"I must not fear.
Fear is the mind-killer.
Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration.
I will face my fear.
I will permit it to pass over me and through me.
And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path.
Where the fear has gone there will be nothing....only I will remain."
-- Dune, The Litany Against Fear
Links:
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3 comments:
As a young man, I forced myself to read the original Dune trilogy.
I failed to be impressed by Herbert's nightmarish neo-feudal cosmos. The greedy, sadistic, murderous, altogether unimproved humans of that world hardly deserved to survive.
I also consider its philosophy, one example of which Drifty quoted above, to be a steaming crock of taurine feces.
If Eden were real, and no human being ever needed to worry about going hungry, or about attack by wild animals or hostile tribes of other humans, why would we have ever bothered to build cities?
Fear built civilization.
What keeps human beings from preying on other human beings?
Fear of retaliation, either by victims or their kindred, or else by the State.
What makes human beings work?
Fear of deprivation.
Fear maintains civilization.
Popular fiction writers make entertaining storytellers, but miserable excuses for philosophers (Hubbard being the supremely bad example, Rand a close second, with perhaps Heinlein a distant third).
Selah.
Afterthought: To Heinlein's credit, at least he never started a cult like the two far worse examples whom I mentioned.
BTW I remember that show The Second Hundred Years in the '60s, so it really happened. Does anyone remember The Time Tunnel? That was pretty awesome, though it only lasted 1-2 seasons.
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