Alexander Hooke judges a book about being judged.
https://philosophynow.org/issues/128/Judged_by_Ziyad_Marar
Judged by Ziyad Marar
Re: Judged by Ziyad Marar
The most remarkable (for me) passage in this article was this: "In a sixteen page account of Philip Roth’s novel The Human Stain (2000), Marar highlights fictional portrayals of the yearning for freedom from judgment that nevertheless are overwhelmed by the desire to obtain the approval of others."
To me the wonder came when I realized that I originally had wrongly read "The Human Stain" as "The Human Stalin".
In other aspects, the author raises the very valid issue of understanding criminals, yet judging them as well. Understanding is bred on empathy, yet judging someone requires disempathy. How to do it? One way to bridge this dichotomy, methinks, is to condemn our own selves for committing the same crime in our imagination as the crime we are to judge. This is not easy. You need a certain amount of madness to condemn your own self, by fighting the natural urge of rationalizing cognitive dissonance. But a good judge can do it, no problem.
Other insights ensued, but I would need to refer to the text, and that is not possible once one starts to write a comment.
Oh, just one more thing: the author of the book which is reviewed, professes to be an atheist, yet he says "in God's eye" etc. The author of the review says, "how can an atheist know what god's eyes see." The answer is easy: the same way a theist imagines it.
To me the wonder came when I realized that I originally had wrongly read "The Human Stain" as "The Human Stalin".
In other aspects, the author raises the very valid issue of understanding criminals, yet judging them as well. Understanding is bred on empathy, yet judging someone requires disempathy. How to do it? One way to bridge this dichotomy, methinks, is to condemn our own selves for committing the same crime in our imagination as the crime we are to judge. This is not easy. You need a certain amount of madness to condemn your own self, by fighting the natural urge of rationalizing cognitive dissonance. But a good judge can do it, no problem.
Other insights ensued, but I would need to refer to the text, and that is not possible once one starts to write a comment.
Oh, just one more thing: the author of the book which is reviewed, professes to be an atheist, yet he says "in God's eye" etc. The author of the review says, "how can an atheist know what god's eyes see." The answer is easy: the same way a theist imagines it.