To be ruthless requires belief that our life on earth is but a brief prelude to an afterlife, or a temporary sacrifice before some utopia can be instituted._x000D_ _x000D_ Where there is the necessary technical skill to move mountains, there is no need for the faith that moves mountains.
Interpretation
The quote suggests that true belief in something beyond life spurs ruthless actions, while technical skill may replace the need for faith.
Eric Hoffer's quote emphasizes the idea that ruthless behavior often stems from a deep belief in an afterlife or a utopian future, implying that such convictions can justify extreme measures. He contrasts this with the notion that practical skills—like those capable of literally moving mountains—can diminish the need for faith, suggesting that when we have the ability to achieve our goals through technical means, the emotional or spiritual beliefs become less relevant.
In practice
In a debate on the ethics of technological advancement, one might quote Hoffer to argue that technical skills can eclipse moral considerations.
Language was invented to ask questions. Answers may be given by grunts and gestures, but questions must be spoken. Humanness came of age when man asked the first question. Social stagnation results not from a lack of answers but from the absence of the impulse to ask questions.
Faith in humanity, in posterity, in the destiny of one's religion, nation, race, party or family-what is it but the visualization of that eternal something to which we attach the self that is about to be annihilated?
You can discover what your enemy fears most by observing the means he uses to frighten you.
Our frustration is greater when we have much and want more than when we have nothing and want some. We are less dissatisfied when we lack many things than when we seem to lack but one thing.
Our credulity is greatest concerning the things we know least about.
Perhaps a modern society can remain stable only by eliminating adolescence, by giving its young, from the age of ten, the skills, responsibilities, and rewards of grownups, and opportunities for action in all spheres of life. Adolescence should be a time of useful action, while book learning and scholarship should be a preoccupation of adults.
This business of burning human beings with napalm, of filling our nation's homes with orphans and widows, of injecting poisonous drugs of hate into veins of peoples normally humane, of sending men home from dark and bloody battlefields physically handicapped and psychologically deranged, cannot be reconciled with wisdom, justice and love.
since some people had told me that I was ugly, I always preferred shade to the sun, darkness to light
Pain may be said to follow pleasure as its shadow; but the misfortune is that in this particular case, the substance belongs to the shadow, the emptiness to its cause.
When they are preparing for war, those who rule by force speak most copiously about peace until they have completed the mobilization process.
Anytime you see somebody keeping a secret, that's symptomatic that something's wrong with the society around them. That means there's discrimination or worse.
Tis Man's to explore up and down, inch by inch, with the taper his reason.
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