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Small-Scale Question Sunday for February 18, 2024

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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I've been thinking of Dewey's point as The Riddle of the Flute Children. Its applies quite generally. Cutting and pasting the riddle:

Amartya Sen starts his book The Idea of Justice with a parable about three children and a flute. Who gets the flute? The child who can play it? The child who made it? The child who has nothing else?

The response that gets to the heart of the matter is

Kill the person who asked the question. Once the idea of redistributing flutes takes hold, ambitious men will fight to be Lord High Distributor of Flutes. The fighting will escalate. The flute will be broken and the child who made it will die.

Asking who deserves the flute is self-defeating because the question sets off violence that leaves us without a flute.

Turning aside from political philosophy and turning back to the reading of old books, I notice that Dewey has priority. He made my point in 1927, 96 years before me. But his point and his once popular book have faded and I was unaware of them.

It seems obvious to me that my violent and strident phrasing of the Riddle of the Flute Children is a mistake. The idea gets masked by peoples reaction against the over-the-top expression. I would do better to phrase it in a mild and temperate way. Perhaps

recognition of evil consequences which have resulted from the opposite course

Whoops! That doesn't work either. Only a dark wizard of Ravenclaw would pick up on the profundity of the point being made. How is one supposed to expressive this difficult idea?