WHAT ARE PEOPLE FOR?

Seamus McGoogle never asks such questions.

One area where some fundamentalists and atheistic materialists agree is the idea that there is no inherent end or goal of human life. For the former, these come only from God, while for the latter any goal or end is arbitrary.

Leaving the God issue aside, I disagree with both. While people have racked their brains over this question, I think it's one of the easy ones. I keep harping on this theme, but I still think Aristotle nailed it when he argued in his Ethics that the goal (telos) of life is happiness because we want it for its own sake whereas we want other things in order to be happy.

The word he used for happiness was eudaimonia, which means something like thriving. It implies actualizing one's potential over the course of a lifetime. It's also the goal of political life.

Thriving isn't necessarily the same thing as pleasure or even pleasing emotions. Sometimes people are happiest when they are so absorbed in doing something that they have little or no self-consciousness. This is sometimes called the flow state.

It also means having one's basic needs met. It's hard to thrive when you're cold and homeless, hungry, sick without the prospect of care, or are unable to have an adequate standard of living. As social beings, we need positive interactions with others and good social networks. As (occasionally) rational beings, we need mental stimulation, etc.

There's obviously more to it than that, but the basics are important.

I'd suggest that a valuable lens to use in looking at economic issues and policy options is to begin with the end in mind and consider how these impede or promote thriving.

IT'S NOT JUST THE UNINSURED who are having health care problems these days. Twenty five million underinsured Americans are facing hard times, health problems, and financial strain.

IT WASN'T JUST IRAQ that the Bush administration misled the nation about. Their greatest success, this item argues, is its attack on the estate tax.

SPEAKING OF IRAQ, some soldiers are going to great length to avoid going back there.

EVERY MOUNTAIN SHALL BE BROUGHT DOWN. Here's s story about mountaintop removal mining in WV that appeared in Financial Times Deutschland, a German publication.

MEDICAID. Here's the latest on the controversy surrounding WV's Medicaid program.

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED

THINKING ABOUT VIOLENCE

There are often occasions in life where following our natural inclinations isn't a very good idea. One example is the all-too-human tendency to ignore things we don't like. Violence is a case in point. I think people who want to make the world less violent and less unjust would do well to think and learn as much about it as possible, although preferably not first hand...

I've had many discussions with people over the years about what they consider violence to be and what kind of violence is the worst. The ideas people come up with vary widely, although it seems like many people who have experienced a lot of violence in their lives often consider mental cruelty to be the worst--perhaps because cruel intent is conveyed by physical violence and other kinds of abuse.

I tend to think of violence broadly as any act (or non-action) involving human agency that harms people or keeps them from developing their potential. This would include institutional or structural violence such as poverty as well as physical violence committed by individuals or groups.

(And by the way, way more people die needlessly from preventable things related to the structural violence of poverty and economic disparities that personal violence or even armed conflict. )

To me, the opposite of violence is not so much peace or nonviolence as that state of thriving or well-being that the ancient Greeks referred to as eudaimonia (literally something like "good spirits"), which is often but inadequately translated into English as happiness. As Aristotle argued in his Ethics, happiness or eudaimonia is the goal of human life in the sense that we want other things in order to be happy but desire happiness for its own sake. It's not the same thing as pleasure, although that's a part of a happy life. Rather, it involves not only being able to meet basic human needs but also self-actualization, which for social animals like ourselves inherently involves others.

STRETCHED. As the economy sours for many Americans, people are turning to food stamps to help make ends meet. But as AP reported recently, rising food prices are diminishing their purchasing power.

DEMOCRACY AT RISK. Here's Bill Moyers musing on the future of the Republic.

HALF IN TEN. A new campaign aims at reducing poverty in the US by 50 percent over the next ten years. For more details, click here.

CHANGING LIFESTYLES are likely to come in the wake of higher fuel costs.

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED