[ExI] re Odyssey, hero

[Anders Sandberg]

On 2015-09-29 21:21, William Flynn Wallace wrote:
> Yes, it has a happy ending, if you like wide scale murder from a thug.
> Odysseus is a thug:  raider of villages, murderer, raper, thief.
> This is a hero?

By the standards of Greek mythology, definitely.

One should not apply current morality to what is going on the Illiad or 
Odyssey.

Today I read some very good discussion by Ada Palmer about Machiavelli 
and his role (starting here, http://www.exurbe.com/?p=1429 but really 
getting towards the point epically in http://www.exurbe.com/?p=1640 and 
http://www.exurbe.com/?p=1640 ). The key thing in her explanation is 
that the fundamental ethical outlook in medieval and early renaissance 
world was cruicially different from how we think today - to such an 
extent that we may have a hard time even recognizing the revolution that 
happened in The Prince.

-- 
Anders Sandberg
Future of Humanity Institute
Oxford Martin School
Oxford University

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