Universal and Unusable

First, I must apologize for being only 2 WHOLE DAYS late on this...I figured, though, that I would still post since people have until Tuesday to comment. 
My bad!!!

Anyway...

After discussing each of the three formulations of Kant's Categorical Imperative, I was slightly disheartened by the seeming inapplicability of this Imperative to tough, real-world, ethical dilemmas.  Specifically, we discussed the issue of abortion.  One of the complications we stumbled upon in our discussion of the issue (besides our lack of knowledge about being able to consider fetuses as having "humanity" yet or not) was that we did not know how to deal with the circumstances of pregnancy.  The possibility of the mother not being able to completely control getting pregnant forced the class to consider the abortion as not only a possible necessity for saving the mother's life but also as an opportunity for the mother to choose for herself if she wanted a child.  My point here is that we had to take into account our flawed world--possible immoral acts (like rape) surrounding the moral dilemma--in order to address the dilemma.  If we did not take those circumstances into account, we could have looked at the problem of abortion the way James brought up: we could have said for certain that the time a woman got to choose whether or not she wanted a child was at the time of conception.

So the reason the topic of abortion is a dilemma at all is because our world is messy--because it is not a "kingdom of ends" or a perfect, moral world.  How can we, then, see this issue in terms of the Categorical Imperative?  Even keeping promises is a complicated issue because of surrounding circumstances.  If we could say that people ONLY promised to do good things or ONLY promised to help out good people, then we would have no problem saying that keeping promises is ALWAYS the right thing to do.  But the fact of the matter is, it's not.  Breaking a promise to help someone on a test by cheating, or breaking a promise to help Bob make a bomb to kill his neighbors, are both promises that I would consider moral to break.  But to do so, according to Kant, would be to break the First Formulation of the Categorical Imperative, since extending "breaking promises" to a universal law would be irrational since it would eliminate the usefulness of a promise.

This leads me to wonder how much good the Categorical Imperative can really do for us.  How is one to conduct him/herself as based on a universal law or as one would in a "merely possible kingdom of ends" when he/she is in a completely singular situation in a flawed, messy world?  Can this imperative actually be used at all?  Or is it nice to have but relatively dormant in its usefulness to us?

One of the first arguments that Kant makes in his "Groundwork" is that the only true good is good will, no matter whether the outcome of the action is good or bad. My argument (a subject we didn't breech in class, as it is very controversial) presents the following question: if instinct is the "organ" that controls action in animals and reason is the "organ" that controls actions in humans, are animals without reason or moral understanding, and how does the categorical imperative apply to them? Maybe this is a silly question to ponder, but as we have all had our own interactions and experiences with animals, I believe we are all capable of raising our own ideas on the subject. If we think about animals' behaviors as they correspond to the categorical imperative, I believe that an argument can be made that domesticated animals act out of moral duty, because they derive some sense of satisfaction from doing so. For example, my dog is very protective of my little brother, not because she has been trained to be so, but because she has determined for herself that he is important to her and that it is therefore her duty to protect him. I believe some universalization can be drawn from this example, in that if my dog could talk articulate her thoughts via speech perhaps she would purport that it is the universal duty of dogs to protect their owners. In regard to the three formulations of the categorical imperative, I believe that my dog applies as an example because she may be alleged to know for herself what is good/moral to her; she treats the other animals/humans around her as beings with which to coexist and worthy of love, not utility (sure, she uses us as a means to get her food, but she also is protective of us, so that this relationship is two-sided and not in violation of formulation 2); and she acts in accordance with the community (in this case, family) of which she is a member. Perhaps it is a silly thing to apply the categorical imperative to a non-human subject, but I believe this example may expand our understandings of the categorical imperative, by exploring it as it relates to someone else rather than to ourselves. Thoughts?

Happiness

                Throughout this week we have discussed the metaphysics of morals and the problematic complications that arise from it. Kant writes in great detail of duty, will, autonomy, universal truth, and the like in order to build upon and establish a true and indisputable idea of morality. Visited in this discourse, it the idea of happiness. While it may be impossible to definitively define happiness, it is absolutely essential to survival. The pursuit of happiness is a hypothetical imperative that effects the actions of every rational being. 

                However, the concept becomes muddled when viewed in relation to its means. If one is to view happiness as the pursuit of pleasure, the idea would simply crumble. Pleasure cannot be universal, as it is subjective. To pull from an example from class, Paul may enjoy being tied up, but this is most certainly not a universal preference.  In effect, if the inclination did not exist, the object would completely lose its value.

                Therefore, happiness must be indefinite. It exists as an end in and of itself and is relevant to all rational beings. But how does one achieve it? All beings desire happiness, but it is difficult to ascertain what it is or what one must do in order to obtain it. Any action towards happiness that we can conceive will inevitably be empirical, which causes an infinite slew of problems to branch off of what was originally intended as a solution. For example, even if one obtains a great achievement, this achievement cannot sustain him indefinitely. This end only gives rise to new desires and brings about further complications such as envy or vulnerability. And then there is the case of immortality, one may have everlasting life but not youth. Loved ones all pass away after a brief amount of time, creating a vacuum of lonesomeness that no finite being can fill. However, could one argue that since an immortal being’s life has no end the same metaphysical rules do not apply to him?  In the end, can rational beings simply not obtain ultimate happiness? It seems like the best we can do is to simply promote our own wellbeing until we reach our respective ends.

Condorcet

Fiero described Condorcet as "the most passionate warrior for the Enlightenment crusade for progress," yet next to other Enlightenment characters such as Hobbes and Locke, he seems less popular and seems to have had less of an impact on society. When I read his description in the text,  though, I was intrigued by his eerily accurate predictions- according to Fiero, such ideas include: "guaranteed livelihood for the aged, a universal system of education, fewer work hours, and the refinement of a technology for the accumulation of knowledge." In our own society these changes have already been enacted and developed over time. Because of this, I feel his opinions may be relevant both to the history of social change in America and to the future, should more of his predictions become reality.
      In the excerpt Fiero presents from Condorcet's Sketch, Condorcet argues for the logic of his approach to how mankind will progress, saying that if we can perform scientific inquiry from an understanding of laws of nature, then a philosopher should be able to evaluate mankind based on past experience. This argument tells us about Condorcet's method to making his predictions, in that he uses understanding of the past to predict our progress. After describing this, he makes a most contentious predictions, one that caught my eye but has not yet come true; Condorcet says: "The time will therefore come when the sun will shine only on free men who know no other master but their reason; when tyrants and slaves, priests and their stupid or hypocritical instruments will only exist in works of history and on the stage; and when we shall think of them only to pity their victims and their dupes." His prediction that tyranny and slavery will cease to exist seems agreeable to a common American, but his subsequent prediction regarding priests, and therefore religion, would probably disturb or even horrify a common American.
      His comparison of these three in the same context shows that he views tyranny, slavery, and religion in a similar way. The accuracy of his other predictions as reflected in America gives me cause to wonder if this last one, the abolition of religion, will become a reality in the foreseeable future. What do you all think? Will Condorcet prove to be correct  in this, or has he got the wrong idea this time? Is he wrong to compare religion to tyranny and slavery? Do his predictions really hold true for the modern world?

Wollstonecraft and the Rights of Women

      As we read in The Promise of Reason (Ch. 24), the Enlightenment Era, an intellectual movement, sparked new ideas and perspectives among middle and upper class Europeans which led to a number of societal reforms.  Among these reformers was Mary Wollstonecraft, who used the same theories and principles of her male contemporaries to attack the female stereotype and demand a revolution.  Wollstonecraft's intellect, combined with her zeal, prompted her 1792 piece entitled A Vindication of the Rights of Women.

     In her treatise, Wollstonecraft recognizes the current trends of intellectual thought in her society, specifically noting the method of analyzing first principles in search of the most simple truths, and daringly picks out the obvious flaws and prejudices inherent in the intellectuals' subsequent claims.  Reason, they say, gives man power over lesser beings.  The acquirement of virtue exalts one man over another.  Experience grants man a degree of knowledge higher than that of the lesser beings.  And finally, men employ their reason to justify prejudices rather than dispelling them, though such prejudices have clouded reason.  This example and more flaws in society are the causes of its corrupt state– a state that enslaves women by constricting their education and subjecting them to obedience.

      Furthermore, upon reading the selection in our textbook from A Vindication, I noted several similarities to Elizabeth Cady Stanton's 1848 Seneca Falls Declaration, written almost a century later.  Within this declaration, which functions as a mockery of Jefferson's Declaration of Independence, Stanton lists her "grievances" as she pinpoints the repeated injuries and usurpations of women on the part of man throughout history.  One grievance accuses man of having "destroyed [a woman's] confidence in her own powers, to lessen her self-respect...", which directly echoes Wollstonecraft's criticism.  In Wollstonecraft's treatise, she notes, "...that the minds of women are enfeebled by false refinement" and that "men endeavor to sink [women] lower, merely to render [them] alluring objects for a moment."  Stanton's evident familiarity with and respect for the works of her bombastic predessesor gives Wollstonecraft's influence a new weight, and certainly makes women around the world endlessly appreciative of her radically progressive role during the Enlightenment.

    After reading A Vindication of the Rights of Women, do you agree with Wollstonecraft's claims that women, who are oppressed by men, also embrace that oppression?  Is it impressive that those ideas were born as early as 1792?  Finally, what do you think about her statement that "it is a farce to call any being virtuous whose virtues do not result from the exercise of its own reason."?

And finally, though it's slightly unrelated...

source: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IYQhRCs9IHM

ECS Seneca Falls source: http://feminism.eserver.org/history/docs/seneca-falls.txt/document_view

Status of Women

Although we didn’t go into great detail about Jean-Jacque Rousseau or Mary Wollstonecraft during class, I wanted to call attention to the great difference these two people had in their theories of female education.

Wollstonecraft, being a woman during the Enlightenment Era, was a huge advocate of progression in female education, proclaiming that women should be equal to men because women have just as much to offer society as men do. Rousseau, on the other hand, believed women should be tamed, sheltered, and held back from any type of knowledge not pertaining to the household. Wollstonecraft’s origin of her progressive idealism is clear: as a woman in a patriarchal society she wishes to also be seen as equally contributive to society. Rousseau, however, seems to be contradictory in his beliefs. His essay Origin of Inequality among Men seems to indicate that he understands and has explored the subject of inequality greatly, almost seeming as he would not be contradictory in his conclusion about women and their place in society. Although, his title does include the specification “Men” and not, per se, “People.”  I have also not read this essay but only a mere summary, and the summary indicated that females were not included in this discourse besides being a primal instinct and priority for men. How could someone so influential from an era of great, progressive, revolutionary thinking remain so focused on an idea that is so outdated and hackneyed, considering the fact that women themselves were arguing for their social and political status during the same time? Were men so focused on being served that they could idealize new governments, societies, economies, but not new social statuses for women?

I also wonder how strong that stereotype and expectation of women is even today. From watching other relationships of those close to me, I know that the concept has still not completely vanished even with our modern thought. What could still be holding society back from giving women equal treatment and expectations as men? What are society’s current views of independent women who take control and use their intelligence and motivation to become successful? Will these views always remain, as they have for hundreds, even thousands of years? What can anyone do to refute these archaic ideas and expectations of women and the hierarchy of society? Tell me what you think. 

Visual Satire

In Chapter 26 of Fiero, entitled "The Limits of Reason", the reader is introduced to some of the reactions of Enlightenment, such as the satirical writings of Voltaire and Swift. While both incredibly important and influential in their time, I would argue that the paintings of William Hogarth were much more indicative of the direction in which social commentary would move over the next few hundred years.  Even during his lifetime, Hogarth’s visual representations of satirical writings were immensely popular (to the extent that Fiero implies piracy of Hogarth’s paintings helped prompt the French Parliament to pass its first copyright law) for several reasons. For one, the literacy rate, while increasing during the Enlightenment, was nowhere near as high as today, making visual satires much more effective to the common person. Convenience was also a factor; it takes much less time to absorb the social message of a picture than that of a novel, or even a pamphlet. As technology advanced out of the Enlightenment, the same convenience factor that facilitated the popularity enjoyed by Hogarth’s paintings helped to facilitate numerous other forms of visual commentary such as political radio and television programs. However, I would argue that visual stimulation, while undoubtedly more powerful and emotionally shocking than merely reading words on a page, is, in the end, insufficient to fully communicate a message without further information. While less true in terms of Hogarth’s unbelievably detailed paintings, one only has to browse the Internet for five minutes to see the extent to which the trend he started has progressed. Complex ideas or commentaries have been reduced to a few key catch phrases (“You didn’t build that,” for example. This trend is everywhere, from actual ads sponsored by politicians, to the scripts of political analysis shows, to the simple internet memes like this one:

This is what the trend started by Hogarth has come to. Instead of real, constructive, political dialogue, we get partisanship and plug words, and a refusal to see the other side as anything but the enemy.  Not that intelligent satirists don’t continue to exist, but the ones with thoughtful satires cleverly making use of irony, overstatements, and understatements get drowned out by the masses, whose idea of political humor is this:

 

Am I overreacting (entirely possible, I’m absolutely exhausted writing this, and I tend to get cranky when tired)? I don’t mean to sit and bemoan the collapse of political institutions, because there are several bright spots, and intelligent commentators on both sides. I only wish the spotlight was on them instead of the more convenient “satirists” who make their points with one liners with little-to-no-context.  So please, fellow Searchers, post a hundred comments proving me wrong. In this case, I could use it.

Satire as a Check on Reason

The reading "The Limits of Reason" introduces us to many "rational" arguments that led to immoral decisions by society, and also introduces us to the satirical arguments made against those immoral decisions. An important example given is slavery in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Thomas Jefferson, often considered to be one of our most important leaders and presidents, is quoted in the text: "This unfortunate difference of color, and perhaps of faculty, is a powerful obstacle to the emancipation of these (African American) people" (p 122). This opinion follows his several reasons why African Americans are intellectually inferior to whites. While indeed inferred through "reason", Jefferson's conclusion is clearly not the ideal moral solution. 

And so satire is inserted into the moral equation of modern day philosophy. What I find fantastic about works such as Swift's "A Modest Proposal" is that they can turn reason on itself. Just as Jefferson used reason to degrade blacks, Swifts uses reason to reach the conclusion that babies should be eaten. In doing so, he not only shows the enormous moral flaws that can create daily suffering when supported by reason, but also accentuates a very progressive idea for his time: that sometimes a problem may not require a cure explained through reason, but simply taking action based on observation of clearly immoral happenings. While Swift shows that starvation of Irish children can indeed be ended, "reasonably", by eating them, we know this to be an absurd solution. Reason has been turned on itself to prove its potential ineffectiveness.

The main argument the text presents is clearly that the eighteenth century was a time where people began to realize that "reason" was not the infallible tool one could use to reach moral/practical decisions. Do you think that reason in itself is good, but that in the wrong hands it can be abused? Or is the other way around? Should "reason" play a part at all in questions of morality? Are there any other memorable instances where immoral decisions were reached through "reasonable" means?

God Made Material

Descartes gives us a summary of his thoughts in his ideas called Meditations of First Philosophy. Guiding us through these, he elaborates his ideas by breaking things down, doubting them and then rebuilding them on things that cannot be proved false. One thing he proves is the existence of God, and how although things all work together, it was not the thought of one person but of a supreme being. An infinite being must have thought of everything, and created finite and material beings. However, man has tried to give God an “image” and think of him as a human, giving him finite qualities. Like using numbers to get to infinity or putting God into a man’s body, it gives us the ability to conceive an infinite being as a finite one. I think this is something we should not do because it causes God to become lower than a finite being because it is something we have imaged and have an image of it in our heads. Why are people constantly trying to solve things they do not understand? Do you think putting a picture in your head of God allows it to become more real in your head?

Descartes has now proven to me the existence of "God"

In class and while reading Meditations on First Philosophy, I have come to believe the idea that there is a infinite being that I am unable to understand but can at least comprehend the existence of.  This being, or "God" has been assigned many different and varying properties by different people throughout history.  Many times God is depicted as an old man with a large beard or as a shimmering mass of white light.  I believe that people attempt to show God in physical so that they are able to relate to the idea of an infinite and perfect being.  I completely agree with Descartes however that God is not what is described or shown in movies or literature.
As Descartes puts it,
"By the word "God" I mean an infinite substance, eternal, immutable, independent, omniscient, omnipotent, and that by which myself and all other existent things, if it is true that there are other existent things, have been created and produced" (Descartes 43).

The idea that God is an all knowing, all seeing, all powerful, perfect and infinite being is a mind blowing notion to me.  I find Descartes' argument that there must be a God because we as humans have no experience of perfection or infinity and yet we can partially grasp this notion.  To me, the example of a baby having no idea of limits and in that way having an example of infinity is a fantastic example.  This idea amazes me even further when I think about the fact that Descartes came up with this solution to his questions simply by thinking about the question of whether or not God exists.

Why do you think that human beings strive to be able to capture God as a form that we can understand?  Do you believe there to even be an image that would be able to succeed in that pursuit?  Is there any other time in which we will be able to experience infinite reality other than when we are first born and have no comprehension of limits or rules?

The Good, The Bad, and The Infinite.

In this week’s class discussions of Descartes’ “Meditations” we frequently brought up Descartes’ idea of God as an infinite substance, all-encompassing of finite substances. Whether one chooses to believe in a God in the same sense as the Christian church, it is not inconceivable to suppose that there surely must be something greater than the finite existences of humans, trees, animals, and the like – that there must be some great ‘Origin’, unbound by any limits of time or space, from whence all other life and existence must have come. Following that idea, it also serves to reason that there must be some purpose for the finite substances of this existing world beyond the Lion King definition of simply composing a “Circle of Life”. Why would this infinite existence lend creation to all of the finite existence that there currently is or ever has been? As the first and only thing that Descartes found to be true beyond a reasonable doubt was the idea that “I am, I exist”, it follows that his view on the purpose of life would be thought, since that is the only thing that we can each call our own. I believe, based on Descartes’ definitions of will and intellect that beyond one’s point in life being to think, it is also important that one’s thought be centered on arrived-at truth.

Embracing Descartes’ argument for thought as the ultimate human life purpose, I would like to propose in answer to this question that since the infinite “God” or infinite substance is neither good nor bad – but both – it thus, by lending both its good and bad qualities to the subsequent creations, has created its finite, rational creations with a certain responsibility to determine for themselves their own life purposes. I think that Descartes would say this because he relied principally on the facility of reason to determine for himself which ideas were innate, adventitious, or fictitious. As Descartes identified, the mind is equipped with the two great facilities of will and intellect – will being infinite, intellect being finite. As we discussed in the last class, by using both of these facilities humans are able to determine what it is that they want and what it is that they know. It is when the two are not in balance with one another that human error (described as false judgments) occurs. But what is error? What is wrong? What is bad?

My big problem with Descartes’ argument on the human condition, in relation to good and bad is that there are no absolute determinants for good and bad. There are no laws or absolute rules set down by Descartes to determine which actions or thoughts are “good” or “bad”, but rather it is left up to the reason of each individual to make these determinations. Additionally, if each person’s mind is the only thing that is absolutely inseparable from doubt as an existing thing, and if each person’s mind is unique to himself, then would not each person’s perceptions, rationalizations, and experiences be individual as well? In this case, how then would one be able to determine for himself what is good and bad, or determine his own standards? Are not we our harshest critics? In the case of one holding a highly positive or highly negative view of oneself, would not one be more inclined to be very extreme in one’s definitions of what is good or bad, in order to make himself feel justified?    With all of these questions left unanswered, there is definitely no possibility for the existence of a universal morality. Even if Descartes discounts a universal morality as something unachievable, any individual standards of morality if discounting the standards of one’s community or if giving oneself too easy or too difficult a judgment is not even possible by these definitions. Therefore, if it is the task of each person to determine right or wrong for himself, we may say that a solidified idea of morality cannot truly exist for each person.