Some lazy questions

They say only death and taxes are definite. Unless you can live under the radar, you have to pay some indirect tax. Some of the principles for taxation include distribution of wealth, provision of public goods and so on. Why, if citizens have to resort to private solutions, should they continue to pay tax? At what point can taxes be said to be punitive, unjustified or outright cruel?

If you were told that killing one person would result in utmost good for everyone, would you consent to it, if you don’t know who this person is? Would you agree to 1000 people or one million? This question is asked by Camus in one of his books ( the fall).

Many people think the problem of evil is a serious challenge to the existence of a certain type of god. Can the freewill defence or any other theodicy such as the argument that a good god can’t create or allow bad to exist and it is a question of judgement, defeat the challenge?

Should the catholic church make celibacy optional? Would this lead to a schism and wouod such s schism be a good thing? Or a bad thing?

some random photos

I hope those photos can speak for themselves.

We often say

There are things we can’t wish on our greatest enemies. But I think this is usually just a saying. I would wish my enemy, if I had a great enemy, bad luck, to be attacked by safari ants, to have the wind on his or her face and all. And that’s not all. I would still think of other unsavoury things to wish them.

To our friends, we always wish them joy, happiness and peace. I think we should add to the list of things we wish our friends pain, loneliness and desolation. There is no gain without pain. So in our wishing them all these, we are not being malicious, we are acknowledging the place pain plays in our growth.

This is not to wish them suffering. Though, if Schopenhauer is to be believed, suffering is the way of life. A life without occasional suffering is not even possible and may not even be desirable.

How would a post suffering world be like?

On book burning

Or banning.

It m7st have been Ray F of Farenheit 451 who wrote that those who staet by burning books end up by burning people. And i have said before i oppose book bannings. Now i have burnt a few books before. We had what we called academic fire at the end of high school where we would set ablaze exercise books we wouldn’t be using in our next life. Now i am grown i use such pages to roll weed or light the jiko, same result but more subtle.

So you must have heard of the koran burning in Sweden. Now i have read of a number of muslims who are pushing for an international ban against burning the koran which i think is ridiculous. Last week a person was stoned to death in nigeria for blasphemy but there is no outcry to ban stoning others, but a book is burnt and they are shitting their pants! Where’s their sense of proportion?

Do you think we should have koran bonfires until the muslims can come to the table to talk?