Yet There Is Method In It

Happy Birthday YtiMii

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Liberalism [...] c: a political philosophy based on belief in progress, the essential goodness of the human race, and the autonomy of the individual and standing for the protection of political and civil liberties.
Merriam-Webster dictionary

Today has been proclaimed “Draw Mohammed Day”. This is an issue I have followed for a few years. The claim of some Muslims is depictions of humans, and particularly their prophet Mohammed, should be prohibited. This is a particularly reactionary use of “the thin end of the wedge argument”, because apparently depicting humans could lead to idolatry. This attitude highlights an apparent contradiction in liberalism: we try to accommodate cultural differences and yet value free expression. The latter should have priority but there is something to be said about not going out of ones way to insult people. Unfortunately, people who have interpreted Mohammad in art, criticism, education or humour have been criticised, threatened and harassed (by various factions respectively). Remember the infamous protests that followed the cartoons in the Jyllands-Posten newspaper? Also, the cartoon show South Park was recently censored because of its “depiction” of Mohammad – the postmodern twist is the character depicted was definitely not Mohammad (but the programme was censored anyway).

When I need some amusement, I look at a certain discussion page on wikipedia for the Mohammad article. The main article includes a few historical artistic depictions. Wikipedia has a strict policy of rejecting censorship (nice work, keep it up!) (at least on good days). There is a seemly endless stream of complaints about the images in the article. After the editors state wikipedia does not censor material, the argument moves to “avoiding insult to millions of Muslims”. The editors point out this is not a valid editorial justification. Their stand is a shining example of free expression. The “draw Mohammed day” is also an example of free expression but one that is going to be more controversial. Pakistan has apparently censored the entire facebook site for hosting information about the event. Because of the vocal protests of some Muslims against depictions, this issue has become about free speech as well as about artistic expression. Because the Muslim protesters chose to politicise this issue, they should not be surprised about a counter protest affirming free expression.

Depictions of Mohammed for artistic, humorous or educational use are very different in style compared to depicting Mohammad as a political statement. In a less emotionally charged situation, people might have been content with relatively tame depictions. But the draw Mohammad day will often use depictions that are deliberately insulting to the Muslim protesters. This is justified because it makes the statement, loud and clear, that depictions on Mohammad, “insulting” or not, are permitted in liberal societies. The point of protests, of course, is to send a message. A tame depiction would not be a protest and probably would have little impact. So the Muslim protests have ironically brought this counter protest upon themselves. Some depictions are made that I would not normally support as part of art or education, but I do support them as a protest for free speech. This includes deliberately insulting people if the point of the protest is “we support free speech, even when it may be insult to some people”, which is the case in today’s protest. The major disadvantage might be to alienate both sides in the dispute. Without mutual understanding, there can be no agreement. But some times we do not want “agreement” when an acceptable alternative is to “agree to disagree”, which is a principle of liberalism. We don’t want to agree that censorship is good. We can agree they can abide by their believes and we to ours. Our beliefs include they don’t have the right to impose restrictions on other people and they don’t have the right not to be offended.

I am offended at people claiming the right not the be offended. To claim “people ought not to be offended” thus results in a logical paradox, therefore it is absurd and is therefore false.

Anti Citizen One

PS. I incidentally include a photo of part of the North Frieze in the US supreme court. I hope you like it. It’s a depiction of Mohammed (and yes, this is technically not a drawing, but it will do). Photo by abde on Flickr.

Update 21st May: The protest received media coverage and a counter protest. Pakistan has indefinitely banned Youtube and Facebook (although it is accessible to tech savvy users), with some protesters calling for the sites to close completely. Having a counter protest against a pro-free speech protest I find repugnant (obviously they have their right to make such a protest). But their disappearance from youtube and facebook (resulting in an Internet traffic reduction of 25% in Pakistan) is, for the majority, no great shame; a culture who can’t handle free speech should stay off the Internet (I am assuming popular support for anti-free speech here). Actually, if I am more constructive, it would be better for them to protest against government censorship, but I don’t expect that any time soon. Fox News provided a characteristically shallow analysis.

I was discussing the is-ought problem with a friend and to sharpen my thinking I have written this. The writing style is a homage to Hume.

Philo: The so called “is-ought problem” divides propositions into prescriptive and descriptive statements. Prescriptive statements describe justified moral actions and are commonly stated as “what you should do”. Descriptive statements might succinctly be defined as non-prescriptive propositions and they include statements that describe observable reality, as well as non-moral metaphysical propositions. Writers on moral subjects often begin with first principles and descriptive statements that, after much discussion, conclude with the justification of prescriptive statements. In a close analysis of these moral treatise, we may inquire as to which was the first prescriptive statement in their argument and its respective justification. It seems “altogether inconceivable, how this new relation can be a deduction from others, which are entirely different from it.” All attempts to bridge this gap by reason have so far failed, and as long as the is-ought problem holds, all moral statements cannot have a final logical basis. This puts laws that guide human actions within the sphere of knowledge but beyond the grasp of philosophers who persist in their attempts to find justification from first principles.

Cleanthes: How absurd to object to the justification of objective morality, as proceeds from the divine being! The justification is plain from what we understand by the only tenable moral system: moral realism. We agree that moral statements are propositions and it is clear that these statements can either be true or false. The truth or falsity exists independent of our opinions as they have existed for all time and are immutable and perfect due to their divine origin. How can you claim this does not satisfy your requirement for logical justification?

Philo: I will attempt to educe [to work out from given facts] this point and show the infirmity of such a justification. When asked, all men are able to provide justifications for their just actions. These justifications may be codified into general principles that illustrate what a man should do in any particular circumstance. And as admitted by all men of good sense, this standard of righteousness proceeds from the divine mind. Take a particular moral action, say “feeding the hungry” and you claim this action is justified by objective morality. But what are the grounds that may I use as the basis for this justification? Or in direct language, why should men follow the principles of objective morality?

Cleanthes: Isn’t this basis self evident and obvious? We agree that objective morality is universal, divine, timeless and perfect and are therefore the principles that a good man should use as a basis for actions. It proceeds from the definition and divine nature of objective morality that it describes what action should be taken by a man. To use your example of “feed the hungry”, God has created a system of laws which is objective and independent of opinion. One law, or part, of objective morality is the imperative to “feed the hungry”. This action is therefore universally justified, except when other divine laws are at stake and we may be satisfied by this justification. Your semantic objections to what is widely affirmed to be true would seem to me as utterly futile.

Demea: We are agreed on the infinite, good and perfect nature of God, Cleanthes, but I am wondering how man might have certain knowledge of the justification of objective moral law. Since this matter is considered by many to be obvious, while I believe it is not so, I will attempt to illustrate my view on the matter. Consider the most abstract conception of God and we may see that there are few or no properties that proceed automatically from the definition of such an entity a-priori. Since the divine nature is so far removed from our every day experiences, we may gain knowledge of God’s commandments, that is “descriptive objective law”, though what ever means are available to man but we cannot a-priori say that God’s privilege to dictate men’s actions. Although you may argue your case from your limited experience of the world, it is presumptuous to assert that this provides justification to any “prescriptive objective law”, since that would incorrectly apply concepts of human origin on the adorable mysteriousness of the divine nature. We can still ask what is the justification of man following God’s commandments, and it remains upon you, Cleanthes, to support your assertion that we can know that divine law is prescriptively justified.

Philo: It seems to me, that there is a distinction in our usage of the concept objective morality, Cleanthes. You have claimed men should follow divine law because it proceeds from God. I will attempt to clarify our definitions in the hopes of clarifying our thought. Your usage of the concept of objective morality implies the definition of “a system of right and wrong conduct which should be followed” which simply means “actions men should do”. Under this definition, objective morality is a prescriptive statement. When I asked you earlier what was the justification, you stated it is by definition justified by objective morality and by your definition, it clearly is. But can you see that if I ask “why should we feed the hungry” and you answer simply “it is objective morality”, which merely means “it is what men should do”, should you be surprised when this answer fails to satisfy? Your claim that the prescriptive justification of objective morality proceeds from the very definition of objective morality is simply an admission of your argument’s tautology!

Cleanthes: You both seem to argue the most abstract and absurd objections, when all reason, common sense and evidence points to God as being the creator and therefore sovereign in the world. This fact being well known and acknowledged even by yourselves. And you, Demea, claim on one hand that God is king of the world and on the other that we cannot know* God is the king of the world! As for you, Philo, who would not accept the plain and succinct answer to your question, I say: objective law should be followed as it is commanded by the creator and sovereign of the world. This answer is equivalent to my first justification, which you seem to fail to grasp, that is the origin and nature of objective law justifies our following it.

Philo: Which provides the justification for objective law? Its origin or its nature? I have already argued that the nature of objective law cannot, without tautology, be shown to be its own justification. And as for objective morality’s origin, the king of the world, you have shifted your justification to a new concept: the sovereignty of God. But your remark that this argument is equivalent to that which you stated at first, opens this point to the same objections. Why should we follow the commands of a sovereign? That God created the world and he is its lord is agreed, but from this descriptive statement of God, it does not logically follow that men should obey him. In reality, Cleanthes, you keep on the same treadmill of stating X is the justification of Y, where all we can of X is that it is defined as “the justification of Y” and we never reach satisfactory descriptive axioms. We can always ask for the logical justification of X and you are likely to posit W as the justification, and so on. You have so far justified “men should feed the hungry” by claiming “men should follow objective moral law” which is justified by “men should obey God’s sovereignty”. We again ask what is the justification of the latter? Without resorting to infinite regress, we may admit, as is acknowledged among the more discerning philosophers, the derivation of prescriptive statements has not yet been achieved from purely descriptive statements.

Pamphilus: “I cannot but think, that PHILO’s principles are more probable than DEMEA’s; but that those of CLEANTHES approach still nearer to the truth.”

by Anti Citizen PhilONE

PS “Murder is wrong” (or “Murder is illegal”) is also tautology. Hint: look up the definition of murder.
*Deliberate straw man here.

Yes, not sure I agree with arbitrary anniversaries. But still, it is a very influential book. Having not read it, I think I might. I was also thinking of commenting on Nietzsche’s disagreements with Darwin’s theory. One area I think he was mistaken. It’s kind of ironic that some people associate the two thinkers. Too tired… *yawn*

AC1

When I read this quote by C.S.Lewis today I couldnt help but feel that it applied not only to the major and obvious examples but also to the many subtle and noxious tyrannies that we are all at some point subject to or perhaps even unconciously participating in.

Some tyrannies I have in mind (and there are many others):

Militant Secularism/Atheism (that would push all religion to the private sphere)

Religious Fundamentalism (the type that seeks social conformity in belief)

Scientism (the belief that the natural sciences has authority over all other interpretations of life and fields of enquiry)

Ratio-Fascism (the assertion that only rationalism is valuable as en explanation or a field of enquiry into the world)

Political Correctness

Total Rights Assertion (the imposition of one perceieved “right” at the expense of other “rights”)

Objective Relativism (the absurd notion that all the varieties of traditions must be equal to everyone)

50% + 1 (the tyranny of the majority – the good of the many etc.)

Ethnocentrism (the viewpoint that “one’s own group is the center of everything,” against which all other groups are judged.)

countless other “isms” (I welcome contributions to this threadbare list)…

anyway here is the quote:

“Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.”   C.S.Lewis

I read this qoute on another blog. It both interested and in a way inspired me to a deep reflection. I offer no comment on it for I feel it may be interpreted and appreciated in many ways by different people so I therefore reproduce it as it is.

“Tradition means giving a vote to the most obscure of all classes, our ancestors. It is the democracy of the dead. Tradition refuses to submit to the small and arrogant oligarchy of those who merely happen to be walking about. All democrats object to men being disqualified by the accident of birth; tradition objects to their being disqualified by the accident of death. Democracy tells us not to neglect a good man’s opinion, even if he is our groom; tradition asks us not to neglect a good man’s opinion, even if he is our father.”

G.K.Chesterton Orthodoxy

Ok, I admit I have not posted for a while. But observing the news, Heraclitus was right! Every moment brings new things! My book reading project is nearing its conclusion (reading the Gay Science/Joyful Wisdom).

Anti citizen one

PS The Brits pulled out of Iraq – finally. What was the point in the war exactly? And without that, how can we judge success?

PPS Considering further comparisons of Kierkegaard and Nietzsche, this is the closest(?) that FN comes to SK’s knight of faith:

When a man feels that he has a divine mission, say to lift up, to save or to liberate mankind–when a man feels the divine spark in his heart and believes that he is the mouthpiece of supernatural imperatives–when such a mission inflames him, it is only natural that he should stand beyond all merely reasonable standards of judgment. He feels that he is himself sanctified by this mission, that he is himself a type of a higher order! . . . What has a priest to do with philosophy! He stands far above it! (The Anti-Christ, FN)

In this part of my review I wish to briefly explore Harries discussions on the postmodern view of language. He is attempting to describe the views of Anthony Freeman the postmodernist theologian who has ceased to believe in a supernatural or transcendent God – seeing Him rather as being a projection of human ideals. Much of postmodernism has its roots in relativism, subjectivism and a sort of late Wittgensteinian Philosophy of Language.

A simple exposition of this philosophy goes like this:

mind is a social reality and language a public phenomenon. We see mothers bending over their prams making noises at their babies. In due course the noises are reciprocated and come to be recognized as talk. Soon this talk becomes internalized as thought. But the talk is prior and public and this enters into the very soul of our thinking. Because language is a public possession, written texts are particularly important. How those texts are intepreted or read still depends very much on the interests and outlook of the readers and these in turn will reflect the ineterests and concerns already built into the language that we use to intepret the texts. If we say we want to find out what a particular text really means, we are stymied, for the language we used to interpet it ourselves is a given, which will shape how we read…

Harries, again somewhat suprisingly is not completely anti-pomo. He accepts a certain degree of interpretative and cognitive relativism. However he rejects total scepticism and abandonment of truth and meaning notions – correctly suggesting that such a position would dissolve philosophy into just one of many methods of literary criticism.

I would just add by means of a clarification that although language is public and in turn shapes our ways of thinking this should by no means be used to suggest that speech is thought, or that absence of speech indicates absence of thought. (I could write much more here on my theories of unthought-thoughts and vocal-thought-thinking-thoughts or about the conscious and unconscious but I will digress.)

I will finish with a quote from Anthony Freeman that illustrates what one may call a postmodern view of religion – it is this view which Harries is ultimately attempting to challenge with recourse to realist arguments.

“A false distinction within Christian doctrine itself between an essential core and a negotiable husk. In presenting the faith to this generation I am bound to be presenting a different faith from that which my forefathers presented. Not just a different interpretation of the same essential core, but a different faith. This is because there is no essence of inner core. The interpretation is not like taking the shell off a nut. It is like peeling the layers off an onion: the interpretation goes all the way down. All is intepretation. That is the essence.”

Carrying on from a previous post which linked to the “Only A Game” Blog and its fascinating series of posted reviews on Charles Taylor’s “A Secular Age” – here is Part 4 “Religion” versus “Science” – It is in brief a description of the false dichotomy that the above phrase engenders not to mention the partisan psychology of many of its adherents.

Well worth a read.

I was engaged in a lively debate recently on the merits or demerits of a monarchical system. Personally I am a republican and in general I consider monarchism an outmoded relic of a bygone era of social repression.

As the debate wore on it became obvious that on most points I was possessed by the spirit of reason. The supporters of monarchy in general could only make appeals to tradition whereas mostly my arguments were based on sound pragmatic opinion.

Then they wheeled out what they consider their strongest argument. Namely “The Royals bring in so much money” i.e. through tourism and as industrial and trade ambassadors.

It is a fairly good argument. Why? Because it sounds empirical – rather than being an appeal to tradition this is an argument based on pragmatic concerns.

There is one problem – basically it is what Wittgenstein would call nonsense. The sentence or proposition though constructed in a way that is similar to an empirical proposition, a proposition about a definite state of affairs, is in fact a clever charade – and according to ‘logical’ rules is a non-argument.

The proposition reads: we must not abolish the monarchy as they provide substantial income for the nation through tourism and trade and industry ambassadorships.

The objection reads: Can you verify this – and is this open to falsification?

The conclusion is: technically one could only hope to measure the “value” of the monarchy by its abolition and subsequent measuring of financial effects.

Naturally no monarchist is going to vote for its abolition – so the argument is null.

The moral of the story – be careful of making psuedo-empirical propositions. When the falsity of their factual basis is uncovered you may find the validity* of your viewpoint eroding away rapidly.

* Validity depends on the language game being played. Just as Anselm famously said “God is a special case” one may choose to argue that psuedo-empirical propositions are in certain language games still valuable and valid as rhetorical tools.