As I have mentioned, I am deep into Spinoza these days…
Hiding from reality as it were…
and in readings, I found that much of what constitutes
philosophy is not useable as ‘‘a way of life’’…
for philosophy to have any sort of basis for our using it,
it must be as part of ‘‘a way of life’’ and a great deal of
Spinoza is not useful in terms of ‘‘a way of life’’
as Kant is not useful nor is Hegel or Aquinas or
Heidegger… not one of them can be used in terms
of helping us create ‘‘a way of life’’ philosophically…
the part of Spinoza that is useful is his use of skepticism…
for many ideas we have today, god, American exceptionalism,
the greatness of capitalism… are among the ideas that
we must view in terms of being skeptical about… Personally,
I hold that liberalism is a far better social, political, economic,
and philosophical position to hold than conservativism
and I have, constantly, show us why… but I, rightly,
have a skeptical viewpoint of liberalism…it is the right
ism to hold right now… but tomorrow, tomorrow may
require a vastly different position…but therein lies a
problem, one of many, that I cannot in advance know what
will be or will not be the ism we need in the future…
the past isms of religion, Christianity for example,
held that man/human beings are by nature, guilty
and full of sin…and I can’t find an ism that has
caused more psychological problems in human beings
then this belief in the guilt and sin in human beings…
that we pale in consideration to god… and nothing could
be more harmful to one’s psyche than that belief…
and this is in part, why I hold to liberalism… I see human
beings in a much more positive light… and what is the
difference between a liberal viewpoint and a conservative
viewpoint? a vision about what it means to be human…
the liberal believes that we are not doomed to failure,
as the conservative holds, that we can make progress
and advance both individually and collectively…
but the key point here is the idea that we react to
reality with our preconceived notion’s… the
preconceived notion that human beings are already full
of sin and by virtue of being born, we are guilty…
our viewpoint convicts us, not the reality of being human…
that we are either ‘‘evil’’ or ‘‘good’’ is just a choice we make…
nothing more…
part of the current failure in our state and society stems
from the notion that we must put ourselves first…
that life is the ‘‘survival of the fittest’’
and that false belief has driven us to hold to viewpoints
that harms us, both individually and collectively…
if there was a more damaging ism than the religious
idea of guilt and sin, it is found in capitalism…
the demonstrably false belief that our private vices
leads to a public good…that each of us singularly
pursuing our private vices, in some fashion creates a public
good… the only evidence for this that has ever been offered
is that in some, unknown fashion, that our private vices
create a public good by the hand of god… that some force
outside of human existence and hence unprovable, somehow
balances the books between private vices and public good…
In the well-known book, the Fable of the Bees…which is
sometimes offered up as the way the society works,
is a false narrative…for the point of bees work, is to
benefit the hive… they do not seek out their own
individual goal, but work to benefit the hive…
for example, bees go out into the world and seek out food sources,
but what do they do when they find said resources? do they
eat them on the spot? No, they bring them back to the hive to
share with the hive… bees also break out into caste to
do specific work that the hive needs… for example,
bees have a caste that defends the hive from
other insect attacks… and that is no different than
the human society… we too have roles to play within
the hive/society… at no point are the bees engaged
in ‘‘private vices’’… only in public good… and we
could learn from that…
so, what can we use to support the idea of philosophy
as ''a way of life?"
that there is no such thing as private vices leading to
a public good, that as social creatures… that can only
survive within the state/society, we must do what we can
to support the state/society… a man alone without
the state or society, is not alive… for there cannot be
any growth or advancement or development for human
beings without the state/or society…our own individual
advancement or growth as a human being must involve
the state/society…without the state/society means
we stagnate and finally die… note the cruelest
punishment we can give anyone is solitary confinment…
for many, death is preferable to solitary confinment…
we can see this in the increase in mental illness due
to the isolation created by Covid era…
and how does this engagement with private vices help us
in our attempts to be one with our state/society?
The two are often in conflict… seeking out our private vices
over seeking out our public good creates conflict and violence
between the needs of the individual and the needs of the state…
It creates distance between the individual and the society…
One sees this in the greater isolation between criminals
and the state/society…in thinking of themselves first,
putting their own private vices ahead of the state or society
needs, they are at war with the state/society… which
is to say, that actions against the state/society are actually
bringing closer Hobbes ‘‘state of nature’’ into the society/state…
with every act of violence against the state/society, helps bring
us one step closer to Hobbes ‘‘State of Nature’’…
the only path to a public good is with a private good…
private vices don’t lead to a public good, but our private
actions that are good, do lead to a public good…
which is in opposition to capitalism and religions…
for the false belief in the inherent evil and guilt
of human beings lead us into believing that we
can only change with the help of god… but that
is false… we can change the narrative of being
human by our actions in which we practice private
good to help create a public good…
it is far easier for a human being to practice private vices
than engaged in private/public good because we have
been conditioned to think of ourselves as being evil
or sinful or guilty… we are not…
by the use of philosophy, we can change the narrative of
what it means to be human… we can engage in private
acts of good that provide public good for all…
we just need to work out, reason out what is the public
good and not just rely on superstitions and prejudice that
passes for truth… hence the battle to overcome our
inherited indoctrinations of god, of the use of private vices,
what is the goal of being human…
Kropotkin