Digressions&Impressions

On unadorned and plain Truth

3. Therefore, mark my words; that forceful manner of speech, rapid and copious, is more suited to a mountebank than to a man who is discussing and teaching an important and serious subject. But I object just as strongly that he should drip out his words as that he should go at top speed; he should neither keep the ear on the stretch, nor deafen it. For that poverty-stricken and thin-spun style also makes the audience less attentive because they are weary of its stammering slowness; nevertheless, the word which has been long awaited sinks in more easily than the word which flits past us on the wing. Finally, people speak of "handing down" precepts to their pupils; but one is not "handing down" that which eludes the grasp. 4. Besides, speech that deals with the truth should be unadorned and plain. This popular style has nothing to do with the truth; its aim is to impress the common herd, to ravish heedless ears by its speed; it does not offer itself for discussion, but snatches itself away from discussion. But how can that speech govern others which cannot itself be governed? May I not also remark that all speech which is employed for the purpose of healing our minds, ought to sink into us? Remedies do not avail unless they remain in the system.--Seneca, Letter 40. translated by Richard Mott Gummere

In an unusually long letter, Seneca appears to be conveying a relatively simple claim: true (philosophical speech) should be "unadorned and plain" [quae veritati operam dat oratio incomposita esse debet et simplex.] He contrasts such speech with speech intended for the market place aimed at ordinary folk (who, it is thought, are impressed by verbal pyrotechnics and, as he makes clear later in the letter, respect different national styles). The contrast is not absolute because Seneca thinks the unadorned and plain speech is also apt for ordinary rhetoric iff the point is to convince the multitude of the truth! But he clearly thinks that's not generally the aim.

That true speech should be unadorned and plain/simple is, of course, a recurring trope in ages that reject scholasticism and rhetorical flourishes. (It is unusual to see its elitism acknowledged.) The aim of philosophical speech for Seneca is (a) not merely to convey the truth, but in so doing (b) heal minds, that is, to be part of a philosophical emendation; and (c) by taking hold of their minds to govern others [rapere...regere]. Somewhat confusingly, at first, for us, who are used to thinking that the patient's autonomy is central, Seneca treats true speech of the philosophical healer/magister as a locus for self-governance.

Thus, even true speech is a means of control of another. This point is made explicit, somewhat rarely, when we say of a demonstration or inference that it compels assent; at such points disagreement, however voluntary, is often thought to be irrational. If you accept the premises, then you must accept the conclusions, etc. To make others accept premises is, thus, a means of control. To be made to accept true premises and a conclusion is, thus, a rational form, perhaps, of subordination,.

So, on Seneca's conception, a healthy mind, one receptive toward the truth, is in some sense under the control of, let's say, the party of truth. I put it this way because for Seneca (recall and here), (i) truths belong to all of mankind, and (ii) one is -- this clearly inspired/anticipated Spinoza -- least individual (and most eternal) when one's mind is filled with truths/apt remedies.

There is a further feature of true philosophical speech that Seneca notes by way of a negative contrast (near the end of the letter). In the more spectacular and pyrotechnic style one must ignore the sense of shame that accompanies it and this can only be done by not listening to oneself speak. One would wish to criticize oneself if one would give oneself the opportunity.

Seneca suggests that being exposed regularly to one's own rhetorical fluff undermines this sense of shame in oneself. I am not entirely sure if Seneca thinks the poison is that one regularly hears oneself say silly stuff or that one regularly ends up suppressing the need for self-criticism in oneself (or both). Either way, Seneca clearly thinks that while a lack of shame facilitates one's complicity in spreading nonsense, it is the manifestation of a self-inflicted malady.*

It would be an anachronistic, of course, to treat Seneca as an anticipation of the now not uncommon thought that certain forms of public nonsense are instances/expressions of  lack of mental health. I think the anachronism is only partially true here. Not because the concept mental health is absent in him, but because what Seneca would take to be a disposition or expression of a healthy and shame-sensitive mind is almost certainly not the statistical norm of health maintained by our clinicians.

Here I stop; for once briefer than Seneca. 

On Repetition, Politics, and Science

He exchanges pound notes for the letters M.P. As the dominant cultural fiction of developed societies, money is the ideal nonsensical sign. I have always found it amazing that in exchange for paper I can get a book or a dress, that the stock market actually rises and falls on rumor — mere talk — and that people trade in something called Futures, as if such a thing were possible. I accept that all this is part of my world, and yet I continue to find it bizarre. Dickens obviously shared this bafflement. As powerful as it is, money refers to nothing real. Currency floats. Dickens reiterates Marx’s idea of money as society’s founding gibberish, as “the general confounding and compounding of all things — the world upside down.” When money is hoarded, it becomes even more meaningless because it buys nothing. It just accumulates like so much wastepaper.

Why money should be so precious to an ass so dull as to exchange it for no other satisfaction, is strange; but there is no animal so sure to get laden with it, as the Ass who sees nothing written on the face of the earth as the three dry letters L.S.D. not Luxury, Sensuality, Dissoluteness, which they so often stand for, but the three dry letters.

In an age when designer labels and celebrity names are used to sell everything from cars to lipstick, when meaningless slogans and lyrics and acronyms are constantly beamed and displayed and written on screens and billboards and the covers of magazines, when right-wing politicians hammer out the same empty phrases ad nauseam, corrupting words like freedom and truth until they are no longer recognizable and refer to absolutely nothing,--Siri Hustvedt "Charles Dickens and the Morbid Fragment" in (2006) A Plea for Eros, pp. 166-7

One often hears economist say with respect, that is, without irony, put your money where your mouth is (see here Cowen and Tabarrok). The underlying idea is not just that money is more solid than cheap talk, but that staking money is a form of serious agency -- skin in the game -- whereas mere talking is prattle. (I consider the epistemologist, who treats betting as the sine qua non of rationality, in the same boat.)

Hustvedt, a terrific novelist and even better essayist, helps us note that this disdain for talk is puzzling not only because (i) talk often moves markets (and so is causally efficacious, one is tempted to say talk better be treated as an endogenous variable), but also because (ii) money is ultimately grounded in some gibberish.+

As an aside (for those who follow recent high profile debates surrounding modern monetary theory (hereafter MMT [see here for Krugman, here my friend Alexander Douglas (who used to be more in favor)], one reason I suspect why modern monetary theory seems so attractive to some is that in it money is not grounded in nonsense (nor the labor theory of value) but in the very real power of the state (which can demand payment in its  own I.O.U.s.)* MMT is ultimately grounded in a kind of Hobbesian intuition.** 

Let me return to Hustvedt, in virtue of the fact that money originates in gibberish and floats, she is inclined to suggest that it cannot refer to something real. The underlying idea is hitched to the (correct) thought that signs are arbitrary. (Given how philosophically sophisticated Hustvedt is, one may even say that the PSR is lurking behind her position.) Unlike Hustvedt I think that money can refer to something real even if (as I grant her) it is founded in the arbitrariness of nonsense and tracked with something arbitrary (a sign).  

How so?

As any Connecticut poet (hoobla-how, hoobla-hoo, and hoo), or Humean-Deleuzian, can tell you, repetition can turn gibberish into something causally efficacious. And as Spinoza teaches, to be is to be a cause (and vice versa). This fact, that some of our beings/causes are grounded in nonsense, is an affront to those who think our starting points should be clear propositions. Be that as it may, because it has causal powers, money is as real as talk.++

In The Summer Without Men (Husvedt's 2011 novel), her narrator writes, "Repetition. Repetition, not identity. Nothing is repeated exactly, even words, because something has changed in the speaker and in the listener, because once said and then said again and again, the repetition itself alters the words." (51) I think the intuition -- the power of repetition -- is sound even if I am uneasy about Husvedt's manner of expressing it. While above I noted that repetition can generate identity, Husvedt is clear it can also, in the opposite direction, as it were, undermine identity. 

In her comment on Dickens, Hustvedt makes the point in stark fashion: repetition can create gibberish from truth. Her claim is not the familiar one associated with the theory of propaganda that through repetition lies can become thought true,*** but rather that one can debase words, even true and respected ones, by repeating them in certain ways. That is, certain forms of repetition vacate truth.

That is it for now. But I add a perhaps puzzling paragraph as a promissory note (and explication on my first paragraph above). As regular readers know, I think (recall) Arendt is right that only a limited number of institutions (related to science and justice) are capable of producing truth in a reliable fashion.+++ (It's now a familiar thought that replication is important in some of their practices.) The slide from [A] 'X=true' to [B] 'X=true if and only you are willing to take a bet on X' is made possible, I suspect, by a certain form of such vacating, that is, pernicious repetition.

 

 

Adam Smith on Three Types of Bad Political Leadership

In this post I argue that according to Smith there are three kinds of bad politicians: (i) a decisionist type; (ii) an ideological type; (iii) a factional type. In practice the qualities that belong to each can be blended.  I discuss them in turn and that point to some commonalities. Consider the following passage:

To insist upon establishing, and upon establishing all at once, and in spite of all opposition, every thing which that idea may seem to require, must often be the highest degree of arrogance. It is to erect his own judgment into the supreme standard of right and wrong. It is to fancy himself the only wise and worthy man in the commonwealth, and that his fellow-citizens should accommodate themselves to him and not he to them….This arrogance is perfectly familiar to them. They entertain no doubt of the immense superiority of their own judgment….they seldom see any thing so wrong in it as the obstructions which it may sometimes oppose to the execution of their own will. They…consider the state as made for themselves, not themselves for the state. (TMS 6.2.2.18, 234)

In context Smith is describing the dangers of acting from the ‘idea of perfecting of policy and law’ (that’s ‘that idea’ in the first quoted sentence). But the problem that is diagnosed is not unique to it. Rather, what’s being rejected is what we would call ‘shock therapy’ (“establishing all at once;”) when it comes to policy and institutional change, Smith promotes gradual change. He worries that fast economic changes will generate dislocations that are inhumane and disorderly (WN 4.2.40, 469.) But he also thinks that shock therapy shows an arrogant lack of respect to other people’s opinions (‘in spite of all opposition.’) Such political arrogance generally presupposes a moral arrogance: one’s ‘own judgment’ is  turned ‘into the supreme standard of right and wrong.’ This is a moral failing because this standard – the ‘idea of exact propriety and perfection’ (TMS 6.3.25, 247) – can only be set by the feelings of impartial spectator (TMS 7.2.1.49, 249). 

The arrogant leader assumes that fellow-citizens will accommodate themselves to him. Smith presupposes here that leaders are not rulers over subjects, but their servants We can discern here a commitment to a species of republicanism, where non-domination is a ruling virtue. What’s key for my present purposes is that such arrogant leaders detest delay (‘at once’), constitutional process, and compromise; they are fond of unitary authority, which facilitates their decisiveness (‘obstructions which it may sometimes oppose to the execution of their own will.’) In context Smith is clear that such arrogance comes naturally to royal princes (“imperial and royal reformers” (TMS 6.2.2.18, 234) and, perhaps, also those with great inherited wealth).[*]

The second kind of bad leader, the ideologue, is one who has excessive fondness for a particular ‘system’ of thought. To understand Smith’s criticism we need to be clear about the role of aesthetics as a legitimate political motive to action in his thought. A key passage is the following:

The same principle, the same love of system, the same regard to the beauty of order, of art and contrivance, frequently serves to recommend those institutions which tend to promote the public welfare. When a patriot exerts himself for the improvement of any part of the public police, his conduct does not always arise from pure sympathy with the happiness of those who are to reap the benefit of it. It is not commonly from a fellow-feeling with carriers and waggoners that a public-spirited man encourages the mending of high roads…The perfection of police, the extension of trade and manufactures, are noble and magnificent objects. The contemplation of them pleases us, and we are interested in whatever can tend to advance them. They make part of the great system of government, and the wheels of the political machine seem to move with more harmony and ease by means of them. We take pleasure in beholding the perfection of so beautiful and grand a system, and we are uneasy till we remove any obstruction that can in the least disturb or encumber the regularity of its motions. All constitutions of government, however, are valued only in proportion as they tend to promote the happiness of those who live under them. This is their sole use and end. From a certain spirit of system, however, from a certain love of art and contrivance, we sometimes seem to value the means more than the end, and to be eager to promote the happiness of our fellow-creatures, rather from a view to perfect and improve a certain beautiful and orderly system, than from any immediate sense or feeling of what they either suffer or enjoy. There have been men of the greatest public spirit, who have shown themselves in other respects not very sensible to the feelings of humanity. (TMS IV.1.11, 185)

Smith clearly thinks that the love of system can be aesthetic, and this also includes systems about “those institutions which tend to promote the public welfare.” Aesthetics has motivational pull because it is “pleasing.” What is notable is that according to Smith such aesthetic judgment can compensate for a lack of (or ‘imperfect’) sympathy with those aided by one’s institutional reform project. True public spirit may, in fact, be more a consequence of such aesthetic motives than concern for the lives of those one claims to be helping; this fact does not undermine (recall) the reality of ‘public spirit.’ (Again, there are republican sensibilities here.)

I do not mean to suggest the significance of the passage is only in its focus on the nature of aesthetic motivation. The key point is that there is a mismatch between why one may desire to improve the constitution of a state – recall from section 1 that this refers to the underlying social structures which give a particular state its stability --  and the proper normative grounds or justification for doing so. For constitutions “are valued only in proportion as they tend to promote the happiness of those who live under them. This is their sole use and end.” That is, when it comes to social affairs, Smith is an egalitarian consquentialist. Imperfect motives, the aesthetic pull of the harmony or fitting-ness of intellectual systems, can lead to good outcomes. Smith also allows that “the perfection of police [that is, public policy], the extension of trade and manufactures, are noble and magnificent objects.” The aesthetic pull of a system that aims to achieve such ends is not illusory; these really are noble objects worth pursuing. This helps explain the comment quoted above that the ““some general, and even systematical, idea of the perfection of policy and law, may no doubt be necessary for directing the views of the statesman.” (TMS 6.2.2.18, 234) Smith thinks (recall) policy must be governed by an ideal vision of society.

The problem is that the aesthetic pull of an intellectual system can displace the public spirit  it should be animating: “This spirit of system commonly takes the direction of that more gentle public spirit; always animates it, and often inflames it even to the madness of fanaticism.” (TMS 6.2.2.15, 232) Smith thinks that such an aesthetic attachment to an ideology is dangerous. For Smith fanaticism is always associated with violence (TMS 3.3.36-7, 152-3; TMS 6.3.26, 249). Not all fanaticism is associated with an ideology taken too far, Smith often treats religion and faction as likely sources of violent fanaticism. Either way, fanaticism enhances readiness to use violence and undermines the working of our moral sentiments: “Of all the corrupters of moral sentiments, therefore, faction and fanaticism have always been by far the greatest” (TMS 3.3.43, 156). So, Smith warns against certain kind of political leaders, of an intellectual kind, who are in the grip of a beautiful ideology and turn violent to achieve their ends.

As the passage reveals (TMS 3.3.43, 156), Smith clear also thinks that the spirit of faction, we would say partisanship, is very dangerous. Smith concern with faction runs through TMS (for example):

The animosity of hostile factions, whether civil or ecclesiastical, is often still more furious than that of hostile nations; and their conduct towards one another is often still more atrocious…It is needless to observe, I presume, that both rebels and heretics are those unlucky persons, who, when things have come to a certain degree of violence, have the misfortune to be of the weaker party. In a nation distracted by faction, there are, no doubt, always a few, though commonly but a very few, who preserve their judgment untainted by the general contagion. They seldom amount to more than, here and there, a solitary individual, without any influence, excluded, by his own candour, from the confidence of either party, and who, though he may be one of the wisest, is necessarily, upon that very account, one of the most insignificant men in the society. All such people are held in contempt and derision, frequently in detestation, by the furious zealots of both parties. A true party-man hates and despises candour; and, in reality, there is no vice which could so effectually disqualify him for the trade of a party-man as that single virtue. The real, revered, and impartial spectator, therefore, is, upon no occasion, at a greater distance than amidst the violence and rage of contending parties….Even to the great Judge of the universe, they impute all their own prejudices, and often view that Divine Being as animated by all their own vindictive and implacable passions. (TMS 3.3.43, 156)

For Smith factions are cohesive because they are echo-chambers of mutual sympathy (“general contagion”).[**] And in so doing they create a robust form of partiality which does not respect, even comes to loath (“hates and despises”) truth and equity. Religious factions are inclined to innovate theologically, and create theological justifications for their own otherwise immoral behavior. Smith notes that it’s very difficult and lonely to avoid becoming factional in the midst of other people’s fanaticism. A key problem of the existence of polarizing partisanship is that a robust willingness to stick with one’s independent and impartial judgment becomes itself a matter of suspicion and antagonism; who has not heard ‘you are either with us or against us.’[+]

And in fact, he thinks that partisan leaders may well themselves be less fanatical and partisan than they let on,[11] but that they cannot reveal their true feelings amidst great partisanship: “Even though the leaders should have preserved their own heads, as indeed they commonly do, free from this fanaticism, yet they dare not always disappoint the expectation of their followers; but are often obliged, though contrary to their principle and their conscience, to act as if they were under the common delusion.” (TMS 6.2.2.15, 233) So, a factional leader will, if she does not willingly encourage fanaticism, be unwillingly be carried along by the zeal and madness (“delusions”) of their fellow partisans. That is to say, while an arrogant leader tramples on the opinions of the people, a factional leader must flatter his followers to stay in power.

These three types of bad leadership have in common some features: they are not impartial, they lack public spirit, and, most notably, they facilitate the corruption of moral life. In sum, they presuppose political life as a zero-sum activity and act accordingly. They also fail to find the right balance between respecting people’s opinions and guiding them. It follows from this that Smith thinks public spirited leaders, who are impartial and promote good morals (or mores) as well as promote policies with (to adopt Jacob Levy's claim about Montesquieu) the grain of society, are laudable.

On Paley's (and Nieuwentyt's) Watch, Spinozism and the Scientific Revolution

In crossing a heath, suppose I pitched my foot against a stone, and were asked how the stone came to be there, I might possibly answer, that, for any thing I knew to the contrary, it had lain there for ever: nor would it perhaps be very easy to shew the absurdity of this answer. But suppose I had found a watch upon the ground, and it should be enquired how the watch happened to be in that place, I should hardly think of the answer which I had before given, that, for any thing I knew, the watch might have always been there. Yet why should not this answer serve for the watch, as well as for the stone?...For this reason, and for no other, viz. that, when we come to inspect the watch, we perceive (what we could not discover in the stone) that its several parts are so formed and adjusted as to produce motion, and that motion so regulated as to point out the hour of the day; that, if the several parts had been differently shaped from what they are, or in any other order, than that in which they are placed, either no motion at all would have been carried on in the machine, or none which would have answered the use, that is now served by it.--William Paley (1802), Natural theology: or, Evidence of the existence and attributes of the Deity, 1-2 (emphasis in original; capitalization modernized.)

There is no doubt that Paley's design argument "displaced" Cicero as the source of pre-eminent design arguments (see Jantzen, p. 119). This got reinforced, perhaps constituted, by its (that is, Paley's) role in debates over Darwinism and Creationism (see this neat paper by Adam Shapiro). To be sure, there are ways of understanding Paley's argument that can be traced back to arguments presented in Cicero (go read Jantzen it's splendid book). In addition, as Jantzen notes (pp. 121, 168-9, Paley's argument was itself clearly inspired on a design argument presented in the preface to a translation of Nieuwentyt's Religious Philosopher (see pp. xlvi-xlvii). So, we should not assume that Paley's argument was wholly new. In what follows I will remain resolutely agnostic about the epistemic status of Paley's argument.

I want to talk about watches, but first we need to discuss stones. Stones are absent in Nieuwentyt's argument. The introduction of a stone in Paley's argument is not a minor detail. To underststand this, we need to remind ourselves that traditionally the design argument is contrasted with two alternatives: chance and necessity. The former is associated with Epicureanism, the latter with Spinozism. Now both Paley and Nieuwentyt oppose the watch argument to chance. 

Nieuwentyt's argument is explicitly directed against Spinozism. I don't just base this claim on the contextual detail that Nieuwentyt's other (posthumous) book -- Gronden van zekerheid (The Grounds of Certainty) -- is a brilliant methodological polemic with Spinozism. Rather, "necessary laws of nature" are the explicit third contrast to an "understanding artifice" as the cause of the watch (xlviii).+ So, Nieuwentyt is still in the orbit of the traditional design argument. Now, to be fair sometimes Nieuwentyt treats an appeal to the ignorant "laws of nature" as identical to an appeal to chance. But when he needs to sometimes he clearly distinguishes them).*

But Paley is distinctly uninterested in Spinozism. First, he treats laws in deflationary (even nominalist) manner. When Paley turns to the possibility of treating "necessary laws of nature," he demotes them to mere "laws of metallic nature." (7) For Paley, harking back to an older, more traditional view, laws presuppose “agents” (or “powers”) and its these powers which are causally efficacious. The only necessity Paley allows is hypothetical necessity (549). And this turns out to be the way in which chance events intersect. (He uses hypothetical necessity to explain the appearance of chance.) I actually think this reflects the impact of Hume, who is mentioned just once coincidentally on the previous page (548), and Hume's famous attack on the presupposition of natural order. But I can't prove that today.

Now, a Spinozist would not accept that a stone and a watch are treated fundamentally differently. Obviously they have different degrees of complexity (or perfection), they may resist destruction in different ways, and they may have different effects on the world. But God is immanent in both, and there are no fundamental differences in their nature.**

By contrast, Paley treats stones and watches differently because (as I suggested the other day) he wants to treat living and inanimate things differently. For Paley it’s not the case that all the parts of nature exhibit apparent design. Paley clearly distinguishes between living things (which do exhibit design) and inanimate ones, which may not. For, there is a lack of symmetry between living and inanimate things. In chapter 17, he shows that the living things are so formed that they can successfully navigate and draw from the inanimate surroundings. But the reverse claim is not made. So, for Paley (but Nieuwentyt), nature is bifurcated in a way that begs the question against the a Spinozist if the Spinozist had to be taken seriously. The bifurcation also helps prompt a further key difference between Paley and the more traditional design arguments. And it connects to the changing understanding of what a clock/timekeeper is.

As regular readers know (recall), I am fascinated by a feature in what I have dubbed the Posidonian (design) argument. A key premise in it, is this (quoting Cicero): "our friend Posidonius has recently fashioned a planetarium; each time it revolves, it makes the sun, moon, and planets reproduce the movements which they make over a day and a night in the heavens." That is, the argument uses as a premise that a concrete model accurate represents nature's patterns or order. But if we look at Paley's argument, he makes no such claim.

Rather, all Paley needs is that the the watch has a particular, functional internal coherence and complexity and indicates time ("its several parts are so formed and adjusted as to produce motion, and that motion so regulated as to point out the hour of the day.") In fact, even if the clock is irregular or sbroken altogether, it makes little difference to Paley's argument. "It is not necessary that a machine be perfect, in order to shew with what design it was made: still less necessary, where the only question is, whether it were made with any design at all."  Irregular, even “stopped” watches are sufficient for Paley’s purposes (5)! 

As an aside, one may well think that Paley's argument is an obvious improvement, because his works with more minimal assumptions than the ancient argument. They need a working machine, he can do with an irregular one. Fair enough.++

Now, it is worth noting that all of the scientific instruments that Paley mentions – telescopes (e.g. 24), microscopes (e.g., 182), a lever (e.g, p, 48), a pump (e.g., 171), a hydraulic machine (82)  – are means toward creating a model of nature or intervening in nature, but not themselves such concrete models. The same is true of Paley's treatment of the eye which is an “optical instrument,” (e.g, 277) rather than, say, part of a model that successfully represent nature. (Paley mentions temperature, but never a thermometer or a barometer.) By contrast, a planetarium does represent nature. 

There is an important, underlying issue. In ancient times it was quite natural to think of the motions of the celestial bodies as being time (or the true measure of time, for present purposes that makes no difference). We can find an important representative of this view in the Timaeus (itself non-trivial when it comes to reflecting on Design arguments):

Wherefore, as a consequence of this reasoning and design on the part of God, with a view to the generation of Time, the sun and moon and five other stars, which bear the appellation of “planets,” came into existence for the determining and preserving of the numbers of Time... Of the other stars the revolutions have not been discovered by men (save for a few out of the many); wherefore they have no names for them, nor do they compute and compare their relative measurements, so that they are not aware, as a rule, that the “wanderings“ of these bodies, which are hard to calculate and of wondrous complexity, constitute Time. Plato, Timaeus [38C-39D]***

So, if you  take such a position on the nature of time, the successful concrete model of the heavens is simultaneously not just an indicator, but a kind of representation of time. During the scientific revolution such a view was decisively abandoned. Leibniz, Huygens and Newton don't agree about much, but the heavenly motions themselves become imperfect means toward measuring (what I'll call) a 'temporal frame' (see here for explanation). But the measurements of these motions require all kinds of corrections and themselves don't bring you in contact with absolute time (if you are Newtonian), something you may well think non-existent (if you are Huygens/Leibniz). More important, a local time-keeper may be calibrated with astronomical motions, but can be decoupled from them. What a watch indicates is local time; there is no clear representation of nature's motions in them. 

 

 

 

 

On Physicists dissing Philosophers [I]

I recently discovered panpsychism. That’s the idea that all matter – animate or inanimate – is conscious, we just happen to be somewhat more conscious than carrots. Panpsychism is the modern elan vital. 

When I say I “discovered” panpsychism, I mean I discovered there’s a bunch of philosophers who produce pamphlets about it. How do these philosophers address the conflict with evidence? Simple: They don’t. 

Now, look, I know that physicists have a reputation of being narrow-minded. But the reason we have this reputation is that we tried the crazy shit long ago and just found it doesn’t work. You call it “narrow-minded,” we call it “science.” We have moved on. Can elementary particles be conscious? No, they can’t. It’s in conflict with evidence. Here’s why.

We know 25 elementary particles. These are collected in the standard model of particle physics. The predictions of the standard model agree with experiment to best precision. 

The particles in the standard model are classified by their properties, which are collectively called “quantum numbers.” The electron, for example, has an electric charge of -1 and it can have a spin of +1/2 or -1/2. There are a few other quantum numbers with complicated names, such as the weak hypercharge, but really it’s not so important. Point is, there are handful of those quantum numbers and they uniquely identify an elementary particle. 

If you calculate how many particles of a certain type are produced in a particle collision, the result depends on how many variants of the produced particle exist. In particular, it depends on the different values the quantum numbers can take. Since the particles have quantum properties, anything that can happen will happen. If a particle exists in many variants, you’ll produce them all – regardless of whether or not you can distinguish them. The result is that you see more of them than the standard model predicts.

Now, if you want a particle to be conscious, your minimum expectation should be that the particle can change. It’s hard to have an inner life with only one thought. But if electrons could have thoughts, we’d long have seen this in particle collisions because it would change the number of particles produced in collisions.

In other words, electrons aren’t conscious, and neither are any other particles. It’s incompatible with data. 

As I explain in my book, there are ways to modify the standard model that do not run into conflict with experiment. One of them is to make new particles so massive that so far we have not managed to produce them in particle collisions, but this doesn’t help you here. Another way is to make them interact so weakly that we haven’t been able to detect them. This too doesn’t help here. The third way is to assume that the existing particles are composed of more fundamental constituents, that are, however, so strongly bound together that we have not yet been able to tear them apart. 

With the third option it is indeed possible to add internal states to elementary particles. But if your goal is to give consciousness to those particles so that we can inherit it from them, strongly bound composites do not help you. They do not help you exactly because you have hidden this consciousness so that it needs a lot of energy to access. This then means, of course, that you cannot use it at lower energies, like the ones typical for soft and wet thinking apparatuses like human brains.

Summary: If a philosopher starts speaking about elementary particles, run.--Sabine Hossenfelder [HT Wayne Myrvold; see also Myrvold's response to Hossenfelder here.]

I have never blogged about Sabine Hossenfelder before, but I often enjoy her blogs about contemporary physics. Importantly, she is a critic of much faddish talk within physics (she is especially critical of string theory). For those who share my empiricist sensibilities, she is especially good (see also her book), I think, on how in mathematical physics aesthetic biases may generate evidential dead-ends. (Her book is useful corrective to those who think theoretical virtues are reliable or simple.) Of course, in the book and in her blogs many of her reflections shade into what one may call philosophy (or philosophy of science).* To her credit; she is aware of this (p. 219). For example, in her book she accepts the philosophical argument -- I call it so because it was developed by philosophers in the twentieth century -- that because there is no time and money to test all possible hypotheses, the choice of which hypothesis to test is informed, in part, by aesthetic and social values (see p. 35--she would like to get rid of the former). 

However, in her book 'philosophy' seems to mean something like, 'the dispensable and useless, pre-scientific discipline that is a playground for useless ideas or puzzles about reality that have not been solved yet.'+ (See pages 29; 51; 85; 137, 219 etc.)** And it's quite clear she associates contemporary philosophy with the proposal of Richard Dawid (see here a link to his book) that some scientific theories can be evaluated with 'non empirical" assessment (p. 31). It's  not that she is unaware of philosophers with a deep knowledge of physics; she is, in fact, not principally against taking advice from philosophers -- see her hopes on p. 40/p221, and the advice quoted on p. 218ff --, but Dawid's is not the advice she wants because she thinks this is a weakening of the philosophical method (41). (For what it's worth, I agree with her, although wouldn't formulate it like that.) 

Okay, let me turn to her post. Let me start by saying that I have made fun of contemporary panpsychism (in a 2015 book review in TLS), so it's not that I do not understand the impulse to do so.  And I have not changed my mind that most versions of panpsychism (see here for an intro) that I am familiar with try to solve a difficult problem (consciousness, spooky action at a distance, etc.) by introducing a universe full of difficult problems. Hossenfelder actually tries to do better than that and offers a purported empirical refutation of it. This refutation relies on the premise:

• [A] if you want a particle to be conscious, your minimum expectation should be that the particle can change. It’s hard to have an inner life with only one thought.

In [A] there are really three claims: 

• [B] To be conscious means one can change outcomes
• [C] To be conscious means one must have an inner life
• [D] One cannot have an inner life with only one thought.

Let me accept, for the sake of argument, [D]. I do so because nothing hinges on it (unless one is inclined to do high modernist, literary experiments) and it is entirely unclear what motivates Hossenfelder to posit it. Perhaps, she thinks that a defender of pan-psychism would have to be committed to the idea that electrons or other particles would have, at most, one idea (because their inner structure is not complex enough for more ideas) or because particles that participate in a double-slit experiment can have one choice; I don't know.

Unfortunately, [B] and [C] are not well thought through. In [B] there is a simple conflation between consciousness and something like freedom (understood as the possibility to change outcomes). But no panpsychist would have to be committed to such freedom. (In fact, one of the most famous panpsychists in history, Spinoza, seems to deny such freedom for all beings, even God.) So, here she simply begs the question by relying on a premise the panpsychist need not accept. In [C] there seems to be a conflation between consciousness, and some particular form of consciousness such as self-consciousness, or higher order consciousness, or an idea of an idea, or having an interior monologue. Now, of course, Hossenfelder has every right to stipulate that consciousness involves an inner life, but it's not clear that in order to make sense of the panpsychist's proposal, the panpsychist would have to agree. So, there is a clear sense in which Hossenfelder is attacking a strawman (by imputing premises the panpsychist does not share).

In fact, as an aside, a Spinozist panpsychist reading Hossenfelder's piece, may, in fact, think she has confirmed one of Spinozism's core commitments, when she writes that "If a particle exists in many variants, you’ll produce them all." This seems very much in the spirit of Ethics 1, proposition 16. Of course, Spinoza had no idea about quantum mechanics, but in articulating his system he was frank that lots of properties of bodies remained to be discovered something that runs through his philosophy (or so I argued).

But, even if she is uncharitable and confused about panspychism, one may still think she offers an empirical refutation:

• [E] if electrons could have thoughts, we’d long have seen this in particle collisions because it would change the number of particles produced in collisions. 

Now, I honestly don't understand why she thinks that if electrons had thoughts and, say [B] were true, this would change the number of particles produced in collisions. It would be quite amazing for any conscious entity if she could think more entities into existence in virtue of thinking.++ (I suspect this would violate all kinds of elementary conservation principles.) If pan-psychism were to require miracles to explain things, then it would be no explanation at all.

Not everything Hossenfelder says about the empirical challenges to panpsychism is silly. For example, she also says,

• [F] you have hidden this consciousness so that it needs a lot of energy to access.

For some panpsychist theories this may well be a firm obstacle. But I suspect that the very idea of burying thought deep inside the internal states of particles, is not the way a panpsychist would wish to go. For this does create many mysteries about the interaction between those invisible internal states and the known states of particles. (This would make Descartes's challenge to explain the interaction between mind and body through the pineal gland almost seem simple by comparison. I can imagine Princess Elisabeth having fun with that.) So, I don't know any panpsychists today who would go this route.***

Okay, when I started this post, I really intended to talk about why some (of course not all) famous physicists (e.g., Feynman, who may never have said, “The philosophy of science is as useful to scientists as ornithology is to birds,” Hawkins, Neil deGrasse Tyson, [but also Lewis Powell's response], academic spokespeople for a discipline which gets billions of dollars/euros of state funding, nobel prizes, and have high status would be so fond of dissing on philosophy--a relatively insignificant discipline in today's academy. I hope to return to this issue some other time. But this post has gone one long enough. So, let me close with this observation; throughout my life I have had great fun making fun of philosophical over-reach. Philosophy is difficult and often our efforts and delusions are comic. But if you think that philosophy is a playground for useless ideas or "crazy shit", you are probably not going to be very receptive of suggestions emanating from it. You may also not be so inviting to those who wish to offer fruitful advice. But most important, as Dan Dennett taught me, if you reject and ridicule philosophy altogether, you probably end up doing bad philosophy.

 

 

 

On An Unphilosophical Legislation of Utopia.

[1] But they report (and there remains good marks of it to make it credible) that this was no island at first, but a part of the continent. Utopus, that conquered it (whose name it still carries, for Abraxa was its first name), brought the rude and uncivilised inhabitants into such a good government, and to that measure of politeness, that they now far excel all the rest of mankind. Having soon subdued them, he designed to separate them from the continent, and to bring the sea quite round them. To accomplish this he ordered a deep channel to be dug, fifteen miles long; and that the natives might not think he treated them like slaves, he not only forced the inhabitants, but also his own soldiers, to labor in carrying it on. As he set a vast number of men to work, he, beyond all men’s expectations, brought it to a speedy conclusion....

[2] They say the whole scheme of the town was designed at first by Utopus, but he left all that belonged to the ornament and improvement of it to be added by those that should come after him, that being too much for one man to bring to perfection. Their records, that contain the history of their town and State, are preserved with an exact care, and run backwards seventeen hundred and sixty years [244BC].

[3] At the first constitution of their government, Utopus having understood that before his coming among them the old inhabitants had been engaged in great quarrels concerning religion, by which they were so divided among themselves, that he found it an easy thing to conquer them, since, instead of uniting their forces against him, every different party in religion fought by themselves. After he had subdued them he made a law that every man might be of what religion he pleased, and might endeavor to draw others to it by the force of argument and by amicable and modest ways, but without bitterness against those of other opinions; but that he ought to use no other force but that of persuasion, and was neither to mix with it reproaches nor violence; and such as did otherwise were to be condemned to banishment or slavery. This law was made by Utopus, not only for preserving the public peace, which he saw suffered much by daily contentions and irreconcilable heats, but because he thought the interest of religion itself required it.--Thomas More, Utopia

While much of the narrative  of book 2 of Utopia is focused on the present, the reader also learns quite a bit about the origin of the polity. While More himself is no Aristotelian, and so may be unmoved by this consideration, an explanation is incomplete without analysis of the origin, which is of independent interest.Above I have collected the three main passages pertaining to the pre-history and founding of Utopia. 

We learn that its origin is in conquest. The original inhabitants lived on a peninsula. This peninsula was eminently defensible, but they lost their freedom for two reasons: first, they were technologically inferior to the conquerors; second, they were dis-unified due to religious disagreements. The latter is significant because it shows that the effects of religion on the dispositions conducive to unity cannot be ignored by those who wish to remain politically independent.

Unusually, the conquest is not followed by permanent subordination, slavery, or destruction of the original inhabitants by the conquerors. For the conquerors are force-ably leveled down and put to work. This has the symbolic significance that the conqueror and conquered are treated equally. It also symbolizes two further facts: first, it dignifies work and, in particular, public works.  Second, no permanent leisure or extractive renter class is permitted to emerge. More subtly, Utopus is ehibited not just as a skillful military commander, but also a kind of despot capable of forcing his own followers to do things against their will (and presumably expectation).

In the previous paragraph I used 'public work.' But the digging of the channel turns the peninsula into an island. This exhibits the control by mankind over nature aimed at in Utopia (which anticipates New Atlantis in this respect).* A further effect is to turn the society into a fortified castle. While it's not the main focus of the description of Utopia, military prowess, even imperial conquest, is not an irrelevant element of its ongoing function (recall this post too).

As an aside, it's unclear how the initial succession of Utopus was arranged. But (eventually) Utopia has evolved into an elective principality. This prince is chosen for life but can be removed if he appears to wish to become a tyrant. He has power to punish crimes, and to pardon them (because he has kept the "prerogative.") In other respects the elected prince has not much further power (except that I assume he is at the head of armed forces).

To return to the main point. Utopus's design for utopia is deliberately unfinished in various respects; it presupposes the possibility of open-ended economic and aesthetic progress ('ornament and improvement'). I am not claiming that modernity is here first invented, but it is a notable break from the more cyclical template(s) that can be found in the classical models to which More richly alludes. 

The possibility of open-ended progress can also be found (recall) in the laws of religion. This is an unusual mixture of requiring core doctrinal agreement about a few core dogmas -- in particular, that souls are immortal and will be punished/rewarded in the afterlife; that God is watchful and providential -- all of which quite clearly conducive to enforcing morality on earth, while simultaneously allowing religious innovation outside the core. However, such religious innovation is, in turn, constrained by the requirements of public order. (All of this anticipates the outlines of Spinoza's position.) The state religion is, with those qualifications, broadly ecumenical and tolerant in spirit. The underlying idea is the product of the fact that "Utopus judged it not fit to determine anything rashly; and seemed to doubt whether those different forms of religion might not all come from God, who might inspire man in a different manner, and be pleased with this variety." Underlying this is the providential idea -- often attributed to J.S. Mill --  that in the long run through the force of polite arguments truth will prevail "he imagined that the native force of truth would at last break forth and shine bright, if supported only by the strength of argument, and attended to with a gentle and unprejudiced mind.")

There is more to be said about this. But the important point is this. Utopus anticipates the Rousseau-ian legislator who introduces and sets a constitution on sound footing and then becomes dispensable. Notably, while there is room for technological and medical innovation on the island, there is little room for genuine political philosophy (or [recall] civilized philosophy) or even speculation (or school philosophy) on Utopia. Moreover, there is little evidence he was guided by such philosophy. This last point may be speculative, but it is made explicit in one of the poems (often attributed to Peter Gilles) that accompanied Utopia in its early printings.

My king and conqueror Utopus by name,
A prince of much renown and immortal fame,
Has made me an isle that once no island was,
Full fraught with worldly wealth,

with pleasure and solace.
I one of all other without philosophy,
Have shaped for many a philosophical city.
And mine I have nothing dangerous to impart,
So better to receive I am ready
with all my heart.*--probably Peter Gilles.

 My only reservation is that the judgment on the philosophical character of Utopia (the city) is incomplete without further evaluation of the blue print in light of the conversations (and the different polities) described in Book I. But that's for another time.

On Ibn Khaldun, Biblical Criticism and Spinoza and Hume

For example, al-Mas'udi and many other historians report that Moses counted the army of the Israelites in the desert. He had all those able to carry arms, especially those twenty years and older, pass muster. There turned out to be 600,000 or more. In this connection, (al-Mas'udi)  forgets to take into consideration whether Egypt and Syria could possibly have held such a number of soldiers. Every realm may have as large a militia as it can hold and support, but no more. This fact is attested by well-known customs and familiar conditions. Moreover, an army of this size cannot march or fight as a unit. The whole available territory would be too small for it. If it were in battle formation, it would extend two, three, or more times beyond the field of vision.
How, then, could two such parties fight with each other, or one battle formation gain the upper hand when one flank does not know what the other flank is doing! The situation at the present day testifies to the correctness of this statement. The past resembles the future more than one (drop of) water another. Furthermore, the realm of the Persians was much greater than that of the Israelites. This fact is attested by Nebuchadnezzar's victory over them. He swallowed up their country and gained complete control over it. He also destroyed Jerusalem,their religious and political capital. And he was merely one of the officials of the province of Fars. It is said that he was the governor of the western border region. The Persian provinces of the two 'Iraqs, Khurasan, Transoxania, and the region of Derbend on the Caspian  Sea were much larger than the realm of the Israelites. Yet, the Persian army did not attain such a number or even approach it. The greatest concentration  of Persian troops, at al-Qadisiyah, amounted to 120,000 men, all of whom had their retainers. This is according to Sayf  who said that with their retainers they amounted to over 200,000 persons. According to 'A'ishah and az- Zuhri, the troop concentration with which Rustum advanced against  Sa'd at al-Qadisiyah amounted to only 60,000 men, all of whom had their retainers.
Then, if the Israelites had really amounted to such a number, the extent of the area under their  rule would have been larger, for the size of administrative units and provinces under a particular dynasty is in direct proportion to the size of its militia and the groups that support the  (dynasty), as will be explained in the section on provinces in the first book. Now, it is well known that the territory of the (Israelites) did not comprise an area larger than the Jordan province and Palestine in Syria and the region of Medina and Khaybar in the Hijaz.--Ibn Khaldun, The Muqaddimah, Translated by Franz Rosenthal.

The quoted passage is from the Introduction to the Muqaddimah. As I have noted before (here and here) the book is embedded in a framework derived from Aristotelian science.* To say this is revealing in lots of ways, but today I want to point to some of his evidential strategies -- Ibn Khaldun calls it "probing with the yardstick of philosophy...[and]  the help of knowledge of the nature of things...speculation and historical insight" -- in which he anticipates methods we are more likely to associate with Spinoza and Hume. I have quoted the first, instructive example of the claim that "historians, Qur'an commentators and leading transmitters have committed frequent errors in the stories and events they reported." The underlying point is to show how one can do source criticism by appealing to non-demonstrative principles that, nevertheless, have the status of robust commitments or generalizations that help one constrain or interpret the data (or some causal claim, etc.). I will call such principles, practical, empirical generalizations. 

Here are some such practical generalizations.

• [A] Every realm may have as large a militia as it can hold and support, but no more.
• [B] An army has [given technological and physiological constraints] a maximum size in which it can fight as a unit.
  • The size of an army/militia is constrained by the requirements of battle-field communication;
  • The size of an army/militia is constrained by field of vision;
• [C] The size of administrative units and provinces under a particular dynasty is in direct proportion to the size of its militia and the groups that support the (dynasty),

The epistemic status of such practical, empirical generalizations is grounded in or based on historical and practical experiences, reflection on human and social nature, underlying political economy, demographics, group psychology,and principles of analogy (etc.). As Ibn Khaldun says, he will show the robust veracity of [C] in a separate chapter. I don't mean to suggest that these are only empirical generalizations. For example, [A] borders on a tautology. But the point of [A] is not to offer an a priori truth, but to make the reader reflect on the demographic, geographic, and economic, !etc.) constraints on the possible size of a militia.  And given the plausibility of such constraints [A] can, in turn, by an informed constraint on the interpretation of source material. (Hume is a master of using informed and empirically grounded constraints to sift data in his work on demographics and political economy. This works in both directions.)

In addition, in practice, [A-C] also assume a further principle of human nature:

• [D] that if military might exists, it will be used to expand territory until it gets checked by an opposing power. 

This principle, [D], is the conatus/will-to-power principle of Ibn Khaldun's historiography. In order to avoid misunderstanding, I don't mean to suggest that for Ibn Khaldun that military power is sui generis or an explanatory primitive; it is grounded in group feeling, demography, economy, leadership qualities, etc. 

Of course, some of the claims that Ibn Khaldun's source criticism relies on are not merely such practical generalizations, but they are connected to more fundamental metaphysical principles. So, for example, one of the principles he explicitly relies (again see the quote above)on is this:

• [E] The past resembles the future,

That Ibn Khaldun embraces [E] is especially notable because he also thinks an unthinking reliance on a version of [E] is simultaneously one of greatest dangers in the writing history because it can license (i) a form of anachronism that prevents understanding of the past (this is familiar enough), and (ii) also (and more interesting) a misunderstanding of the present based on familiarity with works of history. The example he offers is that the content and status of particular political and legal offices have, without changing names, dramatically shifted in character. So, he claims that in the early caliphate and also the conquest of Spain a judge was often somebody who either had the power of the sword or was very closely affiliated to the center of power (due to group feeling); in his own age the judge is more an administrative functionary.+ Contemporary readers, may misunderstand their own time, and "aspire to similar positions" if they think that judges are still at the center of political power.

The last paragraph also hints at the fact that point of source criticism for Ibn Khaldun history is not just an understanding of the past, but also a better understanding of the present. In addition, Ibn Khaldun recognizes that works of history can motivate readers to courses of action. Some other time I return to that. 

Here I want to close with a final observation because the title of this post promises something riviting than Ibn Khaldun's source criticism. In the quoted passage, Ibn Khaldun calls attention to the greatest military victory of early Islam, the battle at al-Qadisiyah. In this battle the numerically inferior Arabs defeated one of the great superpowers of the Ancient worlds, the mighty Persian Sassanid empire. It opened the 'East' to Muslim expansion. The significance of the battle would have been familiar to Ibn Khaldun's readers and a source of group pride. 

Ibn Khaldun's official point of reminding the reader of this famous battle is to undermine the plausibility of historians's reports that Moses's army turned out to be 600,000 or more. Such an army would have been the basis of world domination not the occupation of a small bit of territory. Ibn Khaldun deftly shows that this number is implausibly large.

The interest of the example is, however, not just illustrative correction of bad scholarship. There is a more important point lurking here. For the implausibly large number is (as is well known) in the Biblical source-material. Numbers 1: 45-46 states, "And all those that were numbered of the children of Israel by their fathers' houses, from twenty years old and upward, all that were able to go forth to war in Israel; even all those that were numbered were six hundred thousand and three thousand and five hundred and fifty." As it happens, the Quran recounts the story of exodus and the further exploits of Moses and Israelites, but without the claim to (exaggerated) exactitude of the sort the Hebrew Bible offers.

So, it is quite clear that the historians that Ibn Khaldun criticizes have embellished their account of the Biblical history re-narrated by the Quran by glancing at the Hebrew Bible (itself a sacred text familiar to Muslim scholars). The error is in the historical source not just the scholarship. What to do? After engaging in such source criticism, a pious and prudent scholar can't respond by claiming that the error "occurs only in the Torah which as is well  known, was altered by the Jews" (for reasons of self-aggrandizement, bias, etc.). Even to an Islamic scholar this response is unavailable "since custom prevents people who have a revealed religion from dealing with their divine scriptures in such a matter."

The problem is obvious, if one allows that sacred Hebrew scripture has been corrupted by interests motivated by group-loyalty one is stuck claiming that it is possible other sacred scriptures could also have been corrupted. This is the road to Spinozism. 

From the vantage point of Spinozism, Ibn Khaldun's response is disappointing. He claims that such passages have to be treated as miracles. This is not the end of the matter, of course, because one must understand what a miracle is. But that's for another time. Here I close with the observation that for Ibn Khaldun one can only speak of such miracles after engaging with source criticism. And this means that he has quietly invited us to apply his methods also to the Quran.

 

Ibn Rushd and Functional Explanation of Scriptures

Copulation ought not to be permitted them [the guardians] whenever they wish and with whomever they wish, since we wish that this activity be human among them and that their copulations not be of any chance character. The arrangement of their procreation will be the best possible with respect to their conditions of guardianship, but at fixed times an with determined individuals and characteristics. This is, as it were, common to the other conventions and Laws [Shari'a], though as it appears the adherents of the Laws differ from one another in the force of the statements. We ourselves will here briefly what Plato asserts about these things.---Ibn Rushd on Plato's Republic, the first treatise, 54.20-8, translated by Ralph Lerner.

At the start of the quoted passage, Ibn Rushd is referring to the breading program of the guardians of Socrates's Kallipolis (see Republic, 457-8). It is part of a larger passage, which is explicitly presented as a what "he said" (see 54.19).* But at the second to last sentence of the quoted passage he has slipped into his own voice, something he then calls attention to in the last sentence. The next paragraph then starts with a "we say,"and Ibn Rushd is officially speaking in his own voice. But what concerns me here is the second to last sentence {This is, as it were, common to the other conventions and Laws [Shari'a], though as it appears the adherents of the Laws differ from one another in the force of the statements.} This claim is not in the Republic, and it's Ibn Rushd's addition. 

But to see what's at stake we must first turn to the first sentences of Ibn Rushd's commentary on Plato's Republic; these tell us that Ibn Rushd's "epitome" only presents the scientific, that is, demonstrative elements of the Republic. (Ibn Rushd claims to have  removed the dialectical arguments.) To be clear, Ibn Rushd does not present a summary of the Republic, but rather only conveys the bits that can be taken to be true,+ and useful (because it is a practical science).  So, this is an epitome in both senses: it's the best parts of the Republic and a synopsis.

As an aside, the most immediately striking omissions are that Book I of the Republic is skipped almost entirely (because as he says at the of the  third and final treatise, "it is entirely dialectical arguments") and the contents of Book 10 are barely conveyed. In addition, the dialogical structure of the Republic is entirely effaced. Socrates himself is only mentioned once, en passant, to remind the reader that Socrates chose death when he could not serve the polity anymore.** Ibn Rushd mentions this to convey accurately one of Socrates's claims (that physicians should not cure those who can't contribute in their functional role to society anymore), but this detail is absent in the Republic.

Okay, let me return to the main point. Two key claims of Ibn Rushd's Decisive Treatise are (a) that the hidden meaning of allegorical interpretation of Scriptures should not be shared with the masses, and (b) that (recall) such hidden knowledge can only put in texts that are demonstrative treatises, but these may only circulate among the cognitive elite. As I noted, the reason for (a) is that Ibn Rushd thinks this is the cause of (religious and political) faction; the reason for (b) is that the demonstrative sciences are recondite, and so ordinarily of little interest to the masses. (One can imagine him thinking that a text about Plato would be of even less interest!) Of course, the commentary on the Republic, does not advertise itself as offering evidence of the hidden meaning of Scriptures as revealed by allegorical interpretation. And, now we can return to the point at hand.

In the passage, Ibn Rushd is claiming that Kallipolis is not the only political constitution in which constraints on copulation serve an eugenic or domestic/artificial selective purpose. He says that this is also the point of other polities, including Islamic Sharia. And, in fact, the Quran and the Haddith, regulate, for example, when sex is and is not allowed. De facto, Ibn Rushd is offering a functional explanation of the meaning behind some of Scriptural practices.++ Another function of Sharia is to point (or to use the language of the Decisive Treatise, indicate) to the significance of good governance and good counsel (48.17).

A very important instance of Ibn Rushd's engaging with a kind of functional interpretation of Scripture occurs just after he has explained why woman ought not just be, in principle, guardians (as they are in Kallipolis), but that there is empirical evidence that they can be quite capable warriors (praising the Berber, female warriors of the dessert). And just before he goes on to explain (recall) that the institutions of his own time have the effect of dumbing down women (and causing economic hardship), he briefly pauses to note that Sharia has a tendency to prevent women from being part of the clerisy. He explains this fact as a consequence of an empirical regularity in which -- presumably in the time of revelation -- there are fewer capable women. But as the next page makes clear this regularity is itself a consequence of badly designed institutions. So, here, Ibn Rushd comes extremely close to saying that Scriptures didn't know any better based on the empirical evidence available; and that [the author(s) of] Scripture lacked the demonstrative understanding to correct for this. So, this is a case in which the hidden functionality of Scriptures reveals a defective understanding of nature.***

 

Íbn Rushd and the Meaning of Scripture

[A] So we affirm definitely that whenever the conclusion of a demonstration is in conflict with the apparent meaning of Scripture, that apparent meaning admits of allegorical interpretation according to the rules for such interpretation in Arabic. [B] This proposition is questioned by no Muslim and doubted by no believer. But (a) its certainty is immensely increased for those who have had close dealings with this idea and put it to the test, and (b) made it their aim to reconcile the assertions of intellect and tradition. [C] Indeed we may say that whenever a statement in Scripture conflicts in its apparent meaning with a conclusion of demonstration, [C*] if Scripture is considered carefully, and the rest of its contents searched page by page, there will invariably be found among the expressions of Scripture something which in its apparent meaning bears witness to that allegorical interpretation or comes close to bearing witness.--Ibn Rushd, Decisive Treatise, Chapter 2, Translated by George Hourani. [Letters added--ES]

Earlier in the Decisive Treatise, Ibn Rushd had established that Scripture cannot conflict with demonstrative knowledge/science. The first sentence of the quoted passage [A] is an implication of Ibn Rushd's tendency to rationalize scripture. So, that allegorical interpretations of Scripture are invited whenever these are required to have Scripture come out true by the lights of demonstration/reason and when the apparent meaning of the text would seem to violate it. (Spinoza scholars are familiar with this position because it is the one Spinoza attributes to Maimonides and criticizes; I ignore here the tricky question to what degree, if any, Ibn Rush influenced Maimonides or the other way around.)

As an aside, it is notable that [A] is explicitly treated by Ibn Rushd as a kind of political axiom, and so perhaps constitutive, of the Muslim community: [B] "This proposition is questioned by no Muslim and doubted by no believer." And he goes on to point out that while the axiom [B] is accepted unquestionably, those few, the cognitive elite,+ that put it to work (a) both come to hold it more firmly [suggesting that unquestioned acceptance is perhaps more fragile than it seems] and (b) end up being committed to a reconciliation project between science and revelation/traditional religion. the ways in which inherited religion and reason can be reconciled. (What the exact relationship between (a) and (b) is, is left unclear--perhaps the Arabic makes clear if this conceptual, logical, or contingent.)

This reconciliation project by the cognitive elite presupposes that Scripture is (and this anticipates Spinoza) primarily aimed at the masses who require opinions to be "guided." That is, Scripture is fundamentally a work of social, ethical, and political significance. (In the first sentence of this paragraph, I say 'primarily' because Ibn Rushd also claims that the apparent tension between reason and Scripture are deliberately there "in order to draw the attention of those who are well grounded in science to the interpretation which reconciles them,"--that is to say, Ibn Rushd claims that Scripture has an esoteric message for those that can understand.) The reconciliation project is explicitly not in the service of public Enlightenment because Ibn Rushd argues later in the Decisive Treatise that (recall) allegorical interpretations by the cognitive  elite should not be shared with ordinary folk. This may entail that the reconciliation project is merely for private edification of the cognitive elite.* 

The final sentence [C] is extraordinary. And it can be taken in (at least) two ways: first, the pious way affirms the miracle of Scripture, which is a holistic work in which any passage can, when taken literally be used,to illuminate some  obscure or evidently false passages, which require allegorical interpretation by the cognitive elite. Second, the scandalous way, which suggests that Scripture can be made to say literally just about anything that, in the hands of the skilled cognitive elite, can support the truths they already know!** 

 

On a Humean Debate with Plato over Enthusiasm (and poetry/demagogues).

We may observe the same effect of poetry in a lesser degree; and this is common both to poetry and madness, that the vivacity they bestow on the ideas is not deriv'd from the particular situations or connexions of the objects of these ideas, but from the present temper and disposition of the person. But how great soever the pitch may be, to which this vivacity rises, 'tis evident, that in poetry it never has the same feeling with that which arises in the mind, when we reason, tho' even upon the lowest species of probability. The mind can easily distinguish betwixt the one and the other; and whatever emotion the poetical enthusiasm may give to the spirits, 'tis still the mere phantom of belief or persuasion.--David Hume, Treatise 1.3.10.10.*

I have noted before that Hume's relationship to poetry is rather complicated (recall here and a bit here). I even even claimed (at the time now four years ago) that according to Hume we need to read poetry for what it reveals about us and its discerning the limits of mortal possibility. One may worry, however, that the quoted passage above suggests a rather deflationary attitude toward poets. Hume makes two claims here: first, that while all of us can be moved by poetry equally, the cognitive or epistemic effects of poetry are due to the character and disposition of the person impacted by it. Second, that regardless of its (shall we say) emotional impact, poetry cannot make us really believe what is not.  

One may well wonder who would think otherwise. Before I get to that, I want to pause at Hume's use of 'poetical enthusiasm.' Today, ‘enthusiasm’ means something like ardor—an energetic interest in a topic. Enthusiasm is derived (via Latin and French) from the  Greek enthousiasmos "divine inspiration, enthusiasm (produced by certain kinds of music, etc.)," and enthousiazein "be inspired or possessed by a god, be rapt, be in ecstasy," from entheos "divinely inspired, possessed by a god."

Of course, Hume primarily uses ‘enthusiasm’ to describe species of religious fervor (see his famous essay, “Of Superstition and Enthusiasm”). While Hume stance is, in general derogatory toward enthusiasm (a form of religious zeal), he recognizes that enthusiasm is grounded in at least some dispositions worth having: “hope, pride, presumption, a warm imagination, together with ignorance, are, therefore, the true sources of enthusiasm.” Moreover, he thinks that while in the short run enthusiasm generates fanaticism, in the long run it can have good political effects in the service of liberty.

Okay, let's return to Treatise, 1.3.3.10. It's worth asking who the target of Hume's remarks are. I suspect they were prompted by Shaftesbury's (1707) "Letter Concerning Enthusiasm," (included in the Characteristics of Men). For in historicizing fashion, Shaftesbury thinks the poets among the ancients (but not the moderns),+ were capable of inspiring belief in what is not (just as modern false religious enthusiasts are also so capable according to him).** The ultimate target here is, of course, Plato or somebody inspired by Plato:

Stop now and tell me, Ion, without reserve what I may choose to ask you: when you give a good recitation and specially thrill your audience, either with the lay of Odysseus leaping forth on to the threshold, revealing himself to the suitors and pouring out the arrows before his feet, or of Achilles dashing at Hector, or some part of the sad story of Andromache or of Hecuba, or of Priam, are you then in your senses, or are you carried out of yourself, and does your soul in an ecstasy suppose herself to be among the scenes you are describing, whether they be in Ithaca, or in Troy, or as the poems may chance to place them? (Ion 535B-C)

Indeed, Socrates uses one such connate (of enthusiasm) to describe poetic frenzy. To be sure, it’s not used to capture the frenzied mania of divine inspiration, but rather to represent the phenomenal experience – the what it’s like – of a poet’s loss of self or identity, in presentating or performing her poem. (Greek poetry is meant to be  performed.) In context (Ion 235b-c), the poetic-performance ecstasy entails that the poet leaves her own body at a particular space and time, and mentally transports himself to the represented reality (somewhere else in time),++ the scenes described. Plato has the poet, Ion, affirm the experience: "I will tell you without reserve: when I relate a tale of woe, my eyes are filled with tears; and when it is of fear or awe, my hair stands on end with terror, and my heart leaps." (Ion 535)

The described effect is politically important because (sophistic) rhetoric produces, in Socrates’s reported experience, an analogous effect on its audience (see Menexenus 235a-c): "they bewitch our souls...when thus praised by them feel mightily ennobled, and every time I listen fascinated I am exalted and imagine myself to have become all at once taller and nobler and more handsome," (etc.). As I noted before (recall here, here, and here), De Grouchy, who lived through the French revolution, was very concerned about the effect of enthusiastic modern, demagogues who may well appear to believe their own rhetoric.

Let's close with Hume. It's possible he was convinced by, say, Shaftesbury that poetic enthusiasm was no political danger at all anymore; that the dangers could be contained by increased freedom of speech, especially the freedom of raillery "for against serious Extravagances and splenetick Humours there is no other Remedy than this." But the way Hume argues in the Treatise he seems to think that given human nature, there is simply little danger that we can be made to believe something just by beautiful words alone. As he put it, "there is something weak and imperfect amidst all that seeming vehemence of thought and sentiment, which attends the fictions of poetry." (1.3.10.10) While Plato may be thought to take the problem too seriously, and to ignore the downside risks of banishing the poets, one may even be tempted to accuse Hume of some complacency in the other direction (if we didn't have Hume's later writings ).

But there is a more interesting point lurking in Hume's position. There is no doubt Hume thinks that enthusiasm can produce strong emotions that make us behave as if we believe its fictions; spirits are excited and our attention is roused. But Hume suggests that if one looks closely there is no firm conviction. People want to believe pleasing poets and demagogues -- as Nietzsche noted "man would rather will nothingness than not will," -- and will express behavior that makes it seem they do. (And the art of demagogues is to make his audience hear what it wants.) But Hume tells us to look more closely, and what one finds is not melancholy, as Shaftesbury thought, but a fragile weakness ("something weak and imperfect"). This entails, I think, that the responsible, political response to enthusiasm should be directed at finding ways of acknowledging this fragility and redirecting it to less harmful ends.