sci.research.careers

On Aug 14, 12:37 am, Straydog wrote:
> On Mon, 13 Aug 2007, Beladi Nasralla wrote:

> > But how about Hitler or Stalin ? They also were sincere in what they
> > were doing... destroying millions of people. Is sincereity a virtue
> > after all ?
>
> But were they doing something nice (or good [and for whom?])?

That was exactly my point. Sincerity alone is not a virtue. The
American society made it virtue, because it is easy to exploit the
sincere person who is also a plain naive person. It is easier for the
government to herd such individuals. It is easy to make them to do
what the government (or other authority) wants them to do. I would say
it was a cornerstone of the economical development of America. Until
the recent time.

But it is also easy to coerce the "sincere" person in doing evil
things. The person also have to have his own critical thinking. If the
person did something bad, then the person should be able to assess it
critically, repent, and vow to never do it again. But sincere
person... he just consumes whatever the cultural idea is hand down to
him by the authorities without critical thinking about it. In fact,
critical thinking about the orders given to you is considered an
anathema for a sincere person.

Hm... I guess I just came close to reasoning that the US state is an
evil formation :-) :-(