It might seem crazy what I am 'bout to say
Discover more from Snale Trails: A Travel Adventure
It might seem crazy what I am 'bout to say
Sunshine, she's here, you can take a break
What’s up, y’all!
By bobbing and weaving around the sunset on a couple of different occasions, we were finally able to get the Fairlady’s Glamour Shots done. We also took her for a nice cruise around the valley. There is something a little bit magical about riding in a convertible on a summer day.
The first few times we took her out, I wore a hat that I could cinch down, so my hair wouldn’t blow all over the place. But I quickly realized that the windshield is designed perfectly. It’s almost like it…shields the wind!🤯
We’re both tall, so that feels like an unexpected bonus feature in a Japanese car. Not only that, but there’s plenty of legroom. I can stretch my legs out completely. It’s a fun little car to ride around in, and I’m glad gnob decided to bring her back to life. She’s going to make someone really happy.
Speaking of being happy, this week’s philosophical exploration took me from London during the Industrial Revolution to ancient China. Thousands of years and thousands of miles apart, and they arrived at some of the same conclusions. Humans are amazing.
The British Utilitarians, beginning with Jeremy Bentham, believed in the Greatest Happiness Principle. As John Stuart Mill explains in Utilitarianism, “…the Greatest Happiness Principle, holds that actions are right in proportion as they tend to promote happiness, wrong as they tend to produce the reverse of happiness. By happiness is intended pleasure, and the absence of pain; by unhappiness, pain, and the privation of pleasure”.
In a nutshell, the Utilitarians thought actions were good if they created happiness, and bad if they created pain. This is a type of consequentialism, a philosophy that is based on the consequences of your actions. Take good actions, get good consequences.
So the Utilitarians tried to always take good action, and to them, a good action was one that would create happiness. The only thing better than a good action was a great action, one that would create the maximum happiness.
In order to correctly calculate how much happiness a particular decision would create (or how much pain), the Utilitarians had to consider the interests of all involved parties, and they had to give them equal consideration.
By giving equal consideration to everyone, only then can the rightness of an action be calculated, according to the Utilitarians.
The ancient Chinese practitioners of the Mohist philosophy also gave equal consideration to everyone. They too, were consequentialists, who believed that we should take whatever actions produce the best outcomes, or the biggest benefit, for all people.
Who were the Mohists? In ancient China (770 – 200 BC), there were many different schools of thought, but there were four major philosophies that stood above the rest. I talked about Taoism in a previous post, and many people have heard of Confucianism. The other two were Mohism and Legalism, which was like it sounds - all about law.
Mohism was named after its founder, Mozi. This philosophy only survived as a practice for a couple of hundred years due to internal upheaval within the Chinese kingdom, but its legacy has lasted.
They practiced being frugal and charitable. They thought that power should be earned through merit, and not through family connections.
They also believed in giving equal consideration to everyone. Mohists believed that we should care for others as much as we care for ourselves or our family members, that we are all humans, equally deserving of love and respect. Because of this, we should always choose the actions that produce the greatest happiness for everyone.
Even as far back as 2500 years ago, people were trying to make sense of our world, and our purpose. Then and now, we still want the same thing. Happiness.
Remember, sometimes our actions don’t create happiness for ourselves, but for others. Sometimes the greatest action you can take will cause you pain. But it will make someone else happy. And won’t that make you happy?🤔
See you next week!
Video of the Week
McGrew was fun, as always. Got to meet some new people and hang out with old friends we hadn’t seen in a while.
Quote of the Week
That wraps up another week with Snale Racing! We’ll leave you with the quote that was most powerful for us this week. Peace!✌
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