There would seem to be a heightened urgency to “Know Thyself” in a world marked by the prospect of challenging dynamics. For who we are and the depth of our character have rarely been tested for the majority of us with the moral luck to have been brought up in the relative security and prosperity of post-WWII America. Beware the pop quiz.

In dealing with what’s probably the definitive historical final exam on the subject, our focus article (click: Moral Luck) cites the extended documentary that features interviews given by the last remaining members of the Nazi party during the Third Reich. It brings to the fore the question we’d previously addressed in a different context i.e. the extent to which who we are is largely shaped within a so-called deterministic universe (MM 11/20/23 Free Will).

More specifically, are transgressions (and heroic traits) the result of circumstances out of our control, rooted in matters not necessarily of our choosing? The matter encourages empathy and humility, but “also threatens the notion of culpability that makes sense of evil.”

Therein lies the false comfort of counterfactuals in the assumption that we ourselves would certainly pass whatever moral tests of history – e.g. refusing the lure of dictators – rather than just being lucky enough not to have been in the life circumstances where we had to decide. Such was the focus of our previous two-part series in MM 7/16/18 Could It Happen Here? I and MM 7/23/18 Could It Happen Here? II, centered on the triangulation of three sources: “They Thought They Were Free,” and “Defying Hitler,” and “Broken Lives.”

Perhaps it's gut-check time before such questions rise beyond abstraction – say, perhaps, by performing an internal assessment of our tendency to “objectify” others or even ourselves. Case in point: the inclination to apply a cost/benefit analysis when it comes to immigration policy where the results have real human survival consequences.

We may not forever be able to hide behind “There but for the grace of God go I.”