Sociology and Explanations (Re: Hitchens responds to critics

ravi gadfly at home.com
Tue Sep 25 17:23:27 PDT 2001


John Gulick wrote:


> Wojtek wrote:
>
>> Any rationally thinking
>> person could easily see that the attack on the WTC would result in a net
>> political loss for the Arab/Islamic world - so no rational calculus can
>> explain that act.
>

forgive my confusion: perhaps we can conclude that the acts of some persons were irrational (and i think john gulick in his response points out why it may not be so), but certainly we can use rationality to analyze the act and its causes, can we not?

--ravi

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- man is said to be a rational animal. i do not know why he has not been defined as an affective or feeling animal. more often i have seen a cat reason than laugh or weep. perhaps it weeps or laughs inwardly - but then perhaps, also inwardly, the crab resolves equations of the 2nd degree. -- alasdair macintyre.



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