Here's an idea.
The Titans from "Attack on
Titan" may or may not be evil.
All right.
Before we get too
much further, this
will serve as your
spoiler warning.
And also, we are
talking principally
about the anime, and
not the manga series,
so that's an important
thing to keep in mind.
OK.
Let's get started.
"Attack on Titan"
is the English name
of an anime series called
"Shingeki no Kyojin," which
is based on a manga
of the same name.
And it is bonkers.
The show focuses on three
friends, Eren Yeager, Mikasa
Ackerman, and Armin
Arlert, who live
in a city that is bordered
and organized by three
concentric circular walls.
Why, you might
ask, would someone
live in a city bordered
by massive walls?
I'll tell you why, but
you might not like it.
It's because of
these, the Titans.
About 100 years ago, they just
appeared and ate everybody,
most of humanity, actually.
Just gulp, gone,
like it's their job,
hellbent on terrorizing
and devouring
nearly helpless little old us.
So people went inside the walls.
Titan stayed outside.
Problem solved.
Until like minute
five of Episode 1,
when a colossal Titan bursts
through the outer wall
and begins a conflict that
@Icemelter00 on Twitter
describes very accurately
as a roller coaster
that only goes up.
The humans do their best, but
it's usually not good enough.
A wave of Titans enter the city
and do their usual smashing
and smooshing,
gobbling and chewing.
And though they are
creepily complacent-looking,
they are also undeniably
driven by-- well,
it's unclear, actually.
Instinct, compulsion,
craving, ideology?
Depending upon why the
Titans hate humanity,
or I guess love
it as snacks, it's
interesting to wonder
whether or not they are evil.
Now, evil is
certainly a word that
has suffered some
semantic expansion.
Many things, including people,
corporations, and hot sauces,
are referred to as evil.
Let's figure out where and if
Titans fall on that continuum.
Classically, evil is
badness multiplied.
It's an extreme expression
of that which is undesirable.
And I think it's fair to say
that the Titans are exactly
that.
Evil people do stuff
that significantly
transgresses a common
understanding of that
which is good.
You could call that common
understanding a moral code.
For instance, stealing candy
from a baby is bad and mean.
But stealing all of the
candy and all of the babies
to work on your
baby-stealing machine
fueled by stolen
candy, that is evil.
Immanuel Kant said that
it's not just the degree
to which someone performs
unthinkably not nice actions
either.
The evil person does so
willingly and with intent.
Radical evil, as
Kant calls it, is
when someone ignores their
categorical imperative to be
and do good, and instead makes
actions based on their own
wants and desires.
But lo, certainly not all
expressions of the undesirable
have to involve people.
Titans certainly aren't people.
Moral evil requires that
someone transgress a maxim,
as Kant would say.
Natural evil is
all of the badness
with none of the people.
Cancer is a natural evil.
Tornadoes and earthquakes
are natural evils.
New York in the summer
is a natural evil.
It's so hot!
And what about animals?
They're certainly
agents of some kind,
but certainly don't
possess a moral code
or any idea of right or wrong.
The question is
then, where Titans
stand amidst all of
these distinctions
other than over them, I guess?
Most important is determining
if they are rational.
Seems like no.
Your run-of-the-mill Titan has
the brains and motor skills
of a toddler.
They run around naked,
banging into stuff
and putting things,
mostly people,
in their wide, creepy mouths
that give me the jibblies.
Jibbly, jibbly, jibbly.
It's hard to make a case
for their moral agency.
Even the Titan shifters, humans
who can turn into Titans,
have talked about
or demonstrated
that even though they're
in there somewhere,
they feel brainless and
not totally in control.
It's almost like the
Titan form itself creates
irresistible violent urges.
Assuming that Titans and
shifters are similar,
this could reveal some
interesting things
about the mysterious
monsters, but also
provide some insight into
their monstrous motivations.
Are those violent urges
instinct or maxim?
For comparison, could we
place the Titans alongside
say the Daleks?
Calling the Daleks evil is like
calling grass green or Carlos
the scientist dreamy.
The Daleks are our
perfect opposites.
They love hate and hate love.
They revel in
destruction and suffer.
But the Daleks do it
because they believe in it.
The Titans do it because--
well, it's unclear, actually.
Maybe they can't
help themselves.
Maybe they're under the
command of some external force.
Maybe they do it
because of belief,
or maybe they do it because
of that part of your brain
that causes you to burn
ants with a magnifying glass
when you're a kid, not that
I'm speaking from experience
or anything.
Who knows?
But what the Daleks and
Titans do have in common
is a perfectly unquestioning,
unfeeling, unempathetic nature.
They will stop at
nothing in their quest
to exterminate, or chew and
regurgitate as the case may be.
And that might actually be
the most important part,
the stopping at nothing.
Friedrich Nietzsche
wrote about something
that he called
master-slave morality,
and how the slave
will always view
that which immovably oppresses
them as essentially evil.
He writes that whereas all
noble morality grows out
of a triumphant saying
of yes to itself,
slave morality says
no on principle
to everything that is
outside, other, non-self.
And while it might
take some work
to qualify Titans
or Daleks or Cylons
as noble, outsiders
and oppressors
they most certainly are.
So we call them evil and
distance ourselves from,
amplify our struggle with this
force that really might have
nothing to do with morality.
For instance, it's really
telling that "Attack on Titan"
really hits you over the
head with the humanity
as bovine herd metaphor.
A lot could be said
about how this influences
the perspective of all of
the characters, Eren, Mikasa,
Armin, the city dwellers,
all of the soldiers.
But what about the audience?
Carl Jung said we need to depict
and see depictions of evil
to exorcise those
feelings within ourselves.
So maybe, whether they
actually are evil or not,
there is a kind of
moral imperative
to see the Titans as evil
and to subject ourselves
by proxy to the idea
that we are trapped
in a circularly walled meat
grinder, being toyed with,
possibly from the
very beginning.
What do you guys think?
Should we consider
the Titans evil?
Let us know in the comments.
And you know what the "Attack
on Titan" theme song really
goes with?
Subscribing.
I wonder if history will
forget or forgive me
for all of those times
that I said LEGOs.
Lets see what you guys had
to say about the two Teslas.
Revya Raksha points out
that this episode was sorely
missing some ideas
of consensus reality
and social constructionism.
Totally fair point.
Revisit, maybe not.
But yes, definitely related.
So if you're interested
in that stuff,
get some Google fu going.
To Quesly1, I think that there
are probably at least 10 David
Bowies.
mfowler1992 says that
the creation of history
is not about unveiling
this portrait,
but about constructing one based
upon the ideology of the people
who are doing the
reporting or who
might be using that history.
And then Lucas Lodovico actually
says that he would rather
embrace the kind of complex
portrait part of things
and get the full picture.
So this is a really interesting
sort of dual uses of history,
I guess.
Khimi Malaka'jin says that the
characteristics of Tesla that
we said did not make it into
the popular portrait might have
actually made it into a lot of
people's ideas of what Tesla
is, and says that they don't
really compare to maybe some
other famous people's
shortcomings,
though at no point did we ever
want to suggest that Tesla is
not someone who
should be celebrated.
He certainly should be.
Alex Norman points out
that some of our arguments
might have been misleading,
especially the physics
skepticism idea, which came
much later in Tesla's life,
and also the fact that everybody
in the intellectual elite
around the time that he
was alive was a eugenicist.
Nathan Hawks has a
great response to this.
Patrick Davison raises a really
interesting question about
the story of Tesla and asks if
there is evidence as to why he
was left out of history, or
why we think he was left out
of history if he wasn't.
That's a very good question.
I don't really know.
If anyone has any
ideas or input,
let us know in the comments.
To Lon3Wolf65, yes,
someday I promise
we will do an
episode on furries.
I'm actually talking in
general with a couple
furs about what the
episode could be about.
It might be a little while,
but yes, definitely sometime.
Sandro Bresba leaves a
really interesting comment
comparing the history of
Tesla to hagiographies
or hey-geo-graphies.
I've never actually
said this word out loud,
so I don't know how it's said.
But this is a great comment.
You should check it out.
To Phoolz Gold and anyone else
who saw me on a Think Geek
newsletter, that wasn't me.
That's just a guy who
looks a lot like me,
and I want to meet him.
Maybe we're brothers.
This week's episode
was brought to you
by the hard work of
these historical figures.
And the tweet of the week
comes from @phampants,
who points us towards an article
about the Japanese depiction
of themselves in
anime and manga.
Very interesting.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
