I subscribe to a few blogs that explore ideas, rather than engaging in political rants – I got rid of almost all of those a few weeks back. One of them, Systemic Disorder, has some really interesting posts. The other, Ian Welsh, tends more towards political rants, but there are some commenters there who offer acute insights into our predicaments.

Systemic Disorder recently posted a long article about cooperation and I made a comment, encouraging the blog readers to consider buying David Abram’s The Spell of the Sensuous, Lewis Hyde’s The Gift, and a book or two by Wendell Berry.

This morning, before leaving for work, I finished reading a very powerful interview of Wendell Berry, by Jordan Fisher Smith, which first appeared in the Autumn, 1993 issue of Orion Magazine. That interview was all about community. I was going to make a comment on Systemic Disorder in reaction to his reply to my comment, but instead I visited Ian Welsh’s blog to catch up on reader comments on a post and came across one, by Z, who used the words “self-righteous” and “moral superiority”. In the wake of the run-in with my friend, the subject of the previous post here, those words caught my attention. I put the words in a search engine and came up with an article by David Brin, from 2007, wondering if scientists would be bold enough to research how self-righteous moral superiority might mimic addiction. A totally fascinating article that goes a long, long way towards explaining all of the hatred and bigotry that has been on display for the last 20 years in this country. I urge anyone interested in civil society in this country to read Brin’s post.