Calculative Deliberation is Insufficient for Practical Wisdom

Journal of Value Inquiry, Vol 43, Issue 2: 149-164.

After witnessing the trial of Adolf Eichmann, Hannah Arendt was particularly astonished not by the criminal's horrific deeds during the Holocaust but by his thoughtlessness. Thoughtlessness is not stupidity but the inability or failure to think from the standpoint of someone else, in Eichmann's case, from the perspective of people he was knowingly sending to their deaths. What is troubling about Eichmann is that he deliberately and proudly performed his duties as required for his job. Given the climate of the times during which Eichmann lived, it is not terribly surprising that he continued to commit horrendous crimes while justifying it as a matter of necessity. Complicity is a compelling and complicated phenomenon from the ethical perspective. Yet Eichmann's character flaw is more than mere complicity, because he actually believed that he was acting well. Furthermore, the fact that people around him including the celebrated exemplars of his times would have fully agreed with him, adds to the ethical problem...

by Mueller, Monica

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