邪惡的面孔是伊斯蘭國教育阿特拉斯大學
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邪惡的面孔是伊斯蘭國

邪惡的面孔是伊斯蘭國

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March 23, 2016

Islamists have struck again in Europe, this time in Brussels, where bombs at the airport and a metro train today took the lives of 30 people and injured hundreds more, with the casualties climbing as I write. The event has been headline and top-of-the-hour news all day—as were the attacks on the staff of Charlie Hebdo a year ago and the Paris rampage last November—whereas bombs and beheadings in Syria and Iraq are page ten news. But why?

It is not that the lives of the Belgians or French are more valuable than those of Syrians and Iraqis, who have been murdered by ISIS in numbers that are orders of magnitude higher. All lives matter to the people who live them. The real explanation has to do with the motives of the killers.

In Syria and Iraq, ISIS is one of many contenders in a civil war for control of failed, authoritarian, Muslim countries. Civil wars are notoriously vicious; motives, alliances, and tactics are complex. But why attack Belgium? ISIS made the laughable claim that the “country [is] participating in the coalition against the Islamic State.” Belgium has a tiny role in that coalition.

No, the real reason is the underlying motives of Islamist terrorists—and the philosophical ideas that underlie those motives. Attacking Europe is attacking modernity itself: the culture of reason, individualism, and secular politics. And the attack comes not from a vision of something better—Islamists in ISIS and al-Qaeda have no coherent vision—but from a hatred of what they see, but resent, as better.

Like most of my readers, I’m sure, I vividly remember September 11, 2001. I remember where I was when I saw the first images of the planes hitting the Twin Towers. I remember sending the staff home early to grieve, give blood, and otherwise deal with the tragedy; no one could concentrate on work. And I remember suddenly grasping the meaning of the event.

In “The Assault on Civilization,” which we published two days later, I said,

Civilization has always attracted parasites who wanted to steal wealth from those who produce it. But this phenomenon is different. The nihilists do not seek wealth for themselves. They want to destroy the wealth of others. They do not seek freedom from domination. They want to abolish freedom. They do not seek a place at the table of world commerce. They want to smash the table. They do not seek a better life. They glory in death. They represent the worst form of envy, the most vicious form of human evil. They hate us not for our sins but for our virtues, and they will not be appeased.

What I was describing was “the hatred of the good for being good,” Ayn Rand’s term for the malice at the heart of evil, which is so powerfully portrayed and explained in Atlas Shrugged. I had long understood that insight intellectually. But on 9/11, the visceral horror of what I saw gave the insight much deeper meaning. It rocked my world, as the event itself rocked the world we all live in today.

That’s what I see in the attacks today, as with so many other outrages and atrocities. As I wrote in The Ideas That Promote Terrorism, “to witness these things is to see the face of evil. We are dealing with evil men and evil deeds, for which there can be no excuses, no justifications, no explaining away.”

If you want to understand the roots and the reasons for Islamist terrorism, I invite you to visit our collection of commentaries on the subject: Modernity and Terrorism.

大衛·凱利

作者簡介:

大衛·凱利

大衛·凱利是阿特拉斯協會的創始人。作為一名專業的哲學家、教師和暢銷書作家,他一直是客觀主義的主要支援者超過25年。

David Kelley Ph.D
About the author:
David Kelley Ph.D

David Kelley founded The Atlas Society (TAS) in 1990 and served as Executive Director through 2016. In addition, as Chief Intellectual Officer, he was responsible for overseeing the content produced by the organization: articles, videos, talks at conferences, etc.. Retired from TAS in 2018, he remains active in TAS projects and continues to serve on the Board of Trustees.

凱利是一位專業的哲學家、教師和作家。1975年獲得普林斯頓大學哲學博士學位后,他加入了瓦薩學院哲學系,教授各級課程。他還曾在布蘭迪斯大學教授哲學,並經常在其他校區講課。

凱利的哲學著作包括倫理學、認識論和政治學方面的原創作品,其中許多作品以新的深度和新的方向發展了客觀主義思想。他是認識論論文感官的證據》的作者;客觀主義中的真理與寬容,論客觀主義運動中的問題;粗獷的個人主義:仁慈的自私基礎;以及《推理的藝術》,這是一本廣泛使用的入門邏輯教科書,現已出版第 5 版。

凱利曾就廣泛的政治和文化主題發表演講和出版。他關於社會問題和公共政策的文章發表在 《哈珀斯》、《科學》、《理性》、《哈佛商業評論》、《弗里曼》、《論原則》等雜誌上。在1980年代,他經常為 《巴倫週刊》財經和商業雜誌 撰寫有關平等主義、移民、最低工資法和社會保障等問題的文章。

他的著作 《一個人的生活:個人權利和福利國家》 批判了福利國家的道德前提,並捍衛了維護個人自主、責任和尊嚴的私人替代方案。1998年,他出現在約翰·斯托塞爾(John Stossel)的ABC/TV特別節目“貪婪”中,引發了一場關於資本主義倫理的全國性辯論。

作為國際公認的客觀主義專家,他廣泛地講授安·蘭德、她的思想和作品。他是電影《阿特拉斯聳聳肩》的顧問,也是《阿特拉斯聳聳肩:小說、電影、哲學》的編輯

 

主要作品(部分):

概念與自然:對現實主義轉向的評論(道格拉斯·拉斯穆森和道格拉斯·登厄伊爾)”,《理性論文》第 42 期,第 1 期,(2021 年夏季);這篇對最近一本書的評論包括對概念的本體論和認識論的深入探討。

知識的基礎。關於客觀主義認識論的六講。

存在的首要地位”和“感知的認識論”,傑斐遜學院,聖地牙哥,1985年7月

普遍性和歸納”,在GKRH會議上的兩次演講,達拉斯和安娜堡,1989年3月

懷疑論”,約克大學,多倫多,1987年

自由意志的本質”,波特蘭研究所的兩場演講,1986年10月

現代性黨”,卡托政策報告,2003年5月/6月; 導航員,2003年11月;一篇被廣泛引用的文章,關於前現代、現代(啟蒙)和後現代觀點之間的文化分歧。

"I Don't Have To" (IOS Journal, Volume 6, Number 1, April 1996) and “I Can and I Will” (The New Individualist, Fall/Winter 2011); Companion pieces on making real the control we have over our lives as individuals.

Ideas e ideologías
Religión y ateísmo