The practice of undergraduates betrays their theoretical relativism. They do judge within themselves between things they like better than others. When they aren’t held captive by political politeness, they can even recognize that they believe their judgments have validity that others should recognize. They feel free to mock musical genres. They detest bad songs within a particular genre – this on matters presumably limited to “taste.”
Bentham, and even Mill, would agree that we must attend to and make judgments about our ends. Bentham asserted that all human aims could be gathered up under one word: pleasure. However, pleasure had many dimensions; every pleasure has a definite intensity and duration, purity and fecundity, and we anticipate it with more or less certainty in the proximate or remote future. Rarely does a contemporary utilitarian calculus work out the varying dimensions of pleasure, which is to say, it has stopped taking pleasure seriously. We say that pleasure is relative; but in reality it is too complex for our vocabularies and calculations. The difference is important for our future happiness.
11 May 2009
10 May 2009
Science of Pleasure I
Popular understanding too easily equates utilitarianism with instrumental rationality, a relentless logic of efficiency incapable of evaluating the ends it pursues.
On the other hand, an introductory course in ethics will insist that the concept of the end, pleasure, plays a central role in the evolution of utilitarian thought. Whereas Jeremy Bentham insisted that Halo is as good as Heidegger, Bentham’s successor John Stuart Mill retorted, “Better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a pig satisfied.” On this story, Bentham thought all pleasures could be quantified and so compared, but Mill claimed that pleasures may be qualitatively different and so incomparable. For Mill, only one who has tasted the pleasures of port and the pleasures of beer can judge between them.
Still, what moral does the introductory ethics student draw from this story? I suspect that they may go further than Mill. Perhaps they conclude that there is no judging, not even within oneself, not between even comparable pleasures of beer and port. Perhaps they make every pleasure a potentially absolute pleasure relative to some potential hedonist for whom “man is the measure of all things.” And so we are delivered back into the hands of instrumental rationality, where we can no longer reason about ends, but only about means.
What would it mean to take utilitarianism seriously? That is, can we imagine paying closer attention to pleasure, to its natures? Does utilitarianism have some insight to offer us in thinking about ends?
On the other hand, an introductory course in ethics will insist that the concept of the end, pleasure, plays a central role in the evolution of utilitarian thought. Whereas Jeremy Bentham insisted that Halo is as good as Heidegger, Bentham’s successor John Stuart Mill retorted, “Better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a pig satisfied.” On this story, Bentham thought all pleasures could be quantified and so compared, but Mill claimed that pleasures may be qualitatively different and so incomparable. For Mill, only one who has tasted the pleasures of port and the pleasures of beer can judge between them.
Still, what moral does the introductory ethics student draw from this story? I suspect that they may go further than Mill. Perhaps they conclude that there is no judging, not even within oneself, not between even comparable pleasures of beer and port. Perhaps they make every pleasure a potentially absolute pleasure relative to some potential hedonist for whom “man is the measure of all things.” And so we are delivered back into the hands of instrumental rationality, where we can no longer reason about ends, but only about means.
What would it mean to take utilitarianism seriously? That is, can we imagine paying closer attention to pleasure, to its natures? Does utilitarianism have some insight to offer us in thinking about ends?
06 May 2009
Aesthetics of Cute II
Cartoons are funny; death is not. So cartoons face into their limits when they picture death. Either they make death funny, in which case death never appears, or they push the limits of being cute cartoons, and they are no longer funny.
The Coyote and Road Runner series, and Warner Brothers generally, treat death as funny. Warner Brothers even applies this aesthetic directly to hunting in the character of Elmer Fudd and his intended prey, Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck. Warner Brothers does not criticize hunting; hunting just provides a setting in which human and animals can have comic interactions. Death is funny only because no one ever dies.
There is little aesthetic difference between Warner Brothers cartoons and the early Walt Disney shorts. However, with Fantasia (1940) and Bambi (1942), Disney began to produce feature length films which introduced a different aesthetic. Cute remained: Mickey Mouse in Fantasia, Thumper, Flower, and Bambi in Bambi. But Disney introduces a new aesthetic alongside cute. The new aesthetic allowed for death, even tragedy, in the form of a cartoon.
In response to Fantasia, Warner Brothers laughed. They produced "What's Opera Doc" to lighten up the dark wizards at Disney. But to Bambi the response could only be Elmer Fudd.
to be continued
The Coyote and Road Runner series, and Warner Brothers generally, treat death as funny. Warner Brothers even applies this aesthetic directly to hunting in the character of Elmer Fudd and his intended prey, Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck. Warner Brothers does not criticize hunting; hunting just provides a setting in which human and animals can have comic interactions. Death is funny only because no one ever dies.
There is little aesthetic difference between Warner Brothers cartoons and the early Walt Disney shorts. However, with Fantasia (1940) and Bambi (1942), Disney began to produce feature length films which introduced a different aesthetic. Cute remained: Mickey Mouse in Fantasia, Thumper, Flower, and Bambi in Bambi. But Disney introduces a new aesthetic alongside cute. The new aesthetic allowed for death, even tragedy, in the form of a cartoon.
In response to Fantasia, Warner Brothers laughed. They produced "What's Opera Doc" to lighten up the dark wizards at Disney. But to Bambi the response could only be Elmer Fudd.
to be continued
04 May 2009
Aesthetics of Cute
Cute defines the aesthetic genre of Precious Moments figurines and the heroines of Walt Disney feature length cartoons. The eyes dominate the face; the balloon of a head sits precariously on a small body. Absolutely any example will validate the claim. Adults are simply larger children; and children are exaggerated infants. The aesthetic of the cute is aimed at children and those who want to hold on to the child’s vision of the world.
There are realities, realities many adults will affirm as good, which the aesthetic of cute cannot present. Imagine first a Precious Moments version of a crucifix. We immediately know something has gone terribly wrong. The crucifixion is not cute; those who think of it as cute have warped sensibilities. They are the avowed enemies of those who would worship the crucified one. But we may respond to a cute crucifix in two ways. First we may claim that “cute” presents a true vision of the world; we may modify Paul and insist “whatever is cute, whatever is sweet, think on these things.” That is, we might say, since a crucifix and what it represents cannot be cute, we should not have crucifixes and we should not think about crucifixions. Alternatively, we might conclude that if cute cannot present a crucifix, so much the worse for cute.
Imagine – unfortunately, in the internet age, one need not imagine – Disney characters engaged in the act of sex. Again, we know immediately that something has gone wrong. Sex is not cute; those who present it as such have warped desires. Confronted with Disney characters engaged in sex, we suspect that the real aim is, again, children. Pedophilias may prey on children by introducing them to sex in a child-friendly aesthetic. If we reject pedophilia, however, we still must choose between the adequacy of the cute and the goodness of good sex. If cuteness is adequate to reality, then we may reject sex because it is unpresentable and as boring in Disney films. On the other hand, if the cute cannot present sex as good, then the cute does not define the good.
Tomorrow: the cute critique of hunting.
There are realities, realities many adults will affirm as good, which the aesthetic of cute cannot present. Imagine first a Precious Moments version of a crucifix. We immediately know something has gone terribly wrong. The crucifixion is not cute; those who think of it as cute have warped sensibilities. They are the avowed enemies of those who would worship the crucified one. But we may respond to a cute crucifix in two ways. First we may claim that “cute” presents a true vision of the world; we may modify Paul and insist “whatever is cute, whatever is sweet, think on these things.” That is, we might say, since a crucifix and what it represents cannot be cute, we should not have crucifixes and we should not think about crucifixions. Alternatively, we might conclude that if cute cannot present a crucifix, so much the worse for cute.
Imagine – unfortunately, in the internet age, one need not imagine – Disney characters engaged in the act of sex. Again, we know immediately that something has gone wrong. Sex is not cute; those who present it as such have warped desires. Confronted with Disney characters engaged in sex, we suspect that the real aim is, again, children. Pedophilias may prey on children by introducing them to sex in a child-friendly aesthetic. If we reject pedophilia, however, we still must choose between the adequacy of the cute and the goodness of good sex. If cuteness is adequate to reality, then we may reject sex because it is unpresentable and as boring in Disney films. On the other hand, if the cute cannot present sex as good, then the cute does not define the good.
Tomorrow: the cute critique of hunting.
Aesthetics of the Hunt
The challenge of "looking at death" leads me to the next topic. The topic of the pleasures and pains produced on the senses we call "aesthetics." Beauty has dominated, perhaps rightly, the topic. But there are other forms of aesthetics: the ugly, of course, but also, the sublime, the trivial, the silly, the disgusting, the delicious.
For the next several posts, I will argue that there are aesthetic modes that are inappropriate to death -- they make it impossible to see death and so we recoil.
Next post: Death and the Cute.
For the next several posts, I will argue that there are aesthetic modes that are inappropriate to death -- they make it impossible to see death and so we recoil.
Next post: Death and the Cute.
22 April 2009
Ortega and Utilitarians
Initially, we may identify what might appear as common ground: the utilitarian, like Ortega’s hunter, aims at “happiness.” Clearly, however, the same word refers to different experiences.
For the utilitarian, happiness means pleasure. To claim that all sentient creatures strive for happiness is to say that they strive for pleasure. If one animal hunts another, it is for the “pleasure” of eating it. Further, the aim of all human action is pleasure or happiness.
For Ortega, this analysis does not go very far. Insofar as humans have broken with Nature and have entered History, their goal is freedom, not happiness. Even if they were to return to Nature as a hunter in search of happiness, it is not for the sake of “the pleasant.” Pleasure is not so much a goal as that which accompanies achievement in action. It is compatible with, perhaps even enhanced by, much pain and effort. Finally, it is a mistake to claim that animals, human or non-human, eat just for pleasure. They hunt and eat to survive (at least) and this brings with it pleasure. The way they hunt and the way they eat actually constitutes them as members of the species that they are.
For the utilitarian, happiness means pleasure. To claim that all sentient creatures strive for happiness is to say that they strive for pleasure. If one animal hunts another, it is for the “pleasure” of eating it. Further, the aim of all human action is pleasure or happiness.
For Ortega, this analysis does not go very far. Insofar as humans have broken with Nature and have entered History, their goal is freedom, not happiness. Even if they were to return to Nature as a hunter in search of happiness, it is not for the sake of “the pleasant.” Pleasure is not so much a goal as that which accompanies achievement in action. It is compatible with, perhaps even enhanced by, much pain and effort. Finally, it is a mistake to claim that animals, human or non-human, eat just for pleasure. They hunt and eat to survive (at least) and this brings with it pleasure. The way they hunt and the way they eat actually constitutes them as members of the species that they are.
20 April 2009
Ortega y Gasset VI The Ethics of Hunting
Some writers criticize the practice of hunting on utilitarian grounds. The claims here are that pleasure is good and pain is bad, that right actions maximize the balance of pleasure over pain (that is the utilitarian part), and that hunting can be shown to not maximize pleasure over pain (and the anti-hunting part). This critique calls those who resist applying the utilitarian framework and only that framework to non-human species “speciesists.”
Part of the disagreement with the hunting concerns the definition of what is meant by hunting. Ortega y Gasset defines “hunting” as “what an animal does to take possession, dead or alive, of some other being that belongs to a species basically inferior to its own.” For the utilitarian, this definition misses the ethically relevant dimensions. That the hunter and the hunted belong to different species is beside the point. That the species have mutually adapted to each other such that, qua species, each depends on the other introduces extraneous data.
The utilitarian decrees that only pleasure and pain have an ethical weight, and not only humans but other animals too can feel pleasure and pain. For the utilitarian, hunting would be “what one sentient animal does to inflict death on another sentient animal, perhaps for the pleasure of eating it or displaying it.” From a utilitarian point of view, the only question is the extent to which the hunter can inflict death with minimal pain, as compared with the pain induced and the pleasure forfeited should the animal not die at the hunter’s hands.
Two features of Ortega’s account of hunting drop out of the utilitarian account. First, the difference of species disappears as irrelevant. As a basis for an ethic of hunting, this has troubling implications. Whether one hunts and eats or displays one’s own species is relevant only to the extent that it might increase the pleasure and pain involved. The utilitarian cannot oppose cannibalism on the grounds that it is cannibalism, only on the grounds that under certain circumstances it creates less than optimal balance of pleasure over pain. Further, though in principle it would not differentiate between species, in practice it values the species suffering pain over the species that inflicts the pain. The result is that animal rights advocates may feel pleasure at news of hunter accidents (and express such pleasure on internet forums) because at least there are fewer hunters to inflict pain on animals. Sometimes those who advocate animal rights must consciously remind themselves that "people are animals too" -- and this statement elevates humans to a moral status the activist can too easily lose sight of. (reference)
Second, the ecosystem drops out of the utilitarian calculus. Institutions, organizations, and systems, even ecological systems cannot feel pleasure or pain. Only individuals within those systems can; only individuals are real. Consequently, the only way to take account of an ecological system is through the pain felt by individuals; the collapse of an ecosystem and the extinction of species concerns the utilitarian only insofar as the individual sentient animals feel pain during the collapse. The utilitarian can have no objection to the extinction of a species, for an extinct species can no longer feel pleasure or pain. The utilitarian is pained only by the pain felt by the members of the species so long as they happen to exist. But “happening to exist” is itself neither good nor bad.
At this point I cannot but wonder if the utilitarian metaphysic is simply too truncated, if its inability to recognize certain realities does not doom those realities in its drive to efficiently maximize pleasure. Michael Pollan roots this metaphysic in a form of life. He notes “how parochial , and urban, an ideology animals rights really is. It could only thrive in a world where people have lost contact with the natural world, where animals no longer pose any threat to us (a fairly recent development) , and our mastery of nature seems unchallenged. ‘In our normal life,’ Singer writes, ‘there is no serious clash of interests between human and nonhuman animals.’ Such a statement assumes a decidedly citified version of ‘normal life,’ certainly one no farmer – indeed, no gardener – would recognize.” (pp. 325-6).
According to animal rights advocates those who reject the utilitarian account are “speciesists.” This term of criticism may be accepted if we define it. To be a speciesist is to claim, minimally, that species and ecological systems ought to count directly in our ethical considerations. It is to claim that the continued existence of a species is a good that we should value, that an ecosystem is worth preserving even if more pleasure and less pain would seem to be the result of developing it. It is to claim that while the pains and pleasures of individuals are important, there are also goods and evils other than the pain and pleasures of sentient individuals. There is more in the world than is dreamed of....
Part of the disagreement with the hunting concerns the definition of what is meant by hunting. Ortega y Gasset defines “hunting” as “what an animal does to take possession, dead or alive, of some other being that belongs to a species basically inferior to its own.” For the utilitarian, this definition misses the ethically relevant dimensions. That the hunter and the hunted belong to different species is beside the point. That the species have mutually adapted to each other such that, qua species, each depends on the other introduces extraneous data.
The utilitarian decrees that only pleasure and pain have an ethical weight, and not only humans but other animals too can feel pleasure and pain. For the utilitarian, hunting would be “what one sentient animal does to inflict death on another sentient animal, perhaps for the pleasure of eating it or displaying it.” From a utilitarian point of view, the only question is the extent to which the hunter can inflict death with minimal pain, as compared with the pain induced and the pleasure forfeited should the animal not die at the hunter’s hands.
Two features of Ortega’s account of hunting drop out of the utilitarian account. First, the difference of species disappears as irrelevant. As a basis for an ethic of hunting, this has troubling implications. Whether one hunts and eats or displays one’s own species is relevant only to the extent that it might increase the pleasure and pain involved. The utilitarian cannot oppose cannibalism on the grounds that it is cannibalism, only on the grounds that under certain circumstances it creates less than optimal balance of pleasure over pain. Further, though in principle it would not differentiate between species, in practice it values the species suffering pain over the species that inflicts the pain. The result is that animal rights advocates may feel pleasure at news of hunter accidents (and express such pleasure on internet forums) because at least there are fewer hunters to inflict pain on animals. Sometimes those who advocate animal rights must consciously remind themselves that "people are animals too" -- and this statement elevates humans to a moral status the activist can too easily lose sight of. (reference)
Second, the ecosystem drops out of the utilitarian calculus. Institutions, organizations, and systems, even ecological systems cannot feel pleasure or pain. Only individuals within those systems can; only individuals are real. Consequently, the only way to take account of an ecological system is through the pain felt by individuals; the collapse of an ecosystem and the extinction of species concerns the utilitarian only insofar as the individual sentient animals feel pain during the collapse. The utilitarian can have no objection to the extinction of a species, for an extinct species can no longer feel pleasure or pain. The utilitarian is pained only by the pain felt by the members of the species so long as they happen to exist. But “happening to exist” is itself neither good nor bad.
At this point I cannot but wonder if the utilitarian metaphysic is simply too truncated, if its inability to recognize certain realities does not doom those realities in its drive to efficiently maximize pleasure. Michael Pollan roots this metaphysic in a form of life. He notes “how parochial , and urban, an ideology animals rights really is. It could only thrive in a world where people have lost contact with the natural world, where animals no longer pose any threat to us (a fairly recent development) , and our mastery of nature seems unchallenged. ‘In our normal life,’ Singer writes, ‘there is no serious clash of interests between human and nonhuman animals.’ Such a statement assumes a decidedly citified version of ‘normal life,’ certainly one no farmer – indeed, no gardener – would recognize.” (pp. 325-6).
According to animal rights advocates those who reject the utilitarian account are “speciesists.” This term of criticism may be accepted if we define it. To be a speciesist is to claim, minimally, that species and ecological systems ought to count directly in our ethical considerations. It is to claim that the continued existence of a species is a good that we should value, that an ecosystem is worth preserving even if more pleasure and less pain would seem to be the result of developing it. It is to claim that while the pains and pleasures of individuals are important, there are also goods and evils other than the pain and pleasures of sentient individuals. There is more in the world than is dreamed of....
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