[Rev 08JAN2012]
http://jetpress.org/v21/blackford3.htm
Russell Blackford has published on JET his long-considered review of Sam Harris' The Moral Landscape, plus a more succinct and focused version at the ABC Religion and Ethics portal. Dr. Blackford takes the granular approach, addressing Harris' most controversial points in detail, analyzing specific arguments as philosophers love to do.
I prefer to look deeper into the subject matter itself, which is a claim by Harris (and others) that there can be a "science of morality."
I agree with that, if it means empirical description of moral behavior among H. sapiens. Human behavior is observable, describable and quantifiable. But that is not what Harris means. He means, explicitly, science can determine human values.
He does not say and does not mean "discover" human values. Unless the majority of his audience and I misunderstand him, he means "determine" in the sense of establish or create, not identify or reveal. He's interested not in tabulation, but formulation.
This view is not unprecedented. Philosophers have attempted to make moral valuation more "factual" ever since the dawn of modern science. Historically the first step has been to remove the supernatural (or metaphysical) from moral theory, to clear a path to a rational "secular ethics" — that is, ethics without reference to religion — substituting reason for theistic tradition or authority in moral arguments. The next step has been to create the secular tradition, showing how rational earthly arguments can justify moral judgments — a work in progress. Harris (and many others) take a further step, intending to transform "secular" into "scientific."
This step to a scientific ethics is possible only if "moral knowledge" is possible — which presumes there is something objective to know about right and wrong. If that presumption is correct, there's something to talk about scientifically. Otherwise, there's nothing for science to study. Thus Harris calls himself a moral realist, which commits him to this presumption that there are such things as "moral facts" from which to logically deduce values or prescriptions.
Even if the presumption "there are moral facts" is true, the larger problem is to discover what they are — and then make valid prescriptive deductions from them. The methods applied to both — discovery and making conclusions — are crucial. Harris believes the correct procedure for both is the scientific method.
But there are reasons to resist the exercise.
I maintain the scientific method is inappropriate for establishing moral values because it does not — cannot — consider human individuals in the process. "Scientific morality" discounts and devalues the most important component in moral behavior: the agent. The resulting moral system presents a threat to every individual's personal autonomy and freedom.
Orientation
Harris assigns a starring role to the concept of "well-being" as a moral goal or value and leans heavily upon it. That concept and "human flourishing" are popular buzzwords among the scientific crowd on the internet these days. Well-being also has found favor in British policy circles as a movement to measure economic progress on more than GDP -- which is to say, the concept is making its way into policy today. But besides the questions whether these two attractive concepts are derived by strictly scientific means (probably not), whether they are quantifiable by scientific method (debatable) and how much moral valuation is reducible to terms of well-being (certainly not all), it's worth asking what civic conditions might appear in the resulting "scientifically moral" world and how it might feel to live there.
While others debate the arcane philosophical merits of Harris' so-called "realist" (there are knowable objective facts) moral theory, invoking Hume's guillotine and related analytic weapons, I am more concerned about the outcomes in moral practice. Rather than asking "can science," it's necessary to ask should science determine human values?
Are there any flaws or shortcomings in the moral work that can be done with a scientific toolkit? What happens if policymakers adopt the toolkit?
http://jetpress.org/v21/blackford3.htm
Russell Blackford has published on JET his long-considered review of Sam Harris' The Moral Landscape, plus a more succinct and focused version at the ABC Religion and Ethics portal. Dr. Blackford takes the granular approach, addressing Harris' most controversial points in detail, analyzing specific arguments as philosophers love to do.
I prefer to look deeper into the subject matter itself, which is a claim by Harris (and others) that there can be a "science of morality."
I agree with that, if it means empirical description of moral behavior among H. sapiens. Human behavior is observable, describable and quantifiable. But that is not what Harris means. He means, explicitly, science can determine human values.
He does not say and does not mean "discover" human values. Unless the majority of his audience and I misunderstand him, he means "determine" in the sense of establish or create, not identify or reveal. He's interested not in tabulation, but formulation.
This view is not unprecedented. Philosophers have attempted to make moral valuation more "factual" ever since the dawn of modern science. Historically the first step has been to remove the supernatural (or metaphysical) from moral theory, to clear a path to a rational "secular ethics" — that is, ethics without reference to religion — substituting reason for theistic tradition or authority in moral arguments. The next step has been to create the secular tradition, showing how rational earthly arguments can justify moral judgments — a work in progress. Harris (and many others) take a further step, intending to transform "secular" into "scientific."
This step to a scientific ethics is possible only if "moral knowledge" is possible — which presumes there is something objective to know about right and wrong. If that presumption is correct, there's something to talk about scientifically. Otherwise, there's nothing for science to study. Thus Harris calls himself a moral realist, which commits him to this presumption that there are such things as "moral facts" from which to logically deduce values or prescriptions.
Even if the presumption "there are moral facts" is true, the larger problem is to discover what they are — and then make valid prescriptive deductions from them. The methods applied to both — discovery and making conclusions — are crucial. Harris believes the correct procedure for both is the scientific method.
But there are reasons to resist the exercise.
I maintain the scientific method is inappropriate for establishing moral values because it does not — cannot — consider human individuals in the process. "Scientific morality" discounts and devalues the most important component in moral behavior: the agent. The resulting moral system presents a threat to every individual's personal autonomy and freedom.
Orientation
Harris assigns a starring role to the concept of "well-being" as a moral goal or value and leans heavily upon it. That concept and "human flourishing" are popular buzzwords among the scientific crowd on the internet these days. Well-being also has found favor in British policy circles as a movement to measure economic progress on more than GDP -- which is to say, the concept is making its way into policy today. But besides the questions whether these two attractive concepts are derived by strictly scientific means (probably not), whether they are quantifiable by scientific method (debatable) and how much moral valuation is reducible to terms of well-being (certainly not all), it's worth asking what civic conditions might appear in the resulting "scientifically moral" world and how it might feel to live there.
While others debate the arcane philosophical merits of Harris' so-called "realist" (there are knowable objective facts) moral theory, invoking Hume's guillotine and related analytic weapons, I am more concerned about the outcomes in moral practice. Rather than asking "can science," it's necessary to ask should science determine human values?
Are there any flaws or shortcomings in the moral work that can be done with a scientific toolkit? What happens if policymakers adopt the toolkit?
First consider some simple, non-controversial premises.
a) Your well-being and my well-being probably are not the same. Our experiences of well-being are unique, idiosyncratic and subjective. My needs and the actions I must take to provide for my own well-being might not be the same set as yours.
b) The well-being of humankind is probably something different again from yours and mine, even after allowing for considerably overlapping magisteria.
c) Science is the same everywhere. Its answers to questions within its ken must be the same at all times and places, or else it isn't science.
d) To be objectively valid, a moral science (in Harris' sense) must produce the same answers to moral questions for everyone, always and everywhere.
e) Harris' moral science is recognizably utilitarian: it contemplates a calculation of well-being and its maximization in society, with an expectation that, once measured and analyzed, well-being should guide public policies.
These simple observations can help us understand how any "scientific morality" (as Harris means it) is flawed, even if based upon a benign value such as "well-being," as done in The Moral Landscape.
Synopsis
Science is better suited to analyze groups, not persons. Since science can quantify the aggregate but cannot account for individuals, a utilitarian moral science will round off the well-being of the individual to the shape of the common good. Consideration for the personal interests of the individual disappears in the process.
At d (above), all values are specifically scientific — ie, the only valid values are those science can derive. The resulting ethics accepts no disagreement unless it is scientific. Dissent dismissed as not scientific can be rejected without further moral argument.
If such an ethics became the basis for public policy, these two features would tend to "scientifically" justify control of personal behavior to reflect the norms of a technocratic state, even at the expense of the legitimate interests, freedom and autonomy of the individual.
At that point, not only is God dead, but so is Patrick Henry.
Exposition
The maintenance of organized society sometimes requires the state to ask the individual to sacrifice self-interests to achieve the "common good." The altruism necessary for that to happen voluntarily, although it may sometimes occur, is not strong enough or common enough among human beings to be a reliable basis for public policy. We cannot count on altruism alone to achieve the common good.
At d (above), all values are specifically scientific — ie, the only valid values are those science can derive. The resulting ethics accepts no disagreement unless it is scientific. Dissent dismissed as not scientific can be rejected without further moral argument.
If such an ethics became the basis for public policy, these two features would tend to "scientifically" justify control of personal behavior to reflect the norms of a technocratic state, even at the expense of the legitimate interests, freedom and autonomy of the individual.
At that point, not only is God dead, but so is Patrick Henry.
Exposition
The maintenance of organized society sometimes requires the state to ask the individual to sacrifice self-interests to achieve the "common good." The altruism necessary for that to happen voluntarily, although it may sometimes occur, is not strong enough or common enough among human beings to be a reliable basis for public policy. We cannot count on altruism alone to achieve the common good.
As James Madison said, "If men were angels, no government would be necessary." To make up for the absence of universal altruism, societies subject individuals to laws and regulations and back them with coercive force. The "common good" is a noble idea in theory and it must be considered or else there will be no such thing, but in practice it requires legal constraints upon individual behavior, contradicting personal autonomy and freedom. The issues are not whether social constraints can or should be applied. The answer is yes or else justice and civil order become unpredictable (cf Hobbes: self-serving becomes the only form of justice and society breaks down). Instead the most difficult issues have always been questions of balance.
On the individual level there is little incentive (besides coercion) to accept the common good as the primary measure of one's own well-being. Submission to the common good (coerced or not), while usually benignly accepted, is nonetheless artificial and secondary in importance from the self-interested point of view.
The divergence of self-interest from social interests might be called a "problem of non-coincidence." It is the crucial problem addressed by nearly every social, economic, political and ethical theorist since philosophy began: to reconcile the individual's interests with those of the community, whatever such interests may be. (Socrates pioneered the social contract by dutifully submitting to censure by the state, having always accepted its benefits. Hobbes thought such duty expired when the state was no longer beneficial. Rorty claimed that public and personal interests are so totally different, they cannot be reconciled in theory. But empirically it can be said simply that the two do not always coincide.)
Some theorists overcome the non-coincidence problem by invoking "enlightened self-interest" to substitute for altruism in fostering cooperation, but badly bog down describing what it is, how to calculate it and why anyone would choose it over the ordinary kind.
To ignore the hedonism inherent in self-interest is to lose sight of what it is: selfishness with a dash of justification. If one used the term "enlightened hedonism," most people would laugh — but that's what enlightened self-interest is. Unless everyone is enlightened exactly the same, it's practically an oxymoron.
Besides, enlightenment suffers from the same lack of distribution in the populace as altruism does.
Meanwhile in secular ethics, self-interest is sacred. If the First Law of Human Nature is self-preservation, then self-interest is fully justified. It is the one theoretic principle that even the least philosophical person understands (even if it doesn't take moral theorists everywhere we want to go). It is the durable foundation of modern liberal democracy (and free market capitalism) courtesy of David Hume and Adam Smith. Out of the chaos of individual interests (albeit competing), the decisions of all produce net, de facto consensus in the form of aggregate behavior. This, says Smith, is all we need; the dynamics of the aggregate produce desirable results. Smith might be too optimistic about the results, but empirically: self-interest is a moral concept the world understands and uses daily. (Indeed this might be the only documentable point where a moral realist can stand). Despite its potential for producing decadence, corruption and ruin, the unbridled self-interest of the individual is a reliable assumption in policy and decision-makers operate accordingly.
On the individual level there is little incentive (besides coercion) to accept the common good as the primary measure of one's own well-being. Submission to the common good (coerced or not), while usually benignly accepted, is nonetheless artificial and secondary in importance from the self-interested point of view.
The divergence of self-interest from social interests might be called a "problem of non-coincidence." It is the crucial problem addressed by nearly every social, economic, political and ethical theorist since philosophy began: to reconcile the individual's interests with those of the community, whatever such interests may be. (Socrates pioneered the social contract by dutifully submitting to censure by the state, having always accepted its benefits. Hobbes thought such duty expired when the state was no longer beneficial. Rorty claimed that public and personal interests are so totally different, they cannot be reconciled in theory. But empirically it can be said simply that the two do not always coincide.)
Some theorists overcome the non-coincidence problem by invoking "enlightened self-interest" to substitute for altruism in fostering cooperation, but badly bog down describing what it is, how to calculate it and why anyone would choose it over the ordinary kind.
To ignore the hedonism inherent in self-interest is to lose sight of what it is: selfishness with a dash of justification. If one used the term "enlightened hedonism," most people would laugh — but that's what enlightened self-interest is. Unless everyone is enlightened exactly the same, it's practically an oxymoron.
Besides, enlightenment suffers from the same lack of distribution in the populace as altruism does.
Meanwhile in secular ethics, self-interest is sacred. If the First Law of Human Nature is self-preservation, then self-interest is fully justified. It is the one theoretic principle that even the least philosophical person understands (even if it doesn't take moral theorists everywhere we want to go). It is the durable foundation of modern liberal democracy (and free market capitalism) courtesy of David Hume and Adam Smith. Out of the chaos of individual interests (albeit competing), the decisions of all produce net, de facto consensus in the form of aggregate behavior. This, says Smith, is all we need; the dynamics of the aggregate produce desirable results. Smith might be too optimistic about the results, but empirically: self-interest is a moral concept the world understands and uses daily. (Indeed this might be the only documentable point where a moral realist can stand). Despite its potential for producing decadence, corruption and ruin, the unbridled self-interest of the individual is a reliable assumption in policy and decision-makers operate accordingly.
The best discussion is George F. Will's Statecraft as Soulcraft.
This brings us to the issue of scientific moral thought.
No matter which direction one slants the non-coincidence problem intellectually — to favor either the individual or society — a scientific answer to the question "what is the best course of action for humankind?" will not be the same as the individual's answer, altruistic or not. Nor will scientific answers necessarily match the individual's answer to "what is the best course of action for me?"
The most obvious problem in making such answers scientific is that science cannot actually "see" individuals. Since the project of science is to model general laws, while specific individuals are not generalities, the scientific viewpoint is blind to the unique experiences, desires and interests of any actual person. Each of us is equally unpredictable in a test tube. Science cannot literally tabulate seven billion self-interests (inputs) and then produce policies (outputs) that are uniform for everyone, always and everywhere, while still respecting every single interest.
No matter which direction one slants the non-coincidence problem intellectually — to favor either the individual or society — a scientific answer to the question "what is the best course of action for humankind?" will not be the same as the individual's answer, altruistic or not. Nor will scientific answers necessarily match the individual's answer to "what is the best course of action for me?"
The most obvious problem in making such answers scientific is that science cannot actually "see" individuals. Since the project of science is to model general laws, while specific individuals are not generalities, the scientific viewpoint is blind to the unique experiences, desires and interests of any actual person. Each of us is equally unpredictable in a test tube. Science cannot literally tabulate seven billion self-interests (inputs) and then produce policies (outputs) that are uniform for everyone, always and everywhere, while still respecting every single interest.
What science can observe is a statistical distribution of existing values (supposing they can be tabulated and categorized) at the level of society. But what if some value were the norm — cannibalism, let's say — yet not necessarily good? Statistics cannot evaluate "goodness." It can only report the values we are using. What if I don't want to be a cannibal? Science can't vindicate me. It can only note my statistical deviation from the norm, investigate what defect such deviants have in common, develop a therapy for it, and ultimately make me a better cannibal.
Although scientific practice incorporates certain values and even ideals (free inquiry, objectivity, empiricism, quantification, logic and reason, falsifiability, continual self-correction, etc), science is not designed to be a value system. The measure of "good science" is not whether it lives up to its values, but whether it produces valid, useful knowledge.
Besides this — and more to the point — its production values are not specifically moral ones.
Besides this — and more to the point — its production values are not specifically moral ones.
What, then, makes science a valid guide for actions I must take, if science is not a value system in the morally relevant sense and is better equipped to analyze not me, but society in general?
Harris thinks he knows. He thinks that science can define (or model) well-being and deploy it. Maybe so, but that will be the well-being of society, not me. If I am x and society is y in the non-coincidence problem, how does Harris solve for x?
That is where Harris falls short: it's exactly where science cannot take him — to me. But since he goes there anyhow, he manages to show his real stripes. He solves for x as a scientist must — and the solution is unacceptable: he calls it y. The common good is the only good. He ignores my personal needs and values, whatever they might be, and inserts a foreign object where my self-interest ought to be.
And if I don't agree with that, he thinks it's okay to change my brain.
Sam Harris is a social engineer, pure and simple. This explains many passages in The Moral Landscape, the subtext of which is Harris' belief that when society's well-being and the people's views conflict, science should change the people. He repeats this belief in his response to critics, so we should take it literally:
Keep in mind, Harris is a neurologist. Both remarks are made while speaking of the human brain. He is referring to changing anatomy, not ideas.
And now it should be clear why some critics bring up Orwellian nightmares of psycho-neurological Hitlerism in response to The Moral Landscape.
That is where Harris falls short: it's exactly where science cannot take him — to me. But since he goes there anyhow, he manages to show his real stripes. He solves for x as a scientist must — and the solution is unacceptable: he calls it y. The common good is the only good. He ignores my personal needs and values, whatever they might be, and inserts a foreign object where my self-interest ought to be.
And if I don't agree with that, he thinks it's okay to change my brain.
Sam Harris is a social engineer, pure and simple. This explains many passages in The Moral Landscape, the subtext of which is Harris' belief that when society's well-being and the people's views conflict, science should change the people. He repeats this belief in his response to critics, so we should take it literally:
If we were ever to arrive at a complete understanding of the human mind, we would understand human preferences of all kinds. Indeed, we might even be able to change them. ...And:
[T]o talk about what is truly good, we must also include the possibility (in principle, if not in practice) of changing people's desires, preferences, and intuitions as a means of moving across the moral landscape.That is Harris' solution to the non-coincidence problem: sand the rough-edged people down. To solve the non-coincidence equation, change every X to Y.
Keep in mind, Harris is a neurologist. Both remarks are made while speaking of the human brain. He is referring to changing anatomy, not ideas.
And now it should be clear why some critics bring up Orwellian nightmares of psycho-neurological Hitlerism in response to The Moral Landscape.
This begs many questions: whether ideas are actually limited by brain configuration, whether brains ought to be standardized, whether we would all think the same thoughts if they were, what's so good about that, and why social progress should not occur instead through the power of persuasion.
Some thinkers maintain this existential conflict between individual and society can be overcome by "guaranteeing freedom" at the level of the individual while requiring some modicum of adherence to certain standards of society (bracket where they come from or what they are). In theory that is a reasonable recipe for social order while the individual has free rein, and that is what we actually pursue in liberal democratic societies — at least in principle.
But in practice — that is, in policymaking and enforcement, where power is exercised — historically "social order" trumps and overrides the freedom and autonomy of personhood. Freedoms guaranteed are not freedom absolute. Many behaviors are regulated either by custom or by law — including many which are "harmless" — essentially because they may disturb others (examples abound, such as, say, spitting on the sidewalk or having sex in public). At the level of policy, social order is a moral absolute and freedom is relative.
But in practice — that is, in policymaking and enforcement, where power is exercised — historically "social order" trumps and overrides the freedom and autonomy of personhood. Freedoms guaranteed are not freedom absolute. Many behaviors are regulated either by custom or by law — including many which are "harmless" — essentially because they may disturb others (examples abound, such as, say, spitting on the sidewalk or having sex in public). At the level of policy, social order is a moral absolute and freedom is relative.
Basing social order upon scientifically determined values does not improve that balance, nor make it more justifiable. It merely installs a scientific agenda behind the justification of constraint.
And here we have the crux of the matter: "well-being" for society resembles "social order" more than it resembles the individual's "what I want" (or need) and as a tool, science doesn't change that.
Science is suited for social policy, not persons, and that is how it will be used.
Social policy "sees" only as much of the individual as will fit within its frame of common good. Though it can coerce actions, it cannot prescribe values for actual individuals without violating their individuality. Social theory grants priority to the group, for policy can manage no other thing. This limit in scope does not expand by making the social definition of "well-being" increasingly scientific.
The Technocratic Life
At the practical level — which is nothing if not the individual level — the likely result is pain and suffering for anyone who does not fit* the presumptive social climate, scientific or not.
*cf Ruth Benedict, Patterns of Culture (1934), who noticed we can discover much about societies by observing which personalities become misfits in them, and which become elite.
For anyone who thinks such suffering cannot happen on a large scale in a regime devoted to scientific "well-being," consider the experience of black Americans, nominally free but neither practically nor politically free, for a full 100 years after the Civil War. A large measure of the "science" done in that time tried to prove that black people were more suited for slavery than citizenship.** Yes, eventually this "science" was discredited — score one for self-correction in the scientific method. Nonetheless, we might have made faster progress ignoring the science and simply treating each other well.
*cf Ruth Benedict, Patterns of Culture (1934), who noticed we can discover much about societies by observing which personalities become misfits in them, and which become elite.
For anyone who thinks such suffering cannot happen on a large scale in a regime devoted to scientific "well-being," consider the experience of black Americans, nominally free but neither practically nor politically free, for a full 100 years after the Civil War. A large measure of the "science" done in that time tried to prove that black people were more suited for slavery than citizenship.** Yes, eventually this "science" was discredited — score one for self-correction in the scientific method. Nonetheless, we might have made faster progress ignoring the science and simply treating each other well.
**cf Polygenism: Ernst Haeckel, Samuel George Morton, Louis Agassiz all wanted to show that various races began as different species.
"James Watson, a Nobel Prize winner for his part in discovering the structure of DNA, made a claim in October of 2007, that black people are less intelligent than white people because of a difference in DNA. The science community rejected and chastised his idea..." (In case anyone believes these things can't happen among scientists in the 21st century.)
Truth will out, so it's said, and now science has "discovered" Africa is the motherland of the human race, and the only Neanderthal-free DNA in our species lives in Africa. Note: these "facts" could change tomorrow.
The point here is that science can be mistaken, its self-correcting features can be culture bound and slow (it took 200 years to get from Newton to Einstein), and even if correct, the discoveries of science can be misapplied. Making a moral judgment scientific does not, ipso facto, make it good.
The point here is that science can be mistaken, its self-correcting features can be culture bound and slow (it took 200 years to get from Newton to Einstein), and even if correct, the discoveries of science can be misapplied. Making a moral judgment scientific does not, ipso facto, make it good.
But it might make it into policy because it's scientific in a scientific culture.
Now suppose an ordinary, non-criminal person does not fit the scientific regime's definition of a "useful" or "socially valuable" human being (a porn star, poet, idiot or priest, let's say, in a society that mainly values engineers, bankers, atheists and astronauts).
What policy would a scientific moral consultant deduce to protect this out-of-favor personality from the grip of famine in a scientific culture? Down to earth, should a "misfit" endure a life of self-effacement, ostracism or marginalization for the "good" of the rest of society? Should Picasso starve? More to the point, should Lenny Bruce or Alex Solzhenitsyn go to prison?
Or perhaps Dr. Harris could lobotomize them. For their own good, of course. Then they wouldn't feel oppressed.
If the answer to such a question has a scientific answer, valid always and everywhere, and that answer is, in principle, "yes, every person must accede to the scientific social good," then every objection an affected individual might lodge against it can be dismissed as unscientific — quite aside from any discussion of morality.
Or perhaps Dr. Harris could lobotomize them. For their own good, of course. Then they wouldn't feel oppressed.
If the answer to such a question has a scientific answer, valid always and everywhere, and that answer is, in principle, "yes, every person must accede to the scientific social good," then every objection an affected individual might lodge against it can be dismissed as unscientific — quite aside from any discussion of morality.
When science determines human values, science itself is valued first. Values that are not scientific may be called "wrong." Dissent is illogical. Resistance is futile.*
*ORIG: "If science determines human values, science becomes the value."
Ref IVO's comments below.
Ref IVO's comments below.
In short, the problem with a scientific version of "morality," even if grounded upon well-being, is not a difficulty in defining or quantifying well-being. Instead the problem is that scientific prescriptions must be accepted everywhere: well-being defined by science must be uniform for everyone even though, scientifically speaking, it can be defined for no one.
The uniformity necessary to make a "morality of well-being" scientific devalues and thus dehumanizes the individual. Coerced conformity — including the impulse to "change the people" — is no more palatable to the individual for being scientific. In fact it will be experienced as oppression.
This is what I have always taken to be the chilling note in the phrase "a brave new world."
On the day I want to become a robot, I will call a scientist. And on the day I want my morality robotic, I will call a scientific moralist.
Until that day, a truly moral world, I think, is a world where policy (scientific or otherwise) does not select the values: people do.
As usual, a masterful discussion. I've missed these.
ReplyDeleteI have no doubt you're right that Harris is a social engineer. That's the norm of the Left, to assert its own value scale at the expense of tradition while calling itself "rational." Save me from "rational ethics."
How to metabolize it all? One point will have to do. For me, the natural state of humanity is laboring under constraint. Whether fighting our impulse to sleep around or struggling to bring in the harvest, the human story has been one of laboring against our desires. We are better when we do so. It is the struggle itself that tempers us, as (I like to think) Aristotle understood when he wrote about eudaimonia (an old word for flourishing or happiness). Certainly Nietzsche would agree.
Oh, and no, Picasso should not starve. He should have painted houses. I mean interior walls, in simple color schemes. The "beige" period.
Another point: Where does Harris come down on abortion? I'd be impressed if he took a stand contrary to the Leftist orthodoxy.
ReplyDeleteFirst of all, thanks for not falling off the planet. Second, thanks for the kind words. People are reading this, but no response until now. It's lonely at the top. LOL.
ReplyDeleteHarris' stand on abortion is an interesting question. It brings up the more general question what practical ethics of any kind his putative scientific procedure might generate. Reducing abortion questions to those of "well-being" would tend to show the limits of the principle, since it begs the question "whose well-being?" Harris' instincts amount to a form of statism (according to my discussion) which, if society is more important than people, leaves open the practice of abortion as a form of birth control -- which, in policy, becomes a means of population control. Surely there are too many people on the planet, so for the good of society, reduction is good. But ends do not justify means, or else not only is abortion OK, but war is also good. I don't know whether Harris says anything like that, but his way of thinking can lead in that direction, and I would be surprised if he thinks otherwise. He is definitely "new left" and therefore "therapeutic" and "interventionist" as a social engineer. Freedom of conscience seems to be the first casualty in his thinking, wherever it may conflict with policy. Like many a new leftist, he does not appear content to let democracy do its work. Maybe I can find some statements from him on abortion. Bet he falls into the pattern.
http://www.samharris.org/site/full_text/a-modest-proposal-for-a-truce-on-religion/
ReplyDelete"Mr. Harris mocks conservative Christians for opposing abortion, writing: '20 percent of all recognized pregnancies end in miscarriage. There is an obvious truth here that cries out for acknowledgment: if God exists, He is the most prolific abortionist of all.'"
AND:
"Almost every cell in your body is a potential human being, given our recent advances in genetic engineering,” notes Mr. Harris. “Every time you scratch your nose, you have committed a Holocaust of potential human beings."
AND:
[quoted from http://insightscoop.typepad.com/2004/2007/08/sam-harriss-rel.html]
Harris: The End of Faith (p 177):
"Many of us consider human fetuses in the first trimester to be more or less like rabbits: having imputed to them a range of happiness and suffering that does not grant them full status in our moral community. At present, this seems rather reasonable. Only future scientific insights could refute this intuition."
I hope this gives you pause, if only to marvel that a man who claims that Christianity is irrational and barbaric believes that a human fetus is no different, on a moral level, than a rabbit. On what rational, scientific basis is this belief—and it is a belief of a most religious nature—rest? The "answer":
The problem of specifying the criteria for inclusion in our moral community is one for which I do not have a detailed answer—other than to say that whatever answer we give should reflect our sense of the possible subjectivity of the creature in question.
Interpretation: "I have no idea why I believe a human fetus is no different than a rabbit. I accept it on blind faith! It simply feels right. And I want it to be true, so it must be true." Not only that, Harris doesn't even have a scientific, objective basis by which he can distinguish what is human from what is rabbit. He writes: "What will be our criterion for humanness? DNA? Shall a single human cell take precedence over a herd of elephants?" Well, I say we find a herd of elephants who are discussing this same topic and ask them what they think.
-- Carl Olson at Insight Scoop, August 31, 2007
I think Harris has a tendency to take advantage of muddy water, after stirring it vigorously first. Just sayin' ...
Yeah, that's what I figured. The Leftist position on abortion is disingenuous at best. At least the Romans were open about their infanticide. Anyway, it would have been asking too much of Mr. Harris to expect him to hold any unorthodox opinions.
ReplyDelete"...how much moral valuation is reducible to terms of well-being (certainly not all)..."
ReplyDeleteGC, would you care to elaborate? So far I haven't yet encountered any upheld moral value that cannot, after some inquiry, be reduced to some underlying concern for the common good. (In real life I mean, forget most philosophers' phantasies.)
CONSULTUS:
"Anyway, it would have been asking too much of Mr. Harris to expect him to hold any unorthodox opinions."
This is quite ridiculous, given how controversial Harris views are, even among his fellow atheists. He's the guy credited by the media for starting the "religion wars" and the "new atheist movement" with the publication of The End of Faith -- Yeah, his views are soooo mild and orthodox that he must walk around with bodyguards and he must live with his family in some undisclosed locality, because of all the death threats. Now with The Moral Landscape he has ignited a renewed public interest and open debate on the nature of morality and the role of science in it, thereby polarizing his fellow scientists and rationalists.
Harris is also known for having outraged many atheists by defending spiritual practices like meditation (once it's salvaged from the grip of religions), and he's the guy who went to a top atheist conference and lectured on why they should drop the label 'atheist', as it's counterproductive.
Way to avoid unorthodox opinions, this Sam...
And GC, thanks for the interesting post. I think you're mainly wrong about Harris' position and its practical consequences, but I will need some thinking to gather a coherent reply.
If you're interested in hearing it, I'll be back!
Yes, Ivo I am interested in hearing any and all responses.
ReplyDeleteI don't want to speak for Consvltvs, as I'm sure he'll do that if he wants to, but I took his comment to mean Harris is orthodox Left on abortion.
Which brings up my response to your biggest question about reducing all moral valuation to terms of well-being:
First, that's the way I phrased it -- "well-being." And your comment phrases it "common good." That was a component of my argument: should we reduce valuation to the individual's well-being, or society's well-being? The two do not always coincide, and people disagree about both. To that I would add it's difficult to define well-being in either form without referring to further moral principles or concepts such as (desirability of) "pleasure and pain," "gratification and frustration," or in the public sphere "harmony and strife." What makes well-being so special that it can become an ultimate value? Suppose there's a good answer for that. Then how do we value freedom (for example)? Well, because it enhances well-being. You see the problem: the sui generis attractiveness of freedom now must be justified in well-being terms, and this can significantly change what we mean by freedom (same for other principles). Besides this, in the process of defining well-being, we cannot presuppose the value we're trying to justify. Therefore we must refer to (many) other terms, to establish what it means and how it's good without presupposing the goodness. Finally, if we reduce everything to well-being after all, whose well-being? Mine? Yours? Everybody's? Is it only good if it's everybody's good? Take the latter. Bill Gates can now be painted as evil, because he makes a lot of money that doesn't do anybody else any good.
Mostly I object to distorting other, more highly evolved concepts (such as democracy, political and personal autonomy, etc) to fit an argumentative regime of "well-being," which is classically a utilitarian formula not quite able to contain all the moral principles every philosopher might want it to hold.
But then, if we knew all the answers, we wouldn't be discussing this, would we? LOL.
Ivo: part two
ReplyDeleteThe overall point of this essay was that besides these problems, even if they can be overcome, there is the issue of what happens if we consider our solution "scientific." Science becomes the value and policy rules the day. Suddenly "my" well-being is the same as "yours" and to argue against it is a scientific sin. I don't want to live in a world like that.
(this is Ivo: I can't make TypePad work anymore for the life of me… argh)
ReplyDeleteOk, let's start with "part two", because I think it is completely misguided, simply because this is not how science works. It does not impose its conclusion on people but, rather, open-minded people get to accept them once the evidence and reasons become sufficiently compelling -- and the conclusions of science are accepted to a degree that is proportional to the current amount of evidence. So, if enough hard evidence is gathered and integrated into a scientific theory explaining that, say, any legal system granting women only an inferior legal status than that of men will almost certainly cause unnecessary suffering and waste of resources, than what? "Science becomes value"? No. Simply, reasonable people will accept these conclusion on the strength of the evidence brought forth, and then it will become sort of clear that that's what any respectable society should do: grant women equal status. This will happen because people want it to happen, not because some cabbal of sociologists and psychologists has imposed that on the whole society.
In fact, this is the whole point. Only because an idea has been scientifically proved, it doesn't mean that it becomes exempt from the usual democratic process before it becomes policy. The only effect would be that its advocated would have very good reasons to have it turn into policy. This is certainly true for ideas of all kinds, including moral ones.
In fact, it's even more basic than this. Think about it: when most Europeans have finally learned it for a biological fact that dark-skinned (or other exotic looking) people are just as fully human as we are, has equality suddenly been imposed by any government?
You seem to think that, if a choice of policy can be proved, beyond any doubt, to be morally superior, that it would be OK to impose it from on high --- or perhaps, you think that it it should be imposed? (This is not clear to me.) But in any case your fears are really misguided. The fact that dictators of all stripe invoke some (usually imaginary) evidence of higher moral ground in order to impose their view has no baring on this. In fact, I would argue that the costs to society of even a benign and illuminating dictatorship are still much too high, especially in the long term. (I can go into much detail here, if you're interested. I've lived in Singapore, which is often considered such a "good" authoriarian state, so I've been giving this a lot of thought.)
" Suddenly "my" well-being is the same as "yours" and to argue against it is a scientific sin. I don't want to live in a world like that. "
I don't understand this complaint. You don't want anybody telling you that you've been proven wrong on any matter related to morals or values? Is that it?
And what is a "scientific sin"? Something that the "scientific police" will hunt you for, and which will condemn you to "eternal scientific damnation"?
I will also answer this, for the moment:
ReplyDelete" First, that's the way I phrased it -- "well-being." And your comment phrases it "common good." That was a component of my argument: should we reduce valuation to the individual's well-being, or society's well-being? The two do not always coincide, and people disagree about both. "
Yes, we should reduce valuation to the individual's well-being. This is very important I think, and the reason is obvious once you point it out explicitly, as Harris does: in a strong sense, there is no other well-being: societies do not really suffer or experience any sort of internal state, those are ony metaphors or short-hand for something that happens to the individual human beings that make it up. There is no way at all that a society fares "better" if each of its individuals fares worse. When, e.g., a catastrophy is thought of as "good" because it strengthens a nation, this really means that the future generations, if not the current stricken one, are going to benefit from it.
Of course the questions remains of how to compare the well-being of different individuals, or how to find a way to integrate multiple sorts of well-being (like: present and future), or how to integrate all the individuals well-beings into some collective measures that would help us evaluate moral outcomes. This are big problems, but not so big as many would have them, and there are already many tentative, but sometimes useful, partial solutions to each of these.
Ivo, I sympathize with your TypePad complaint. I'm supposed to get an email whenever someone sets a new comment here, and I didn't get it. Might have something to do with my tweaking the comments so people can post without my moderating them first. So I apologize if it looks like I'm slow on the uptake here.
ReplyDeleteI just read your Anon comments a couple of times and I have a few thoughts in response. I'll compose them and post them soon enough, but in the meantime I'll just say you make some valid points and in general I don't disagree with them -- mostly because I don't think they're fatal to my position.
Parenthetically, though, "scientific sin" is not meant as a new technical term. LOL. If you read it as "scientific equivalent of sin," ie, "heresy," you'll get the flavor. I have a colorful streak and I find whenever I get "literary" like that, people start demanding definitions. It's a turn of phrase, nothing more.
More later. Thanks for tuning in. I love the repartee.
I know, I know. But the phrase "scientific sin", even if only used for literary style, does have some strong connotations that I think are unwarranted: the whole scientific mindset is alien to notions such as "sin". Up to a certain degree, your choice of words implies that once an idea establishes itself as a scientific fact, then it becomes a "sin" to believe otherwise. But this is not how science works: any idea, no matter how established or cherished, is always open to further critique and scrutiny. Every idea must always stand on its own merit, or perish. No authority may prevent a line of inquiry by setting up "sins" or "heresies".
ReplyDeleteI have similar misgivings with the current phrases "scientific dogma" and "fundamentalist/militant atheist". Colorful, yes. But also misleading, because the implied simile is not justified.
Looking forward to your response. (By the way, clearly I'm the one who should apologize for the long delay! I had been traveling for work, and had other things on my mind...)
>> Up to a certain degree, your choice of words implies that once an idea establishes itself as a scientific fact, then it becomes a "sin" to believe otherwise.
DeleteYes, that's exactly what I do mean to imply -- in the moral sphere.
But since you don't like the metaphor, it can be rephrased. Change "sin" in the statement to "heresy" or simply "disbelief" and it would still mean exactly what I'm after: criticism of scientific "moral conclusions" might be called anti-science rather than immoral.
I resist giving science a moral authority it has not justified by moral argument beyond the ex cathedra "science is good."