Ethical foundations of the left

Justin Schwartz jkschw at hotmail.com
Mon Jul 23 11:29:08 PDT 2001


I think I am morte Humean, or Marxian, or something. I think you have exaggerated faith in the persuasive and motivational powers of mere ratiocination. I believe in ratiocination, and I even enjoy it. I hope to hold true beliefs, and think that thinking about them is the only way to be as sure as one can that they are true--in general. There are, however, fixed points, like one I mentioned (freedom is better than slavery); sure, I might come up with a brilliant argument to show why. But I am more confident in the conclusion that I am in any argument I could give for it. To quote myself, I think using this very example: explanations can only illuminate these truths. We will take then in the dark if we have to. Might we be wrong? Yes, about them or anything. C'est la vie. Anyway, I think we have reached an impasse, here. Better stop unless we have something new to say.

--jks


>From: Kenneth MacKendrick <kenneth.mackendrick at utoronto.ca>
>Reply-To: lbo-talk at lists.panix.com
>To: lbo-talk at lists.panix.com
>Subject: Re: Ethical foundations of the left
>Date: Mon, 23 Jul 2001 12:16:20 -0700
>
>At 02:47 PM 7/23/01 +0000, you wrote:
>
>>No, it's just a fact that strong arguments do not trump intuitions.
>
>Should we resign ourselves to this or generate better arguments to
>encourage *rational* thought? Intuitively - we have *reasons* for
>everything we believe. These might be bad reasons - based on idiotic
>logical deductions, poor observation, perhaps even naughty habits, but if I
>have an intuition that is going to rain, it is because I've had some
>experience in that past that, by analogy, indicates to me that it is going
>to rain. If we don't have some reasoning behind such intuitions, they are -
>strictly speaking - meaningless (meaningless to us). The only way to
>address this meaninglessness is to investigate further why our intution has
>become blocked to a cognitive faculties, this might mean therapy, but it
>might also mean a walk in the park. On a social level, intuitions are
>extraordinarily unhelpful - and probably authoritarian. If I say, I have a
>hunch that frogs are going to fall form the sky today, without explanation
>or reason, and then I actually pursue this in parliament... well... what
>nonsense, eh?
>
>> Absolutely nothing could persuade me that slavery is better than
>>freedom, even though this is remarkably difficult to show.
>
>It isn't difficult to show at all. One would have to have experienced
>something of both in order to make any kind of coherent decision on the
>matter. In other words, if one is enslaved or exploited, it is obligatory
>for the 'free person' (so-called) to engender conditions that would allow a
>decision to be made: communicative logic demands that conditions be such
>that communication itself is not endangered. This logic is immanent to
>having a conversation at all. And, as Gadamer once noted, even the criminal
>tries to understand (a 'crime' cannot be successful unless the criminal
>[so-called] has already achieved 'verification' [with others] about a
>certain state of affairs that would allow them to even consider violating a
>behaviour norm --- this is a awkward example, I think I mentiond before
>that I like to quote it... however, it illustrates that understanding is
>primary for the coordination of any kind of action (instrumental,
>strategic, purposive and so on) - at least if that action has even the
>vaguest notion of attempting to be successful...
>
>> It's idle to say that this is not as it should be; you just have to live
>>with it. Moral argument only changes people's minds incrementally and at
>>the margins. People adjust, tighten up, and systematize their intuitions;
>>the results of many small changes may be a big one, but there is no
>>reason to think that moral philosophers have been effective prophets.
>
>It isn't a matter of a prophetic voice at all, it is a matter of mutual
>recognition and education. A crucial question would be this: are people
>interested in learning? If so, then the learning process makes demands on
>our everyday intuitions. Most of the time we aren't interested. Why?
>Because we've got nice substitutes to curb our interest in reason,
>emancipation, exploration and so on. But these substitutes are precisely
>the target of social criticism, because they form the blocks to
>communication and enlightenment that is inherent to the mechanism of
>thought (self-reflection and intersubjective reflection). We tighten up,
>form rigid boundaries for specific reasons, which can be identified in an
>objective way through theoretical inquiry. This is why critique, which is
>already part of self-reflection is necessary. This is always dialectical,
>it is taken more or less, sometimes we want to learn and sometimes we don't
>(reflective vs. non-reflective learning). How to we encourage the learning
>process which is immanent to our sensory perception? That's the question.
>And it *must* be solved on a rational level because there is no other way.
>I think it can be demonstrated, systematically, that intuition doesn't fall
>from the heavens or grow up from the earth - it is backed by reason. The
>idea of a 'thought' creatio ex nihilo is .. well... almost unthinkable. It
>would be on the side of the intuitionist to demonstrate how this is
>possible, even then, they would have to rely on non-intuitive means, or,
>default to an authoritarian argument (God, Nation, whatever). Even then,
>there would have to be reasons up to the point of termination, so even the
>most intuitive thinker must give some reasons, however foolish, inadequate
>or paltry they are (from a discursive perspective).
>
>> On historical materialist grounds, why would you expect them to be?
>>Social being determines thought, and much less vice versa. And no, most
>>intuitions are, I think, unargued. The grounds I ahve to thinking that
>>slavery is worse than freedom are much weaker than the conclusion.
>
>Thought determines social being just as much as social being determines
>thought. The point, as Zizek notes, is that this is undeterminable as such.
>In Hegelian thought, both sides are strictly equal - and politics is the
>place where we argue over which is which and how is how.
>
>In any event, Zizek aside, I still think that intuition is inherently
>connected to our cognitive faculties. If pressed, all intuitions can be
>expressed in the form of an argument, however inadequately. They can be
>criticized, revised, and developed. I mean, really - if I asked you to come
>up with an argument why freedom is better than slavery (and you took my
>question seriously) - you'd develop, I'm sure, a brilliant and stunning
>defense of the necessary - and rational - potential for human beings to be
>free, linked to the very fact of sensory perception qua intersubjective
>socialization... you might not put it like that, but I'm just intuitively
>guessing about how such an argument might be developed and articulated.
>
>How do we know this is true? Because we engender its truth the moment we
>engage in a conversation, reflection is actualized, so to speak, in the
>attempt to understanding.
>
>What do you think about that?
>
>love,
>ken
>

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