[lit-ideas] Re: Sunday Poem

  • From: "Andy Amago" <aamago@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
  • Date: Sun, 22 Jan 2006 08:41:44 -0500

> [Original Message]
> From: david ritchie <ritchierd@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> To: <lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> Date: 1/22/2006 2:59:57 AM
> Subject: [lit-ideas] Re: Sunday Poem
>
>
> I also said that when it comes to students two things annoy me from  
> the outset:
> quoting Webster's Dictionary as if that settled anything,
> and quoting Santayana's comment about people being doomed to repeat  
> history.
> A more inane comment would be hard to imagine!


Interesting comments, they caught my eye.  Quoting the dictionary may not
settle anything, but it often brings to light that people use words so
casually as to not know what the other is talking about, or sometimes even
what they?re talking about.  Defining words before using them has to be
fundamental to a meaningful discussion.

Also, the human race does repeat history, whether they study it or they
don't.  Military people study war with the intention of fighting it, which
is to say, repeating history.  The human race is compulsive in its
need/desire to wage war, irrespective of level of ?civilization?.  If
doomed is defined as unhappy destiny, and war is seen as a negative
condition, then certainly people are either doomed or doom themselves.  On
the other hand, if people enjoy war, or the idea of war, then they?re fated
instead for whatever joy or pleasure they get out of planning for war or
waging it.  Either the human race is doomed to repeat history, or they?re
perverse.  

BTW, I didn't know Santayana was the one who made the comment originally.



>
> David Ritchie
> Portland, Oregon
>
>
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