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BBC Sherlock Meta: On Sociopaths, Morality and 'Sherlock'
I finally wrote up some thoughts that have bumping around inside my skull ever since I saw HLV back in January (took me long enough, I know). Basically: are sociopaths and psychopaths -- at least as those words are used on "Sherlock" -- necessarily amoral? Or can someone be a sociopath in the way that show uses the term and still be a good person?
Read it here: On Sociopaths, Morality, and 'Sherlock'
(The short answer to that second question, IMO, is "yes.")
I also talked a lot about philosophy, though some would say abused it. This post started out about 6,000 really pedantic words where I really went into the metaphysics of Aristotelian notions of good (being a good member of a certain class, being morally good, and the connection between the two) and how virtue fit into that whole picture. But it was dry as the milk-jug in 221B and so I cut a lot of that out in the efforts to make it more accessible and also to bring the focus back to the bits of Sherlock I was discussing. What I lost was an in-depth discussion of the philosophical issues, and I may have misrepresented a bit of how philosophers discuss these concepts. I think it works as a fannish discussion, but don't look too hard at what I say Aristotle actually said, or what philosophers mean by moral regret. It's basically true but if I was trying to really talk about those things on their own terms there's a lot more to be said.
(This is the meta equivalent of a fan-artist saying "Okay I've done the best I could but for the love of God don't stare at the left hand for too long." I suppose metaists are allowed to pull that as well. :-D)
Oh, and before I forget: A happy Thanksgiving to all who celebrate it! And a happy Thursday to everyone else.
Read it here: On Sociopaths, Morality, and 'Sherlock'
(The short answer to that second question, IMO, is "yes.")
I also talked a lot about philosophy, though some would say abused it. This post started out about 6,000 really pedantic words where I really went into the metaphysics of Aristotelian notions of good (being a good member of a certain class, being morally good, and the connection between the two) and how virtue fit into that whole picture. But it was dry as the milk-jug in 221B and so I cut a lot of that out in the efforts to make it more accessible and also to bring the focus back to the bits of Sherlock I was discussing. What I lost was an in-depth discussion of the philosophical issues, and I may have misrepresented a bit of how philosophers discuss these concepts. I think it works as a fannish discussion, but don't look too hard at what I say Aristotle actually said, or what philosophers mean by moral regret. It's basically true but if I was trying to really talk about those things on their own terms there's a lot more to be said.
(This is the meta equivalent of a fan-artist saying "Okay I've done the best I could but for the love of God don't stare at the left hand for too long." I suppose metaists are allowed to pull that as well. :-D)
Oh, and before I forget: A happy Thanksgiving to all who celebrate it! And a happy Thursday to everyone else.
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