Philosophy Now - Issue 74

Philosophy N Philosophy  Now  ISSUE 74 July/Aug 09 EDITORIAL & NEWS 4 The Edge Edge of Knowledge Knowledge Grant Bartley 5 News in Brief  Brief 

WAYS OF KNOWING 6 Is Psychology Psychology Science? Science?

Peter Rickman on hermeneutics  8 Analytic versus versus Continental Continental Philosophy  Philosophy   Kile Jones thinks across the great divide 12 Would My Zen Master Fail Me For Writing Writing This? Patrick Cox explains Zen’s suspicion of explanations  14 Evaluating the the Scientificness Scientificness of Theories  Russell Berg has a set of criteria 18 Feyeraben Feyerabend d and the Monster Monster ‘Science’  Ian James Kidd on a reneg renegade ade philosopher of science OTHER ARTICLES 21 Interview: Charles Taylor  Chris Bloor talks to  page  pa gess 6-20 6-20 and elsew elsewhe here re a philosopher of culture and difference 24 Logic: Predestination Predestination and the Wagers Wagers of Sin  Robert Howell boxes clever with fate 26 Ethics: The Golden Rule: Not So Golden Golden Anymore Stephen Anderson isn’t isn’t totally positive about doing to others  REVIEWS 38   Book:  C.S. Lewis and the Search for Rational Religion by John Beversluis, reviewed atheistically by John Loftus  40   Book:  A Sceptic’s Guide To Atheism by Peter S. Williams,  reviewed reverently by Luke Pollard  41   Book:  What We Can Never Know by David Gamez,  reviewed enigmatically by David Braid  42   Film:  There Will Be Blood  Terri Murray with a bloody Nietzschean review REGULARS 30 Moral Moments: Moments: From Here to There There on history, history, identit identityy & culture  Joel Marks says beam me up, Aristotle 31 Food For Thought: Conscience Tim Madigan tells us what is and what isn’t cricket  34 Letters to the Editor 46   Crossword Deiradiotes  47 Science: Hypotheses? Hypotheses? Forget Forget About It!  Massimo  Mass imo Pigliucci Pigliucci has a date with data (not the android) android) 50 Tallis in Wonderland: Don’t Tell Him, Pike! Pike !  Raymond Tallis Tallis asks, what is in a name, anyway? anyway? 52 Dear Socrates POETRY & FICTION 33 The Job Interview   Josh Tomlin Tomlin gets a clear picture of his prospects  33 ‘The mission mission of poetry poetry is to make us alive’ alive’  Natasha Morgan plans a poetic revolution revolution 33 But, Socrates Gary W. Gilbert doesn’t seem to know the form Book Reviews, Reviews, pag pagee 38 on 53 The Bells, Bells, The The Bells  Kevin Robson’ Robson’ss hero knows what he knows – or does he?

Ways to Know

Charles Taylor

God Go d: Pr Pro o & Con

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Editorial pistemology is the mining boss of philosophy. philosophy. It digs deep into the foundations even of philosophy itself. The word  pisteme me meaning means the study of knowledge (from the Greek e piste ‘knowledge’ or ‘belief’, or in some circles, ‘faith’.) Its question is,  How can we we be sure sure about anyth anything? ing? René Descartes asked this question in its most radical form  when he said: said: ifif a powerful powerful,, evil demon demon set set out to to mislead mislead us about everything , then how could we tell? If we couldn’t tell, how  do we know that there really isn’t such a demon? Less generally, how can you ever credibly claim to know  how you something before you can say how  you know know it? it? Put this this way, way, it’s not hard to see that epistemology is at the base of science, philosophy,, religion and many other areas of human endeavour philosophy endeavour.. But the ways we know things may differ from field to field. How do we know when a theory is scientifically valid? Here,  what we we want to to know is whether whether it is is an accurat accuratee descriptio description n of  the world, within its limits. The methodology of science is to compare the theory with whatever it is that the theory is about, then refine the theory as necessary until it gives a description consistent with what is observed. (As to which theories are scientific, a set of possible criteria is proposed by Russell Berg on p.14.) Science is about the observed world. The principle of how   we know some something thing to to be true true in science science is, is, we know this is the way the observed world behaves because this is how it may best (ideally, incontrovertibly) be observed to behave. behave .  Maths proofs proofs are good good for maths. maths. In an attempt attempt to to uncover uncover a general pattern for knowledge, perhaps we could redescribe the process of mathematical discovery so that it too could be thought  of as comparing a theory to what that theory is about. Here the evidence for the conclusion would be the steps it takes to get  there. Similarly for arguments of logical symbolism: the evidence  would be the steps steps in the argument argument.. Thus what what counts counts as as evidence would be different for different domains, evidently. (Philosophy doesn’t doesn’t count as purely logical, because as soon as signs are used as language, possible meanings for each sign multiply exponentially. exponentially. Peter Rickman argues on p.6 that  psychology cannot be considered science for this precise reason.)  Aside from the the incontrov incontrovertibl ertiblee parts of science, science, maths maths and and logic, can any other way of thinking strictly be called ‘knowledge’ truth? Could there be ways to – that is, yielding an assurance of truth?  what might might rightly rightly be be called called knowledge concerning religious experience, emotional intuitions, philosophical ideas too?  And which which way? way? Kile Jones reports on the split   Why/why  Why/w hy not? not? ( And between analytical and continental philosophy in thought and method on p.8.) To To say that ‘religious experience’ for instance is inadmissible as evidence begs the question of what is admissible.

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Now  w   July/Aug 4  Philosophy No July/August ust 2009

The Edge of  Knowledge Howeve Howe verr, th thee en enqu quir irer er sh shou ould ld al also so as askk wh whyy an and d wh whic ich h re reli ligi giou ouss this typ experi exp erienc encee is adm admiss issibl ible. e. Why tru trust  st this  type? e? The unf unflin linchi ching ng clai cl aim m to kn know ow so some meth thin ing g wi with thou outt th thee wi will llin ingn gnes esss (o (orr ab abil ilit ity) y) to resp re spec ecta tabl blyy sa sayy ho how w, is th thee mo most st ph phil ilos osop ophe herr-b -bai aiti ting ng as aspe pect ct of  dogm do gmat atis ism. m. Th Thee co core re im impu puls lsee of re reas ason on,, th thee de dema mand nd fo forr un unde derrstandi sta nding, ng, req requir uires es ope openne nness ss to all que questi stions ons,, especially concer con cernin ning g how ide ideolo ologic gical al cla claims ims to kno knowle wledge dge are jus justif tified ied,, beca be caus usee of th thee si sign gnif ific ican antt im impl plic icat atio ions ns of th thes esee cl clai aims ms.. On th thee othe ot herr ha hand nd,, a sc scep epti tic’ c’s la lack ck of im imag agin inat atio ion n is no nott ne nece cess ssar aril ilyy th thee same sa me as a di disc scer ernm nmen entt of tr trut uth. h. We lo look ok at re reli ligi giou ouss know kn owle ledg dgee-cl clai aims ms fr from om bo both th si side dess in th thee bo book ok re revi view ewss se sect ctio ion n of th this is is issu sue. e. Even Ev en if in th thee le less ss pr prov ovab able le ar area eass we ca can’ n’tt ha have ve wh what at co coul uld d stri st rict ctly ly be ca call lled ed kn know owle ledg dge, e, in th thee se sens nsee of ‘i ‘inc ncon ontr trov over erti tibl blee assu as sura ranc nce’ e’,, so wh what at?? Do Does esn’ n’tt th thee qu ques esti tion on of wh what at to be beli lieve eve in these the se sit situat uation ionss sim simply ply sof soften ten int into o ‘Wh ‘What’ at’s the mos mostt rea reason sonabl ablee thin th ing g to be beli lieve eve?’ ?’ Th This is wi will ll no nott sa sati tisf sfyy th thee tr trul ulyy pa para rano noid id Cart Ca rtes esia ian, n, bu butt sc scep epti tici cism sm to th thee ex exte tent nt th that at we ca can’ n’tt tr trus ust  t  anythi any thing ng we can can’’t inc incont ontrov rovert ertibl iblyy dem demons onstra trate, te, is onl onlyy rea really  lly  usef us eful ul as an ex exer erci cise se in de deli limi miti ting ng th thee bo bord rder erss of ce cert rtai aint ntyy. Neve Ne vert rthe hele less ss,, it it’’s a pa para rado doxx of ph phil ilos osop ophy hy,, or at le leas astt an  prove phi irrita irr itatio tion, n, tha thatt you can can’’t oft often en prove philos losoph ophica icall view views; s; you can only on ly gi give ve yo your ur be best st re reas ason onss to su supp ppor ortt th them em – an and d th thes esee ar aree only on ly th thee re reas ason onss yo you’ u’re re pr prep epar ared ed to se sett ttle le fo forr.. .... On th thee br brig ight  ht  side si de th thee ac ackn know owle ledg dgem emen entt of fa fall llib ibil ilit ityy ca can n ha have ve a mo mode dera rati ting ng effe ef fect ct on th thee pa pass ssio ions ns of ze zeal alot otry ry.. As wi with th an anyt ythi hing ng,, th thee cl clai aims ms of an anyy re reli ligi gion on ar aree on only ly as ju just stif ifie ied d as th thee be best st re reas ason onss to be beli liev evee they th ey’r ’ree tr true ue – ye yett a wi wide derr ap appr prec ecia iati tion on of th this is fa fact ct th this is mi migh ghtt ju just  st  take ta ke th thee ed edge ge of offf th thee ab abso solu lute te ju just stif ific icat atio ion n of id idio ioti ticc an and d barb ba rbar aric ic ac acts ts in th thee na name me of Th Thee Tru ruth th..  The value of a good philo philosoph sophyy of know knowledge ledge can be seen in alll th al thee fr frui uits ts of sc scie ienc nce. e. Th Thus us,, co cont ntra rary ry to De Desc scar arte tes’ s’ me ment ntal al quic qu icks ksan and d, an and d in th thee fa facce of the fea ears rs of all wh who o do no nott tr trus ust  t  ques qu esti tion onin ing g – wh who o fe fear ar th thei eirr be beli lief ef-s -sys yste tems ms mi might ght be un unde derrmine mi ned d by to too o ma many ny qu ques esti tion onss – we ca can n vi view ew th thee ep epis iste temo molo logi gica call miss mi ssio ion n as be bene nevo volen lent: t: to in incr crea ease se th thee st stoc ock, k, st stre reng ngth th an and d de deta tail il of ou ourr mo most st re reas ason onab able le be beli lief efss by pr prov ovid idin ing g th them em wi with th th thee strong str ongest est fou founda ndatio tion n of jus justif tifica icatio tion n pos possib sible; le; and per perhap hapss to open op en up ne new w wa ways ys of kn know owin ing. g. En Enga gagi ging ng th thee ep epis iste temo molo logic gical al unde un ders rsta tand ndin ing g wh whic ich h is th thee to touc uchs hsto tone ne of sc scie ient ntif ific ic res resea earc rch h wa wass like li ke st step eppi ping ng in into to a hi hidd dden en gr grot otto to un unive ivers rse. e. Wh Who o kn know owss wh what  at  know kn owle ledg dgee is po poss ssib ible le if we fi find nd eq equa uall llyy go good od wa ways ys of kn know owin ing g forr ot fo othe herr ar area eass of en enqu quir iryy to too? o? Gran Gr antt Ba Bart rtle leyy is As Assi sist stan antt Edi Edito torr of  of Philo Hiss bo book ok The Philosophy sophy Now . Hi  The avai aila labl blee as a fr free ee do down wnlo load ad fr from om  Metarevolut  Metare volution ion is av philosophynow.org . Sc Scro roll ll do down wn to ‘Abou A boutt Us Us’, ’, th then en cl clic ickk th thee li link nk..

•  The impermanence of the Dalai Lama-ship  • •  Happiness breaks out everywhere • •  Bishops still generally annoyed • News reports by Sue Roberts. Souled Out  A senior Catholic bishop believes that  Britain has sold its soul to the pursuit of  scientific knowledge above all else. The  Most Rev Vincent Nichols, Archbishop of  Birmingham, believes that because only  provable facts are now considered valuable, arguments based on morality and spirituality are being ignored. In a new   The book about the rise of secularism, secularism, The  Nation That Forgot Forgot God , Nichols claims that faith has been relegated to an indi vidual pursuit, and the country has sought  to define itself by secular and material standards. In his view, society lacks cohesion when there are no common values,  while the virtues of compassion, respect  and tolerance cannot survive once severed from their roots in Christian teaching. However, this view of Britain as a secular society isn’t shared by Dr Rowan  Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury. Canterbury. He claims that it is a country “uncomfortably haunted by the memory of religion” and not knowing what to do with it. He cites the piles of flowers left at the scenes of road accidents as potent symbols of  such a society. With regard to the Church’s attitude to other faiths he says “The ideal in a plural society is everyone has the respect to say what they want. A  country in which we are all nervous about  offending each other is not a free society.” Frankenstein Sperm  The debate over stem cell research has been reignited by an announcement in the  journal Stem  journal  Stem Cells and Development  of Development  of what   become an astonishing breakthrou breakthrough gh could  become in fertility treatment. Researchers at the Northeast England Stem Cell Institute have created human sperm in the laboratory, from stem cells harvested from the skin of the ‘parent’. The researchers believe that with minor changes the sperm could theoretically fertilise fertilise an egg to create a child. If so, it could mean that in  years to come the technique might enable infertile couples to have children who are genetically their own.

 

Even more controversially, it might be possible to create sperm from stem cells collected from the skin of a woman. This could leave men out of the reproductive process altogether. At present the UK’s Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act  bans the use of artificially-created sperm and eggs in fertility treatment. Some experts are sceptical of the claim, saying that the cells did not constitute ‘authentic sperm’ with all the necessary  biological characteristics. Josephine Quintavalle, rhe founder of Comment on Reproductive Reproducti ve Ethics, described the research as “totally wrong... science must  be totally ethical and totally safe.” Healthy, Happy Planet 1  The Happy Planet Index measures life expectancy, happiness and environmental impact on people of different nations. Nick Marks, who devised the Index, reported that the top 10 Happy nations are middle-income countries in Latin  America, Asia and the Caribbean, where there is high level of life satisfaction and a low carbon footprint. On the other hand, Britain ranked 74th out of 143 countries,  with Australia 109th and USA 114th. All Change  The Dalai Lama has told fellow exiles in India that the tradition of a monk  leading Tibet’s Buddhists by divine right  should end with him, and that in the interests of democracy, future leaders should be elected. As the 14th Dalai Lama, (Jetsun  Jamphel Ngawang Lobsang Yeshe)  Tenzin Gyatso has been Tibet’s spiritual leader during six decades of turmoil.  The Tibetan parliament-in-exile parliament-in-exile will debate this pivotal reform, but attitudes may be very hard to change. A young man of 24, Osel Hita Torres, was believed by  some to be the reincarnation of the previous Lama when only five months old. He was chosen by the Dalai Lama over others to be raised accordingly. In keeping  with tradition, he was taken from his home, and from 14 months old he lived in

News a monastery and was treated like a god. But Osel has now completely turned his back on the order that held him in such esteem. In spite of this rejection, and although wearing normal clothing and studying film in Spain, he is still revered by many Tibetans. Healthy, Happy Planet 2 In an attempt to improve customer services, the Keihin Electric Express Railway in Japan plan to subject their  workers to a ‘smile scan’ computer that  produces a smile rating between zero to 100 (depending on estimated value of the fulfilled potential of that person’s biggest  smile). Workers will receive print-outs each day, and be expected to keep them throughout the day to inspire them to smile at all times. Meanwhile, drivers on the London underground are trying to lift  travellers’ spirits by reading out philosophical quotes along with their normal announcements. A book of quotations from Jean-Paul Sartre, Mahatma Gandhi,  Albert Einstein and other great thinkers has been compiled by the artist Jeremy  Deller. Such pronouncements pronouncements as “An ounce of actions is worth a ton of theory” (Friedrich Engels) will now compete for attention with sudoku or the daily cross word puzzle. Euthanasia Overruled Euthanasia  Two former former UK Cabinet Ministers, Ministers, Lord Falconer and Baroness Jay, recently  attempted to change the law to remove the threat of prosecution from people who take terminally ill loved ones to die abroad in ‘suicide clinics’. However, their amendment to the Coroners and Justice Bill was rejected reject ed by a vote of 194 to 141. It is believed that 115 people from Britain have travelled overseas to die since 2002. Currently, Curren tly, assisting suicide is a crime in Britain, punishable punishable by up to 14 years imprisonment. The rejection of the Bill  was blamed on fears fears of giving a ‘green light’ to the state sanctioning of all assisted suicide. July/Augu July/ August st 2009  Philosophy Now  5

Is Psychology  Science Science? Peter Rickman  tells us why it isn’t

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 was slightly taken aback when I heard a speaker at a psychology lecture meeting claiming confidently that psychology was a science. Of course, if we define science broadly,, as the systematic search for knowledge, psycholbroadly ogy would qualify for that label. But it is not terminology that  is at issue here, but a matter of substantial importance.  When we talk of science, we primarily think of physical science. If a mother said that her son was studying science at  Cambridge, would psychology come first to the listener’s listener’s mind? The paradigm of the physical sciences is physics, because its elegant theories based on ample observation and experimentation provide clear explanations and reliable predictions. It also provides the foundations for the technologies  which have transformed our lives. The man on the Clapham bus may not understand the laws of physics, but he happily  relies on the means of transport based on those laws. In consequence, the methods of physics become the model of scientific methodology. The different disciplines concerned  with the study of humanity humanity,, such as psychology psychology,, sociology sociology and anthropology, seem to fall woefully short of this. The concepts and theories of these disciplines are not consistently coordinated; and their application does not compare with that of  physical sciences. While aeroplanes are pretty reliable, and millions of people enjoy television programmes, programmes, there are still too many divorces and mental breakdowns. Groups of violent   youths still still roam the city streets. Unobservable Truths  Many stude students nts of the the mind sough soughtt the remedy remedy for for their failfailures and their lack of public esteem in modelling the methods of  psychology on the physical sciences. An extreme example of this is behaviourism is  behaviourism.. Why not focus on studying observable human behaviour, as you can study the movements of falling bodies and theorisee on that evidence? After all, humans are behaving theoris bodies.. There are various flaws in this approa bodies approach, ch, and one of  them is illustrated by a well-targeted joke. Two behaviourists spend a night passio passionately nately making love. In the morning, one says to the other, “It was good for you. How was it for me?”  A proper starting point is to recognise the disciplines which study human nature as a distinct group which require, if not a complete alternative to the scientific method, at least some essential supplementary methodology.  The fact is that the bulk of the evidence given to the student  of humanity on which to theorise, are not  observable not  observable facts , but  communications . These do not correspond to anything observable. In other words, what is in front of the psychologist are statements from interviews or completed questionnaires (eg, I am afraid of dying, I was abused in childhood, etc), responses to tests such as the Rorschach pictures, diaries, and the like. Similarly,, sociologists use interviews, questionnaires and legal Similarly documents, while historians use biographies, letters, inscriptions on gravestones, eyewitness accounts of battles and revolutions and similar material. The same is true of other human 6 Philosophy No Now  w   July/Au July/August gust 2009

studies such as social anthropology or politics.  All this is pretty obvious and non-controversial. non-controversial. It needs mentioning because of widespread error of taking what is communicated in this material as simple data whose meaning is transparent. What is thus ignored is the immense complexity  of the process of communication. For instance, the question, as  well as the answers, may be misunderstood, or respondents may be lying to please the questioner, motivated by pride or shame or simply by wanting to get rid of the questioner. A lady  confessed to me that when canvassers of different parties come to the door at election time, she says to all of them, “Yes I shall  vote for you,” and closes the door door.. Or, if a stranger rings your doorbell and asks you how often you have sex, will you necessarily tell him the truth? Certainly, commercial companies have been the loser when trying to sell goods because of so many  people trying to be liked when answering their questionnaires.  An anecdote I quoted in one of my books illustrates one type of miscommunication. An investigator was puzzled when a man in prison answered ‘no’ to the questionnaire query ‘Were  you ever in trouble with the police?’ He went to see the man and asked: “How come you gave that answer? After all, you are serving a prison sentence.” The man answered: “Oh, I thought   you meant  trouble.”   trouble.”  A case of partial failure in understanding is the famous study  of the Authoritarian Personality, Personality, which successful successfully ly demonstrated some personality traits of fascists. It was later shown that the characteristics pinpointed were not confined to fascists, but also shared by members of left-wing parties. Here the interpretation of the data was flawed by political naïvety. naïvety. It follows that the human studies cannot naïvely ape physical science. If they don’t want to resign themselves to being woolly  and merely anecdotal, they must therefore address themselves systematically systematica lly to the complex problems of communicatio communication. n.

 John Donne 1572-1631

Hermes and Hermeneutics  There is an ancient discipline discipline concerned concerned with the interpretation of communications. In Ancient Greece, education focused on the study of literary texts. The theory and methodological approach for the understanding of such texts was called hermeneutics , after Hermes, the messenger of the gods. With the advent of Christianity Christianity,, quarrels and schisms arose over the exact meaning of Biblical texts. To To help settle these differences of opinion hermeneutics then became a branch of theology.  This systematic textual interpretation continued continued throughout   Antiquity and the Middle Ages up to modern times. Schleiermacher,, philosopher, macher philosopher, theologian and translator of Plato, was a professor of hermeneutics who widened the concept of this discipline. Not only texts but all other kinds of communication needed interpretation and could be subjected to this type of  examination. Wilhelm Wilhelm Dilthey, a pupil of some of Schleiermacher’s followers, systematically developed Schleiermacher’s approach, demonstrating the vital contributio contribution n hermeneutics had to make to the human studies.  This is not the place for a full, systematic systematic account of  hermeneutics, hermeneu tics, but it is the place for drawing attention to some distinctive features of its methodology which are highly relevant. First,      )      1      1 one needs to emphasi emphasise se      6      1      ( that unlike physical sci    s     u      i ence, the focus of under    z      t      l     o standing in hermeneutics      G      k     c is not  classes   but  individu classes  but   individu     i     r      d . Primarily, we aim to als      n     e      H understand a poem, not      y      b poetry in general; a par     d     e      t ticular person, not the     n      i     a group to which he     p  ,     s belongs. By contrast, in      d     o     g physics or chemistry, the     e      h      t example investigated is      f     o     r not of intrinsi intrinsicc interest.     e     g Once the experiment is     n     e     s     s finished, the contents of      e     m the test tube may be     e      h      t poured down the sink:  ,     s     e they’re only useful inas    m     r     e much as they help form      H general laws. Yet in the human studies, studies, the individual thing studied studied – it may be a person,, a family or a whole community person community – remains of interest.  The classic sociologica sociologicall study of ‘Middletown’ ‘Middletown’ or the analyses of Sigmund Freud are examples. Physical objects are substantially explained in terms of the class to which they belong. This is a diamond, this is a table, etc, and they and they behave  behave in such-and-such ways. But such explanations of human beings – eg, she is a woman, he is a teenager, etc – are inadequate, and often rightly condemned as stereotyping. Instead, we tend to better understand individuals by  placing them their context. A simple example concerns the way  in which the correct meaning of a word is only specified by the sentence and general context in which it occurs. Terms Terms such as

‘club’ or ‘file’ have several distinct definitions, and the meaning is determined only in the particular statement in which they  occur. Similarly, a gesture like raising your hand might be understood as a greeting, a threat, or otherwise, according to other aspects of the circumstances which accompany the act. Each meaningful expression is a crossing point of contexts.  Take,  T ake, for example, the John Donne poem ‘The Sun Rising’: Busy old fool, unruly Sun,  Why dost thou thus,  Through windows, windows, and through curtains, call on us?  Must to thy motions lovers’ seasons run? Saucy pedantic wretch, go chide Late school-boys and sour prentices prentices,, Go tell court-huntsmen that the king will ride, Call country ants to harvest offices; Love, all alike, no season knows nor clime, Nor hours, days, months, which are the rags of time.

Its grammar and vocabulary is obviously one of its contexts; but the context is also the history of the sonnets, Donne’s personality,, and the conditions and conventions of his age. To sonality To understand the poem with insight – though on one level it  appears to be immediately accessible – we have to trace the different contexts as far as is fruitful and practicable. Different Types of Disciplines Because of the distinct methodologies involved, the distinction between the two groups of disciplines, the physical sciences and the human studies, is both necessary and justified. Of course, there are features common to both groups. Such processes as checking data, forming and testing hypotheses and the like, are required for all systematic research. Some of the methods of the physical sciences are also required in the social studies. The authenticity of manuscripts may need to be chemically tested, vital statistics analysed, and the like. Typical Typical methods of the human studies are also not wholly absent from the physical sciences. For example, in astronomy, astronomy, the movements of planets may be explained with reference to their contexts, such as their relation to other planets or against the background of the stars. It remains true, however, that a human study such as psychology is not a science in the same sense as physics, because whatever it shares with the scientific method, it also receives essential support from the methods of hermeneutics. Faced with communications, we need to establish the background, likely knowledge and personal motives of the communicato communicator. r. © PROF. PETER RICKMAN 2009

 Peter Rickman was  Peter was for many years head of the (now-closed) (now-closed) philoso phy unit at City University University in London. Now  w  7 July/August July/Au gust 2009  Philosophy No

Analytic   versus Continental   Philosophy Kile Jones  explains the differences between these ways of thinking “What’s in a name? That which we call a rose By any other name would smell as sweet.”  Romeo and Juliet  Juliet 

hakespeare never met Wittgenstei Wittgenstein, n, Russell, or Ryle, and one wonders what a conversation between them  would have been like. “What’ “What’ss in a name, you ask?”  Wittgenstein  Wittgenst ein might answer “A riddle of symbols.” Russell might respond “An explanation of concepts,” and Ryle might retort “Many unneeded problems.” What  might Hegel, Husserl, or Nietzsche reply? It seems odd to even ask such a question, but why? To answer that, we need to look at the philosophical traditions which these thinkers inhabit. This will reveal the differences at the heart of the division between what have become known as ‘analytic’ and ‘continental’ philosophy. philosophy. I hope that by understandi understanding ng these two philosophical philosophic al camps we may better understand their differences and similarities, as well as how they might compliment  each other.

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Typical Definitions In order to lay a general framework let’s start with some typical definitions that scholars give, despite the fact that these definitions tend towards over-generalization over-generalization or over-simp over-simplifilification. In his well-known collection of essays on this subject,  A  House Divided , C.G. Prado begins with their difference in methodology. He says: “The heart of the analytic/Continental opposition is most evident in methodology, that is, in a focus on analysis or on synthesis. Analytic philosophers

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typically try to solve fairly delineated philosophical problems by reducing them to their parts and to the relations in which these parts stand. Continental philosophers typically address large questions in a synthetic or integrative  way,, and consider  way consider particula particularr issues issues to be ‘parts ‘parts of the larger larger unities’ unities’ and and as proper pro perly ly und unders erstoo tood d and dea dealt lt wit with h onl onlyy whe when n fitt fitted ed int into o tho those se uni unitie ties.” s.” (p. (p.10. 10.))

So analytic philosophy is concerned with analysis – analysis of thought, language, logic, knowledge, mind, etc; whereas continental philosophy philosophy is concerned with synthesis – synthesis of modernity with history history,, individuals with society society,, and speculation with application application.. Neil Levy sees this methodological difference as well; in  Metaphilosophy  Metaphilo sophy, Vol. 34, No 3, he describes analytic philosophy  as a “problem-so “problem-solving lving activity,” activity,” and continental philosophy as closer “to the humanistic traditions and to literature and art... it tends to be more ‘politically engaged.” Hans-Johann Glock  remarks in The Rise of Analytic Philosophy Philosophy that “analytic philosophy is a respectable science or skill; it uses specific techniques to tackle discrete problems with definite results.”  Although these distinctions are helpful in understanding the larger picture, they can be overgeneralizations. To To say for instance that there are no thinkers in analytic philosophy who  write political philosophy or harvest the blessings of history is to be mistaken. One need only think of  A Theory of Justice by   John Rawls or  The History of Western Philosophy Philosophy by Bertrand Russell. On the other side, it is not as if continental philosophy  has nothing to contribute to logic or language; Hegel wrote extensively on logic, and Heidegger extensively on language. In fact, every philosopher, if they are at all comprehensive, can be found to make this line more blurry. Therefore, we must be  watchful in our generalizations, realizing that any definitive assertion is likely to be tentative at best.  With this warning in mind it should equally be noted that these generalizations contain partial truths. Philosophy of mind, for instance, is strictly analytical: Hilary  Putnam, Daniel Dennett, David Chalmers, J.J.C. Smart are all analytic thinkers, and to look for this analysis in traditional continental philosophy philosophy is like looking for Prester John. Likewise, it is almost impossible to find analytic philosophers discussing phenomenology phenomenology.. This reveals that these two camps are clearly  divergent in emphasis and have different  places in philosophy. philosophy. They have different  trajectories, motives, goals, and tools, and must be understood in light of their independent and differing traditions. The question now is, how did these different  traditions come about?

The Split of Traditions If we must start somewhere to find the beginning of this split, perhaps we should begin with the Sage of Königsberg, the great Immanuel Kant (1724-1804). Kant constructed a theory of knowledge to explain how ‘synthetic cognition is possible  a priori ’ [broadly, how there are some things that we can work out by reason alone which aren’t just matters of definition – Ed]. One crucial step in his process is the bifurcation between two realms: the  noumenal  (things  (things as they are in themselves) and the  phenomenal  (things  (things as they appear to us). There is a chasm, says Kant, Kant, between what is known in appearance, and what is beyond any possible experience, and so  unknowable (eg God, immortality immortality,, freedom). However, there were two major backlashes against Kant’s Kant’s doctrines.  The first of these came in the works of G.W.F G.W.F.. Hegel (1770-1831), from whom many of the Continental philosophers of the 20th century directly or indirectly drew inspiration. Hegel’s backlash was primarily against Kant’s separation of the noumenal from the phenomenal, ie of reality in itself  from its appearance. For Hegel there could be no such division, because he believed all of reality was united in one  Idea.  There could be no epistemic chasm between the knowable and unknowable, for there’s there’s nothing outside the Idea left to be unknown. Hegel became the precursor of the traditional continental emphasis on grand overarching narratives and the inclusion of  everything (literature, history history,, art, etc) into philosophy’s quest. Speaking on this last aspect of continental philosophy, Michel Foucault noted that “from Hegel to Sartre [continental philosophy] has essentially been a totalizing enterprise.” By the late 19th century Hegel’s idealist approach dominated philosophy right across Europe and even in Britain the leading philosophers – like F.H. Bradley, J.M.E. McT McTaggart aggart and  Thomass Hill Green  Thoma Green – were Hegelians. Hegelians. But as the the century  closed, a second backlash against Kant was brewing both in Cambridge and in Vienna.  While Hegel had reacted to Kant’s Kant’s two-tiered epistemic reality, others now reacted against Kant’s synthetic  a priori . G.E. Moore led the attack in Cambridge, rapidly convincing his colleague Bertrand Russell. Moore insisted on the importance of analysing concepts; Russell, who was a philosopher of  mathematics, developed a reductionist approach to knowledge called logical atomism and a general focus on particular logical problems in opposition to any sort of totalizing enterprise, both of which things led him away from the Hegelians. Mean while, Ernst Mach, a leading physicist and philosopher, philosopher, saw  Kant’ss joining of metaphysics and epistemology as hazardous Kant’ to science, and even referred to Kant’ Kant’ss epistemology as ‘monstrous.’ A group of philosopher philosopherss in Vienna eventually gathered around the philosopher Moritz Schlick, with the intention of  furthering Mach’s Mach’s philosophy philosophy.. They first called themselves the ‘Ernst Mach Society’ but eventually became known as the  Vienna Circle. Among the many goals of this circle of philosophers, were the eradication of metaphysics (Carnap), reclaiming the supremacy of logic in philosophy (Gödel), linguistic conventionalism conventionalis m (W (Waismann), aismann), and also the debunking of Kant’ Kant’ss ‘synthetic  a priori ’. ’. Those in the Vienna Circle instead made the Humean distinction between  a priori  (non-observable)  (non-observable) and

Gottfried Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel by Schlesinger, 1831

 (dependent on observation) truths; and they said a posteriori  (dependent that the only truths are either tautological (true by definition) or empirical (verified by observation) observation)..  Therefore, these two reactions to Kant led to the formation of two distinct schools of philosophy philosophy,, each with their separate attitude towards metaphysics and epistemology epistemology,, thus having differing philosophical methodologies and trajectories. Heidegger and Wittgenstein Widen the Split  As the continental post-Hegelians formulated their various dialectical metaphysics, metaphysics, and while the Vienna Circle constructed logically-oriented logically-oriented theories of knowledge, German professor Martin Heidegger (1889-1976) was constructing his theories of  ontology   ontology [ontology means ‘the study of being’ – Ed]. For Heidegger philosophy is, and should be, essentially ontology.. He describes philosophy as “universal phenomenologic ogy phenomenological al ontology” (Bein Beingg and Time, p.62), placing Being in an elite philosophical philosoph ical category because “it pertains to every entity entity.” .” Contrary to the Vienna Circle, which saw philosophy as mainly an epistemological project, Heidegger argued that  Being precedes knowledge, and that  phenomena   phenomena (the contents of experience) must be studied prior to any logical categorization or interpretation. This turn toward phenomenology created in Heidegger a distaste for logical analysis in philosophical philosophical problems: Richard Matthews describes Heidegger as “trying to place limits upon logic” and seeking “to free philosophy from logic”, yet one could go further and say that Heidegger cancels out logic in favour of a pre-logical phenomenology.  Meanwhile there were numerous shifts in emphasis in analytic philosophy. philosophy. The revolutionary  Tractatus   Tractatus Logico-Philosophi by Russell’s student Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889-1951) led cus  by it to focus on the philosophy of language. Wittgenstein had developed a theory which saw propositions as logical pictures Now  w  9 July/August July/Au gust 2009  Philosophy No

of states of affairs in the world. world. This meant that sentences  were only meaningful if they painted such pictures. Thus, along with Carnap and the Vienna Circle, Wittgenstein Wittgenstein found himself destroying metaphysics and God-talk. In a lecture in 1929, Wittgenstein noted that: “in ethical and religious language we seem constantly to be using similes. But a simile must be the simile for something. And if I can describe a fact  by means of a simile I must also be able to drop the simile and to describe the facts without it. Now in our case, as soon as we try to drop the simile and simply to state the facts which stand behind it, we find that there are no such facts. And so, what at first appeared to be simile now seems to be mere nonsense.”

Not only was Wittgenstein a fulcrum in the long analytic tradition of anti-God-talk, he created in analytic philosophy a mentality which saw the analysis of language as a tool whereby  ‘philosophical ‘philosoph ical pseudo-problems’ could be deflated. What were once held to be conceptual or logical problems were, according to Wittgenstein, mere mistakes about language – problems created by stepping beyond the limits of language, or through semantically misguided statements that confused the logic of  language, to be dissolved by an analysis of the propositions in question. The Rise of Existentialism and Logical Positivism In post WWII France, Jean-Paul Sartre (1905-1980) popularised ‘phenomenological ‘phenomenological ontology’, which is how he described existentialism. This has had decisive effects on Continental thought up to the present. For Sartre, human ontology  is united in its complete subjectivity: we are what we choose and what we experience. Picking up Heidegger’s teaching of  the Dasein (being-there), Sartre identifies humans as existential beings – we have been thrown into an uncaring world and we find we are inescapably free and inescapably responsible for our actions. Sartre famously remarks: “I am abandoned  in  in the world, not in the sense that I might remain abandoned and passive in a hostile universe like a board floating on the water water,, but rather in the sense that I find myself suddenly alone and without help, engaged in a world for which I bear the whole responsibility responsibility without being able, whatever I do, to tear myself away from this responsib responsibility ility for an instant.” (Being & Nothingn Nothingness  ess , p710.)

His friend Albert Camus (1913-1960) would find genuine absurdity in our existential state. For Camus, “the absurd is the essential concept and the first truth” and “accepting the absurdity of everything around us is... a necessary experience” ( An  Absurd Reasoning  Reasoning , pp.15, 16.) Embracing and challenging the absurd character of the world brought about true and authentic experience. Yet there were two threats in embracing the absurd: it might lead to despair and possible suicide; or it could lead to idealism and ignorance. The goal is to balance between these extremes of idealism and despair. Continental philosophy was undergoing a shift while Sartre and Camus were publishing their numerous works. No longer  were continental thinkers engaged in a totalizing project, but a firm individualism. Hegel’s Hegel’s utopian ideas about the grand 10 Philosophy No Now  w   July/Au July/August gust 2009

sweep of history had not foreseen WWII and the rise of  National Socialism. Because of that war, continental philosophers realized that any enterprise which sought a power monopoly,, even philosoph monopoly philosophyy itself, was to be mistrusted.  Meanwhile, “the rise of analytic philosophy”, Robert Hanna noted, “decisively marked the end of the century-long dominance of Kant’s philosophy philosophy in Europe” ( Kant and the Foundation Foundation of Analytic Philosophy, p.5). Logical Positivism brought the thoughts of the Vienna Circle to fruition while decisively  framing the focus of analytic philosophy. philosophy. Bertrand Russell described his similar program of ‘logical analysis’ thus: “All this [religious dogma and metaphysics] is rejected by the philosophers  who make make logical logical analysis analysis the main main business business of philoso philosophy… phy… For this this renunrenunciation they have been rewarded by the discovery that many questions, formerly obscured by the fog of metaphysics, can be answered with precision.” (The History of Western Philosophy, p.835.)

 The procedure he named ‘logical analysis’ was to focus on logical issues, philosophical problems and epistemology with the tools of scientific testing and procedure, to avoid being caught in the unprofitable web of speculative metaphysics.  This ethos became the trademark of analytic philosophy and defined its methodology and trajectory trajectory.. This was how analytic philosophy was truly defined as a separate way of doing philosophy over and against the continental. Postmodernism as Modern Continental Philosophy On the continent of Europe, existentialism largely ended  with Sartre and de Beauvoir Beauvoir,, but a succession of other movements there have continued a general trend of sceptical, antiauthoritarian philosophy philosophy. Structuralism gave way to poststructuralism structuralis m and, with Jacques Derrida, to deconstructionism. Foucault examined issues of government control, madness and sexuality; Baudrillard raised questions on hyper-r hyper-reality eality and simulacra, and Vattimo Vattimo resurrected nihilism. These various developments are all loosely called ‘postmodernism’. ‘postmodernism’. It’s It’s a hard term to define, but what can be said is that it is about the task  of deconstructing absolute views of reality, truth, value, and meaning. The meta-narratives of German Idealism come sharply under scrutiny in postmodernism, for these overarching systems of meaning have, in the postmodern view, only left  their hopefuls sadly disappointed. Postmodernists view parts of  analytic philosophy as similarly too optimistic and overly selfsatisfied – for instance, analytic philosophy’s trust in logic and science can be seen as ignorin ignoring g the big issues of meaning and existence. existenc e. Postmodernism Postmodernism can now be seen as a main terminus  within continental continental philosophy philosophy for continuing continuing many of its classiclassical traditions. Philosophy of Mind as Modern Analytic Philosophy In the late twentieth century philosophy of mind became one of the main concerns of analytic philosophy. philosophy. Hilary  Putnam, one of the great pioneers of modern philosophy of  mind, introduced ideas that he thought would solve the problem of how the mind and the brain relate. He became one of  the founders of  functionalism   functionalism, a theory which analyses mental states in terms of their function. He also put forth a theory of 

‘multiple realizability’, realizability’, which posits that differing types of  physical entities could experience the same mental state if  there were the right organisational similarities. By contrast, Donald Davidson became the champion for a theory known as ‘non-reductive ‘non-reduct ive physicalism’, which states that only physical objects can cause physical effects, but that the mind is not  entirely reducible to the physical brain. David Chalmers, director of the Center for Consciousness at Australian National University, has argued that the mind cannot be reducible to the physical brain because of various hypothetical arguments, including the possibility of zombies. All of these theories are within the tradition of analytic philosophy. philosophy. Summary: The Story So Far  Summary:  There were two distinct responses to Kant’s metaphysical metaphysical and epistemological theories: one by Hegel and much later the other by the Vienna Circle. Hegel rejected Kant’s Kant’s two-tiered  world by advocating a strict ontological monism, while the Circle rejected Kant’s synthetic  a priori  by  by dividing what can be known into tautologies and empirically verifiable data. Heidegger translates Hegel’s idealist ontology into phenomenology by placing strict emphasis on being-in-the-world.  Wittgens  Wit tgenstein tein enters enters the philosoph philosophical ical scene scene with his analysis analysis of  of  language, fueling the anti-metaphysical fire of the Vienna Circle by postulating the criteria that language must mirror observable nature and nature alone, if it is to be considered meaningful. Over on the Continent, existentialism adopted many of the teachings of the phenomenologists and added issues of existence, freedom, angst and absurdity absurdity.. In England, Logical Positivism continued the analytic tradition of the Vienna Circle; Russell and A.J. Ayer constructed various theories of knowledge and methods of logical analysis. analysis. In recent times postmodernism has emerged as a dominant strand of continental philosophy.. Postmodernis philosophy Postmodernism m attacks absolutist views of truth, historical meta-narratives, idealistic metaphysics and linguistic/semantic realism. On the analytic side, modern philosophy  of mind has emerged as a strong movement which incorporates analytic thinking with biology, biology, neuroscience, and physics.  Thus, continental philosophy philosophy started with German idealism,  which was translated into phenomenology, phenomenology, reconstructed in existentialism, existentialis m, and is currently still in postmodernist mode.  Analytic philosophy philosophy started as a reaction to Kant’s Kant’s epistemology in the Vienna Circle, picked up its linguistic impetus through Wittgenstein, Wittgenstein, became strictly formulated by Logical Positivists and others, and continues today strongly in philosophy of mind, among other disciplines.  What are we to do with analytic and continental philosophy, then? Neil Levy makes a great and simple wish when he  writes that we “could hope to combine the strengths of each: to forge a kind of philosophy with the historical awareness of  continental philosophy and the rigor of analytic philosophy.” philosophy.” ( Metaphilosophy  Metaphilosophy, Vol. 34, No.3.) If we are to keep a balance, we must understand that both camps have methods, trajectories, and emphasis that can be honored and incorporated into a synthesis. This is not to mean that we must believe everything. Rather, we should realize that there are correct and incorrect  starting points, methods and answers in both analytic and continental philosophy. philosophy. What a philosopher is dealing with –

specifically, what question she’s specifically, she’s trying to answer – largely  determines what emphasis she will have. Yet philosophy philosophy can also be done interchangeably: there is a way of doing analytic phenomenology,, and of doing phenomenologic phenomenology phenomenological al analysis; scientific history and historically historically-minded -minded science; epistemological ethics and ethical epistemology. epistemology.  Although it may be possible possible to use both camps to construct construct a balanced philosophy of life, it becomes quite difficult once one gets into specialized fields. When anyone enters the philosophy  of mind, for instance, they necessarily find themselves using the methods of analytic philosophy. philosophy. What to Learn from Both Traditions Each camp has something unique to contribute to philosophy.. Analytic philosophy should be able to enter into phenomphy enology,, existentialism, literature, and politics with the same enology enthusiasm as continental philosophy philosophy.. It should also realize that philosophy is not without a history; philosophy is a historical movement which tackles social and political questions as  well as more technical problems of logic and epistemology. epistemology. To To assume that analytic philosophy is above the social and historical currents of its time is to canonize a golden calf and ignore the wider reality reality.. Similarly, Similarly, the average person may not care about answering the Problem of Induction or the Liar Paradox, but may wonder what life, existence, and history means to her. She may be questioning her political situation or her place  within society, society, and to presume that what she’s she’s asking are not  philosophical questions belittles the scope of philosophy. Continental philosophy may have some things to learn as  well. It might need to realize that all reasoning must assume that logic is meaningful and necessary; that language is intricately connected with our ability to convey meaning, and that  epistemology is one of the most crucial areas to investigate:  whenever we are making assertions assertions or expounding expounding propositions propositions  we act as if our ability to know is correct and justified. justified. It seems obvious that existence and Being are vital to philosophy, yet  analytic philosophers philosophers might ask how we know that to be true. Continental philosophy may be forgetting those basics necessary for intelligible experience. Science, logic, and the analysis of language are not the only things that matter, but neither are literature, art, and history.  What is the difference between a philosopher and a philanthropist? One is questioning issues pertaining to the life of the mind, while the other is engaging in social concern and virtuous living. We must never negate one for the other: they both have a role to fill, and to harmonize them is the greatest of  goals. The balance between love and knowledge, the knowing and the doing of the good, is the philosopher’s ideal state, and the promised land to which the modern sage must set her eyes.  There is a great hope standing before contemporary philosophy,, somewhere between skepticism and dogmatism, nihilism phy and idealism, logic and art. There is a hope for a progress with humility,, which will aid humanity not only epistemically but  humility also ethically. © KILE JONES 2009

 Kile Jones is pursuing a Masters of Sacred Theology Theology (S.T.M.) (S.T.M.) at  Boston University on top of holding a Masters of Theological Studies  (M.T.S.) from the same institution. Now  w  11 July/August July/Au gust 2009  Philosophy No

Would My Zen My  Zen Master Fail Master  Fail Me For Writing This Article? Article? Patrick Cox  tells us why Zen has to use words to get beyond words

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n Zen Buddhism, one often finds ‘explanation’ spoken about  in a negative manner. manner. But in writing on Zen, one necessarily explains; explaining something something is often the only purpose of an article or book. Can Zen and explanation be reconciled?  What about concepts? concepts? Concepts Concepts (ideas) (ideas) are the atoms of  explanation: they are what make up explanation. Zen is not  fond of concepts, and instructs students of Zen to avoid them. “This mind is no mind of conceptual thought” says  The Zen Teaching of Huang Po, translated by John Blofeld, p.33. p.33. The mind one is supposed to achieve in Zen is not a mind of conceptualization: “[T]he concepts we have of things do not reflect  and cannot convey reality” reality” as Thich Nhat Hanh says in Zen  Keys, p.41. This is why concepts are very frequently spoken of in a negative manner in Zen. Yet when one attempts to convey to others what Zen is, one must use concepts to explain it. I’ll begin by discussing passages on explanation from books on Zen, and then discuss the nature of Zen. To To determine the role of and view of explanatory concepts in Zen, I focus on its method, its purpose, and the nature of a  koan. To provide an example of explaining Zen that hopefully resonates well with the reader, I also explain a fundamental goal in Zen, achieving mind fulness . Finally, I come to a conclusion regarding the question expressed in the title. Overall, I focus on the nature of purpose and method in Zen Buddhism, and their interplay. interplay. These two things play a crucial role in determin determining ing my answer. Expressing the Inexpressible

“Those who speak of [Reality] do not attempt to explain It.” Huang-Po says in The Zen Teachin eachingg of Huang Po p.31. How can a Zen book, which spends chapter after chapter explaining Zen, place explanation in such a low position? “The essence of  Zen is awakening. This is why  one  one does not talk about Zen, one experiences experienc es it ” (Zen Keys , p.49). Yet to say “This is why” as Hanh does repeatedly in Zen Keys , is obviously to explain something. So explanation plays an important role in Zen, but so does the lack thereof. Zen directs students to break free from a false understanding understand ing of concepts as reality. Zen masters use confusing and seemingly illogical koans  [surprise  [surprise sayings or questions] to shock their students to the point that they grasp reality and stop clinging to false concepts. But while masters intentionally  avoid explicitly advocating concepts and explanation, one does not require exposure to ancient wisdom to predict that explanation and concepts are used by Zen masters in teaching Zen.  A story equally lucidly shows the method of not explaining in Zen. Someone seeking understanding of Zen goes back and forth between a senior monk and the head monk, asking about  the essence of Zen. Instead of an explanation, he gets beaten for asking the questions questions.. He finally shows his understanding by  saying, “After all, there is not much in Huang Po’s Po’s Buddhism.”  Wing-Tsit Chan considers this anti-explanatory point to be “one of the five most important in Zen” ( A Source Book in Chi12 Philosophy No Now  w   July/Au July/August gust 2009

nese Philosophy, p.449). Yet Yet even the fact that this story appears in a work that attempts to teach Zen, shows that explanation has some place in Zen. If Zen masters use explanation, but do not explicitly afford it a lofty role in teaching, then what is its role in Zen? The methods used in and the purposes identified in Zen, and the overall nature of Zen books, hold the answer. So let us now take a closer look at Zen’s purpose and methods. The purpose of Zen is to become fully aware at every moment. One is supposed to become  mindful  of  of things in the world or the situation one is in at each instant: to become fully aware of the tea that one is drinking, for example. “In short, the whole philosophy of the various methods is to broaden a person’s vision, sharpen his imaginations, and sensitize his mind so that he can see and grasp truth instantly any time and anywhere.” ( A Source Book in Chinese Philosophy, p.429). In other words, the goal of Zen is maximum awareness of reality reality,, unmediated by false concepts. (Although Zen resists the tendency to define ‘reality’, let me provide a definition of what I understand to constitute reality  for Zen, acknowledging my inability to do full justice to the reality Zen mind can make known, and which experienc experiencee verifies.  Reality is everything that can be perceived by the senses and conceived by the intellect . Zen considers the non-Zen mind to view  reality through concepts and sensory data, which results in a failure to fully understand it. Zen does not regard this common partial understanding of reality as complete completely ly wrong; rather, our normal conceptions are regrettably far from the perfect  understanding of reality that Zen mind tries to help us achieve.) For Zen, mindfulness  refers  refers to awareness of all that crosses the path of one’ one’ss faculties of sensation, and of all that pertains to oneself as a moral being – a being who must make decisions regarding actions in the world. As the mind is a sense organ in Buddhism,, the former includes various concepts like drinking, Buddhism cup, and tea as well as the sensory data that derives from the experience of drinking a cup of tea. Zen mind grasps all such sense contents perfectly and without effort – without thinking through any of it, so to speak. Yet Yet far from viewing all knowledge as equal, it seems that in Zen mind the assessment of one’s one’s acquired knowledge is of primary necessity. However, true Zen mind transcends even the attempt to prioritize ideas in terms of  importance,, as Zen mind is the perfect awareness of reality and importance does not rely on the division of reality through concepts. Conceiving No Concepts

In Zen, concepts are used to explain why concepts should be avoided: indeed, indeed, Zen books spend pages explaining why concepts are to be avoided. In  Zen Keys , the example of the experience of drinking tea is contrasted to one’s one’s description of drinking tea. One uses concepts to describe the situation, but the concepts are not the reality reality.. Thich Nhat Hanh explains that  one can drink tea in ‘mindfulness’; but when one tries later to describe the experience, one must conceptua conceptualize lize to distinguish

this experience from others. So what is one lacking when one conceptualizes? conceptua lizes? One lacks awareness of reality. Hanh also speaks of prejudici prejudicial al concepts, or prejudices, as an inhibitor to understan understanding ding reality. reality. Yet Yet this is to affirm only  that Zen is markedly anti-dogmatic, anti-dogmatic, because any proponent of  reason understands that prejudice prevents one from seeing reality.. In addition, Hanh distinguishes between things themreality selves and the concepts we have of them. Whereas things are dynamic, concepts are static (Zen Keys , p.40). So to mentally  grasp the reality of things we would have to be more fluid and less static in our approach to concepts. Furthermore, Furthermore, Hanh states that ‘wood’ and ‘old’, for example, are more than our concepts of them. This suggests that concepts can be inhibiting; but not necessarily that they are not useful in the path to enlightenment. Moreover, not every Zen master would speak  explicitly about concepts as static or as prejudices to explain their inhibiting power. power. And whether or not every Zen master  would agree with such terminology is an open question.  What, then, then, is the practical method method for achieving achieving awareness? awareness?  More immediate immediately ly important important than questions questions about the outside outside  world, people people must rid themselv themselves es of their subjective approach  to the world. Thus, even concepts and explanation are not being criticized by Zen on a purely philosophical or truth-seeking level. Zen is concerned with the  method  we  we must employ to attain mindfulness. Zen’s concerns are of the most practical nature: students are to seek practical enlightenment. They are not to be interested in speculative philosophical questions, for example. It understands the necessity for people to work on making themselves more  aware of the world before they can change  anything in the world for the better. Thus Zen identifies the need for people to control themselves before they can reach truth and deep awareness: “[I]t is impossible to organize things if you yourself are not in order,” Shunryu Suzuki says in  Zen  Mind, Begin Beginner’ ner’ss Mind , p.231. One must control the self before attempting to use one’s mind to understand matters outside of  the self. In contrast, a quotation from Hanh gets at the method by saying that we do not achieve mindfulness because of ourselves, our desires, or intentions: “To intend to realize the Way  is opposed to the Way” (Zen Keys, p.50). Here again, Zen is concerned with specifically human inhibitions to awareness – that  is, with the problem of human subjectivity. Explaining No Explanations

Let’ss further explore the nature of the methods used to Let’ teach Zen. “The best way to control people is to encourage them to be mischievo mischievous” us” ( Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind , p.235).  This quote exemplifies exemplifies Zen’s Zen’s oppositional nature as it seeks to free us from the persuasiv persuasivee force of concepts. “Our body and mind are both two and one... [O]ur life is not only plural, but  also singular” (p.229). This quote shows us that Zen employs the method method of telling its students things that the students will find paradoxical, unexpecte unexpected, d, and perhaps contradictory. contradictory.  The original meaning of the word ‘koan’ is ‘decree’ ‘decree’,, suggesting “the final determination of truth and falsehood falsehood.” .” ( A  A Source Book in Chinese Philosophy, p.429). Chan further states that the koan is perhaps the “most misunde misunderstood rstood technique” in Zen: “Zen Masters made use of any story story,, problem, or situation, the more shocking the better better.” .” (ibid ). ). Chan states that the answers to koans  are  are often interpreted to mean that the truth is

mysterious and irrational, but “Nothing is farther from the mysterious truth.” Koans  are  are tailored to the individual. Usually, Usually, they consist of a question and an answer, and, as Chan stated, they are meant to shock the student. Would Would such paradoxical sayings be used for people who would thus be quickly turned off? No, for Zen would not allow such an impractical approach to teaching.  This opens up room for an explanation of explanation in Zen.  The method of Zen is certainly not intended to make people feel emotionally insecure and become confused to the point of despair due to a lack of belief in themselves or in their capacity to understand Zen. That would mean they never achieve mindfulness. mindfulness. When Zen speaks of not concerning oneself with reason, conceptualization, conceptualization, or explanation explanation,, it is not  referring to the definition of reason as the mental capacity to know and to understand things; nor to the meaning of explanation as that process which is fundamental to learning. Practically any book written on Zen by a Zen master clearly manifests this latter use of explanation, showing, showing, without explicitly  admitting,, that explanation is at least  fundamental admitting  fundamental to dialogue. Zen does not find it useful to clarify this, because its method is preciselyy to provide the student of Zen with statements that  precisel shock us beyond explanations. explanations. Moreover, Moreover, Zen will likely never say explicitly that explanation is fundamental to learning precisely because we are so accustom accustomed ed to thinking that explanation is fundamen fundamental tal to learning: rather, rather, Zen frequently reminds us that explanation has been unsuccessful at producing in us Zen understanding. understanding. Thus, the means by which Zen thinks we  will achieve mindfulness mindfulness are markedly different from the means by which this article, as an abstract explanation of distinctions, reconciliations, reconciliations, and methods, hopes to help us achieve enlightenment. enlightenment. However, However, the goal of Zen and the goal of the explanatory approach in this article is the same.  Whereas Zen intends for us to keep striving for awareness awareness  while avoid avoiding ing explicitl explicitlyy telling telling us to think of awarene awareness ss as the most important idea in life, an explanatory approach does allow  for the cultivation of this idea of awareness. The explanatory  explanatory  approach allows the concept of awareness to be placed above more inhibiting concepts, and subsequently, subsequently, to be the guiding force in our everyday life. If awareness is precisely what Zen always aims at, then there is no danger, at least for many practitioners, if the idea of awareness takes precedence precedence over all other concepts. I must stress that I am not stating dogmatically  that Zen is about the prioritization of ideas; but the practicality  of Zen leads to me think that it should not be excluded as a possibility possibili ty.. While complete awareness awareness of reality might be difficult to achieve, that does not discredit the idea that one should always strive for it in the ways that one can as a finite being. However, Howeve r, I also recognize that most ardent students of Zen  will instead achieve mindfulness mindfulness from their masters’ koans . Zen masters themselves often use explanation and concepts, so an explanation of Zen could certainly be written with mindfulness. My Zen master master,, therefore, would not necessaril necessarilyy fail me for writing this, as I might well have written it with Zen mind – although he could very well disagree with my explanatory approach to teaching Zen. © PATRICK COX 2009

Patrick Cox received his B.A. in philosophy & religion, psychology, and political science from Boston University and is currentl currentlyy finishing  an M.A. in political philosophy at the Universi University ty of Dallas. Now  w  13 July/August July/Aug ust 2009  Philosophy No

Evaluating Scientific Evaluating  Scientific Theories  Theories Russell Berg  has fifteen criteria for scientificness and he knows how to use them

 T

he ‘scientific method’ is a group of methods and procedures. But since Thomas Kuhn argued in the 1960s that the concept of ‘falsification’ formulated by Karl Popper is insufficient on its own to determine the scientificness of an idea, there has been no method of distinguishing scientific theories from non-scientific ones. Kuhn himself muddied the waters by rejecting the established rules for determining scientific results, to broaden the conception of science to include economics and psychoanalysis. The problem with this, as Kuhn admitted, was that it makes it extremely difficult to distinguish between science and pseudo-science. Examples of  the consequences are that in America creationists are arguing that Creation Science and Darwinian Evolution should be given equal time in school biology lessons. Alternatively, theoretical physicists have produced concepts such as string theory,  justified purely by its mathematical elegance, without any  experimental evidence. This is perhaps also pseudo-science.  As if this is not enough, scientific ideas such as Marshall’s theory that stomach ulcers and stomach cancer are caused by a bacterium were shunned for many years due to the combined efforts of vested interests (ie pharmaceutical companies), plus senior doctors’ and scientists’ fixed beliefs about the possibility  of microbes surviving in low pH, despite the evidence. Mean while, alternative medicine with little scientific merit – homeopathy, aroma therapy etc – is funded by the NHS. What have the philosophers of science been doing all this time? From a utilitarian perspective a method for quantifying scientificness would be worthwhile if it leads to a clearer distinction between science and pseudo-science, rejection of ineffective and unscientific medicine and a better grasp of the scientific method amongst amongst the general public. public. It would mean new  theories being judged on their scientific merit rather than being hyped or hindered by vested interest and subjective prejudice. I see no theoretical reason why the quantification of scientificness should be less reliable than the quantification of risk   which currently takes place in health and safety and food safety.  The next problem is what is the best method for quantifying the quality of being scientific. I’ve chosen a simple descriptive method so that as many people as possible may evaluate the evaluation. In a more academic exercise, I would have chosen a more enumerative approach which would provide significance levels when comparing theories for scientific quality, quality, such as non-parametricc enumerative statistics, discussing the merits of  non-parametri a Wilcoxon test against each criteria vs a Kruskal-Wallis Kruskal-Wallis one way analysis of variance by ranks, or even the Friedman two way analysis of variance by ranks. But that’ that’ss for another day. However to obtain a better tool for a job, we have to start   with a basic tool. The wheel had to be invented before the pneumatic tyre. Therefore, the following fifteen criteria may  be used to evaluate the scientificness of theories, and a theory  can be scored against each criteria. When the aggregate score is known, the theory will have a ‘Scientific Quotient’ (SQ). 14 Philosophy No Now  w   July/Au July/August gust 2009

Fifteen Criteria For Scientificness 1) Does the theory use natural explanations? explanations?  Thales of Miletus, the first recorded natural philosopher, believed that natural events have natural explanations, not  divine. This rejection of explanations invoking gods or spirits led to the need for natural explanations and the development of  the scientific method. Untestable supernatural explanations act  as stoppers which prevent or retard further enquiry or research.

2) Does the theory use rational, inductive argument? argument? Rational  deductive  arguments are based on logical inference rather than appeal to authority authority.. Rational  inductive arguments are uncertain but plausible explanations based on evidence concerning cause and effect claims. A theory must use inductive argument to be scientific (cf   9). An early example is Anaximander’s claim that man must have been born from animals of  another kind, as humans alone require a long period of nursing. 3) Is the theory based on an analytical reductionist  approach approa ch rather than a synthetic approach? approach? Reductionism is the attempt to understand complex things by  analysing them in terms of their parts or simplest aspects. Reductionism Reduct ionism was first used by Thales, when he claimed that all is water. A synthetic approach is the opposite of reductionism, in that it attempts to build a system of explanation explanation from theory  and usually results in added layers of complexity normally based on argument alone rather than substantial evidence. Examples are Plato’s forms, Freudian psychoanalysis, Marxist historicism and string theory evoking extra dimensions. 4) Is the theory self-consistent? self-consistent?  According to Aristotle, the Principle of Non-Contradiction is the most fundamental principle of logic and thus of thought.  The need for consistency is a manifestation of this principle.  Most theories are self-consistent, but occasionally a theory  can be internally inconsistent. Such theories are however

sometimes useful as transitional ideas. Take Rutherford’s solar system model of the atom, in which electrons are imagined to orbit the nucleus of the atom in a similar manner to planets orbiting the sun. This model is inconsistent because electrons orbiting the nucleus would emit electromagnetic radiation,  which would result in loss of kinetic energy, energy, causing the electrons to slow down and fall towards the nucleus, quickly colliding with it. But the solar system model was a useful stimulus for further thought about the structure of the atom.

5) Does the theory involve a mechani mechanistic stic approach?  A mechanistic approach explains how a proposed idea works.  This is in contrast to an approach which simply states that a situation is so  (or less dogmatically, may be so). A good example of a mechanistic approach is the kinetic theory of gases. This states that as the temperature of a gas rises the molecules move faster so that they are more likely to collide; hence they  become more reactive. This also explains why the pressure increases with temperature if the volume of a gas remains constant, as the molecules collide more frequently with walls of  the container as the temperature rises. By contrast, a non-mechanistic approach is often taken by  extreme reductionism, such as Thales’s Thales’s claim that all is water water.. Sometimes a theory is formulated without without an explanatio explanation n of how  it works, such as Newton’s Newton’s law of gravity and Darwin’s theory  of evolution; but good scientific theories will become mechanistic as new observations are obtained or ideas are proffered. 6) Are qualities given quantities? Pythagoras first successfully assigned quantity to quality when he discovered that the pitch of a note depends on the length of  the string which produces it: hence concordant intervals in musical scales are produced by simple numerical ratios. According to Arthur Koestler, this first successful reduction of quality  to quantity was the first step towards the mathematization of  human experience, and therefore was the beginnin beginning g of science.

each with different values for these six constants. e) This is the only universe, and the constants have their value by pure chance. f) This is the only universe, and the values of the six constants are not independent but fundamentally linked together in ways  which we currently do not understand, due to theories of  physics which have not yet been formulated.  The present question is, which of these six theories is the simplest, all other things being equal? They would not be equal if we started to pick up information from another uni verse, or there was strong evidence for a yet-unknown theory  of physics that explains how these constants are linked.  Theories a) to d) all involve extra entities not required by  theories e) and f). So the question now becomes, is e) or f) the simpler theory? I think that saying that the six constants are linked actually produces a simpler model of the universe, so according to this interpretation, theory f) should be the one investigated first.

8) Does the theory conform to existing scientific understanding? Scientific theories do not stand alone, but relate to other scientific theories, hence it is not adequate for a scientific theory to be merely self-consistent: the theory should also be consistent   with the existing body of scientific knowledge. However, However, sometimes the evidence for an incompatible new theory is so overwhelming that an existing theory has to be amended, revised, or even dropped, so the situation isn’t simple.  When Alfred Wegener first proposed proposed Continental Drift in 1912 to explain why the coast of Africa seems to fit into the coast of South America like a jigsaw piece, the majority of  geologists did not accept that masses as large as continents

7) Is the theory the simplest way to explain the data?  The first first person to formula formulate te this principle principle was Willia William m of  Ockham, hence it’s referred to as  Ockham’s Razor . (Ockham’s formulation was ‘ entitia non sunt multiplicanda praeter praeter necessitatem’: ‘entities should not be multiplied beyond necessity’.) It  has been extended to the idea that the best interpretation of a phenomenon should make as few assumptions as possible. This principle is also referred to as the Law of Parsimony or the Law  of Succinctness. Ockham used it to argue that ideal forms in the mind of God were unnecessary for entities in this world to exist. In Just Six Numbers,  Martin Rees, Britain’s Astronomer Royal, discusses six physical constants fundamental to the structure of the universe, such as the speed of light. If any of these  values were slightly slightly different different the universe would not be capable capable of supporting life. However, the probability of all six constants randomly random ly having a value that would together together give rise to a lifesupporting-universe is very low, so how did it happen? Possible explanations are: a) God gave the constants their values. b) The constants were set by another intelligent designer. c) The universe is a computer simulation. d) This universe is one of many in a multiverse of universes, Now  w  15 July/August July/Aug ust 2009  Philosophy No

could move round the surface of the Earth. However, after the Second World War, evidence was discovered that supported plate tectonics. Paleomagnetic studies found a striped pattern of magnetic reversals in the Earth’ Earth’ss crust, which showed that  the crust was moving around. Also, most seismic activity was found to occur along the lines where the plates would be colliding. The anti-mobilists’ understanding had to be revised in the face of the new evidence.  A general rule of thumb is that the greater and the more fundamental changes required to existing scientific thinking, the more conclusive the evidence must be for the challenger theory to obtain scientific orthodoxy, orthodoxy, as this will only be possible after the more established theories have been reviewed. It  is unlikely that existing theories will be reviewed if a new conflicting theory is proffered without any substantial evidence.

9) Is the theory based on observed data?  The gathering of data is the first stage of the  inductive process  developed by Francis Bacon and Thomas Hobbes. It became the basis of Newtonian science, and empiricism generally.  This is where science parts from philosophy. philosophy. In philosophy, philosophy, theories can be based purely on speculation without the burden of data-gathering. Plato’s Plato’s division between body and soul and his theory of forms were products of speculation rather than observation or gathered data, for example. However, science is concerned with what may be observed. 10) Has the theory been tested?  At the beginning of the eighteenth century Georg Stahl proposed the existence of ‘phlogiston’ to explain why some substances burned and others do not. According to this theory, substances which burnt contained phlogiston, which was released by the fire. The problems were that phlogiston had never been isolated.  The quantific quantification ation of qualitie qualitiess (see 6) had then barely barely entered entered chemistry. But Lavoisier tested the theory of phlogiston by carefully making measurements, and he found it wanting. Lavoisier showed that when metal is burned it  increases  in  in weight, and the air in a closed container suffers a corresponding loss of weight. So the metal doesn’t lose phlogiston by burning it; rather, it  gains something else. After further experimentation, Lavoisier proved that only one fifth of the air could support combustion, and he concluded that it was this ‘oxygen’ which combined  with the metal during burning. The theory of gases had come into being, and the theory of phlogiston was dead.  There was a similar occurrence in 1948, when Hoyle, Bondi and Gold proposed the Steady State Theory to explain the observation of galaxies moving away from each other. They  claimed that the universe had always existed in the state it was now, and that matter formed from nothing in the spaces between the galaxies, which coalesced into stars and new galaxies, pushing the others away and making space for more matter to form. The problem was this theory hardly made any predictions which could be tested (see 14) – except for the creation of  matter between galaxies, which had never been observed and  would be very difficult to observe in any case. However the alternative Big Bang Theory made testable predictions, one of the most important being that there would be background radiation from the Big Bang. The background 16 Philosophy No Now  w   July/Au July/August gust 2009

radiation was discovered by Penzias and Wilson by accident in 1964, in the microwave range, at about 3.5º above absolute zero. Also in the early 1960s, radio astronomer Martin Ryle discovered that the further away (and so back in time) he looked, the greater the percentage of radio galaxies. This showed that the universe had changed with time. The Steady  State theory suffered a similar fate to the phlogiston theory.

11) Do the results of the tests plausibly support the theory? Homeopathy was invented at the beginning of the 19th Century by Samuel Hahnemann, who proposed that ill people could be treated by medicines that would be harmful to healthy people. Even more controversial was his belief that the more dilute the medicine the more potent the vanishing drug. In contemporary homeopathy the solution is diluted to half its strength thirty times, making it unlikely that there is even one molecule of the ‘active’ ingredient in the final medicine. Homeopaths get round the problem of the lack of medicine in the medicine by claiming that water has memory. This conflicts with existing scientific understanding (see 8), yet testing by the double blind method does show that homeopathy is of  some benefit. However, this benefit is of equivalent power to the placebo effect. Hence there is not adequate evidence for the claim that water has memory memory.. (When homeopathy started, conventional medicine was less scientific and included many  untested treatments which often did more harm than good, so the more ‘neutral’ homeopathy rapidly gained popularity. However, conventional medicine has progressed scientifically but  homeopathy has not, being trapped in a blind alley.) 12) Ar Are e the exp exper erime iments nts re repe peata atable ble by dif differ ferent ent ex exper perime imente nters? rs? In 1989 two scientists in America, Fleischmann Fleischmann and Pons, claimed they’d achieved nuclear fusion at relatively low temperature – in a standard laboratory, rather than at the exceedingly  high temperatures temperatures which occur in a star or a particl particlee accelerator. If cold fusion is possible, the world’s energy supply would be virtually limitless. However despite numerous attempts by  other scientists, none succeeded in repeating their ‘results’. 13) Can the theory be falsified? Experiments Experime nts can be set up to dispro disprove ve some theories, but  others might not be potentially falsifiable. Theories that cannot  be disproved by experiments fall into two categories: those intrinsically immune to experimentation, and those that cannot  be disproved by experimentation due to lack of technology.  The concept of falsification was formulated by Karl Popper  when investigating the differences between  dogmatic  and  and  critical  thinking. Dogmatic thinkers, including the followers of Marx and Freud, try to interpret all events in terms of their favoured theory or beliefs, whilst a critical thinker tries to find the  flaws  in  in theories – especially  their favoured ones. Popper gives Einstein as an example of a critical thinker, when Einstein said “If the redshift of spectral lines due to the gravitational potential should not exist, then the general theory of relativity will be untenable.” 14) Does the theory have predictive elements? elements?  Withoutt a predictive element, science would be an esoteric or  Withou speculative subject, the output of which would only be higherdefinition ‘Just So Stories’. It’s It’s the predictive element which

15. Accuracy of Predictions

4

1

1

 A disadvantage of this approach is the subjectivity in the  weighting of the criteria and the scoring process. However this problem can be offset by choosing an expert panel to evaluate the theory against the criteria. (This is not meant to exclude an amateur from calculating a scientific quotient.)  There are other complication complicationss too. History shows us that   whether or not a theory is scientific can change in the light of  new evidence or new techniques. What is currently not  testable can become testable, for example. The first six criteria given are intrinsic properties of theories, not alterable by new  data or techniques. The criteria of  simplicity, conformity, falsifi are transitional, insofar as new data cation  and  predictive elements  are and techniques are highly unlikely to change this part of a theory’s nature with time. The remaining five criteria are extrinsic properties that  are change as new data is gathered  are likely to change or new techniques become available.  The aspects of a theory’ theory’ss scientificness are not independent. For example, just because a theory is based upon observed and gathered data it does not necessarily mean that the theory is accurate or is the simplest (see 7). Moreover, the criteria are not of equal weight. Some of the criteria given above are necessary for a theory to be scientific, others more amorphously  influential. We We can combine this scientific quotient scoring system with a star system in which all the  necessary  criteria for a theory being scientific are given a star (as shown), and so theories are unscientific if they do not pass all the starred criteria.  These criteria include: Is the theory self-consistent? self-consistent? Is the theory based on data? Has the theory been tested? etc. However, a star system alone would not distinguish the degree of  fulfilment of criteria between two competing theories, unlike the Scientific Quotient system. Before the background radiation from the Big Bang was discovered it was inconclusive  which was the stronger theory. However, However, using the Scientific Quotient system, I think the Big Bang theory would still have had a higher score. It would have fared better on  simplicity, a single creation then expansion being a simpler explanation than the continuous creation of matter. Also, at that time the Big Bang theory was more in tune with the rest of physics than matter being formed in interstellar space (violating the first  law of thermodynamics), and so had a stronger fulfilment of  criterion 8. Furthermore, many theories at the boundaries of science  would cease to be scientific having failed to obtain stars for ‘Has the theory been tested?’ Currently string theory and multiverse theory would fall into that category. And by the mechanistic criterion, Darwin’s Darwin’s theory of evolution by natural selection could have been said to be unscientific until Watson and Crick discovered DNA. I would think it fairer to say these are untested or otherwise incomplete rather than claim that they  are unscientific. If we acknowledge that some of the necessary  criteria for being scientific are extrinsic (dependent on factors other than the theory itself), the claim that whether a theory is scientific or not could change with time. Or perhaps we can augment our vocabulary and say that there are  immature  scientific theories. As I say, this theory of evaluation is itself in its preliminary stages.

 TOTAL/150

110

34

56

© RUSSELL BERG 2009

SQ:

73

23

37

 VERDICT:: SCIENTIFIC?  VERDICT

YES

NO

NO

 Russell Berg Berg studied at the University University of Leeds and is currently working as a food microbiologist.

gives science its practical value, allowing us to say how materials will behave or what various reactions will produce. This made possible the technology which changed the world during the industrial and information revolutions. Physics underpins the technology of locomotives and jets.  As medicine has become more scientific it has been more successful. Dr Alexander Fleming observed the mould  Penicillium retard the growth of the bacterium  Staphylococcus,  and predicted that penicillin could be used to treat bacterial disease.  Also, Marshall’s theory that stomach ulcers are caused by bacteria and hence are treatable by antibiotics, has proved correct.

15) Ho 15) How w ac accu cura rate te ar are e th the e pr pred edic icti tion onss ba base sed d on th the e th theo eory ry?? Scientific theories are not the only explanatory systems that  produce predictions. Long before there was science there were oracles, the most famous being the Oracle of Apollo at Delphi. However,, her prophecies were not subject to the statistical However analysis used to test modern scientific predictions. Also, like the quatrains of Nostradamus, Oracular predictions were ambiguous and relied on equivocation. When King Croesus of  Lydia asked the Oracle what would happen if he went to war against Persia, the Oracle prophesied that a great empire  would fall. She just didn’t say whose great empire.  The predictions based on the laws of motion of Newtonian physics, for instance, are very different. These laws were used to accurately predict when Halley’s comet would next be visible. Unfortunately not all theories which claim to be scientific are as accurate in their predictions as Newton’s. Newton’s. Marxist theory  (which Marxists claim to be scientific) claims that it can predict  future historical periods: in Marxist theory the feudal period is succeeded by the capitalist period, which is succeeded by the socialist period, which in turn is succeeded by the communist  period. But according to Marxist theory the countries which  would be the first to undergo socialist revolution would be the advanced capitalist ones, Britain, Germany or the United States, not the peasant-based economies of Russia or China.  This prediction failed, even though it was a very broad theory. Critical Qualifications Of The Criteria Let us briefly compare some well-known theories by assigning scientific quotients according to each of these criteria: Evolut Evo lution ion Cre Creati ationi onism sm

ID (Score ID  (Score out of 10.

1. Natural Explanation *

9

1

8 Stars indicate a

2. Rational Argument *

8

6

8 necessary criterion.)

3. Reductionist Approach

9

2

2

4. Self-Consistent *

10

10

10

5. Mechanistic Approach *

10

1

1

6. Qualities in Quantities

6

1

1

7. Simplicity

8

3

4

8. Conformity

9

2

4

9. Data Based *

9

2

3

10. Tested and Verified *

9

1

6

11. Supported by Test Results

6

1

4

12. Repeatability

1

1

1

13. Falsification

6

1

2

14. Predictive Elements

6

1

1

Now  w  17 July/August July/Aug ust 2009  Philosophy No

Paul Feyerabend

‘Science’ ‘Science’

And The Monster 

Ian James Kidd introduces an iconic iconoclast of the philosophy of science.

P

aul Feyerabend (1924-1994) was not a conventional philosopher – a fact he delighted in and took great  care to maintain. He trained as an opera singer singer and a physicist, and only came to philosophy by accident, as he freely admitted. He disliked academia and was consistently  critical of the philosophy of science, once describing it as “a subject with a great past.” Feyerabend was also unwilling to confine his research to the bounds set by academic convention. His writing makes generous appeal to Hesiod and Homer, to Renaissance art and sculpture, and he moves easily between Platonic epistemology and astrology, quantum mechanics and the history of witchcraft. His personality is also evident in his use of  rhetoric, provocation, humour and anecdote in his writing. For these reasons then, it is interesting to find that Feyerabend was also an eminent and influential philosopher. philosopher. He became one of the ‘Big Four’ philosophers of science of the last  half of the twentieth century, century, alongside Karl Popper,, Thomas Kuhn and his close friend Imré Popper Lakatos. Lakatos suggested that he and Feyerabend set down their opposing views on science in a  For or and Against Method .  volume they intended intended to call  F Sadly,, Lakatos’ death in 1974 put paid to this idea; Sadly but Feyerabend pressed on, the result being his iconoclastic classic Against Method  (1975).   (1975). This book was, he emphasis emphasised, ed, a ‘collage’ of earlier papers, spiced up with challenging rhetoric. Against Method  Against Method  made  made the radical argument that a single ‘scientific method’ method’ does not exist, and that  successful successf ul scientific research does not and cannot  conform to the idealised models designed for it by  philosophers. philosophe rs. Here, Feyerabend had the Logical Positivists Positivis ts particularily in mind. Anticipating the emphasis of later philosophers of science such as Nancy Cartwright and Ian Hacking, Feyerabend insisted that instead, philosophy of science should remain close to scientific practice and the history of  science. For this reason, he praised the philosophical physicists of the early twentieth century – men like Ernst Mach and Niels Bohr. Bohr. They could also augment their experience as practical scientists with a keen awareness of the philosophical ramifications ramifications of their research.  Mach is a good example example of the sort of philosophiphilosophically-conscious scientist that Feyerabend admired.  Mach, he says, says, was a scientist, but was also familiar familiar  with psychology psychology,, literature literature and the arts, and the history of science and of ideas. Mach was also dissatisfied with the scientists of his day for their lack of  critical reflection. Their science, says Feyerabend, following Mach, “had become partially petrified” 18 Philosophy No Now  w   July/Au July/August gust 2009

and “used entities such as space and time and objective existence  Philosophical phical Papers  Papers , vol. 2, p.80.) but without examining them.” ( Philoso  Mach insisted insisted on pursuing pursuing the philosophical philosophical implications implications of sciscientific research not merely as a tangential and perhaps idiosyncratic interest on the side, but as a necessary component and corrective to scientific thought and practice. The history and the philosophy of science should be indispensable parts of scientific practice, and whenever they are not, stagnation and dogmatism is the inevitable result, he said.  There are close close parallels parallels here with Feyerabend Feyerabend’’s own criticisms of science. (Indeed, Feyerabend admitted that many of his ideas were simply observations he had taken from scientists and reapplied for the benefit of the philosophers of science who, it  seemed to him, had not thought to listen to them.) Like Mach, Feyerabend abhorred the lack of critical reflexion among scientists and insisted that scientific progress demanded the constant  Feyerabend Feyerab end asked, Would we sacrific sacrifice e all traditi traditional onal relationships relationships with the natural world for a monolithic scientific worldview? worldview?

examination and questioning of its theories and even the methods of research. Otherwise, he warned, science would ossify  into a standard set of uniform ideas which would inhibit the freedom and experimentalism that characterised progressive research. “Successful research” argued Feyerabend on the first    Against Method , “does not obey general standards; it  page of  Against relies now on one trick, now on another.”  The pluralis pluralism m and opportuni opportunism sm this implies implies means means that  that  actual scientific practice is far more complex or ‘anarchistic’ than philosophers of science had been willing to admit. This means that the monistic ‘scientific method’ to which philosophers of  science had pointed in their attempts to establish the special authority of scientific knowledge didn’t didn’t exist.  The idea of a unique and distinctive scientific scientific method had been the foundation of the special status of scientific knowledge as compared with other forms of inquiry inquiry,, such as magic, theology or mythology. mythology. The scientific method was supposed to ensure that scientific knowledge, unlike other forms of knowledge, was objective, reliable and free from the contingencies of  idiosyncratic idiosyncra tic beliefs, values and prejudice prejudices. s. However if scientific method, at least as traditionally imagined, turned out to be chimerical, and if scientific research was in fact an erratic combination of formal techniques, opportunism,  ad hoc  manoeuvres   manoeuvres and so forth, then the special status of science and scientific knowledge became far more difficult to establish.  Moreover,  Moreove r, the pluralistic pluralistic nature of science (‘now one trick, now another’) meant that the outcome of that research was in fact contingent, not inevitable inevitable.. Different combinations of  methodology, opportunism and conjecture will result in different results, and so in a different set of ‘scientific knowledge’. knowledge’. Feyerabend Feyerabe nd hence asked the question, “What’s so great about science? – what makes sciences preferable to other forms of life, using different standards and getting different kinds of results as a conseque consequence?” nce?” (‘On the Critique of Scientific Reason’ in  Essays in Memory of Imre Lakatos , p.110.) This question, I think, came to occupy him for the remainder of his career. New Old Pathways Unfortunately, Feyerabend’s work after  Against Method  attracted much less attention. Many philosophe philosophers rs were upset  and offended by the book and its mode of presentation. It was criticised for being aggressive and antagonistic, and for its apparently hostile rhetoric and mocking humour. humour. Feyerabe Feyerabend nd  was disappointed disappointed and stung by these criticisms, criticisms, and responded in kind. He complained that his reviewers had failed to understand the book and described them as ‘illiterates’. Afterwards, Afterwards, he seemed to retreat from mainstream academia, about which he had always been rather reticent. Although he remained a professorr at Berkeley and Zurich until his retireme professo retirement nt in 1991, and continued to publish and teach, he was no longer a visible frontline philosopher of science. Indeed, his interests had moved in other directions. True to his pluralistic and opportunistic inclinations, he had always enjoyed wide interests, but in the 80s and 90s he began to explore the consequences consequences of his criticisms of the special status of science. In particular, he asked the question, ‘If science is not quite as privileged as we think it is, what will be the implications for our treatment of non-scientif non-scientific ic beliefs and prac-

tices?’ Science, at  Paul least in the WestFeyerabend ern world, generally commands absolute authority  as a source of  knowledge. Physics, medicine, psychologyy and the psycholog other physical and life sciences pro vide an articulated description descripti on of the universe and our place within it, confidently confident ly tackling questions of cosmology and human nature that were pre viously the domain of mythology, mythology, religion or other traditional beliefs. Usually, the replacement of these prescientific world views by science is depicted as a positive development development – the  Triumph  T riumph of Reason. But, says Feyerabend, Feyerabend, if science, the vehicle for Reason, cannot assume the special authority it claims to have, then we must reasses reassesss the credentials of magic, mythology and traditional beliefs and practices. In particular particular,, this reassessment must begin with our current Western attitudes towards indigenous ways of life. Once we abandon the scientisti scientisticc assumption that ‘science knows best’, or that science has unique license to describe the  world and the best way of living within it, indigenous ways of  thinking must come to be seen in a new light. Feyerabend is emphatic and passionate in his insistence that paternalistic attitudes towards indigenous indigenous peoples must give way to sympathetic acknowledgement acknowledgement of the efficacy and merits of their  ways of life. “People all over the world,” he says, “have developed ways of surviving in partly dangerous, partly agreeable agreeable surroundings. surroundi ngs. The stories they told and the activities they  engaged in enriched their lives, protected them and gave them  Against Method , 3rd ed, p.3.) Despite the efficacy of  meaning.” ( Against such ways of life serving the spiritual as well as the material needs of the cultures which employe employed d them, under the banner of Reason, Western cultures “destroyed these wonderful products of human ingenuity and compassi compassion on without a single glance in their direction.” Thus, the indigenou indigenouss cultures of the  Andes, the Amazon, the African savannah, Southeast Southeast Asia and the South Pacific islands had sophisticate sophisticated d worldviews and  ways of life that met their needs and described their world and their place within it, but these ways of life were trampled by   Western  W estern cultures, initially initially through soldiers, merchants merchants and missionaries, missiona ries, and recently through development agencies and educational education al programs, who tend to operate under the presumption sumptio n that Western Western culture and specifical specifically ly science knows best. Feyerabend was vigorously opposed to these destructiv destructivee and parochial attitudes, and worked to develop forms of philosophical relativism relativism which could sustain his critique of them. Such an attitude of tolerant pluralism would of course require that Western cultures abandon, or at the least retract, their belief in the universal authority of scientific knowledge. Science and the technological ways of life it sustains may suit Western Now  w  19 July/August July/Aug ust 2009  Philosophy No

cultures, but cannot be uniformly applied to all cultures every where. One One should, says says Feyerabend, Feyerabend, approach approach other cultures cultures  with humility humility,, offering one’ one’s own ideas and beliefs beliefs and practices practices in a spirit of cooperation and exchange. Unfortunately, such an attitude would be difficult to introduce into our contemporary  international institutions, which assume and act on the superiority of Western values and ways of life – scientific medicine, liberal democracy, market economics and so forth. Any cultures  which do not recognise recognise the desirability desirability of these these things are demeaned by Western ideologues as ‘under-developed’ and as needing social, economic and political ‘development’. Farewell To Reason  Farewell ell to Reason (1987) Feyerabend argued that cultures In Farew ought to be left to their own devices, living and acting according to their own beliefs and customs. However he later retracted this on the grounds that this tended to imply that cultures were static and isolated entities, and would prohibit interaction with and moral criticism of other cultures. So into the 1990s Feyerabend argued argued that cultures are in fact fluid and mutable, and that, for better or worse, they change through interaction with others: “potentially “potentially every culture is all cultures.” This interaction would allow the members of each culture to pursue their own ways of life, whilst also allowing them to change and develop through internal action and external stimulus. However, even if all cultures are potentially all cultures, there is the constant danger that one culture (or set of allied cultures) will conspire to transform all the others into its image. Feyerabend says this is a general trend in world history  since the Enlightenm Enlightenment, ent, and Farewell to Reason  is largely  devoted to a defence of cultural pluralism against the tendencies to uniformit uniformityy encouraged, he claims, by shifting confeder confeder-ations of philosophers who consistently maintain that “there exists a right way of living and that the world must be made to accept it.” ( FTR p.11.) Although differing in their values and ideals, these philosophers all insist that their particular view of  the ideal way of life is best for everyone, and strive to legitimate their monolithic prejudices by describing themselves as ‘rationalists’. The consequence is that “a collection of uniform views and practices [are] being imposed [in the culture of origin], exported and again imposed [upon indigenous peoples].” (p.2.) It’s clear that Feyerabend has now moved considerably beyond the philosophy of science. His motivations here, as he explains, are ‘humanitarian, not intellectual’, since his concern is not   with the pursuit pursuit of knowledge knowledge or with intellectual intellectual values values such as truth, but instead with human well-being. As he once explained to Thomas Kuhn, “I judge the importance of a topic from the influence a specific solution of it may have upon the well-being of mankind… which derives, among other thing, from the exercise of one’s imagination, from the full development of human faculties,, and from spiritual happiness.” (Quoted in Hoyninge faculties HoyningennHuene in Studies in History and Philosophy of Science, 37, pp.613614.) Thus to Feyerabend, human well-being now becomes the primary criterion in the assess assessment ment of theories, methods, world views and ways ways of life – not abstract standards standards such as ‘truth’ ‘truth’ or ‘knowledge’. ‘knowledg e’. If one puts such abstractions ahead of human  well-being,, then one has lost sight of the purpose both of sci well-being ence and of philosophy philosophy,, which should be our servants, not our 20 Philosophy No Now  w   July/Au July/August gust 2009

masters. As Feyerabend said, “I am totally opposed to any attitude which says: ‘I am out to find the truth, come what may’.  Ibid .)  What truth? And why? would be my question.” ( Ibid  .)  Thus, having begun with a critical study of scientific methodology, Feyerabend gradually found himself questioning the role science has played in the expansion of Western Western cultures since the Renaissan Renaissance. ce. Anticipating later postcolon postcolonial ial theorists and the anti-global anti-globalisation isation movement, he criticised the relentlesss impositi relentles imposition on of Western Western values and practices throughout the world, and the homogenising effects effects that such cultural imperialism imperialis m inevitably brought (and brings) with it. Rich and diverse cultures are being erased because they do not conform to Western Western intellectual ideals, out of a philosophi philosophical cal ideology   which presumes that a single way of thinking and living is best  for all. In the face of this culturecidal imperialism imperialism conducted through a powerful rhetoric of liberation and developm development, ent, Feyerabend Feyerabe nd argued passionate passionately ly and persuasiv persuasively ely that “diversity is beneficial while uniformity reduce our joys and our  FTR p.1.) intellectual, intellectu al, emotional, and material resources.” ( FTR  Today  T oday Feyerabend Feyerabend’’s work has a new significance. significance. Despite Despite the growing hostility to mass Westernisation and corporate hegemony, and new concerns for the gradual disappearance of languages, cultures and peoples, science still enjoys an unequalled authority. But if we are to address the global concerns, then the role of science in our society will need to be reevaluated. As Feyerabend said, perhaps it is time to confront the monster ‘science’, and take steps towards ending its tyranny over us. © IAN JAMES KIDD 2009

 Ian Kidd is doing a PhD in the Department of Philosophy at  Durham University University..

Crossword No.28 Solution (See page 46 for the clues)

harles Taylor’s intellectual journey  took him from studying at McGill University in Montreal to Balliol College Oxford, then back to McGill.  Theree he has taught  Ther taught philosophy philosophy and and politics while writing a series of influential articles on concepts of freedom and the nature of explanation in the social sciences. His books include works on  Sourcess of the Self: The Hegel, as well as Source  Making Of The Modern Identity. His most  Secular Age, was published recent book, A Secular in 2007. In 2007 he was also awarded the  Temp  T empleton leton Prize Prize for his his life’s work,  which comes comes with with an award of $1.5 $1.5 milmillion; and this year he was awarded the Kyoto Prize, which includes an award of  50 million yen ($500,000 ($500,000). ).

C

Chris Bloor: Professor Taylor aylor,, were you sur prised to win the Kyoto Prize? Charles Taylor: Yes, I was indeed, because it’s a very rare honour. I didn’t  expect it at all. I understand it more now  that I’ve gone there and talked to the  judges.  judg es. They’r They’ree not only looking looking for for people who have done something important  intellectually, but they look very much at   your attitude attitude – whether whether your your motivatio motivation n is to help mankind and so on. And the application to the political world of the idea of helping humanity was very  important in my motivation. Before that you won the Templeton Templeton Prize?  That’’s right. That  That That was even even more sursurprising in a sense, because in previous  yearss they were  year were giving giving it to natural natural scientists who were interested in a link with spirituality, and not at all to… whatever I am! I guess I’m somewhere in-between a social scientist and a humanities person. What are you going to spend the money on?  A lot of what I do in philosophy philosophy,, in my   work in general, comes out of networks. Certain people I work with need to meet together, and we can’t simply wait  until we all get invited to go to a symposium in London or wherever. It’s very  helpful to be able to move around, and to move other people around, and to bring them together in small groups, be it in New York York or Chicago or Europe, or even Delhi, which is one of the places

 we’ve been meeting. meeting. That’s That’s essential for everybody everybo dy in this type of work, unless  you’re a total hermit and get it all out of   your own head, which I could never possibly do. I need to work like that. I’m doing things across disciplinary boundaries, and I probably make lots of mistakes when I cross these boundaries and poach in historians’ territory or political scientists’’ territory or sociologis scientists sociologists’ ts’ territory. You make less terrible mistakes if   you’re working with sympathetic sympathetic social scientists,, historians, and so on. scientists You found the analytic philosophy at Balliol  College dry and uninvolving. Do you have any advice to students who might find philosophy off-putting or not what they expected? Really, it’s a DIY situation – do it yourself! That’s That’s not necessarily impossible – I  alone. I suppose don’t mean do it yourself  alone I can best put this autobiographically.  When I felt felt like that that in Oxford, Oxford, I found some like-minded graduate students, and  we very quickl quicklyy discovere discovered d some intere intereststing authors – in our case Merleau-Ponty  – so we read them together. This is what   you sometim sometimes es just just have to do, if it isn’ isn’t  t  on offer in the course you’re doing. And on the web it’s even easier to get hold of  interesting stuff and discuss it than it was for us back in the 50s. The flip side of that is that some students, students, particularly in multi-disciplinary multi-disciplinary courses, find   philosop  phil osophy hy fascina fascinating ting but but overwhe overwhelmin lming. g. They embark on required texts such as Heidegg Heidegger’ er’s s  Being and Time or something by Foucault, but they can’t understand them, there’ there’ss something missing which they expect to be there. What would you advise such students?  Well,  W ell, yeah, that’s that’s a very difficult thing, because you are quite right, sometimes, as with the work of Foucault, it can take a really big investme investment nt of time, particularly if it’s just you and the text and  you’re reading it for the tenth time, asking ‘What’s going on?’ But there are some good commentaries out there. Hubert Dreyfus has written a commen commen- Being and Time tary on Division One of  Being that I think really bridges the gap between Heidegger Heidegger and anybody with a certain knowledge of philosophy in the English-speaking English-sp eaking world. But it is cer-

Charles Taylor  is one of the world’ world’ss leading living philosophers. Chris Bloor  talks   talks to him about philosophy and society.

The Kyoto Prize  is an “international award to honor those who have contributed significantly to the scientific, cultural, and spiritual betterment of mankind. The Prize is presented present ed annuall annually y in each of the followi following ng three categories: Advanced Advanced Technology Technology,, Basic Sciences, and Arts and Philoso Philosophy phy.” .” The Templeton Prize  was set up in 1972 and is awarded to “a living person who has made an exceptional contribution to affirming lifeʼs spiritual dimension, whether through insight, insight, discovery, discovery, or practica practicall works.” (Quote (Quotes s from Prize websites.) websites.)

Interview 

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tainly true that for both Heidegger and Foucault you definitely have to retool  your mind (laughs ). ). You don’t get it right  away, because they’re not writing in terms immediately immediately connected to the terms you’ve been used to. Do you think there’s a problem in trying to  fit such characteristic characteristic and difficult thinkers  into a typical university syllabus?  At any given moment, in any given situation where people are discussing things, there are assumptions so deep they’re not even seen as assumptio assumptions, ns, because they look so obvious – they look  like ‘two and two make four’. The great  example that I’ve been battling with throughout my life is the whole epistemological tradition from Descartes. Descartes says in one of the letters that   we get all our ideas from the impact of  the outside world causing representarepresentations in our minds. When he was saying that, he was saying ‘two and two make four’ – an obvious thing  –  – yet it’s actually  quite wrong  in  in many ways (laughs ). ). But  people don’t don’t see that: they get so into this ‘obvious’ way of thinking that it just  never occurs to them it might be wrong.  When  Whe n you get get somebo somebody dy thinkin thinkingg beyond the obvious, at first you’re baffled by what they’re saying – they seem to be speaking nonsense: nonsense: ‘two and two is five’! ‘Retooling your mind’ means being able to haul the absolutely unquestioned frameworks framewo rks up and looking at them, and seeing that it ain’ ain’tt necessarily so; or maybe it is so in a way in the end, but you have to argue for it in light of other possibilities. That’s a very big change. And before the penny drops, you can be com pletelyy  baffled by a text where somebody’s  pletel challenging your basic assumptions. It  looks like somebody’s just denying obvious facts about the world or the mind.  In you work you’ve often been trying to correct a kind of failure of self-understanding  of our culture. For For example, you called  Sources of The Self ‘an essay in retrieval’.  In some sense we’re missing what it is to have arrived at this point in our history, so  your work is an attempt to explain Western Western culture in the early 21st century to itself. I think that’s right. I try to do that by  delving back into history. If you’ve lived through a transforma transformation tion you understand something of how you got to  where you now are. But further generations may lose sight of history, history, and they  take the mental landscape they’re in as being totally natural. They therefore miss something about the nature of that  22   Philosophy No Now  w   July/August 2009

landscape, about the nature of their reference points of identity identity.. They take them not as adopted possible reference reference points, but as the obvious ones you can’t  avoid. So they’re living their identity, identity, but in a way which hides very important  dimensions and features of it. So it is a matter of retrieval – retrievin retrievingg the tra jectory that brought you to where you  should  be are. I think that  should   be a very important part of philosophi philosophical cal work.

people. I still feel that was a real turning point in my work, because from then on I could expand and work on that field of  problems – how we got to the point   wheree the things  wher things we’re arguin arguingg about are are ‘x and y’ as opposed to ‘y and z’ or ‘z and q’ – why the obvious alternatives seem to be these and not something else. And that’s a real effort of retrieval, trying to see how we got here, and trying to understand it differently differently..

 How might that be accomplished?  Well,  W ell, I think that there are certain certain moments in university history where this kind of retrieval was maximally facilitated. At the time of Max Weber – maybe  we nostalgically nostalgically magnify magnify that – and even slightly later, you found that philosophy  students in Germany, were given an incredibly broad course in Greek philosophy and the history of philosophy, and Kant and German idealism; but they also read Weber, Durkheim, Troeltsch, and Dilthey. So they had a broad understanding of how the questions then being debated had got to that stage.  That was one of the things that  struck me when I managed to see the tail end of it – because I think it’s dying out, even in Germany. When I visited Habermas, he was handing on that kind of education to his students, even though he didn’ didn’tt necessarily agree with a lot of the stuff that he was conveying to them. That’s That’s what got me riled up  when I went to Oxford – they were so narrow, those people: they weren’t even reading one tenth of the tradition that  had got them to where they were.

You make many powerful assertions about  modern identity drawn not only from philosophy but from the history of religion, and  literature and art and so on. It is difficult for   someone who does not have that breadth of   knowledge to assess your claims adequately.  Yes.  Y es. So great  ( (laughs ) – so people might  go and read somethin something! g! It connects up  with what I was saying about my ideal  circa picture of the German university  circa 1920: that we really should have that  kind of breadth in our education system for the history of humanitie humanities, s, social science, and so on. So I’m not displeased by that kind of reaction. If people really   want to know if an idea is right, then they’ll go and read something, and it will make them capable of forming their own  view about about how we got got to where we are. are.

 I wanted to ask you about  Sources  Sources of the twentieth ieth anniversary anniversary Self . This year is the twent of its initial publication. publication.  That’ss right – already! That’s so fast, it   That’  just seems like yesterday! yesterday!  That was was the first book book where where I sys I  wanted tematically presented what  I   wanted to say. Before, I wrote books on Hegel, and a lot of articles on aspects of social science. I was very much wanting not just to argue against certain positions in social science, psychology and so forth, but to understand why people were defending those positions which I thought were false and very implausible. But in order to see why, you have to see the development of the modern conception of the self. So that was the first attempt I made to open up that area – not simply arguing against certain errors, but trying to explain how the situation could arise in  which those those errors errors would would be plausible plausible to

The book contains a soundbite that sums up  your criticism of the shallower aspects of our  culture: ‘Nothing would would count as a fulfilment in a world in which literally nothing is  important but self-fulfilme self-fulfilment’. nt’.  Well,  W ell, ‘what makes things important in the end’ can’t simply turn on fulfilling or satisfying the self. That puts you in a  what  is kind of regress: ‘Okay! But  what   is it  that is going to give me self-fulf self-fulfilment?’ ilment?’  You  Y ou have in the end to point to some purpose in something beyond you, such as in the way things are, or the way the universe is, or the way human beings are, or the direction of human history. history.  The things that people find deep, deep self-fulfilment self-fulf ilment in all have that feature. One person says “I want to work with  Médecins Sans Frontieres  in  in the Congo” and another person says “I want to write the Great Canadian novel.” It should be obvious that all these forms of very deep satisfaction satisfactio n refer to something that  reaches beyond you. So it’s a soundbite, but it has an important truth.  I was thinking about your recent book A  Secular Age this morning and a bus passed  by with an atheist (or more correctly, agnostic) slogan “There’ “There’ss probably no God: now  stop worrying and enjoy your life.”  life.”  Interview  

Interview  I heard about that! It’ It’ss hilariously funny. It’s very odd, isn’t it? I’m trying to figure out why this is happening in our time.  This new new phenomena phenomena is puzzlin puzzlingg – atheists that want to spread the ‘gospel’, and are sometimes very angry. I think it may  be rather like the response of certain bishops to Darwin in the 19th century.  The bishops bishops had a sense sense that the the world  was going going in a certain certain direction direction – more and more conversion, and so on – and then they find they’re suddenly upset in their expectation and they get very rattled and very angry angry.. Similarly, we’re seeing this now among the secularising intelligentsia – liberals who felt that the world  was going going in a certain certain direction, direction, that that it   was all going going according according to plan plan – and then when it seems not to be, they get  rattled. So you get these rather pathetic phenomena. Putting things on buses as though that’s that’s going to make people somehow change their view about God, the universe, the meaning of life and so on. A  bus slogan! It’s not likely to trigger something very fundamental in anybody.  It seems symptomatic of when you say that  modern people are stuck between two  polarised positions – as you put it, Strong   Atheism on the one hand, and on the other other,, Strong Religiosity. But this leaves the average person wavering between the two, not   particularly drawn drawn to one pole or the other other,, but kind of messing around in the middle.  That’ss right. And it can lead just to per That’ plexity, or it can lead to bricolage – putting together your own position. In A Secular Age I mention lots of people who obviously do so. Victor Hugo is a very  good nineteenth century French example of people who put together a middle position, and I think it’s a very, very   widespread  widesp read phenomeno phenomenon n today – including the cases where it’s de facto bricolage, but it doesn’ doesn’tt appear that they’ve put it  together themselves. Then there are the cases where people are self-consciously  putting it together. That’s what people often mean when they say, “I’m spiritual, but not religious. ‘Not religious’ means I don’t belong to any tradition with a preexisting formula that I would have to sign up to; but I’m ‘spiritual’ in that I’m exploring this whole area.”  This scene of such a tremend tremendous ous number of different positions – spiritual, anti-spiritual and what have you – being held simultaneously simultaneously in the same society  – is undoubted undoubtedly ly unprecedented in history,, I think, and the number of pository tions are multiplying. There are positions which were just not thought of a Interview 

hundred years ago at all. That passage about the two extreme extremess people are reacting to was my attempt to look at some of the underlying dynamic. You make the point in your work that liber liberal  al  democracy is confused when it holds itself up as neutral neutral.. You say, in fact ‘liberal ‘liberal democr democracy’  acy’  is itself a value, which sometimes comes into conflict with other values, as it should, and  we should recognise that this is inevitable.  Yes.  Y es. I think that there’s no such thing as total neutrality, neutrality, particularly in terms of   what the good life is. For instance, the notion of participating, of being a citizen, taking part in determining the future of   yourself  your self and your your society society – I think this is not an ‘optional virtue’, as it were (laughs ): ): it’s very close to the health and lifeblood of liberal, democratic society. We should be upfront about that. You’ve suggested that when considering the claims of different cultural perspectives, perspectives, it’s  valuable to adopt a ‘language of perspicuous  contrast’ – striving for a form of discourse which highlights the differences between those cultures rather than attempting to  gloss over or reconcile them. I think that’s what we have to aim at if   we want to get these differences differences out into a sphere where there can be a rational and calm discussion of how to live together with tension between different  groups. It’s only by coming to such a language that we can have a discussion that doesn’t doesn’t degenerate into a kind of  stigmatising of the other. It’s not just  important in the classroom or the anthropology monograph, it’s tremendously important in our public debate.  Wee need it very  W very badly badly in our diverse diverse socisocieties. etie s. I’m very pleased about what happened in a public consultation in Quebec over religious extremism. People started off saying very xenophobicsounding things, but then others, particularly Muslims, came along and said “this is just wrong.” The debate evolved to a non-caricatu non-caricature re way of presenting the differences. I think that’ that’ss what we always have to try to do.  In an interview with Bryan Magee in 1978  you said a lesson from Marx is that “at the very moment when men have developed  immense potential to control their lives and  to make of themselve themselvess whatever they want, this power is, as it were, wrenched from their  hands by their own internal divisions.” divisions.” Similarly, in Ethics of Authentici Authenticity  ty , you wrote of ‘La Lotta Continua’ – ‘the continuing   struggle’ – a phrase you borrow from the

 Italian Red Brigade. Is   your message here that a degree of conflict and  upheaval is inevitable in Western society? I hope we don’t have to get used to this level of disarray in our economy! But   yes, in a general sense there are no final, determining determini ng solutions. There are deep dilemmas,, and we’re being pulled in difdilemmas ferent directions, and we’re going to have to find the least destructive way of  putting things together. I think that’s true also of the current dilemma, of on the one hand needing markets and a certain degree of free agency in them, and on the other hand, the need to head off the terrible consequences that markets can bring about if left unfettered.  The resolution’s going to be difficult.  The same same thing is true true of the two tentendencies I call the ‘technologist’ and the ‘expressivist’. I think most of us have both tendencies, but there are obviously  people who are more into one or other, and they square off against each other.  We’re  W e’re never never going going to reach reach a final and definitive solution. That’s what I mean by   La Lotta Continua Continua. There’s always going to be the problem of putting perspectives together. There will always be people pushing terribly hard in one direction and not paying attention to other requirements. We are always going to need to knit together a solution that will last for a while between opposing tendencies. tendencies. So is the hope that we can strive towards some higher level in which the fundamental con flicts of culture are resolved a pipe dream?  Yeah.  Y eah. That’ That’s a pipe dream. It’s a beautiful dream, but it’s not something we can possibly hope for. It’s a pipe dream in the kind of sense that Marxism in its original form contained. This means that Marxism’s a tremendously interesting philosophy to read, because it holds out an important definition of the main cultural contradiction – as opposed to its error of  thinking that we can resolve it. It’s just as bad not even to see the contradiction – to have this bland neo-liberal view that  there are no major cultural contradictions at all, and things will all go swimmingly, that we’ll all just globalise. This is the absolute nadir of blindness. Those neo-liberals have to be put to read Marx – and if they totally convert to Marxism, then maybe they’ll have to be corrected by a dose of reality! PN Chris Bloor studied under Charles Taylor  and now philosophizes in London. Now  w  23 July/August July/Au gust 2009  Philosophy No

Predestination

and the Wagers

of Sin

Robert Howell suggests a surprising reason for piety. “We call predestination God’s eternal decree, by which he determined  within himself what he willed to become of each man. For all are not  created in equal condition; rather, rather, eternal life is foreordained for some, eternal damnation for others” (Calvin, Institutes  3.21.5).   3.21.5).

C

alvinists and their ilk believed that there are a group of people, the Elect , who are predestined by God to partake of the fruits of Heaven while the rest are headed for a less salubrious fate. One cannot tell  who the Elect are, except by gleaning a hint from the fact that  they lead perfectly Christian lives. Nevertheless, Calvinists typically adhered to an extremely strict and inconvenie inconvenient nt religious regimen. Why? It is not as if they were earning their salvation, since whether or not they were saved or damned was already determined, and could not be affected by any of their actions or thoughts. Consequently Consequently,, the obedienc obediencee of the Calvinists is often rationalized by appealing to their fear either of self-loathing or of ostracism. According to this story, Calvinists act pious so as to preserve the appearance that they  are among the Elect. However, this is not a particularly charitable interpretation interpretation of Calvinist motives, motives, as it seems to mislocate their reasons for being pious. If this were all that moti vated them, then it would be entirely possible to satisfy that  goal through self-deception self-deception or deceptio deception n of others while being impious. While there were surely no hypnotists then available to aid in self-deception, or Rings of Gyges to aid in deceiving others, it does seem dubious that these lacks were the only  reasons Calvinists remained remained truly pious. It behoove behoovess us to find an explanation for their actually  being  pious,  pious, and not merely   seeming  so,  so, that doesn’ doesn’tt ascribe to them a blatant irrationality. irrationality.  An important puzzle in decision theory can help in sorting out intuitions behind these matters, I think. In Newcomb’s Newcomb’s problem,, we’re asked to imagine the following scenario. An problem immensely intelligent fellow, christened by reputation The Predictor, is able with astounding accuracy, approaching perfection, perfectio n, to predict the actions of others. The Predictor sets  you the following game. There are in front of you two boxes; one opaque and the other translucent. The game allows you two options: you can either take both boxes and keep the contents of both, or you can take only the opaque box, keeping only its contents. In the translucent box, there is $50,00 $50,000. 0. In the opaque box, the Predictor (who has amassed quite a fortune by his forecasting excellence) will have placed either $1 million or nothing at all. He places the money within the box an hour before you make your choice. His decision about what  to place in the box is determined by the following rule: if he predicts that you will take only the opaque box, he will place $1million within it; if he predicts you will take both, he will place nothing inside the opaque box. Should you take only the opaque box, or both boxes? People have conflicting intuitions on this matter: there are many one-boxers, and many two-boxer two-boxers. s. Both sides adduce 24 Philosophy No Now  w   July/Au July/August gust 2009

persuasive reasons in their favor. In general, though, most  persuasive people – at least those unschooled in the problem – side with the one boxers. Why? The Predictor is extremely good at  predicting whether whether people take one or two boxes, and you know this. We can imagine that you’ve seen him play this game  with hundreds of people, and every time people take one box they receive a million dollars, and every time they take two they receive only the $50,00 $50,000. 0. When it’s your turn to choose,  why think that you can buck the odds? You You should act in such a  way as to maximizes expected utility, utility, and the probabiliti probabilities es are extremely high that if you take one box you will walk off with a cool million, while if you take two you’ll have to gripe about  only receiving fifty grand.  As I said, it seems to me that most most people are one-boxe one-boxers. rs.  The interesting interesting thing thing for us is that the rationale for being being a one-boxer is exactly the same as the rationale for being extremely well-behaved if you’re a Calvinist. God is the Predictor; Heaven might or might not be in the opaque box, and sinful pleasures on earth are in the translucent box. Heaven is in the opaque box only for the Elect; but God chooses the Elect based upon his infallible prediction as to whether or not  they partake of earthly sins. Thus by the same utility-maximization strategy, it seems quite rational to be very well behaved

indeed. Calvinists were just one-boxers ahead of their time! two-boxer, two-boxe r, they can always say, “Thanks for the lesson in deciI think it is a sufficient vindication of the Calvinists that there sion theory, but I’ve noticed that whenever someone acts on is this plausible defense of their behavior. If they were making a  your argument they wind up in Hell. Excuse me, but I think in mistake, it’s an easy one to make, and it certainly leaves them light of that, it is quite rational to remain pious.” At this point,  with a rational rational justific justification ation for for their pious pious obedience obedience.. They’re They’re one suspects that the Calvinist and his critic must simply part  not out of the woods, however, for the old complaint against the paths, perhaps in more ways than one. © DR ROBERT J. HOWELL HOWELL 2009 Calvinists still resonates. Consider yourself confronted with the  Robert Howell is Associate Professor of Philosophy at the Southern two boxes once again. The money is either already in the  Methodist University, University, in Dallas. opaque box or it is not. Nothing you will do can change that. How can you go wrong by taking both boxes? The Predictor either put the money in the opaque box or  John Calvin he didn’t. Suppose he did. Then, if you take both out of the box boxes you wind up with $1,050,000 – fifty grand more than if you had just taken the opaque box. Or suppose he didn’t. Well, then you go home with $50,000 – which is again fifty grand more than if   you had only only taken taken the opaque opaque box. It would would seem that whatever the Predictor actually did,  you would would be better better taking taking two boxes boxes – how  could this be anything but the rational thing to do? One can furthermore imagine that the Predictor, who is also a truth-teller, tells your buddy whether or not the million is in the box.  What would would your your buddy, buddy, who has all the the information about the potential payoffs, recommend that you do? If he had your financial interests at  heart, he would always, no matter what the Predictor did, also recommend you take two boxes. It would seem completely irrational to go against the advice of your well-informed friend.  These considerations considerations support the doubts about the motivations which drove pious Calvinists.. God already knows if someone is a Calvinists member of the Elect – he has already decided the matter, and it’s irrevocable. Now suppose Satan, a two-boxer to the bitter end, knows of   Jacob whether or not he is a member of the Elect. It seems that no matter whether Jacob  was a member of the Elect or not, Satan would recommend recomm end that he partake of whatever carnal sin tickled his fancy. Despite Satan’s wily ways, it  seems that in this case he would have Jacob’ Jacob’ss best interests at heart, and that any angel who  wasn’tt completely under the thumb of the Old  wasn’  Man would also recommend the same. It  furthermore furtherm ore seems that pious Jacob, once in Heaven, would be right to kick himself and say  “I was one of the Elect all along! I should’ve gone for Goody Whitfield when I had the chance!” So, anyway, suggests the Protestant  two-boxer.  Whether or not the Calvinists were right, or  whether one should be a one-boxer or not, is a troubled question, question, and if it is ever solved conclusively conclusiv ely,, it will not be here. In any case, it  seems without a doubt that the Calvinists have a more rational justification than is usually  ascribed to them. After all, in response to the Now  w  25 July/August July/Aug ust 2009  Philosophy No

The Golden Rule Not So Golden Anymore

Stephen Steph en Ander Anderson son an anal alys yses es as he wou ould ld be an anal alys ysed ed

P

luralism is the most serious problem facing liberal democracies today. today. We can no longer ignore the fact  that cultures around the world are not simply different    profoundly so; and the most urgent area in from one another, but  profoundly  which this realization realization faces faces us is in the realm of morality. morality. Western democratic systems depend on there being at least a minimal consensus concerning national values, especially in regard to such things as justice, equality equality and human rights. rights. But global communication, economics and the migration of populations have placed new strains on Western Western democracies. Suddenly we find we must adjust to peoples whose suppositions about the ultimate ultima te values and goals of life are very different different from ours. A  clear lesson from events such as 9/11 is that disregarding these differences is not an option. Collisions between worldviews and  value systems systems can be cataclysmic cataclysmic.. Someh Somehow ow we must learn to manage this new situation. For a long time, liberal democratic optimism in the West has been shored up by suppositions about other cultures and their differences from us. The cornerpiece of this optimism has been been the assumption that whatever differences exist they cannot be too great. A core of ‘basic humanity’ humanity’ surely must tie all of the  world’’s moral system  world systemss together together – and if only we could could locate locate this core we might be able to forge agreements and alliances among groups that otherwise appear profoundly profoundly opposed. We could perhaps then shelve our cultural or ideological differences and get on with the more pleasant and productive business of celebrating our core agreement. agreement. One cannot fail to see how how this hope is repeated in order buoy optimism about the Middle East peace process, for example. It seems clear there is some similarity in the various intuitions about moral responsibility that people have had in various times and places places around the world. world. But what could the elusive universal universal ‘core’ of the many diverse moralities be? For over a century now, the chief candidate has been the Golden  Rule. The Golden Rule, whether articulated articulated as ‘Treat ‘Treat others as  you would wish to be treated’, or ‘Do unto others as you would have them do unto you’, or in any of the other several ways in  which it has been stated, is by far the most oft-cited formulation of universal universal morality morality.. Policy makers makers declare it. The media repeats repeats it. School textbooks textbooks promote promote it. Many ordinary  folks simply believe believe it. It is generally believed believed that not only  does it appear in all major cultures and religions, but that it can be detected in some submerged form even in moralities that  seem only dubiously compatible with it.  A few brief examples will have to suffice: there are simply  too many I could list. For example, in ‘A Short Short Essay on the Golden Rule’, ethicist Harry Gensler writes, “The go “The gold lden en ru rule le is en endo dors rsed ed by all the gr great eat wo worl rld d rel relig igio ions ns;; Je Jesu sus, s, Hi Hille llel, l, an and d Confu Co nfuciu ciuss us used ed it to su summ mmari arize ze th their eir eth ethic ical al tea teachi ching ngs. s. An And d for ma many ny cen centu turie riess the ide ideaa has be been en in influ fluent ential ial amo among ng pe peop ople le of ver veryy di diver verse se cu cultu lture res. s... .. Th These ese facts fac ts su sugg ggest est tha thatt the go gold lden en ru rule le ma mayy be an im impo porta rtant nt mo mora rall tr truth uth.” .” 26 Philosophy No Now  w   July/Au July/August gust 2009

In fact, Gensler argues that an awareness of the Golden Rule is the most important practical resource for the performance of  ethical thinking. Likewise, theologian theologian Wolfhart Wolfhart Pannenberg in  First rst Things  80), ‘When Everything is Permitted’ ( Fi  80), calls this kind of ‘rule of mutuality’ a basic concept of the natural law. law. Multiculturalism advocates also proudly cite the Golden Rule as the lynchpin of universal morality: the Scarboro Interfaith Mission presents what it perceives to be Golden Rule variations in twenty-one religious traditions from around the world (see later for some of them). them). It is also advocated by experts experts in moral eduEducation: Theory and Application cation. For instance, instance, in Moral Education: (eds Berkowitz & Oser, 1985), Thomas Lickona writes, “in a pluralisti pluralisticc society, respect for persons is common moral ground. It is something that all people, regardless of what else they believe, can agree on. Indeed, the best-known expression expression of the principle of respect – the Golden Rule – can be found in religions and traditions all over the world.”

 Wee can detect  W detect the Golden Golden Rule Rule in various various forms forms even in ethiethical reflection of the most most scholarly kind. For instance, it is not  hard to see that it re-emerges as essential components of things such as John Rawls’ ‘veil of ignorance’ and Jürgen Habermas’ ‘U’ principle. Golden Rule Universalism is also commonly disseminated in the press. press. For instance, we find Heather Heather MacDonald of the Manhattan Institute for Policy Studies announcing in USA Today for Oct 23rd, 2006, “The Golden Rule and innate human empathy provide ample guidance for moral behavior behavior.” .” She goes on to argue that from these two things essential moral principles “are available to people of all faiths or no faith at all.”  Thus Golden Rule Universalism Universalism is a recurrent theme. Clearly there are large numbers of intelligen intelligentt people operating under the assumption that something like the Golden Rule provides the essential essential core of a universal morality morality. It is hard, then, to fault the ordinary person for believing likewise. The Universality of the Golden Rule  That many people from a variety of situations seem intuitively to have discovered the values articulated by the Golden Rule would seem to imply that the Rule is not the exclusive possession of one culture or of a group of cultures, but taps into a universal moral moral recognition. recognition. At the very least, the Golden Rule seems to address the very widespre widespread ad tendency to think that morality means equity: that everyone should be treating everyone else else in the same way. way. Perhaps even even if we agree upon nothing else, else, we can be said to agree upon upon this rule. This might well prove to be our moral salvation in an increasingly  complex and conflicted world. But is it plausible to argue that the Golden Rule or some close  variation  vari ation of it articul articulates ates the hidde hidden n core of human human morality morality at  all times and in all places? In order to answer that, we must must look  more closely at the Golden Rule itself, especially at the variation variationss it appears in in our major religious and philosophical traditions.

It becomes obvious immediately that no matter how widespread we want the Golden Rule to be, there are some ethical systems syste ms that we have to admit do not have it. In fact, there are  disdain the Rule. In philosophy, a few traditions that actually  disdain philosophy, the Nietzschean tradition holds that the virtues implicit in the Golden Rule are antithetical to the true virtues of self-assertion and the will-to-power. will-to-power. Among religions, there are a good many  that prefer to emphasize the importance of self, cult, clan or tribe rather than of general others; and a good many other religions for whom large populations are simply excluded from goodwill, being labeled as outsiders, heretics or infidels. Humanist George Bernard Shaw also had no affection for the Rule. He famously (and paradoxically) quipped, “The “The Golden Rule is that there is no golden rule.” Shaw believed that  to assert any universal moral principle was to deprive the indi vidual of the chance chance to form his or her own morality morality.  Therefore,  Therefo re, there are some views of morality that simply  exclude the Golden Rule. But perhaps it would be unfair to say  that this fact alone militates against our belief in the universality of the Golden Rule. Perhaps we can say that although there are marginal  traditions  traditions that reject the Golden Rule, the bigger  and more important  traditions  traditions embrace it. Two Distinct Forms of the Golden Rule So let’s let’s consider some articulations of the Golden Rule as it  appears in the various major religious traditions, traditions, and see how   well we can get this last idea to work. Firstly, of course, there is the best-known account of the Golden Rule in the West. Here  Jesus says, says, “Do unto others others what you would have them them do unto  you.” Below is a list of some other articulations of this idea:

1) Buddhism: “Hurt not others in ways that you yourself   would find hurtful.” (Udana-Varga 5:18) 2) Confucianism: ‘Do not do to others what you do not want  them to do to you.” ( Analects  15:23)  15:23) 3) Hinduism: “This is the sum of duty: do not do to others  Mahabharata 5:1517)  what would cause pain if done to you.” ( Mahabharata 4) Humanism: “Don’t “Don’t do things you wouldn’t want to have done to you.” (The British Humanist Society) 5) Islam: “None of you [truly] believes until he wishes for his brother what he wishes for himself.” (#13 of Imam AlNawawi’s Forty Hadiths .) .) 6) Jainism: “A man should wander about treating all creatures as he himself would be treated.” (Sutrakritanga  1.11.33) 7) Judaism: “you shall love your neighbor as yourself.”  Leviticus  19:18) ( Leviticus   19:18) 8) Zoroastrianism: Zoroastrianism: “That nature alone is good which refrains from doing unto another whatsoever is not good for itself.” (Dadistan-i-dinik 94:5) (Quotations (Quotatio ns selected from the Scarboro Missions list.)  This provides us with a good sample of at least some of the major equivalents equivalents of the Golden Rule. Since the wording of  each is somewhat different, we can begin by saying that probably the outstanding feature is that they all seem to suggest that  there is some kind of relationship between how we ought to treat others and what we would wish for ourselves. ourselves. Superficially,, this might lead us to think these injunctions all amount  cially

to the same thing. But look again. again. Reading carefully carefully,, we will note that some of these statements appear in a positive form (‘Do…’)) and some appear in a  negative form (‘Do not do…’). (‘Do…’  Jesus’ version, version, plus numbers 5, 6 and 7, might be called positive, whereas all the rest are in the negative form. Considering the Negative Golden Rule Does it make a difference? difference? Some people people argue that the two types of versions versions are functionally functionally the same thing. But they are not. Consider, for instance, that your children are fighting and  you say to them, “Leave “Leave each other other alone!” This would be the negative commandment. On the other hand, “Be nice to your sibling!” would be the positive commandment. Anyone who has had children (or siblings) will quickly recognize that it is easier to enforce commands in the negative  (ie not to do things) than it  is to enforce commands  in the positive (ie to do something).  This difference difference is substantial, and we can see how it works out in practice. If we have only a negative duty, duty, an obligation to avoid harming people, that can be construed as imposing minimal obligations. obligations. We simply are not allowed to do anything actively harmful – anything additional is left to our discretion. In fact, the negative version may be fulfilled (if we wish to con ignoring  our strue it that way) simply by  ignoring   our neighbor, for as long as we are not directly implicated in his harm, we have not  transgressed transgres sed the negative version of Golden Rule ethics.  This negativ negativee version version of the Golden Golden Rule Rule is particula particularly rly minimal if we happen to be among those millions of people in the  world  worl d who believe believe that that a person’ person’s lot in life, life, even his suffer suffering, ing, is caused by fate or  karma: to ‘not do harm’ might then mean that   we have a duty duty to leave leave him alone. alone. Perh Perhaps aps we might might think it is in his ultimate best interest to suffer, and thereby to achieve his penance, enlightenment, or moksha. To be sure, we might not  see things this way, and we might decide to help the sufferer. But – and here is the key point – under the negative version of  the Golden Rule we would have no  obligation to help him. The Positive Version  The positive version version of the Golden Rule has somewhat different implications. implications. Under it, we would be obliged to help a sufferer, suffere r, on the assumpt assumption ion that if we ourselve ourselvess were suffering  we would want to be helped. Actually Actually,, ultimately the positive  version imposes imposes a burden on us to bring others up to whatever standard of well-being well-being we would wish for ourselves. ourselves. Of the three positive versions we have listed, 6 and 7 make this most  clear,, but 5 could also imply it. clear Inevitably,, this points to a supplementary Inevitably supplementary problem. If it is our duty to ‘love’ our ‘neighbor’ (version 7) or our ‘brother’ (version 5), then we might well ask, “Who is my ‘neighbor’?” or “Who is my ‘brother’?” Does it only include people of our own kind who live close to us and with whom we have natural sympathies? Or does it include people who live in distant lands, and  whose suffering suffering thus thus seems remote remote and unreal? Does Does it include men and women; children; people of a different tribe or language? Does it include those who deny our cultural or religious traditions? Does it include criminals, the unborn or the physically challenged? challenged? Thus one problem with even the positive version of the Golden Rule is that it is escapable depending upon  who one identifies as the entitled recipient of the goodwill. Now  w  27 July/August July/Au gust 2009  Philosophy No

 This problem arose when the Christian version was first  articulated.. A young scholar of the Jewish religious Law  articulated approached Jesus and asked him what he would have to do if he  was to inherit inherit eternal eternal life. life. Jesus replie replied, d, quoting, quoting, among among other other things, the Judaic Golden Rule. But the passage says that the law  student, wishing to justify himself, asked “And who is my neighbor?” – to which Jesus told the famous ‘Good Samaritan’ parable in reply (see  Luke 10:29). The problem highlighted by the  young scholar is that people can still find an escape-clause from the positive version of the Golden Rule by choosing not  to see someone as a ‘neighbor’. Can the Positive Golden Rule Work?  Any rule, rule, golden golden or otherwise, otherwise, that that demands demands no more more than ignoring one’s one’s neighbor (ie, the negative version) has a doubtful claim to reflect the essential core of human morality. It would be only marginally better if it were improved to the point that it  mandated goodwill only to a select membership, not to the human race at large (ie a limited  positive version). Yet perhaps we still have a way to save the Golden Rule. Let us suppose that, as suggested earlier, we eliminated all those peripheral moral systems that reject the Golden Rule outright; and furthermore, that   we add the claim claim (though (though it seems seems rather rather snobbis snobbish h to say it) that  traditions that have only the negative form of the Golden Rule  part  of are possessed of only  part   of the essential core of morality. But  perhaps that is fair, and they are capable of taking the next step, and converting to a positive view of the Golden Rule. If, then,  we could could get all major  religious  religious and philosophical traditions to admit the validity of the positive Golden Rule, could we at last  say we had discovered a secure core for a universal morality?  That might might initially sound sound plausible. plausible. Perhaps Perhaps we can get  people to see that we owe our neighbor whatever we would  wish for ourselves. ourselves. Some Some Golden Rule Rule advocates advocates call this ‘reciprocity’. Reciprocity means equal give and return. It views morality as a balanced equation, in which a person who receives the benefit of a moral action has a responsibility to respond in kind. Such moral treatment of others requires things like being fair, equitable or even-handed. It means ‘I’m-okay-if-you’reokay’, or ‘you-scratch-my-back-and-I’ll-scratch-yours’. Reciprocal responsibility between citizens sounds like a pretty good  way to run a society, society, especially especially a liberal democracy democracy,, at first. However,, there are good reasons to suspect reciprocity will However not work on its own. Many aspects of society cannot work on simply an equitable give-and-take give-and-take basis: something higher and much more morally  demanding is involved in maintaining a soci sacrifice. ety. Societies require the principle of  sacrifice  This will come as no surprise to anyone  who has been married, or who has had children. Marriages simply do not function unless the partners are prepared to make sacrifices without expectation of return, and children certainly cannot be expected to repay the sacrifices parents find it necessary  to make in raising them. Those who have been in a serving profession – a teacher, a cleric, a doctor, a charity worker, a counselor, or even a politician (sometimes) – know that  28 Philosophy No Now  w   July/Au July/August gust 2009

their profession could not continue without what they contribute to the public welfare without expectation of reciprocity reciprocity..  A society cannot survive without the things people do while not demanding that society should equitably repay them. But if  reciprocity is not enough to ground a society, society, we can hardly  argue that it represe represents nts the essentia essentiall core of human morality. morality. No principle of equity would be sufficient to make people see the value of sacrifice. Rather, Rather, they need a reason to accept  inequity. They must be content to render, for the good of  others, things that cannot be returned. The very height of this behavior is the one who, like a soldier in a good cause, lays down his life in order that others may live freely. Such we regard nearly as moral ‘saints’. The Platinum Rule  Theree is even a level  Ther level of moralit moralityy above the the level level of simple simple sacrifice. Sacrifice for an acknowledged cause may have some attractions. Yet what about those who make sacrifices for those  whom they they do not know know, or even for for those who are, are, on some some level, their enemies? Perhaps we would have to call the principle behind such sacrifices the Platinum Rule, for it seems so far above even the positive articulation of the Golden Rule that most of us find it hard to imagine. Yet it’s found in our moral traditions; for instance as, “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy’. But I tell you: Love your enemies and  Matthew ew 5:43-45.) pray for those who persecute you...” ( Matth I think anyone who views the case objectively must admit  that this principle of sacrifice represents represents a higher moral value than the laissez-faire attitude of the Golden Rule in its negative form, and a higher moral value than the reciprocity principle principle of its positive form as well. The chief criticism that can be raised against the Platinum Rule is that it requires more than most of us are able to deliver deliver.. However, However, that may say less about  the Platinum Rule than about human nature. Nevertheless, Neverthe less, the Platinum Rule has influence influenced d at least one modern political project, the South African Truth Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Commission. This aspires to transcend the reciprocal  justice, and to orient a solution to the higher values of  idea of  justice mercy and forgiveness . Given that injustice and inequality have been so rife in modern history, history, it may never be possible to restore justice to our world through any principle of reciprocity.. In such conditions, the higher principles of the Platinum ity Rule may offer the only hope, as it did in South Africa.

     M      O      C  .      D      N      I      M      E      N      O      F      O      E      B  .      W      W      W      T      I      S      I      V      E      S      A      E      L

     P  .      E

     G      A      M      I      S      I      H      T      E      C      U      D      O      R      P      E      R      O      T      N      O      I      S      S      I      M      R      E      P      R      O      F      D      O      L

     G      M      O

     T

     O      T      S      K      N      A      H

     T

Concluding Concerns Several things become apparent even from this brief survey  of the Golden Rule: • It is not actually universal. • It has two forms, negative and positive positive.. • The two forms create very different results. • Both forms fall short of requiring the sacrifices society needs. needs. • Neither form represe represents nts the highest moral standards.  At this point point perhaps perhaps I may be accused accused of of having a spoilsp spoilsport  ort  disposition, for casting doubt upon a rule of life so widely celebrated, thus chipping away at a source of common moral optimism. I can only reply that it should be a source source of wonder that  a belief so open to criticism should be so widely celebrated, adding that optimism is no virtue if glibly invested. If, as I have suggested, we stand in need of a core universal morality upon  which we can can base liberal liberal democr democratic atic social social projects projects,, then we  would  woul d be ill-advise ill-advised d to embrace embrace a counterfe counterfeit; it; for counterf counterfeits eits notoriously prove unreliable at the crucial moment. moment. Thus the Golden Rule, in either its positive or negative articulations, cannot be the gold standard of moral behavior: it cannot support  the things liberal democratic nations need in the 21st Century – like consensus on policy, general standards of justice, and a warrant for human rights. First, it is not universal; but even even if it is generally reflected in all  major  cultures,  cultures, the Golden Rule can still hardly be the core of all morality. morality. It offers little resistance to  weak,, inconsiste  weak inconsistent nt or morally-q morally-quest uestionab ionable le applicatio applications, ns, and it  fails to reflect our highest highest moral standards. Thus we should be concerned about the enthusiasm with which some people tend to embrace something like the Golden Rule as a cure-all for the

modern problems of value pluralism; and we should wonder  what that that tendency tendency tells tells us about our our unwillingne unwillingness ss to squarely  squarely  face the fact that cultures have disharmonious moral moral styles. It is true that if we could find a universal rule of morality – something like  the Golden Rule – it would help us resolve a great  many serious moral moral and political problems. But the fact remains  not  the that the Golden Rule is very clearly  not   the core of morality, and  yet it has been been embraced embraced as such such nonethele nonetheless. ss.  Moreover,  Moreove r, whatever whatever advantages to democratic democratic politics may  come from Golden Rule universalism, it also has an insidious side. Its subtext is the denial of the unique moral contributions of diverse societies in the name of creating superficial harmony.. We may well doubt that people who indwell particular mony cultural/religious cultural/re ligious traditions and who have long labored under the impression that they have unique moral positions to contribute to humanity would be happy to hear that they have been wrong, and that their whole heritage can be boiled down to the same thing as everyone else’ else’s. We might also have a hard time convincing them that our attitude was not born more of cultural tone-deafness than of tolerance.  The arguments here against Golden Golden Rule universalism are obvious ones. Very clearly, we ought  to   to know better, but we appear to have a strong emotional stake in  not  knowing  knowing better. Our refusal to face this has to be troubling to any rational person, and a source of concern to anyone genuinely interested interested in pursuing mutual understanding in a pluralistic world. © STEPHEN L. ANDERS ANDERSON ON 2009

Stephen L. Anderson is a high school teacher, teacher, and a PhD candidate in the Philosophy of Education at the University of Western Western Ontario. Now  w  29 July/August July/Au gust 2009  Philosophy No

   r    e     h     t    o    &

MORAL MOMENTS MOMENTS by Joel Mark Marks s.

From Here to There: A Ph Phii-Fi Fi Inv Invest estig igati ation on

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ome say th ome that at pe pers rson onal al id iden enti tity ty is cl clos osel elyy co conn nnec ecte ted d to memo me mory ry.. Ho Howe weve verr, in an ea earl rlie ierr co colu lumn mn (‘ (‘Wh Who o Ar Aree You ou?’ ?’ in Is Issu suee 61) 61),, I co comm mmen ente ted, d, “Y “You ou co coul uld d su suff ffer er am amne nesi siaa an and d have ha ve th thee co cont nten ents ts of yo your ur mi mind nd er eras ased ed,, bu butt yo you u wo woul uld d st stil illl be  you. Why believe that? Well, suppose you knew you were about  to su suff ffer er to tota tall me memo mory ry lo loss ss an and d th then en be th thro rown wn in into to a ca caul uldr dron on of bo boil ilin ing g oi oil: l: wo woul uld d yo you u no nott fe feel el dr drea ead d on be beha half lf of  yourself  ?”  yourself ?” It is ce cert rtai ainl nlyy my in intu tuit itio ion n th that at I wo woul uld d ex expe peri rien ence ce th that at dr drea ead. d. Butt I kn Bu know ow th that at no nott ev ever eryb ybod odyy sh shar ares es my in intu tuit itio ion. n. Do yo you? u? Even Ev en if yo you u do do,, an in intu tuit itio ion n is no nott a pro roof of.. A pe pers rson on ca can n ha have ve an in intu tuit itio ion n th that at so some meth thin ing g te terr rrib ible le is ab abou outt to ha happ ppen en to th them em,, butt th bu then en no noth thin ing g do does es;; or th that at so some meth thin ing g wo wond nder erfu full is ab abou outt to happen hap pen,, but the then n so somet methin hing g ter terrib rible le doe does. s.  What would be a pr proo ooff th that at on onee an and d th thee sa same me pe pers rson on ex exis iste ted d befo be fore re an and d af afte terr su such ch am amne nesi sia? a? It se seem emss sa safe fe to as assu sume me th that at a exis ists ts bot oth h be befo fore re an and d af afte ter; r; so if it we were re no nott th thee sa same me  person ex pers pe rson on,, wo woul uld d it be tw two o di diff ffer eren entt pe pers rson ons? s? Th Then en th thee pe pers rson on afte af terr am amne nesi siaa wo woul uld d be a br bran andd-ne new w pe pers rson on,, wh who o wa wass li lite tera rall lly  y  ‘bor ‘b orn n ye yest ster erda day’ y’ (o (orr a mi minu nute te ag ago) o).. An And d ye yett un unli like ke a ne newb wbor orn n babe ba be,, th this is pe pers rson on,, we ar aree su supp ppos osin ing g fo forr th thee sa sake ke of th thee ex exam ampl ple, e, is fu full llyy eq equi uipp pped ed wi with th ad adul ultt kn know owle ledg dgee of th thee wo worl rld, d, ha havi ving ng fo forrgott go tten en on only ly th thee de deta tail ilss of hi hiss or he herr id iden enti tity ty as so so-a -and nd-s -so. o. Th Thus us,, s/h /hee mi migh ghtt be a flu luen entt spe peak aker er of Fr Fren ench ch,, but no nott re resp spon ond d to the nam namee ‘Je ‘Jean/ an/ne’ ne’.. If su subs bseq eque uent ntly ly Je Jean an/n /ne’ e’ss fu full ll me memo mory ry re retu turn rned ed,, th then en we  would seem to have the proof we desired. Perhaps there would also al so be me memo mory ry of th thee am amne nesi sicc ep epis isod ode: e: “I re reme memb mber er th that at I ha had d no id idea ea wh who o I wa was… s… li like ke th thos osee mo mome ment ntss af afte terr aw awak aken enin ing g wh when en som omet etim imes es one doe oess no nott kn kno ow whe here re on onee is or ev even en wh who o on onee i s. ” O r p e r h a p s i t w o u l d j u s t b e a b l a n k : a n a m n e s i a o f t h e amnesia. “All I know is that I was unlo loccki kin ng the door to my  apar ap artm tmen ent, t, an and d no now… w… he here re I am in th this is ho hosp spit ital al wa ward rd.. It is li like ke awake aw akeni ning ng fr from om a dr drea eaml mless ess sl sleep eep.” .” Si Sinc ncee on onee is pr pres esum umab ably  ly  thee sa th same me pe pers rson on af afte terr aw awak aken enin ing, g, so th thee am amne nesi siac ac mu must st be th thee same pers person. on. Butt le Bu lett us pu putt th thee qu ques esti tion on sp spec ecul ulat ativ ivel ely  y à la sci-fi – or as I like to call it, phi-fi (for  philosoph fict ctio ion) n).. Su Supp ppos osee yo you u  philosophical  ical  fi ente en tere red d a de devi vice ce th that at wa wass su supp ppos osed ed to tr tran ansp spor ortt yo you u to a di dist stan ant  t  loca lo cati tion on by me mean anss of a li ligh ghtt be beam am.. Th This is so so-c -cal alle led d te tele lepo port rter er  would have great advantages over normal means of conveyance bec ecaaus usee it wou ould ld no nott ha have ve to ca carr rryy a ph phys ysic icaal body dy,, th ther ereb eby  y  avoi av oidi ding ng th thee ne need ed fo forr ve vehi hicl clee an and d fu fuel el,, an and d wo woul uld d mo move ve pe peop ople le (and (a nd th thin ings gs)) at th thee fa fast stes estt sp spee eed d po poss ssib ible le,, na name mely ly,, th thee sp spee eed d of  ligh li ght. t. Ec Econ onom omic icss wo woul uld d di dict ctat atee th thee un univ iver ersa sall ad adop opti tion on of su such ch a metho me thod d of tra travel vel as so soon on as it be becam camee tec techno hnolo logic gical ally ly fea feasi sibl ble. e. Butt ho Bu how w ex exac actl tlyy wo woul uld d it wo work rk?? Fo Forr ex exam ampl ple, e, wh what at ha happ ppen enss 30 Philosophy No Now  w  July/Aug July/August ust 2009

to th thee bod odyy th that at en ente ters rs th thee de devi vice ce if it is no nott tr tran ansspo port rted ed to th thee other location? If this is a one-way tick ckeet, then it mig igh ht be dest de stro roye yed, d, si sinc ncee pr pres esum umab ably ly a new bo body dy wo woul uld d be co cons nstr truc ucted ted at th thee de dest stin inat atio ion. n. Al Alll on onee wo woul uld d ne need ed fo forr th thee te tele lepo port rtat atio ion n itse it self lf is a pl plan an of th thee bo body dy to be co comm mmun unic icat ated ed vi viaa th thee el elec ectr troomagn ma gnet etic ic si sign gnal al.. It wo woul uld d be li like ke se send ndin ing g a CA CAT T-s -sca can n ov over er a radi ra dio o li link nk.. Ju Just st as to toda dayy an im imag agee is cr crea eate ted d at th thee de dest stin inat atio ion, n, so in th thee fu futu ture re wh whol olee bod odie iess co coul uld d be (r (re) e)cr crea eate ted d fr fro om ra raw  w  mater ma teria ials ls,, wh which ich wo woul uld d pe perh rhap apss be rec recyc ycle led d fr from om bo bodi dies es tha that  t  had ha d be been en te tele lepo port rted ed an and d di disc scar arde ded d at that site. So in you wa walk lk on Ear artth, an and d ou outt you walk on Ma Mars rs,, whe herre a re rece ceiv ivin ing g sta tati tio on ha had d bee een n set up by th thee pio ione neer erss who ha had d rock ro ckete eted d th there ere be befo fore re te telep lepor orta tati tion on wa wass po poss ssib ible le.. If yo you u we were re a commu co mmuter ter,, th then en per perhap hapss yo you u co coul uld d ree reent nter er yo your ur or origi iginal nal bo body  dy  back ba ck on Ea Eart rth h at th thee en end d of th thee da dayy. So in inst stea ead d of co cons nstr truc ucti ting ng a ne new w bo body dy fr from om sc scra ratc tch, h, th thee CA CAT T sc scan an tr tran ansm smit itte ted d fr from om Ma Mars rs  would be used to make the appropriate changes to your originall bo na body dy an and d br brai ain n on Ea Eart rth h su such ch th that at wh when en yo you u re resu sume med d co connscio sc ious usne ness ss yo you u wo woul uld d re reme memb mber er wh what at yo you u ha had d do done ne on Ma Mars rs.. (But (B ut if yo you u ha had d ac acci cide dent ntal ally ly sc scar arre red d yo your urse self lf wh whil ilee on Ma Mars rs,, yo you u coul co uld d pu putt in a sp spec ecia iall re requ ques estt no nott to ha have ve th thee sc scar ar in inse sert rted ed on onto to  your Earthbound body body.) .) Does Do es te tele lepo port rtat atio ion n ma make ke se sens nse? e? It se seem emss to me th that at th thee te tech ch-nolo no logy gy I ha have ve de desc scri ribe bed d wi will ll be pe perf rfec ectl tlyy po poss ssib ible le in st stri rict ctly  ly  mate ma teri rial al te term rms. s. Th That at is is,, it sh shou ould ld be po poss ssib ible le so some meda dayy to cr crea eate te a new body on the plan of an old one down to the nth detail.  This is really only a further elaboration of the commonplace of  manu ma nufa fact ctur ure, e, is it no not, t, wh wher erei ein n an anyy nu numb mber er of co copi pies es ca can n be madee fr mad from om a si singl nglee de desig sign? n? The tr tric icky ky pa part rt,, how howeve everr, is tha thatt now   we would be dealing with a person. Why is this problemati problematic? c?  There are several reasons. Consid Consider, er, for example, that if instead of re retu turn rnin ing g to Ea Eart rth h yo you u de deci cide ded d to li live ve on Ma Mars rs,, an and d me mean an- while the technici technician an on Earth neglected to destro destroyy the body that  had ha d be been en CA CAT T-s -sca cann nned ed.. Wou ould ld th ther eree no now w be tw two o of yo you? u? We coul co uld d im imag agin inee th thee Ea Eart rth h pe pers rson on ca call llin ing g hi hiss ow own n nu numb mber er on hi hiss celll ph cel phon onee and hav having ing th thee Mar Marss pe pers rson on ans answer wer th thee ph phone one (w (whi hich ch had also been teleported) and having a conversation with himse him self. lf. “So “So,, wha what’ t’s th thee we weat ather her lik likee on yo your ur pl plane anet? t?””  Wee can multip  W multiply ly such scena scenarios rios ad inf infini initum tum, and at this poin po int, t, I th thin ink, k, ou ourr in intu tuit itio ions ns wo woul uld d co comp mple lete tely ly br brea eakk do down wn..  This is another reason why intuitions cannot be relied upon for knowle kno wledg dge: e: th they ey ca can n con contra tradic dictt one ano anothe therr. Bu Butt may maybe be the there re is a ki kind nd of kn know owle ledg dgee to be de deri rive ved d fr from om co cont ntra radi dict ctio ion n as su such ch.. In oth other er wor words ds,, whe when n our int intuit uition ionss do gen genera erate te con contra tradic dictio tions, ns, perh pe rhap apss th this is te tell llss us th that at wh what at we ar aree th thin inki king ng ab abou outt ma make kess no sens se nse. e. In th this is ca case se we ar aree ta talk lkin ing g ab abou outt th thee co conc ncep eptt of a pe pers rson on..

Hence, there may be something deeply flawed about personhood or the self. Thinkers from the Buddha to today’s Tom  Metzinger have certainly certainly thought so. Insofar as I can rank my own intuitions, my feeling is that teleportation such as I have described is impossible. I mean that no  would d be convey conveyed ed from from one locat location ion to anothe another. r. A person person  person  pers on woul enters the sender and a person emerges from the receiver, but  they are numerically distinct, albeit qualitatively identical. Thus, the situation is not like the amnesiac, not to mention, the dreamless sleeper. The difference is precisely that in teleportation there has not been a continuation of the same body. From this, two

further implications can be drawn: (1) Any person entering a teleporter whose body is destroyed dies  and (2) personal identity  resides essentially in a particular physical body body.. By the way, a fictional version of this argument, which draws out the implications more direfully, can be found in John C. Snider’s online science-fiction magazine SciFiDimensions here:  www.scifidimens  www .scifidimensions.com/Oc ions.com/Oct05/teleporter t05/teleporter.htm. .htm. © JOEL MARKS 2009

 Joel Marks is Professor Emeritus of Phil osophy at the University of   New Haven in West West Haven, Connecticut. More of his essays can be  found at at moralmoments.com

Thus Conscience Doth Food for Thought Make Crickets of Us All

Tim Madigan is startled by the form of the angel on his shoulder.

 Take the straight  Take straight and narrow narrow path and if you start to slide, give a little whistle! Give a little whistle!  And always let your conscience conscience be your guide. guide.  As sung by Jiminy Cricket Cricket in Walt Walt Disney’s Pinocchio

thicists such as Thomas Aquinas, Joseph Butler and Immanuel Kant grappled mightily with the question of  the nature of our conscience – that inner voice which tells us when we are acting rightly or wrongly. wrongly. But for all their learned writings, none of these wise gentlemen have had as major an impact on the popular understanding of the conscience as Walt Disney, Disney, who gave us its best known representative – Jiminy Cricket, the dapper, devil-may-care bug with a song in his heart who is always willing to give advice to his pal Pinocchio on proper behavior behavior.. Voiced by the beloved Cliff  Edwards (known to all the world as ‘Ukelele Ike’), Jiminy is the kind of friend anyone would long to have. 2010 will mark the 70th anniversary of the film, which has just been released in a spiffy 2-DVD Platinum Edition to mark the occasion. Coincidentally, a new edition of Carlo Collodi’s 1883  Le  Avventure  Avve nture di Pinocchio Pinocchio has also just been published, ably translated by Geoffrey Brock, with an introduction by Umberto Eco. Like most people in the English-speaking world, I had never read the original. Eco notes:

E

I remember the discomfort we Italian kids felt on first seeing Walt   Pinocchio on the big screen. I should say at once that, watching it  Disney’s Pinocchio Disney’s again now, I find it to be a delightful film. But at the time, we were struck 

by the stark difference between the  American Pinocchio and the PinocPinocchio we had come to know both through Collodi’s original text and through the book’s early illustrators... And though I admit that  Disney’s Jiminy Cricket is an extraordinary invention, he has nothing to do with Collodi’s Talking Cricket,  who was an actual insect: insect: no top hat, no tailcoat (or was it a frock coat?),  Pinocchio, p.ix) no umbrella. ( Pinocchio, The original Talking Cricket

Indeed, not only is the Talking Cricket – a rather minor figure in the picaresque picaresque tale – undress undressed ed and unnamed (“Jiminy Cricket!” being a popular American way of nicely  saying “Jesus Christ!” when upset), he isn’t even Pinocchio’s friend. The cricket first appears in Chapter IV, where it is stated that he has lived in Geppetto’s home for over a century  (unlike the vagabond Jiminy, who scuttles in to get out of the cold at the very moment of Pinocchio’s ‘birth’). He scolds the marionette boy for his misbehavior which includes kicking people in the shin, lying, and causing Geppetto to get arrested by pretending to be physically abused by him: “Woe to any  little boy who rebels against his parents and turns his back on his father’s house! He will come to no good in this world, and sooner or later he’ll be filled with bitter regret,” the cricket  solemnly intones (p.14). Wise words, but not very friendly. He further chastises Pinocchio for shirking his household responsibilities, and for not desiring a proper education. If you won’t  go to school, he warns, you’ll have to get a job to support  July/August 2009  Philosophy Now 31

A pre-Disney Pinocchio

 yourself. “Of all the trades  yourself. in the world,” Pinocchio replies, “there’s only one that really suits me... That  of eating, drinking, sleeping, playing, and wandering wherever I like from sunup to sundown.” The cricket laments that this attitude will only lead to the poor house or to prison. When the puppet   warns him that his gloomgloomanddoom prognostications are starting to get on his nerves, the cricket calls him a blockhead, which is literally true, but not   very nice nice to say say.. Much to my surpri surprise, se, Pinocchio reacts to such rebukes in a manner very different than in the Disney   version, where he is always always contrite contrite after being being upbraided. upbraided. In the Collodi original, he grabs a wooden mallet and flings it at  the criticizing cricket. “Perhaps he didn’t mean to hit him at all, but unfortunately he hit him square on the head. With his last  breath the poor Cricket cried cree-cree-cree and then died on the spot, stuck to the wall.” (p.15) Wow! That  was  was uncalled uncalled for for..  As Eco points points out, Collodi’ Collodi’s original puppet puppet is much much more mischievous and genuinely naughty than the rather goodygoody Pinocchio in the film version. However, However, he is never deliberately malicious. Like Mark Twain’s Huck Finn (whose own sense of right and wrong is beautifully delineated in philosopher Jonathan Bennett’s classic article ‘The Conscience of Huckleberry Finn’) he is in need of a conscience. It’s just too bad that the one he finds is such a prig. Walt Disney astutely  realized that his puppet needed a pal, not a know-it-all. Yet  Collodi’s Pinocchio seems to do fine without the bug, who later reappears as a ghost, and at the end of the tale is charitable towards the puppet, when he sees how compassionate he has become toward Geppetto. When Pinocchio asks for the Cricket’s forgiveness, he replies “I’ll have mercy on the father and also on the son. But I wanted to remind you of the cruel treatment I received, to show you that in this world, whenever possible, we should treat others kindly, if we wish to be treated  with similar kindness in our hour of need.” (pp.154-155). (pp.154-155). As the Golden Rule tells us, don’t hurl mallets at others’ heads if   you don’t don’t want mallets mallets hurled at your own. Collodi’s book is filled with many bizarre characters and situations not found in the film. This is not surprising, since it was  written  writt en original originally ly as an ongoing ongoing seria serial, l, very very loosely loosely struc structured tured.. Collodi, a Florentine journalist and freethinker whose real name  was Carlo Lorenz Lorenzini, ini, becam becamee bored bored with with his his own own creation creation,, and tried to kill him off. He did this by having the Fox and the Cat  (called Honest John and Gideon in the film) hang Pinocchio from a tree – thereby getting his own comeuppance for killing 32 Philosophy No Now  w  July/August 2009

the cricket, appropriately enough by means of another wooden contrivance. But, just as Arthur Conan Doyle found out when he tried to do away with his creation Sherlock Holmes by  having him plunge to his death from the top of the Reichenbach Falls, the public wouldn’t stand for such an ending, and Collodi  was compe compelled lled to bring bring him him back back to to life. life.  The Disney Disney movie movie version version stands stands on its own own as a true cinecinematic masterpiece. In many ways, it’s even more disturbing than the original. For instance, in Collodi’s work, the Fox and the Cat pay the price for their evil-doing by becoming blind and paralyzed. Not so in the Disney story, where we never learn  what becomes of them. And I for one will never forget forget the chilling scene where the wayward boys turn into donkeys, and cry out for their mothers. Truly the stuff of nightmares.  Walt  W alt Disney Disney was smart to spruce spruce up the the Talkin alking g Cricket, Cricket, putting on a top hat, tying up his white tie, and brushing up his tails. Jiminy Cricket earns his 18 Carat Gold Official Conscience Badge from the Blue Fairy by giving good advice through personal example and sincere friendship.  As Walt Walt Disney Disney so astute astutely ly unders understood tood,, nobody nobody likes to be scolded. We We want a conscience with a touch of class! © DR TIMOTHY J. MADIGAN 2009

Tim Madigan’s favorite Disney character is J. Worthington Foulfellow.

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 Josh Tomlin Tomlin attends an honest job interview, while Natasha Morgan and Gary W. Gilbert philosophise poetically.

Ar t Corner 

“Ah yes, I believe that I am a slightly above-average human being. Do I qualify?” “Well, that depends, young man. Are you an exceptional  slightly above-average human being?” “I’m sorry?” “Ah, allow me to explain myself. Can you demonstrate an exceptional capacity to satisfy all of the criteria specified by us as requisite in order to do what we want our employees to do? For example, will you be able to draw a rose-tinted veil over the eyes of both your colleagues and yourself, as you do jobs a monkey could do?  Ha-humph. I’m sorry. Allow me to excuse myself – human beings are better workers than monkeys! Of  course they are! They’re more intelligent . But, there is something else. Human beings are social creatures. It is very important that they be kept amused. So, are you a work horse that   will be able able to entertain our other work horses? horses? Will you be able to make jokes about your mundane tasks? In short, can  you have fun, fun, young man? Do you you enjoy life? life?  Hmm?” “Well, yes, I – ” “How?” “Sorry? Oh. Well... I like reading.” “Reading! Well, I say! What do you like reading, son?” “Philosophy. I think that – ” “Philosophy! Philosophy, eh?  Hmmm. I suppose you like to think about the, the... the, er... bigger picture?  Hmm?” “Yes, you could call it that. I like to try and see things as they really are, you know? To – ”

“Yes yes yes, I understand. The bigger picture is a fascinating thing, a fascinating thing indeed... But each of us has a different bigger picture, you must understand. You see, it depends on the size of the picture with which one starts. Now  my picture – MY picture, my boy – is a big picture, and my big picture is, is... well, let’s say, ‘considerably large’. And as such it is quite hard to hang. So I leave it be, up in the attic.” He taps his temple with his forefinger. “But you, my boy – I imagine that   you are forev  trying to hang up your bigger picture. I can see  forever  er  trying it in your shoulders right now. But now I’m going to ask you, boy – on whose wall are you going to hang that great big bigger picture of yours? Not mine, my boy! No, certainly not! Let me show you something.” He leads them out of the office. “Before you is the shop floor. You can see the workers doing their work. Their work is on their desks, so they look at their desks. Do you see? Good. Now, suppose, just suppose for a moment... Are you following me boy?” “Yes, sir.” “Good. Well, just suppose that you were to hang your bigger picture on the wall over there – which you wouldn’t, wouldn’t, because it’ it’ss my wall. But anyway, suppose you hung it there. I dare say that it’s a fascinating thing, your bigger picture; and I dare say that all of the workers would think so too. They love to be entertained, as I was saying. But you must understand! I cannot have them looking away from their desks!” © JO JOSH SH TO TOML MLIN IN 20 2009 09

 Joshh is a rece  Jos recently ntly qual qualified ified bar barrist rister er,, but is stil stilll hunt hunting ing that elus elusive ive job! 

‘The mission of poetry is to to make us alive’ alive’ – Lorca

But, Socrates

I will dance with you one more time and you will be my prince so I will die in your arms  while the party members arrive and shuffle their feet in the corridor outside,  while you tell yourself  it’ss the party, the politics of it all that counts, it’ more than the dance.

I like to compare  A chair and a stool Or a horse and a mule  To  T o induce, of course,  The chairness of chair Or the horseness of horse.

 And I’ll be sent to bed and you’ll have your most serious meeting debating the life of the party  and Stalin and Marx and Lenin, and I, the heart and the soul of the dance, hunched on the stairs,  will creep down so much later to ask for maybe could you spare me perhaps a glass of water? © NATASHA MORGAN 2009

 Natashaa Morgan  Natash Morgan teaches teaches art ther therapy apy in London. London.

But, Socrates, I have to confess I can make quite a mess Of the essence of ness, If you please.  The sine qua non of a stone Is its stoniness,  That’ss a certain text.  That’ But sine-qua-nonin  sine-qua-noniness  ess  I had best let alone Like a stone unperplexed In its loneliness. © GARY W. GILBERT 2009

Gary W. W. Gilbert is a writer living liv ing in Wyoming. July/August 2009  Philosophy Now 33

Letters When inspiration strikes, don’t bottle it up! Now  w  Write to me at: Philosophy  No 43a Jerningham Jerningham Road •London •SE14 5NQ, U.K. U.K. or email [email protected] Keep them short and keep them coming! Heroes,, Hatre Heroes Hatred d & Human Rights DEAR  E  EDITOR : I very much enjoyed   Philosophy Now, and Now, and whilst  Issue 73 of  Philosophy not a comics reader or superhero fan, nevertheless neverthe less I found the related articles interesting interesti ng reading. I was particularly  struck by Todd Walters’ review of the recent Batman film (which I have not  seen), and his wise conclusion that in times of crisis we must ask “how to reconcile order which is not oppression  with freedom which is not license.” Unfortunately, the review was rather spoiled for me by the nonsense about  hatred he endorsed. Walters’ first praised the Batman films for their exploration of  moral ambiguity, but then he began to spout reductionist nonsense which appeared to support an over-simplified Good Guys vs Bad Guys worldview. His citing of Berman’s thesis that all hatred is the result of an ‘irrational paroxysm’, and his conclusion that “The wildest of  hatreds do not need a cause outside of  ourselves” is unhistorical, patronising and downright dangerous. Presumably  Russians, Iranians and various other people who live outside the liberal West are more prone to these paroxysms than we are: the fact that they may have something to rebel against is conveniently dismissed by this thesis. After all, these people are simply being irrational, so we need not take them seriously or examine the circumstances that might drive them towards their actions.  Moreover,  Moreove r, Hitler and Stalin were certainly not nihilists. Both had their own moral codes and both believe believed d in something. Stalin was well-read in Marx, Engels and Lenin, and probably  obtained his messianic streak from studying in a seminary. Hitler was influenced by Nietzsche, Houston Stewart  Chamberlain Chamberl ain and Herbert Spencer, among others. Both believed what they   were doing was right and morally justified, and both were a product of their times. Why was Hitler considered a joke in Germany in the 1920s, but voted for 34 Philosophy Now  July/ July/Augus Augustt 2009

by millions in the 30s? Surely it was something to do with the material conditions Berman and Walter so glibly  dismiss – or were the Germans subject  to a paroxysm of hatred that just happened to coincide with the onset of  mass unemployment unemployment and economi economicc collapse following the Wall Street Crash? Berman’s, and so Walters’, treatment  of history is too simplistic and neat. It  brands the likes of Hitler, Stalin and Pol Pot as maniacs, and thereby exculpates everyone else, the societies that produced them, from any responsibility. But  if we brand our enemies as ‘irrational evil maniacs’ we will never understand them or what put them in power, and thereby never tackle the causes of their actions. This, surely, is the antithesis of   what philosophy philosophy should should be about. COLIN JENKINS HIGHAMS P ARK , LONDON DEAR  E  EDITOR : I have little interest in comics, just like I have little interest in novels. Both are a form of escapism and entertainment that I don’t need. But I understand that those genres perform a social service. Both relate to and expand the commonalities commonalities of the human condition. Thus, in a subliminal way, by  appealing to what people have in common – emotions emotions,, needs and aspirations – they help facilitate social cohesion,  which is essential if we are going to live  well together. (I think that the Danish comic depictions of Mohamma Mohammad d helped, in a perverse way, to engage and defuse a lot of animosity between faiths that  otherwise would have continued to fester and potentially have led to worse.)  Inventing Human Rights  In her book  Inventing Lynn Hunt writes about the role novels have played in the development of rights. Human rights would never have been established if the mining and cultivation of the common characteristics that make us human, like sympathy and empathy, hadn’t occurred in novels. Hunt  describes how Rousseau’s novel Julie novel  Julie

(1761) was an early contributor to this process. If the novel was instrumental in culti vating human rights, I see the comic doing the same thing, but in a different, simpler, way, mainly graphically. Now   we have the combination of the two, the graphic novel. Some may see this as a dumbing down from the traditional novel, but in its clipped, pictorial version its messages may be reaching and influencing more readers, producing an additional venue in which to bring a common understanding. IRTH D AVID A IRTH  TORONTO, C ANADA  Credit Where It’s Due DEAR  E  EDITOR : I just wanted to compliment Toni Vogel Carey’s clarifying article in your latest issue (73). I’ve read a lot  about the financial crisis, but her essay is a necessary corrective to the misinformed opinions coming from a lot of  talking heads in the media, floating in the blogosphere and elsewhere. And she’s not afraid to name names! Perhaps some  wise foreign foreign leader leader – from Norway, for instance, where a natural wisdom seems to have left that country’s finances untouched by this mess – should hand  Wealth of   President Obama a copy of  Wealth  while the cameras are rolling. Or  Nations   Natio ns  while maybe someone should just send him a copy of this article. S TUART BERNSTEIN ORK , NY  NEW  Y   Y ORK 

DEAR  E  EDITOR : Philosophers who venture into economics need to be sure of their ground. I’m an amateur philosopher, but  a finance professional, and I would say  that Toni Vogel Carey got into marshy  terrain in trying to lay the blame for the international liquidity crisis on a retired US central banker, relying on a few selective quotes from the US press for her case. She also got some technicalities  wrong.. Derivative  wrong Derivativess are merely merely bets bets where there is no ownership of the related asset.

Letters Collateralised debt instruments, on the other hand, represent real liabilities, albeit thinly spread to mitigate – or hide – the risk. The crisis was systemic; but  those to blame, if anyone, are the complacent and mechanistic credit-rating agencies, and the banks who tried to outsmart the regulators for the sake of profit. But it is not true to say that the financial markets are unregulated, as Carey does.  The problem problem is that that the (quite (quite strict) strict) concontrols on capital adequacy did not bite the ingenious instruments that the bankers devised to maximise return at, they  hoped, minimal risk. It’s true that the crisis revealed the inherent instability of  markets, as Mike Fuller says, but it  doesn’t take a thinker of the stature of   Marx or Keynes Keynes to deduce deduce the the obvious. obvious.  The banks, who had previously  resisted and avoided regulation, are now  gratefullyy absorbing the funds the public gratefull authorities are throwing at them in an attempt (which seems to be succeeding) to avoid deflation of the scale of the Great Depression. Depression. I suspect history will  judge former former President Bush, and perhaps soon-to-be-former Prime Minister Brown, kindly for their prompt rescue measures. measure s. The central banks are also playing a part, in the UK by the mysterious practice of quantitativ quantitativee easing.  Are philosophers any better placed than journalists or economists to comment on the credit crunch? There are epistemological epistem ological questions, to be sure; but the failures of the credit agencies arose less from the staff of Moody’s or Standard & Poor’s succumbing to Humean scepticism about the impossibility of induction, than from the complacency and self-serving which is characteristic of the financial services industry. In any case, the credit crunch was not only predictable in principle, but   was actually predicted in practice, by the  venerablee but largely unknown Bank of   venerabl International Internatio nal Settlem Settlements. ents. Taleb’s thesis about probability, debated debated in this letters column recently, sheds no light, because the credit crunch has had huge global impact together with high predictabil predictability. ity. Perhaps political philosophy has benefited most from the credit crunch, because the belated intervention by governments and central banks has ruined the case for neo-liberalism for good. It is open to question how far the neo-liberal agenda ever really dominated politics.  The proportion of GDP taken by the

public sector remained much the same in the UK throughout Conservative Conservative and Labour governments, governments, and it’s wrong to equate Thatcher and Reagan, for the National Health Service has survived in the UK (more or less) as a model left wing US Democrats can only dream of.  The true lesson of the credit crunch is the triumph of neo-social neo-socialism. ism.  M ARK  F  FRANKL I INGSTON NGSTON PON-THAMES K  -U PON DEAR  E  EDITOR : In Issue 73 Mike Fuller stated: “Karl Marx famously pronounced: ‘The last cause of all real crises always remains the poverty and restricted consumption consumpt ion of the masses as compared to the tendency of capitalist production to develop the productive forces in such a way that only the absolute consuming power of society would be their limit.’” In a less well-known pronouncement, pronouncement,  The quoted in Vince Cable’s 2009 book  The Storm,, Marx apparently also predicted in Storm Nostradamus-like Nostradam us-like fashion: “Owners of  capital will stimulate the working class to buy more and more of expensive goods, houses and mechanical products, pushing them to take more and more expensive credits, until their debt becomes unbearable. The unpaid debt will lead to bankruptcy of banks, which will have to be nationalised, and the state will have to take the road which eventually will lead to communism.” It is unclear where  Marx is held to have said these things, but the latter quotation is so laughable it  is clearly a forgery. Snopes seem to agree  with my opinion, at snopes.com, as does liberation.typepad. liberation. typepad.com. com. It is unfortunate that an academic like Dr Mike Fuller was taken in, and that your editorial controls are not strong enough to identify such forgeries.  A  TRI INDIRESAN BY EMAIL

Tallis: Knowing and Not Knowing DEAR  E  EDITOR : I enjoyed Raymond  Tallis’ well-argued well-argued article about atheism in Issue 73. His ‘bad’ reasons for not  believing believin g in God are particularly good.  When still a child, brought up in a very  Catholic (yet outwardly communist) communist) country, I once asked my mother a rhetorical question: question: “If I had been born in India, I would have been believing in  very different different gods, going to different  temples,, and praying different prayers. temples So it’s only an accident that I am a

Catholic believing in Christ, isn’t it?’ My  first seed of doubt and disobedience was sown. Darwin did the rest. ‘Gods’ are created by the human brain, hence the ubiquitous presence of  religion in different cultures. The atavistic mind (equivale (equivalent nt to today’s psychotic)  was prone to formulate beliefs in response to extraordin extraordinary ary experien experiences, ces, such as hallucinations or moment momentss of  ecstasy. These mystical mystical events feel as real as they are puzzling. Their most frightful quality comes from the collapse of the mind’s categorical framework (particularly the categories of time and space), accompanied accompanie d by an all-pervading sense of  presence and extraordina extraordinary ry meaningfu meaningfullness. A compelling need for rationalisation renders a willing suspension suspension of belief  impossible. A vision or a voice would instantly, uncritically, uncritically, and without any  attempt at ‘falsification’ or other testing, solidify into an idea that ‘explains it all’.  A life-saving phantom is thus created! Such ideas can take the comforting, anthropomorphic anthropom orphic shape of a personal God, or the frightful theriomorphic shape of a personal Satan. Hallucinations Hallucinatio ns and other psychotic phenomena phenome na were common in early cultures (some believe as late as at the time of Homer). We still observe their remnants in the form of psychoses. It’s this regression regressi on to humanity’s earlier emotionality and ‘proto-reasoning’ that lies at the heart of God-creat God-creation. ion. If someone came along today and insisted he was the Son of God, wouldn’t he be committed under the Mental Health Act? People have been committed for less!  Mystical experiences experiences are the domain of prophets, who fall in love with their phantasms readily and with great tenacity. Herds of the faithful then follow the charismatic seer... until the next prophet  emerges and a new religion is born that  often re-works elements of the old. The cauldron of religious ideas contains a limited quantity of archetypal images, regularly recycled. For example, Isis the mother of Horus transform transformss into Demeter the mother of Core, who in turn becomes Mary the mother of Christ: the dismembered god Osiris metamorphoses into Dionysus, and Dionysus transmutes transmutes into Christ, and so on. But why should our existenti existential al aloneness feel so unbearable when it could be downright empowering? empowering? As John Milton asked, is it not better to reign in hell than July/Augus July/ Augustt 2009  Philosophy Now  35

Letters serve in heaven, even if we are our hell’s makers? Unreason Unreason (no matter how comforting) can never bring salvation to humanity, whether it comes in a shape of  God, a prophet, or Derrida! Refusal to  yield to Unreason is, I think, the best  reason for not believin believing g in God.  E VA  C  C YBULSKA  DR  E PSYCHIATRIST, LONDON DEAR  E  EDITOR : Towards the end of his explanation of why he is an atheist in Issue 73, Raymond Tallis writes that he is not willing to imprison “a thrilling intuition of transcende transcendent nt possibili possibilities ties arising out of (his) sense of the unknown.” Isn’t that a definition of God? ODRIGUEZ D YANA  R   R ODRIGUEZ HILOSOPHY STUDENT, L AMPE  AMPETER  TER   MA P DEAR  E  EDITOR : I am grateful to Raymond  Tallis for dispensing with human behaviour as a justification for atheism.  To reject the notion of God because some humans act hideously in God’s name is as illogical as refusing to vote because MPs fiddle their expenses, and is also unscientific, because the undeniable evidence is that other people act well in the same cause. However I would like to take issue  with the two reasons he enlists to underpin atheism. First, that the notion of God is incoherent, even comical (I regret his use of the word ‘infantile’). The religious systems with which I am familiar share the notion that God is a mystery, ultimately beyond human ken. Indeed a God fully comprehensible comprehensible by the human mind  would be too small to qualify as divine. I suggest that the more we see God as paradoxical and complex, the more we tread the path of wonder and humility. God’s otherness is not sufficient reason to reject God’s existence, then. This argument,, I think, supports agnosticism, argument agnosticism, but does not prove atheism. His second reason is that the religions present such a bewildering array of stories about God that it is impossible to choose between them. I agree that this seems impossible, but would suggest an analogy. Imagine that you wanted to understand games involving bats and balls. You could read in your study the rules of cricket, baseball, rounders and stoolball, and decide that the whole family is so varied that the concept of ‘ball game’ is vacuous. Or, you could join a club and start to play; or support a team. Then you would 36 Philosophy Now  July/ July/Augus Augustt 2009

understand that commitment makes the concept come alive. (I think this argument says more about human rootlessness than about atheology, though.)  The question modern modern atheists do not  seem to be able to answer is why atheism itself needs to be promoted promoted.. If atheism is right, and religious belief is a fading cultural meme, why bother to write against  it? On the other hand, if atheism is  wrong, and religious belief survives survives and even revives, why not question the atheistic worldview rather than support it? ICHARD M ARTIN R ICHARD OCHESTER  S TROOD, R OCHESTER  DEAR  E  EDITOR : Raymond Tallis’ ‘I Kid  You Not: Knowingnes Knowingnesss and Other Shallows’ (Issue 72) analyzed an important  but rarely recognized social phenomenon – ‘knowingness’. Much has been written about stupidity, ignorance, dogmatism, prejudice, and bigotry, but next to nothing about knowingness, which I see as an important topic for the philosopher, psychologist, sociologist, and historian. I personally define knowingness as thinking and claiming that one knows more about the world, life, politics, history or whatever, than one really knows, especially for purposes of showing solidarity as a ‘regular guy or gal’ with the person(s) one is addressing, and practicing ‘one-upmanship’ against those foolish or perverse enough to doubt or disagree with one’s own prejudices by dismissing them as naïve, uninformed, sentimental, or unwitting dupes of sinister interests. As Tallis notes, it “also carries an air of cognitive privilege.” Some people, he said, “seem permanently in the know, and – especially when their ‘expertise’ lies in conspiracy theories, or ‘women’, or ‘men’, or ‘sex’ – they are insufferable.” I have also long noted Tallis’ ‘epistemic community’ community’ of those with an “air of cognitive privilege” of “one who is ‘in the know’.” Most writers so far have focused on the contents of the knowing ones’ diatribes, their specific ideological biases or social and cultural resentments.They have been satisfied, for instance, to simply assert that Sarah Palin is poorly informed about many  things and obviously an ultra-conse ultra-conservarvative Republican. But these writers have rarely ever addressed the psycholog psychological ical and social dynamics of knowingness; the stances or poses assumed by ‘knowing’

speakers or writers, which Tallis did perceptively ceptive ly analyze. Unlike him, they have rarely described the process of binding speakers and hearer(s) into the buddybuddy solidarity of an epistem epistemic ic community of a regular guy or gal speaking to other regular guys or gals, et gals,  et cetera. cetera. If I may indulge a bit of sociological speculation, I’ve long felt that knowingness is a folkish or populist reaction to modern industrial society’s increasing reliance on education and expertise.  Many ‘plain folks’ folks’ – and many unsophistiunsophisticated, unintellectual ‘rich folks’ too – feel that they are being left behind by everincreasing formal education, certified expertise, and ‘book-learning’. This alienation is found at all social and economic levels: in drawing-rooms and country  clubs as well at kitchen tables and in corner taverns; at Ivy League or Oxbridge alumni reunions nostalgically celebrating the ‘rah-rah’ side of college life, as well as in taxicabs and bowling alleys. It especially afflicts, I think, conservative parents dismayed to find that their children going away to college have been ‘seduced by  radical ideas’ and ‘led astray by pinko professors’. They respond by claiming that formal education and certified expertise isn’t everything – that the ‘experts’, ‘intellectuals’ and ‘professors’ can be and often are plain wrong: either naïve, or even deliberate, conscious liars serving sinister interests. These parents stress the  virtuess of common sense,  virtue sense, ‘native ‘native shrewdness’ and ‘having been around’ that are supposedly devalued by the intellectuals, professors, elite media, and naïve, callow  college kids who think that they know  everything.  P ARK   T. PETER  P G  ARDEN CITY  S  SOUTH, NY  Machine Of The Heart DEAR  E  EDITOR : I read the articles in Issue 72 surrounding the morality of machines  with great interest. I am a practicing anesthesiologist anesthes iologist at an institution where left ventricular assist devices (LVADs) are routinely placed in patients dying from heart failure. LVADs are devices that essentially act as an external heart, diverting blood flow from the lungs to the body. These devices can do a remarkable amount of good, allowing some patients to live longer and with a better quality of life. They can also be a costly  exercise in futility, worsening quality of  life and prolonging the inevitable at the

Letters expense of our rapidly-dis rapidly-disappearing appearing health care dollars. Now imagine if these machines were programmed programm ed with a ‘moral code’. From  what or whose perspective would that  moral code derive? From the perspective of the individual  who returns home to his or her family, the LVAD will keep pumping happily. However, Howeve r, from the viewpoint of the patient who is bedbound in the intensive care unit with their other organs failing in grisly succession, the Moral LVAD may or may not shut itself down depending on the patient’s concept of quantity   versus quality of life (would shutting down be considere considered d suicide?). Of course, maybe that same ‘decision’ would be made differently if programm programmed ed from the perspective of the family who cannot  accept the loss of their loved one. And  what about from the standpoint of the surgeon who promises the possibility of a longer (if not better) life? Would the LVAD drum on to help prevent compromised promise d patient care? Of course the LVAD would likely be built and programmed gramme d in an industrialized nation  with resources to spare. Here the LVAD may keep running like a perpetua perpetuall motion machine. But maybe the programming grammin g was farmed out to cheaper labor in developing nations. Their perspective on the utility of resource allocation would shut the LVAD down before it even starts (how many immunizations immunizations could fifty thousand dollars buy?).  As medicine continues to progress progress at a meteoricc pace, and the ratio of resource meteori resourcess to population dwindles, the role of   Machine Morality, Morality, Roboethics, Friendly   AI, etc. will likely prove to be indispens indispens-able to our health care system. B YRON FERGUSON BY EMAIL

Switching Glasses DEAR  E  EDITOR : There are two types of  people in the world: those willing to commit murder and those not willing to do so. Lawrence Crocker (‘Switching  Wine Glasses’, Glasses’, Issue 70) wants to protect  the former from the latter. He asserts that to be ethical, those not willing to murder must not switch wine glasses  with those actively attempting attempting to murder them. In fact, he says, when one has been intentionally intentional ly served poisoned wine, one’s absolute certainty that the wine glass  enhances  the contains poison actually  enhances   the pro-

hibition against switching it with one’s  would-be assassin’s. assassin’s. He asserts, “you will be criminally liable if you switch a glass that you know to be poisoned – and you should be.” Turn about, in this case, is  fair play. This reasoning is based on not  fair the premise that deadly force is permissi permissi-ble only if ‘the necessity test’ has been met – ie, one must be in “imminent risk  of death or serious injury,” before one can respond in kind, it is alleged. I agree with Crocker on what constitutes an imminent risk, but disagree with him on what justifies immediate and subsequent uses of deadly force. Obviously, any successful use of deadly force in selfdefense would have to be in response to an attack. Self-defense must not be preemptive. And any successful act of selfdefense which takes the life of the attacker, amounts to a dealing out of the death penalty for the attempted offense. Here a life has been taken without the attacker having taken a life, or even having produced serious injury. This is entirely   justifiabl  justi fiablee – yet not by the mere mere immiimminence of risk, but rather by the threat  itself – and most importantly, because of  the forfeiture of the perpetrator’s right to life resulting from the threat he offered. By contrast, if the right to life of the offender remained intact, then the taking of his life would be murder, regardless of   when it was taken. taken. Or in other other words, words, the right to life of the mortally-threatening perpetrator must be nullified before selfdefense can be justified. This fact, and not  imminent risk, determines justification. Furthermore, the perpetrator’s right to life is not restored once the imminent risk  passes, because the intended violation poses an ongoing (although not imminent) threat. Crocker’s idea that the victim of an attempted attempte d murder is morally obligated to harmlesslyy empty the glass of poison harmlessl meant for her, is a result of a mistaken assumption that rights to life are absolute. In such a world the imprisonm imprisonment, ent, execution or killing of anyone for any  reason would be impermissible.   require the  To be sure, sure, ethics ethics does not  not  require the use of force under any circumstances, but  it also does not  prohibit   force in the  prohibit  force administration of just deserts. It is commonly understood that justice is achieved  when the punish punishment ment fits fits the crime. crime.  What is more more perfectl perfectlyy balanced balanced than knowingly switching wine glasses with a  would-be  would -be poisone poisoner? r? Is society society not benebene-

fited when erstwhile murderers are eliminated from the population, and when potential assassins are justly hoisted on their own petards? The theory that  imminent risk alone justifies self defense leads to the remarkable conclusion that   we must not not switch wine wine glasses glasses with with murderers to avoid natural justice. Crocker indicates that Penny may  serve Quinton the poisoned lemonade he had served her if the probable outcome  would  woul d cause cause him only only minor minor discom discomfort fort,, like a stomach ache; but she may not serve him the deadly the deadly poison  poison he intended for her. But if Quinton deserves to get sick for playing a prank on Penny, why doesn’t he deserve to die if he tries to kill her? OBERT K RAFT RAFT R OBERT HICAGO C , IL DEAR  E  EDITOR : In Issue 70, Lawrence Crocker discussed the ethics of switching glasses if one thought that their drink had been poisoned. He did not  believe that this situation came up in real life, and says, “I did not prosecute or defend a single poison switch case, and I did not hear of anyone else handling a case with even the remotest  resemblance.” resembla nce.” Yet a moment of thought   will show that far from being an exceedingly rare occurrence, people are often being warned against the possibility of  their drink being poisoned – by date rape drugs. Indeed, ordering two of a certain drink and giving one to the person paying would be an extremely useful  way of dealing with the possibility of a spiked drink. If one had doubts, one could simply switch drinks, assuming that both drinks were being consumed.  A  ARON THOMSON H AMILTON, ONTARIO Evolutionary Erratum Apologies if you were baffled by a discontinuity in Daria in Daria Sugorakovaʼs Memes  in article on Dragons on Dragons and Memes in Issue 72. The missi missing ng text, which should have gone on the end of p.23 and led into p.24, reads: “ Anothe  Anotherr hypothesis hypothesis has a greater likelilikeli-

hood: for every culture to have these myths and legends with similar features, a very long time ago there was a common observation of some disastrous event. What kind of event could have been observable all over the world, disastrous, and looking like a dragon?” July/Augus July/ Augustt 2009  Philosophy Now  37

Books C.S. Lewis and the  Search for Rational  Religion by John Beversluis C.S. LEWIS HAS HAD AN enormouss impact on the enormou evangelical evangeli cal mind. His books still top the charts in Christian bookstores. bookstore s. But what about the substance of his arguments? arguments? Philosop Philosopher her Dr John Beversluis Beversl uis wrote the first full-leng full-length th critical study of C.S. Lewis’ apologetics apologetics in 1985, titled C.S. Lewis and the Search for   Rationall Religion. For twenty-two  Rationa twenty-two years years it   was the only full-length critical study of  C.S. Lewis’ arguments arguments.. Beverslu Beversluis is took as his point of departure Lewis’ challenge, challenge, “I am not asking anyone to accept Christianity  if his best reasoning tells him that the  weight of the evidence is against it” ( Mere  Mere Christianity  p.123)  p.123).. Beverslu Beversluis is thoroughly  examined the evidence Lewis presented and found that it should not lead people to accept Christianity Christianity.. Beversluis Beversl uis is a former Christian who studied at Calvin College under Harry   .

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38  Philosophy Now  July/August 2009

 John hn Lo Loft ftus us heartily Reviews at the borders of knowledge as  Jo  C.S. Lewis, Luke Pollard finds agrees with a debunking of  C.S. nothing new about the New Atheists, and  David Braid peers at the limits of what we can possibly know anyway.  Jellema, who tutored Christian Christian thinkers such as Alvin Plantinga and Nicholas  Wolterstoff.  Wolterst off. Later Beversluis Beversluis was a student at Indiana Universi University ty with my former professorr James D. Strauss. professo Strauss. He became a professorr at Butler University. professo  According to Beversluis, Beversluis, his first version “elicited a mixed response – indeed, a response of extremes. extremes. Some thought I had largely succeeded. succeeded. I was complimented complimented for  writing a ‘landmark’ book that ‘takes up Lewis’ challenge to present the evidence for Christianity and... operates with full rigor’.”  (Revised Version  pp.9-10) But the critics were ‘ferocious’. ‘ferocious’. He said, “I had expected criticism. What I had not expected  was the kind kind of criticism… criticism… I was was christene christened d the ‘bad boy’ of Lewis studies and labeled the ‘consummate Lewis basher’.” (p.10)  This Revised Revised and Updated Updated edition, edition, published by Prometheus Books in 2008, was prompted by Keith Parsons and Charles Echelbarger. In the Introduction Beversluis claims “this is... a very different book that  supercedes the first edition on every point.” (p.11)) Accor (p.11 According ding to him, “Part of my purpose in this book to show, by means of  example after example, the extent to which the apparent cogency of  [Lewis’] arguments depends on his rhetoric rather than on his logic… Once his arguments are stripped of  their powerful rhetorical content, their apparent cogency  largely vanishes and their apparent persuasiveness largely evaporates. The reason is clear: it is not the logic, but the rhetoric that is doing most of the  work. We will have occasion to see this again and again. In short, my purpose in this book is not just to show that Lewis’ arguments are flawed. I also  want to account account for their apparent plausi-

bility and explain why they have managed to convince so many readers.” (pp.20, (pp.20, 22)  Additionally,  Addition ally, Beversluis Beversluis tells us, “I will reply to my critics and examine their attempts to reformulate and defend his arguments, thereby responding not only to Lewis but to the whole Lewis movement – that cadre of expositors, popular apologists and philosophers who continue to be inspired by him and his books. I will argue that their objections can be met and that  even when Lewis’ arguments are formulated more rigorously than than he for formul mulate ated d the them, m, theyy sti the still ll fai fail.” l.” (p. (p.11) 11) C.S. Lewis’ writings contain three major arguments argumen ts for God’s existence: the ‘Argument from Desire’, the ‘Moral  Argument’,  Argume nt’, and the ‘Argument From Reason’. Lewis furthermore argued that the ‘Liar, Lunatic, Lord Trilemma’ shows that   Jesuss is God. He also deals  Jesu deals with the major major skeptical objection known as the Problem of Evil. Beversluis examines these arguments and finds them all defective; some are even fundamentally fundamentally flawed. flawed. Finally  Beversluis examines Lewis’ crisis of faith  when he lost lost his wife, wife, the love love of his life. life. I can only briefly articulate what  Beversluis says about these arguments. ‘The  Argumen  Arg umentt From Desire Desire’’ echoes echoes Augustine Augustine’s ’s sentiment in his Confessions  when  when addressing God that “You have made us for yourself  and our hearts find no peace until they rest  in you.” Lewis develops this into an argument for God’s existence which can be formulated in several ways; but the bottom line is that since humans have an innate desire for joy beyond the natural world (which is  what he means means by ‘joy’), ‘joy’), there there must must be an object to satisfy that desire, therefore God. Beversluis subjects this argument to criticism on several fronts. How universal is the desire for this ‘joy’? Is Lewis’ description of  ‘joy’ a natural desire at all, since such desires are biological and instinctive? Must our desires have possible fulfillment? What  about people who have been satisfied by  things other than God – with their careers, spouses and children? In what I consider the most devastating question, he asks if  there is any propositional content to Lewis’ argument. Surely if there is an object corresponding to the desire for ‘joy’, then someone who finds this object should be able to Book Reviews

Books Even William Lane Craig defends this argumentt in his book  Reasonable argumen   Reasonable Faith . But  it is widely heralded by opponents as Lewis’ weakest argument, and fundamen fundamen-tally flawed as he presente presented d it. Beverslu Beversluis is subjects Lewis’ and his defender defenders’ s’ defense of it to a barrage of intellectual attacks.  There is the problem of knowing for sure  what Jesus claimed – which by itself “is sufficientt to rebut the Trilemm sufficien Trilemma.” a.” (p.115)  Also, it is a false trilemma. Even Even if Jesus claimed he was God he could simply have been mistaken, and not a liar or lunatic. It’s quite possible for someone to be a good moral teacher and yet be wrong about whether he’s God. Furtherm Furthermore, ore, the New Testament itself indicates that many  people around Jesus, including his own family, did think he was crazy. In the end, Beversluis Beversl uis claims, “we can now dispense of  Aslan from Lewis’ Narnia stories. the Lunatic or Fiend Dilemma Dilemma once and A big divine lion head in the sky, for all… If the dilemma fails, as I have what’s irrational about that? argued, the trilemma goes with it. In the describe it from her desire. Beversluis Lewis’ case, deductively arguing that there future, let us hear no more about these argues she cannot do this, and since that’s is a Power behind this moral law is said to arguments.” (p.135). I agree. the case, how can she know there’s an object  be committing ‘the fallacy of affirming the In the book  The  The Problem of Pain,  coming  which corresp corresponds onds to the desir desiree for ‘joy’? ‘joy’? consequent’ (p.99). This fallacy is: 1) If  at the heels of WWII, Lewis deals head-on Lewis’ ‘Moral Argument’ is basically  there is a Power behind the moral law then  with the Problem of Evil. How Beversluis Beversluis that all people have a notion of right and it must make itself known within us. 2) We tackles Lewis’ argument is probably best   wrong, and the only explanati explanation on for this do find this moral law within us; Therefore, summed up by Christian philosopher philosopher Vicsense of morality must come from a Power there is a Power behind the moral law. tor Reppert, who wrote: “If the word behind this moral law, known as God.  Thus the Moral Moral Argument Argument is invalid. ‘good’ must mean approximately the same Beversluis claims this argument is based on ‘The Argument From Reason’ is best  thing when we apply it to God as what it  some questionable assumptions related to seen in Lewis’ book, Miracles . According to means when we apply it to human beings, Plato’s Euthyphro dilemma, and it also Beverluis, Beverlu is, it “is the philosophical backthen the fact of suffering provides a clear depends on Lewis’ criticisms of ‘ethical bone” on which “his case for miracles empirical refutation refutation of the existence of a subjectivism’, against which theory Lewis depends” (p.145). There Lewis champions being who is both omnipotent and peronly critiques straw man arguments rather the idea that naturalism [the idea that  fectly good. good. If, on the other hand, we are are than the robust arguments of Hume and everything everyth ing can be explained with reference prepared to give up the idea that ‘good’ in Hobbes. If that isn’t enough to diminish only to the natural world] “impugns the reference to God means anything like  validity of reason and rational inference,”  what it means when we refer to humans as C.S. Lewis: and as such, naturalists contradict contradict themgood, then the problem of evil can be medievalist, selves if they use reason to argue their case. sidestepped, but any hope of a rational theologian theolog ian and children’s If you as a naturalist have ever been trou- defense of the Christian God goes by the author  bled by such an argument you need to read boards.” (dangerousidea.blogspot.com) Beversluis’ Beversl uis’ response to it. It’s the largest   This is must reading if you think C.S. chapter in the book, and I can’t adequately  Lewis was a great great apologist. Beverslu Beversluis’ is’ summarize summar ize it in a few short sentences, arguments argumen ts are brilliant, and devastating to except to say that Beversluis approvingly  the apologetics of Lewis and company. quotes Keith Parsons: “surely Lewis cannot  © JOHN W. LOFTUS 2009 mean that if naturalism is true, then there is  John Loftus is founder of the blog  debunk  debunkno such thing as valid reasoning.” (p.174) ingchristianity.blogspot.com  and author of   Lewis’ ‘Liar, Lunatic, Lord Trilemma’ is  Why I Became an Atheist; A Former one of the most widely used arguments Preacher Rejects Christianity  (Prometheus  among Christian popular apologists. Lewis Books, 2008). said that since Jesus claimed he was God, the only other options to this being true are that  • C.S. Lewis and the Search for Rational Relihe was either a liar or a lunatic, which isn’t   gion, Revised and Updated  Updated  by  by John Beversluis, reasonable, given Jesus’ moral teaching. Prometheus Books, 2008, 363 pages pb,  Therefo  The refore re Jesus Jesus is God, God, as he he claimed claimed.. $21.98, ISBN: 978-1-59102-531-3 Book Review Reviewss

July/Augus July/ Augustt 2009  Philosophy Now 39

 A Sceptic’s Guide To  Atheism by Peter S. Williams HETHER IT ’S POSITIV POSITIVE E  W HETHER or negative, it’s there, being proclaimed from the roof-tops: a new philosophy for a new age. A new atheism.  You may have heard of the New Atheists, and now a brilliant sceptic writes his account of this ‘phenom ‘phenomenon’. enon’. He’s a heretic – but not for denouncing God; instead, for concluding that He exists. Peter S. Williams’ new book  A   A Sceptic’s  Guide to Atheism seeks to challenge the popular conception that the New Atheist movement has a monopoly on the rational. He examines modern popularist anti-theistic  writings, specifically specifically focusing on the New   Atheists,, and concludes, altogether rebel Atheists liously, that “I am not impressed.” Sunrise or sunset?

 According  Accord ing to Williams, Williams, the New Atheist  Atheist  movement is nothing new, drawing much movement of its philosophy from Hume and others living hundreds of years ago. But it is “angry, acerbic and rhetorically cunning.” Unfortunately, Unfortuna tely, claims Williams Williams,, these eccentricities eccentricit ies tend to crowd out the philosophical essentials essentials – reason and rigorous argumentation. argument ation. In popular culture the philosophical extremists from both religious and anti-religious groups have shouted down the rest. Williams’ book is an attempt  to redress this – promoting thinking , and lending logic to the debate. He helps us to see that the question of God can be addressed with care and precision, as is done in more academic circles (sometimes). (sometimes).  A Sceptic’s Guide to Atheism acts, first and foremost, as a thorough account of the God debate in contemporary circles. It  covers the key arguments in favour of atheism, as propounded by the New Atheists. Atheists. In the attempt to ensure that the arguments are not misrepresented, Williams over40  Philosophy Now  July/August 2009

quotes, which can make for laborious reading; but conversely, this also pulls together the key statements from the main thinkers.  A Sceptic’s Guide to Atheism is a wonderful resource if one’s main aim is to study the history of the New Atheists, or if one wants to save time: the book is a good substitute for reading every popular New Atheist tome – most of their arguments, and best quotes on the God debate are contained within.  Williams first sets out to assess the current level of atheism. Through Through sourcing a  variety of polls, he finds that lack of belief  in a God may be declining world-wide, but  is growing in parts of the West.  Why is this? Williams claims claims it is mainly  to do with the devastating effect Logical Positivism had in the 20th Century on religious belief. Logical Positivism holds that  only statements that can be observed to be true through our senses or otherwise be potentially verified, have any meaning. This leaves the unverifiable God hypothesis meaningless. However, argues  Williams,  Willia ms, it  does the same to the opposite claim too. The atheist declaration ‘there is no God’ is also impossible to scientifically  prove. So under Logical Positivism, atheism is also meaningless. As Williams writes in Ch1, “Dawkins’ atheism, no less than the theism he opposes, is built upon Positivism’s grave.” Positivism had to die for atheism to live. However, Williams then moves on to argue that bizarrely, Logical Positivism is historically the main reason atheism has such a grasp on public imagination today. It provided the social credibility  for atheism upon which the New Atheists have built. However,, the book’s real attraction is However not its history lessons. Instead, it is the logical assessment of the atheist arguments.  Williams dedicates dedicates a chapter to each one, first giving it a fair hearing and then critically appraising it. Evide Evidence nce and reason is allowed to rule above rhetoric and emotive gut-reactions. Williams doesn’t hammer his point across – you don’t finish reading  with the sense that that you’ve been been intellectuintellectually mugged. Instead you feel enriched by a plethora of new information. This is the

opposite of a mugging – leaving you with more in your pocket than at the start.  Williams  Willia ms deals with most most of the big arguments against theism. For example, he examines the ‘Faith is the root of evil’ argument, which he sees as a foundationless moral reaction against foundationless religious belief. The argument that science leaves no room for a God is also dismissed. Following on from this is a debate about   whetherr the ‘Who designed  whethe designed the designer?’ designer?’ argument is logically valid, or even coherently expressible. Williams also discusses the less-popular argument that explaining the prevalence of religious belief in evolutionary terms negates negates any truth that it may  hold. That is Daniel Dennett’s position,  Williams  Willia ms claims; claims; but few other New AtheAtheists support this kind of attack. Williams also examines many other, less famous arguments. He deals with the big thinkers on both sides of the debate, getting us to re-examine ideas we’ve all heard before.  Williams attempts attempts to raise the level of  debate not by reciting his own arguments  whilst the other side recite theirs, competing to be the loudest voice. Instead he interacts with the New Atheist arguments, evaluating them logically, logically, thus giving us a  well-thought-out  well-thoug ht-out perspective. perspective. This is relatively uncommon at the popularis popularistt level.  And whilst we have plenty of deep books on both sides (which are, unfortunately, rarely the popular ones), it is unusual unusual to have them interacting with the alternative perspective in such a compelling way. Richard Dawkins’ The God Delusion, and  Alister McGrath’s McGrath’s The Dawkins Delusion are other exceptions to this rule. However, The God Delusion tends to offer false versions of classical theistic arguments, and The Dawkins Delusion  relates almost entirely to Dawkins. This book is different, interacting  with all the main lines of reasoning, thus giving us a new level of civilized debate. debate. Entering this debate at the popularist  level is a risky move for anyone not promoting atheism. Although Although it is written from a Christian perspective, perspective, Williams’ precise, logical style makes it fascinating reading for the rest of us. Thus it is an essential resource, resource, helping the reader to get to grips with every angle of the God debate. As such, it will probably be burned as heretical teaching. © LUKE POLLARD 2009

 Luke Pollard  Luke Pollard is a writer writer interes interested ted in the the areas  areas  of Ethics and Philosophy of Religion. • A Sceptic’s Sceptic’s Guide To Atheism Atheism by Peter S.  Williams, Paterno  Williams, Paternoster, ster,20 2009 09,, £1 £12. 2.99 99,, IS ISBN BN:: 9781842276174

Book Reviews

Books What We Can Never  Know  by David Gamez  THE POTENTIALLY ALL encompassing title gives a good indication of the sweep of Gamez’ argument. Drawing together several of the main streams of philosophi philosophical cal thought, the author offers much more than just an overview overvie w of various attempts to surpass the limits of our knowledge of ourselve ourselvess and everything everyth ing else. Beginning with a concise, clear discussion of ‘stable’ versus ‘collapsing’ theories, he applies these categories to a number of disparate yet related subjects, including ‘Evidence ‘Evidence for the Brain’, ‘Impossible Speech About Time’, and ‘Merging  Madness and Reason’, making making the connections between the limits of our knowledge explicit, and explaining why they are essentially unsurpassable. Gamez finds common ground between  writers as diverse as Baudrillard, Dawkins Dawkins and Philip K. Dick. What We Can Never   Know also bears the influence of Derrida, except that he’s trying to deconstru deconstruct ct not  texts but philosophical and scientific theories. The self-reflexive limitations limitations of those theories are exposed in the main chapters,  where they are turned into models. Gamez claims that this process of model-building enables us to see our theories in a different   way: “The process of condensation condensation and abstraction into a model can highlight how  utterly absurd some theories are; how they  are all-embra all-embracing cing monstrous metaphysical  visions.”” (p.3).  visions.  The first chapter gives details of Gamez’ framework framewo rk of ‘stable’, ‘collapsing’ and ‘unstable’’ explanatory circles. This frame‘unstable  work is used to show the limitations of theories in subsequent subsequent chapters. chapters. Chapter 2 examiness theories of mind and deals with examine the question of whether the qualities of  experience experie nce can be explained using the brain. Gamez argues that this is only possible if our bodies and our physical environment are represented within a single virtual reality, with our brains becoming virtual as  well. This avoids the problem of how the mind can interact with somethin somethingg that’s non-mental, as everything is now in the mind, at least potentially. But if so, we are led to the conclusion that our entire world consists of virtual impressions: “Virtual bees sup at fake flowers beneath a cyber sky.” (p.84). Neuroscience Neuroscience is therefore confronted with the paradox that it is based on evidencee taken from our experien evidenc experiences ces with Book Review Reviewss

‘real brains’, and yet this evidence leads to theory of knowledge right in the centre of  the conclusion that we have never seen or his ‘labyrinth of conflicting aspects’, accepttouched a real brain: “there are just virtual ing that this makes it both true and untrue arms, virtual tongues and virtual lips. All at the same time – another unstable my evidence for the brain hypothesi hypothesiss has hermeneutic circle... also vanished; virtual observations take the  With its eclectic mixture of aphorism, place of this lost objectivity, and the brain detailed thought-experiment thought-experiment and academic hypothesis becomes an absurd metaphysiargument, the style of the book has a touch cal and theological leap.” (p.84). of the informal throughout. Like Descartes, In Chapter 3, Gamez examines Relativ- Gamez speaks from the first person as the ity Theory and uses Bergson and Ouspen- initial point of reference. This has the sky’s philosophies philosophies to build an elaborate effect of amplifying the sense of the subjecmodel of time as a kind of cinematic protive, thus underscoring the limits of our  jector. Kojève’s Kojève’s reading of Hegel is used to experienc experience-ability e-ability and therefore our knowlargue that if we were living in objective edge about what the ‘outside ‘outside’’ may consist  [independently-existing] time, we would be of, if anything at all. However, he argues unable to speak about it. Despite a number from first principles, employing a bottomof imaginati imaginative ve thought-exp thought-experiments eriments,, this up approach whereby one can clearly folchapter was not always easy to follow, and low the construction of his theory. probably the least convincing convincing.. Ironically, a book that takes as its subject   The chapter ‘Merging Madness Madness and the grandest notion of all – the possibility  Reason’ brings to light the acute and ruth- of some form of ultimate knowledge – and less way in which madness is diagnosed then goes on to systematically destroy the according to what are fundame fundamentally ntally little  very idea of even attempting to consider it  more than the mores  of  of a particular society. as a possibility possibility,, may find particular strength By making madness relative in this way, in its application to more everyday fields Gamez suggests that there is somethi something ng such as the notion of madness and what it  arbitrary and artificial about the distinction may mean for the individual and the culture between madness and sanity. Indeed, this in which they reside. blurs the distinction to the extent of elimi- © DAVID BRAID 2009 David Braid, a composer of contemporary classinating it altogether: “there is just a single cal music, has researched the temporal percep‘homogenous ‘homoge nous zone’ of madness and reason” in which “we have always been foam- tion of music and its effect on musical form. His   One Year ing fools pouring out an endless stream of  new CD of vocal and chamber music  One Lighter  will be available from Toccata Classics  fantastical metaphysical, metaphysical, scientific, relilater this year. Please visit www.davidbraid.net  gious and cosmolog cosmological ical imagining imaginings.” s.” (p.178).. Unfortunately, this dissolutio (p.178) dissolution n of  • What We Can Never Know: Blindspots in the distinction between madness and rea Philosophyy and Science by David Gamez, son is self-defeating – if I am mad, how can  Philosoph I ever know that I am? Or indeed, how can Continuum, 2007, 304 pages, £12.99, ISBN: I ever know that I’m not mad? Gamez han- 0826491618 dles these problems using his notion of  the ‘unstable hermeneutic circle’.  The final chapter sets out a contradictory, labyrinthine understanding understan ding of  knowledge, influenced by Pyrrhonic (absolute) scepticism and Nietzsche’s perspectivism. Questions about self   e reflexivity reflexiv ity are never    p    a      P far away – a theory     e    v of knowledge has to    a      D    y be able to account       b    o     t for itself – and    o      h Researcher Researc her testing a CAVE virtual reality environment      P Gamez places his July/Augus July/ Augustt 2009  Philosophy Now 41

There Will Be Blood Be Blood Film

Terri Murray Murray tells  tells us about a Hollywood hero beyond good and evil.

Blood  is  is between Plainview, who is a plainspeaking businessman with big ambitions in the burgeoning oil industry, and a hypocritical Christian preacher, Eli Sunday, who shares Plainview’s ambition for wealth but  doesn’t want to get his hands dirty earning it. The film opens in 1898, when we see Plainview making his first discovery, and badly injuring his leg in the process.  There is no dialogue dialogue during during the opening scenes, and our attention is drawn instead to the raw, uncivilized physicality of man as animal struggling against the elements. Several years pass, and again we see Plain view prospectin prospectingg for oil, this time with a team of colleagues, one of whom is killed in an accident at a primitive drilling site, leaving a son. Plainview adopts the orphaned boy, who goes by the name ‘H.W.’. These early scenes of injury and death set the conf Hollywood genre movies can be tours of what will follow: destruction, loss depended upon to deliver one thing, it  and injury is seen throughout the film as an is a good hero pitted against an evil integral part of all that is exceptional, enerfoe. Simplistic though it is, Hollywood getic, life-affirming and productive, not as cinema seduces us all with these Manichean antithetical to it. It is a means to greatness, conflicts that persuade us to side with the progress and flourishing. good guys. Paul Thomas Anderson’s 2007 It is not until 1911, some thirteen years Oscar-winning There Oscar-winning   marked  There Will Be Blood  marked after his first discovery, that we hear Plaina rare exception to this rule, giving audi view speak for the first time. He is by this ences an unconventional protagonist – one time seeking to buy leases on plots of land seemingly beyond good and evil.  where he wishes to drill for oil, offering a share of his profits to the owners. Before There Will Be Oil Be  Oil long, a young man comes to sell him infor The narrativ narrative, e, a cinematic cinematic adaptatio adaptation n of  mation about the location of a plot of oilUpton Sinclair’s novel Oil  novel Oil , centres on the rich land that can be bought cheaply. He epic rise, and ultimate decline, of oil mag wants $500 cash for the information. nate Daniel Plainview (Daniel Day-Lewis). Eventual Eventually ly Plainview reaches an But this is no typical tale of poor boy made agreement agreem ent with the shrewd good, for Plainview is far from good in any   young man, who introduces moral sense, despite his admirable charachimself as Paul Sunday, from a teristics. Instead Plainview is a thoroughly  poor family of goat farmers who Nietzschean Nietzsch ean figure, and if one is seeking can’t grow anything on their  ways to to vivify vivify Friedri Friedrich ch Nietzsc Nietzsche’s he’s philo philososo- land, which is mostly dry rock. phy – especially his attitude towards Chris- Plainview wastes no time going tian morality – one can do no better than to the oil-rich town, Little through this film. While Plainview embod- Boston, with H.W., where they  ies many aspects of Nietzsche’s philosophy  have ostensibly arrived to do and personality, I will limit my focus to some quail hunting. Plainview  how the film illuminates Nietzsche’s crifinds the barren Sunday farm, tique of Christianity. The parallels go far and meets Paul’s father Abel, beyond Plainview’s bushy moustache.  who is so poor he cannot even  The central central conflic conflictt of  There  There Will Be offer Plainview and his son

I

42  Philosophy Now  July/ July/Augus Augustt 2009

bread. While setting up camp near their home, Plainview and H.W. are greeted by  a man who introduces himself as Eli, Paul’s brother. This is somewhat perplexing, perplexing, as Eli appears to be the same young man who had previously introduced himself as Paul. Soon afterwards H.W. and Plainview  ascertain that the land is indeed as oil-rich as ‘Paul’ described it, and Plainview  attempts to negotiate a price with Abel Sunday. Eli intercedes to raise the price, since he’s the only member of the family who knows the true worth of the lot. Plainview is inclined to pay Eli’s asking price of $5,000 plus a cash bonus of $5,000 more when the  well starts starts to produce produce,, although although again there there is some ambiguity about this. The oil man  wants to build build a pipeline pipeline through through Abel’s Abel’s land that could stretch to the ocean and make him very rich, since it would allow  him to circumvent the railways and their exorbitant shipping costs. During the negotiation, Plainview asks Eli what he wants the money for and Eli replies “for my church.” Plainview looks at him in disbelief and replies, “That’s good. That’s a good one.”  This cynicis cynicism m shows us us parallels parallels between between Plainview and Nietzsche. Nietzsche, whose father was a Lutheran pastor, thought we  would do do better better to study the the motives motives that  drive philosophers and preachers to their particular moral conclusions than to concern ourselves with their ‘truth’. Nietzsche thought that, like everything else, philosophy and religion were expressions of selfinterest. Plainview too does not even enterPlainview washing his hands

     X      A      M      A      R      I

     M      D      N      A      E      G      A      T      N      A

     V      T      N      U      O      M      A      R      A

     P  .      7      F      0      A      0      E      2      L      R      ©     E      V     D      O     O  ,     O     L      E      H

    B     C     E      S     B     Z      T

    L      I      E     L     I      N

    W     H     E      C     R      I     E      R      D     H      E      I

    T      R

     M     F      O      T      R      P      F      E      S      C      E      X      G      E      A  ,      M     S      I      M      L      L      L      L      I

     A     F

tain the possibility that Eli’s desire might be motivated by anything other than his willto-power. There is no question in Plain view’s  view ’s mind that that Eli uses uses religion religion merely merely to rationalise his motives and dispositions. Plainview quickly brings wealth and progress to the people of Little Boston.  Where once once bread was scarce, scarce, now they   will have it in abundance abundance – along with  water wells, wells, irrigation, irrigation, education, education, employemployment and new roads. However, Plainview’s form of advancement has a distinctly Nietzschean flavour. In Beyond In Beyond Good and Evil  (Aph. 258) Nietzsche asserts that a “good and healthy aristocracy” must be founded on the belief that society does not exist for its own sake, but as a scaffolding upon  which a select kind of being being can raise itself  to a higher existence, much as a climbing  vine wraps its tendrils tendrils around around an oak tree to ascend until it emerges into the sunlight  and unfold its coronas. Nietzsche felt that   when an aristocratic aristocratic society society tosses away away its privileges, and from an excess of moral feeling begins to try to justify itself in terms of what the nobility do for society, it gets things the wrong way round. He identified this inversion of the power relationship as a symptom of ‘democratic’ decadence and corruption. While Daniel Plainview’s oil drilling enterprise can improve living conditions for the townspeople, he clearly sees these benefits as means to his own success and wealth. Plainview is first and foremost  an entrepreneur, not a philanthropist.  This is consistent with Nietzsche’s view  of leadership. The noble person, he says,  himself  as feels himself  feels  as determining value. He does not need the approval of others, or of God. He creates values: he knows that he is the one who causes things to be revered, so does not need approval. He feels a kind of  fullness, of overflowing power, so that if he helps the unfortunate it is not out of pity  but out of an urgency created by an abundance of power: “The noble person reveres the power in himself, and also his power over himself, his ability to speak and to be silent, to enjoy the practice of severity and harshness towards himself and to respect everything everything that is severe and harsh.” (BGE  (BGE  Aph.  Aph. p.260, trans Marion Faber, Oxford World Classics, 1998.) The fundamental fundament al principle of Nietzsche’s ‘master morality’ is that we have duties only  towards our peers, and we may treat those of lower rank as we think best. Aimed as it   was at containing, diminishing and moderating the natural passions, European morality was, in Nietzsche Nietzsche’s ’s view, leading to a decline into mediocrity. Nietzsche

thought moral codes a tyranny against  nature. He saw in contempor contemporary ary European society a kind of levelling that was making people ‘equal’, to be sure, but at the price of elevating “those who can’t do much harm any more” while suppress suppressing ing the power of their natural masters.

Film

Beyond Good and Evil

Eli Sunday sets about trying to make converts of the new arrivals to Little Boston but is met with indifference. He seems to have nothing to offer men and women  whosee bellies  whos bellies are full full of bread and and whose days are filled with productive work. He attempts to siphon off some religious currency from the new oil well by requesting that Plainview allow him to give a blessing at the public opening of the new well. Plainview appears to give his assent, but   when the townsp townspeopl eoplee are gathered gathered in front  front  of the well, he gives his own ‘blessing’: “Let’s forget the speech; I’m better at digging holes in the ground than making speeches, so let’s forget the speech for this evening. Just make it a simple blessing. You see, one man doesn’t prospect from the ground, it takes a whole community of good people such as  yourselves,, and uh, this is good  yourselves – we stay together. We pray  together, we work together, and if the good Lord smiles kindly on our endeavour, we share the wealth together.”

 At this juncture he says, “God bless you all, Amen,” the well is opened, and drilling commences. commen ces. Eli has been rendered impotent and silent. Plainview has demonstrated that he knows the true source of  power in Little Boston, and that any religiosity to be drawn from the well will be under his authority, not Eli’s. Plainview is not against the use of religion as a means to power; and neither was Nietzsche. For Nietzsche, the responsibility  of the ‘free spirit’ is to his own development. For this, the free spirit may use religion, in the same way that that he might  exploit political or economic circumstances.  Thosee who are strong,  Thos strong, indepe independent ndent and and of a noble nature can use religion to remove obstacles. Nietzsche also saw that religion tends to make the drudgery of life bearable for those powerless to change their circumstances. It gives meaning to their suffering and allows them to remain content with the

circumstances of their lives by assuring them that they have a place in an illusory  higher order. But to Nietzsche, religion goes wrong when seen as an end in itself, or  when it celebra celebrates tes or exalts exalts what is weak  weak  and ought to die out. He thought that  Christianity was nihilistic to the core, sacrificing everything of value in others and ourselves, ultimately even God himself. Christianity sacrifices everything real – life – for a non-existent future. But for the church, Nietzsche’s life-affirming values are sins. One evening there is a fatal accident at  Plainview washing his soul

the well, and Plainview is forced to shut  down until the middle of the next day.  When he learns that the deceased was a devout Christian, he feels obliged to visit  Eli to ask whether he would give the man a Christian burial. When he arrives at the Church of the Third Revelation, he finds Eli in the throes of a ‘healing’. Eli Sunday  is transparently false, and we are positioned to identify with Plainview’s point of   view on his disingenuous antics, which swing between extremes of saccharine sweetnesss and uncontrollab sweetnes uncontrollable le rage. This also fits Nietzsche’s description of the religious disposition. Nietzsche noted that  repression and denial of the will leads to “spasms” of “extravagant voluptuousness” followed by penitence and “denial of the  world”” (Aph. 47 in  world in BGE ). ). Nietzsche diagnosed this tendency to swing back and forth between extremes as a kind of ‘neurosis’.  When Eli Sunday Sunday has finished the ‘heal‘healJuly/Augus July/ Augustt 2009  Philosophy Now 43

Film ing’, Plainview says, “That was one Goddamn hell of a show.” Eli launches into a diatribe about how the accident could have been avoided if Plainview had only let him bless the well – suggesting that not only Eli but divine providence had been displaced from the well. He continues to taunt Plain view with accusations accusations,, but the older man interrupts him with a reminder that the well cannot “blow gold all over the place” if the men are too tired from listening to Eli’s gospel. At last this silences Eli, whose bluff  has been called by Plainview’s acute discernment of where his true motives lie. Both men are ambitious for wealth and power, they have simply chosen different  means of getting it. Like Nietzsche, Plain view knows that the will-to-power works in many ways, but is always the underlying explanation for men’s actions and thinking.

the fire. With chaos and devastation all around, he sees the vast potential that lies  within this raw power. Yet when his assistant asks, “H.W. okay?” Plainview replies matter-of-factly, matter-of -factly, “No he is not.” While obviously unhappy about what has happened to his adoptive son, it is as though Plainview accepts the fact that great  achievement cannot be had painlessly, nor  withoutt the shedding of blood.  withou blood.  This is why Eli Sunday is particularly  annoying to Plainview. When Eli comes to collect his family’s $5,000 land bonus from him, the viewer can hardly help but share the oilman’s disdain for this preacher who has shed no blood, no sweat, and no tears for the wealth the well has produced. By  contrast, Plainview Plainview knows that his adoptive son’s loss of hearing is his responsibility, and he bears the full weight of this knowledge with great difficulty – but not with regret, and without resentment. Plainview  knows that his choices have exacted their toll, but this is the price of being decisive, ambitious and ultimately successful. He will not give up his enterprising spirit just  because it is sometim sometimes es costs more than the average man can bear. So when Eli Sunday, a man who has neither ventured nor lost  anything, confronts Plainview with a demand for his cash bonus, Plainview loses his temper, throwing him into a pool of oily  mud, slapping mud on his face and even forcing it into his mouth, saying, “I’m gonna bury you underground, Eli. Oooooh. I’m gonna bury you underground.”

character traits – independ independence, ence, will, ambition, fearlessness, strength, decisiveness – that make the viewer admire him. But  Plainview feels no moral guilt.  Theree is a distinct  Ther distinct flavour flavour of social social Dar winism  winis m in Nietzsche Nietzsche’s ’s outlook. outlook. He describ described ed the liberal dream of social conditions of  equality and justice as the invention of a life form that has lost all its organic functions. Nietzsche was convinced that human life devoid of its exploitative nature is not worthy of being called ‘life’ at all. To Nietzsche, Christianity originated originated from what he called ‘slave morality’: that is, it emerge emerged d amongst oppressed groups who resented their more powerful masters. Yet because they were unable to throw off their chains and overpower their natural superiors, they  invented religion to invert the masters’ values of conquest, domination, strength and

De Profundis

Plainview himself is a man who has Nietzsche observed that the saint is a fasci- emerged from the depths of the earth. We nating riddle to us because we wonder at  saw him injured in the opening sequence how anyone can have such strength of will.  while diggi digging ng in a deep hole. hole. We have have seen Surely the asceticism must be being endured his filthy hands and his face covered in dirt  for a reason? Nietzsche suggests suggests that the and oil, and we know that his power comes ascetic is also exercising his will-to-po will-to-power, wer, from the same source. The metaphor is one but simply using an indirect means, and that  of evolution – of man the species who has is why powerful people sense a “strange emerged from dust, from lower forms of life, unconquered enemy” when he approaches. and who survived through his adaptation Not long after the first accident, an and overcoming of adversity. By contrast, equally horrible one occurs at the well, Sunday is a soft, effete, solicitous fellow who leaving the young H.W. deaf. In the midst  in Nietzschean terms is unfit for survival. of the tragedy, with H.W. still lying He is an embodim embodiment ent of everythi everything ng Nietinjured, oil shooting out of the ground and zsche despised about Christianity. In Nietraining down on everythin everything, g, and fires zsche’s view, Christianity exalts the meek, burning the rig, Plainview says to his assis- the lowly, the oppressed, the poor – in tant, “What are you looking so miserable other words, that which naturally ought to about? There’s a whole ocean of oil under die out. It elevate elevatess what is ignoble, making our feet. No one can get at it except for it an object of praise, while stigmatizing the me!” There’s a stunning close-up of Plain- ‘manly’ virtues, labelling them ‘sins’.  view’s face covered with slick black oil, his Indeed, Sunday attempts to do this by tryeyes glowing with passion in the light of  ing to make Plainview ashamed of the very  44  Philosophy Now  July/ July/Augus Augustt 2009

creativity. And it is precisely out of resentment – because he cannot fight back  against the stronger, more influential oilman – that Eli Sunday goes home from his embarrassing embarrass ing run-in with Plainview to abuse his frail and defenceless father. Eli beats Abel violently, calling him “stupid” for having sold the plot in the first place. Of course, we know that it was not Abel  who made the decision, but Eli himself. He had little choice in selling, since the only  choice was between getting some of Plain view’s wealth or nothing at all, and his attempt to assert his claim to the money as though it were his ‘right’ is dismissed by  Plainview’s swift slap. Plainview understands only one kind of ‘right’, and it is might. To Nietzsche, the ideals of ‘rights’ and ‘equality’ so venerated by 18th century American and French revolution revolutionaries aries were concocted to allay people’s fears of domination and abuse. According to Nietzsche, what’s

Film needed in order to improve humans is not  humiliate and take revenge revenge.. The tension rights, but self-discipline and a master between the two mounts as Plainview is morality which accepts life in its essence – made to get on his knees and confess over  which for Nietzsche meant “appropriating, “appropriating, and over that he is a sinner to prove his injuring, overpowering overpowering those who are for-  worthiness for ‘God’s’ ‘God’s’ (Eli’s) forgiveness forgiveness eign and weaker; oppression, harshness,  while Eli exhorts him to “Beg for the blood forcing one’s own forms on others, incor[of Christ]!” Yet as his baptism ordeal poration, and at the very least, at the very  draws to a close, Plainview can already taste mildest, exploitation...” exploitation...” (BGE , pp.152-3) sweet victory. No sooner has Eli taken his  presents Plainview’s impotent revenge than Plainview’s dream is There Will Be Blood  presents acts of violence from a Nietzschean perachieved and his pipeline will be a reality. spective – done not from resentment or  This oil pipeline is likened to a vein, supsadism but from the need to eliminate the plying the lifeblood of the industrial revo-

“The noble person person reveres the power in himself, himself, and also his power over himself himself, his ability to speak and to be silent, to enjoy the practice practice of severity severity and harshness towards himself and to respect everything that is severe and harsh.” harsh.” Fried Friedrich rich Nietzsche Nietzsche obstacles that obstruct his projects. Seen in this way, Plainview’s later murder of his (pseudo-) brother Henry takes on a postmoral kind of neutrality that we associate more with animal survival instincts than  with an evil intent. intent. The worry for NietNietzsche, as for Plainview, was that the necessary violence done in the course of lifeaffirming projects (what is merely ‘bad’)  would be misinterpr misinterpreted eted within within a Christian context as ‘evil’. Indeed, it is only when the Bible-toting William Bandy learns of Plain view’ss murder of ‘Henry’  view’ ‘Henry’ that Plainview Plainview is forced to repent for his ‘sin’. Bandy owns the last plot of land that prevents the building of the pipeline, and the only thing that   will make Bandy Bandy sell is Plainview’s Plainview’s public baptism at the hands of Eli Sunday: BANDY: God… God has told me what you must do. PLAINVIEW: What is that? BANDY: You should be washed in the blood of   Jesus Christ.

 The resulting scene is probably the best  in the film. Plainview arrives at the Church of the Third Revelation for his baptism. In a direct reference to the film’s title, and  with absurd irony, in front of the congregation Eli announces to Plainview Plainview,, “You will never be saved if you… reject the blood.”  The absurdity is that Plainview never eschewed real  eschewed  blood. From a Nietzsche Nietzschean an  real  blood. perspective perspecti ve it is is Eli   who rejects the blood –  Eli  who the blood of life with all of its cruelty; the bloodshed that comes from the strong expressing expressi ng their strength, and conquering, exploiting,, injuring and being injured. exploiting Eli Sunday relishes this chance to

lution and powering a whole planet  towards prosperity (and as we now know, possible destruction). There Is Blood

 The final scene scene resolves resolves the conflict  between Plainview and Eli Sunday. After several years Eli comes to Plainview’s home to announce that William Bandy has passed away, leaving the leased land to his son, a  very good member member of Eli’s Eli’s congregation. congregation.  This gives gives Eli the leverage leverage he needs to suggest that Plainview develop and drill for the oil on the plot, for which privilege Eli wants a $100,000 bonus, plus the $5,000 Plain view ‘owes’ ‘owes’ him, with interest. interest. Plainview  Plainview  agrees to the terms on the condition that  Eli confesses that he is a false prophet and that God is a superstition. The tables are turned. Eli is desperate for money, and he now has to endure the ordeal of humiliation that Plainview underwent at his ‘baptism’.  The scene is a reversal reversal of the baptism, baptism, exceptt that it is not public. excep public. When Eli Eli has finished making his excruciating confession, Plainview tells him the bad news: the areas Eli is offering for development have already  been drained by Plainview, who owns all the surrounding land and has simply sucked the oil underneath the Bandy plot as it  seeped out into the surrounding areas. Now  it is Plainview who revels in his revenge: “You’re not the chosen brother, Eli. It was Paul who  was chosen. chosen. He found found me and told told me about about your land. I broke you and I beat you. It was Paul told me about you. He’s the prophet. He’s the smart one. He knew what was there and he found me to take it out  of the ground. I paid him $10,000 cash in hand.”

Once more, this leaves the audience to ponder whether there was indeed another brother – or whether ‘Paul’ is simply Eli’s alter ego, the man he should have been – the man who would have successfully have successfully held  held Plainview to his agreement to pay $10,00 $10,0000 for the land. At this point, Plainview begins chasing Eli around his private bowling alley   with a bowling pin as the latter begs him to stop. Finally Plainview beats Eli Sunday   with the pin, leaving him dead in a pool of  blood. As he collapses beside beside his prey, Daniel Plainview appears to have gone mad.  This leaves us with a question that’s equally relevant considering Nietzsche’s descent into madness and demise – what do  we do with this ‘madman’ who has liberated us from the lowest constraints on our nature? Should we condemn his ideas and acts as immoral? Or should we too question  whether  wheth er our own system system of of morality morality hasn’t  hasn’t  lead us  lead  to madness and self-destruction?  us  to  Modern liberals accept moral constraints constraints in the class of ‘other-re ‘other-regarding’ garding’ behaviours behaviours – limiting the liberty of individuals so that  all can be free to live without constant fear.  The price of constraining those whose power would otherwise allow them to oppress and exploit weaker people, is that  the most powerful have to give up some of  their natural advantage. advantage. The question question is  whether these constraints constraints on the ‘fittest’ are a price worth paying for the freedom of all. Nietzsche felt that it would be better to constrain no one and let nature weed out  the weak. The problem problem with this is that  power left unchecked soon turns into tyranny, with the consequence that only a few powerful ‘masters’ have any degree of  real freedom. freedom. Liberals think think giving everyeveryone relative freedom is preferable to giving an elite minority absolute absolute freedom. freedom. But     is is post-liberal, and lets There Will Be Blood   viewers  view ers draw draw their own conclus conclusions. ions. It is virtually  de  that there will be  de rigeur  that blood in Hollywood movies – but seldom is it shed by such an amoral protagonist, and seldom does it leave us with no feeling of  moral indignation. indignation. One may accept accept Nietzsche’s view, as I do, that orthodox Christianity reeks of hypocrisy, fully supporting in its very doctrines the abdication of personal moral responsibility, and yet deny the Nietzschean Nietzschea n idea that moral responsibility  ought to be abandoned altogether. © TERRI MURRAY 2009

Terri Murray teaches film studies and philoso phy at Hampstead College of Fine Arts &   Humanities  Humaniti es in London. She is also a post-grad  research student at Oxford Brookes University. July/Augu July/ August st 2009  Philosophy Now  45

Crossword Corner Our twenty-eighth potpourri of perplexing philosophical phrases perspicuously placed in parallel poses by Deiradiotes Across 1 How the Vi Vienna enna Circ Circle le might might have appeared to an observer? (7) 5 Auth Author or of the orig original inal book  The  The Queen.. (7) Queen 9 A French French bedr bedroom oom I used used freely freely is  without blemish. (9) 10 Kind of architecture found found in Greenland or Iceland. (5) 11 Narcotic discovered in Punjab hangar. (5) 12 These people really deliver. deliver. (9) 14 Orphan at market produces produces pithy  summary of Epicureanism. (14) 17 An ancient philosophy philosophy is a mixture mixture of paganism and theory. (14) 21 It’s on its way in a van. (2,7) (2,7) 23 Follower of of 17 from Syracuse Syracuse lost  lost  monad. (5) 24 Man and others others sound sound silly? (5) 25 Mean Stoic Stoic could could be one who who gives praise. (9) 26 Inju Injure re a football football team: team: sadomasochism is a philosophy! (7) 27 Nosy elk elk disturbed disturbed Russian Russian scientist. (7)

Down 1 Danc Dancee of an island island with an airline airline.. (6) (6) 2 Offe Offence nce given by old shad shade. e. (7) 3 Arid area area of China, China, Algeria Algeria and most most of Hungary Hungary once. (8) 4 Cres Cresss and trip tripod od could could be symbo symbols. ls. (11) 5 Direc Director tor Brown Browning’ ing’s ivy ivy bush. bush. (3) (3) 6 Wavy dune movi moving ng east east.. (5) 7 Vi Violen olently tly angry angry fool fool consu consumes mes vetch. vetch. (7) 8 Cent Centaurs aurs conf confused used diss dissenter enter.. (8) (8) 13 ‘A form of a language’, language’, I state, ‘is logical.’ (11) 15 Old philosopher philosopher from Eretria used men and me badly. badly. (9) 16 There is confid confidence ence in the philos philosophy ophy of Leibni Leibniz. z. (8) 18 Guardian covers covers broken lute with with tar. (7) 19 Shia man organised organised festival. festival. (7) 20 Colouring held by man at tonsorial tonsorial establishment. establishment. (6) 46   Philosophy No Now  w   July/Au July/August gust 2009

22 Very musical. musical. (5) 25 Tree begins exuding ligneous matter. matter. (3) (See page 20 for solution)

Question of the Month We’re still looking for answers to the question: Ho How w Ar Are e We Fr Free ee? ? Explain the nature of free will and other freedoms in less than 400 words to win a random book from our book mountain. Subject lines lines or envelopes should be marked ‘Question of the Month’, and must be received by 1st October. October. If you want a chance of getting a book, please include your physical address. Submission implies permission to reproduce your answer physically and electronically. So no freedom there, clearly.

Our philoso philosophical phical science correspo correspondent ndent Massimo Pigliucci says Pigliucci says

Hypotheses?

Forget About It!

N

ewton famously said “hypotheses  “ hypotheses  non fingo,” fingo,” meaning, “I frame no hypotheses” – a rather startling position for a scientist to advocate. Isn’t  science precisely the activity of constructing and testing hypotheses about the natural world? Certainly this has been the view  of influential philosophers of science such as Karl Popper. Popper said that scientific hypotheses can never be proven correct, but they can be falsified  be  falsified , that is proven is  proven wrong . For Popper, science progresses through the successive elimination of   wrong hypotheses. Many scientists proudly  ignore philosophy, but Popperian falsification is one of the only two philosophical concepts you are likely to find in an introductory science textbook. (The other is  paradigms . This is  Thomas Kuhn’s idea of  paradigms  rather strange, since Kuhn was a fierce critic of Popper.) I came across a delightful paper by  David Glass and Ned Hall – the first a biomedical researcher, the second a philosopher – published in a rather unlikely  place, the journal Cell  journal  Cell  (August  (August 8, 2008). As its title states, the main point of the paper is to provide readers with ‘A Brief History of  the Hypothesis’. Hypothesis’. This makes it a must-read for young (and perhaps not so young) scientists. But what caught my attention in the paper is Glass and Hall’s suggestion that, contrary to Popper’s conception of  science, scientists would be better off  replacing hypotheses with two other guides to their research: questions and models. Let me explain. Half of the problem  with hypotheses was mentioned above: there is no way to conclusively prove a hypothesis correct, because there is always the possibility that a new set of observations will disprove it. The bad news is that, unbeknownst to most scientists, philosophers have also made a very compelling argument that hypotheses cannot be decisively  disproved   either. Falsificatio Falsification n doesn’t   disproved  either.  work, because one can always tweak the hypothesis enough to accommodate the initially discordant data, or question some of the ancillary hypotheses, or even ques-

tion the accuracy of the data itself. (This is not as far fetched as it may seem given the complexity of the machinery used nowadays to produce scientific data, from particle colliders to genomic sequencers.)  What now? Glass and Hall advise us to go back to the basics. Science is really  about asking questions, they suggest: “it   would seem that a question is the appropriate tool because the question, as opposed to a hypothesis, properly identifies the scientist as being in a state of ignorance when data are absent.” Right! I became a scientist because science has the power to answer questions about nature. Questions can be formulated in either open-ended or very specific ways, and both ways can provide guidance for fruitful empirical research. Besides, as Glass and Hall also note, in many fields of modern science one would not even know how to begin to formulate sensible hypotheses. For instance, in the field of genomics, it’s easy to ask questions: how many genes are there in the human genome? How much does the human genome differ from that  of other primates, and in what ways? But   what sort of hypotheses could one possibly  formulate to replace such questions? Genomic research is highly explorative, so it is natural to base it on well-thoughtout questions. Even when research is more advanced and less explorative, Glass and Hall contend that hypotheses still will not  do, as they can’t be proven and they can’t  be disproven. Instead, here we need models  need  models  of the phenomena under study. Unlike a hypothesis, a model is constructed after some of the data is in, and then the model is used to predict new data.  A model can be statist statistical ical or directly directly causal causal in nature, mathematical or verbal, but its predictions are probabilistic and always sub ject to refinemen refinement. t. It is the very dynamism of models  which makes them powerful intellectual tools in the scientific quest for knowledge. Glass and Hall write: “eliminate the ‘hypothesis’’ term and substitute the ‘ques‘hypothesis tion’ for settings where experiments are

Science performed before sufficient data exist, and the ‘model’ for situations where the scientist is working with sufficient data to produce a construct that can be tested for inductive [predictive] power.” In fields which rely heavily on statistical analysis, such as biology and the social sciences, some scientists have already moved away from hypothesis testing to model comparisons. It used to be that statistical tests were rigidly set up to pit a simple (some would say simplistic) ‘null hypothesis’ (nothing’s happening) against an alternative, catch-all hypothesis (there’s something going on here…). Slowly but surely, people have figured out that this is not  particularly productive, productive, and recent years have seen a steady increase in the use of  statistical software that can pit several alternative models against each other, with analytical methods that can tell which ones are more likely, given the available data.  The funny thing about all this is that a few years ago the US National Science Foundation made a ‘philosop ‘philosophical’ hical’ move in their guidelines for grant proposals. They  explicitly asked scientists to do away with questions (the traditional way to frame grants) and to replace them instead with the more ‘solid’ concept of hypothesis. So now a prospective grant applicant can be seriously penalized if she does not put her proposal in a way clearly contradictory to Newton’s dictum (I venture to say that citing Newton as a reference will not help). But this is what happens when scientists pay so little attention to philosophy that  they are a few decades out of date with the philosophy of science literature. Maybe we should mandate Philosophy of Science 101 for all graduate students in the sciences. © DR MASSIMO PIGLIUCCI 2009

 Massimo Pigliucci is Chair of the Philosophy Department at City University of New York,  Lehman College, and is the author of several  books, including  Making  Making Sense of Evolution:  The Conceptual Foundations Of Evolutionary Biology  (Chicago  (Chicago Press, 2006). His   philosop  phil osophica hicall musing musingss can be be found found at   www.p  www .plat latof ofoot ootnot note.o e.org rg July/August July/A ugust 2009  Philosophy Now 

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’m watching the classic BBC sitcom Dad’s Army. Army . It is 1940, the hour of  maximum danger. The survivors of a sunken German U-boat have been picked up by a fishing vessel and taken to  Walmington-on Walming ton-on-Sea, Sea, where the Home Guard, under the leadership of Captain  Mainwaring,  Mainwar ing, are to hold them until a proper military escort arrives. The U-boat  captain, undaunted by his situation, demands Mainwaring’s Mainwaring’s name so that he can put him “on a list” for when the war has ended with victory for the Axis. Private Pike, who is not the sharpes sharpestt knife in the drawer, defiantly sings a song which describes describ es Hitler in terms the Führer might  not approve of. The U-boat captain demands his name too. Captain Mainwaring jumps in: “Don’t tell him, Pike!” It’s one of those lines that make you laugh however often you hear it – but, since you are a philosopher, it also invites you to think, in this case about proper names, and perhaps about the profoundest of all mysteries – the relationship between words and the world.  At first sight, sight, proper proper names seem seem the most straightforward of all grammatical forms, and hence philosophically the least  interesting. They are certainly less baffling than common nouns such as ‘dog’ or ‘table’, or general terms such as ‘truth’ or ‘virtue’,  which have have prompted prompted some of the the profoundest philosophical investigations in the 2,500 years since Plato tried to make sense of them. This is ‘the problem of universals’. Plato’s way of dealing with the mystery of  generality in a world of particulars – by creating another world accessed by our intellect and not by our senses, composed only  of general meanings which he called ‘Forms’ (or ‘Ideas’) – has been bitterly contested. But no-one has come up with an entirely satisfactory way of making sense of  the generality of general terms. And as for ‘grammatical’ or ‘function’ words such as prepositions and articles and conjunctions –  well, they they are even more challeng challenging. ing. How  do they do  work? More to the point, how do  they work? they work together with other words in 50 Philosophy Now  July/ July/Augus Augustt 2009

Don’t Don ’t Tel Telll Him, Him, Pik Pike! e! Raymond Tallis  from the home front in the war of words. expressions, utterances, utterances, and all those long and short emissions that come out of our mouths, pens and word processors processors?? So proper names seem like a good place to start. You don’t have to dream up a Platonic heaven to house their meaning. Here meaning.  Here is the word – ‘Pike’; and  there  is the object   there is – Pike. The object is not only the referent  of the word; it is also the meaning of it.  Thus proper names would seem to support  the much-scorne much-scorned d  “Fido”-Fido  theory of   “Fido”-Fido theory ‘I have a little list...’

language, which claims that the meaning of the word is the object to which it refers.  Alas, scorn is justified even here. If the meaning of ‘Pike’ were Pike himself, then the term would lose its meaning when Pike ceased to be. And words that referred to non-existent objects would also be meaningless – semantic bouncing cheques.  Yet manifestly they are not: ‘unicorn’ and ‘squared circle’ are not meaningless. Besides, objects and the meanings of words are not really the same kind of thing. If   you don’t believe it, try getting Pike into a sentence about himself. Even so, there does appear to be something very basic about proper names. I could put it technically by saying that they  access their referents immediately rather than by going through a more general sense. That is, when I talk about ‘Pike’, I seem to home directly on the item in ques-

tion; but when I talk about a ‘man’, I access any actual man only indirectly, through a general category which then has to be supplemented with other specifying terms. I can of course bring the general category down to particular earth, and fasten the word to a singular thing by talking about ‘this  ‘this  man’,  man’, as it were verbally pointing to the person in question. However, the use of demonstratives (like ‘this’ and ‘that’) in this context is extraordinarily  complex, as philosopher philosopherss of language have found to their cost.  We might instead instead specify what is distinctive about proper names by  saying, as John Stuart   Mill did, did, that they have have ‘denotation’ without  ‘connotation’: that is, they mark out something  without  witho ut implying implying any  significance or personal interpretation to me.  And, because because proper proper names do not rely on connotations to carry  them to their objects, they are highly arbitrary:: Pike could just as well have been trary called ‘Jones’. This is my excuse when I forget the name of someone who could reasonably be offended at my having done so, thinking that my amnesia signals that I don’t care for them. In fact I have mislaid only an arbitrary denotation; meanwhile, all that I (of course) cherish them for – their connotative aura – glows undiminished in my mind. Notwithstanding Notwithsta nding Mill’s perceptive observation, it should now be obvious that  there’s nothing primitive about proper names – nothing, anyway, that should enable them to work by mere mental association, so that the name acts as proxy as  proxy for  for the object – as a psychological stand-in for the thing itself. And the highly-charged exchange at Walmington-onWalmington-on-Sea Sea confirms this. It shows that we employ proper

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names not only to denote people, but also to tie them into all sorts of other discourses. Our name is the primary tag for our identity. Via the tag ‘Raymond Tallis’ I am located on endless documents, registers, and lists (including, who knows, perhaps the kind of list on which the U-boat  captain wished to include Private Pike) recording my characteristics characteristics,,  curriculum vitae,, attendances, absences, entitlements, vitae obligations, criminal record, blood potassium levels, and so on. My name, and nowadays, my e-name, give me a presence and identity that far exceed anything I could imagine. That I, Raymond Tallis am ‘Raymond Tallis’ is both a truism and untrue. Jorge Luis Borges’ wonderful little essay ‘Borges and I’, begins by noting that  “The other one called Borges, is the one things happen happen to.” At any rate ‘Raymond  Tallis’ has a life on papers and computer screens and in the minds of those who read them that I would hardly recognise.  A proper name, then, is a hook that  links our living flesh and its life to the larger human world – to an infinite nexus of discourses. It is the means by   which others get hold of us. Hence the urgency of Captain Main waring’s self-cancelling self-cancelling instruction to Pike to withhold his name. Name Calling  When we seek someone’s name, we ask   what they are called  are  called , as if the essence of a name is a handle by which we can grasp them. Wittgenstein once observed what a strange thing it was to call someone by their name. Animals may call to each other, but  the summons is not mediated via names: beasts do not linguistically recognise each other’s singularity. It is our names that  acknowledge us as subjects and as ‘subjected subjects’ – ‘abjects’, as the paranoid French philosopher Louis Althusser once argued.  The world that gets hold of you by using  your name as lexical tweezers also has your number, as it were. It may assert power over  you – the power to tie all those little knots that might Gulliver you to the common ground. Which is why, Private Pike, there are as many reasons for withholding our names as for introducing ourselves by  offering them along with our outstretched hand. We can even assert our power over others by the tone of voice in which we utter their name, or by employing a surname rather than a first name, by omitting titles, or by inflicting an unchosen abbreviation or unwanted nickname. The ultimate

denial of equal subjectivity is to replace someone’s name by a number: one’s uniqueness is reduced to the merely objective singularity of occupying a place in a series of units like yourself.  And names may be used to direct commands to their targets, of course. Since sounds promiscuously enter all ears within earshot, a spoken instruction does not necessarily single out its intended recipient.  When the skull of the commanded commanded is thought to be somewhat dense, the command may need to be spiked with the recipient’s recipien t’s name to ensure that it penetrates a burqa of inattent inattention. ion. Pike’s own name  was, Mainwaring Mainwaring thought, thought, such a necessary  poke – hence “Don’t tell him, Pike him,  Pike.” .” Of  course Mainwaring Mainwaring didn’t mean to utter Pike’s name as a piece of information. Yet, alas, it was inescapably both poke and information.  There could be no

more striking tribute to the complexity of  proper names than this moment, in which a name participates simultaneously in two different differe nt speech acts, one intended and the other unintended. Captain Mainwaring was caught up in the pragmatic contradiction contradiction of  revealing what was to be kept under wraps to the very person from whom it was to be hidden, as a result of specifying specifying the person  who was to keep it under wraps. This is how he tripped himself up and made us laugh 35 years ago, and laugh again now.  Mainwaring’s ‘Pike!’ is a reminder that  proper names are a special form of reference by which that which is referred to is caught hold of. No wonder we are prone to magic thinking, believing that names may invoke things. This kind of thinking may also spread to certain very emotive general terms: obscenities and oaths. What   would be the point of obscenity if referring to certain parts of the body did not seem to bring them, wobbling and dangling, before our eyes, or if the action of the two-backed beast was not somehow made present by  the f-word? And what of our imprecations to the gods? Their systematic absence is alleviated a little bit when, in our agony of 

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o nderland  W onderland loss, or when we bark our shins, we believe that saying ‘Christ!’ somehow causes to materialise that which is spoken of.  The intimate relation between the proper names and the existence of their deity is brilliantly dramatised in Arthur C. Clarke’s Nine Clarke’s  Nine Billion Names of God . A computer programme is designed to test the

Take your pike

claim that, once all the names of God have been spoken, the universe will come to an end. When the programme finishes churning out the list, the scientists, disappointed that there is no Apocalypse, look up at the sky, and see the stars going out one by one. Our names are strange possessions by   which we are also possessed until death,  when, as the poet Rainer Maria Rilke said, one discards “one’s own name as easily as a child abandons a broken toy.”After that they  continue without us, glimmers on others’ memories, perhaps chiselled on memorials, as something that ‘liveth forever’ (sort of).  Thus are we reduced to the seemingly  most straightforward of all words reminding us, via Captain Mainwaring’s gaffe, that no word is at all straight straightforwar forward. d. Forgive me if this philosophical autopsy of a delicious joke removed the smile from  your face. The DVD will put it back again! © PROF. RAYMOND TALLIS 2009

 Raymond Tallis is a physician, philosopher,  Raymond philosopher,  poet and novelist. His book The book The Kingdom of  Infinite Space: A Fantastical Journey  Round Your Head is Head  is publishe publishedd by Atlanti Atlantic. c. July/Augus July/ Augustt 2009  Philosophy Now 51

Dear Socrates Having traveled from the turn of the Fourth Century B.C. to the turn of the TwentyFirst Century A.D., Socrates  has eagerly signed on as a Philosophy Now  columnist  columnist so that he may continue to carry out his divinely-inspired dialogic mission. Dear Socrates, In a previous dialogue (in Issue 65) you mentioned that there are no evil opossums because there there are no virtuous opossums. opossums. My question is this: Assuming that that good and evil are really just abstract abstra ct human notions applied to the behavior of other humans, could not these notions just as arbitrar arbitrarily ily be applied to opossums? Something is good only if a human designates it as such (and other humans typically agree), so an opossum could be good or bad just as a human can if we agreed to designate it as such, right? If you disagree disagree,, please respond and explain to me another way of looking at right and wrong. Josh McIntyre Alto, Michigan, U.S U.S.A. .A.

Dear Josh, Let me turn the tables on you and note that, if moral designations are only the result of human consensus, we could just  as well dispense with labeling human beings as good or bad and doing right or wrong things. Why not all of us return to the state of nature before Adam and Eve ate of the tree of  knowledge of good and evil, to cite the Biblical story? Having eaten of that tree, would it be possible now for us humans to give up this knowledge? And if so, would it be desirable for us to do so?  As it happens I have been pondering this question question a great  deal lately. lately. I must admit that I sometim sometimes es tire of preaching  virtue and morality, morality, not to mention striving to exemplify exemplify them. I also notice that some of my worst traits, such as anger and egotism, appear to be caught up in that striving and that  preaching. There is nothing quite so satisfying as being able to condemn somebody somebody else with full certitude and passion, thereby also to bask in the reflected glory of one’ one’ss own superiority.. What would it be like, I wonder, if nobody cared about  ority ethics at all?  Wee might expect all chaos to break loose without the  W constraint of social standards and personal conscience. conscience. But   when I consider the world of the opossum opossumss and other animal species, I do not see chaos. They clearly do not have morality  as we do, but they neverthe nevertheless less coordinate their affairs in effective ways. They raise families, they find food, they have social interactions and community, community, they are sufficiently at peace to sleep a great deal of the day, and so forth. It is not obvious to me that their lives are “nasty, “nasty, brutish, and short.” Even when I consider human beings, if I think carefully  about what is motivating our actions, I do not always find morality underlying underlying the best. Instead, there is often a spontaneous feeling of sympathy for the pain of another that prompts Now  w   July/Aug 52   Philosophy No July/August ust 2009

us to help them. We do not need a commandment to tell us to do so. In fact, it is a commonplace that a commandment will prove idle if there is no feeling to back it up. Conversely Converse ly,, when I consider many of the truly heinous acts of humans, morality is often to be found at their root. The self-assured self-assu red and self-righteous of all times and places have been the scourge of this world. If I am Right, and accordingly  am convinced of an obligation to stamp out the Wrong: watch out! “The way I see things must be the way everybody should see things.” What an awful regimentation regimentation that forebode forebodes. s. But  in fact it is the more sure path to chaos and strife, since every  society feels the same way about its own mores; and so all clash  with all. I am sure that what I am saying must horrify you, and surprise you. My reputation is as a seeker after virtue. Now I seem to be impugning virtue. But I think I do not contradict  myself. Virtue Virtue may not be the same as morality morality.. What I seek is the good life. But perhaps my good life would not conform  with every other good life. And perhaps it would not consist of  duty but rather of freedom and reason. I know that many of my successors attempted to reconcile these various motifs. Might not morality be the result of our exercising freedom freedom and reason? One could call it that, Josh, since, as you implied, it is up to us to call things whatever we  want. But I have become wary of the word ‘morality’, ‘morality’, and even the words ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ when used in the moral way, since they have been implicate implicated d in so much mischief through the ages. I honestly believe that people do not even know what they  are referring to most of the time when they use those words.  As I said at the outset, I suspect what is mainly going on is that  people are venting their emotions, and not the noblest ones at  that.  Thereforee I recommend that we try to live with more  Therefor awareness of our true motives and, on that basis, decide how  to act. Let us be like the Zen opossum who said, “When hungry I eat, when tired I sleep.”  As ever, Socrates Readers who would like to engage Socrates in dialogue are welcome to write to Dear Socrat Socrates, es, c/o Philosophy Now  or  or to email him at [email protected]. In doing so you implicitly grant us permission to publish the correspondence in print or online. Socrates will select select which letters to answer and reserves the right to excerpt or otherwise edit them. Please indicate if you wish your name to be withheld.

The Bells, The Bells Kevin Robson drinks whiskey and sees things in a different way

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ou know our pub The Careless Whisper? Whisper? We had this singer on stage stage there last week. You know Fred? Fred  was telling me she was a “terrible monstrosity” monstrosity” – him mouthing the words slow at me like a bloody goldfish, coz if   you know me, you’ll be knowing I’m partially deaf in both me ears. He wrote down “FAT “FAT WALRUS WALRUS CROAKING” on my  deaf pad I always carry. carry. I told him I was glad then that I was of  the deaf persuasion. persuasion. This made him him laugh out loud. I clapped him on the back. “It was the Bells that made me deaf,” I was telling him, “Bells Whiskey Whiskey,, that is.” Seems to me how the committee had a change to their minds after that awful singer. singer. They swapped swapped things around. around. Instead Instead,, Saturday night night we had this big ugly old sock of a fortuneteller.. Just for a change, here for one night  teller only at the Whisper, we had a clairing  voyant. She only went an’ picked me out. Fortunatellerly,, it was about nine o clock  Fortunatellerly in the evenin’ by then, and I’d had enough of the fighting-spirit Dutch courage.  There I was, me with with just the the dozen double whiskeys under my belt. belt. Everyone hooted hoote d me to go on up on the stage. Naturally I couldn’t wait to show her what’s  what. I’m great great with the craic  the craic , me. I got up there, an’ I sat down on a chair facing her. She grabbed my one hand between her two sweaty palms, and then placed me other hand on top of her crystal ball. I could see close up how truly ugly she she was. Moles over her face like a country lawn in Spring, and the biggest wonkyfied yellowed teeth to go with a wonkyfied stare. stare. On her head she had a dishrag dishrag of  tartan, knotted up under under one of her chins. She looked the part – she also looked familiar, familiar, if you’ll be catching my drift. She might also have been Old Ma Jenkins from the Post Office: her that keeps all her half-eaten sweets in her linen hanky for later on. She was jabbering away with the talking, going nineteen to the dozen, breathing her smelly breath into my face, and I hear a call from down below behind me, like you might be hearing something if you’re under water, far away like, shouting, “He’s deaf, you know!” Someone threw her me deaf pad, someon someonee else a stub of pencil. She writ scratchily, and tore off the page like she was in in a temper with me. Honestly, I’d done me best wit the  woman. She folded folded the page and pressed it into my hand. Then she done a strange thing. thing. She grabbed me by me hair and lifted lifted me out of the chair. Then she turned me round an’ pushed pushed me on to the stairs down the stage. I missed the first step down, down, and managed to land myself a good ‘un almost face-down face-down back  in my chair. I heard a stripe of laughter and saw folk clapping. clapping.  Well,  W ell, I sat back in my seat and I opened that scrap of paper. It said, ‘T ‘Tomorrow omorrow Sunday 11.14 p.m. Outside the Careless

 Whisper by the crossroads. White Audi A4 Whiskey Golf  Foxtrot 194 Tango. Tango. Thirty-eight mph. Watch Out!’ “Rubbish!” I thought “What would I be wanting to buy  meself a car for, especially if it can’t get up to 40?” and I signalled Harry at the bar for another of them there double  whiskeys. I crumpled the paper and let it sit on the table.  The very next night was a Sunday Sunday.. I was to be found in my  usual seat in the Whisper, Whisper, doing what I do best. After closing time, Fred, Harry and a couple of the others gave me a help through the door. door. I still had me glass in me hand, and was being most especially especially careful not to to let the going of it. I downed the last of me whiskey to my lips, and tossed the glass back over my shoulder, turning to see that it had broken with no noise on the pavement. As far as I could see, and in my very best of judgement, the road seemed relatively clearish. But as I stepped out from the pavement my legs  were suddenly took away from under me. It was as if I’d been blown up high into the air by the hugest gust of wind. I remember seeing a wisp of a white blur. No pain. Me sat sitting on the crown of  the road among shattered headlights and splinters of red wet things. A dark bush  was sat on me lap. A number plate looked out at me from the side of the bush, WGF 194 T. T. I’m sure I’d seen those numbers before, but I couldn’t for the life of Jeezus remember where I’ve been knocked down by a motor before. before. Haven’ Haven’tt you been?  Yeah,  Y eah, we all have.  The ambulance driver’s driver’s name was Hugh. He was desisted by Lloyd, the parrot medic. Lloyd had a wonkyfied eye too. I oughta get one, perhaps they’re they’re all the rage. Soon, it’ll be you can’t come in the Whisper unless you’ve got a messed-up eye, to be sure. He also had the mother of all foul breath from from him. “Hugh,” I asked, “Hugh, do you believe in God?”  shhhh.” “Quiet, shhhh “Quiet, .” He tightened something hard round my neck. I’d heard him! Me hearing had come back to me! Not such a bad thing, being run over, it’s it’s not all bad... does mighty good for your hearing. Still, I wouldn’t wouldn’t let it lie. “Hugh,” I said, “Hugh, do you believe in God?” “Quiet, shhhhh “Quiet, ...” He tightened me neck up more.  shhhhh...” “Hugh, does God believe in you, though?” I chuckled as they put their fingers under me and rolled me onto a bed on the floor. floor. I blacked out. out. Next I knew I was finding my surroundings to be a hospital bed. “Nurse” I cried, “I can’t feel my legs!” She came. “I can’t... I can’t feel my legs!” I repeated. “I’ll get a doctor, he’ll explain,” she told me in her soft Scottish lilt. Put me in mind of Simon’n’Garfunkel. Simon’n’Garfunkel. They were of  the Scotty persuasion, if I remember rightly. “In the clearing Now  w  July/August July/Au gust 2009  Philosophy No

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stands a boxer and a fighter by his trade,” I sung to my newly  re-activated earholes. 4 a.m. I still had my watch on me wrist. I felt the hands.  The glass was missing. An Asian doctor has come in, the collar of his blue shirt too big for his scrawny neck, a child in man’s clothes. I told him: “You’re “You’re a child in man’s man’s clothes,” I said. “I’m sorry, I’ve been on call,” he tells me, stethoscope round his egg-blue collar collar.. “You should get your mother to take you to Peacocks, they’ve got some lovely lovely shirts in the winda,” winda,” I tell him. He comes back with somethin’ like, “You were in a car accident.” He has a very serious look on his fizzer when he says it. “Oh really?” my voice dripping with the sarcasm. “Try to be telling me something I don’ don’tt know.” He picks up a clipboard. clipboard. I think he’s he’s gonna clock me with it. Instead he says again, “You were in a car accident.” Then he goes all formal formal like. “I will come back   when you’re more reasonable. reasonable. Before I go, is there anybody you’d like us to call – a friend or relative? relative?”” “My daughter. daughter. I have a daughter.” daughter.” “I’ll get the nurse to take the details. Get some rest. We’ll talk in the morning.”  This morphine morphine kicks kicks in. It’s not as good as the whiskey, mind. It’s not yer  Jamesons,  James ons, nor even even yer Black and and White.  Makes you you the awfullest awfullest itchy itchy in a man’s man’s peculiars. But it does work. Eventually the nurse arrives. She comes over. My watch says 4.55. It’s a liar. My watch is a liar. I’m gonna total this watch! I’m gonna do the Flatley stamping on the muvva! Now there’s two of them there now  standing over me – two wee golden angels, smiling down a mother’ mother’ss love on me. “Abby – is that you?” “No, I’m Livvie, I’m your nurse. Who’s Who’s Abby?” “Not you nurse. My daughter Abby, Abby, next to yourself.” “There’s no one else here, just me,” she says, and puts her hand right through my Abby’s tummy. “She looks like you nurse, does my Abby.”  The other figurine I saw with my own eyes vanishes. “How do we reach her?” the nurse asks. “You phone, dontcher.” “The number?” “I used to ’ave it. She moved on.” “We’ll need a number.” “Let… sleep. I’ll remember it,” I reached out my hand to  where Abby had been, where I’d been seeing my Abby, Abby, but  she’d clean mean disappeared disappeared.. Fields of yellow and blue grass. My mother holding me. My  first love. The time I almost drowned. Going to Macdonalds.  My first long trousers. She was back again tugging me shoulder. “Go away nurse, I’m having a lovely dream.” “We checked all records – we can’t find a number for your daughter.” 54   Philosophy No Now  w   July/Aug July/August ust 2009

“It’s not important... Tell me nurse – was there anywhere  really wanted  you really wanted to go –  really  wanted to, mind – and when at  long last you got there, it wasn’t ‘alf as good as you thought?” “Uh huh?” funny,, like I was a bomb not  huh?” She looked at me funny  yet for exploding, exploding, and she moved away like a crab; a slow step, then another slow step. step. When she got to the bottom of the bed I let her have the both of me barrels: “Well, answer me bitch! No, tell you what – you shut up! up! Shut up when I talk to  you!” “I’ll get the doctor.” “You go – get him then!” I thundered at her. “You get him then, you see if I care!”  What a dream I had. I was back in County Cork, marrying my Jessie, Abby coming along seven months later – premature and not premature, if you know what I’m meant to be meaning, in that type of a town-full-of-curtain-twitchers town-full-of-curtain-twitchers way. way. In days when they said, “Did you see that Jessie  Tyler  T yler with that doyty man from the Chalk  Pit? Ooooh, bold as brass that one.” That’s the sorta thing what they’d say – what they  said about me and my Jessie. Still, I showed them differ different. ent. Made an honest woman woman of my Jessie, so so I did. I can still see me – that’s me, that is, throwing me babby Abby, high into the air; and the catching of her, her so much loving it, gurgling and chuckling. There’ There’ss me, look – holding  Jessie and Abby, Abby, posing for a photograph in our first first own brand new home. My car. car. Me dressed in olden days, wrapped in crinoline of juniperberry and and wine. You held my  hand. We’ve all gone to look for America. Feeling Groovy. Here’ss a strange thing: me looking down Here’ on me. The me I’m looking at is in a hospital bier, wired up to a whole load of tellies and sweet-shop bottles. I can smell roasting roasting pork, there’s there’s a crowd of suited ‘n’ booted hospital bodies. “Stand back!” goes the head honcho hospital hospital body. body. Then he hits me chest with two steam irons with wires hanging out.  There’ss that sizzle, more roasted pork smells.  There’ He stands back and looks at the tellies biting his lip. “Once more,” he says, him full of panting, with the sweating, green circles under the arms of his dress.  The same palaver again with the irons.  Again he stands back and looks at the tellies, biting his lip. “Are we agreed?” – plummy voice like he’s been to college, or even university – “Time of death, zero nine three six?”  The others others look up at the clock clock or their watches watches.. All murmur or nod their soppy soppy hatted heads at him. I look at all the dust on the top of the strip lights, on the tops of the tellies, and at the doctor with cartoon pictures on the top of his green cap, and down at the all the bits of red shiny cutlery. “Your arse. I’m not dead, not dead, not dead... Hello Abby. Hello Jessie.” © KEVIN ROBSON 2009

 Kevin Robson ducks and dives in Hadleigh, where he is contracted by the second-hand-car-sales Mafia to enforce the strict Essex code of   honour.