Barry Mallis (LO9280, 96-08-21) writes:
<< ....will we move closer and closer to an Orwellian world where those with
lesser IQ's are put down, figuratively or literally? This tremendously ugly
thought swirls like a gray-black cloud on the periphery of consciousness:
haves versus have-nots; monetary wealth against oppression and poverty. And
to a degree much easier to contemplate, high quotients against low ones. >>
Barry - That's a big question! Probably one of the biggest. I might
rephrase it as: How does the system balance the interests of individuals,
groups, and the whole? And how do the groups get defined? I think it's a
universal question (in my rephrasing), and I don't think it's really a new
question in your more specific form (think of Nazi extermination of
"defective" individuals for a relatively recent example).
I do think it is a very important question, and a good one to raise in this
kind of forum. Systems thinking might be able to shed some new light on an
old subject. (It's amazing what this stuff leads to, isn't it?)
- Jeff Brooks (BrooksJeff@AOL.com)
--Learning-org -- An Internet Dialog on Learning Organizations For info: <rkarash@karash.com> -or- <http://world.std.com/~lo/>