The Grasshopper and the Ant
And then the wives of the ant and the grasshopper fell ill, and needed to be sent to nursing homes.
Neither had suitable insurance; both applied for Medicaid.
For the grasshopper who had squandered his income over his entire lifetime of travel, partying, and festivities, it was a piece of cake.
Neither he nor his wife had a thing.
Medicaid granted!
But the ant and his wife had scrimped and saved all their lives, living on cold porridge and travelling no further than the next town, doing their best to provide for their "golden years".
They had to give up and sign over everything they had spent a life of sacrifice and prudence to save.
And only then, stripped as naked as the grasshoppers, but not having had the life of ease, riotous living, and heedless pleasure of the grasshoppers, were they given Medicaid.
"Gee," said the ant to himself. "It's as if the state wanted to punish the prudent, the provident, the industrious, the thrifty, the responsible, in favor of the altogether shiftless and thoughtless."
And the grasshopper looked over at the ant. And smiled.
Showing posts with label La Fontaine. Show all posts
Showing posts with label La Fontaine. Show all posts
Sunday, October 20, 2019
Wednesday, July 30, 2014
King Log or King Stork, and some other thoughts
That these are so widely regarded as the only alternatives says much about human dispositions toward others.
In case you wondered which might be more common, benevolence or malevolence.
Three things are not the same.
Choice, which results like a vector from the strengths of present desires.
Happiness, which appears to be a function of affective, emotional, and conative states.
Well-being, which seems to be a function of objective factors like health, safety, and physical condition.
Regarding the latter two there are obvious negative interactions.
For example, illness being a source of anxiety or preventing realization of desire makes for unhappiness.
And chronic stress, dread, or fear can ruin one's health.
On the other hand, it is not unknown for people to sacrifice personal well-being to desires whose satisfaction is needful for their happiness.
Typically this involves sacrifice for beloved others, human or not.
It also seems there are desires whose satisfaction can only be had for a net loss in long run happiness, well-being, or both, that all the same are strong enough to prevail.
Think of addictions.
Think of those who make great sacrifices, even of their lives, for love.
Or for hate.
There is not generally, if ever, among our present desires a desire to maximize our own happiness or well-being, per se.
Much less that of any specific others or humanity in general.
Common twaddle to the contrary notwithstanding.
What passes among humans for prudence, for example, is only marked and persistent concern for future recognized elements of well-being, mostly in order to ward off future impediments to happiness.
Friday, July 4, 2014
Saturday, June 28, 2014
The animals sick of the plague
La Fontaine 7/1.
The consolations of faith.
Human sacrifice.
The justice of the strong.
Sunday, June 15, 2014
Profiting from slavery
Slave shrimp
Profit is made from X when total revenues from production and sale of X exceed total costs.
Nothing else is profit from X.
Thus only people in the trade, themselves, can profit from slavery, those who produce slaves as well as those who buy slaves in bulk for distribution and resale.
Before the whites put a stop to it, that would have been black Africans who captured untold millions of other black Africans for enslavement, for example, and the Arabs and other Muslim traders they sold to, and the Muslim, European, and American shippers they sold to, and the wholesalers they supplied in African and Middle Eastern lands, in India, and in the Americas, as well as retailers if any in those same areas.
Persons employing slaves in their enterprises do not profit from slavery or even the labor of the slaves they own, nor by any other factor of production, but certainly may diminish their costs by use of slaves as they might by use of any form of cheaper labor, or any cheaper factors of production.
And that, I think, covers it.
Do people or enterprises buying products made by slaves, or produced using components or materials or other factors of production made by slaves, or themselves using components or materials or other factors of production made by slaves, or etc. . . . profit from slavery?
Well, no, though they may indeed realize savings and it may even happen that they can only afford such products and cannot afford alternatives made only by free labor, produced using only components, materials, and other factors of production made only by free labor, themselves using only components, materials, and other factors of production made only by free labor, and etc. . . . - even free labor more viciously sweated and worse compensated than the slaves.
If I recall correctly, there was a time in ante bellum America when it was pretty much impossible for ordinary folks to buy clothing, for example, not incorporating materials made by slaves, or etc. . . . and perhaps many other products as well.
Leaving out the really, really poor who wore only used clothing or found castoffs, of whom there were many.
The post as KOS to which I link threatens moral condemnation of white consumers buying shrimp from farms recently discovered by The Guardian to be using shrimp feed made from fish caught by boats using slave labor, and thus also indirectly future moral demands that their white descendants pay reparations to the Asian descendants of those slave fishermen to the billionth generation.
Hence these questions that might as well have been raised by recent demands of privileged black writers in America and their well-off white allies that another black skin privilege be created here, that of receiving reparations for slavery though they were never slaves, from white people who never owned slaves or lived in a society that legally allowed slavery, almost none of whose ancestors were in the trade and many of whose ancestors were not even Americans at the time.
These whites, of course, are very, very far from profiting from slavery, and it is equally far from evident that they or their non-American ancestors ever faced lower costs because of slavery.
As to those ancestors who were American at the time of slavery and may (it is uncertain) have faced lower costs on account of it, it is far from evident either that the cost difference was significant or that they had any actual alternative.
Anyway, as to the moral issues the proper and final response is that morality is coercive bunk by no means always in a laudable cause, as are the political demands purportedly resting on it.
And in this case both the moral condemnation and the demands resting on it are particularly revolting.
Given that those on whose behalf demands are made do not include descendants of non-slaves whose exploitation was equally awful or even worse this is transparently racist special pleasing.
Given that those upon whom demands are made include only white and leave out black descendants of those who actually did profit while including (again) only white descendants of multitudes who did not, this again is transparently racist special pleading.
In sum, the whole business stems from and powerfully encourages the racial hatred of American blacks for American whites.
That, along with the looting, is of course the point.
Anyway, to return to the matter at hand, people buying these shrimp don't profit from slavery though they may face lesser costs on its account.
As to that, just how important that cost difference is, by the time the shrimp get to the super market, is hard to say, though I must point out that despite the KOS writer shrimp at the local store are very far from cheap.
Should you avoid buying such shrimp on account of the involvement of slaves?
Should you stop buying anything at all because of such involvement, assuming you have the least idea of it?
Well, that's up to you, but your individual choice will have no noticeable effect - far more shrimp are simply lost along the way in a few days than you will ever buy in all your life.
Come to that, should you stop buying goods from Asia or wherever labor is, by comparison with America and Europe, much, much cheaper or cruelly exploited?
No more consumer electronics for you, eh?
And where will you buy your clothes?
And, again, you as a single consumer are as invisible and utterly insignificant as you as a voter.
And what can these questions about what you should do mean, anyway, if they are not meaningless moral questions laden with menace?
You may do as you wish, of course, but morality swept aside, why would something so completely out of your hands as the ultimate sources on the far side of the world of what you buy in any case concern you?
Just a thought.
Here is a little something about right and might.
Profit is made from X when total revenues from production and sale of X exceed total costs.
Nothing else is profit from X.
Thus only people in the trade, themselves, can profit from slavery, those who produce slaves as well as those who buy slaves in bulk for distribution and resale.
Before the whites put a stop to it, that would have been black Africans who captured untold millions of other black Africans for enslavement, for example, and the Arabs and other Muslim traders they sold to, and the Muslim, European, and American shippers they sold to, and the wholesalers they supplied in African and Middle Eastern lands, in India, and in the Americas, as well as retailers if any in those same areas.
Persons employing slaves in their enterprises do not profit from slavery or even the labor of the slaves they own, nor by any other factor of production, but certainly may diminish their costs by use of slaves as they might by use of any form of cheaper labor, or any cheaper factors of production.
And that, I think, covers it.
Do people or enterprises buying products made by slaves, or produced using components or materials or other factors of production made by slaves, or themselves using components or materials or other factors of production made by slaves, or etc. . . . profit from slavery?
Well, no, though they may indeed realize savings and it may even happen that they can only afford such products and cannot afford alternatives made only by free labor, produced using only components, materials, and other factors of production made only by free labor, themselves using only components, materials, and other factors of production made only by free labor, and etc. . . . - even free labor more viciously sweated and worse compensated than the slaves.
If I recall correctly, there was a time in ante bellum America when it was pretty much impossible for ordinary folks to buy clothing, for example, not incorporating materials made by slaves, or etc. . . . and perhaps many other products as well.
Leaving out the really, really poor who wore only used clothing or found castoffs, of whom there were many.
The post as KOS to which I link threatens moral condemnation of white consumers buying shrimp from farms recently discovered by The Guardian to be using shrimp feed made from fish caught by boats using slave labor, and thus also indirectly future moral demands that their white descendants pay reparations to the Asian descendants of those slave fishermen to the billionth generation.
Hence these questions that might as well have been raised by recent demands of privileged black writers in America and their well-off white allies that another black skin privilege be created here, that of receiving reparations for slavery though they were never slaves, from white people who never owned slaves or lived in a society that legally allowed slavery, almost none of whose ancestors were in the trade and many of whose ancestors were not even Americans at the time.
These whites, of course, are very, very far from profiting from slavery, and it is equally far from evident that they or their non-American ancestors ever faced lower costs because of slavery.
As to those ancestors who were American at the time of slavery and may (it is uncertain) have faced lower costs on account of it, it is far from evident either that the cost difference was significant or that they had any actual alternative.
Anyway, as to the moral issues the proper and final response is that morality is coercive bunk by no means always in a laudable cause, as are the political demands purportedly resting on it.
And in this case both the moral condemnation and the demands resting on it are particularly revolting.
Given that those on whose behalf demands are made do not include descendants of non-slaves whose exploitation was equally awful or even worse this is transparently racist special pleasing.
Given that those upon whom demands are made include only white and leave out black descendants of those who actually did profit while including (again) only white descendants of multitudes who did not, this again is transparently racist special pleading.
In sum, the whole business stems from and powerfully encourages the racial hatred of American blacks for American whites.
That, along with the looting, is of course the point.
Anyway, to return to the matter at hand, people buying these shrimp don't profit from slavery though they may face lesser costs on its account.
As to that, just how important that cost difference is, by the time the shrimp get to the super market, is hard to say, though I must point out that despite the KOS writer shrimp at the local store are very far from cheap.
Should you avoid buying such shrimp on account of the involvement of slaves?
Should you stop buying anything at all because of such involvement, assuming you have the least idea of it?
Well, that's up to you, but your individual choice will have no noticeable effect - far more shrimp are simply lost along the way in a few days than you will ever buy in all your life.
Come to that, should you stop buying goods from Asia or wherever labor is, by comparison with America and Europe, much, much cheaper or cruelly exploited?
No more consumer electronics for you, eh?
And where will you buy your clothes?
And, again, you as a single consumer are as invisible and utterly insignificant as you as a voter.
And what can these questions about what you should do mean, anyway, if they are not meaningless moral questions laden with menace?
You may do as you wish, of course, but morality swept aside, why would something so completely out of your hands as the ultimate sources on the far side of the world of what you buy in any case concern you?
Just a thought.
Here is a little something about right and might.
The wolf does not always get to eat the lamb.
But he tries.
Jean de La Fontaine, The Wolf and the Lamb
Translation by Eli Siegel
Jean de La Fontaine, The Wolf and the Lamb
Translation by Eli Siegel
A lamb was quenching its thirst
In the water of a pure stream.
A fasting wolf came by, looking for something;
He was attracted by hunger to this place.
—What makes you so bold as to meddle with my drinking?
Said this animal, very angry.
You will be punished for your boldness.
—Sir, answered the lamb, let Your Majesty
Not put himself into a rage;
But rather, let him consider
That I am taking a drink of water
In the stream
More than twenty steps below him;
And that, consequently, in no way,
Am I troubling his supply.
—You do trouble it, answered the cruel beast.
And I know you said bad things of me last year.
—How could I do that when I wasn't born,
Answered the lamb; I am still at my mother's breast.
—If it wasn't you, then it was your brother.
—I haven't a brother.—It was then someone close to you;
For you have no sympathy for me,
You, your shepherds and your dogs.
I have been told of this.I have to make things even.
Saying this, into the woods
The wolf carries the lamb, and then eats him
Without any other why or wherefore.
In the water of a pure stream.
A fasting wolf came by, looking for something;
He was attracted by hunger to this place.
—What makes you so bold as to meddle with my drinking?
Said this animal, very angry.
You will be punished for your boldness.
—Sir, answered the lamb, let Your Majesty
Not put himself into a rage;
But rather, let him consider
That I am taking a drink of water
In the stream
More than twenty steps below him;
And that, consequently, in no way,
Am I troubling his supply.
—You do trouble it, answered the cruel beast.
And I know you said bad things of me last year.
—How could I do that when I wasn't born,
Answered the lamb; I am still at my mother's breast.
—If it wasn't you, then it was your brother.
—I haven't a brother.—It was then someone close to you;
For you have no sympathy for me,
You, your shepherds and your dogs.
I have been told of this.I have to make things even.
Saying this, into the woods
The wolf carries the lamb, and then eats him
Without any other why or wherefore.
Tuesday, June 10, 2014
La Fontaine and the efficacy of petitionary prayer
6/18, The carter stuck in the mud.
Just as well he gave this one a pagan setting.
Sunday, June 8, 2014
"Our master is our enemy"
Fable 6/8, The old man and the ass.
Un Vieillard sur son Âne aperçut en passant
Un pré plein d’herbe et fleurissant :
Il y lâche sa bête, et le grison se rue
Au travers de l’herbe menue,
Se vautrant, grattant, et frottant,
Gambadant, chantant, et broutant,
Et faisant mainte place nette.
L’ennemi vient sur l’entrefaite :
« Fuyons, dit alors le Vieillard.
– Pourquoi ? répondit le paillard ;
Me fera-t-on porter double bât, double charge ?
– Non pas ? dit le Vieillard, qui prit d’abord le large.
– Et que m’importe donc, dit l’Âne, à qui je sois ?
Sauvez-vous, et me laissez paître.
Notre ennemi, c’est notre maître :
Je vous le dis en bon français. »
Note the only place in his fables La Fontaine expressed a political skepticism that cannot have been welcome to the court, in his day.
Or a political leftism quite unexpected.
Sunday, May 25, 2014
La Fontaine
4/20, The Miser Who Lost His Treasure
Written in an age when medicine could do nothing for the old, and charged accordingly.
By a man who gave no thought to the costs of home care for, say, stroke victims.
Tuesday, May 13, 2014
It's nothing. A woman drowned.
Fable 3/16, La femme noyee.
First, there is the rather brutal misogyny of the saw he refuses.
But then it turns out the illustration and the moral are only more gently misogynist.
Not that I mind a dose of misogyny, now and again, unless it's overdone.
That's thanks to feminism, by the way, much as my racism, such as it is, is a response to the race hatred of whites by other races.
Fed by liberals, of course, much like feminist man-hating.
Liberal euro-whites and liberal men.
Is misogyny a standard theme of pessimist writing, l wonder?
Think of Nietzsche and Schopenhauer.
Ie ne ſuis pas de ceux qui diſent,
Ce n’eſt rien ;
C’eſt une femme qui ſe noye.
Je dis que c’eſt beaucoup ; & ce ſexe vaut bien
Que nous le regrettions, puiſqu’il fait nôtre joye.
Ce que j’avance icy n’eſt point hors de propos ;
Puiſqu’il s’agit
dans cette Fable
D’une femme qui
dans les flots
Avoit fini ſes jours par un ſort déplorable,
Son Epoux en
cherchoit le corps,
Pour luy rendre en
cette avanture
Les honneurs de la
ſepulture.
Il arriva que ſur
les bords
Du fleuve auteur
de ſa diſgrace
Des gens ſe promenoient, ignorans l’accident.
Ce mary donc leur
demandant
S’ils n’avoient de ſa femme apperçu nulle trace ;
Nulle, reprit l’un d’eux ; mais cherchez-la plus bas ;
Suivez le fil de
la riviere.
Un autre repartit : Non, ne le ſuivez pas ;
Rebrouſſez plutoſt
en arriere.
Quelle que ſoit la pente & l’inclination
Dont l’eau par ſa
courſe l’emporte,
L’eſprit de
contradiction
L’aura fait floter
d’autre ſorte.
Cet homme ſe railloit aſſez hors de ſaiſon.
Quant à l’humeur
contrediſante,
Je ne ſçay s’il
avoit raiſon.
Mais que cette
humeur ſoit, ou non,
Le défaut du ſexe
& ſa pente,
Quiconque avec
elle naiſtra,
Sans faute avec
elle mourra,
Et juſqu’au bout
contredira,
Et, s’il peut,
encor par-delà.
In Praise of King Log
LES GRENOUILLES QUI DEMANDENT UN ROI
Les Grenouilles, se lassant
De l'état démocratique,
Par leurs clameurs firent tant
Que Jupin les soumit au pouvoir monarchique.
Il leur tomba du ciel un Roi tout pacifique :
Ce roi fit toutefois un tel bruit en tombant,
Que la gent marécageuse,
Gent fort sotte et fort peureuse,
S'alla cacher sous les eaux,
Dans les joncs, dans les roseaux,
Dans les trous du marécage,
Sans oser de longtemps regarder au visage
Celui qu'elles croyaient être un géant nouveau ;
Or c'était un Soliveau,
De qui la gravité fit peur à la première
Qui, de le voir s'aventurant
Osa bien quitter sa tanière.
Elle approcha, mais en tremblant.
Une autre la suivit, une autre en fit autant,
Il en vint une fourmilière ;
Et leur troupe à la fin se rendit familière,
Jusqu'à sauter sur l'épaule du Roi.
Le bon Sire le souffre et se tient toujours coi.
Jupin en a bientôt la cervelle rompue :
Donnez-nous, dit ce peuple, un Roi qui se remue.
Le Monarque des Dieux leur envoie une Grue,
Qui les croque, qui les tue,
Qui les gobe à son plaisir,
Et Grenouilles de se plaindre ;
Et Jupin de leur dire : Eh quoi ! votre désir
À ses lois croit-il nous astreindre ?
Vous avez dû premièrement
Garder votre gouvernement ;
Mais ne l'ayant pas fait, il vous devait suffire
Que votre premier Roi fut débonnaire et doux :
De celui-ci contentez-vous,
De peur d'en rencontrer un pire.
The translator, Christopher Wood, remarks that the moral of the fable condemns monarchy, representing the utter inactivity of the utmost indifference as the best that can be hoped for from a king.
That is true.
But the pessimism runs deeper than that.
The direct target, after all, is the folly of the many who, forsaking democracy, demand to be ruled by an autocrat.
In any case, though La Fontaine has made it his own, the fable originates with Aesop.
Google "King Log."
La Fontaine on Death
Both versions exaggerate the value of mere life, the
tenacity of the will to live, or fear of death.
DEATH AND THE WRETCH
A wretch, who in misfortunes pined,
Daily invoked the aid of Death :
“ Come quick,” he said, “I yield my breath ;
Come, lovely Death ! and ease my mind.”
The monarch dire to please him came,
Knocked at the door, announced his name ;
Entered the room and near him drew.—
“ What,” cried he, trembling, “ do I view !
Hence, hideous object, from my sight !
I shake with horror and affright !
O Death, keep off ! Away ! ill-omened wight !”
Mecaenas somewhere thus exclaimed,
Let fate all vigour from my body take,
Let me be gouty, handless, maimed,
Let fate a moving trunk my body make ;
More than content do I the bargain strike,
Never to die.—Many have said the like.
LA MORT ET LE MALHEUREUX
Un Malheureux
appelait tous les jours
La mort
à son secours;
Ô Mort, lui
disait-il, que tu me sembles belle !
Viens vite, viens finir ma fortune cruelle.
La mort crut en venant, l'obliger en effet.
Elle frappe à sa porte, elle entre, elle se montre.
Que vois-je !
cria-t-il, ôtez-moi cet objet ;
Qu'il est
hideux ! que sa rencontre
Me cause
d'horreur et d'effroi !
N'approche pas, ô Mort ; ô Mort, retire-toi.
Mécénas fut un galant homme :
Il a dit quelque part : Qu'on me rende impotent,
Cul-de-jatte, goutteux, manchot, pourvu qu'en somme
Je vive, c'est assez, je suis plus que content.
Ne viens jamais, ô Mort ; on t'en dit tout autant.
DEATH AND THE WOODMAN
A woodman poor, and sunk in years and woes,
Groaned with the load his weary hands had cut.
Bowed down beneath Time's many-handed blows,
With painful steps he sought his smoky hut.
At last
lie could no farther go—
Laid down his load, reflected on his woe ;
What earthly pleasure had he ever found !
Lived there a poorer wretch this world around !
Often no bread—through wakeful nights oppressed ;
Wife, children, soldiers, taxes, and the rest.
What gloomier picture could his fancy draw ?
He called on Death, and soon the monarch saw.
“What do you want ? ” he asked, as near he strode.
“Please,” said the man, “ help me to raise my load.”
Death
comes, a cure for every cry ;
Yet we
recoil and doubt his skill,
And
trembling hold our motto still,
Rather
to suffer than to die.
LA MORT ET LE BÛCHERON
Un pauvre bûcheron, tout couvert de ramée,
Sous le faix du fagot aussi bien que des ans
Gémissant et courbé, marchait à pas pesants,
Et tâchait de gagner sa chaumine enfumée.
Enfin, n'en pouvant plus d'effort et de douleur,
Il met bas son fagot, il songe à son malheur.
Quel plaisir a-t-il eu depuis qu'il est au monde ?
En est-il un plus pauvre en la machine ronde ?
Point de pain quelquefois, et jamais de repos.
Sa femme, ses enfants, les soldats, les impôts,
Le
créancier et la corvée
Lui font d'un malheureux la peinture achevée.
Il appelle la Mort ; elle vient sans tarder,
Lui
demande ce qu'il faut faire.
C'est,
dit-il, afin de m'aider
A recharger ce bois ; tu ne tarderas guère.
Le
trépas vient tout guérir ;
Mais
ne bougeons d'où nous sommes :
Plutôt souffrir que mourir,
C'est la devise des hommes.
Aesop’s, in one of many English translations.
An Old Man cut himself a bundle of sticks in a wood and
started to carry them home.
He had a long way to go, and was tired out before he had got
much more than half-way.
Casting his burden on the ground, he called upon Death to
come and release him from his life of toil.
The words were scarcely out of his mouth when, much to his
dismay, Death stood before him and professed his readiness to serve him.
He was almost frightened out of his wits, but he had enough
presence of mind to stammer out, "Good sir, if you'd be so kind, pray help
me up with my burden again."
Including philosophical essays like this famous one by Bernard
Williams
Live forever, no
matter what?
Pshaw.
Consider Alzheimer’s, Mad Cow (Creutzfeldt–Jakob disease),
or any number of other fates that pretty much erase us without necessarily
actually killing us.
Well, live forever if you keep your youth and health?
A theme taken up by Beauvoir in an interesting 1946 novel.
And others in other literary forms.
Saturday, May 3, 2014
La Cigale et la Fourmi
Might as well burn your nest-egg as waste it trying to help the improvident.
They will just piss it all away, and then they will be as bad off as before.
But this time you will be right there with them.
Smart move, eh?
A life lesson from La Fontaine.
Character, they say, is destiny.
Or was it Schopenhauer?
La cigale , ayant chanté
Tout l'été,
Se trouva fort dépourvue
Quand la bise fut venue.
Pas un seul petit morceau
De mouche ou de vermisseau
Elle alla crier famine
Chez la fourmi sa voisine,
La priant de lui prêter
Quelque grain pour subsister
Jusqu'à la saison nouvelle
«Je vous paierai, lui dit-elle,
Avant l'oût , foi d'animal,
Intérêt et principal .»
La fourmi n'est pas prêteuse ;
C'est là son moindre défaut.
«Que faisiez-vous au temps chaud ?
Dit-elle à cette emprunteuse.
Nuit et jour à tout venant
Je chantais, ne vous déplaise.
- Vous chantiez ? j'en suis fort aise.
Eh bien : dansez maintenant.»
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