NationStates Jolt Archive

Yes, it's a weekend, I'm bored and tired from last night, so it must be time for another one of my trademark debates, mulling over a philosophical issue and not really going anywhere. :D

This thought occured to me as I was eating a tin of crab meat from the disputed waters of the South China Sea, and reflecting on the endless possibilities of conflict...


Suppose you believe you are serving your country/cause, and maintain this belief right up to the moment of death.

Suppose the truth is that you died in service of a lie.

The question is, did you die for your country/cause, or the lie?


It is an interesting question, because one has to ask, when it comes to self-sacrifice, what it more relevant - reality, as seen by an outside observer - or perception, which is obviously limited by your context?

Objectively, and thus looking at the wider picture, one may conclude that said individual died for a lie. But equally, one could decide to the contrary, that the individual did die for his country/cause, as that was the motivating factor.

In view of this, could much of the conflict between some pro- and anti- war camps be due to a difference in interpretation of this duality, with some pro-war people believing that an individual's perception of his/her sacrifice is more valid than the true context, and some anti-war people believing that the context is all-important and invalidates any false impressions an individual may have?


And now the floor is open to random people, because I'm out for a pizza. But I will be eager to read your thoughts. :)

Well, my first observation is that either way gets you equally dead.

I do find it interesting that conservatives have lately adopted wholeheartedly the concept of subjective reality. They used to be such strong objectivists. But now they believe they can create their own reality (and many of them clearly have.)

If your country lies to you, then you can believe you are serving your country when you are, in fact, serving a lie. But does belief that it's true make it any less of a lie? Not in my book.

I believe it's a tragedy for the soldiers who die believing a lie, and a criminal offense for those who lied to them. We should stop pretending otherwise.

And before anyone objects: Saying so does not dishonor the dead. Does saying a murder victim was murdered dishonor them? No.

Very interesting question.

I think that the key point is: 'Would they have done the same if they hadn't believed the lie?'

If they would then the lie would be irrelevant.

If they wouldn't then they would be dying for the lie.

Suppose you believe you are serving your country/cause, and maintain this belief right up to the moment of death.

Suppose the truth is that you died in service of a lie.

The question is, did you die for your country/cause, or the lie?

You answered your own question in the first sentence, in so far as I can tell. You died for your cause. It may have been an invalid cause, but you died because you believed in it. It's the reason you are even fighting to begin with.

Well ultimately your efforts served the lie. But if serving the lie doesn't hurt the country/cause, then I suppose you could have a duality of truths (?), where you died in service of both.

I think I might have originally misunderstood your question. Where you think you are fighting for your country, but the precise thing you are doing is because of the lie, and damaging to your country. In this case I'd say you could only have subjective personal truths. You thought you died for your country - so you did. But someone else from your country perceives the damage that you caused to your countries cause, and so you died for a lie.

However, if I can presume we're talking about the Iraq war (where the lie is about WMD), then I think it's completely fair to say you died for both the lie and your country. That's if we can say dying for your country is dying for its government. But, if dying for your country is dying for what it represents then we're talking about what I said in the second paragraph.

Ack, my head hurts.

Well, my first observation is that either way gets you equally dead.

I do find it interesting that conservatives have lately adopted wholeheartedly the concept of subjective reality. They used to be such strong objectivists. But now they believe they can create their own reality (and many of them clearly have.)

If your country lies to you, then you can believe you are serving your country when you are, in fact, serving a lie. But does belief that it's true make it any less of a lie? Not in my book.

I believe it's a tragedy for the soldiers who die believing a lie, and a criminal offense for those who lied to them. We should stop pretending otherwise.

And before anyone objects: Saying so does not dishonor the dead. Does saying a murder victim was murdered dishonor them? No.I agree with you except on your third point. Say that lie has meant that either -
a) your country has managed to set up a government that empthasises the same ideals as your country does.
b) you have strengthened the position of your country, the new government is sympathetic to your country either politcally, or economically (ie. they no longer ban the import of oranges, that your country exports lots of, because it's no longer led by a psycho that hates citrus fruits).

Then doesn't that mean you have served your country by strenghtening it's ideals on the world stage or just strengthing it's position in the world. Even if you went to fight because of a war.

Well ultimately your efforts served the lie. But if serving the lie doesn't hurt the country/cause, then I suppose you could have a duality of truths (?), where you died in service of both.

I think I might have originally misunderstood your question. Where you think you are fighting for your country, but the precise thing you are doing is because of the lie, and damaging to your country. In this case I'd say you could only have subjective personal truths. You thought you died for your country - so you did. But someone else from your country perceives the damage that you caused to your countries cause, and so you died for a lie.

However, if I can presume we're talking about the Iraq war (where the lie is about WMD), then I think it's completely fair to say you died for both the lie and your country. That's if we can say dying for your country is dying for its government. But, if dying for your country is dying for what it represents then we're talking about what I said in the second paragraph.

Ack, my head hurts.
Hehe, but this is probably the best answer so far. Kinda what I was thinking. And yet normally I do tend to lean heavily towards the validity of purely objective truths. It is indeed a headache. :confused:

Yes, it's a weekend, I'm bored and tired from last night, so it must be time for another one of my trademark debates, mulling over a philosophical issue and not really going anywhere. :D

This thought occured to me as I was eating a tin of crab meat from the disputed waters of the South China Sea, and reflecting on the endless possibilities of conflict...


Suppose you believe you are serving your country/cause, and maintain this belief right up to the moment of death.

Suppose the truth is that you died in service of a lie.

The question is, did you die for your country/cause, or the lie?


It is an interesting question, because one has to ask, when it comes to self-sacrifice, what it more relevant - reality, as seen by an outside observer - or perception, which is obviously limited by your context?

Objectively, and thus looking at the wider picture, one may conclude that said individual died for a lie. But equally, one could decide to the contrary, that the individual did die for his country/cause, as that was the motivating factor.

In view of this, could much of the conflict between some pro- and anti- war camps be due to a difference in interpretation of this duality, with some pro-war people believing that an individual's perception of his/her sacrifice is more valid than the true context, and some anti-war people believing that the context is all-important and invalidates any false impressions an individual may have?


And now the floor is open to random people, because I'm out for a pizza. But I will be eager to read your thoughts. :)
Your ultimate question has little to do with patriotism, war, death or truth. (in fact it is a poorly camouflaged attempt to create yet another "Boosh es a liar - Iraq eees bad, bloood for oil!" thread)

Reduced to it's simple essence this trolly query is a question of perception vs reality. Once exposed it is a quite simple conclusion - perception IS reality.

Whatever you think about yourself is your reality. I call this Perception Inside. What anyone else thinks of you is their reality. This is Perception Outside.
http://www.nextstepmagazine.com/nsmpages/articledetails.aspx?articleid=1597

http://www.cdaconsulting.com/communication.htm

They died for their country, but their death was for a lie.

They should be commended, but not taken as an example.

Does that make sense?

(1000th Jolt post)

they died because they believed it was worth dying for they are no less heroes than someone who dies hearing the truth

Your ultimate question has little to do with patriotism, war, death or truth. (in fact it is a poorly camouflaged attempt to create yet another "Boosh es a liar - Iraq eees bad, bloood for oil!" thread)

Reduced to it's simple essence this trolly query is a question of perception vs reality. Once exposed it is a quite simple conclusion - perception IS reality.
Erm, if you knew anything about me, you would know that you are very wrong. ;)

If you bothered to read instead of just skimming through and posting as though you understand what I am talking about, you would have noticed me saying that it was the territorial disputes in the South China Sea that provoked my thoughts on this issue.

That's right, I am sufficiently well-read to consider the dilemmas arising from non-American conflicts. :)

I really am not exclusively interested in whether US soldiers are omfg dying for oil. Apply this thread to that one conflict of patriotism if that is the only one which comes to mind, but there are numerous others to consider.

Erm, if you knew anything about me, you would know that you are very wrong. ;)

If you bothered to read instead of just skimming through and posting as though you understand what I am talking about, you would have noticed me saying that it was the territorial disputes in the South China Sea that provoked my thoughts on this issue.

That's right, I am sufficiently well-read to consider the dilemmas arising from non-American conflicts. :)

I really am not exclusively interested in whether US soldiers are omfg dying for oil. Apply this thread to that one conflict of patriotism if that is the only one which comes to mind, but there are numerous others to consider.

I would like to belive that. I really would, but... AFIK there is no claim of a 'lie' or 'deception' happening regarding the South China Sea. Nor am I aware of any pro or anti war camps regarding this. Though I will admit- it is not very high on the local media radar here in FL. (Hurricanes are so much more immediate right now) If you have info that hasn't made it through my media pipeline - I'm all ears.. (eyes?)

With those specific details I mention about your post it is not hard to conclude that this is yet another of the same-old same-old. If that was not your intention then - bummer. If it was - then I am glad to have exposed it this early.

May as well also point out the logical flaw in your question - which I indirectly addressed earlier;

It is an interesting question, because one has to ask, when it comes to self-sacrifice, what it more relevant - reality, as seen by an outside observer - or perception, which is obviously limited by your context?
Your presumption, that an outside observer is more in touch with 'reality' than actual observation - or perception - of that reality by a participant.

It becomes a questions of whose perception is more accurate. The correct answer is; neither. both. Your reality is your perception. The links I provided disucss this in more detail.

I would like to belive that. I really would, but... AFIK there is no claim of a 'lie' or 'deception' happening regarding the South China Sea. Nor am I aware of any pro or anti war camps regarding this. Though I will admit- it is not very high on the local media radar here in FL. (Hurricanes are so much more immediate right now) If you have info that hasn't made it through my media pipeline - I'm all ears.. (eyes?)

With those specific details I mention about your post it is not hard to conclude that this is yet another of the same-old same-old. If that was not your intention then - bummer. If it was - then I am glad to have exposed it this early.
There is as yet no pro- or anti- war camp about the South China Sea issue...that's simply what got me thinking about the field of human conflict in general. But by way of example, I have met Chinese students here in the UK who were worryingly firm on the idea that Taiwan is a renegade province that must be brought into line. I have caught myself wondering to what extent their belief is grounded in reality, and to what extent it is indoctrination which serves the ulterior interests of their government. If it came to a war, would they be fighting for their country, or someone's fantasy?

Chechnya is another good example - in spite of what you hear about the pitiful demoralised state of the Russian conscript army, there are plenty of young naive soldiers fighting there out of a sense of patriotic duty - usually the airborne units rather than the regular infantry. They believe they die in service of their country, but the struggle there is a counter-productive one, no longer waged for reasons of territorial integrity or energy security, but now simply out of a desire on the part of Putin's administration to demonstrate what happens to successful attempts at resistance. But this is not a fact recognised on the ground. I am acutely aware of this, as it is a duty I have declined.

During the final collapse of the Communist government in Russia in 1991, the army refused to fight and the Interior Ministry was ordered to drive armoured vehicles through the crowds of demonstators gathered in Moscow. Thankfully, they too stood down. Not much risk of death there, but if you suspect your nation no longer exists, in whose service do you fight? Are you still fighting for your nation if you believe you are, even if the orders are being issued on false authority?

This was also an issue in the early phases of the Bosnian civil war, with the various fractured armies, initially concerned with territorial integrity, being misused by corrupt officials (many of whom are now on a Wanted list, being hunted by UN investigators). The war we have all seen being waged by paramilitary gangs, began with regular army units.

These are just modern examples, of course. It is also debatable how much of WW1 was contrived, for example, and the minor European conflicts going back centuries previously, one suspects were sometimes just a case of some monarch getting bored and wanting to play soldiers. And with democracy and international news media more widespread than ever before, it is more difficult for governments to go to war than ever before. The old jovial "play the game!" attitude of 1914 isn't going to work again, governments are, in some cases, going to have to lie or at least withold information to get sufficient support for military action, because a fully-informed public or military may lobby against them. It's not just Iraq, it's the way things have been for a while now, and is the state of the forseeable future.

Now you may still think my ideas on this subject are just waving the banner of some crazy woman in Texas. I assure you my view of things is not so constrained that that's my sole concern. It is not this one topical war, it is numerous others past, and more importantly, future.

May as well also point out the logical flaw in your question - which I indirectly addressed earlier;

Your presumption, that an outside observer is more in touch with 'reality' than actual observation - or perception - of that reality by a participant.

It becomes a questions of whose perception is more accurate. The correct answer is; neither. both. Your reality is your perception. The links I provided disucss this in more detail.
There is an implicitly stated assumption which could be more clear - that the outside observer accurately perceives the true reality. That is why the word 'truth' appears in italics. I agree, that could have been indicated more clearly. :)

The question is, did you die for your country/cause, or the lie?

For the cause. Always the cause before government.

The question is, did you die for your country/cause, or the lie?
No circularity, you died for your country/cause, and possible you died because of the lie. Your country/cause still has a type of existence and when you die protecting Zeef from invaders you die for that type of existence. You also died because there is no country Zeef and the "invaders" who you got into a gun battle with were actually the police coming to give you one of the nice jackets with the sleeves that tie in back. But if you believed Zeef were not real and died to protect Zeef against invaders who you knew were really the police, you would have died for the lie.