Christopher asked:

My “philosophy 101” textbook states that Nietzsche’s conception of the supreme human is a passionate person who has his/her passions under control. This may be so, but this seems to me like pretty low standards for the most supreme people of the human race. Obviously this statement is a generalization as well, but I would imagine that his vision of the Ubermensch would have a lot to do with power. This leads to my question of what kind of power? Power over what/whom? Power over our passions has already been stated, but there has to be more than that, doesn’t there? My interpretation is that the Ubermensch would not be Christians, for example, but a Christian can be passionate and have their passions under control, so there is a contradiction.

Answer by Martin Jenkins

Christopher, Karl Jaspers noted that Nietzsche’s writings are full of contradictions. I think it is because he writes in a style that is a ‘flow of consciousness’, feeling now this, now that – echoing the flow of life itself.

Power

Yes the Ubermensch is to do with power. Yet Power not in an instrumental sense of power to use, abuse, employ. Power is Macht in German. The root Mak is found in the English word ‘make’, as in to make something. So ‘Power’ could be interpreted a creative, affirmative ontology and not a reductive one of instrumental domination.

Power is immanent, it is present in all manifestations of life, human and non-human; it is present in all the drives which constitute life from the weakest and lowest, to the strongest and highest. [Beyond Good and Evil #36] The more Power Macht a drive has, the stronger it is. The greater the amount of intensive drives that constitute a human being, the greater the degree of Will to Power possessing a person.

Christianity

Nietzsche proposes that the majority of human beings suffer from sickness. Their drives are in chaos, anarchy and this leaves then exhausted, depressed and so weary of life itself. [See also The Problem of Socrates in Twilight of the Idols]. Expedients are found which address this sickness. Nietzsche identifies one such expedient as Christianity. It gave the sick the beliefs by which they could order their drives, expressing some but repressing others. Subsuming themselves within the doctrines of what became Christianity, people engaged in Willing – the orientation, galvanising of drives in one direction which would otherwise be in chaos [BGE #188]. Willing appears to be the key for as Nietzsche writes in On the Genealogy of Morality at the end of the final Treatise: For man would even will nothingness than not will at all.

As described in BGE #200, there have generally been two solutions to give order to the chaos of drives in those that require it. The first is that of weakness. Escape from and an ending to the war that one is the panacea found in rest, lack of disturbance, a flight from the world of drives into another – a ‘Sabbath of Sabbaths’ as St Augustine termed this, which was his and Christianity’s solution.

The other is not to negate and suppress the raging drives, it is to value them as a stimulus to life; to control, outwit and incorporate them. Then ‘what emerges are those amazing, incomprehensible and unthinkable ones, those human riddles destined for victory and seduction.’ Alcibiades, Caesar, the Hohenstaufen Frederick II and Leonardo da Vinci are cited by Nietzsche as examples of this approach.

Nietzsche Contra Christianity

As you note Christopher, Christian’s can be passionate yet master such passions. So this is nothing exceptional. However, Nietzsche believed that this type of mastery was a symptom of decadence precluding more powerful types who would equally master their drives but – drives of a greater and higher magnitude and complexity.

Christianity was a response from the Priests – themselves sick – to the general sickness of humanity. Decadence as Christianity’s type of morphology – a shaping of the drives – cultivated a human being lesser than s/he otherwise could be. Ascending drives were condemned as ‘Evil’. Being for oneself, being the power that one is, is condemned as immoral. Meekness, humility, putting others always before oneself and the annihilation of human difference under equality before God, stunts humanity. A general levelling occurs which is contrary to life. For life is Will to Power and Will to Power manifests itself in varying degees in different people. To suppress this is to decapitate life itself.

So whereas mastery might be practiced, it is practiced at different levels. The Ubermensch/New Philosoper Creators are possessed by stronger, higher drives. By their very intensity, they will rise above and beyond restrictive the restrictive egalitarianism of Christianity and its secular descendents of Modern Ideas, which will conflict with their endeavours. For Nietzsche believed that a healthy society was an Aristocratic one.

So the contradiction you cite would hold only amongst equals. Nietzsche’s opposes equality between those who are unequal.

Martin Jenkins received the ISFP Fellowship for his dissertation ‘Aristocratic Radicalism or Anarchy? An Examination of Nietzsche’s Doctrine of Will to Power’. He is a Pathways Mentor.

 

Jawaid asked:

What is the future of religion?

Answer by Craig Skinner

There’s no sharp distinction as to what counts as religion and what doesn’t.

Commonest is shared belief in an omniscient, omnipotent, eternal Creator, worthy of worship and interested in us, plus rituals affirming allegiance. In short, Theism (as in Judaism, Christianity, Islam). Deism, polytheism, panentheism, and much else also count. And some religions recognize no supernatural entities, although I find this use of the word confusing.

My guess is that religion will be alive and well for the indefinite future.

I have two main reasons for this view:

1. Religion is a deep-seated feature of human nature.

2. Whether God or gods exist is undecidable, and a view either way is reasonable.

To deal with each point:

1. Religion exists in all societies at all times. It appears to be an innate, evolved feature of humans. The front-runner naturalistic explanations are:

(a) it promotes tribal solidarity and moral order, giving the group a survival advantage in inter-group conflict or competition (David Sloan Wilson’s view).

(b) it is an extension of the brain’s agent-detector device, a hyperactive agent detector device (HADD) as Dennett terms it. The idea here is that overdiagnosis of agency is a naturally selected, safe default option: better to think the stripey pattern in the long grass is a tiger and to run off, than to think the more likely option that it is just a trick of the light; we hear a creak at night and instantly suspect an intruder etc. By extension, we impute thunder, rain to specialist gods, crop failure to angry gods, ultimately all of creation to an almighty god.

Whether (a) or (b), or both, or some other explanation is correct, we don’t know, but future research may clarify.

Of course, existence of an evolved tendency to religion doesn’t help us with (2) – atheists are happy with the Darwinian explanation, so are theists (evolution is how God has gone about creating us including our capacity for knowing and relating to God).

2. Theism and atheism are both rational views.

Some fundamentalists (e.g. Watch Tower and Bible Tract Society) tell us atheism is the devil’s work, others (e.g. Dawkins) tell us theism is irrational, even delusional.

My view (and I think it is shared by most theist and atheist philosophers) is that, in the light of the evidence, belief either way is a reasonable all-things-considered stance.

The a priori Ontological arguments are unconvincing. But, in the light of accepted science, modern Cosmological and Design arguments make Theism at least as likely as atheism.

I would particularly cite:

* the existence of a universe (as opposed to absolutely nothing).
* the fact that the universe had a beginning (Big Bang). If it were eternal, like God (allegedly), no startup cause need be sought. But science tells us it isn’t.
* the order of the universe (it might have been chaotic with no natural laws)
* the fine-tuning (for emergence of life) of the constants of nature.
* the existence of conscious minds (the ‘hard problem’ for physicalism).

I am well aware of naturalistic suggestions to account for these facts (quantum fluctuations producing universes; multiverses, eternally inflationary or otherwise, coupled with the anthropic principle; ’emergence’ of consciousness to be explained in due course; etc). All speculative. Some may be on the right track. My point is that theism is as plausible a hypothesis as atheism in the light of the findings of modern science. And note that God is central in this theistic view, not a ‘God of the gaps’.

Many theists point to their personal religious experience (feeling God’s presence). I have had no such experience, and that may be why I am less impressed with such evidence.

So, good and bad things will continue, both in the name of religion and without it. Some extremists will enforce views and harm dissenters. Moderates will urge mutual tolerance of differing religious views. Agnostics may agonize or just shrug their shoulders. I see no prospect of religion withering away (it isn’t just primitive superstition as militant New Atheists declare). Nor prospect of any universally-held world religion. God, if existent, may know the ultimate position, but if God really gives us freedom to accept or reject him as we choose, maybe even an omnipotent being can’t then be sure how it will go with humanity.

Craig Skinner at PhiloSophos.com

 

Darlin asked:

What is your reflection about, ‘Philosophy is a battle against the bewitchment of our intelligence by means of language.’?

Answer by Shaun Williamson

This is a remark from Wittgenstein’s Philosophical Investigations. It is a reminder of what he thought the task of philosophy should be.

In his later work Wittgenstein thought the following:

1. There are no philosophical truths or true philosophical theorems.

2. There are no solutions to philosophical problems.

3. There are no real philosophical problems.

4. The task of philosophy is to help us to disentangle our superstitions about our own language and to stop us thinking philosophically.

The only question here is, is Wittgenstein right? If he is right then we cannot prove that he is right, it is a matter of experience. If you find Wittgenstein’s method helps you to dissolve a philosophical problem so that you no longer feel the need to solve it then you will know that he was was right.

Shaun Williamson developed the Ask a Philosopher cgi script question.pl. He did his postgraduate studies on the philosophy of Wittgenstein.

 

Ryne asked:

Hawking says that even what we take reality to be in science is shaped by theory. A couple of my friends are going back and forth as to if this is true or false. What’s your opinion?

Answer by Craig Skinner

It is true that we take reality to be as our best theories suggest, and its entities to be those postulated by such theories. And so we should.

Scientists intend and hope that their theories do describe reality. And, if a theory is well-tested and generally accepted, we do indeed take reality to be as the theory says.

Furthermore, I think reality often is as we so take it. In short, I think some of our best theories are true.

Of course, no theory can be proven to be true (a later improved theory may explain all that our current one does and also things our current one doesn’t). Nor, strictly, can any theory be proven to be false (all theories are tested along with auxiliary hypotheses as a package, and we can always salvage the theory when one of its predictions proves incorrect, by discarding an auxiliary hypothesis). Science, unlike mathematics, is not in the business of proof.

But don’t let these philosophical points persuade you to the view that just as past theories were mostly wrong (stock examples: phlogiston theory; caloric theory; the luminiferous ether; Newton’s gravity replaced by Einstein’s), so our present theories will eventually turn out also to be wrong, and therefore what we take reality to be is always wrong. Some current theories will turn out to be wrong (see below), but with others there is just no chance of this.

For example, it wont turn out that DNA is not the genetic material in cells or that the coding for amino acids doesn’t depend on the base sequence along the DNA strands. Nor will the periodic table of the elements, and its account of chemical properties depending on the number and arrangement of electrons in the atoms, turn out to be wrong. Nor will it be shown that planets don’t orbit the Sun in elliptical paths. Or that the Sun (and other stars) is not a huge nuclear fusion reactor.

On the other hand, very fundamental physical and cosmological theories are less secure, and leave us unsure as to how to take reality to be:

What are the ultimate constituents of matter? Successive versions of atomism have suggested tiny indivisible corpuscles, then mostly-empty-space atoms with tiny nuclei and shells of electrons, then nuclei composed of protons/neutrons, then these in turn composed of quarks, now speculations (no good theory yet) that all these (and other) apparently fundamental particles are composed of miniscule strings or loops, or even that ultimately they are all just parts of immaterial fields, in turn reducible to numbers or sets so that matter isn’t even material.

What is the reality behind quantum mechanics? Is consciousness necessary to collapse probability wave functions and produce definite states of affairs, or is there no collapse and instead endless proliferation of Everettian parallel realities, or are things yet some other way. We just don’t know.

Furthermore, our two best fundamental physical theories, general relativity and quantum mechanics, each wonderfully well-confirmed in its domain, are incompatible at the level of the very small, so that one or both must be wrong, and the search for a quantum theory of gravity continues.

To focus on the cosmos now, rather than the microworld, The Big Bang origin of our universe is a well-established theory, so that we can safely say we live in an expanding universe containing visible matter, energy, so-far-mysterious dark matter, and maybe even-more-mysterious dark energy. But as to whether our universe is the only one or merely one of a vast ensemble (multiverse) we don’t know. Neither do we know what set off the Big Bang, nor why a universe exists rather than nothing at all.

So, whilst certainty, proof and infallibility elude us, we are definitely justified in taking many aspects of reality to be as theory says, although there are, and maybe always will be, some aspects beyond our grasp.

I have dealt with reality as being the natural world including the biosphere and the human species.

As to whether reality includes supernatural entities, that is another important matter, but not one for science, although findings of science are relevant to the question. And philosophy-savvy scientists contribute much to the theism/atheism debates (although I am reluctant to count Hawking, even less so Dawkins, as being in this category)

Craig Skinner at PhiloSophos.com

 

Kirby asked:

What is wrong with this statement:

PII (standard definition):

If X and Y share ALL their properties (indiscernible), they are identical.

It is generally held that this definition is trivially true, so PII is redefined as:

If X and Y share all QUALITATIVE properties, they are identical.

I do not understand why the original definition is trivially true rather than just true, and I do not see any justification for the redefinition. This seems to be a case of taking a perfectly good principle, unjustifiably redefining, then arguing that the principle, as redefined, is false.

When PII is re-defined, a major argument for its falseness is that we can conceive of there being two, therefore nonidentical, objects that are qualitatively indiscernible. So spatial and/or temporal dispersal becomes a good argument against redefined PII. But, if we stay with the original definition of PII, the spatial and/or temporal dispersal argument is a major argument in favor of PII. Under the original PII, perceiving two objects in different regions of space is prima facie evidence of nonidentity; if they are in different regions of space at a time, they are not identical.

Answer by Jürgen Lawrenz

I disagree with Geoffrey Klempner’s claim in his answer to this question that the PII of Leibniz is a purely logical principle, not to be misunderstood as pertaining to the physical universe. The very example quoted at the beginning (the leaves in the garden) disproves that supposition, by showing that Leibniz was (without room for hedging about) concerned with things that exist.

I also don’t consider the example of the pennies to be valid. It is an intuition pump deliberately engineered to produce a false conclusion. Where do these ‘logical’ pennies come from? If they’re not ‘in space’, then they don’t exist and the issue of PII never enters. In fact it would have been better to use two drops of water, which is at least an experience we are all familiar with. Then the PII has something of merit to contribute, namely confronting us with our notion of ‘1’.

The point with regard to Leibniz is precisely that the purely nominal status of space requires the concept of a volume to be replaced with the relational configuration of existents. These existents create what we call ‘space’ in their mutual relations, as something addressed to our perceptions. Accordingly the whole issue revolves around actualised monads, i.e. existents. The theoretical matrix for this is the multiple worlds in God’s mind prior to his choice of implementing ‘the best’ of these possible worlds.

It is easy to fall into the trap set for us by the likes of Everett or Wheeler that the unactualised world(s) in the collapse of a quantum wave train may be actual as simultaneous but unperceived worlds. This is another ‘logical’ game, conveniently forgetting (or disregarding) that the whole wave train is actual and terminated by the experimenter, who thus gains sight of only the instantaneous remnant of the wave, the rest being fatally disrupted and dispersed. Next time it rains, I invite you to make the analogous macroscopic experiment of inserting a piece of cardboard in the rain. Except in this case you get the whole picture, not a fragment per analogiam!

This comparison should alert us to the problem of dimensions, which as far as I can see is persistently kept out of sight. Leibniz arrived at his monads and his spatial doctrine from the recognition that all monads are a species of force (be careful not to read ‘energy’ here!): accordingly they are ‘simple, having no parts’ — in our language zero dimensional. Thus two or two trillion monads would occupy the same space, i.e. no space, to a Newtonian observer. Which brings us to the essence of the doctrine, namely the perceptions of the monads, each perceiving the others as ‘others’ and adjudging those which can only partially be perceived (because they are obscured by the nearer ones) as spatially more distant. But always ‘in its perceptions’. This is the basis for the PII thesis. As monads collectivise, each such collective comprising an existent would be influenced by its dominant monad to perceive other existents as spatially separate.

So in Leibniz’s canon, the PII is a physical, not a logical argument. It is physical not primarily because the term ‘matter’ is especially meaningful in the context, but because the species of force that binds collectives of monadic force together produce loci of force that are perceived by monads as coherent. If it is not coherent then there is no existent. Then the PII does not apply, nor does it apply to the unactualised monads that didn’t make it into God’s chosen world.

Obviously there is more to it than I’ve depicted here. Not least, perhaps, whether Leibniz’s God is dispensable to the argument or not. I believe it makes no difference if God is left out or replaced by a residual electric potential. ‘Look you, the situation is the same as in Macedonia’. Whatever exists, is subject to the Identity of Indiscernibles. And Leibniz’s monadology is about existence, about ‘why is there something rather than nothing?’ The world created by his God is such that no two identical objects can ‘occupy’ the same space because there is no space. But the moment we speak of relations, we need relata; and even in logic it is impossible to marry one relatum to itself!

Jürgen Lawrenz at PhiloSophos.com

 

Shane asked:

Could you go over David Hume’s Is-Ought problem and its application to morality?

Answer by Craig Skinner

Hume raises the is-ought issue in a brief passage which I quote selectively:

‘In every system of morality…I have always remark’d, that the author proceeds for some time in the ordinary way of reasoning…., or makes observations concerning human affairs; when of a sudden….instead of is and is not, I meet with no proposition that is not connected with an ought or an ought not. This change is imperceptible; but is…of the last consequence…for what seems…inconceivable, how this new relation can be a deduction from others which are entirely different…’ [A Treatise of Human Nature (Book 3,’Of Morals’), 3.1.1.27 (1740)].

In short Hume points out that facts (what is) can’t logically entail a value judgment (what ought to be). Reasoning from facts to value, a deductive argument from factual premises to judgmental conclusion, is invalid.

Of course an argument to an ought conclusion can be valid if we have an ought premise (with or without factual ones).

An example will illustrate:

P. Torturing animals for fun causes much suffering (a fact, an is statement)
C. We ought not to torture animals for fun (a moral value judgment, an ought statement)

This argument is invalid, exhibiting the is-ought fallacy.

To make it valid we need to add an ought premise (P2) as below:

P1. Torturing animals for fun causes much suffering
P2. Causing much suffering for fun is wrong
C. We ought not to torture animals for fun (it is wrong)

And herein lies the application to morality – what is the justification for the ought premise, in this case the justification for ‘causing much suffering for fun is wrong’.

Different moral theories suggest different justifications:

* feeling (Hume)
* reason (Kant)
* eudaimonia (Aristotle)
* consequences (Mill)
* common agreement (Rawls, Scanlon).
* divine command

To say a little about each:

Hume thinks reason can’t move us to action, only feeling, and that good action is driven by our innate moral intuitions or sentiments. We just feel that torturing for fun is wrong, and this is reinforced when we observe others’ horror and repulsion at the idea.

For Kant, it is wrong because we would thereby treat a fellow rational being as a mere means, not as an end; and torturing for fun is not a maxim a rational being could wish to be universal.

For Aristotle, it is wrong because it damages our soul, it prevents genuine flourishing, it goes against the proper ends or purposes of humans.

For Mill, we should do what makes for the greatest happiness of the greatest number, and this wont include torture for fun (there are subtle issues to be brought out here but now is not the time).

For Rawls and Scanlon, refraining from torture for fun is something all reasonable citizens would agree to, or no reasonable citizen would object to.

On divine command theory, God tells us torturing for fun is wrong (of course this just shows the weakness of the theory, for if we thought, instead, that God did command us to torture for fun, we wouldn’t think it right, we would think God wrong).

Finally, the Is-Ought fallacy is sometimes called Hume’s Law or Hume’s Guillotine, which is fair enough. But It is also sometimes referred to as the Naturalistic Fallacy (because it moves from nature (what is) to values), and this is confusing as that term is also used for attempts to define values in naturalistic terms, something Moore, with his ‘open question’ argument, unfairly accused Mill of doing in Mill’s account of Utilitarianism.

Craig Skinner at PhiloSophos.com