Philosophy of Mind: The Art of Self-Creation

The Art of Self-Creation

Many people have an inkling that there must be more to life than merely fulfilling the day-to-day habits and the life-recipes we are constantly encouraged to accept as real; even so, most of these will find it necessary actually to fulfil all of the customary conditions before they can attribute suficient certainty to their own intuitions and begin to leave the comforts of custom behind. This is what Freud describes as the "involution phase," the point - usually around middle-age - where the individual, having perfected his or her adaptation to the external world, suddenly begins to turn inward (note the coincidence with the popular notion of the "mid-life crisis"). Having reached this stage, the desire to know a level of consciousness transcending that offered by slavish adherence to the social norms, or else the underlying intuitions are at least strong enough to cause you to devote a certain amount of energy to the study of the hypothesis that such a project is both possible and desirable. I have no doubt that even attaining the latter condition is the beginning of wisdom. For if one resolves to look beyond the world of easy appearances, then there is no explanation for the investment of energy in such a patently non-material pursuit other than this: one desires a glimpse of truth. And any energy invested in the pursuit of a higher good must yield rewards manifold. Such is the only logic whereby an ethical being can possibly exist....

What is the nature of reality? Prima facie, this looks like a very important question, indeed, one whose importance would have to be universally recognized. If its importance is allowed, then a pursuit such as this one, which purports to be searching for deeper meanings than are provided by unreflective adherence to custom and convention, must likewise be acknowledged as valuable. Note that I do not condemn custom or convention, per se, but only the unquestioning obedience thereto. I fully expect that the force of social consensus has been a most discriminating judge of important matters, as is attested by the evidence of thousands of generations of cultural evolution. Thus, I assume that most of the central concepts which we, as cultural beings would purport to value - truth, honesty, self-sacrifice, hard work, etc. - are, in fact, concepts of some substantial worth. We are not, however, the cultural beings whose personae we affect. For example, no political leader aspiring to any degree of public credibility would stand up and proclaim that he or she was against world peace, against human equality, against complete honesty, etc., and yet how many actually take a stand in the name of these principles? Not many; to date, most who have - Gandhi, King, Christ, etc. - have been assassinated. On the other hand, how many follow these principles when actually conducting business, when the cameras aren't around? Let's take a poll, a show of hands, please. Come on, you don't want to appear naive....

As cultural beings, we know these to be the most important issues; and yet, just as surely, we know that "things just don't work that way." There is a climate of conspiracy, wherein we agree not to mention the mysterious duplicity between the cultural selves we pretend to be, and that sinister core of selfishness that would find some pretext of justification to bend any rule in the mere hope of attaining thereby some minute increment of prestige, power, popularity.... In other words, nestled in the very heart of all our legitimate cultural values, like a worm coiled in the apple, like Sartre's nothingness, coiled in the heart of being, there lies a tacitly perpetuated anti-value, which, plainly put, is just this: the prerogative of every individual to ignore social obligations in the name of self-aggrandizement.^a We all take it for granted that, given the chance, any individual will sacrifice the public good for personal gain, and we legitimize this state of affairs by our complicity. Why? Because each of us cherishes the secret ambition that, at some point in the lottery of life, his or her turn will come. After all, have we not been thrust, unasked, into an unfair world and been forced to do things we did not wish to do in order to survive? And if we have been subjected to the brute demands of survival because some others have frittered away our rights to basic human dignity in frivolous and conspicuous material consumption, then why should we scruple to perpetuate the same injustice, given half a chance?

Perhaps I have exaggerated somewhat, made matters seem worse than they are in order to make a point...but have I really? Exactly how deep does ego run in each of us? In you? I am accusing us all of possessing a selfish core willing to sacrifice truth for personal advantage. At what point did your hackles start to rise at what I was saying? Are you really willing to be offended, when by that very offense you are choosing to identify with precisely the objectionable thing that is being criticized? Personal advantage should always be abjured in favour of the public good, that is, the equal good of every individual. There, I've said it! When we proclaim ourselves to our friends, to our neighbours, can we say any less? Then why do we resist making this proclamation to ourselves?

And yet, things are maybe not as bad as they seem. Just as I am not condemning custom, per se, but only the its blind acceptance, likewise, I do not think that ego is all bad. That is, I believe that there are both illegitimate and legitimate types of egoism. Unfortunately, as was said, the type of egoism being generated by current social programming is predominantly of the illegitimate variety, what I called the "tacitly perpetuated anti-value." Nevertheless, if there is a real need for the existence of strong personalities, then we can understand the tenacity with which this anti-value clings to life. If a powerful, cohesive ego-centre is necessary for the evolution of consciousness, then any principle which contributes to that end has a certain justification. What, then, is the nature and function of legitimate egoism?

Of the many things which the course of cultural evolution has taught us to value, one stands head and shoulders above the rest as a good never to be opposed and always to be desired; I am talking, of course about progress. That great nineteenth century champion of individual liberty, John Stuart Mill, is especially instructive on this point:

The despotism of custom is everywhere the standing hindrance to human advancement, being in unceasing antagonism to that disposition to aim at something better than customary, which is called, according to circumstances, the spirit of liberty, or that of progress or improvement....The progressive principle...whether as the love of liberty or improvement, is antagonistic to the sway of Custom...and the contest between the two constitutes the chief interest of the history of mankind. ¹

Since the time of Mill, progress has accelerated at an unprecedented rate, so that the pure opposition of progress and custom described by Mill is no longer strictly true. Custom may be somewhat slow on the uptake, but, as was said, in the long run its judgement appears to be essentially sound. We, in contemporary society, find ourselves shaped by the force of custom so as to be accustomed to the idea of progress. We have a healthy appreciation of the fact that our experience of reality can improve at an astonishing pace, provided we nurture the conditions which make progress possible.

So what are the conditions which make progress possible? Beyond everything else, progress is sponsored by the spirit of the pioneer, the adventurer, the inventor. Only a mind capable of being dissatisfied with all the best that life has to offer has the true courage to seek beyond the bounds of the known for something utterly new. Mill identifies this quality as "genius," and notes that ex vi termini - "from the meaning of the term" - genius really designates precisely that which is most unique to a given individual; but this is what we think of as personality. In other words, we have discovered the function of legitimate egoism. For society to continue to enjoy the benefits of progress, as all of its members surely desired, it was inevitable that social norms contributing to the formation of very strong individual egos should have developed. The essence of this ego-strength, however, consists of an ability not to be bound by those very norms which have brought it into being.

Thus, matters are not quite so clear cut as Mill would have them (or as perhaps they were in Mill's time). Custom cannot be wholly antagonistic to the progressive spirit, but must perpetuate its possibility by means of a class of very special customs whose function it is to liberate the individual will from the despotism of custom. Even so, the great mass of humanity are quite content to be settlers instead of pioneers. Most of us are quite happy to operate within the bounds of custom, and are understandably wary of all those who make it their business to operate outside of accepted parameters. How are we to distinguish creative behaviour from criminal? How are we to know the psychotic from the saint? This caution was also evident to Mill, who remarks that,

People think genius a fine thing if it enables a man to write an exciting poem, or paint a picture. But in its true sense, that of originality in thought and action, though no one says that it is not a thing to be admired, nearly all, at heart, think that they can do very well without it....Originality is the one thing which unoriginal minds cannot feel the use of....If they could see what it would do for them, it would not be originality. ²

Note that, in this passage, Mill is also calling attention to the central dichotomy with which we are so concerned, that of the cultural self each purports to be, who will not say of genius that "it is not a thing to be admired," and that unspeaking core which is quite happy to "do very well without" the values it is forced to proclaim - or, at least, to which it tacitly accedes - in public. More to the current point, however, what Mill is describing is the self-contradictory desire of the cautious masses to enjoy the rewards of allowing a creative mind to blossom, while at the same time constraining that freedom within certain narrow limits, thereby minimizing the risk of public damage, should that freedom go awry. It has always been the lot of the most creative among us to find refuge in the arts, where they may at least do little harm, if not little good.

The issue runs far deeper than the trite cliché of the "tortured artist," however, living and dying in his or her own little world for the sake of an artistic vision and a few miserable artefacts to be admired only after the artist's death. What is being described is the way in which custom, while recognizing the value of creativity and so incorporating specific customs which create contexts of radical freedom, nevertheless, out of caution and fear, attempts to restrict the impact of the radically new - at least until it can be verified. Science itself is little more than a system of highly formalized constraints designed to focus creative thought in a certain area, yes, but also and especially, to permit the validation of creative thought by the larger community. Indeed, most scientific research has become so specialized that no more than a handful of people thoroughly comprehend what is going on in any particular field.^b There is, however, an overlapping system of checks and balances among specialists, whereby certain basic theories are common to a given field, and any research which is to be credible will have to at least proceed from these accepted starting points. Moreover, there is also a system of hierarchical constraints reaching from material to theoretical praxes - i.e. from practical applications in day-to-day life to the highly abstract reasoning of the research scientist. The theoretical scientist must be able to transmit his or her discoveries to students and colleagues, and also be able to provide something substantial, either in the way of a methodology or data, which can be used by the more concrete practitioners, engineers and technicians. Now, the engineers, in turn, repay the theoreticians by constructing for them ever more sophisticated machines, based on the information provided, whereby the latter may further explore their theories. But this technical support is only feasible so long as the technical mechanisms of a given branch of theoretical knowledge can be adapted to produce valuable results^c in the lebenswelt (life-world) of ordinary human experience. Particle physics, for example, has produced quite a lot of tremendously expensive but relatively useless equipment. Its contributions to the field of nuclear medicine, however, give it some pretext of justification. Even so, nuclear medicine is still a long way from being a significant factor in the daily lives of the mass of human beings. Not that we should scrap a technology if it only finds occasional use. We should be thankful that nuclear medicine is used on only a small segment of the population, and we should acknowledge our obligation to provide that life-saving service. Nevertheless, creation of that which will find the most widespread use at the most basic level of human existence must remain an ideal at which we aim. It is just possible that the billions of dollars which have saved a handful of lives "over here" may have been better applied to the problem of malnutrition, saving millions of lives "over there." That fact will remain what it is, no matter whether your spouse, or your child, or even you yourself have been saved from death by some form of nuclear medicine. Personally, I think we can solve both problems, but ethically, we are absolutely obliged to get our priorities straight. Believing that you yourself are the most important being in the universe is a good way to get ahead, if you happen to be possessed of natural advantages, personally or environmentally. Convincing everybody that all life is sacred, however, is a way to focus the maximum resources upon the solution of individual problems, wherever they may appear....

Thus far, we have begun to identify the nature and function of legitimate egoism, as well as the general social conditions under which it is suffered to exist as "creativity." This notion of the strong individualist, unbowed by the burden of social norms and preconceptions, fighting his or her way into a new realm and bringing back a precious treasure which may contribute to a new and improved social order, is neither radical nor new. The tradition of the hero is central to all mythologies, and has been extensively (and brilliantly) analyzed by Joseph Campbell in numerous books. Kierkegaard's "knight of faith" performs actions which cannot be justified by any existing moral standards, but the faith of his actions brings the new level of morality into being. In Answer to Job, the hapless Job, by maintaining his faith despite all manner of torments being inflicted upon him, is interpreted by Jung as achieving a moral victory over an infantile deity, in other words, transcending an outmoded form of morality and thereby bringing a new form into being. The idea of creative exploration as transcending norms is particularly fascinating when applied to a cognitive analysis of the genesis of radical new discoveries. It will be argued that "radical theoretical insights" can only come about by a transcending of existing conceptual frameworks; both Kierkegaard and Jung will be much more closely examined in the elaboration of the psycho-epistemological nature of this phenomenon.

But let us return to our original question; suppose its importance is not allowed. There are people, I am sure, who would object to a question like, "What is the nature of reality?" on the grounds that it was obscurantist, that it takes what is beyond all doubt, our immediate experience of being a real creature living in a real world and involved in real situations, and insinuates that, somehow, we're not quite getting the whole picture. This sort of "common sense realism" can be descried in the attempt by certain logical positivists, in the mid-twentieth century, to "eliminate metaphysics." More practically, however, common sense realism has a kind of bourgeoisie smugness about it, which leads one to believe that the people who are most inclined "to accept things as they are," are not the people who derive the least benefit from that state of affairs. Those who, with paternal condescension, tell us "not to question the obvious" are precisely those who know (or have a pretty good idea) that "the obvious" (which they are trying to perpetuate) will not hold up under rational inquiry. The only thing obvious about the way things are is that we live in a system of legally sanctioned inequality. As long as we continue to abide by laws which permit certain people to have more - and it matters not whether by right of talent, perseverance, or birth - as long as there are those who are entitled to more, there will be a great many others who are forced to make do with less. This is basic math. We live in a closed system. There are finite available material resources. Ergo, for any one to have more, some other must have less....

Of course, the standard objection here is that some people are just plain lazy. Why should someone who is not willing to work be entitled to as much prosperity as a hard worker? Again, the point is an elitist one. Having a strong intellect is no less a chance result of a toss of the genetic dice than having a strong back. But, no matter how hard you are willing to work with your strong back, you will never have the same opportunities for material success as someone with a strong intellect. Theoretically, rationally, the same possibilities should exist for everyone - but they don't. Let us consider a more subtle argument.

Of course, in terms of organic or inborn abilities, different people are suited to different tasks. Perhaps individuals also seek different rewards. It may well be that someone with a strong enough intellect is not satisfied with material rewards, but has to seek the satisfaction of some nebulous "intellectual rewards" - as Mill puts it, "better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied."³ On the other hand, perhaps someone blessed with a strong back might find immense fulfilment in whatever opportunities were afforded him. But there is an additional factor to consider. A human being is not simply the set of physical capacities with which he or she is born. A capacity is only a potentiality; a potentiality can only become an ability if it finds itself in a nurturing environment where it can grow. As Sayre says, in the initial stages of

development, an organism is not "...capable of maintaining itself in the face of an indifferent environment....An acorn that does not sprout rots away or is eaten...."⁴ If it does not find active support, then a capacity is only a seed cast on sterile ground; it may linger, dormant, until there comes life-giving rain, or until it is transplanted to a more fertile land; it may be crushed underfoot by the hostile inhabitants of a hostile land; or it may simply wither, unprotected in the sun, and die, without ever really having been born.... You see what I'm getting at. Even though we're all born with a different and arbitrary set of talents, how we make use of those talents depends on the environment in which we grow. The norms which the common sense realist would maintain are all tainted with the view that economic inferiority implies intellectual and moral inferiority. This is precisely the point made by Lewontin in his book Biology as Ideology:

The nonsense propagated by the ideologues of biological determinism that the lower classes are biologically inferior to the upper classes...is precisely nonsense. It is meant to legitimize the structures of inequality by putting a biological gloss on them and by propagating the continual confusion between what may be influenced by genes and what may be changed by social and environmental alterations.⁵

It must be reiterated, cannot be overemphasized, that those who benefit from a system of inequality cannot be regarded as objective commentators on that system. If we create a climate which is not conducive to intellectual and moral development among the economically challenged, and further limit economic rewards to those who are intellectually and morally developed - or at least possess sufficient acumen to feign the same - then of course most individuals in this position will live up to our worst expectations.^d The fact that our presuppositions have caused something to come to be does not prove that our presuppositions are right. All it proves is that we are capable of shaping ourselves by shaping our environment. Does it not make sense, at this point, to assume responsibility

So it seems that the question, "What is the nature of reality?" could be threatening to those people who enjoy a certain success under a system of preferential norms, beneficial to those holding the other end of the stick. Now, it is obvious that intelligence is a key factor in determining who will benefit from our preferential norms. The rewards so gained can be identified as primarily material (the illusion of moral superiority having been firmly laid to rest). Are these material rewards sufficient recompense for allowing oneself to be seduced into perpetuating social injustice?

What is the nature of happiness? Perhaps those possessed of ample material distraction never even bother to wonder about this question. And yet, the actual range of material pleasures is really quite limited (especially if you wish to operate only within the norms). Once we have satisfied our basic drives - food, sex, etc. - there's not much left to do. So your material wealth allows you to satisfy your basic drives at will - now what? If there is one thing to which human beings adapt with amazing rapidity, it is positive changes in their environment. What begins as a source of intense pleasure soon becomes nothing but a habit, and, eventually, even a source of tedium. Moreover - here is the real kicker - those individuals who are able to amass material wealth because of their intellectual powers are precisely least likely to be satisfied with what they have amassed...because of their intellectual powers. As Mill puts it,

It is indisputable that the being whose capacities of enjoyment are low has the greatest chance of having them fully satisfied; and a highly endowed being will always feel that any happiness which he can look for, as the world is constituted, is imperfect.⁶

The capacity which leads one to master very quickly the task of achieving optimal adaptation to one's environment - a task which might challenge another for an entire lifetime - will soon lead one to recognize that the adaptation is complete, and spur one on to even greater challenges. Thus, it seems unlikely that the question, "What is the nature of reality?", can really be discounted by anyone. To those who suffer in the clutches of oppressive norms, the question promises to annihilate every prejudice with the scrutiny of reason. To those who enjoy the ostensible successes of favourable norms, the question offers the promise of greater, more authentic rewards, happiness too vast ever to keep to oneself, treasures enough for all.

Apology

I fear that, in my impatience to express all of the ideas that plague me, I have leapt too hazardously from half-finished concept to half-finished concept, have given myself over too frequently to verbose diatribe, have, in short, failed to accomplish what I wished to accomplish. Perhaps it has all been for the best, though, inasmuch as it compels me to attempt to formulate the most terse position statement possible. Briefly, my position is as follows: It seems to me self-evident that the existence of consciousness is a phenomenon of such overwhelming importance that any time which is not spent in the relentless task of probing and expanding its boundaries is time utterly wasted.

In elaborating the nature of this task, I may have offended some by constantly berating social customs and social norms. While the notion of a norm is a convenient fiction, it must be stressed that social and behavioural norms have no objective existence. A social critique remains psychologically valid, due to a general belief in the objective status of norms, but it must be stressed that what exists are really myriad individual beliefs about what constitutes a norm. We may constantly attempt to codify, commercialize, or otherwise represent our norms in some intersubjectively verifiable form, but the complexity of life ensures a significant variation in subjective interpretation.^* Thus, my only challenge to the status quo is really a challenge for each individual to commit to a constant and critical examination of his or her own presuppositions.

Doubtless, we are suited to different tasks, all of which contribute to the richness of existence, but the vast importance of this exploratory work must come to be acknowledged by all. For by accepting and condoning such cognitive exploration, non-explorers themselves assume some of the risk, allowing dangerous freedoms to exist in their world and threaten their complacency, and so participate in the great task. This book is intended to effect a transition from the mere acceptance of the premise of the importance of cognitive exploration to a full blown desire to search beyond the parameters of the known for an optimum possible reality. Hegel postulates a transcendental "community of rational beings." Similarly, Heidegger, in his study of Hegel, envisions all philosophers as being involved in one vast, exo-temporal project - when one reads Plato one is working with him, as when one reads Heidegger writing about what happens when one reads Plato, as when one reads someone writing about Heidegger.... Perhaps we are all auditioning for membership in the community of transcendental beings. Perhaps this is an initiation test.

FOOTNOTES

a. Deception, guile, trickery...are not the adventitious
acts of a regrettable minority of persons....They seem
to be an endemic ingredient of our daily activities....
our daily life is characterized by rule violation of one
form or another.... (E.W. Vaz, Aspects of Deviance,
Prentice-Hall 1976, p. 77)

b. Relatively recently, a participant at a mathematical conference
stated, for the record, that no person present at that
conference would be capable of understanding any more
than six of the thirty papers presented.

c. Formal logic, for example, is among the most highly
theoretical of pursuits; its methods, however, find
almost universal application. Scientists, consultants,
politicians, etc., all attempt to use - or abuse -
logical principles in order to attain their ends. We
might consider the academic community itself, the
resources and support services of a university, to be
the "technical support" whereby logicians are repaid.

d. Some studies place the range of variation in I.Q. due to
environmental influences as high as forty points. The
fact that I.Q. tests are all norm-biased is, of course,
another problem.

E N D N O T E S

1. J. S. Mill, On Liberty, NY: Norton & Co. Inc., 1975, p.66

2. ibid., p. 62

3. Mill, Utilitarianism, p. 166

4. Kenneth Sayre, Cybernetics & the Philosophy of Mind, Humanities Press, 1976, p. 100

5. Lewontin, Biology as Ideology, p. 37

6. Mill, Utilitarianism, p.166