This title is made up of words of Wallace Stevens, appearing in his poem The Comedian as the Letter C which in turn appears in his book Harmonium. The title "Socrates of Snails" is given in the poem to man; that is, to human beings considered as a whole. What, I wonder, is a group of snails called?
It is a belittling title, to be sure. What is it to be the Socrates of snails? The wisest, the best of snails? A snail others look up to? Perhaps he mocks the pretensions of our species, and there are enough of them, certainly; though it may in that case be more appropriate to substitute some great religious figure for the great philosophical figure, our colossal conceit being more evident in religion even than in philosophy. Mockery runs throughout the poem, particularly in its descriptions of its hero, Crispin, who is "the auditor of insects" among other silly things.
There are interpretations enough of the poem, but I can only speak for myself, as one of the snails. Crispin seems to go on a journey, France to the Yucatan to North Carolina. He also seems to commence his journey with grand ambitions, full of expectations of achievement, in understanding and knowing and doing, only to gradually lose them--while being mocked, repeatedly, by the words of the poem. He goes from the sublime not to the ridiculous (Napoleon's words while stopping in Warsaw on the retreat from Moscow) but to the mundane.
The poem appears in his first book, so one wonders why he would write something which seems to portray life's rise and fall and most ordinary end. But he came late to poetry, having practiced law as an insurance lawyer for many years before he became known as a poet. I can attest that the practice of law can be wearisome and can tell us much of our similarities to the snail.
Stevens, most annoyingly, wrote extensively about poetry generally if not his own poems in particular, and so assured that it's difficult to interpret his poetry as being anything but what he claimed poetry to be. It may be this was a clever anticipation of criticism and a means of addressing it, a tactic a good lawyer might employ, similar to drafting an agreement with an eye towards potential disputes. But there's no reason to think that by writing of poetry, he was being insincere. However, he did call poetry the supreme fiction, and it's interesting to consider whether an analysis of the supreme fiction would of necessity be fictive itself.
Again, I speak only for myself. But for me, for all his word-play, for all his concern with great philosophical matters, for all his undoubted sophistication, he intended to express that we live only in the mundane, can only know the mundane, are only content when we live a mundane life, when we become content with the mundane. Our pretensions befuddle and confuse us as a result.
The question we snails must address and answer is whether we are content to be snails. We must first, of course, recognize we are what we are, and this would seem to be what living can teach us, if we're not deluded by our conceit. But isn't it disappointing, at best, to be snails, to be humans?
As I noted, Stevens was no adolescent when he wrote his poetry, and so cannot be considered, presumptively, filled with angst. And the cool, precise, complicated beauty of his poetry indicates he was not one of the adult adolescents who fail to accept that they were not born for a special purpose, are not God's favorites, are not the highest concern of the universe, and spend their time telling us they resent this is the case and insisting we share in their resentment. He was a man.
I think he accepted that we are not what we pretend to be, but simply are what we are, seeking a means by which to do the best we can with what we have and take the rest as it happens, to paraphrase Epictetus (I'm not the first to think that Stevens was in some respects, at least, a Stoic). But doing the best we can with what we have can be significant if we have the necessary strength, intelligence, patience and humility to know ourselves and use those qualities we possess secundum naturam.
Thursday, June 26, 2014
Sunday, June 15, 2014
Dewey's Remarkable Logic
I've gone back to perusing John Dewey's Logic: The Theory of Inquiry, and have cracked open a recent book of studies related to it. I do so as I find myself agreeing with those who think that logic was always his first concern and his view of it most unusual and interesting.
He'd written on the subject for many years before he wrote this work in 1938, but his conception of it found its fullest expression at that time and in that book. It baffled many, including Bertrand Russell, who must have thought he had a kind of proprietary interest in logic after Principia Mathematica (although he had to share the honor of authoring that tome with Whitehead, which it seems he did rather grudgingly). And this confusion can't be entirely attributed to Dewey's often perplexing writing style, which is itself a kind of wonder. He doesn't employ the obscure, almost mystical, jargon and hierophantic phrasing common (I think) to certain continental philosophers of his time and ours; he writes in good old English and uses words we read all the time, for the most part. However, I find that in reading him, while I seem to know what he is saying, I'm not really sure I do until he has worked himself to a conclusion. His style of writing seems to be indirect.
The confusion felt by his critics may also be attributed to the fact that while he addresses what would be deemed logic by most--Aristotelian, symbolic, mathematical--he doesn't think of them as being what others think them to be nor does he treat it as they do. Logic to Dewey is something more than any logics. If I understand him correctly, he sees logic as something which derives from our interaction with our environment and our need to meet and solve problems and disturbances as they arise due to that interaction. Logic is, in other words, a method we employ in living, part of intelligent inquiry which includes the scientific or experimental method; or, perhaps, the theory underlying intelligent inquiry of all kinds.
Throughout his career, Dewey criticized what he thought was the tendency in philosophy since the time of the ancients to view the mind as separate from the body and from what we still like to call the "external world." He thought this resulted in a "spectator" theory of knowledge and experience. As a consequence of the prevalence of this view, logic was considered by some to be a kind of system or structure the mind imposes on the external world--something springing from the mind, as it were, possibly prompted by the external world which we experienced, if we did so at all, as sense impressions or some equivalent thought to intrude between the world and our minds. Also as a result of this view, philosophers developed the various dualisms which plague us still, e.g. the mind/body distinction.
Russell it seems referred to Dewey's conception of logic as psychological, and it may be possible to describe it as such if we include within that characterization the view that our thought--including logic--derives from and indeed originates in our functioning as a living organism in the universe. It is not writ into the structure of the universe or our mind, waiting to be discovered or applied. Instead, it it is developed, used, perfected through use, subject to revision depending on how well it answers our needs. This view of logic must have astonished if it did not enrage those who see it as something pristine and unsoiled by mere life.
It seems that Dewey is enjoying (an odd word for those dead) like pragmatism a kind of Renaissance or renewal of interest. I think that's due not to some of the so-called neo-pragmatists like Rorty, who I think misunderstood him in a rather spectacular manner, but due instead to a recognition that Dewey's thought was in its way revolutionary and allows for a place for philosophy in life--in determining how to live and what to do--not merely in the classroom or in literary or cultural criticism. Some have taken his willingness to think of "truth" as contingent and subject to revision as being indicative of relativism and as sanctioning a sort of postmodernism, but in doing so they ignore his constant insistence on the application of inquiry in the form of the scientific or experimental method, modified to address all issues, as intelligence. Creative intelligence has a place in addressing the problems of the real world of which we are a part.
He'd written on the subject for many years before he wrote this work in 1938, but his conception of it found its fullest expression at that time and in that book. It baffled many, including Bertrand Russell, who must have thought he had a kind of proprietary interest in logic after Principia Mathematica (although he had to share the honor of authoring that tome with Whitehead, which it seems he did rather grudgingly). And this confusion can't be entirely attributed to Dewey's often perplexing writing style, which is itself a kind of wonder. He doesn't employ the obscure, almost mystical, jargon and hierophantic phrasing common (I think) to certain continental philosophers of his time and ours; he writes in good old English and uses words we read all the time, for the most part. However, I find that in reading him, while I seem to know what he is saying, I'm not really sure I do until he has worked himself to a conclusion. His style of writing seems to be indirect.
The confusion felt by his critics may also be attributed to the fact that while he addresses what would be deemed logic by most--Aristotelian, symbolic, mathematical--he doesn't think of them as being what others think them to be nor does he treat it as they do. Logic to Dewey is something more than any logics. If I understand him correctly, he sees logic as something which derives from our interaction with our environment and our need to meet and solve problems and disturbances as they arise due to that interaction. Logic is, in other words, a method we employ in living, part of intelligent inquiry which includes the scientific or experimental method; or, perhaps, the theory underlying intelligent inquiry of all kinds.
Throughout his career, Dewey criticized what he thought was the tendency in philosophy since the time of the ancients to view the mind as separate from the body and from what we still like to call the "external world." He thought this resulted in a "spectator" theory of knowledge and experience. As a consequence of the prevalence of this view, logic was considered by some to be a kind of system or structure the mind imposes on the external world--something springing from the mind, as it were, possibly prompted by the external world which we experienced, if we did so at all, as sense impressions or some equivalent thought to intrude between the world and our minds. Also as a result of this view, philosophers developed the various dualisms which plague us still, e.g. the mind/body distinction.
Russell it seems referred to Dewey's conception of logic as psychological, and it may be possible to describe it as such if we include within that characterization the view that our thought--including logic--derives from and indeed originates in our functioning as a living organism in the universe. It is not writ into the structure of the universe or our mind, waiting to be discovered or applied. Instead, it it is developed, used, perfected through use, subject to revision depending on how well it answers our needs. This view of logic must have astonished if it did not enrage those who see it as something pristine and unsoiled by mere life.
It seems that Dewey is enjoying (an odd word for those dead) like pragmatism a kind of Renaissance or renewal of interest. I think that's due not to some of the so-called neo-pragmatists like Rorty, who I think misunderstood him in a rather spectacular manner, but due instead to a recognition that Dewey's thought was in its way revolutionary and allows for a place for philosophy in life--in determining how to live and what to do--not merely in the classroom or in literary or cultural criticism. Some have taken his willingness to think of "truth" as contingent and subject to revision as being indicative of relativism and as sanctioning a sort of postmodernism, but in doing so they ignore his constant insistence on the application of inquiry in the form of the scientific or experimental method, modified to address all issues, as intelligence. Creative intelligence has a place in addressing the problems of the real world of which we are a part.
Sunday, June 8, 2014
The Bergdahl Brouhaha
I've come to believe that the mere mention of our President's name causes some of us (figuratively, at least) to twitch and drool with a kind of lunatic wrath. I no longer expect such folk to be sensible in assessing anything he does, and in some cases doubt their capacity to be sensible at all. It's difficult therefore to find any reasonable assessment of the barter of Sergeant Bergdhal for five Taliban among our politicians, the pundits and the media; frenzied claims are generally met by more frenzied claims, from all participants in our political circus. It may be too early to comment rationally in any case, as we learn more all the time and doubtless will continue to learn more of the circumstances. But I will make an effort.
It is important to note, first, that this exchange is not something which can be said to have taken the President's political opponents by surprise. At least according to the Washington Post, efforts to obtain his release have been urged for quite some time, even by Republicans. It also seems to be the case that it has been known for some time that his release would likely be conditioned on release of the Taliban in question (even by Republicans). Why then the sound and the fury?
Prisoners have been exchanged in times of war for centuries, by the U.S. and other nations. The exchange of this one prisoner should not in itself be objectionable. If it's maintained that this case is different because we deal here with terrorists instead of formally declared enemies, we've fought many wars without declaring them wars, and it seems almost silly to require that war be declared for this common practice to apply. This is not even to mention the fact that our long military involvement in Afghanistan can only be considered a war, and not a kind of police action against terrorists. Would those who object so loudly be doing so if a hero was released in these circumstances?
Much of what we hear regarding his conduct when captured and prior to that time is indeed quite strange. It's possible, I suppose, that a good deal of the outrage results from the fact that there are those who served with Bergdahl who claim he was a deserter and that there were those who lost their lives in searching for him. It's unclear to me whether this was known or not known by the high and mighty in our government. If it was known, the condemnation of the arrangement by those who knew this beforehand yet felt his release should be obtained is contemptible, but I've come to expect that most of our politicians are contemptible, so this is no surprise. The pertinent question would be whether this fact if it is a fact, or possible fact which may or may not be established, should have precluded efforts at his release.
Even if he deserted, if he did not then join the Taliban or participate in activities against the U. S., I think the view that soldiers should not be left behind is sound and admirable and should have been honored in this case. He will be subjected to military law on his return. If he deserted he should pay the penalty; it doesn't follow that he should be left in the hands of the enemy, however. If it is not enough for those that object to his release that he be subject to investigation, trial and punishment on his return pursuant to American military law, then one has to ask why it isn't. It's likely that any answer given will itself be of very questionable worth.
Whether the terms of his release are objectionable is another issue, however. I think it would be unsurprising if the five Taliban continued to fight against the U.S. if given the chance. The best that could be hoped for is to neutralize them for a time. So it would seem what would have to be considered is whether the release of the Taliban is "worth" the release of the Sergeant given the likelihood they will cause harm to the U.S. and its citizens and soldiers some time in the future.
This isn't an easy judgment to make, and it's to be hoped that the factors were considered and steps taken appropriate under the circumstances (and there could be many factors to be considered). Whether they were is hard to say, at this time at least. It appears that Congress should have been notified and was not at least in the manner specified by the law. I don't know that anyone is in a position to say whether the judgment was a good one or not at this time, but I think that on any reasonable view that, if anything, should be the focus of attention, not this soldier's character and actions before taken captive.
Eventually, I think the high and mighty will get around to considering the propriety of the judgment from the standpoint of the terms of the release, not the release itself. But now I think there is too much political hay to be made, and we must resign ourselves to the posturing on this issue which typifies our politics. Soon enough, something else will trigger the outrage of our outrageous representatives in government.
It is important to note, first, that this exchange is not something which can be said to have taken the President's political opponents by surprise. At least according to the Washington Post, efforts to obtain his release have been urged for quite some time, even by Republicans. It also seems to be the case that it has been known for some time that his release would likely be conditioned on release of the Taliban in question (even by Republicans). Why then the sound and the fury?
Prisoners have been exchanged in times of war for centuries, by the U.S. and other nations. The exchange of this one prisoner should not in itself be objectionable. If it's maintained that this case is different because we deal here with terrorists instead of formally declared enemies, we've fought many wars without declaring them wars, and it seems almost silly to require that war be declared for this common practice to apply. This is not even to mention the fact that our long military involvement in Afghanistan can only be considered a war, and not a kind of police action against terrorists. Would those who object so loudly be doing so if a hero was released in these circumstances?
Much of what we hear regarding his conduct when captured and prior to that time is indeed quite strange. It's possible, I suppose, that a good deal of the outrage results from the fact that there are those who served with Bergdahl who claim he was a deserter and that there were those who lost their lives in searching for him. It's unclear to me whether this was known or not known by the high and mighty in our government. If it was known, the condemnation of the arrangement by those who knew this beforehand yet felt his release should be obtained is contemptible, but I've come to expect that most of our politicians are contemptible, so this is no surprise. The pertinent question would be whether this fact if it is a fact, or possible fact which may or may not be established, should have precluded efforts at his release.
Even if he deserted, if he did not then join the Taliban or participate in activities against the U. S., I think the view that soldiers should not be left behind is sound and admirable and should have been honored in this case. He will be subjected to military law on his return. If he deserted he should pay the penalty; it doesn't follow that he should be left in the hands of the enemy, however. If it is not enough for those that object to his release that he be subject to investigation, trial and punishment on his return pursuant to American military law, then one has to ask why it isn't. It's likely that any answer given will itself be of very questionable worth.
Whether the terms of his release are objectionable is another issue, however. I think it would be unsurprising if the five Taliban continued to fight against the U.S. if given the chance. The best that could be hoped for is to neutralize them for a time. So it would seem what would have to be considered is whether the release of the Taliban is "worth" the release of the Sergeant given the likelihood they will cause harm to the U.S. and its citizens and soldiers some time in the future.
This isn't an easy judgment to make, and it's to be hoped that the factors were considered and steps taken appropriate under the circumstances (and there could be many factors to be considered). Whether they were is hard to say, at this time at least. It appears that Congress should have been notified and was not at least in the manner specified by the law. I don't know that anyone is in a position to say whether the judgment was a good one or not at this time, but I think that on any reasonable view that, if anything, should be the focus of attention, not this soldier's character and actions before taken captive.
Eventually, I think the high and mighty will get around to considering the propriety of the judgment from the standpoint of the terms of the release, not the release itself. But now I think there is too much political hay to be made, and we must resign ourselves to the posturing on this issue which typifies our politics. Soon enough, something else will trigger the outrage of our outrageous representatives in government.
Monday, June 2, 2014
Requiring Proof of the Divine
I've noted in this blog and elsewhere my belief that the debate regarding whether God exists is futile. It is also, of course, unending, and may be unending due to its futility; we love to dispute what is pointless--there are those who claim philosophy consists of the consideration of questions which cannot be answered, and is wondrous as a result. So much, then, for philosophy.
I hold that those who believe in God will never be convinced through debate there is no God, and that those who maintain there is no God will likewise never be convinced there is a God through this dispute, which seems to involve the repetition of points and arguments which have already been made for many years. Nonetheless, those who believe in God insist on seeking to prove God's existence. Their efforts to do so prompts claims they have not and cannot do so. So I think believers typically initiate the dispute or debate, and wish they would not. I'm uncertain whether the believers' forbearance in this regard would keep nonbelievers from insisting there is no God, but like to think it would. As far as I'm concerned, we should believe or not believe and be silent in either case.
I'm baffled by the apparent need believers have to establish the existence of God in a manner others would find satisfactory. I suppose it may be considered an effort at self-justification, but think it to be more a case of being unduly concerned with what others may think, which is one of the things Stoicism teaches us should be a matter of indifference. Provided a belief in God causes no harm to others, that belief should be of no concern to anyone but the believer.
Non-believers may be expected to assert the belief causes harm to others, and there are certainly many instances in which it does. But it need not do so, and when it does not it should be treated as a uniquely personal concern. This is not to say we must respect all religious beliefs or sanction them; only those which cause no harm or are not used to cause harm.
Certain religious beliefs may be said to be such as would tend to cause harm to others. Belief in an intolerant, angry, commanding deity requiring that all act in a particular manner and think in a particular way is likely to induce harmful conduct. But there are other religious beliefs, other Gods, which don't impose such requirements.
There are, in other words, beliefs in God that are more reasonable than others. A God which is not peculiarly human with exclusively or predominantly human concerns may be deemed more like a God of a vast universe than one which is so anthropomorphic, for example. As such, it's more probably such a God would exists if a God exists. An immanent God may be deemed more reasonable than a transcendent God in the sense that a transcendent God is necessarily unknowable, while an immanent God is all around us, is part of us.
The atheist will contend that we can no more establish the existence of a pantheistic God (or panentheistic) than we can any other God, and this is true in the sense that we can't establish God as we would something ascertainable by scientific means. But accepting this as the case, we can nevertheless decide that certain conceptions of God are preferable to others, or so I would maintain, and have a reasonable basis on which to make such a determination.
There are various things we can't establish scientifically, though, and would not think of being subject to scientific verification. Love for a particular person or work of art, for example, can't be established or justified in that fashion. Nor can a sense of the sublime, sense of awe and reverence be so established. Are they thereby of questionable merit?
We experience love and awe and reverence and this cannot reasonably be doubted. When we question such experiences, we question why they're felt, not whether they're felt, and we question why they're felt because we feel the subject of those experiences is not worthy of them, which is to say that we don't have those experiences in that case. We have them in other cases.
Do we have any need to justify what we feel in listening to a great musical work, or viewing a great work of art or the beauties of nature? Do we attempt to prove their existence? I don't think we do. I think that it makes no sense even to speak of proving them. If the belief in God is substantially the same kind of experience, this angry, pointless debate should not be taking place.
I hold that those who believe in God will never be convinced through debate there is no God, and that those who maintain there is no God will likewise never be convinced there is a God through this dispute, which seems to involve the repetition of points and arguments which have already been made for many years. Nonetheless, those who believe in God insist on seeking to prove God's existence. Their efforts to do so prompts claims they have not and cannot do so. So I think believers typically initiate the dispute or debate, and wish they would not. I'm uncertain whether the believers' forbearance in this regard would keep nonbelievers from insisting there is no God, but like to think it would. As far as I'm concerned, we should believe or not believe and be silent in either case.
I'm baffled by the apparent need believers have to establish the existence of God in a manner others would find satisfactory. I suppose it may be considered an effort at self-justification, but think it to be more a case of being unduly concerned with what others may think, which is one of the things Stoicism teaches us should be a matter of indifference. Provided a belief in God causes no harm to others, that belief should be of no concern to anyone but the believer.
Non-believers may be expected to assert the belief causes harm to others, and there are certainly many instances in which it does. But it need not do so, and when it does not it should be treated as a uniquely personal concern. This is not to say we must respect all religious beliefs or sanction them; only those which cause no harm or are not used to cause harm.
Certain religious beliefs may be said to be such as would tend to cause harm to others. Belief in an intolerant, angry, commanding deity requiring that all act in a particular manner and think in a particular way is likely to induce harmful conduct. But there are other religious beliefs, other Gods, which don't impose such requirements.
There are, in other words, beliefs in God that are more reasonable than others. A God which is not peculiarly human with exclusively or predominantly human concerns may be deemed more like a God of a vast universe than one which is so anthropomorphic, for example. As such, it's more probably such a God would exists if a God exists. An immanent God may be deemed more reasonable than a transcendent God in the sense that a transcendent God is necessarily unknowable, while an immanent God is all around us, is part of us.
The atheist will contend that we can no more establish the existence of a pantheistic God (or panentheistic) than we can any other God, and this is true in the sense that we can't establish God as we would something ascertainable by scientific means. But accepting this as the case, we can nevertheless decide that certain conceptions of God are preferable to others, or so I would maintain, and have a reasonable basis on which to make such a determination.
There are various things we can't establish scientifically, though, and would not think of being subject to scientific verification. Love for a particular person or work of art, for example, can't be established or justified in that fashion. Nor can a sense of the sublime, sense of awe and reverence be so established. Are they thereby of questionable merit?
We experience love and awe and reverence and this cannot reasonably be doubted. When we question such experiences, we question why they're felt, not whether they're felt, and we question why they're felt because we feel the subject of those experiences is not worthy of them, which is to say that we don't have those experiences in that case. We have them in other cases.
Do we have any need to justify what we feel in listening to a great musical work, or viewing a great work of art or the beauties of nature? Do we attempt to prove their existence? I don't think we do. I think that it makes no sense even to speak of proving them. If the belief in God is substantially the same kind of experience, this angry, pointless debate should not be taking place.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)