What is Peace Worth?
Daily Meditation 608 — 10/26/2023
Today’s meditation is more in the format of a philosophical question. It is designed to cause you to think deeply on morality, ethics, life, law, and value among countless other things.
— — —
Suppose God picked you up and sat you down before the whole Earth.
He sits opposite you, perhaps fingers steepled. Perhaps shrouded in thunder and fog. Perhaps in a suit and tie. Something recognizable to you.
But regardless, He is there before you and He offers you a choice before everyone:
You can grant perfect equality to all the world.
You can get “world peace” — a true peace where no one ever kills another willfully.
You get everyone a lifestyle free of judgement and frustration. One where everyone does what they love.
Now.
In exchange, you must sentence one child to a life sentence in solitary confinement.
They get the de minimus food to maintain weight. One shower a week. No human contact. No outdoors time.
And you cannot negotiate.
Do you sentence the little one in exchange?
Suppose you say “Yes!” and put it to God that that one child is worth all the peace, joy, and equality.
Now, instead, it’s 3 children in those conditions.
Would you still say “Yes?” Perhaps less emphatically?
10 children?
100?
1,000?
For perfect world peace and all the other stuff, would you put 1,000 children into the most deprived prison-like cells for their entire lives?
If you said “yes” at any point, here’s the next caveat:
What about if you, personally, must select which children?
You must hand-pick them to be torn from their parents’ breasts…
Or maybe you pick the already miserable orphans from the depths of 3rd world countries…
Maybe you pick the already spoiled ones from the wealthiest — “They deserve it,” you may think.
Would you still exchange a child (or many) for the perfect peace?
— — —
Reflect on this question and all the sub-roots that spread out from it.
Peace is obviously impossible on Earth. We can certainly endeavor to “have” peace in our life and to ensure there is peace in our home (and maybe even our community).
But what is true peace worth?
If one (or 10 or 1,000) people must be made utterly mentally and physically deprived in exchange for that peace, can the remaining 99.99999% of people truly feel at peace knowing what was sacrificed in that exchange?
If you personally picked 10 children, aside from the tormented and isolated children rotting in prison, what of the parents? The siblings? The friends? All left behind in this perfect and peaceful and equal world at the expense of someone they knew and loved so dearly.
Would life really be peaceful for them?
This is a very impossible scenario to play out, but it is beneficial to the soul to ponder it over.
If placed in this situation, what would you do?
What is right to do?
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These are distillations from my coming book “YouDaimonia: the Philosophy of Human Flourishing.”
