Morality and the pragmatic approach to statesmanship

submitted by casparvoneverecBig tiddy respecter from self.debatealtright

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[–]LGBTQIAIDSAnally Injected Death Sentence 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (4 children)

As I have had more time to reflect on our last few replies to each other, and regarding your last paragraph as the next step in this discussion, let us continue for a short time longer in the hope that you can convince me of the merits of Platonism or Aristotelianism or Evolianism or whichever philosophical school it is that you appear to adhere to, one which is evidently not Cartesianism.

Where we last ended was on the soul: I was arguing against 'popular dualism' (to which Cartesian dualism is greatly similar, particularly in its interactionism) whereas you perceived my comment as attacking some other kind of dualism, presumably either Platonism or Aristotelianism, neither of which I have more than a cursory understanding of.

To my memory, Plato's typology was that the soul is composed of desire, reason and thumos. Aristotle rejected this in favour of another typology in which the soul is composed of nutritive soul-part (shared by all living things), a locomotive soul-part (shared by animals including men) and a rational soul-part (which sets Man apart from animal). Aristotle seemed to reduce desire from a single soul-part to three categories of desire which are located in at least two of three soul-parts. Epithumia, he locates in the locomotive; boulesis, he locates in the rational. Thumos, having also been reduced from soul-part to a mere third category of desire, appears to be reduced to a mere 'phantasia'.

I welcome any correction that you might make to what is probably a paragraph which could use great improvement, and is simply the product of my memory combined with a few notes I took from several decent papers on the topic of thumos, and then condensed. I write this in the hope that we are this time on the same page concerning these Socratic conceptions of the soul.

In Traditional civilisations, the soul was not at all abstract but had very concrete features. I also rejected the claim that moral and spiritual qualities are unverifiable, which I consider completely self-evident and see no need in proving.

This jumps out to me as the thing which seems to me most obviously disagreeable, and it is on here that I will focus. Last time, you dismissed what I know as the 'Cartesian mind' (which for Descartes I believe is numerically identical with the soul) and seemed to agree that—perhaps because of how minimalistic Descartes' claims are concerning the nature of this soul—that it is indeed the gateway towards egalitarianism that I accuse it of being. My argument was that because there are few properties of this soul—among them nonspatiality, that it is a reasoning thing, that it is created by God, that it exists both prenatally and posthumously, that it is irreducible to body or brain, that it has a two-way causal relation with the body (interactionism)—and that these things are essentially either 'Yes' or 'No' and not 'Better' or 'Worse', we have no grounds on which to assert the superiority or inferiority of persons. For if all people indeed a possess a soul that possesses these qualities, and the worth of a person is judged predominantly if not solely on this soul, then all that we can do is say that all persons are effectively equal because each soul possesses these exact same properties to no greater nor lesser extent than any other. This is obviously to me a conclusion which must be avoided, hence what I described as a physicalist drift away from dualism. However, you have argued for some other kind of dualism rather than moved in the physicalist direction.

Now, the Platonic and Aristotelian conceptions of the soul, to me, whilst undoubtedly less minimalistic than their Cartesian counterpart, suffer from much the same problem. For whilst we eschew the Cartesian mind's properties, all that we have to replace them with are soul-parts which, though unlike the Cartesian properties in that boulesis, epithumia, and thumos likely differ in each person, still cannot be measured in any obvious way to determine who is superior and who is not.

Now we might say at this point that thumos is something that is measurable. And we might say that those with high thumos can be identified because they have high 'intrinsic motivation', high self-esteem and certain other observable relational properties (a la Donald Trump or Elon Musk); whereas someone with low thumos is essentially a 'Last Man' who seeks to achieve little if anything at all in life. But such an observation could be attributed just as easily to a psychological concept (such as the aforementioned 'intrinsic motivation', something which may at some point be found to have a neuroscientific explanation if we have faith in the claims of modern 'eliminativist' philosophers like Churchland) or even to the influence of what we know as sociological concepts, such as the Japanese ikigai or Protestant work ethic, upon individuals. So much of what has been philosophized can be psychologized, sociologized or otherwise scientized. Freud, for example, has been recorded as once remarking that he was essentially psychologizing Schopenhauerian philosophy: that is, that certain key claims of Schopenhauer matched his more 'scientific' (keeping in mind that I view psychoanalysis as pseudoscientific, although still more scientific than philosophy) findings.

I must wonder just who possessing of a scientific mind would accept something such as either of these tripartite conceptions of the soul? For how am I to verify just which man's typology, if either, is indeed correct? Why should I accept Plato over Aristotle or vice versa? And if every valuable insight from philosophy such as thumos—which for me are (usually) those which are later scientized once scientific advancement reaches a level at which such ideas can be put to test—can be reached through scientific means, will not science erode the value of philosophy as it proves that of it which is provable, leaving only that which cannot be?

All that I have said of the Cartesian mind also holds true of the Christian soul, as Caspar has observed. How can we have an actually 'inegalitarian dualism' that is more useful for a new social order than a more NatSoc-like physicalism that can easier attribute human worth to the body and gene? Christianity (and Cartesianism, were it not repressed and largely wiped out by the mid-eighteenth century) must surely lead to egalitarianism precisely because the alleged content or properties of the soul plain and simply encourage it. Hence the common claim in these quarters, that contemporary Left-liberalism is some kind of mutant bastard child of Christianity that simply took this underlying egalitarianism and then cut out God, original sin (except for White people) and a few other things, thus leading to the conclusion that a dualist creed—not a physicalist one—led us to where we are today.

[–]NeoRail 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (3 children)

To my memory, Plato's typology was that the soul is composed of desire, reason and thumos.

You are referring to the tripartite soul, yes, but there are other elements that also need to be considered. It should also be noted that there are some ambiguities when we speak about "reason" in Ancient Greek thought - the spiritual noetic intellect and the rational logos are both considered forms of reason. I can't comment on the views of Aristotle because I have only read small bits and pieces by him. I consider Aristotle to be a more rationalistic thinker, so I do not like him.

This jumps out to me as the thing which seems to me most obviously disagreeable, and it is on here that I will focus.

This is good, because the section you have quoted is perhaps the most central part of my argument.

My argument was that because there are few properties of this soul—among them nonspatiality, that it is a reasoning thing, that it is created by God, that it exists both prenatally and posthumously, that it is irreducible to body or brain, that it has a two-way causal relation with the body (interactionism)—and that these things are essentially either 'Yes' or 'No' and not 'Better' or 'Worse', we have no grounds on which to assert the superiority or inferiority of persons.

Examining everything you mentioned here in full would be an extraordinarily massive endeavour. The problem for me here is that, in my view, it is not hard to establish through various means that your claims are incorrect - the issue consists in being able to set the record straight. Even in Traditional religions, there is a very broad degree of variety in how souls are considered and described. This is so because of two reasons: first, the people articulating these ideas about the soul can be competent to a lesser or greater degree, and second, their ideas about the soul will generally be associated with the methods they use to interact with it and with the character of their civilisation. Buddhists, for example, deny the existence of the soul altogether even though they work with it more directly than most other religions - you can find more on this in the writings of Coomaraswamy, but essentially their views are owed to the use of an apophatic, practical method. This is probably a good example of the degree of difference, but I am struggling to find a way to address all of your points in a concise manner. The crux of the issue is that the soul is an extremely complex entity, there are various ways to define it and there are various different ways in which it is possible to interact with it. I have to refer to the master builder analogy I made earlier - perhaps if you raised all these points to an extremely advanced and highly intelligent Tibetan Buddhist, he may be able to address them easily and quickly. As for me, all I can do is use the method of counterexample.

among them nonspatiality

Different aspects of the soul are assigned spatial qualities in Hinduism, and also for example in Christianity, hence the idea of the resurrected soul-body complex at the Second Coming.

that it is a reasoning thing

Some religions assign the soul more emotional and devotional qualities, like Christianity. Others deny it is a thing at all, like Buddhism.

that it is created by God

This is not universal at all, more advanced metaphysical systems like Hinduism put the theistic God in a subordinate position to the cosmic laws and to Brahman.

that it exists both prenatally and posthumously

This is not the case for all religious systems, I think you are referring mainly to the Abrahamic religions here.

that it is irreducible to body or brain

Technically correct statement. There is nuance and diversity of opinion, however, on the matter of how the soul and the body are connected.

that it has a two-way causal relation with the body

I think various Hindu schools of thought would disagree with you on this. It is a complex issue.

As you can see, the scope of the points you have raised here is extremely broad. I hope that my use of counterexamples has been sufficient to address them. There are still some useful things which can be said about the rest of your argument, which I will now discuss.

For if all people indeed a possess a soul that possesses these qualities, and the worth of a person is judged predominantly if not solely on this soul, then all that we can do is say that all persons are effectively equal because each soul possesses these exact same properties to no greater nor lesser extent than any other.

The properties you have examined are essentially doctrinal claims about the nature of the soul, and are strongly linked to the spiritual methodology of religious traditions. These are universal properties which apply to every soul, and consequently are the same for everyone, as you have suggested - even an unrepentant sinner, destined for hell according to Christian theology, would have a soul that has the same properties as a Christian does in this general and universal sense. As this example demonstrates, however, on the plane of the concrete and the particular, extremely drastic differences may exist, so that one man ends up a saint, and another is sent to hell. There is obvious qualitative discrimination between the two.

To illustrate my point better, I will briefly go over some of the things I mentioned earlier:

No two souls are the same, and each differs from each on the basis of character, personality, dignity, wisdom, virtue, nature, affinities, capacity and lastly, content - much of which is received organically from a traditional society.

This description of the soul I gave earlier is very concrete. There is no rigid split between spiritual and material life, the two go together, and the first governs the second. Character, personality and nature are all attributed to things which are either inborn to the soul, or were acquired through experience - the way a man conducts himself, his psychological qualities, his style of expression etc. all stem from the soul. His interests, skills and affinities are a fundamental part of him and say something deeper about him. His sense of honour and dishonour, his understanding and practice of virtue, the wisdom he has, all of these things differentiate him from other men and are attributed to the soul. Finally, the acquired cultural heritage, the traditions and customs a man inherits, were also considered a part of his being in Traditional civilisations. The household gods of classical societies are one good example of this at the family level. Even the physical qualities of the body were considered the product of the soul, and reflected its nature - beauty, health, strength, intelligence, all these things were considered products of the soul. Plato, for example, also considered memory to be a faculty of the soul - for the purposes of the discussion, it is irrelevant if this belief is correct or incorrect, what matters is that from a Platonic perspective, essentially every meaningful difference between human beings is owed to the soul.

I could not possibly do justice to all the things discussed in so few words, but I hope that what I have said will prove valuable in some manner. Now, it is time to address the second half of your post.

[–]NeoRail 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (2 children)

So much of what has been philosophized can be psychologized, sociologized or otherwise scientized. Freud, for example, has been recorded as once remarking that he was essentially psychologizing Schopenhauerian philosophy: that is, that certain key claims of Schopenhauer matched his more 'scientific' (keeping in mind that I view psychoanalysis as pseudoscientific, although still more scientific than philosophy) findings.

This is essentially reiterating my previous claim that everything is downstream from metaphysics and philosophy, only in different termss. It should not be surprising that alternative explanations for the mind, society, the conception of knowledge etc. can be offered by various scientistic approaches, because all of these approaches are rooted in a presupposed metaphysics and philosophy, however defectively understood or applied. Modern materialist science is itself a form of natural philosophy, as we discussed earlier.

I must wonder just who possessing of a scientific mind would accept something such as either of these tripartite conceptions of the soul? For how am I to verify just which man's typology, if either, is indeed correct?

Not with the tools of a modern materialist sub-branch of natural philosophy which we refer to as science, which by design exclude non-quantitative phenomena, at any rate. If you wish to verify these things for yourself, there are a plethora of traditional methods available, which of course presuppose an entirely different methodology.

Why should I accept Plato over Aristotle or vice versa?

There are some people who would argue this rationally, but I am not one of those. I would rather you think what you believe to be correct, regardless of what it is. My objection to your initial post was your framing of the soul as some sort of abstract and levelling egalitarian concept, when historically the exact opposite has been the case.

will not science erode the value of philosophy as it proves that of it which is provable, leaving only that which cannot be?

It will not, because that would be the same as science eroding its own value, given that it is a subordinate branch of philosophy and draws its legitimacy from it.

All that I have said of the Cartesian mind also holds true of the Christian soul, as Caspar has observed.

That's not really true, as I demonstrated with my example about the sinner earlier. Not to mention that to my knowledge both the Catholic and Orthodox Churches have much more developed conceptions of the soul than is commonly known, most Christians are just completely ignorant of those conceptions and instead rely on the modernist, secular Cartesian model.

physicalism that can easier attribute human worth to the body and gene?

Well, that's wrong, so you would obviously have to deal with that problem. I assume you remember the example I gave to demonstrate the falseness of this notion in our previous conversation. Countless other examples can be given. A quick look at the members of the aristocracy today is sufficient proof.

(and Cartesianism, were it not repressed and largely wiped out by the mid-eighteenth century)

What do you consider to have replaced Cartesianism? If I recall correctly, in our last thread you agreed that the modern understanding of a human being is essentially that it is a "sovereign rational actor", with humanity being defined as our common ability to use the reasoning faculty.

must surely lead to egalitarianism precisely because the alleged content or properties of the soul plain and simply encourage it.

An indefensible claim. In order to stick to what to you sounds plausible, you end up entertaining the utterly ridiculous.

Hence the common claim in these quarters, that contemporary Left-liberalism is some kind of mutant bastard child of Christianity that simply took this underlying egalitarianism and then cut out God, original sin (except for White people) and a few other things, thus leading to the conclusion that a dualist creed—not a physicalist one—led us to where we are today.

There is nothing even remotely dualist about modern leftism, absolutely everything in leftism is constantly reduced to matter and is completely lacking in any transcendent character - the conception of the mind is materialist, the conception of society is materialist and the conception of morality is materialist-utilitarian too. Critiques like this can only really point at the superficial moralism and zealotry of modern leftists, but this is by no means something only the religious have a monopoly on. A great example of this is Dawkins, who is an extremely materialist individual, yet a no less zealous, puritanical and bigoted one for all that.

[–]EthnocratArcheofuturist 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

given that it is a subordinate branch of philosophy and draws its legitimacy from it.

Science draws its legitimacy from the fact that it works.

[–]NeoRail 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

On a popular level, you are correct. The problem is that that is still completely nonsensical. In the first place, knowledge isn't supposed to "work" - it simply is. To say that the "scientific" perspective is always correct just because science has resulted in the production of advanced technology is logically incoherent and completely arbitrary. The former does not follow from the latter at all, not even a bit. Initial proponents of the empirical method had far humbler goals and understood their scientific pursuits as merely one way of knowing things, with rather limited applications at that.