I Want To Think Big: Emotional Denial Has Undermined The Role of Philosophy

We need to let emotion back into philosophy if we want to escape social inertia, and allow this purest of reasoning disciplines the chance to regain its ambition: of making life and the world a better place. 

Until recently, if a Martian were suddenly to land on earth and attend a University philosophy lecture, it could easily have believed that it had arrived on the most perfect and harmonious culture in the universe. Why else would we be concerning ourselves only with the minuscule details, unless we had the big issues already covered? This is what Simon Glendinning suggests when talking last week to Nigel Warburton on Philosophy Bites. In the 40s and 50s, he says, thinking big rather went out of fashion in philosophy academia. But a renewed interest in what he calls the 'two cultures of philosophy', is giving belated credibility to the often criticised Continental philosophy, as it aims to stand shoulder to shoulder with the confident, muscular logic of the Analytic school. So let's hear it for prose and thoughts and convictions; this is where the quest for truth begins. Why? Because in order to become analytic you need an ideal from which to build it.

Two things prove to me the importance of upholding a culture of philosophy that is rooted in human emotion. First of all, philosophy is fundamentally concerned with what it means to be true, and how the individual can reconcile his personal desires with others in the world. It starts from the premise that humans are emotional animals, and everything else follows from this given. Secondly, the fact that humans are reflectively aware of their efforts and achievements, proves how we justify moral behaviour based on practical experience of our emotions. These are cognitive qualities that have mobilised us as a race, and allowed us to flourish in a world of savages. No other animal can reason to such a sophisticated degree. These are characteristics entirely specific to humans.

Our emotions indicate levels of morality. If something seems abhorrent, such as rape or battery, we know we are witnessing a grossly immoral act. [Cross refer John Mikhail on Battery and Morality] If something seems delightful or wonderful, then we know we are witnessing an act of great moral fortitude. Morality is our way of codifying the specifically human condition of emotion. No other animal has morality because no other animal has an emotional life. This is why philosophy is unique to humankind. Our morals therefore necessarily reflect this inclination. So to deny this strain of philosophical insight in favour always of logical argument, contradicts our very nature, and what it means to be human. If philosophy is about searching for absolute truths, then we cannot place analytic philosophy above its more openly emotive continental cousin.

The Arrogance of Proof: Science, Materialism and Green Morality

Confidence is temporary, and conviction is permanent. It's a cute soundbite if nothing else. But underneath the nice symmetry of this throw-away remark, is, I argue, a certain admirable desire for integrity in the face of an all-powerful consumer materialism.

Listening to Green Philosopher Dale Jamieson interviewed on Philosophy Bites with Nigel Warburton, got me thinking about the world's hyper-confident material capitalism, and its inability to tolerate other moral convictions that might frighten and stifle mass consumption. [Link to Dale Jamieson on Green Virtues]

So what is the relationship that a human being has to his/her environment? And what is the psycho-spiritual impact that material possessions have on human beings? From a moralistic point of view, I do have concerns for materialism's desire to negate the existence of spirituality in society; and for the backing that some scientists so willingly give to it. To be aware that the resources of the earth are finite and therefore precious, is, as Dale Jamieson states, a modern virtue that is an essential moral of our time. It is a spiritual understanding, because it requires that we deny ourselves material possessions in the faith that we can protect the world for those who we do not personally know, and for those who will come after us in the future.

On a most basic level, looking after our possessions indicates this human moral responsibility. It shows that we understand that the world is not for mindless pillaging. It shows that we appreciate the 'use value' of tools and crucially, therefore also the 'emotive value'. It is this emotive value that we often want to deny, or turn into an OCD. Yet, I argue that when we treat possessions carelessly, and as ever-replaceable and as instantly disposable, we are defiantly disrespectful of not just the resources themselves, but also the energy and effort 'footprint' that weaves intricately back to a sacred source. Sacred, because it is surely a marvellous, as well as enormous, privilege to be able to conjure up material possessions at the click of a button.

My concern with materialism and science, is that it can focus too much on finding 'the next innovation', and it often ploughs through vast quantities of the earth's finite resources in its relentless quest to get better tools. I compare science with art in this respect, because art, by contrast, asks us to delight in the infinite possibility and potential of materials. It asks us to be creative with raw materials, to recycle, rethink, observe, re-observe and reuse. Whereas science and materialism can be frustrated by the slowness and limitations of material resources, art rejoices in the restrictions imposed by our environment, because it focuses a wild imagination.

If we imagine a world and our individual lives as being devoid of anything other than that which we can sense bodily, then how can we give value and meaning to nurturing a collective sense of harmonious human society? The short answer is that we cannot. But having faith in humanity does not require us to abandon the laws of physics. The two are not mutually exclusive. Richard Dawkins' book The God Delusion (Bantam, 2006) shows how some scientists can so wholly misunderstand spirituality when they set out to debase the truth behind organised religion.

Separating his profession from his life, the material scientist risks becoming arrogant and even a menace to society, because he fails to understand the responsibility that society has for the welfare of its citizens. Faith is the shield that each and every one of us possesses, with which to protect our human dignity in the face of oppression. How else would we reconcile the constant hardships we experience in our mortal existence?

Faith is not about living in a fairytale world where god looks down on us. Faith is about being allowed to believe in people. If science wants to take away our right to believe in humanity, then its lack of moral intelligence is in danger of preventing anyone from taking it seriously as a discipline. Thankfully this is not the intentions of science. It is the misinterpretation of certain people who deny the significance of their own spirituality in a misguided loyalty to scientific truth. Worryingly however, in a capitalist world that is becoming ever more dismissive of and hostile to any activity that is not driven by material productivity, I wonder how much longer can spirituality defend itself against the global Consumer State?

To deny us a spiritual space is to deny us an alternative to rampant consumer capitalism. We must already acknowledge that capitalism is the supremely dominant social force of our times. Must we be so humiliated as to accept that it is also the best?

Art: A moment of relief from the fear of death

IF ART FAILS TO MOVE US, WE ARE SIMPLY PASSING TIME CONTEMPLATING OUR OWN MORTALITY. 

I want to highlight the significance of movement in art. If we start from the premise that movement is what strikes us about art, then we can explore what it is that creates movement and we begin to understand how, on a technical level, a work of art both fails and succeeds. 

An experience is necessarily a physical encounter. It needs a time frame and a space frame in order for us to perceive it as a tangible thing. If we are not convinced by the composition of an aesthetic, then we experience nothing. Aesthetic theory, in the sublime sense that Theodor Adorno so brilliantly argues, is the dialectic between the technical, tangible, physical domain of the structure of a work, and the enigmatic quality that true art gains through transcending the definable arena where art hopes to spring. 

The 'rhythm' of a work of art is what carries us from the beginning to the end of the experience. It is what distracts us from seeing it as a clever aesthetic composition. It is what keeps us honest and what reveals our humanity. As soon as we sense that we are aware of ourselves as art critics or observers, the experience has failed in artistic terms and we are back looking at brushstrokes and colours. 

Humanity: Too Big to Bust

Any capitalist will tell you that a business can only exist if it is profitable. This seems fair considering that the nature of business is 'survival of the fittest'. To deny it this quality undermines its essence and economic purpose.

A problem arises however, when we try to implement these rules and impose these instincts onto social welfare. To justify human existence in these terms is immoral because humanity, unlike business IS NECESSARILY too big to fail.

When a business fails, it is forgotten and its failures are measured up and explained through detailed analysis of its activities. When society fails, we cannot send in the administrators, 'write off' the collateral. Why? Because the collateral damage is human beings. It is obscene to consider that a 'survival of the fittest' model be an appropriate system with which to organise peoples' quality of life. Business ventures live and die by profitability. Do we really want to promote a society where real people must survive according to the same standard? When we do, we force people to fend for themselves, which is what the state calls crime.

When we abandon people according to the terms and conditions of business, we forget that a government's commitment to its people is constant and unconditional. Business has no moral obligation to protect vulnerable projects. In fact, as we see with the recent bank bailouts, if it does, it undermines its own code of conduct and calls into question the worthiness of capitalism as a socioeconomic model. So I do not make these statements out of sentiment. I merely point out the importance of differentiating between what is 1) the state's eternal duty to protect its people, and 2) the state's decision to let its economy work according to capitalism.

Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, talking to Women's Own magazine, October 31 1987:

"I think we've been through a period where too many people have been given to understand that if they have a problem, it's the government's job to cope with it. 'I have a problem, I'll get a grant.' 'I'm homeless, the government must house me.' They're casting their problem on society. And, you know, there is no such thing as society. There are individual men and women, and there are families. And no government can do anything except through people, and people must look to themselves first."

When Margaret Thatcher talked about 'no such thing as society' she fundamentally misunderstood this difference, and made us all realise that she saw her citizens as business rivals rather than her cherished responsibility. There is no room for humanity in this model. I am not talking purely about compassion. There is no room for human difference, human brilliance and human intelligence. There is no room for the exceptional or the emotional, and no room for belief. Furthermore, does she really want to promote 'the family' as the bedrock of social welfare? Do we want to be run by feuding mafias? This only encourages us to be corrupt and fascist. Society is what needs to exist in order that families respect each other.

This is why it matters from a societal point of view. It matters because by denying vulnerable individuals social security, we criminalise them. When we feel that "there is no such thing as society," we feel no sense of loyalty or obligation. We have, quite understandably, lost respect for the government that has disowned us. We become anarchic and lawlessness prevails, (E.g. The miners' strikes and recently the London riots) all because the state has walked away from its people and forgotten its humanity. Most shockingly of all, the state does this, not in the name of a greater good, but in the name of frenzied capitalist greed.

This may sound very Marxist. And it is. It is the fundamental downfall of capitalism that Marx acutely realised. As a social system capitalism will never succeed because it depends upon its people being obedient to a set of rules that are intolerably humiliating. Fortunately human beings are not so willing to surrender their basic humanity to such a machine. For we see both intuitively and reasonably, that when a government condemns its people to poverty, depravity and humiliation, it destroys any potential for these people to be creative, to be happy, to be secure and therefore peaceful. So from a purely practical point of view, it is a foolish leader who attempts to keep order with such antagonistic methods.

"The bourgeoisie has torn away from the family its sentimental veil, and has reduced the family relation to a mere money relation."  (Karl Marx. The Communist Manifesto.)