[extropy-chat] Heinlein and thinking for yourself

[Damien Broderick]

At 02:17 PM 10/29/2004 -0700, Mike L. wrote:

> > "The steel tortoise gave MacKinnon a feeling of Crusoe-like
> > independence. It did not occur to him his chattel was the end product
> > of the cumulative effort and intelligent co-operation of hundreds
> > of thousands of men, living  and dead."
> >                   --Robert A. Heinlein, `Coventry'
> >
> > Heinlein's utopian judge condemns MacKinnon, a reckless rugged
> > individualist: `From a social standpoint, your delusion makes you as
> > mad as a March Hare.'
>
>Heinlein wrote Coventry when he was coming down off of his
>Georgist/Socialist kick of the 1930's when he flirted with Upton
>Sinclair's party.

`Coventry' was published in the middle of 1940, when Heinlein was 33. He 
was a mature adult with military, (failed) commercial, and political 
experience behind him. Far from `flirting' with EPIC, he was
a staff writer for Upton Sinclair's EPIC News, the organ of the EPIC (End 
Poverty In California) campaign, and ran in 1938 (unsuccessfully) for 
office as a Democrat.

>By the time he wrote Methuselah's Children, he had
>realized the errors of his ways

Well, he had changed his opinions, which slowly shifted and then schlerosed 
for another 40-odd years. While it is customary (especially in those over 
40) to suppose that an older person's views are wiser and better based on 
experience than those of youth, it is notable that Einstein's later years 
were spent fruitlessly on the wrong track, as were Newton's.

But the point is not to decide whether Heinlein's brain started soft and 
grew tougher, or started sharp and grew duller. The point is to look at 
what the damned quote *says* and evaluate it:

"The steel tortoise gave MacKinnon a feeling of Crusoe-like independence. 
It did not occur to him his chattel was the end product of the cumulative 
effort and intelligent co-operation of hundreds of thousands of men, living 
and dead."

Damien Broderick