Cutting Capers

      My favorite chapters from Part I are VII and VIII. I loved the in-depth philosophical thought experiment. What if we finally figured out exactly how the mind works, mathematically and chemically? The way mankind operates, we most definitely would begin to develop “logarithms up to 108,000” (p. 17). It would be all for the best, we would imagine, and everyone would live a grander and more enriched life. Many of us assume that man operates purely rationally, and that he seeks out only what is advantageous to him. Dostoyevsky turns this argument around. He asks: if that is true, how can you explain the people who induce chaos on purpose and go against what is advantageous for them? The answer, he writes, lies in the one true advantage we all seek. This advantage is the right to do whatever we feel like. 

     When we are restricted, we go against the grain. We cannot stand to be stifled and controlled. We also cannot stand to be bored. Instead of sitting around, we begin "cutting capers"; a potentially useless endeavor that has no real purpose. Dostoyevsky predicts that even in a society of perfect utopia, there would still be a man would exclaimed “hadn’t we better kick over the whole show” (p.17). This is the nature of man, and for this reason Dostoyevsky labels them as “the ungrateful biped”. If man was given cakes for eternity, he would still find a way to risk them all. Perhaps this is because we do not really ever want to reach our goals. Even if we spend a lifetime seeking riches and good fortune, once we acquire them we wish with all our might that life were different. This is the nature of man. 
-Anike