Wittgenstein: A Wonderful Life

Some of you may know it already; but it was new to me when I stumbled across it this morning--a 1989 BBC documentary about Wittgenstein's life, featuring, albeit briefly, Norman Malcolm. Not very exciting in terms of philosophical content, it does offer nice pictures from Wittgenstein's various homes.

Ready or not.

In the 1970s and 80s, Benjamin Libet, an American brain scientist, conducted a series of famous experiments. Instructed to carry out small, simple motor activities, such as pressing a button or flexing a finger, participants were placed in front of a clock with electrodes affixed to their scalps. During the experiment, the participants were asked to note the position of the arm of a clock when he or she was first aware of the urge to act. The experiments revealed an increase of electrical brain activity preceding the conscious decision to move by several hundred milliseconds. This subliminal brain activity was dubbed «readiness potential». While Libet himself has wavered somewhat in his interpretations of these findings, others unhesitatingly think this discovery has huge ramifications for our self-understanding. If volitional acts are initiated before we become aware of them, then we must be deluded when thinking our conscious «decisions» have any causal effect on what we do!

It may seem impossible to conclude otherwise. If electrical goings-on in our brans make our decisions, then in a sense we don't. But here one must not forget what a conclusion is in this context. The conclusion that we are not free is not a scientific discovery, but rather an interpretation of (or implications drawn from) certain scientific discoveries. Interpretation is a way of framing data, involving, at least tacitly, arguments based on some underlying assumptions. That human beings are mere neurological robots, therefore, is not an empirical fact, but rather the implications drawn from one possible interpretation of these facts. Am I then suggesting that this interpretation must be wrong? No. I only suggest that it is not obviously correct either. In other words, I am asking us to consider the possibility of reading Libet's data differently. How to read scientific discoveries, of course, cannot itself be a scientific question--at least not merely. This calls for philosophising.

Let us start by investigating why this gloomy conclusion may at first seem unavoidable.

Instinctively one might be alarmed to learn of the readiness potential. How unsettling that our brains decide for us! But as Wittgenstein once remarked, we often are struck by the wrong aspects of things: the important features escape our attention because of their familiarity (PI §129). Perhaps, then, the conclusion that subliminal brain activity diminishes the role of consciousness in human action seems so compelling only because we overlook something which is always before our eyes?

For example: There must be electrical goings-on in the brain all the time. Acknowledging this obvious fact should make some of the initial surprise ebb away. Electrical brain activity prior to conscious decisions is exactly what one should expect to find! After all, no brain activity is synonymous with brain death. Ok. But Libet did not merely record electrical humming in the brain—that, clearly, would be unstartling. What his experiments revealed was a significant increase of electrons firing some milliseconds prior to a conscious urge to act. Surely this warrants paying special attention to it, or am I denying that something imortant happens here? Well, not exactly. But if we take a closer look at one of Libet's graphs, will we not see the line going up and down all the time? And if that is the case, why single out this particular peak as particularly significant—rather than, say, regarding it as just another elevated stage in a normal pattern of fluctuations? Doesn't this peak seem rather randomly chosen? (Subsequent experiments have, in line with this logic, identified readiness potentials several seconds prior to any conscious urge to act.)

My intention with that rhetorical question is not to deny that a case can be made for «the compelling» conclusion, merely to emphasize that the case must indeed be made. One cannot simply take Libet’s assumptions for granted. Once his reading of the graph is seen for what it is, namely a reading, and the assumptions built into that reading are made explicit, then, my point is, we are positioned to see that other readings must be possible too.

But let us, for argument’s sake, grant Libet his reading of the graph's ultimate peak. Let us assume, then, that «readiness potential» was an established fact. Would this render conscious decisions causally ineffective in volitional human action?

Before stampeding towards that conclusion, one thing we should notice is how anemic are the concepts of action and decision with which Libet operates. A severely limited understanding of these human capacities is buit into his research design, making it unclear how much of human action actually is illuminated by Libet's research. Purposeless finger flexing and random button pushing are (at best) special instances of human action--if indeed «bodily movements» is not a better term for them than «human action». However we categorize it, the behaviour of Libet's subjects is quite unlike much of what we otherwise think of as human action. Furthermore, Libet’s experiments were purposely designed so as to make the timing of the movement irrelevant. The participants were to have no reason for preferring sooner over later. Some human actions may very well be like that—at least they were in Libet's artificial settings—but more often than not do we care about what to do and when to do it. To make a long story short: It will take a considerable amount of philosophical work on Libet’s part to make this convincing as a paradigmatic picture of human behaviour. (Which is needed for the implicit general rejection of conscious decisions to be plausible.)

And what does it mean to say that an action is «initiated»? Being clear on that point is of course crucial when reflecting on the implications of Libet's findings. The readiness potential is conceived as a brain activity initiating human action at a particular moment in time. But does it make sense (and if so, what sens does it make) to think of all volitional actions as subliminally initiated some milliseconds before they occur?

Sometimes we say that it took us time to make up our minds on what to do, suggesting a picture of a long inrun before a sudden take-off. A typical case would be the child who hesitates for a long time before suddenly ripping off a band-aid. Now, it seems plausible that certain happenings in the motor center of the brain—i.e. a «readiness potential»—can explain the sudden motion. But could it not also be argued that these electrical goings-on only mark the final stage of the initiation process? That the initiation of the initiation, as it were, began when the child first formed the intention to rip the band-aid off? Consider also planned actions. How much light does the readiness potential shed in such cases? Take, for example, someone who finally asks for his girlfriend’s hand in marriage. A lot of preparation has led up to this moment: For months he has deliberated on how best to approach it; he has considered different options for time and place—should he propose at midsummer and out at sea, or rather wait until her birthday when her favorite flowers blossom?; he has rehearsed the question (the exact formulation of which he has actually written down on a piece of paper in his pocket); he has booked a hotel suite; bought a ring, and today he has picked up a lovely bouquet of roses. If someone were to explain the time and manner in which he proposed in terms of electrical signals firing in his brain, then there are reasons—not empirical reasons perhaps, but certainly philosophical ones—for being sceptical about their approach. Of course this man would never have performed as he did but for electrical firings in his brain—but, this surely is a very thin explanation, and miles away from what we under all but very limited circumstances would consider an answer to the question of what prompted him to propose when and how he did.

Holiday Surprise.

Last night I was informed by the organizers that my post had won 3QD's Top Quark Prize for 2015. What a surprise!

Happy New Year everyone!

Slow corruption.

Regular readers of this blog will recognize this text. A version of it was posted last year. Rewritten and translated, I now re-post it in the hope that it might qualify as a contender in 3quarksdaily's philosophy competition. (This may be my last chance of fame and fortune.)

***

When a woman last year confessed that she would not know what to do if her fetus were diagnosed with Down’s syndrome, Richard Dawkins promptly replied: "Abort it and try again. It would be immoral to bring it into the world if you have the choice." Reactions came from all corners of cyberspace, and Dawkins was later forced to explain himself. Tweeting his opinion had probably been unwise; a medium that allows a little more space for reasoning would have been a better choice. His mea culpa went no further than that. He admitted that he should have expressed himself differently; but as for the opinion expressed, he saw no faults with that: "Apparently I'm a horrid monster for recommending what actually happens to the great majority of Down Syndrome foetuses. They are aborted." I believe, however, that this distinction between the form and the content of his message is less clear-cut than Dawkins believes. People reacted against the tone of his "recommendation" because of the attitude it expressed (toward the "content").

Dawkins is right; the majority of these pregnancies are in fact terminated. In Norway this happens in 80-90% of the cases. But that was not his point, nor was he merely expressing agreement with the majority; Dawkins claimed that there could be no serious doubt about what is the right thing to do in such a situation. In this respect Dawkins agrees with the most militant anti-abortionist. This black-and-white picture is unhelpful in a number of ways. First, as with anti-abortionist slogans, his "recommendation" is likely to appeal only to those already share his view. Blind certainty, whether it be political slogans from the militant right or moralizing tweets from a grey-haired male professor, is hardly the sort advice a pregnant woman in a moral dilemma needs. In fact, there is a danger that she will experience this as undue pressure from on-high (an allegation Dawkins tried, though not convincingly, to wriggle away from since he had portrayed her “dilemma” as being a choice between morality and immorality). Finally, we may fear what discussions, such as the one initiated by Richard Dawkins, might do to our moral sensitivity. If Down’s syndrome becomes a topic of public debate, what does this say about—and what might it do to—our view of human beings with this syndrome? Might we be heading for a society where deselecting such fetuses increasingly will appear unproblematic?

It is particularly these latter questions I will discuss here. The discussion flared up in Norway when Aksel Braanen Sterri, a young social scientist, published an essay in a prominent weekly outlet with the deliberately provoking title "A Vindication of the Sorting Society". His argument relied partly on the observation "…that all parents want their children to be born as healthy as possible and to have all the opportunities other children have." At least good parents do. If prospective parents expressed wishes of children with Down’s or other syndromes, we would question their motives. But it is problematic to model our thinking in this context too closely on the healthy/sick distinction. "What would be so terrible with a society without Down’s syndrome," Braanen Sterri asked, addressing everyone worried about a possible sorting society. "Every medical progress means the danger of eradicating a disease that some identify with." But who sheds tears over the eradication of polio and tuberculosis today? Why assume it will be different with Down’s syndrome?

Well, because Down’s syndrome is different, according to Marte Wexelsen Goksøyr. "You cannot get rid of this condition without killing the person. That's the difference. I am myself a woman with Down’s syndrome. I am not sick; I have an extra chromosome in my cells." You don’t recover from having Down’s syndrome; there are no cures for it. This fact alone, of course, does not distinguish Down’s syndrome from a disease—there are, after all, many diseases still without a cure—but it does make a difference that we cannot because of this fact describe Wexelsen Goksøyr as having an incurable condition. To say that she is "incurably affected" by Down’s syndrome sounds just as awkward as to say that she as a woman is "incurably affected" by femininity—a choice of words suitable only if one’s aim is to make a joke on her expense. Refusing to view Down’s syndrome as a disease, Wexelsen Goksøyr prefers to describe her kind as a special type of human beings. Put differently: Braanen Sterri’s question shall not be answered, but rather reformulated. The question is not what would be so terrible with a society without Down’s syndrome, but rather what would be so terrible with a society without people with Down’s syndrome.

To be honest, I would prefer to stop here. I don't fancy addressing this topic. This confession probably will offend some. There are those who believe an intellectual should be ready to discuss anything. True, open-mindedness is an intellectual virtue; but it must not be so open that one's brain might fall out. A moral community is partly defined by what is not discussed. In Norway, for example, we no longer deliberate on the pros and cons of forced sterilization of Gypsies. But such values are not set in stone. Ali Esbati, a well-known journalist and politician, recently announced that he "is fleeing" to Sweden because of the tone in the political debate in Norway. A significant difference between the two countries, he writes, "is the way in which immigrants are described in the media and in the public debate." Since 2008, it has become commonplace to talk about the immigration problem in Norway, and as Esbati explains: "Constantly seeing oneself described in problem-terms does make a difference." Discussing the pros and cons of having people with Down’s syndrome among us will possibly have a similarly corrupting effect on our culture. And the pro-arguments are no better in this respect than the cons--both contribute to establish this as a legitimate question. That is why I would prefer giving the issue the silent treatment; but I am afraid it is too late for that. Turning my back on it for fear of disgracing myself and degrading those concerned would hardly accomplish anything at all. The topic has already contaminated our public debate--or in less moralizing terms: The chances that an appeal to decency will succeed in silencing the debate are slim since our sense of decency is already adapting to this debate. The questions are out there, discussed in all seriousness by decent people in the columns of distinguished newspapers.

I have sympathies with Wexelsen Goksøyr’s stragegy of rephrasing the question; refusing to discuss it in medical terms, but rather insisting on this being a question about people. Asking what would be so terrible with a society without a certain type of human beings (as opposed to a society liberated from a certain syndrome), does at least strip the possible future we are asked to consider of some of its immediate appeal. But how are we to proceed from this reformed question? Very often the debate gets side-tracked on the issue quality of life. Both Braanen Sterri and Dawkins claim that “healthy” people in general live better lives than most people with Down’s syndrome do, and welcome full-scale fetus selection because it allegedly will improve society’s overall life quality if all fetuses with Down’s were replaced by “healthy” ones. The opposition denies that removing people with Down’s will have that effect. People with Down’s syndrome, according to Wexelsen Goksøyr, often lead happy and fulfilling lives. Why is this a side-track? Because, behind this disagreement lies the uniting assumption that happiness is the central issue here. But if we assumed that people with Down’s on average were less happy than others, would this settle the matter? Of course not. The true problem here is not finding the most efficient way to aggregate happiness—whatever, if anything, that means—but finding ways to express our vision of human dignity and to understand which society serves that vision best. I sympathize with those who answer the reformed question by appealing to human diversity. If certain types of people—children with Down’s syndrome, left-handed people or people who love skiing—no longer were among us, we would live in a less diverse society. "It takes their kind to make all kinds," as the saying goes. A good society, on this vision, is a society which lets a thousand flowers bloom.

Wexelsen Goksøyr does appeal to the core values of the tolerant and inclusive society in her protests, and she does so with an existential force which commands us to listen. "I belong to a minority group in Norway," she writes, and one must be quite tone-deaf not to notice her existential horror at the prospect of "it [becoming] a state project to eradicate [this group], to sort them out." Currently Norwegian legislators are contemplating to introduce ultrasound screenings during the 12th week of pregnancy as a standard, so describing reality this way is not entirely unfair. (But here it is easy to err. Wexelsen Goksøyr lets herself be carried away by her own horror when she draws parallels between this screening program and previous cases of ethnic cleansing. "To wipe out these troublesome people [the Gypsies], to sort them out, children were taken from their parents and put in orphanages. Women were forcibly sterilized, some put in asylums and some lobotomized." If this were the methods by which Braanen Sterri's Down’s-free society were to be accomplished, then his apologia would hardly even provoke (let alone be printed in a reputable weekly). Such practices will not be reintroduced into Norwegian policy anytime soon. And yet, people with Down’s syndrome understandably feel personally threatened by these proposals.)

Obviously, as Richard Dawkins stressed, there is a difference between suggesting that a fetus ought to be aborted and saying of a child that it ought never to have been born. The latter would be downright vile. Dawkins' point was this. Systematically deselecting new people with Down's syndrome shouldn't concern those already among us. We should be allowed to discuss this possibility without offending anyone. My concern, though, is that this distinction might not be as sharp as Dawkins imagines. Is it possible for someone to contemplate a screening program where the consequence (if not objective) is that these children are no longer born without showing a degrading attitude towards such children? Maybe; but I don't see how. It is not simply a matter of chosing words. Limiting each tweet to 140 characters, Twitter is designed for snappy messages. Other media allow more caveats and careful reasoning. This may soften your message; but the unpleasant implications of your message are not so easily escaped. This is what Dawkins and Braanen Sterri don't sufficiently appreciate; that they are caught by the dynamics of the discourse in which they engage. While championing systematic deselection of "unhealthy" fetuses, they deny sending any message to the "unhealthy" individuals among us today. Through fancy distinctions, Dawkins attempts to wriggle away from Wexelsen Goksøyr’s accusation. But this--I imagine she would reply--only results in, well, wriggling: "Oh, my dear no. Of course I don’t mean to suggest that you are unwanted. What I say is merely that when discussing these matters, we must remain open to the possibility that the best solution, when all is said and done, may be that people like you are phased out.”

Ateisme på barnerommet.

Ja, jeg er stadig i live, og nei, denne bloggen er heller ikke erklært død. Den ligger bare på sotteseng. Jeg innser at det å beklage laber bloggaktivitet er i ferd med å bli en slags vane, skjønt ikke noe jeg gjør særlig hyppig. Siste og eneste post av året kom i mars--og siden juni i fjor har jeg kun produsert fem poster! Jeg har til hensikt å trappe opp, men er redd jeg vil forbli nokså opptatt frem til jul. Kanskje jeg skal gjøre dette til et nyttårsforsett når vi kommer så langt? I påvente av noe bedre, serverer jeg i dag en familiær anekdote.

Min yngste datter er glad i sang. Særlig er hun begeistret for Thorbjørn Egners sanger. Forleden dag gikk hun imidlertid, til min forbauselse, omkring og nynnet på en velkjent kristen barnesang, den om hvem som har skapt alle blomstene, fuglene og stjernene. Hun kan ha lært sangen på barnesang i Longyearbyen kirke, hvor hun hadde et par sporadiske opptredener for omlag et år siden. Men i så fall har hun hukommelse som en elefant. Sannsynligvis har hun hørt den på nytt i det siste, skjønt jeg aner ikke hvor. Uansett: fremføringen var helt etter boken. Hun gikk og sang for seg selv, og visste ikke at foreldrene lyttet. Vår tilstedeværelse ble avslørt først da vi brøt ut i spontan latter over siste vers. For etter de velkjente versene om at Gud i himmelen har skapt blomstene, fuglene, stjernene og deg og meg, kom en egenkomponert (tør jeg si subversiv?) avslutning som ville ha moret selv Richard Dawkins:

Hvem har skapt Gud i himmelen, himmelen, himmelen
Hvem har skapt Gud i himmelen, jo [det er] deg og meg.

Personalised medicine anyone?

Recently I moved to Trondheim. (It was with a heavy heart I left Svalbard, a decision made even more difficult by the fact that my family didn't. But when they join me in June I assume we will all settle in fine.) Since new year I have been part of a research group called RESET (Research Group on the Ethos of Technology). To be more specific, my work is concerned with the moral and scientific ambiguities within what is called Personalised Medicine. Hopefully, in three years time, I can on the basis of this work call myself Doctor of Philosophy. Being entirely new to this field (not philosophy but philosophy of medicine), familiarising myself with it has been quite time consuming. This is the main reason for my being so inactive on Blogger the past few months.

"Personal" is a buzzword in today's society. Amazon as well as Youtube offers personalised recommondations. The more personalised a service is, the better -- or so the cultural trend seems to imply. What then is more natural than hoping for a more personalised healthcare? This is what I hope to investigate. One challenge is separating hope from hype. Consider some key slogans: Away with the one-size-fits-all approach to medicine! The right treatment to the right person at the right time! Barack Obama touched both in a recent speech. What but Amen can one say to this? Disagreement seems impossible. But that is my problem too. If no alternative position is available (who, after all, thinks impersonal ill-treatment is the future?), I struggle to see what one hopes to achieve with this rhetoric. Nor is it obvious to me what is novel about it either. I mean, the rhetoric itself is clearly a recent invention; but what else is new? Obama seems to imply that medicine is about to be radically changed. But hasn't clinical medicine always been about treating individuals? The fact that no two people are identical and may react differently to the same drug has been known ever since Hippocrates. True, part of the vision is that genome sequencing will play a prominent role in future healthcare -- and this has become technologically possible only in recent years. Still, it is not clear to me why this should be thought of as representing a paradigm shift in medicine rather than as a refinement of existing scientific practices (nor for that matter, why it is best thought of as "personalising" medicine).

To be continued...

På skråplanet.

Da en kvinne tidligere i år skrev at hun ikke visste hva hun ville gjort dersom hennes foster fikk påvist Downs syndrom, svarte Richard Dawkins kort og kontant: "Abort it and try again. It would be immoral to bring it into the world if you have the choice." Siden ble han nødt til å forsvare seg. Ja, valget av Twitter som medium for ytringene hadde vært uheldig. Formatet tillater ikke resonnementer. Men selv om formen var problematisk, var innholdet ikke det: "Apparently I'm a horrid monster for recommending what actually happens to the great majority of Down Syndrome foetuses. They are aborted." Men dette skillet mellom form og innhold er langt mer teoretisk enn hva Dawkins tror. Man kan reagere på tonen i "anbefalingen" fordi denne antyder en urovekkende holdning (til "innholdet").

Det stemmer at flertallet av slike graviditeter faktisk blir terminert. I Norge skjer dette i mellom 80 og 90% av tilfellene. Dawkins støtter ikke bare flertallet, men hevder at dette utvilsomt er den rette avgjørelsen: Her er det ingenting å tenke på. Blir det påvist Downs syndrom, så ta abort og prøv igjen. Det er flere grunner til å reagere på denne lettvinte nonsjelansen. Sjansen for at dette oppleves som utilbørlig press er overhengende (en anklage Dawkins forsøkte å sno seg unna, uten særlig hell ettersom han hadde beskrevet situasjonen som et valg mellom moral og umoral). Videre vil denne "anbefalingen" kanskje falle i god jord kun hos de som allerede oppfatter dette som en uproblematisk løsning. Hvis du befinner deg i en moralsk knipe på grunn av en graviditet, er teoretisk skråsikkerhet fra en gråhåret mannlig professor knapt hva du trenger. Til slutt er det mange som frykter hva slike holdninger vil gjøre med oss og vårt moralske gangsyn dersom de får spre seg. Er vi på vei mot et samfunn der slike avgjørelser ikke lenger oppleves som problematiske? Og hva forteller dette om vårt syn på våre medmennesker med Downs syndrom?

Denne siste diskusjonen blusset opp i Norge også da Aksel Braanen Sterri publiserte et essay i Morgenbladet med den bevisst provoserende tittelen "Et forsvar for sorteringssamfunnet". Argumentasjonen støtter seg til dels på en nokså tilforlatelig observasjon: "Det er knapt en overdrivelse å si at alle foreldre ønsker for sitt barn at det skal bli født så friskt som mulig og ha alle de muligheter andre barn har." Dette ønsket er nok styrende for vår tenkning omkring Downs syndrom, i det minste på den måten at dersom vordende foreldre uttrykte ønsker om barn med dette syndromet, ville mange -- også mange abortmotstandere -- stille spørsmål ved deres beveggrunner. Likefullt tror jeg distinksjonen mellom syk og frisk ikke bør styre tenkningen i for sterk grad. "Hvorfor er det så ille om vi får et samfunn uten Downs syndrom," spør Sterri. Spørsmålet retter seg til alle de som bekymrer seg for sorteringssamfunnet. "For hvert medisinsk utviklingstrinn står vi i fare for å utrydde en sykdom som noen identifiserer seg med." Ingen savner polio og tuberkulose, så hvorfor anta at Downs syndrom er annerledes?

Fordi Downs syndrom er annerledes, svarer Marte Wexelsen Goksøyr. "Du får ikke utryddet denne tilstanden hos en person uten å ta livet av mennesket. Det er forskjellen. Jeg er selv en kvinne med Downs syndrom. Jeg er ikke syk, jeg har et ekstra kromosom i mine celler." Downs syndrom er ikke noe man kan bli "frisk" av. Det finnes ingen medisiner og heller ingen kur mot tilstanden -- og likevel kan man ikke si at Wexelsen Goksøyr er rammet av en uhelbredelig tilstand (les: sykdom). Å si at hun er "rammet" av Downs syndrom låter omtrent like corny som å si at hun som kvinne er "rammet" av femininitet -- en uttrykksmåte som kun er egnet dersom man ønsker å gjøre seg morsom på hennes bekostning. Wexelsen Goksøyr treffer betydelig bedre når hun avviser at Downs syndrom er en sykdom og heller beskriver personer med dette syndromet som en bestemt mennesketype. Braanen Sterris spørsmål fører oss med andre ord på villstrå. Spørsmålet burde ikke være hvorfor det er så ille om vi får et samfunn uten Downs syndrom, men hvorfor det ville være så ille om vi fikk et samfunn uten mennesker med Downs syndrom.

Helst hadde jeg satt punktum her. Dette spørsmålet har jeg ingen lyst til å gi meg i kast med. En slik bekjennelse vil nok falle enkelte tungt for brystet. Noen mener vi i redelighetens navn må være rede til å diskutere alt. Men dét er å forveksle et høl i hue med et åpent sinn. Moralske fellesskap defineres blant annet av hva man ikke diskuterer. I Norge har vi for eksempel sluttet å diskutere fordeler og ulemper ved tvangssterilisering av sigøynere. Men slike grenser kan flyttes. Ali Esbati kunngjorde nylig at han "flykter" til Sverige på grunn av tonen i det politiske ordskiftet i Norge. En vesentlig forskjell mellom de to landene "er måten innvandrerbefolkningen blir beskrevet i mediene og i den offentlige debatten." Siden 2008 har det blitt A4 å snakke engasjert om innvandringsproblemet i Norge, og som Esbati sier: "Det gjør en forskjell å hele tida se seg selv bli beskrevet i problem-­termer." Å innlate seg på å diskutere verdien av det å ha mennesker med Downs syndrom blant oss vil bidra til en tilsvarende endring av offentligheten, fordi slike meningsutvekslinger -- både positive og negative vurderinger -- er med på å etablere dette som et rimelig spørsmål. Å ta diskusjonen er å anerkjenne temaet som diskutabelt. Men jeg er redd jeg er litt sent ute. Jeg har lyst til å svare at problemstillingen er høl i hue; at diskusjonen er nedverdigende overfor dem det gjelder og at vi tilsmusser oss selv ved å ta spørsmålet på alvor, men utretter neppe noe med det, ettersom disse spørsmålene allerede har fått forgifte det offentlig ordskiftet -- eller i litt mindre moralistiske termer: Sjansen for at en slik appell til folks anstendighet vil falle på stengrunn er stor ettersom vår moralske sensitivitet allerede er i forandring i den forstand at dette og beslektede spørsmål faktisk blir diskutert med stort alvor i landets avisspalter.

En strategi kan, slik Wexelsen Goksøyr anyder, være å omformulere spørsmålet. Hun avviser å se dette som et (samfunns)medisinsk spørsmål: dette handler om mennesker. Å spørre hva som vil være så ille med et samfunn uten bestemte mennesker snarere enn hva som vil være så ille med å bli kvitt et bestemt syndrom, fjerner i alle fall noe av den umiddelbare appellen til fremtidsutsiktene. Men hvor man skal gå videre fra dette alternative spørsmålet, er imidlertid ikke opplagt. (Skal man tolke dette som et historisk-hypotetisk spørsmål? Hvorfor det er så ille om vi får et samfunn uten...?, er i så fall et spørsmål om hva historiens dom vil bli: Hvis alle fostere med Downs syndrom systematisk velges bort slik at disse mennesker sakte men sikkert forsvinner, hva vil fremtiden mene? Vi kan naturligvis ikke utelukke mulighetene for en knusende dom. Problemet er bare at vi ikke kan utelukke noen andre muligheter heller. Wexelsen Goksøyrs nye spørsmål spiller også ballen rett i føttene på dem som ønsker å diskutere forstersortering i lys av begrepet livskvalitet. Både Braanen Sterri og Dawkins hevder at "friske" mennesker har bedre liv enn mennesker med Downs, og ønsker derfor sorteringssamfunnet velkommen med den begrunnelsen at samfunnets samlede livskvalitet ville øke dersom alle fostere med Downs ble byttet ut med "friske" individer. Nå er dette filosofisk svært lettvint argumentasjon. Dawkins tar for gitt at livskvalitet eller -lykke er noe som kan samles opp på denne måten, hvilket ikke er innlysende -- det er ikke engang klart hva dette betyr, og langt mindre klart hvorfor en slik summering av lykke ha noen avgjørende betydning i denne sammenhengen. Men når Wexelsen Goksøyr og hennes meningsfeller innlater seg på denne diskusjonen, så står ikke deres argumenter særlig sterkere.) Selv har jeg sympatier for den som svarer med å gripe til mangfoldsargumentet. Hvis bestemte mennesketyper -- barn med Downs syndrom, kjevendte eller folk som liker å gå på ski -- ikke lenger finnes blant oss, har vi fått et mindre mangfoldig samfunn. "It takes their kind, to make all kinds," som det heter. Dette argumentet springer ut av en visjon om det gode samfunn som det samfunnet som lar de tusen små blomster blomstre.

Det er også til denne visjonen om et tolerant og inkluderende samfunn Wexelsen Goksøyr appellerer, og hun gjør det med et eksistensielt alvor vi plikter å lytte til. "Jeg tilhører en minoritetsgruppe i Norge," skriver hun, og man må være nærmest tonedøv for ikke å forstå hennes eksistensielle forferdelse ved tanken på at "det skulle være et ønsket statlig prosjekt å utrydde [denne gruppen], sortere dem bort". Nå som det diskuteres å innføre systematiske ultralydundersøkelser i 12 svangerskapsuke, er det ikke urimelig å beskrive virkeligheten på denne måten. Men her er det lett å trå feil. Wexelsen Goksøyr lar seg rive med av egen retorikk når hun trekker paralleller fra denne statlig sanksjonerte fostersorteringen til tidligere tilfeller av etnisk rensning mot for eksempel tatere. "For å få sortert dem bort, utslette disse brysomme, ble barn tatt fra foreldre med tvang og satt på barnehjem. Kvinner ble tvangssterilisert og noen endte på asyl og ble lobotomert." Hvis det var sånn strategien for et Downs-fritt samfunn så ut, ville Sterris forsvarsskrift knapt provosere engang (enn si komme på trykk i Morgenbladet). Det er ingen fare for gjeninnføring av slike praksiser.

Richard Dawkins har selvsagt rett i at det er stor forskjell på det å foreslå at et foster bør aborteres og det å si om et barn at det aldri burde ha blitt båret frem. Enhver som sa noe sånt ville med rette nedsables for sine usmakelige holdningers skyld. Men bekymringen min er at den moralsk-politiske diskusjonen for og imot innføringen av et screeningprosjekt der konsekvensen (om ikke målet) er at slike barn ikke lenger blir båret frem, allerede er et tegn på og en årsak til at usmakelige holdninger til denne gruppen tvinger seg frem i oss; at i lys av disse diskusjonene vil alle forsøk på å sno seg unna anklagen fra Wexelsen Goksøyr nettopp være å sno seg: "Nei, kjære deg, vi mener selvsagt ikke at du er uønsket, men vi må jo, når vi diskuterer denne saken, være åpne for at den beste løsningen, når alt kommer til alt, kanskje er at slike som du blir faset ut."

Philosophy in Science.

Lately we have seen many heated debates between philosophers and scientists about the relationship between science and philosophy, very often framed as the question what, if anything, philosophy has to offer science. Some prominent scientists take an extreme stance when declaring all philosophical questions as little more than “pointless delay in our progress,” to quote Neil deGrasse Tyson. Massimo Pigliucci does a good job unmasking the naïve philosophical (!) presumptions such views rest on. Other scientists reject philosophy, believing philosophers to cook up pseudo-scientific alternatives to scientific methods. But this is clearly at odds with what most philosophers are actually doing, and a profound misconception of the relationship between philosophy and scientific methods. A while back Peter Hacker published an essay (on which I commented here), where he addressed some of these issues. Far from offering competing explanations of natural phenomena, Hacker wrote, philosophy is rather:

…a technique for examining the results of specific sciences for their conceptual coherence, and for examining the explanatory methods of the different sciences – natural, social and human. The sciences are no more immune to conceptual confusion than is any other branch of human thought. Scientists themselves are for the most part ill-equipped to deal with conceptual confusions.

Scientists, of course, don't deny the importance of conceptual clarity. We need to know what we mean by our words in order to speak rationally. However, some don't see what philosophy has to do with it. Some argue, as Julia Galef did in an episode of Rationally Speaking, that scientists are quite capable to manage on their own:

There is an irritation on behalf of scientists or science enthusiasts, that philosophy is defending its relevance by defining as philosophy things that would have happened even without the discipline of philosophy; that there is a certain level of built-in and developed common sense and critical thinking that scientists would have even if they hadn't read any philosophers or come into contact with the field of philosophy, and to say that philosophy therefore is relevant is unfair.

This irritation is understandable. Claiming that scientists are unequal to their tasks, or even that it is the task of philosophers to tell scientists what they can and cannot do, is unlikely to find much support in the scientific community (which hardly was Hacker's aim either). Of course, describing philosophy as a nuisance isn't exactly an invitation to a calm discussion either. My aim here is not to take sides. I am rather suggesting that if we all take one step back, we will perhaps see this trench war as misguided.

Often the question is: What, if anything, can scientists gain from reading or listening to philosophers? Philosophers sometimes reply with a history lesson. A few hundred years ago all scientists were philosophers. So, until quite recently it would have been literally senseless to ask why scientists should bother with philosophers. And in recent years many great scientists have been philosophically inclined. During the twentieth century, some of the towering figures in physics and biology (Einstein, Bohr and Heisenberg, and Ernst Mayr and Richard Lewontin, for example) were well-versed in the philosophical literature of the day and thought this crucial to their own research. Even today scientists from various fields collaborate with philosophers. Hence: If nothing else, it is at least not a universally shared opinion among scientists that talking to philosophers is a "pointless delay in [their] progress". But for argument’s sake, let us assume, contrary to the facts, that this was what most scientists thought. What then? What if scientists entirely quit reading and listening to philosophers? Some philosophers seem to believe that this would result in science becoming a vessel without its pilot, forever doomed to sail round in circles in confused and muddled thinking. That seems a wild assumption. What then about the opposite assumption? Say that science were unaffected by this radical division between "the two cultures". Would this support the conclusion that philosophy is indeed irrelevant to science, as Julia Galef suggested?

That's not simply a questionable inference. Not only does the conclusion not follow, the conclusion is itself curiously incoherent. The reason, I think, is that Galef confuses two separate questions. Suggesting that philosophers are irrelevant to scientists is one thing. Suggesting that philosophy (i.e. philosophical thinking or philosophizing) is irrelevant is quite another. The first is a question of who should (or could) do the work. The second question is about what kind of work needs to be done. Galef may be right in assessing that scientists for the most part are capable of doing the conceptual and critical thinking their research requires even if they don’t read philosophical journals. This is an empirical question. But suggesting that altered reading habits among scientists could possibly make philosophical reflection irrelevant in science doesn’t even make sense. (Galef does in fact take this very distinction for granted herself when she claims that scientists can solve these puzzles without any knowledge of the field of philosophy.)

Settling the largely empirical question (around which much of the debate revolves) regarding who's best equipped to deal with conceptual confusions seems to me both trivial and unimportant – so long as they who end up doing the philosophically needed work (whatever their profession might be) do so properly.

Here I am of course doing exactly what Galef accuses philosophers of doing, namely defining as philosophy things that even people outside the field of philosophy are capable of doing (more or less successfully). But there is no need for irritation any more. Calling certain difficulties scientists inevitably are faced with in their daily work “philosophical difficulties” is not a strategy to lay claims on these difficulties on behalf of trained philosophers. The subtext is not: Amateurs aside! Such union disputes don’t interest me. (If someone objects to my using the word "philosophy" here -- why not stick with "critical thinking" if that is what you are talking about? -- my answer is that "philosophy" allows for distinctions to be drawn: Not all forms of critical thinking or conceptual self-reflection are philosophical. Criticizing concepts for being used in unfamiliar ways aren't, for instance. When that is said, though, I do concede that what word we use is relatively unimportant, as long as we are clear on what we are talking about. (As "philosophy" often denotes more than critical thinking too, I guess that that label might cause confusion too.)) My point is simply that all good and honest scientific research involves different modes of thinking, including (sometimes) what is commonly called philosophical reflection.

Bare en bit av fotballen.

Sist Luis Suarez bet en motspiller ba han uforbeholdent om tilgivelse for sin uforsvarlige oppførsel. Denne gangen har pipen en annen låt. Nå svarer Suarez at dette er sånt som skjer på fotballbanen -- en mildt sagt forunderlig uttalelse. På en måte har han selvsagt rett. Men hvem hadde trodd at slikt faktisk kunne skje bare for noen år siden -- før Suarez altså gjorde biting til et slags varemerke? Ok. Hendelsen er ikke helt unikt. Biting har forekommet tidligere også, både på fotballbanen og i andre idretter -- og ikke minst: dette er tredje gang på like mange år at "Kannibalen av Anfield" setter tennene i en motspiller. Mener Suarez å si at ettersom biting -- mye takket være ham selv! -- faktisk forekommer i toppfotballen, så må man bare venne seg til det? Eller mener påstår han at biting tilhører kategorien uheldige ting man må regne med når voksne mannfolk sparker ball? "Dette er ting som skjer på banen. Det var bare oss to inne i feltet, og han løp inn i meg med skulderen sin. Det var slik øyet mitt ble seende slik ut," skal Suarez ha forklart til uruguayansk TV. Selv om verken spisse albuer, etterslenger eller kjefting på dommeren egentlig "hører hjemme" på fotballbanen, er det en hverdagslig sak at slikt skjer i kampens hete. Mener Suarez at han på samme selvfølgelige vis kunne ha fortsatt forklaringen: Og jeg hogg tennene mine i Chiellini. Det var slik skulderen hans ble seende slik ut?

Tigging og (annen) kriminalitet.

"Tigging er ikkje eit lovbrot i seg sjølv, men er knytt til andre problem," svarer Senterpartiets Jenny Klinge når Klassekampen 14. juni spør hva som gjør tigging til et lovbrudd. Senterpartiet har besluttet å støtte regjeringens forslag om et nasjonalt tiggeforbud. Klinge gir to grunner for denne beslutningen. En kriminalpolitisk begrunnelse, og en sosial- og fattigdomspolitisk. For det første: "Å forby tigging er eit verkemiddel for å forby andre typar kriminalitet." For det andre: "Ingen har nokon gong komme seg ut av fattigdom ved å tigge." Tvert imot mener Klinge at "tigging sementerer sosial naud". "Å la tigging vere tillate er ikkje ein måte å kjempe mot sisial naud på."

La meg ta det første først. Påstanden om at tigging ikke er kriminelt i seg selv, men knyttet til kriminalitet på en slik måte at et tiggeforbud vil gjøre det lettere å forby andre typer kriminalitet, virker forvirret på flere måter. Språklig sett er det merkelig å si at man skal forby former for kriminalitet. Kriminalitet er ikke noe man kan forby eller ikke. Kriminalitet er forbudt; det er hva "kriminalitet" betyr. Vi innfører ikke nye forbud fordi vi oppdager nye former for kriminalitet, men fordi vi bestemmer at noe vi før tillot ikke lenger skal være tillatt. Hva som er kriminelt og ikke beror på det til enhver tid gjeldende lovverket. Dette er grunnen til at nye lover og regler aldri har tilbakevirkende kraft. Innføringen av sexkjøpsloven forbød således ikke en form for kriminalitet, men gjorde kjøp av sex kriminelt. I henhold til samme logikk kan Senterpartiet vanskelig innføre en lov mot tigging og samtidig mene at tigging ikke er et lovbrudd. Videre har Klinge selvsagt rett i at tigging kan knyttes til (annen) kriminalitet. Men hennes beskrivelse av denne tilknytningen er så generell og omtrentlig at den ikke forteller noe som helst, verken om tiggere eller kriminelle. Klær kan også knyttes til kriminalitet: Alle kriminelle går med klær. Kanskje vil noen avfeie dette som en usakelig innvending, fordi det ikke finnes noen direkte kobling mellom klesbruk og kriminalitet. Selvsagt ikke. Men mitt spørsmål er: Hvor klar er koblingen mellom tigging og kriminalitet? Alle tiggere er i alle fall ikke vinningskriminelle.

Klinge gjør rett i å koble tigging til sosial nød og fattigdom. Det sosialpolitiske målet er å tilby en annen løsning, slik at tiggingen forsvinner. Alternativet finnes egentlig allerede i dag:

Ingen er i utgangspunktet tvinga til å tigge. Slik det er i dag, har vi eit sosialt sikringsnett som skal ta vare på alle. Samtidig er det klart at ein del har komme i ein situasjon der ting fortonar seg som håplaust. Særleg i tilfella knytt til psykiatri og rus. Tigging kan ikkje vere det ultimate sikringsnettet. Ein viktig del av avtalen [med regjeringen] er at han inkluderer målretta sosiale tiltak.

Det fremgår ikke av intervjuet hvilke tiltak dette skulle være, men mye av dette virker vel og bra, selv om jeg har vondt for å forstå nøyaktig hvordan en kriminalisering er ment å hjelpe dette prosjektet. Skal avtalen inkludere et påbud om å benytte seg av de målrettede tiltakene?

Klinge er åpen med at en slik lovendring vil by på praktiske problemer. Det vil blant annet være utfordrende for politiet å håndheve loven. På den andre siden er hun overbevist om at endringen vil bety færre politiressurser brukt på menneskehandel og visse typer vinningsforbrytelser, ettersom slik kriminalitet ofte henger sammen med tigging. Av intervjuet kan man få inntrykk av at aksepten for tigging i det norske lovverket også har vært en stående invitasjon til kriminalitet. Klinge tenker her naturligvis på utenlandske tiggere som kommer til landet -- noen som følge av menneskehandel og noen med lysskye intensjoner i tillegg. Dersom det ble forbudt å sitte på gaten om dagen, ville denne nattaktiviteten også flyttes til andre land. Så langt kan jeg følge resonnementet. Imidlertid reiser dette nye spørsmål, som Klinge ikke konfronteres med av journalisten. Er det ikke en viss fare for en motsatt endring av kriminalstatistikken også -- at visse former for kriminalitet vil kunne blomstre opp som følge av et tiggeforbud? Et trivielt poeng er at forbudet gjør tigging ulovlig, hvilket utvider spekteret av mulige lovbrudd. Et dypere bekymring er at tigging og visse former for kriminalitet synes å være uttrykk for samme sosiale nød -- og at dette er den koblingen mange ser mellom tigging og kriminalitetsstatistikken. Skulle tigging tigging også bli ulovlig, vil kanskje mange nødstilte oppleve å stå overfor et valg mellom to former for kriminalitet for å brødfø seg. Gitt at tiggere må operere på åpen gate hvor giverne befinner seg, og således vil være et lett bytte for kriminalpolitiet, er det et spørsmål hva et slikt forbud vil bety for vinningskriminaliteten, for eksempel, som i sitt vesen alltid foregår i det skjulte....

Ordinary critical intelligence.

Are there any readers of this blog who don't also read Language goes on holiday? Well, stop being in that category, and go check it out! In any case, this post is meant for you. I was thinking of writing a follow-up to my previous entry, but then gave away my good points commenting over at Duncan Richter’s. Rather than rewriting my arguments, I decided simply to post a gently edited version of the comments here.

 

***

Richard Taylor has written:

Students of philosophy learn very early -- usually first day of their course -- that philosophy is the love of wisdom. This is often soon forgotten, however, and there are even some men who earn their livelihood at philosophy who have not simply forgotten it, but who seem positively to scorn the idea.

I was, when writing that previous post, hoping to make use of this quote but in the end deiced to drop it because I didn’t know what to do with it. I have myself never heard anyone profess such disdain, but have attended lectures where this wouldn’t have surprised me much. This attitude seems to me connected with the danger of dogmatism. One form of dogmatism which concerns Taylor is the idea that philosophy really is (or should become) like the sciences. When Peter Hacker presents philosophy as a set of techniques, this sounds too mechanical, as you [D.R.] write, but doesn’t it also, and not incidentally, suggest a model of philosophy rather too close to that of the sciences? (This is surprising because Hacker too, both previously and again in this essay, has been fighting this very model.)
 
Academic philosophers sometimes feel a need to defend their subject, which is easily understood given the worldwide trend of cut-backs in the ”unprofitable” humanities departments. However,  inflated rhetoric is hardly the best way to make non-philosophers see things differently. As Miranda Fricker once remarked: "I think it is a bit ludicrous when people defend philosophy on the grounds that it teaches you how to think. That is extraordinarily insulting to other subjects!" This is partly why I too react against such claims. But I also think philosophers, with such claims and claims about the expertise a philosopher acquires, give the wrong impression of what philosophical thinking actually is.

 

Historians of philosophy often regard the subject as to have been invented by the ancient Greeks. When one's objective is to trace the understanding of philosophy as a more or less academic discipline with theoretical ambitions back to its origin, this story seems about right. However, philosophy has other (and deeper, yet more mundane) roots too. I am inclined to see philosophizing as a natural feature of human language use. Questions like “What do you mean?” and “What are the grounds for that claim?” were after all not invented by Thales. Nor are they something we first encounter at university. Someone might question our words whenever we say anything. Thus can the most casual dinner table conversation suddenly transform into a discussion or a probing investigation into the structure of our consepts. (The tools needed to resolve such situations are not theories produced at philosophical institutes, but ever-present to all competent language users in the language we share.) Philosophy -- understood as the application of ordinary critical intelligence -- is as ancient and as evenly distributed as language itself -- though some do of course exercise their critical faculties more than others.

In short, philosophers don't really do anything that non-philosophers can't do, and they don't necessarily do it better, but they ought at least to do it better than they themselves did it before they started studying and practicing philosophy, and they ought to do it without some other mission. [D.R.]

Agreed. Still, philosophers are often asked to sit on expert panels. In Norway, Knut Erik Tranøy headed several committees on medical questions; Mary Warnock has done the same in England. As far as I am able to judge, both have done great jobs; but, frankly, I believe this is more thanks to who they were and their personal characters than to their educational background. This issue has been at the front of my mind lately because I currently am in the middle of the process of applying for a position as a researcher in bioethics at my old university. If I am qualified for this job, which I think I am, this is not because I possess any philosophical (or ethical) expertise (whatever, if anything, that is); but rather because I have an interest in that field, have read a fair amount of the literature, both good and bad, and because I care about finding out which is which.

Why study philosophy?

In a recent essay, Peter Hacker gives many good answers; but as is often the case with advertisements, he over-sells his product. I will be focusing on this formulation:

The study of philosophy cultivates a healthy scepticism about the moral opinions, political arguments and economic reasonings with which we are daily bombarded by ideologues, churchmen, politicians and economists. It teaches one to detect ‘higher forms of nonsense’, to identify humbug, to weed out hypocrisy, and to spot invalid reasoning. It curbs our taste for nonsense, and gives us a nose for it instead. It teaches us not to rush to affirm or deny assertions, but to raise questions about them.

Similar claims about the general usefulness of philosophy are endlessly repeated in introductory texts. (For instance by Bertrand Russell in the raving last chapter of his Problems of Philosophy: "The man who has no tincture of philosophy goes through life imprisoned in the prejudices derived from common sense, from the habitual beliefs of his age or his nation, and from convictions which have grown up in his mind without the cooperation of consent of his deliberate reason.") I must admit scepticism.

When Hacker writes that 'philosophy cultivates a healthy scepticism' and 'teaches one to detect higher forms of nonsense', he makes it sound as if taking philosophy classes were a method for developing fail-safe nonsense-alerts. Because philosophy means love of wisdom, and wisdom is never foolish or gullible, there is in that sense an intimate connection between "philosophy" and "critical thinking". Empirically speaking though the connection is less reliable. Great philosophers have been guilty of great stupidity. Heidegger famously was a Nazi. I doubt that Wittgenstein shared Hacker's optimism; but when hearing one of his students unreflectingly repeating nationalistic slogans, Wittgenstein was infuriated, and his anger seems somehow to have been aggrevated by the fact that the person talking nonsens was a philosopher:

[W]hat is the use of studying philosophy if all that it does for you is to enable you to talk with some plausibility about some abstruse questions of logic, etc., if it does not improve your thinking about the important questions of life, if it does not make you more conscientious than any... journalist in the use of the dangerous phrases such people use for their own ends.

Studying philosophy would be a waste of time if all it did was to enable one to talk about abstruse questions of logic. But there is no reason to think this is so. If anything, evidence seems to point in the direction of Hacker. Philosophers seem better equiped than most when it comes to general reasoning skills. Philosophy majors tend to do very well on certain tests. Some claim this is due to their education: "[P]hilosophy majors develop problem solving skills at a level of abstraction" that cannot be achieved through most studies. But if we assume (which seems plausible to me) that philosophy mainly attracts students who already possess certain skills and interests, this cannot be the final word. It doesn't follow from this that exercising one's philosophical muscles might turn out to have no effect on a person's ability to think (that would be as astonishing as if one's stamina could never be improved by physical excercise); but it does follow that even if philosophers demonstrate first rate reasoning skills, it is an open question to what extent these test results actually reflect the learning outcome of their studies.

Continuing on a semi-empirical line. Most courses in philosophy, certainly most courses an undergraduate is likely to attend, are designed not to make the student better at reasoning in general, but to make him better at philosophical reasoning. A course in moral philosophy, say, is deemed successful not to the extent its students have become more sensitive and morally reflective persons (though this of course would not be negative), but, borrowing Wittgenstein's prase, to the extent the students have learned to talk with plausibility about abstruse questions in ethics. I don't think there is anything inherently wrong with this. Philosophising is after all working with philosophical questions. As any academic field, philosophers have manufactured tools and techniques suited to these questions. Picking up on the jargon is the first step toward making contributions to the classroom discussions. And sometimes this will prove useful in other contexts too...

 
But reading philosophy and acquiring the analytic and argumentative tools on offer is, as demonstrated by Erasmus Montanus, not the same as becoming a clearheaded thinker. Mastering a philosophical style, may even -- if it is true that certain philosophies offer nothing but fashionable nonsense -- have quite pernicious effects on one's judgement. Not even (mainstream) analytical philosophy is what Hacker has in mind when he hails philosophy as "a unique technique for tackling conceptual questions". Judging by his many heated debates with colleagues, mainly from the anglo-american tradition, it is reasonable to interpret the quote with which I began as deliberately echoing a sigh by his friend, Bede Rundle: "Whatever their limitations, earlier analytical philosophers had at least a nose for nonsense. Sadly, so many philosophers today have only a taste for it."

It is puzzling that Hacker, throughout this essay, keeps using "philosophy" as if it denoted one uniform activity ("At a very general level, it [philosophy] is a unique technique for tackling conceptual questions that occur to most thinking people" and "At a more specialised level, philosophy is a technique for examining the results of specific sciences for their conceptual coherence," and so on), when he clearly would agree with much of what I have written. The reason, I suspect, is that Hacker, as Wittgenstein often did, uses "philosophy" to refer not to everything going by that name, but mainly to his own practice. In that case his claims seem on safer footing. Hacker's texts are predominantly critical, and his ability to sniff out philosophical nonsense is (usually) impressive. Studying his philosophy -- or wittgensteinian philosophy generally -- and acquiring some of his tools and techniques will be good for any critical thinker.

But in the end, though, which philosophical texts one studies (or if they are philosophical texts at all) is less important for one's ability to think straight than how one studies them. Reading even the most conceptually self-conscious and critical writer won't make critical thinkers out of us unless we read him critically.

No Future?

Though the story is set in the final days before the world ends, Noah opens like a typical post-apocalyptic film. Nature is nothing but pebbles and rocks, and the human race in an equally sorry condition. In their own eyes they still are images of the divine creator; in reality the human interior is more like the spitting image of the foul surroundings. Since the eviction from Paradise, the children of Adam and Eve have turned into savages, killing and looting. Only one tribe has preserved some purity. Noah and his family live alone. Their goodness is expressed by their care for the natural world. Seth, captivated by its beauty, plucks a solitary flower for his father to see; and though he shares his son's wonder, Noah (with a mien we clearly are supposed to interpret as expressing a reverence for God's creation) explains how Seth now has killed the flower. Their alienation from the rest of humanity is also marked by the fact that they do not eat flesh. Noah's sons are stupefied when learning that humans hunt animals for food.

Noah contains long (in my mind too long, and boring) action scenes. The dialogues are strikingly artificial. The acting is often bad. At one level, this is a not very well-made survival movie (as a guide to the biblical story, it is worse still). Nevertheless, I found Noah interesting for its obvious concerns with environmental issues. The barren landscape is more than a mere mirror or a symbol of the moral landscape of the human soul. Nature's deplorable state is due to human folly. Having interpreted the command to "fill the earth and subdue it" as a carte blanche for exploitation (a clear misunderstanding, because God is obviously pissed-off by it), the humans have transformed the once lush Garden of Eden into a desert. When a now extinct animal is hunted and killed, the thematic backdrop of the movie suggests to the viewer that this is when and how this species went extinct.

When Noah starts preparing for the flood to come while being ridiculed by his neighbours, this is certainly true to the biblical story, but it is also an unambiguous statement about similar attempts today to undermine the environmental whistle-blowers. The movie leaves no one in doubt about who's right and who's wrong: all scepticism is literally drowned when the rain starts pouring down.

Other questions raised are left unanswered. Much of the drama revolves around Man's future existence. On this issue, the Bible is quite clear. When God commands Noah to "[bring] out every kind of living creature that is with you--the birds, the animals, and all the creatures that move along the ground--so they can multiply on the earth and be fruitful and increase in number on it," (Gen 8:17) Noah, reasonably, never suspects that the notion of "living creature" might exclude human beings. In the biblical story, humanity too is due for a fresh start. But in the movie God doesn't speak so articulate. In fact, apart from a few miraculous incidents, there are no hints of His presence at all. The messages Noah receives all have the form of visions, and to Noah these visions suggest that human beings have no place in God's future plans. Hence, Noah takes care to collect two of every animal, but strictly forbids his own sons to procreate. (Put in the words of some extreme environmentalists, he is convinced that humanity is a cancer that must be cut out for nature to survive.) This alienates him from his family. The ensuing conflict reaches its climax when Seth's wife does become pregnant. Like a crazed Abraham with the knife, Noah threatens to sacrifice his two granddaughters on Nature's altar.

He doesn't of course (after all, there are still humans around), because in the end his fanaticism is softened by his love of children. It is natural to view this as a case of good sense prevailing over madness. But in the movie this is not necessarily so. When Noah, employing God of the Bible's words: "Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth," finally gives his blessings to the small family, this might indeed be interpreted as a hopeful conclusion. Humanity cannot continue exploiting Nature as before (a condition emphasised by Noah not repeating the whole Bible passage, which continues "subdue [the earth]; and rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over every living thing that moves on the earth"), but on the condition that Seth, his wife and their children learn to change their ways, perhaps there is reason for optimism? But the movie leaves room for an alternative (and equally plausible) interpretation of this final scene. Everyone knows what did in fact happen next. Not much did change, at least not for the better. Hence, the environmental challenges facing us today. In this light, Noah's conditional, but still fundamentally optimistic blessing of mankind might strike one as comical -- if "comical" is not too light-hearted a word to capture one’s reaction (some might, after all, think history proves Noah made the wrong decision). This reading of the final scene is supported by the fact that the rainbow (the token of God's promise never to flood the earth again) is conspicuously missing.

Trolleyology.

Siste nummer av Fri tanke omtaler boken Moral Tribes av Joshua Greene. Greene som er direktør for Moral cognition Lab ved Harvard har konfrontert mennesker med et knippe velkjente filosofisk dilemma -- ulike versjoner av det såkalte trikkeproblemet -- og studert hva som skjer i hjernen deres og hvordan dette henger sammen med moralske beslutninger.

En variant av dilemmaet er dette. En sporvogn raser ukontrollerbart i retning fem personer som ligger fastbundet på skinnene. Skrekkslagen ser du alt fra en bro over skinnegangen. Ved din side står også en overvektig mann (eventuelt en mann med diger ryggsekk) og ser på. Kroppen hans er det eneste som er stort og tungt nok til å stanse trikken. Du rekker ikke be ham hoppe, men har tid til å skubbe ham over kanten og ned på skinnene foran trikken. Spørsmålet er hva du ville gjort i en slik situasjon. Ville du unnlatt å gripe inn og latt stakkarene dø, eller hadde du ofret ett menneske for å redde fem?

Greenes forskning avslørte "at de som ikke ville dytte mannen ut i sporet var påvirket av de delene av hjernen som styrer følelsene. Mens de som valgte å redde flest mulig mennesker viste mer aktivitet i de delene av hjernen som koples til rasjonell tenkning." "Når vi styres av følelsene våre," kommenterer Greene, "tar vi avgjørelser som ikke nødvendigvis får det beste utfallet, rent konsekvensetisk," noe som i og for seg virker nokså tilforlatelig; men dermed er det ikke sagt, som Greene også antyder, at konsekvensetikken må være den fornuftigste måten å tenke på og at vi rasjonelt sett bør kaste mannen av broen. Greene opererer med en for enkel forståelse av forholdet mellom empiri og moral. Psykologer har påvist koblinger mellom konsekvensetiske tilbøyeligheter og Aspergers syndrom. Betyr det at autister må ha bedre moralsk gangsyn enn folk felst? Det kunne jo like så gjerne bety at det må være alvorlige mangler ved konsekvensetikken. Sannheten er naturligvis at det betyr verken-eller. Empirisk forskning kan ikke -- i alle fall ikke direkte -- besvare moralske spørsmål. Hvordan -- eller hvorvidt -- nevrokjemiske fakta om hjernen kan veilede oss i moralske spørsmål er i seg selv et moralsk spørsmål som ikke kan avgjøres ved ytterligere studier av hjernen.

Et annet problem med Greenes resonnement, er det antagonistiske bildet av følelser og fornuft hans konklusjoner hviler på. Rent konsekvensetisk betraktet er trikkeproblemet lite annet enn et banalt regnestykke. Vi skal simpelthen velge mellom én og fem. Men hvis problemet var så enkel, hadde vi ikke opplevd noe problem i det hele tatt! Konflikten, mener Greene, skyldes at vi mennesker ikke er rene rasjonalister. Vi tenker at det må være bedre å redde fem liv enn ett, men samtidig føler vi at det er galt å dytte tjukkasen utfor kanten, forklarer Greene, som mener folk har en medfødt aversjon mot denne slags håndgripeligheter. Teorien er at de emosjonelle delene av hjernen utviklet seg den gangen mennesket levde i små samfunn, mens de analytiske hjerneområdene er langt yngre. Dét er grunnen til at vi vemmes ved tanken på fysisk vold, mens hypermoderne drapsteknologi, som bomber fra dronefly, som ofte har langt verre konsekvenser, ikke vekker de samme emosjonelle reaksjonene. Vitenskapelig sett virker dette nokså søkt (uten at jeg med det avviser alt sammen); men det er de filosofiske sidene jeg er mest skeptisk til.

Greene slår kategorisk fast at de kalkulerende delene av hjernen bør styre oss i moralsk dilemmaer: "We should push the fat man, despite our instinctive abhorrence of doing so." David Edmonds som jeg har hentet dette sitatet fra, forteller ikke hvordan Greene kan være så sikker i sin sak; men det er tydelig hvilken filosofisk tradisjon han plasserer seg i. Det finnes en lang historie for mistro til følelser. Følelser har ofte blitt betraktet som ukontrollerbare affeksjoner som forstyrrer dømmekraften. I følelsenes vold -- når sinne, sorg, glede eller forelskelse rår -- gjør vi lett dumheter vi senere angrer. Sunn skepsis er det naturligvis ingenting feil med. Problemet med denne forståelsen av trikkedilemmaet er imidlertid at hvis det kun var instinktiv vemmelse -- eller såkalte Yuk!-reaksjoner -- som hindret oss i å gjøre det rasjonelle valget (som altså er å skubbe mannen over kanten), så burde noen enkle grep være nok til å løse problemet. Å lukke øynene og tenke på noe annet mens man skubbet, ville kunne få alle motforestillinger til å forsvinne. Eller hvis det er selve skubbingen (disse bestemte fysiske bevegelsene) man reagerer på, kunne løsningen være tilfeldig å "komme borti" mannen så han faller utfor. Trikkeproblemet ville i alle fall være løst den dagen noen lager en medisin mot slike følelser.

Enkelte finner kanskje slikt overbevisende. Andre vil derimot mene det er noe galt med premissene her, og at moralske vanskeligheter overhodet løses med slike grep. Det faktum at vi trenger følelser for å se et moralsk problem betyr ikke at problemet kun er en følelse. Medisin som fjerner følelsene fjerner ikke nødvendigvis problemene, men gjør oss kanskje bare blinde for dem. Det finnes således filosofer med en helt annen tillit til følelsene. Blaise Pascal mente eksempelvis at "[h]jertet har sin egen forstand som forstanden ikke alltid forstår." Dette betyr ikke at "hjertet alltid vet best", for følelser kan åpenbart villede oss og få oss til å reagere upassende, og faren for å havne i grøften er der alltid; men argumentet er at følelser bare kan villede den som er åpen for å lytte til og reflektere overdem på måter som også kan veilede oss. Det er en grøftekant på motsatt side også. Overdreven målrasjonalitet og manglende emosjonell åpenhet er noe av det som preger visse typer psykopati.

"Vil det være riktig av oss å la eget ubehag hindre oss i å redde fem liv?", spør konsekvensetikeren. Det problematiske synet på forholdet mellom følelser og fornuft er ikke eneste ankepunkt her. Konsekvensetikeren bryr seg utelukkende (eller nesten) om resultatene, og lite (eller ingenting) om hvordan resultatene kommer i stand. Dermed overser han også hensyn som for mange mennesker vil være sentrale for deres stillingstaken til et slikt dilemma; for eksempel hensynet til det som på engelsk kalles agency, eller hvem som utfører handlingen. Ansvar er et sentralt begrep i mye moralfilosofi og allminnelig tenkning omkring moral. Poenget er at enhver er ansvarlig for sine gjerninger, og ikke for andres. Om jeg skubber tjukkasen ned på sporet, innebærer det kanskje færre dødsfall, men resultatet er også at jeg har noe, nemlig et liv, å svare for. Griper jeg ikke inn, vil flere dø -- men er dét noe jeg kan lastes for? Den eneste skyldige er vel han som har bundtet stakkarene sammen på trikkesporet? Fordi ansvarsbegrepet blir uvesentlig på denne måten, oppfatter mange ren konsekvensetikk som en parodi på alvorlig etisk tenkning.

Denne kritikken kan drives ytterligere et stykke. Sett fra dette alternative perspektivet fortoner ikke Greenes selvsagte løsning seg bare som lite selvsagt eller parodisk, men muligens også umoralsk. Dersom det fantes en enkel og ufarlig måte å forhindre katastrofen på, ville nok mange kalle meg medskyldig dersom jeg ikke grep sjansen. Men Joshua Greene oppfatter meg som moralsk medskyldig dersom jeg vegrer meg for å bruke tjukkingen som bremsekloss også. Hvor mange som deler dette synet aner jeg ikke -- mye avhenger selvsagt av detaljene i situasjonen. (Flere vil nok gi Greene medhold om den tjukke mannen er Adolf Hitler enn om han er (en ikke lenger fastende) Mahatma Gandhi, for eksempel -- eller hvis det er han som har iscenesatt hele katastrofen.) Men for svært mange fortoner ikke dette seg engang som et mulig valg. Hvor mange ville ærlig talt komme på å vurdere å kaste mannen utfor broen? I manges øyne vil bare det å betrakte et menneske som en mulig bremsekloss være tegn på moralsk korrupsjon!

Alt dette innebærer ikke at det er moralsk galimatias å tenke som følger: "Hvis jeg ikke gjør noe, vil resultatet bli langt verre". Det betyr bare tanken er langt fra så innlysende riktig som Greene gir inntrykk av. Bernard Williams drøfter et beslektet dilemma, hvor denne måten å se saken på kanskje er mindre søkt, fordi det i Williams' dilemma er mindre søkt (eller mindre avhengig av en bestemt moralsk grunnholdning) å beskrive situasjonen som et valg mellom to mulige løsninger. Jim ankommer en liten by i Sør-Amerika. På torget ser han tjue indianere linet opp mot en mur foran en gruppe bevæpnede menn. Kommandanten forklarer at fangene skal skytes for å statuere et eksempel om at myndighetene ikke tolererer opprør. Som tegn på godt vertskap tilbyr han imidlertid Jim å skyte en av indianerne i stedet. Går Jim med på dette, lover kommandanten å la de nitten andre gå; takker han nei, vil samtlige bli skutt i henhold til planen. Kommandanten har ved sitt tilbud satt Jim i en forferdelig knipe der uskyldige vil dø uansett hva han svarer. Og han kan ikke bare skyve problemet fra seg, for dermed har han i realiteten valgt en av to! Bernard Williams diktet opp historien for å kunne kritisere konsekvensetikerens tenkemåte. Likevel var også han tilbøyelig til å mene at Jim alt i alt burde ta imot pistolen. Innvendingen var altså ikke at konsekvensetikken trekker feil konklusjon, men at konklusjonen blir trukket på feil eller mangelfullt grunnlag.

(Kanskje er det innlysende at simpel kalkulasjon ikke er tilstrekkelig. På den andre siden, hva som vil være et akseptablet resonnement i en slik situasjon, er ikke opplagt. Tiden er knapp, så det er i alle fall grenser for hvor langt og dypt Jim rekker å tenke. Men la oss for argumentet skyld si at ingen ser grunn til å beskylde Jim for å ha tatt lett på situasjonen når han til slutt griper pistolen med ordene: "Hvis jeg vegrer, blir resultatet langt verre!" Å gutere Jims avgjørelse kan ha flere funksjoner. Ved å si seg enig med Jim ønsker man kanskje å uttrykke støtte og sympati med Jim i den vanskelige situasjonen; kanskje man mener å si at man selv ville ha gjort samme vurdering i samme situasjon. Men hva kan det bety å hevde at dette er hva Jim burde gjøre? Sett for eksempel at Jim allerede i neste øyeblikk og for resten av livet fortviler: "Herregud, hva har jeg gjort!? Jeg har skutt og drept et uskyldig menneske!" Her er det i alle fall uklart hva man kan oppnå med å forsikre Jim om at han tross all sin anger gjorde riktig avgjørelse den gangen. Skylden er det jo han som må leve med. -- En personlig takk fra de nitten overlevende, kunne kanskje atter få ham til å se tingene i det lyset han gjorde til å begynne med....)

La oss vende tilbake til trikkeproblemet og komplisere ting enda en smule. Spørsmålet stilles på en måte som naturlig får oss til å betrakte situasjonen i aktørens perspektiv: Hva ville du gjort i en slik situasjon? Moralfilosofi er ofte aktørsentrert; men aktøren er ikke den eneste som kan ha noe å si på hva en handling betyr. Hva om du ikke var den slanke aktøren, men tjukke tilskueren: Hvordan ville du da ha tenkt? Muligens hadde du sett det som din plikt å hoppe. Eksempler på slik selvoppofrelse finnes. Enkelte tenker i slike situasjoner: bedre én enn fem. Men har sidemannen din rett til å tenke at du bør hoppe? Han kunne kanskje overbevist deg dersom dere rakk å diskutere spørsmålet -- det hadde gjort saken mindre komplisert, eller komplisert på en annen måte (spørsmål om manipulasjon ville dukket opp) -- men her finnes det ikke tid til snakk. Har sidemannen rett til å ta besvare spørsmålet for deg eller til å tvinge deg?

Og hva med fem fastbundnes syn på saken? Hvis vi spurte, ville kanskje noen av dem mene at ja, det riktige alt tatt i betraktning ville være å kaste tjukkingen i døden for deres skyld. Men ville ikke en slik forsikring få alle moralske varselslamper til å blinke? Kanskje burde et lignende ubehag melde seg dersom de overlevende i ettertid takker oss for å ha reddet livene deres på denne måten? (Og hva sier dette om min antydning om at Jim skulle kunne finne trøst i slike takksigelser?) Enda mer interessant blir de overlevndes perspektiv dersom vi ikke, slik Greene og de fleste andre trolleyologer alltid tar for gitt, at det å overleve er et gode uansett hvordan. Det er en kjensgjerning at mennesker ofte opplever skam og eksistensielt ubehag ved selv å overleve katastrofer der andre stryker med. Hvorfor meg!? Sett nå at de fem på sporet har sett alt sammen. De så trikken komme stormende mot dem, og de så hvordan vi stanset den. I det vi frigjør dem fra repene som har holdt dem fangne, forblir tre liggende apatiske på sporet, en spretter opp og kaster seg om halsen på oss, mens den siste av fangene reiser seg opp i moralsk raseri, og med den nettopp nevnte eksistensielle fortvilelsen hudfletter han oss for hva vi har gjort: Hva er du for et menneske!? Jeg blir kvalm! Hvordan kan du innbille deg at du har gjort meg en tjeneste -- gjort noe godt for min skyld!? Jeg hadde mye heller dødd enn bli reddet på denne måten!? Ingen har bedt deg myrde for min skyld!! Og så videre. (Og hva om alle fem gjør det?) Joshua Greene har natuligvis sitt ferdige svar, men hvordan ville du svare for deg?