360. Now, though Plato had joined with an imagination the most splendid and magnificent, an intellect not less deep and clear, yet it is not to be supposed that either he or any other philosophers of Greece or the East had by the light of nature attained an adequate notion of the Holy Trinity; nor even that their imperfect notion, so far as it went, was exactly just; nor perhaps that those sublime hints, which dart forth like flashes of light in the midst of a profound darkness, were originally struck from the hard rock of human reason, but rather derived, at least in part, by a divine tradition (Sects. 298, 301), from the author of all things. It seems a remarkable confirmation of this, what Plotinus observes in his fifth Ennead, that this doctrine of a Trinity--Father, Mind, and Soul--was no late invention, but an ancient tenet.
361. Certain it is that the notion of a Trinity is to be found in the writings of many old heathen philosophers--that is to say, a notion of three divine Hypostases. Authority, Light, and Life did, to the eye of reason, plainly appear to support, pervade, and animate the mundane system or macrocosm. The same appeared in the microcosm, preserving soul and body, enlightening the mind, and moving the affections. And these were conceived to be necessary universal principles, co-existing and co-operating in such sort as never to exist asunder, but on the contrary to constitute one Sovereign of all things. And, indeed, how could power or authority avail or subsist without knowledge? Or either without life and action?
362. In the administration of all things, there is authority to establish, law to direct, and justice to execute. There is first the source of all perfection, or Fons Deitatis; secondly, the supreme reason, order, or λóγοσ ; and lastly, the spirit, which quickens and inspires. We are sprung from the Father, irradiated or enlightened by the Son, and moved by the Spirit. Certainly, that there is Father, Son, and Spirit; that these bear analogy to the sun, light, and heat; and are otherwise expressed by the terms Principle, Mind, and Soul, by One or τò ''εν, Intellect, and Life, by Good, Word, and Love; and that generation was not attributed to the second Hypostasis, the νοûς or λóγοσ, in respect of time (Sect. 352), but only in respect of origin and order, as an eternal necessary emanation; these are the express tenets of Platonists, Pythagoreans, Egyptians, and Chaldeans.
363. Though it may be well presumed there is nothing to be found on that sublime subject in human writings which doth not bear the sure signatures of humanity, yet it cannot be denied that several Fathers of the Church have thought fit to illustrate the Christian doctrine of the Holy Trinity by similitudes and expressions borrowed from the most eminent heathens, whom they conceived to have been no strangers to that mystery, as hath been plainly proved by Bessarion, Eugubinus, and Dr. Cudworth.
364. Therefore, how unphilosophical soever that doctrine may seem to many of the present age, yet it is certain that men of greatest fame and learning among the ancient philosophers held a Trinity in the Godhead. It must be owned that upon this point some later Platonists of the Gentile world seem to have bewildered themselves (as many Christians have also done) while they pursued the hints derived from their predecessors with too much curiosity.
This is all from Siris. The notion of a primitive revelation to all humanity is common in this period; one finds mention of it, for example, in Malebranche and Butler (as far as I know, Malebranche merely mentions it, but Butler defends it).
Wednesday, July 21, 2004
Shiftiness and Perpetual Deja-vu
Warning! This is a very dogmatic post. Not, of course, that my other posts are never dogmatic....
There is an interesting post by Neal Tognazzini at the philosophy weblog, "The Garden of Forking Paths," on the question of what is really meant by 'determinism'.
I think it's about time people started asking this question, because, quite frankly, the only reason 'determinism' hasn't been completely demolished and banished from the intellectual scene is that 'determinists' significantly change their position every ten years or so. (Yes, this is my very non-determinist libertarian view; God only knows how determinists themselves would explain it. Hence the need for people to start asking the question.)
This shiftiness irritates me, in case you haven't figured it out from my tone.
For instance, there is the view noted by the author of the post, namely, that determinism is the position that {past + laws of nature} entails one single future. (It always seems to me that exactly how they entail it is always nudged under the rug a bit, but that's a side issue.) But this is a fairly recent view; the farther back in time you go from the present day, the harder it is to find it. The farther back you go, the more it is entirely about causes. (How the causes entailed a unique future was always nudged under the rug a bit, too, but that's also a side issue.) The exact variation varies considerably from decade to decade, depending on what's fashionable. To make matters worse, scientists at some point began using the term differently than philosophers, and now there's a weird feedback loop going on. It's all a mess.
This occasionally happens in philosophy, i.e., a label, for purely historical reasons, is retained through radical transformations that make it an endless invitation to equivocation. 'Determinism' isn't actually the worst example; the worst example is 'materialism', which has been used for so many mutually exclusive positions, and has been adapted to so many facts that would previously have been considered not materialistic at all, that it is only just this side of useless. 'Determinism' is in a fair way to that.
This wouldn't be a problem - just an issue about labels - if it weren't for the effects it has on the discussion. (1) We libertarians can never assume anything about 'determinism', because it's something different half the time it comes up. The pro-free-choice position has varied through time, as all philosophical positions have, but there have been several stable themes that unite the whole: the phenomenology of choice, self-mastery, moral responsibility, etc. Not everyone takes precisely the same view or has precisely the same theory of these, but libertarians have been fairly constant and dependable in appealing to the same facts as the foundation of the position. Not so with 'determinists', since that label indicates theories built on some rather different foundations through time. (2) Contrary to first impressions, there hasn't been a continuous free-will vs. determinism debate in philosophy. Rather, there have been a whole bunch of smaller debates in which the basic core of the free-will position has outlasted every one of the fashionable contenders brought against it as its new certain nemesis. This important truth has been obscured both by the shiftiness of the 'determinism' label and by the odd fact that every 'determinism' is always put forward with triumph as a relatively problem-free position that is far superior to the free-will position - and it is never more triumphalistic than when it is just about to morph into something completely different. So advocates of the free-will position should take heart; it's a long hard fight agains the forces of unreason, but we've always been here before and survived....
Now, calmness is returning.
Note added later: I should say, now that my rant is done, that it is entirely possible to defend a particular version of determinism without any intentional shiftiness. But in general philosophers who call themselves determinists help themselves to a level of credibility and assume for themselves a level of stability their actual position has not earned, precisely because they do not take sufficient care to avoid this sort of shiftiness. This is most obvious in the so-called Problem of the Intelligibility of Free-Will. The assumption is generally that 'determinism' is the more intelligible option, and that the libertarian position has to go to greater lengths to show that their position is intelligible. There is no such problem. The free-will position is less obscure, first, since its primary appeal is directly to experience, and second, because no particular determinist position has actually shown itself to be both intelligible and capable of recognizing all the facts of human choice; thus the real discussion should always be about the Problem of the Intelligibility of (this particular variant of) Determinism.
There is an interesting post by Neal Tognazzini at the philosophy weblog, "The Garden of Forking Paths," on the question of what is really meant by 'determinism'.
I think it's about time people started asking this question, because, quite frankly, the only reason 'determinism' hasn't been completely demolished and banished from the intellectual scene is that 'determinists' significantly change their position every ten years or so. (Yes, this is my very non-determinist libertarian view; God only knows how determinists themselves would explain it. Hence the need for people to start asking the question.)
This shiftiness irritates me, in case you haven't figured it out from my tone.
For instance, there is the view noted by the author of the post, namely, that determinism is the position that {past + laws of nature} entails one single future. (It always seems to me that exactly how they entail it is always nudged under the rug a bit, but that's a side issue.) But this is a fairly recent view; the farther back in time you go from the present day, the harder it is to find it. The farther back you go, the more it is entirely about causes. (How the causes entailed a unique future was always nudged under the rug a bit, too, but that's also a side issue.) The exact variation varies considerably from decade to decade, depending on what's fashionable. To make matters worse, scientists at some point began using the term differently than philosophers, and now there's a weird feedback loop going on. It's all a mess.
This occasionally happens in philosophy, i.e., a label, for purely historical reasons, is retained through radical transformations that make it an endless invitation to equivocation. 'Determinism' isn't actually the worst example; the worst example is 'materialism', which has been used for so many mutually exclusive positions, and has been adapted to so many facts that would previously have been considered not materialistic at all, that it is only just this side of useless. 'Determinism' is in a fair way to that.
This wouldn't be a problem - just an issue about labels - if it weren't for the effects it has on the discussion. (1) We libertarians can never assume anything about 'determinism', because it's something different half the time it comes up. The pro-free-choice position has varied through time, as all philosophical positions have, but there have been several stable themes that unite the whole: the phenomenology of choice, self-mastery, moral responsibility, etc. Not everyone takes precisely the same view or has precisely the same theory of these, but libertarians have been fairly constant and dependable in appealing to the same facts as the foundation of the position. Not so with 'determinists', since that label indicates theories built on some rather different foundations through time. (2) Contrary to first impressions, there hasn't been a continuous free-will vs. determinism debate in philosophy. Rather, there have been a whole bunch of smaller debates in which the basic core of the free-will position has outlasted every one of the fashionable contenders brought against it as its new certain nemesis. This important truth has been obscured both by the shiftiness of the 'determinism' label and by the odd fact that every 'determinism' is always put forward with triumph as a relatively problem-free position that is far superior to the free-will position - and it is never more triumphalistic than when it is just about to morph into something completely different. So advocates of the free-will position should take heart; it's a long hard fight agains the forces of unreason, but we've always been here before and survived....
Now, calmness is returning.
Note added later: I should say, now that my rant is done, that it is entirely possible to defend a particular version of determinism without any intentional shiftiness. But in general philosophers who call themselves determinists help themselves to a level of credibility and assume for themselves a level of stability their actual position has not earned, precisely because they do not take sufficient care to avoid this sort of shiftiness. This is most obvious in the so-called Problem of the Intelligibility of Free-Will. The assumption is generally that 'determinism' is the more intelligible option, and that the libertarian position has to go to greater lengths to show that their position is intelligible. There is no such problem. The free-will position is less obscure, first, since its primary appeal is directly to experience, and second, because no particular determinist position has actually shown itself to be both intelligible and capable of recognizing all the facts of human choice; thus the real discussion should always be about the Problem of the Intelligibility of (this particular variant of) Determinism.
Determinism and Debauchery
From Beattie, An Essay on the Nature and Immutability of Truth, Part II, Ch. II.3, pp. 367-369:
(By 'Fatalism' Beattie means what we would call 'determinism'.) Much of Beattie's argument on liberty and necessity is difficult to follow, in part because it seems to confuse various senses of 'liberty'. Or, indeed, it may be quite deliberate; he may be refusing to distinguish (sharply) these various senses, preferring to treat them as all intimately connected. Whatever's the case with the rest of the argument, however, I think the above argument particularly interesting, because it seems to me to highlight a problem people have with determinism that determinists have not done much to alleviate. The idea is this:
1. If the necessity proposed by the determinist is the same as that to which the debauchee appeals to excuse himself, determinism makes moral responsibility impossible.
2. But if it is a different sort of necessity, as it needs to be the case to preserve the whole notion of moral responsibility, what sort of necessity would that be? And how would it be distinguished from the necessity that would excuse?
This isn't, of course, a refutation of determinism. But it is a challenge to those who hold that determinism is compatible with moral responsibility, a challenge to give some principled reason for distinguishing the necessity of determinism from the necessity of the excuse of the debauchee. We need a reason, if we are to preserve moral responsibility, to think determinism does not give the latter. This sharpens one aspect of the big problem determinists have always had to deal with, namely, the question of whether determinism is actually compatible with morality at all. This problem of the two necessities, then, is one of the fronts on which determinists have to fight.
As I said, I haven't really seen anything that shows determinists making any great effort to distinguish the two necessities. A common argument for determinism, in fact, going back to the early modern period, appears to require that there be only one necessity in the two cases, namely, the argument that determinism is necessary for making sense of moral character and causation. But if the two are the same, then determinism actually eliminates moral considerations entirely, so the determinist needs some significant difference in the cases.
Moral agency further implies, that we are accountable for our conduct, and that if we do what we ought not to do, we deserve blame and punishment. My conscience tells me, that I am accountable for those actions only that are in my own power; and neither blames nor approves, in myself or in others, that conduct which is the effect, not of choice, but of necessity. Convince me, that all my actions are equally necessary, and you silence my conscience for ever, or at least prove it to be a fallacious and impertinent monitor: you will then convince me, that all circumspection is unnecessary, and all remorse absurd. And is it a matter of little moment, whether I believe my moral feelings authentic and true, or equivocal and fallacious? Can any principle be of more fatal consequence to me, or to society, than to believe that the dictates of conscience are false, unreasonable, or insignificant? Yet this is one certain effect of my becoming a Fatalist, or even a sceptic in regard to moral liberty.
I observe, that when a man's understanding begins to be so far perverted by debauchery, as to make him imagine his crimes unavoidable, from that moment he begins to think them innocent, and deems it a sufficient apology, that in respect of them he is no longer a free, but a necessary agent. The drunkard pleads his constitution, the blasphemer urges the invincible force of habit, and the sensualist would have us believe, that his appetites are too strong to be resisted. Suppose all men so far perverted as to argue in the same manner with regard to crimes of every kind;--then it is certain, that all men would be equally disposed to think all crimes innnocent.
(By 'Fatalism' Beattie means what we would call 'determinism'.) Much of Beattie's argument on liberty and necessity is difficult to follow, in part because it seems to confuse various senses of 'liberty'. Or, indeed, it may be quite deliberate; he may be refusing to distinguish (sharply) these various senses, preferring to treat them as all intimately connected. Whatever's the case with the rest of the argument, however, I think the above argument particularly interesting, because it seems to me to highlight a problem people have with determinism that determinists have not done much to alleviate. The idea is this:
1. If the necessity proposed by the determinist is the same as that to which the debauchee appeals to excuse himself, determinism makes moral responsibility impossible.
2. But if it is a different sort of necessity, as it needs to be the case to preserve the whole notion of moral responsibility, what sort of necessity would that be? And how would it be distinguished from the necessity that would excuse?
This isn't, of course, a refutation of determinism. But it is a challenge to those who hold that determinism is compatible with moral responsibility, a challenge to give some principled reason for distinguishing the necessity of determinism from the necessity of the excuse of the debauchee. We need a reason, if we are to preserve moral responsibility, to think determinism does not give the latter. This sharpens one aspect of the big problem determinists have always had to deal with, namely, the question of whether determinism is actually compatible with morality at all. This problem of the two necessities, then, is one of the fronts on which determinists have to fight.
As I said, I haven't really seen anything that shows determinists making any great effort to distinguish the two necessities. A common argument for determinism, in fact, going back to the early modern period, appears to require that there be only one necessity in the two cases, namely, the argument that determinism is necessary for making sense of moral character and causation. But if the two are the same, then determinism actually eliminates moral considerations entirely, so the determinist needs some significant difference in the cases.
Tuesday, July 20, 2004
Beattie on Taste
Since I recently posted on taste, and since I've hinted at Beattie's position on taste before, but never given any details, here's a set of passages from Beattie on the subject:
To be a person of taste, it seems necessary, that one have, first, a lively and correct imagination; secondly, the power of distinct apprehension; thirdly, the capacity of being easily, strongly, and agreeably affected, with sublimity, beauty, harmony, exact imitation, &c.; fourthly, Sympathy, or Sensibility of heart; and, fifthly, Judgment, or Good Sense, which is the principal thing, and may not very improperly be said to comprehend all the rest.
I. Good taste implies Lively Imagination. This talent qualifies one, for readily understanding an author's purpose; tracing the connection of his thoughts; forming the same views of things which he had formed; and clearly conceiving the several images or ideas that the artist describes or delineates....
II. Sometimes, when one's imagination is lively, and regulated too by an acquaintance with nature, one may, notwithstanding, contract habits of indolence and irregularity in one's studies; which produce a superficial medley of knowledge very detrimental to the native vigour of the mind. And therefore I mentioned Distinct Apprehension, as the second thing necessary to good taste....
Now the third thing necessary to good taste is, Acuteness of (what is here called) Secondary Sensation; or, to express it in other words, "a capacity of being easily, strongly, and agreeably affected, with sublimity, beauty, harmony, exact imitation," &c....
IV. A fourth requisite to good taste is Sympathy; or that Sensibility of heart, by which, on supposing ourselves in the condition of another, we are conscious in some degree of those very emotions, pleasant or painful, which in a more intense degree would arise within us, if we were really in that condition....
V. The last thing mentioned as necessary to form good taste, is Judgment, or Good Sense; which is indeed the principal thing; and which some would consider, as comprehending most of the foregoing particulars. By Judgment, I here understand such a constitution of mind, as disposes a man to attend to the reality of things, and qualifies him for knowing and discovering the truth. It is by means of this faculty, as applied in criticism, that we compare poetical imitations with natural objects, so as to perceive in what they resemble, and in what they differ; that we estimate the rectitude of sentiments, the probability of incidents, and whether fictitious characters be similar to those of real life and consistent with themselves, and whether any part of a composition be unsuitable to the tendency of the whole. Hence too we discern, natural, or confused and unnatural; and whether the author have been careful to make it, both in the general arrangement, and in the structure of each part, conformable to the rule.
James Beattie, "Of Imagination," Chap. IV. in Dissertations Moral and Critical, pp. 166, 170, 173, 180, 182.
On p. 174, he says, "I here join taste and genius together. They are kindred powers; and of so near affinity, that the first, perhaps, might be called passive genius, and the second active taste." What Beattie above calls "Secondary Senses," and which, as he notes, are sometimes called "Reflex Senses" or "Internal Senses" were a major philosophical research project in 18th century Scotland, in great measure due to Francis Hutcheson. They include things like a sense of beauty, a sense of harmony, a 'musical ear', a taste for sublimity, a taste for novelty, a sense of humor, a feel for magnificence, a sense of morality, etc.
To be a person of taste, it seems necessary, that one have, first, a lively and correct imagination; secondly, the power of distinct apprehension; thirdly, the capacity of being easily, strongly, and agreeably affected, with sublimity, beauty, harmony, exact imitation, &c.; fourthly, Sympathy, or Sensibility of heart; and, fifthly, Judgment, or Good Sense, which is the principal thing, and may not very improperly be said to comprehend all the rest.
I. Good taste implies Lively Imagination. This talent qualifies one, for readily understanding an author's purpose; tracing the connection of his thoughts; forming the same views of things which he had formed; and clearly conceiving the several images or ideas that the artist describes or delineates....
II. Sometimes, when one's imagination is lively, and regulated too by an acquaintance with nature, one may, notwithstanding, contract habits of indolence and irregularity in one's studies; which produce a superficial medley of knowledge very detrimental to the native vigour of the mind. And therefore I mentioned Distinct Apprehension, as the second thing necessary to good taste....
Now the third thing necessary to good taste is, Acuteness of (what is here called) Secondary Sensation; or, to express it in other words, "a capacity of being easily, strongly, and agreeably affected, with sublimity, beauty, harmony, exact imitation," &c....
IV. A fourth requisite to good taste is Sympathy; or that Sensibility of heart, by which, on supposing ourselves in the condition of another, we are conscious in some degree of those very emotions, pleasant or painful, which in a more intense degree would arise within us, if we were really in that condition....
V. The last thing mentioned as necessary to form good taste, is Judgment, or Good Sense; which is indeed the principal thing; and which some would consider, as comprehending most of the foregoing particulars. By Judgment, I here understand such a constitution of mind, as disposes a man to attend to the reality of things, and qualifies him for knowing and discovering the truth. It is by means of this faculty, as applied in criticism, that we compare poetical imitations with natural objects, so as to perceive in what they resemble, and in what they differ; that we estimate the rectitude of sentiments, the probability of incidents, and whether fictitious characters be similar to those of real life and consistent with themselves, and whether any part of a composition be unsuitable to the tendency of the whole. Hence too we discern, natural, or confused and unnatural; and whether the author have been careful to make it, both in the general arrangement, and in the structure of each part, conformable to the rule.
James Beattie, "Of Imagination," Chap. IV. in Dissertations Moral and Critical, pp. 166, 170, 173, 180, 182.
On p. 174, he says, "I here join taste and genius together. They are kindred powers; and of so near affinity, that the first, perhaps, might be called passive genius, and the second active taste." What Beattie above calls "Secondary Senses," and which, as he notes, are sometimes called "Reflex Senses" or "Internal Senses" were a major philosophical research project in 18th century Scotland, in great measure due to Francis Hutcheson. They include things like a sense of beauty, a sense of harmony, a 'musical ear', a taste for sublimity, a taste for novelty, a sense of humor, a feel for magnificence, a sense of morality, etc.
Monday, July 19, 2004
On Critical Thought and Political Taste
In my neverending quest for the development of a theory of political taste, I've been thinking about the issue of critical thought in politics recently. First a clarification:
'Critical thought' or 'critical thinking' doesn't necessarily have anything to do with criticizing; the two words are similar, but not that similar. The 'critical' in 'critical thought' is much closer to what is meant by 'criticism' in 'literary criticism' or 'art criticism'. That is, it indicates a particular sort of good judgment excercised in reasoning about things. In other words, it is closely related to the early modern notion of 'Taste'.
This point is relevant for political thought, because a quick trip around the political bloggers of the blogosphere, or a quick look at pundits of all persuasions, shows that there are a lot of intelligent people who think that criticism of someone's position is, simply in and of itself, an exercise of critical thinking. This, of course, is blatantly false. As I try to teach my students, Mere opposition is one of the least significant, and least rational, uses of reason. Even when it is dressed up with a bit of wit and humor it is not, on its own, a particularly rational activity. Where criticism or opposition does become rational is when it is bolstered by a genuine self-criticism, or self-critique. The reason is that it is only through self-criticism that we can develop the consistency, objectivity, and insight of our criticisms. It is self-critique that checks to see if the objection we're making is consistent with our own principles; it is self-critique that checks to see if we are blinded by any ignorance or prejudice of our own; it is self-critique that judges whether we are actually being relevant, or just knocking down a straw man; it is self-critique that examines whether we are recognizing distinctions between the important and the unimportant, the essential and the unessential. Everything genuinely rational about criticism arises solely when it is combined with self-critique. Being (reasonably) self-critical is the heart of what it is to engage in critical thinking. (It should be noted that by 'self-critique' is meant not pathological self-criticism, but the sort of self-criticism in which we engage when we are genuinely trying to improve ourselves.)
This, I suggest, is precisely one of the major points about Taste in the early modern sense. This is why theories of Taste often appeal either to the perspective of the impartial (i.e., unbiased) spectator, or to the development of an increasingly consistent and general set of maxims, or both; that is, these are methods of self-critique, by which one holds oneself to relevance, consistency, and fairmindedness. By putting oneself temporarily in the perspective of a spectator not biased to your own position, you help yourself to see both your weaknesses and your opponents' strengths, and so to come to a better understanding of the entire issue. Likewise with trying to articulate better and better general rules.
There is another aspect to artistic Taste that sheds light on critical thought in politics and the closely associated notion of political taste. Taste is the complement of Genius; one of the things developing our Taste enables us to do is appreciate other people's genius and taste. This is important in politics because there is such a thing as political genius; and it is immensely hard to spot. If you think that you would have been able, out of sheer native talent, to recognize that (e.g.) Lincoln was a political genius, you almost certainly are overrating yourself. Lincoln did not go around with a halo, and he certainly did not look, as he does in the Lincoln Memorial, like a sage and immortal deity surveying the world from a throne. If you would have been able to recognize his genius, it would have been either a lucky guess or a conclusion of extremely difficult critical thought. Even the Gettysburg Address, which is one of those rare political classics of enduring political genius and taste (and in less than 300 words, which is rarer still in politics!), received mixed reviews. But it is possible, through critical thought, to refine one's evaluations of political works and persons; and, indeed, people have been refining their views on Lincoln since Lincoln's day. Any other political genius could be substituted for Lincoln. Similar things can be said for whatever's the opposite of political genius (bungling?). But in all these cases, the correctness of the evaluation presupposes genuine self-critique. This is a point in which we tend to be rather deficient.
There's a brief article by Keith Burgess-Jackson, called "How to Argue" that should be required reading before anyone talks about politics at all (he is unabashedly conservative in just about every sense of the term - as can be seen by his blog AnalPhilosopher - so be forewarned if you're of a different persuasion; but whatever one's political persuasions, his article is dead on when it comes to the nature of argument).
'Critical thought' or 'critical thinking' doesn't necessarily have anything to do with criticizing; the two words are similar, but not that similar. The 'critical' in 'critical thought' is much closer to what is meant by 'criticism' in 'literary criticism' or 'art criticism'. That is, it indicates a particular sort of good judgment excercised in reasoning about things. In other words, it is closely related to the early modern notion of 'Taste'.
This point is relevant for political thought, because a quick trip around the political bloggers of the blogosphere, or a quick look at pundits of all persuasions, shows that there are a lot of intelligent people who think that criticism of someone's position is, simply in and of itself, an exercise of critical thinking. This, of course, is blatantly false. As I try to teach my students, Mere opposition is one of the least significant, and least rational, uses of reason. Even when it is dressed up with a bit of wit and humor it is not, on its own, a particularly rational activity. Where criticism or opposition does become rational is when it is bolstered by a genuine self-criticism, or self-critique. The reason is that it is only through self-criticism that we can develop the consistency, objectivity, and insight of our criticisms. It is self-critique that checks to see if the objection we're making is consistent with our own principles; it is self-critique that checks to see if we are blinded by any ignorance or prejudice of our own; it is self-critique that judges whether we are actually being relevant, or just knocking down a straw man; it is self-critique that examines whether we are recognizing distinctions between the important and the unimportant, the essential and the unessential. Everything genuinely rational about criticism arises solely when it is combined with self-critique. Being (reasonably) self-critical is the heart of what it is to engage in critical thinking. (It should be noted that by 'self-critique' is meant not pathological self-criticism, but the sort of self-criticism in which we engage when we are genuinely trying to improve ourselves.)
This, I suggest, is precisely one of the major points about Taste in the early modern sense. This is why theories of Taste often appeal either to the perspective of the impartial (i.e., unbiased) spectator, or to the development of an increasingly consistent and general set of maxims, or both; that is, these are methods of self-critique, by which one holds oneself to relevance, consistency, and fairmindedness. By putting oneself temporarily in the perspective of a spectator not biased to your own position, you help yourself to see both your weaknesses and your opponents' strengths, and so to come to a better understanding of the entire issue. Likewise with trying to articulate better and better general rules.
There is another aspect to artistic Taste that sheds light on critical thought in politics and the closely associated notion of political taste. Taste is the complement of Genius; one of the things developing our Taste enables us to do is appreciate other people's genius and taste. This is important in politics because there is such a thing as political genius; and it is immensely hard to spot. If you think that you would have been able, out of sheer native talent, to recognize that (e.g.) Lincoln was a political genius, you almost certainly are overrating yourself. Lincoln did not go around with a halo, and he certainly did not look, as he does in the Lincoln Memorial, like a sage and immortal deity surveying the world from a throne. If you would have been able to recognize his genius, it would have been either a lucky guess or a conclusion of extremely difficult critical thought. Even the Gettysburg Address, which is one of those rare political classics of enduring political genius and taste (and in less than 300 words, which is rarer still in politics!), received mixed reviews. But it is possible, through critical thought, to refine one's evaluations of political works and persons; and, indeed, people have been refining their views on Lincoln since Lincoln's day. Any other political genius could be substituted for Lincoln. Similar things can be said for whatever's the opposite of political genius (bungling?). But in all these cases, the correctness of the evaluation presupposes genuine self-critique. This is a point in which we tend to be rather deficient.
There's a brief article by Keith Burgess-Jackson, called "How to Argue" that should be required reading before anyone talks about politics at all (he is unabashedly conservative in just about every sense of the term - as can be seen by his blog AnalPhilosopher - so be forewarned if you're of a different persuasion; but whatever one's political persuasions, his article is dead on when it comes to the nature of argument).
Kudos on Comments
I always sound extremely stupid when I comment on other people's blogs; I have difficulty responding coherently. Now, why is that? I do fairly well in other sorts of modes of response; but comments undo me completely. I've found that other people's comments on Siris, however, are great; so this is just a note to say I appreciate it.
Brandon
Brandon
A Just War Conundrum about Whether War can be Just
Wilson at "The Elfin Ethicist" has an interesting post on hating war.
I tend to a (relatively medieval) just war theory myself; but this gives less room for supporting war than one might think. The reason is this.
As Wilson notes, when we talk about 'war' we may mean either an action or an event. This is actually very important, because there are really two things called 'just war theory' that are extremely different, and they divide more or less along this line. One 'just war theory' means by 'war' the event of going to, and being in war; the other means by it the personal action of warring. There is all the difference between them.
When Aquinas writes on just war, he is talking about one thing, and one thing only: Given that warring involves fighting one's enemy, and given that Christians are supposed to love their enemies, can it ever be just for a Christian prince to war? His answer is that it can be if (1) the prince has been put in charge of protecting the people, and thus has legitimate authority; (2) the prince is going to war because his enemies actually deserve it; (3) the prince is properly disposed, i.e., virtuous in his means, to that end. The idea behind all three is the common good; a prince put in charge of protecting the common good of all, must deal with threats to it, and that includes external as well as internal enemies. Aquinas is concerned entirely with the prince as the person who actually wars; soldiers are only barely brought in insofar as they participate in the prince's warring through obedience; and civilians not at all.
Eventually people began to think of war (the situation) when they talked about 'just war'; and this, I think, goes with another modern innovation, the notion of total war. That is, we have made it virtually impossible for ourselves not to think of nations as going to war. This would have been utterly unthinkable for Aquinas, except perhaps as a figure of speech. He thinks of war as a heavy external policing action; so the whole responsibility for it, and the whole issue of the justice for it, lies entirely with the person in charge. We don't hold the whole nation responsible for a major SWAT operation, even if it were a very extended and elaborate one. It would never have occurred to him that anyone could think that, when the king of France goes to war against the king of England, the peasants of France are "in a state of war" with the peasants of England; warring is just not the sort of thing peasants do. But we do think of it in these terms. And this is, perhaps, a problem from the (older) just war perspective. While it's always been the case that civilians could get caught in the crossfire of two leaders, it is our innovation to think of one civilian population warring against civilian another as an integral part of war. But it is immoral, unjust, uncharitable, to war against someone who doesn't deserve it; and it isn't clear that there is any real sense in which we can say an entire nation deserves to be warred against. This suggests, that, while there are still some things (a very few) that we might call 'war' that would be allowed in themselves, the older just war theory, which I think is the better-founded one, would hold us to be engaging in an act of injustice even in those cases because of the way we think about war - we (and this includes civilians as well as leaders and soldiers) are treating people as our enemies who don't deserve it, and that's unjust. In other words, virtually any war today (and this will include much of what has to do with war, e.g., international law and peacekeeping) is accompanied with an immense amount of injustice because the way we think about war encourages us to be unjust toward others.
I'm not sure this was stated very clearly (I'm rushing to get the post out before class), but I think this highlights a problem for us. I don't think this is unanswerable; but I do think answering it would require a complete rethinking of the way we actually approach the whole notion of war, and indeed, all military action.
I tend to a (relatively medieval) just war theory myself; but this gives less room for supporting war than one might think. The reason is this.
As Wilson notes, when we talk about 'war' we may mean either an action or an event. This is actually very important, because there are really two things called 'just war theory' that are extremely different, and they divide more or less along this line. One 'just war theory' means by 'war' the event of going to, and being in war; the other means by it the personal action of warring. There is all the difference between them.
When Aquinas writes on just war, he is talking about one thing, and one thing only: Given that warring involves fighting one's enemy, and given that Christians are supposed to love their enemies, can it ever be just for a Christian prince to war? His answer is that it can be if (1) the prince has been put in charge of protecting the people, and thus has legitimate authority; (2) the prince is going to war because his enemies actually deserve it; (3) the prince is properly disposed, i.e., virtuous in his means, to that end. The idea behind all three is the common good; a prince put in charge of protecting the common good of all, must deal with threats to it, and that includes external as well as internal enemies. Aquinas is concerned entirely with the prince as the person who actually wars; soldiers are only barely brought in insofar as they participate in the prince's warring through obedience; and civilians not at all.
Eventually people began to think of war (the situation) when they talked about 'just war'; and this, I think, goes with another modern innovation, the notion of total war. That is, we have made it virtually impossible for ourselves not to think of nations as going to war. This would have been utterly unthinkable for Aquinas, except perhaps as a figure of speech. He thinks of war as a heavy external policing action; so the whole responsibility for it, and the whole issue of the justice for it, lies entirely with the person in charge. We don't hold the whole nation responsible for a major SWAT operation, even if it were a very extended and elaborate one. It would never have occurred to him that anyone could think that, when the king of France goes to war against the king of England, the peasants of France are "in a state of war" with the peasants of England; warring is just not the sort of thing peasants do. But we do think of it in these terms. And this is, perhaps, a problem from the (older) just war perspective. While it's always been the case that civilians could get caught in the crossfire of two leaders, it is our innovation to think of one civilian population warring against civilian another as an integral part of war. But it is immoral, unjust, uncharitable, to war against someone who doesn't deserve it; and it isn't clear that there is any real sense in which we can say an entire nation deserves to be warred against. This suggests, that, while there are still some things (a very few) that we might call 'war' that would be allowed in themselves, the older just war theory, which I think is the better-founded one, would hold us to be engaging in an act of injustice even in those cases because of the way we think about war - we (and this includes civilians as well as leaders and soldiers) are treating people as our enemies who don't deserve it, and that's unjust. In other words, virtually any war today (and this will include much of what has to do with war, e.g., international law and peacekeeping) is accompanied with an immense amount of injustice because the way we think about war encourages us to be unjust toward others.
I'm not sure this was stated very clearly (I'm rushing to get the post out before class), but I think this highlights a problem for us. I don't think this is unanswerable; but I do think answering it would require a complete rethinking of the way we actually approach the whole notion of war, and indeed, all military action.
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