convictions

Emil Cioran:

We have convictions only if we have studied nothing thoroughly.

This is true sometimes. And sometimes not. Regarding the natural sciences, having convictions about the physical world around us is rather close to what most of us would call “rational convictions”. Objectivity, in other words. Others can indulge in radical skepticism [re Hume] if they wish but I’m more or less sticking to what the hard guys tell me about gravity and chemical interactions and planetary orbits and meteorological phenomena.

Where convictions start to veer more and more toward conflicting narratives, however, is in regards to damn near everything else. Sure, you can have convictions about moral and political issues, art, religion, what happens after we die etc… And, if you genuinely believe them to be true, then, for you, they are.

But there seems to be no way you can reconfigure your own personal prejudices about things like this so that other rational minds might embrace them so that, in turn, they can be established as the philosophical equivalent of natural laws. And, as Cioran suggests above, the more you peruse things like this, the less your convictions tend to stick around.

Then eventually you wind up with the conviction that one cannot have convictions. Then you think about how contradictory that is. Then you read Wittgenstein. You learn about language. You learn about what language can and cannot be used to express objectively about the world we live in.

So one must act with conviction whilst simultaneously being not-convinced. Sink or swim.

So what are we discussing here? The paradoxical nature of convictions? Science vs. opinion? Wittgenstein?

Conviction is just a word we invented to describe a particular state of mind. But sometimes it coincides with a great deal of precision to the world around us and sometimes it does not. Or, perhaps, in some contexts, cannot.

Now, Nietzsche once said something to the effect that the opposite of truth is not a lie, the opposite of truth is a conviction. But did he hold this as a conviction of his own? We can easily become entangled in language discussing things like this. Some words are applicable with an extraordinary degree of exactitude “out in the world” and some are not.

I believe the language used by science is considerbly more reliable in describing the world around us than the language of philosophy.

In particular, the language used to propagate the agendas of those who make moral and political claims.

I’ve always thought of ideas and the language we use to express them as the means by which human beings program each other - that is, as though our brains were computers. Speaking in the language of science would be to download into the brains of others a program best suited for interpreting the empirical world, making predictions about it, and establishing a basis for how to control it. The language of philosophy, politics, religion, etc. are also programs but not ones best suited for dealing with the empirical world. They have other purposes - some of which might include how to deal with each other, how to live one’s life, or even how to manage one’s own programs running on one’s own brains (ex. positive thinking). The advantage that the language of science enjoys is that its effectiveness can be tested quite reliably, whereas other languages (or language games?) can’t nearly as easily, and heaven forbid we download into our brains a lethally dangerous program that might, on the surface, appear innocuous enough, it would be extremely hard to detect just how dangerous it is until it is perhaps too late.

Interesting post gib.

It really depends on what you want to do with your description. A poet, and a scientist each have their own way of describing the trees I see before me now, equally, they each have their own agenda to propagate.

My point though is this:

One of the fundamental questions we all have to answer day after day after day is this: how ought I to behave?

And here, the scientist, the philosopher, the poet, the artist, the anthropologist, the sociologist, the psychologist, the politician and the preacher are all equally impotent. None of them have the capacity to describe human behavior objectively. Not in their moral or political calculations.

That’s just not true. All the philosopher should be doing is to figure out how to behave. Why am i not in the best of all positions to decide that - for myself? I am nothing like impotent. I decide how i ought to behave, in the large majority of cases. Being imprisoned and tortured to madness being a notable exception.

But “objectivity” is:

a) a myth

b) not required, and

c) the last thing you’d want when trying to figure out how you ought to behave.

Figuring out what cannot be figured out is more useful, in my view. And impotency is not a description of each individual’s attempt to figure this out but a description of his or her attempt to demonstrate that what they figured out is what every other rational man and woman should have figured out in turn.

Folks who have tried this [and failed] range from Plato and Aristotle to Kant and Rand.

There is no rational manner in which to demonstrate a moral duty or an obligation to behave one way rather than another. And if you don’t believe this is the case than so demonstrate it.

I find this ambiguous. Are you saying that we all should come to the same conclusions? That there is some set of behaviors that we all should subscribe to?

But they were all idiots. Maybe not Aristotle, but the others were idiots.

Well, Aristotle was kind of an idiot.

But you must also remember that Plato was a politician and not a moralist in the modern sense. Or even in the Ancient greek sense. He was a political scientist. Kant was just a whore for religion and Rand was a sociopath - and I don’t mean that as a compliment. Maybe you should concentrate on Nietzsche, Kierkegaard, Dewey, even Schopenhauer. These writers had a clue about how to behave. Maybe not so much around women, but they at least understood morality for the philosopher.

That Plato was a great philosopher doesn’t make him a good one.

I won’t demonstrate any such thing. Your premise is horrifying. You really have been reading too much Kant. Read all of Nietzsche and report back to us.

Rational manner? Duty?

Please.

Rational shmational.

Philosophise with your blood. Or your gut.

That’s quite a sweeping statement, and it overlooks a few subtle discrepancies among the professions you listed. I would definitely invest more trust in a psychologist than a politician if I were depressed and seeking advice on how best to live (I’d even trust the poet over the politician, but that’s a personal bias ). But I agree than none of them hold that much weight.

Still, can we avoid the things they have to tell us? Can we honestly decide for ourselves how to live without at least some measure of influence from them? We don’t live in a vacuum, and I know a lot of us like to think of ourselves as totally independent thinkers, but you’d be surprised how influenced we are by what our cultures shove down our throats every day.

This is why I hold out hope for the possibility of a science of sorts of ‘good ideas’. I don’t know how possible such a science is, but it would be one that seeks to determine what are the characteristics that distinguish between ‘good’ ideas (i.e. ideas that, when adopted by a community, lead more readily to positive and healthy outcomes for that community) and ‘bad’ ideas (i.e. ideas that don’t). In the end, I’m sure such a science would find that the characteristic sought after are actually to be found in the relation between the ideas and the community subscribing to them… But that’s all if such a science is possible - ideas may be too unpredictable a beast for any patterns to emerge distinguishing between good and bad ones. At the same time, however, I think such a science may just be as imperative as it is impossible. We’re human. It is in our nature to be influenced by ideas… and there are no filters sifting out the bad ones from the good ones. We need filters - at least better ones. We need to learn how to build and use them - and I’m not even sure if this idea itself is a good or bad one.

“Stupid men are always so sure of themselves, it is intelligent men who doubt.”

GBS

For what is a good man good?

For nothing it seems given history.

The failure of describing human behaviour objectively - is that a bad thing?

I agree with the relevance of asking how one ought to believe but I don’t believe anyone else will have an answer for us, at least, I don’t even care if they do have an answer because it’s something I’d rather find out for myself.

Excuse the irony but, from Dostoyevsky’s Notes From The Underground:

Iambiguous wrote:

Figuring out what cannot be figured out is more useful, in my view. And impotency is not a description of each individual’s attempt to figure this out but a description of his or her attempt to demonstrate that what they figured out is what every other rational man and woman should have figured out in turn.

No, I am saying that many who embrace moral and political convictions insist this is so. My own assessment is quite the opposite: There are no moral or political conclusions we should all embrace in order to be thought of as rational purveyors of human Virtue.

But then, of course, someone can readily suggest that I embrace this as a conviction. But I don’t. It is only the manner in which I view the world around me here and now. I will always concede the possibility that, in having new experiences and new relationships—and in encountering new sources of information—I might easily be persuaded to change my mind.

But, just as you construe Plato, Kant, Rand and [sometimes] Aristotle to be “idiots”, there will always be those who hold the same convictions regarding these folks. And how then do we determine 1] what constitutes being an idiot philosophically and 2] which philosophers then clearly qualify?

How can this ever be but a point of view?

iambiguous wrote:

There is no rational manner in which to demonstrate a moral duty or an obligation to behave one way rather than another. And if you don’t believe this is the case than so demonstrate it.

You won’t demonstrate it because you can’t demonstrate it. Any more than Kant could demonstrate the categorical imperative. Any more than Nietzsche could demonstrate the Ubermensch

Nietzsche once suggested something to the effect that the opposite of a truth was not a lie but a conviction. Yes, but did he hold that as a conviction of his own?

As for philosophizing with your blood and guts, we have, historically, seen a lot of bllod and guts spilled in the name of one or another Uberman.

Yes, but my focus is on any “professional” attempt to differentiate good from bad behavior morally or politically. Here all ethical propositions can be but “personal biases”.

In my own opinion, of course. I could well be wrong. But that would necessitate someone pointing out to me the ethical equivalent of a black swan.

Science tends to steer clear of is/ought distinctions. It is concerned more with either/or relationships. But there are is/ought distinctions raised about science. For example, ought it to be used by the government for research in sustaining the interests of the military industrial complex and the war economy? Ought it to be spending billions of dollars in space exploration when there are so many pressing problems right here at home?

It is if the behavior can be described objectively and needs to be. For example, if you need to perform CPR on someone and don’t know how this is done someone who does can describe step by step what to do over the phone.

Or, in an emergency situation, you might be able to contact someone who can talk you through delivering a baby.

But my contention is that no objective description of human behavior exist with respect to moral and political values. Thus, if you are pregnant and do not want to give birth there is no one you can contact who will be able to tell you objectively if aborting an embryo or fetus is ethical or unethical.

Woody Allen:

Life doesn’t imitate art, it imitates bad television.

John Lennon:

Keep them doped with religion and sex and tv
And they think they’re so clever and classless and free
But they’re still fucking peasants as far as I can see

Living above ground nowadays is, more often than not, a lifestyle you can purchase at the local mall. And when you grow tired of it just pick another one to take its place. And, if you’re really lucky, you might be able to peddle it on reality tv.

I understand your point but consider your first two examples - a problem is presented and a solution is provided, the question is about how one should perform CPR and how one should deliver a baby but this is also the case about the third - problem: unwanted pregnancy; solution: abortion. The solution to the problem is not the ethical dilemma because the ethical dilemma exists in the first two too i.e. should I take responsibility for the deliverance of this baby or the resucitation (sp?) of this person. You might conclude that the dilemma of these two is a ‘no brainer,’ an imperitive well, maybe it is for the third example too…

Yep, depressing isn’t it?

I’m not sure I understand your point [or your distinction] but I see them as very, very different. When one performs CPR or delivers a baby there is an actual solution that can be measured empirically. CPR saves someone’s life [if it was able to be saved] and the baby is delivered safely.

There may be different techniques preferred by some over others but they either work or they do not. And there is not exactly an intense debate over whether to perform CPR or deliver babies.

To view abortion as a “solution” however will outrage millions of men and women who view it as anything but a solution. On the contrary, they view it as profoundly unethical; or as premeditated murder; or as a mortal sin against God. An abortion can be measured objectively [empirically] as either successfully or unsucessfully performed but not so one’s moral agenda regarding it.