sdv wrote:
>
> Brad
>
> My uncertainty with the below statement - (not with the onlineethics.org but with what
> follows)...
[snip]
> We have escaped the world of necessity...'... Towards the middle of the 20thC... we
> have the rise in power of all the mixed scientific disciplines - physics, biology,
> medicine, cybernetics - plus the whole set fo technologies brought about by them. We
> are finally effective in the organisation of work, in providing food, in matters of
> sexuality, of illness ,
[snip]

In all seriousness, this sounds almost word for word like Sophocles'
"Ode to Man" in _Antigone_!

[snip]
> the argument Serres is reaching towards is that science and technology in its recent
> forms is destroying the foundations upon which morals were based. Morals and ancient
> ethics were based on '...people crushed by the irremediable pains live in my childhood
> memories and in the memories of the humanities...' Morality, religion and ethics formed
> a system of practical means for dealing with the bondage imposed upon us by the world
> and our fragility... Science and technology have become the true points of our
> transcendence but are marked by our inability to allow the constitution of a modern
> ethicical position from which to evaluate and guide scientific activity. The question
> is how can we dominate our domination? hiw can we subjugate our mastery of the physical
> world?
[snip]

Here is what I believe is the basis for any possible solution,
and I will offer an illustration.  The illustration first: Any
renaissance Madonna and Child painting in which Mary offers
some small object or domesticated animal to her baby's
delectation (or, of course, his rejection -- it's OK for him
to not like it!). [see Donald Winnicott's works, e.g.,
_Playing and Reality_, or Melanie Klein's lovely little observation:

    http://www.users.cloud9.net/~bradmcc/culture.html#gratitude

.]  Now the basis, which is specified in a phrase from
Heinz Kohut.  Below all the miasma of ethnicity,
exploitation, "human nature", etc. -- the bedrock
of the human *being* is the event of mutual recognition:

    the mother whose face lights up at the sight of her child

(and, of course, the child whose own visage lights up in response...).

Hegel spells out a clear recipe for how each of us -- i.e.,
each of us insofar as he or she has social *power* -- can do this in our
adult daily lives, here and now, in the story of "The Gentleman and his
Butler", in his _Phenomenology of Spirit_.

+\brad mccormick

--
  Let your light so shine before men,
              that they may see your good works.... (Matt 5:16)

  Prove all things; hold fast that which is good. (1 Thes 5:21)

<![%THINK;[SGML+APL]]> Brad McCormick, Ed.D. / [log in to unmask]
  914.238.0788 / 27 Poillon Rd, Chappaqua NY 10514-3403 USA
-----------------------------------------------------------------
  Visit my website ==> http://www.users.cloud9.net/~bradmcc/