the mal imerfrence of large numberof indent factor: comands which compete recommendations ae soced (che two factors responsbie for the ring incoerence and dimiiching uli of dose voles) other, more india, idlonynorate dna personal actos, forinsance personal characte may playa increasingly important role inthe choc of sponses: The Raman iy of humans mig gain they di. ‘And yet our sharedexprene thus far ofr fe ify reasons tobe optimist, As W. 6. Sbal sugges nie 1999 Lalo tnd Literate taslated by Antes Bellas On the Natl Pstory Of Desiacton), we ae unable to learn fom the msfornes we bring on ourscive® and we are incoreghe and wil continue long the beaten racks that bear some sigh elation to the old toad neework’ Bent at we al are by nature oF tai, On Seeking and finding the shortest ay vo the ais we purse and Ketiewe tbe worth pursing, “mlrcues” land paritlarly Soran sale ote! donot ea ese ih Price wo pay for shortening she rote ening costs and maging hectic “ * = Sebald quotes, afer Alexander Kiuge’s Unhimlichei der Ze, an interview conducted bya German journals, Kune th he US Bight Army Air Fore Brigadier Frederick L- Anderson. A natural bistry of el 141 Pressed by Kunzort to explains whether there wasa way to prevent for avoid the destruction of Halbertagr, his home roven, by ‘American. carpet bombing, Anderson responded tha the bombs ‘were after all, “expensive inems “In practice, they could’ have been dropped over mountains or open country after so much labour had gone into making them at home.” Anderson, uncom ‘monly frank, hit the nail on the heads it was not the need co do omething about Halberstade thc decided the use ofthe bombs, but the need to do something with the bombs thae decided the fate of Halberstade alberstads was just a“ollateral casualty” (to update the language of the miltacy) of the success ofthe bomb factories. As Sebald explains, “once the matériel was manufac: tured, simply letting theatcrafe and their valuable fecighe stand ilo the aie of eastern England ea counter any heathy That ‘economic instinct’ might pechaps have had the fst, bur most certainly did have che lase word in the debate about the propriety and usefulness of the scaegy of ir Arthur (Bomber) Flansthe destruction of German cities went into fll and unstop pable sing well after the spring of 1944, when it had aleeady ‘awned on policy makers and the gives of military orders that contrary so the ofcialy proclaiied abjetve of the air cam paign and ite protracted, determined, lavish and zealous execu fons plling no punches, the morale ofthe German population was obviously unbroken, while industrial production wasimpaired nly marginally at best, and the ead of the war has) nor come 2 tay closer By the rime of that discovery, and disclosure, “the tatérie” in question had already been manufactured and-was fling the warehouses to capacity letting ile idle would indeed “counter any heslthy economic asin’, to pute simply, would sake no ‘economis.sense (according to an estimate by A. J.P ‘Tylon quoted by Max Hastings in his 1979 study” Bomber Command, p. 349, the servicing of the bombing campaign afer “llengaged and swallowed up’ oneied of roral British produce sion rervicing che wat). ‘We have so far sketched and compared reo tacks along which the search for an answer to the unde malo has proceeded in recent times. There i, however, a third track, 100, which due to the universality and extemporality of the faciors i invokes and 2 A natural bitory of evil deploys in the pursuit of understanding deserves ro be called “anthropological. Tiss a perspective that with the passage of ime Seems to rise in imporeane ard promis, just as the other 10 sketched above neat the exhaustion of ther cognitive potenti ‘We could intuit the direction ofthat tied tack in Seba seid, Iehad aleady been iid ot before, howevse, in Gunther Anders Seminal sudy, overlooked or neglected for a few decades, af the ‘Phenomenon ofthe "Nagasaki syndrome’, charged by Anders with the fully and truly apocalyptic potential of “slobocide.*" The "Nagasaki syndeome’, Anders suggested, means that “what has been done once can be repeated over again, with ever weaker reservations; with each succestive case, more and more ‘mat offal, casually, with litele deliberation ox motive “The eepet tion of outage is Hot just posible, bu probable = as the chance to win the bate vo prevent i gets smalls, while tha of losing it The decision to drop atomic bombs on Hiroshi on 6 Aug 1945, and thre day ater on Nagasaki, wos ofilly explained, expe fato, hy the need to bring forward the capitulation of Japan in onder t sae the countless American lives which most certainly would have heen fort ifthe Amescaazy had had eo invade the Japanese archipelago. The jury of story stil Sesion, but the ofScial version of heme sting she mean, ness and villainy ofthe means by reference the grandiosity and nobility ofthe goals, as heen rece cat into doa by American Instone examining newly dclssied informetion about the cireumstancs in which the decison was condere, caken-and implemented, allowing the offal version t0 be guesidned not only on moral, Bt sso on fac gros Sethe cris of the ofl werson ae thelr a aan were ey pile 41 month oro before the Bt stom Bomb was dropped and ust, ‘so steps would have caused them to lay down seme: Tras ‘Consent to the Sorce Army joining the wat with Japan, and the commitment ofthe ales co keep the Emperor on hit throne afer Japan's surcenden “Truman, hover, procrastinate, He waited for the resus of the ese ich was be onde Ange In New exc, where fal touches were about to be put on the perfor mance ofthe frst atomic bombs. The news Of the ress dd A natural history of evil 43 arcve, in Potsdam on 17 Jul the test was not ast socessful—the impact of the explosion” clipsed the boldest of expecta tions... Resenting the es Of consigning an exorbitanlyexpen- sive technology eo waste, Teaman started playing for time. The [enue stake of his proctastnacion could easly be deduced from the triumphant presidential address published in the New York Times on the day following the destruction of a hundred thousand lives in Flioshima: "We made the most audacious scientific bet in ‘sory; a bet of 2 billion dllars~ and won.” One just couldn’ waste 2 billion dollars, could one? IF dhe original objective is reached before the product as had a chance to be used, one has {o promptly find another aim that will preserve or restore “cco nomic sense” to the expenditure ‘On 16 March 1945, when Nasi Geemany was aleeady on is knees and the speedy end of the war was n0 longer in doubt, ‘Arthur ‘Bomber’ Harris sent out 225 Lancaster bombers and ‘leven Mosquito fighter planes with orders to discharge 289 rons ‘ofexplosives and $73 tons of incendiary substances on Wurzburg, ‘Pniddleszed town with 107,000 residents, rich in history and fre treasures, and poor in industry. Berween 9.20 and 9.37 pam. bout 5,009 iahabitants (of whom 66 pee cet were women and 11 per cent children} were killed, while 21,000 dwelling houses were set on fire: only 6,000 residents sill found a roof over their heads once the planes had left. Hermann Keel, who calculated the figures above after scrupulous scrutiny ofthe archives, asks ‘shy atown devoid of any kind of serategic sigaificance (an opinion Confirmed, even ifn a roundabdit way, by the emission of any ‘mention of that town’s name in the olfiial history of the Royal Air Force, which meticulously iss all ss accomplishments, even ‘the most minute) was selected for destruction. Having examined tll conceivable alternative causes, and_disqualid them one by toe, Knell was left withthe sole scesble answer to his question: tha Arthur Harris and Cat! Spaate (the commander of he US Air Force in Great Britain and Iealy} found shemselves short of cargets ax the beginning of 1945 “The bombing progrened 24 plained Wathout consideration of the changed military station. The destruction of German cies Comiaued until the cad of Apel Seanagly once the rary 4 A natural history of eit machine wat moving it could not be kopped: I had 2 life ofits town. Tete was ow all the equipment ahd soldiers oa had Te most have been thar aspece that made Fans deve 0 have ‘Wirebarg anacke. Bat why Wiraburg of all place? Purely for reasons of eon ‘evince As previous resonnatsone srt ho stow, te Shy could eat be located wh the ctcrone ad aalabe atthe te’ And the cy was sulcemty dant fom the avanes ing lied troops 0 vedice the thet of another ease of nay ee oping fam on om ups oe wor the cowa was "an emy and sil tages Ths was Wrzburgy inadvertent and uniting fal 2 Kind of fault for which to “ange would ever be pardoned once the miltary machine wt moving” Ina Violence nae une sénélogie nroponeEnao Teaver pus forgard a concept of the bybarc pore of moder i Tration.® Tis study dedicated to Nan! vlence he comes to the fonclsion tat the Nestle soci wee unigue sole inthe Sse of ening rns oe mean ef entenent al soiacon ale tested tho Separately in the histor ‘of Western civilization. eee “The bombs dropped on Hizoshma and Nagasaki prove shat ant Enlighenmene seniments ae not ecesary coniions of techno. Jogial massacre. The wo atomic ba, ike the Nai camps, were laments of the ‘ielzing process, manfetaons of one oft potentials one of ws fees and one of is ponte ramicions “Teaverso finishes his exploration with warning that shete are no rounds whatsoever fr excluding the possiblity of other synehe- Ses nthe future ~ ones o-less murderous than those ofthe Navi, “The liberal civilized Europe of the twentieth century proved 10 bey ater al, a laboratory 6f violence. Myself, Pd add that there {f¢ no signs ofthat laboratory having been shot or of opeeation ‘ceasing atthe dawn of the twenty fist century Giinther Anders asks: are we, in this age of machines, the last, telcs of the past who have not as yet managed to-clean off the toni sediments of past strociies?* And he answers: the outrages lund discussion were committed thew aot because they were si A natural bistory of ell 14s feasible (or had so far failed tobe eradicated, but onthe contrary, they were already perpecated then because then they had already become feasible and plausible [Let me sum up there mt have been 2 fest moment when the technologically assisted straciiee that had been inconceivable tint then became feasible. Those atrocities must have had their ‘moment of bepianing, their staring point ~ butt does nofollow thar they must have an end as well Tt does not follow chat they entered haman cohabitation only fora brief vst, and even'less ‘hat they brought with them or set i motion mechanisms that twere bound sooner or later eo cause their departure. Teas rather the other way round: once contraption allowing the separation of technological capacity from moral imagination is put place, ittbecomes sle-propeling,slF

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