Theodore Dalrymple has an excellent article up at City Journal about "The Frivolity of Evil". He worked in hospitals and prisons in Britain for 14 years and claims to have dealt with scores of thousands of perpetrators and victims of evil and violence.
Intellectuals propounded the idea that man should be freed from the shackles of social convention and self-control, and the government, without any demand from below, enacted laws that promoted unrestrained behavior and created a welfare system that protected people from some of its economic consequences. When the barriers to evil are brought down, it flourishes; and never again will I be tempted to believe in the fundamental goodness of man, or that evil is something exceptional or alien to human nature. ...There is something to be said here about the word "depression," which has almost entirely eliminated the word and even the concept of unhappiness from modern life. Of the thousands of patients I have seen, only two or three have ever claimed to be unhappy: all the rest have said that they were depressed. This semantic shift is deeply significant, for it implies that dissatisfaction with life is itself pathological, a medical condition, which it is the responsibility of the doctor to alleviate by medical means. Everyone has a right to health; depression is unhealthy; therefore everyone has a right to be happy (the opposite of being depressed). This idea in turn implies that one's state of mind, or one's mood, is or should be independent of the way that one lives one's life, a belief that must deprive human existence of all meaning, radically disconnecting reward from conduct. ...
There has been an unholy alliance between those on the Left, who believe that man is endowed with rights but no duties, and libertarians on the Right, who believe that consumer choice is the answer to all social questions, an idea eagerly adopted by the Left in precisely those areas where it does not apply. Thus people have a right to bring forth children any way they like, and the children, of course, have the right not to be deprived of anything, at least anything material. How men and women associate and have children is merely a matter of consumer choice, of no more moral consequence than the choice between dark and milk chocolate, and the state must not discriminate among different forms of association and child rearing, even if such non-discrimination has the same effect as British and French neutrality during the Spanish Civil War.
I suggest you read the whole essay, as it's quite compelling. I've written about total depravity before, and I think only someone incredibly naive could possibly believe that mankind, or any individual, is "basically good".
(HT: Wretchard.)
I agree that "depression" is a term used too often to describe what once was considered "a bad day".
I disagree with you, MW, that it is naive to think that mankind or any individual is "basically good". It is easy to see how the life experiences of Mr. Dalrymple could result in his outlook on life, society, and government. The err, though, is in assuming that his life experiences... and the corresponding conclusions he draws... is the model to which everyone else's life experiences should be compared and judged.
There are millions of people and millions of experiences that you or I will never encounter. The sum of all those people and all those experiences is certain to result in millions of slightly different outlooks on life, society, the world, and government. Many people have very similar experiences. Relatively few people have a purely "good" or purely "evil" set of experiences. In that sense, the concept of people as "basically good" is valid.
So, Mark, let's consider, say, a person who was beaten and abused as a child and later went on to perpetrate the same on her own children. According to you, this person is not evil by nature, nor were the people who did this to her evil by nature-- they were just victims of some random probability distribution of bad experiences?
As for Mr. Dalrymple drawing conclusions about the world based on his experiences, how is that different from you drawing the conclusion that he's wrong based on your experiences?
WH: Oh, I never said that there aren't people whose lives are filled with evil experiences.. either inflicted upon them or inflicted by them onto others.
I also never said that him drawing conclusions about the world was different from mine or anyone else's.
Mark: "I also never said that him drawing conclusions about the world was different from mine or anyone else's."
Sure you did: "The err [sic], though, is in assuming that his life experiences... and the corresponding conclusions he draws... is the model to which everyone else's life experiences should be compared and judged." Meaning, of course, that since his conclusions don't fit your life experiences (who else's can you mean by "everyone else's", since you don't have everyone else's experiences?), he is in error. Error can only be judged by a standard, and since you downplay a divine standard, the only standard you are left with is your own experience.
Mark: "It is easy to see how the life experiences of Mr. Dalrymple could result in his outlook on life, society, and government. The err, though, is in assuming that his life experiences... and the corresponding conclusions he draws... is the model to which everyone else's life experiences should be compared and judged."
You're overlooking an important point about Dalrymple: He is no armchair moral philosopher. It is staggering to think about the volume of the social degeneracy that he has been in contact with, and the detail with which he has studied it. He has spent years with these people, listening to their problems and trying to help them understand how their behavior makes them miserable.
Try reading Dalrymple's first book: Life at the Bottom. It will show you the depth and scope of his experience. He knows what he's talking about. You can disagree with him on theoretical grounds if you like, but it's simply ludicrous to argue that Dalrymple hasn't had enough life experiences on which to base his conclusions.
WH: He is not in error. Judging the differing experiences and conclusions of everyone else as being in error is the problem. In other words, he and his experiences are not the benchmark against which everyone else's are measured.
If you want to talk about a "divine standard".. again... that's different from person to person. Everyone interprets the books purported to be "sacred" differently. There's diversity of opinion within every group of people and within every theological, sociological, and ideological group category.
BB: I never said he didn't have a basis for the conclusions he draws. I simply said that he is not the only person with such depth of experience... and his conclusions are certainly not held by everyone with that same depth of experience.
Mark: You seem to be using a weird liberal rhetorical device. Driving home, sometimes all I can get on the radio is Alan Colmes, and he does this all the time:
"You say X. But other people say Y. So how can we know?"
The implication is that we can't really know anything until everyone with expertise on the subject holds to a single view. This is impossible, of course, for anything but the most basic of logical truths, so it amounts to the claim that we can never really know anything. It thus amounts to a species of relativism.
As with all types of relativism, this argument is a weapon rather than a belief. For example, I have never heard a liberal say: "Sure, I think that taxes should be higher. But some conservatives disagree. So who really knows?" No, it is always the conservative belief that must dissolve into relativistic mud at the mere hint of a contrary liberal belief.
So if you're going to argue that Dalrymple is wrong, then you're going to need something better than, "Others disagree, so nobody knows."
BB: One does not have to go to the extreme of saying "we can't really know anything" because of relativism. We can make assumptions, based on an aggregate of our own experiences and the similar experiences of others... but when we do so, we must allow for the fairly significant possibility that these assumptions won't always (or even most of the time) fit. No system as diverse as our world is entirely black-and-white. Much more of what we say and do falls under a shade of grey than either pure black or pure white.
There is no doubt that Mr. Dalrymple's studies have yielded a formidable insight into violence and the many bad things that we can do. It is also clear that these studies have shaped his view of the world. It is understandable.. and probably logical.. but that doesn't mean it is the only valid view of the world; that we as a species.. and as individual people.. are not "basically good".
It has been my experience that there ARE many people who are "basically good". How are people who read Mr. Dalrymple's work supposed to resolve this conflict; a conflict between their experiences (which, more often than not, are far more positive than Mr. Dalrymple's) and his experiences? If the message is that there are people in the world who commit horrible acts of violence and are purely malevolent, I'd say that it's entirely obvious. I don't walk down the street and assume that no harm can come to me from anyone... but I also don't assume that everyone is, at their core, actively violent and evil.
Mark: "No system as diverse as our world is entirely black-and-white."
And nobody said that it was. This is the standard straw man of relativism:
taking any non-apologetic statement as wild absolutism, as in:
Me: Steak tastes better than maggots.
Relativist: Oh yeah! Well, the Pago Pago tribe of central Africa actually
prefers maggots to steak. So you're wrong!
The relativist's goal here is not intellectual. It is to burden speech and
thought. The goal is to abuse our social rules to twist my thinking into
rubbish like:
"I think that most people prefer steak to maggots. At least, most people in
my culture. Or really I should just say that the people I've met, within my
limited experience, prefer steak to maggots--within my own American,
meat-normative, gustatory paradigm. I mean, at least I assume that the
people I've met prefer steak to maggots. I've never really asked them.
Maybe I should just say that I, personally, prefer steak to maggots, just
speaking for myself. But then, come to think of it, I've never really tried
maggots. I mean, they look gross, but I'm just assuming that I wouldn't
like the taste. So maybe I don't really know if I would prefer maggots over
steak."
You can think that way if you like, Mark. Tell me how the maggots taste.
In the meantime, I'll simply reject out of hand the idea that I must choke
my every statement with apologies, qualifications, and disclaimers to ensure
that no listener can feign idiocy and claim to have misunderstood me.
Mark: "There is no doubt that Mr. Dalrymple's studies have yielded a
formidable insight . . . but that doesn't mean it is the only valid view of
the world"
Again, you're inventing straw men. He didn't say what you're accusing him
of saying. I think that his view is correct in the sense that it is more
accurate than any other competing view. But you knew that already, didn't
you?
"It has been my experience that there ARE many people who are "basically
good". How are people who read Mr. Dalrymple's work supposed to resolve
this conflict; a conflict between their experiences (which, more often than
not, are far more positive than Mr. Dalrymple's) and his experiences?"
Dalrymple discusses this in some detail in Life at the Bottom. The
intellectuals who support the abolition of social norms do so from relative
safety. They preach it, but they don't live it. Dalrymple treated those
who lived it, who were mired in it, and reported its practical results.
BB: And no one said that ANY non-apologetic statement is an example of "wild absolutism".
As for your steak and maggots ruminations... all I can say is that your lengthy example of relativism could've been shortened to: "I much prefer steak to maggots, but that's just me"... but that wouldn't have sounded as absurd as your lengthy diatribe... so you used the lengthier version.
BB said: "I think that his view is correct in the sense that it is more
accurate than any other competing view."
There it is... you used the magic phrase: "I think". What's wrong with using that phrase more often?
BB said: "The
intellectuals who support the abolition of social norms do so from relative
safety. They preach it, but they don't live it."
You don't know that... maybe you should've added "I think" to that as well.
Mark: "There it is... you used the magic phrase: "I think". What's wrong with using that phrase more often?"
What's the value in saying it all the time? Why is it so important to you that people constantly defend themselves against the obviously bogus charge of wild absolutism--even before it's made? You know what my sentence meant. Everyone knows what it meant. So why insist on the constant groveling?
It must be a social goal, not an intellectual one. The point of pressuring people to constantly inject statements like, "I think," "of course, that's just my opinion," "It just seems to me that maybe," and so on is to effectively make them swear allegiance to relativism. It's a conversational loyalty pledge that amounts to:
"Please don't think of me as one of those narrow-minded absolutist bigots that I've heard exist somewhere. I swear that I'm a good, soft-minded silly-putty person with barely enough confidence to assert a preference for chocolate over vanilla ice cream, and certainly without the temerity to assert that any given statement is actually true in some global sense. At least, I think so. Is that OK?"
You may think that my steak-and-maggots monologue is an exaggeration, but I've heard people talk that way--and think that way. It's precisely what relativists want. The point of relativism is not to make thought more precise or efficient. It's the opposite. The point is to make people grovel. It's to prevent them from thinking, to suspend them in a state of perpetual uncertainty.
It sounds reasonable to say: "Don't say or think anything unless you're absolutely certain of it." But since there's very little than anyone can be absolutely certain of, those who try to hold that belief will say and think as little as possible. The few thoughts that they manage to eke out will be weak and twisted under the weight of all the apologies, like Harrison Bergeron in the Kurt Vonnegut story.
Your generic relativist arguments could apply to nearly anything. You can always say, "Yeah, but somebody else disagrees," or, "He didn't qualify his ideas to an infinite level of precision, so he might be a drooling absolutist."
You know what Dalrymple is trying to say. You're just trying to avoid it. If you think he's wrong, then articulate exactly how and why he wrong. But don't just dismiss him because he didn't wallow in enough self-doubt to satisfy the unattainable relativist standard.
"The fact that a believer is happier than a skeptic is no more to the point than the fact that a drunken man is happier than a sober one. The happiness of credulity is a cheap and dangerous quality." - George Bernard Shaw
BB said: "It must be a social goal, not an intellectual one. The point of pressuring people to constantly inject statements like, "I think," "of course, that's just my opinion," "It just seems to me that maybe," and so on is to effectively make them swear allegiance to relativism. It's a conversational loyalty pledge..."
I couldn't care less if you swear allegiance to relativism or anything else.
BB said: "You may think that my steak-and-maggots monologue is an exaggeration, but I've heard people talk that way--and think that way. It's precisely what relativists want. The point of relativism is not to make thought more precise or efficient. It's the opposite. The point is to make people grovel. It's to prevent them from thinking, to suspend them in a state of perpetual uncertainty."
You've heard people talk and think that way? That's too bad. I'll bet you dollars to donuts, though, that those people are few and far between. Making thought more precise is exactly the point of relativism. When you acknowledge the possibility of error, especially in reference to large groups, you more precisely and accurately represent reality. For example, the statement: "Steak tastes better than maggots" is not as accurate as "Steak tastes better than maggots to most people". Why do you think scientists, more often than not, phrase their discoveries and conclusions in terms of "As far as we know", etc.
BB said: "Your generic relativist arguments could apply to nearly anything. You can always say, "Yeah, but somebody else disagrees," or, "He didn't qualify his ideas to an infinite level of precision, so he might be a drooling absolutist.""
Yes, they can be applied to a great many things. We should always be skeptical of broad claims and sweeping generalizations.
BB said: "You know what Dalrymple is trying to say. You're just trying to avoid it. If you think he's wrong, then articulate exactly how and why he wrong. But don't just dismiss him because he didn't wallow in enough self-doubt to satisfy the unattainable relativist standard."
I've already stated how and why I think his decision to never "believe in the fundamental goodness of man," is the wrong decision to make.
Mark: "For example, the statement: "Steak tastes better than maggots" is not as accurate as "Steak tastes better than maggots to most people"."
They're equally accurate. No reasonable person who hears "Steak tastes better than maggots" imagines it to be a declaration of some unalterable law of nature. Within a culture and a context, no one will misunderstand the statement. It's perfectly clear and accurate.
What's more, it's efficient. Accuracy carries costs, and those costs are not always justified. It's more accurate to describe colors in terms of wavelengths of light, but it's also more complicated, and in most cases the extra complication is unnecessary.
The purpose of language is efficiency, not accuracy. It is to convey meaning with acceptable accuracy with a minimum of effort. The kinds of relativistic disclaimers you want introduce useless accuracy at a heavy linguistic cost.
When I was in college, the most liberal professors insisted on gender-inclusive pronouns in student papers. If you didn't turn every 'he' into a 'he/she' or 's/he', then your grade went down half a letter or more.
The pretext for this was accuracy. 'He' by itself was unclear, or so the explanation went. Some feminist somewhere might misinterpret the statement as apply to males only, causing confusion.
But that was an obvious lie. No one was confused by a gender-neutral 'he'. The point of the demand was social. It was to drill anxiety over gender issues into our skulls. It was a conversational loyalty oath, just like Nazis giving each other their special greeting or Soviet citizens calling each other comrade. They did the same kind of thing in the French Revolution, and in many other times and places, I'm sure. They pushed day-to-day linguistic demands on people to make everyone wear their politics on their sleeve, and to help drill the connected ideas into people's heads. Make people say "Long live the king" often enough, and eventually some of them may actually come to believe that they want the king to live a long time.
Mark, I’m not accusing you of any of these ulterior motives. I assume, for the sake of politeness, that you sincerely believe in truth relativism. You seem like a very sincere and thoughtful guy. But you’re mistaken in thinking that these generic relativist attacks contribute anything of substance to a conversation. The simple fact that they’re so broadly applicable should demonstrate that. It’s fine to say that we should be skeptical of broad claims and sweeping generalization. But if people aren’t allowed any generality, then they can’t say anything at all.
Mark: “Making thought more precise is exactly the point of relativism.”
Granting for argument that that’s its goal, does it accomplish that goal? In your experience, do relativists think more or less clearly than non-relativists? Most of the relativists I’ve ever met are academicians who scarcely bother to think at all. This doesn’t surprise me, as relativism is at its core a contradiction: the assertion as absolute truth that there is no absolute truth. Most people who try to digest that logical contradiction will naturally have trouble thinking clearly.
But perhaps your experience is different. Maybe you could help me out on this. I have a particular interest in relativism, but I’m not sure where to find well written books defending it. Do you know of any you could recommend?
BB: You always do a great job breaking things down to their essentials. It's threads like these that make me doubt my passion for tax reform....
Well, I believe in being accurate... and when I try to be accurate I also try to find the most succinct way of doing so.
A leader without any followers is simply someone going for a walk, and so talking for the sake of talking serves no purpose. Your dissertation on the ulterior motives for relativism serve no purpose, since you said afterward that you're not accusing me of having such motives. If you're trying to address a larger argument against relativism and want to use those as examples, fine... but perhaps that would be better utilized in a separate argument.... not one addressed to me. I cannot explain away what other people in your life have done with regards to relativism.
BB said: "In your experience, do relativists think more or less clearly than non-relativists?"
They think no more or less clearly than anyone else, in my experience. I think clearly on any given issue.. and I think about a lot of issues. It has been my experience that interest in a particular topic is what leads to thinking about it, regardless of whether that thought is rooted in a relativist or absolutist approach. To be sure, there are plenty of people who don't think about big-ticket items in our society and world... but what's not for sure is whether they're absolutists or relativists.
BB said: "I have a particular interest in relativism, but I’m not sure where to find well written books defending it. Do you know of any you could recommend?"
I'd say it's a given that relativism is a particular interest of yours.. but, unfortunately, I am unable to provide any documentation on it.