Tuesday, March 31, 2009

Politics and Ethics

For Aristotle, Ethics and Politics are coordinated. The attainment of personal virtue for him is possible only through the actualization of one's rational nature, and the exercise of the latter involves the constructive interaction with others, which is the fundamental character of the sphere of Politics. Perhaps the first significant historical separation of the two comes with the distinction drawn between 'rendering unto Caesar' and 'rendering unto God'. In other words, Ethics proper then became attached to Religion, leaving Politics earthbound, relegated to the status of Necessary Evil. Even with the advent of the 'secular' era, the stigma continued. For Hobbes, Politics is a recourse to prevent a 'war of all against all'. For Locke, it is a means to the enhancement of personal happiness. Perhaps only Rousseau's concept of Democracy approximates the dignity envisioned by Aristotle. For him, voting is an expression not of one's personal wishes, but of what one judges to be best for society as a whole. Such transcendence of the merely personal is analogous to Aristotle's conception of Reason, though it took Kant to explain that better than Rousseau. Still, most contemporary Americans conceive of Democracy along Lockeian or Hobbesian lines, rather than Rousseauian. Marx and other pioneering Socialists, might also have been attempting to restore Politics to its original dignity, but 20th century Communism has severely compromised that effort. So, Politics continues to be regarded as 'dirty business', and even its proponents seem embarrassed by 'big government' policies. The flip side of that coin is that Ethics is still often widely regarded as merely private, as in e. g. 'it's the thought that counts'.

Monday, March 30, 2009

Pantheism

Despite his seminal development of the prototypes of American democracy and personal freedom, Spinoza is basically unknown to the American public. But even amongst the few, who either revere or revile him, the radicality of his perhaps most significant theory seems barely understood. Whatever fame that he does have is attached to his Theological views, the best-known of which is his pioneering proposition that Biblical scriptures are to be read metaphorically, not literally. Especially coming from a rabbi, this heresy got him ex-communicated from his Jewish community, a somewhat laughable action since, unlike in Roman Catholicism, there is no one invested with such meaningful authority. To others, on the other hand, he was 'God intoxicated', no doubt because of his formal Theological theory. But such swooning seems strangely misplaced when applied to a philosopher who attempted to devise what is possibly the most rigorously rational system in intellectual history. That theory is classified as Pantheistic, which means that Nature and God are one and the same, not to be confused with the view that God is 'in' everything', which still implies some dimension that is not divine. This theory, which denies any separation of God and the Universe, is, for that reason, profoundly opposed to Judaic orthodoxy or even convention. Furthermore, it attributes to God physicality, which makes it impossible to reconcile with any version of Christianity. But God/Nature is not merely a body either; it is a mind/spirit as well, which refutes the interpretation of NeoCon guru Leo Strauss and others, who take the Spinozistic God to be a Newtonian automaton. Instead, a full understanding of this position could lead to the conclusion that what has generally been known as 'Secularism' is actually 'Pantheism', as can be seen in the extent to which Nature is divinized by allegedly secular Environmental principles. Re-casting the common Religion vs. Secularism debate as Theism vs. Pantheism could significantly and profitably upgrade the quality of that argument, but both sets of partisans involved would first need a drastic change of mind-set.

Sunday, March 29, 2009

Pragmaticism and Idealism

'Pragmaticism' and 'Idealism' are commonly thought to be in conflict. The 'idealist' is usually understood to be someone who is guided by goals that are difficult, if not impossible, to achieve. In contrast, the 'pragmatist' will only pursue what is reasonably attainable, often by whatever means necessary. But true Pragmatism, the doctrine invented and developed by Americans such as C. S. Peirce, William James, and John Dewey, runs deeper than that. It tries to combine Theory and Practice by holding that the meaning of words, the truth of assertions, and the value of principles, all lie in practical application, not in mental entertainment. For example, the meaning of the term 'Ideal' means not 'abstract perfection', but 'the best attainable under the circumstances'. Furthermore, it rejects, also as an abstraction, the typical conception of the means-end distinction, asserting, instead, that a means is an earlier phase, and an end the latest, of a continuous course of action. Hence, Pragmatism is not to be confused with expediency in authorizing questionable methods in the pursuit of some ambition. Instead, a more precise formulation of the Pragmatist principle is 'Follow the course of action that is determined to be best under the given circumstances'. In other words, rather than, as conventional wisdom has it, 'Idealism' being the High Road, and 'Pragmatism' the Low, Pragmatism holds that Idealism is no road at all, and that it is the Highest available Road which should be followed. So, it is not so much that Pragmatism opposes Idealism as much as it is that it reconceives it.

Saturday, March 28, 2009

The Will to Live

One of the most deeply-ingrained traditional doctrines is that the fundamental human drive is the Will to Live, aka Self-Preservation, the Survival Instinct, etc. Even Darwin, who is assumed to assert that Evolution is the most basic law of nature, adheres to that orthodoxy, insofar as he holds that Evolution is ultimately only a means to survival, not an end-in-itself. Likewise, an underappreciated problem with the Will to Live that Spinoza raised is that it fails to explain how suicide is possible in a creature governed by self-preservation. But refusing to challenge the latter premise, he can only conclude that suicidal tendencies are actually destructive external forces that have been internalized. Perhaps dissatisfaction with that analysis led Freud to posit the existence of multiple psychological drives, including the Death Instinct. But the innovative heterodoxy came earlier, from Nietzsche, who proposed that the fundamental life-force is the 'Will to Power', a doctrine that has been as hysterically interpreted by Nazi-haters as it was tragically misappropriated by Hitler. Contrary to conventional wisdom, which understands Nietzsche as promoting something like a lust for power, his notion is a descriptive alternative to the Will to Live, namely, that all beings aim to not merely live, but to prevail. Such prevalence comes in multifarious forms, artistic shaping of material, and self-control, as much as tyranny over others. Other novel principles, such as the Will to Evolve and the Will to Create, might differ from the Will to Power, but they agree in their rejection of the Will to Live thesis. The idea of 'expanding horizons' is derived from those two basically equivalent former principles.

Friday, March 27, 2009

Philosophy in America

These days there seems to be three general popular conceptions of 'Philosopher'. One is monastic, i. e. referring to someone who is 'philosophical' about life, meaning, someone who retreats from the tribulations of life to seek solace in contemplation and reflection. Another is someone who teaches the academic subject 'Philosophy', usually a selection of abstruse studies and exercises. Finally, there is the 'street' philosopher, the utterer of pithy phrases that try to sum up personal experience. The difficulty in seeing what these three might have in common is rooted in the complexity of the word 'wisdom', which is half of what comprises the term 'philosopher', the 'lover of wisdom'. There are traditionally thought to be two types of wisdom--theoretical, and, practical. While the former concerns the grasp of the 'big picture' of the way things are, the latter proposes a guide for conduct. So, on the basis of that classification, the monastic philosopher is one devoted almost exclusively to theoretical wisdom; the academic type might practice the teaching of theory of a sort, the implication of wisdom therein however being usually, at best, unclear; and, the street philosopher seems to be trying to promote practical wisdom, though the scope of the theory informing it is typically limited. On the other hand, this classification suggests what would constitute a 'Philosopher' in the fullest sense--someone who systematically combines theoretical and practical wisdom, namely someone who articulates a code of conduct to which they adhere, that is informed by a comprehensive vision of reality. That there have been those who have exemplified this notion, for example Spinoza, Kant, and Dewey, to name a few, does not seem to be common knowledge in the monastery, on the street, and even in academia, so it should be no surprise that the general American public knows so little about true Philosophy either.

Thursday, March 26, 2009

Science vs. Religion

Conventional wisdom has it that one of the current central debates is Science vs. Religion, and that, at heart, the debate is between Reason and Faith. Now, there is no doubt that there is such a debate, and that the two sides involved generally go by the labels 'Science' and 'Religion'. However, the attempt to further pigeonhole them as 'Reason' and 'Faith' only bears out how misconstrued the conflict is, for, both sides use both Reason and Faith, and so the key difference must lie elsewhere. Both sides employ Reason in its function as offering causal explanations: in 'Science', the causes of what occurs are expressed by the laws of Physics, Chemistry, Biology, etc., while in 'Religion', the most prevalent general cause is the activity of God, though human causes, such as a prayer and ritual are often also recognized. Likewise, both sides take at least the same something on Faith, namely that their explanations of what has already transpired, whether it be a law or God, continue to be applicable to future events, for which there can plainly be absolutely no evidence available, and, so, must be taken on Faith. Likewise for unwitnessible occurrences such as accounts of the beginning of the Universe. So, both 'Science' and 'Religion' express mixtures of Reason and Faith. Given that homogeneity, one key difference gets highlighted. Religion has more heavily emphasized Faith, not as its essence, but due to the historical circumstances that its Rational legs got kicked out from under it by the Copernican astronomical theories. For, the Ptolemaic cosmos, as Aristotle shows, can accommodate the location of God in contiguity with the Earth, namely, in the sky above. This contiguity is crucial, because it provides the grounds for interaction between God and humans to take place, without which is an abyss the bridging of which is difficult to explain. In other words, Copernicus eliminated God from his astronomical throne, thereby seriously weakening the explanatory power of Religion, leaving it to a much greater reliance on Faith. So, the real difference between Science and Religion lies in the greater, not the absolute, Rationality of the former. Though, the fact that centuries later, people still point to the sky when referring to God, may show that Religion still has reason enough to keep the Faith.

Wednesday, March 25, 2009

Ethics in America

Ethics originated as a study by Aristotle. The term derived from the Greek word meaning 'habits', so, accordingly, his analysis is coordinated with his Psychological theory. What he proposes is the self-inculcation of acquired habits, based on the principle of moderation, his conclusion being that Happiness consists in moderate conduct. In other words, Ethics was originally conceived of as a program of self-cultivation. Over the centuries, the term got conflated with the term Morality, which was derived from the Latin 'mores', meaning 'customs'. Hence began a subtle shift in scope from the personal to the general. Thus, when Middle Age theologians appropriated Ancient Philosophy for religious purposes, the notion more easily adapted to the Scriptural adherence to impersonal legalistic formulas, such as the Ten Commandments. Now, despite, in the intervening recent centuries, the attempts of major Ethicists such as Spinoza, Kant, and Mill to recapture in their programs the original sense of self-development, the most prevalent connotation in contemporary of America of the issue is the Medieval one, namely 'Morality' as obedience to religious precepts. Meanwhile, 'Ethics' is usually relegated to guiding narrow, specific spheres of activity. Hence, Ethics in America might be described as a lost art.

Tuesday, March 24, 2009

Sexual Ethics

There currently seems to be two main principles governing sexual activity. The first holds that only marital, heterosexual sex is legitimate, the other, that any consensual adult sex is permissible. To me, both of these miss the mark, because while the latter is wrong to draw any further line, the former misplaces one at marriage. In contrast, the overwhelmingly obvious primary distinction is between reproductive and non-reproductive sexual activity. The alleged 'sanctity of marriage' muddies this distinction in two ways. First, it is the expression of a long tradition that has attempted to spiritualize, or to put it conversely, de-physicalize, sex, on the basis of a questionable concept of the separation of spirit and matter. So, not only can't it see that non-marital reproduction is as wondrous as marital, but it also sanctifies casual marital sex, heterosexual only, of course. On the other hand, the consensualists often seem to miss the point that recreational sex is nothing more than idle fun, nothing more than mutual Onanism. Particularly ridiculous are the notions that, in itself, an orgasm is any more significant than a sneeze, or that 'getting laid' is an end-in-itself. Plus, given that sex can be cold, impersonal, or escapist, it doesn't necessarily qualify as meaningful interpersonal intimacy. So, a Sex Education can start with the fact of the distinction between reproductive and recreational sex, and then teach young people that sex is neither Evil nor without consequences.

Monday, March 23, 2009

Is Greed Good?

The phrase 'Greed is Good', from the film Wall Street, is a paraphrase of an assertion by Ivan Boesky, 'Greed is Right'. So, the association of the 80s with the former is not a mere Oliver Stone plot. The idea behind the phrase seems to have induced a lot of head-shaking, but is it true? Well, the two most significant Moralists of the past several centuries, Kant and Mill, would certainly condemn it. And, it is listed as a 'mortal sin' in religious circles. So, probably the only credible support for the principle is presumed to come from Adam Smith, who asserted that the pursuit of private interest by each is equivalent to the pursuit of the Good of the whole. Now, such a computation has over the centuries been repeatedly criticized as over-simplistic, just as the repeated economic failures of the attempts to implement the principle as policy have paralleled. But the more problematic aspect of the invocation of Smith is that it is half-assed. As his presumed acolytes seem oblivious to, Smith wrote TWO major books in his lifetime, the other, his first, presenting a Moral theory that proposes that the Good is based in sympathy for others. Smith never repudiated the latter view, which suggests that his promotion of self-interest in the Wealth of Nations was meant to be taken, at minimum, in conjunction with the promotion of the welfare of others. So, even Adam Smith would likely condemn much of what passes as business as usual in this country. But the definitive diagnosis of Greed probably comes from Aristotle. First, he believes that anything that anybody does is for what they believe is a'Good', the potential shortcoming being that what they believe is 'good' is not always what in fact is so. Secondly, his theory of balance applies to both Ethics and Psychology, so, in other words, Greed is both a Vice and a form of psychological imbalance. Thus, when in one of his novels Salman Rushdie suggests that Greed and mental illness are related, he is approximating a literal truth, one confirmed by the pride with which the goodness of greed is often trumpeted.

Sunday, March 22, 2009

Consciousness Expansion

One autobiographical germ of the idea of 'expanding horizons' was experiences often described as 'consciousness expansion'. Possibly because of the cultural baggage involved, such experiences have rarely been subjected to serious analytical scrutiny. One unlikely source of a potentially illuminating, to me, explanation of what transpired in those synaesthetic episodes was Kant. According to one aspect of his pioneering theories, the mind naturally imposes structures on incoming sensory information, while according to another, these structures might prove to be inadequate in the presence of what he calls the "Sublime". However, his system is inadequate to accommodate the possibility of a reconstruction at a higher, more inclusive level. of those structures that have been overwhelmed by sensory overload. Indeed, these experimental experiences risk permanent psychological breakdown, and that there have been such casualties is undeniable. But there have been at least equally many who have constructively grown through such adventures. Over the years, what became obvious to me was that such growth was not merely 'mental', as the term 'consciousness' often implies, but that conduct, notably social, drastically metamorphosed as well, to an openness towards others that is to this day still derided in some circles. My own theorizing has led me to conclude that the connotation of 'consciousness' as purely mentalistic is based on a mistaken conception of the 'mind-body' relation. So, in sum, 'expanding horizons' is a maturation of 'consciousness expansion', not to mention that maturation is a type of horizon expansion.

Saturday, March 21, 2009

Tree Time

To continue an earlier point, the idea of 'expanding horizons' is more than just a whimsical diversion from the gritty business of everyday life. To the contrary, its fundamentally organic nature can be seen in a familiar example from nature. As is well-known, a tree is an accumulation of rings, and such growth is a simple but precise model of horizon expansion. The application to human experience is not immediately easy to appreciate, but that is probably due to some too superficial ideas about the nature of Time. In day-to-day activities, we orient ourselves to the 'times' of a clock, but that hardly captures the Temporal quality of the experiences themselves. They usually entail a rush from situation A to situation B, so Time seems be a succession of discrete points. A more reflective consideration of experience notes how these points are separated by other points, and so on, until the succession of points turns into a line. But more abstract specualtion has asserted, for example, that the line is actually a circle, or that there is no line, but just one ongoing point, or that the lines, the points, and Time itself, are just illusory. In contrast to all of these, tree time is cumulative, and insight into our experiences shows that our lives are, as well. Sometimes, one can easily miss the rings for the tree.

Thursday, March 19, 2009

American Individualism

'Individualism' is well-recognized as a signifcant ethos in American life. It is usually taken as promoting ideas like 'self-sufficiency' and 'independence', which would suggest that the general definition of the term is 'numerically distinct'. However, close examination of the word reveals otherwise--'individual' means 'not divided', which at minimum connotes something other than 'distinct'. Now, such a discrepancy might seem too minor to be relevant in everyday conversation. But consider the chasm between them that opens up when they are implemented as prescriptions for interpersonal conduct. According to the conventional meaning, 'Act individualistically' is essentially a formula for anti-social behavior. In contrast, 'Be undivided' can encourage 'Join with others' and 'Be consistent in your treatment of others', in other words, gregarious and fair behavior. So, what could be more typical of some aspects of American life than ignorance and distortion in the service of selfishness? And, who are the true 'individuals'?

America's Moral Crisis

America is suffering from a Moral crisis, not so much because of some rampant, blatant phenomena, but because it tends to get horrified when it gets a glimpse of its true Moral nature. Appearances are that America is conflicted between two Moral principles--'Family Values', and the 'Golden Rule'. The term 'Morality' seems most frequently associated with the former, but it scope is unprecedentedly narrow, concerned primarily with reproductive practices. In contrast, the latter, 'Do unto others as you would have them do unto you', indeed has applicability to a much wider range of situations, but it lacks motive power; that is, its appeal is limited to those who already possess some degree of sociability with others, and hence, to those who do not really need it. Now, while these two principles contend for the title of 'America's Morality', and, indeed, politics these days is at root this very struggle, another already possesses it, and the fact of that possession is underscored by its hardly being recognized as such. The predominant dimension of American life is economic activity, and this dimension is governed by one principle--the pursuit of profit. Everybody recognizes this, but a lot fewer know, as Adam Smith did, that there is a legitimate traditional system of Morality generally entitled 'Egoism'. In other words, the fundamental Moral principle of American life is Egoism, with which society seems comfortable when it is dressed up in the guise of 'Individualism'. But when it is discovered that a group of financiers are guided by the pursuit of profit, suddenly everybody is outraged. The crisis consists in this confusion, America being conflicted about itself, rooted in denial about its true character. The resolution to this crisis would thus begin with honesty about its fundamental Egoism, and then it can start putting its outrage to constructive ends.

Wednesday, March 18, 2009

What's It All About?

It's about expanding horizons, and maybe more. What follows will be an informal, piecemeal presentation of what I elsewhere construct more technically and systematically, plus anything else relevant that might crop up. 'Expanding horizons' is to me a casual, familiar version of a notion that is greatly significant and fruitful. We all know roughly what it means--the surpassing of what had been previous limitations, with the possible re-establishment of new, broader ones. And, most, if not all, of us likely regard what is therein involved as a positive development. But, it is generally regarded as a peripheral phenomenon in our daily affairs, so it seems to be rarely, when at all, entertained as anything other than the vague referent of a catchy phrase suggesting a pleasant digression from the serious business of life. Likewise, it might be expected that writings under this rubric would be no more than idle whimsy. However, even if it doesn't always seem that way, dead seriousness will express what I take to be the profound significance of the topic. What is at issue is my taking exception to a deeply-ingrained prevalently-held set of presumptions as to what it is all about. Hopefully, I can make why I feel that way comprehensible, if not persuasive.