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Robert C. Watson

 ------------------- Trust in truth keeps hope alive...

Good Storytelling Enlightens

[Comment #1 by Robert Watson to the post "Bush ethics adviser gets her principles from Star Trek" and "Update on trekkie ethics adviser " on Enterprise Ethics, March 21, 2005.]

Though I disagree with her positions on cloning and stem cell research, I applaud Ms. Schaub's courage to divulge something more widespread than anyone realizes -- the influence the Star Trek stories have had on our society.

The science fiction genre of story telling exists to explore the unknown… to play "what if" on a grand scale. Unlike most of its predecessors, Gene Roddenberry and his collaborators patterned their stories after the great works of authors like Harlan Ellison, Arthur C. Clarke, and Robert Heinlein. They used science fiction to explore the human condition. To ask tough ethical questions too highly charged to be confronted directly. But when faced by fictional aliens on another planet, or even fictional humans in the far future, could be considered with the reason and compassion necessary to formulate beneficial and lasting solutions.

Having followed all of the Star Trek series' since September of 1966, I find Star Trek: The Next Generation to have been the biggest shaper of my own ethical center. The thoughtful and honest appraisal of each ethical dilemma while making every effort to respect even personally repulsive views and values of others is a philosophy usually ignored and even denigrated these days.

In a 1991 interview with Gene Roddenberry (http://www.philosophysphere.com/humanist.html), he makes a chilling observation…

Alexander:
You made a statement about 15 years ago: " I think television is one of the most dangerous forces in our lives today." Do you think that situation has changed?
Roddenberry:
Certainly there is a great deal of danger from anything as powerful as television; its imagery can affect us with such power. But it’s no more dangerous, in its own way, than a car is over a horse and a wagon. I think now that I was saying, "Let’s be careful of it". In the hands of a Hitler, yes, television could change and turn society backwards.

That Ms. Schaub and I have arrived at entirely different ethical positions based in significant part on the influence of Star Trek, I believe says much for the balance and thoughtful consideration given by those stories to such questions.

Throughout the various series as well as many of the novels, there is clearly a general uneasiness with the practice of cloning sentient beings. The principal characters often express repulsion on a personal level but that it's a personal choice (much like most people today view abortion) and thus to be tolerated when the DNA of others is used with their consent.

I personally have no problem with human cloning for I believe that what makes me "Me" is what is in my mind. Spiritually, that would be my "soul". The physical body, which is all that is being cloned, is just a container. To have several or even thousands of genetic "twins" would be no different than having twin brothers. It does not diminish my uniqueness in the least.

The controversy over stem-cell research is of course the abortion controversy from a different angle. Logically, the growth of a zygote into a baby is a progression from being a part of the woman's body to being an independent organism. Deciding when this mass of cells becomes independent from the mother is partially based on science and partially based on ramifications to society. Thus, it must be acknowledged to be an arbitrary approximation… good enough to cover most situations but more subject to exceptions and amendment than most laws. Stem cell research and its use to treat Alzheimer's and other diseases is beneficial to society with no harm to any sentient being. The donor embryos are not sentient and never would be.

Related Links:
The Ethics of Star Trek
Make It So: Leadership Lessons from Star Trek, the Next Generation
Interview of Gene Roddenberry, The Humanist, March/April 1991

Personal or Professional?

It's pretty well documented that most news people in the waning years of the 20th century personally leaned liberal. However, the evidence does not support such a leaning in their professional choices of what to cover and how to cover it. The bias, my friends, was not liberal vs. conservative, but rather pro-government vs. con- and the media clearly preferred the latter.

In the old axiom of "what is news-worthy", restating the government line already spouted in speeches and press conferences would have been old news: boring and unworthy of reporting. Public figures already got prime access to the bully pulpit; none more so than the President, so we'd already heard what they wanted us to hear. What we wanted (and I believe still do) was the counter view, the details, the ramifications, "The rest of the story".

As the most successful embodiment of the constitutional guarantee of freedom of speech, the news media became as indispensable as any other checks and balances. While seldom as eloquent and certainly less restrained, the news media challenged government's assertions and oppressions in the same way Jefferson, Adams and other men of letters used the mighty pen to wrest these lands from the leeching clutches of a monarchy unaccountable for its excesses. Frighteningly, such advocates for "We, The People" are no more. What happened?

Any paradigm, any principle of governing, can be carried to a destructive extreme. We saw how corruption and unbridled fanaticism chipped away at communism to destroy the old Soviet Union (And good riddance to it too.) There are numerous examples throughout history of personal fanaticism and excess bringing down powerful dictatorships and monarchies. That most of these cases have resulted in more capitalistic forms replacing them; we can take great pride. While an improvement to be sure however, to conclude from it that we should abandon the mixture of capitalistic and socialistic principles that have brought us to our current state of world dominance is dangerously arrogant at best and could very well be the beginning of our own extinction. Like removing sodium from table salt (sodium chloride), ignoring the indispensable socialistic principles that have combined with capitalism to create our great democracy, would leave a poison sure to destroy us. Today's mad pursuit of pure capitalism threatens to return us to those laissez faire days of a century ago where robber-barons ruled -- getting fat raping our land, our people and our souls. Turning the news media into the entertainment business it has become is a watershed event in that slide into oblivion.

All may not be lost however. Perhaps we are witnessing (and participating in) a major shift in the way the citizenry obtains news. There is much discussion these days of the rise of blogging and its role in gathering and reporting "the news". Is blogging a "democratization" of mass communication? In a few years, will most people get their news from some sort of summarization of information supplied by dozens, hundreds, thousands of citizens via blogs and other forms?

The traditional news media have clearly violated the trust of the people and abandoned their constitutional responsibilities. How will we fill the void?

We need not a media that is liberal or conservative, commercial or non-. We need a media that is curious, critical and courageous. Where will we find it?
[Robert C. Watson on Enterprise Ethics, Mar 13, 2005 6:37 am ]

Here I Sit Broken Hearted

Here I sit broken hearted.
Tried to vote, but was only thwarted.

"You're in the wrong place." they said to me.
"The computer says so. Look, here see."

"I always vote here!" I cried.
They looked at me as if I'd lied.

"Computers don't lie. That's the law."
"So if you're not there, there can be no flaw."

"Perhaps you're a felon, a terrorist or both."
"Perhaps you're just lost, or prone to Democratic sloth."

"Whatever the trouble, it's not our fault."
"Try again next time. While you wait - read up on John Galt."

[Robert C. Watson, 01/14/2005]

Santa is Dead!
Washington Denies Responsibility

Robert C. Satire
Washington, D.C.
Shortly after 1am this Christmas morning, President Bush issued a press release expressing his dismay and deepest condolences to the people of the United States over the untimely death of Kris Kringle, a.k.a. Santa Claus, in the skies over Washington, DC. He vowed to open a comprehensive investigation under the direction of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. When the Secretary was later asked to confirm reports that his office gave the final shootdown order, Mr. Rumsfeld denied any involvement. "We have procedures in place for these situations and everyone knows what to do. It's unfortunate that he was in the wrong place at the wrong time, but these things happen in war."

According interviews with officials and eyewitness accounts, at around midnight, the NORAD public relations desk was tracking the jolly old elf as it does every year when they lost contact. At first there was no concern since this had occurred several times throughout the night due to inclement weather over much of the country. About the same time however, over at the NORAD air defense desk, jets were being scrambled from Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland. They were investigating an unknown aircraft approaching the Temporary Flight Restriction Area over Washington, DC that was created after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.

"Its radar signature read as a small private plane but its altitude, speed and erratic flight pattern indicated that it was way overloaded for that size aircraft," Major Snivly of NORAD advised. "We don't know how it got off the ground, but a normal landing under such a load would seem impossible. Thus it was a reasonable security precaution to determine the intentions of the track and formulate a response which could include the use of lethal force."

However, the aircraft entered the restricted space before the jets could reach it or establish radio contact. Per Executive order 09-666, they had no choice but to establish a weapons lock and again issue numerous warnings. There was no response. The protocols dictated that the aircraft posed a serious threat to The White House and Capitol below. The lead jet received clearance -- and fired.

On the ground, the first reports received by police were of burnt and broken toys falling from the sky. A cab driver was killed when his car was struck by a 400lb reindeer. Wood splinters rained down on an encampment of homeless vets just a few blocks from The Capitol sending many to the hospital for eye injuries. Bar patrons along 4th Street NE claimed to find a half-burnt Santa's cap rakishly cocked on the head of the newly unveiled statue of Vice President Dick Cheney across the tracks in Haliburtan Park. And the charred body of a large man was found in a dumpster behind the Republican National Committee headquarters on First Street. The coroner's office is still investigating.
[Robert C. Watson, 12/25/2004]