One subject relating to Objectivism that has always concerned and interested me is why altruism and Kantian philosophy have such a powerful hold over modern intellectuals.
At the heart of this subject is what I see as an apparent contradiction. On the one hand, we understand (as Objectivists) that man’s nature demands he use reason to live and thrive. On the other hand, there has been a constant struggle between altruistic philosophies and objective reality-based philosophies. In this struggle, the primitive philosophies dominate the greater part of human history.
The contradiction is: if man by nature requires reason to survive, why is irrationality such a huge part of his history, and likewise so dominant during the modern era? By irrationality, I mean a rejection of reason philosophically, rather than an incomplete intuitive primitivism.
Objectivism, Ayn Rand particularly, seems to provide an answer. Ayn Rand held that man is born tabula rasa. So man is not by nature born to be rational. He must learn to be rational, and choose to be rational. This he may do, and must do, if he desires to live. Nevertheless, the choice is open. Cultural factors, and perverse incentives, can cause man to choose unreason. To this effect, many good explanations have been given for why ‘mystics’ and ‘Atillas’ arise. This includes an overview of their motives and tactics. If I am not mistaken, Ayn Rand’s solution – beyond the generic ARI tactic of educating young intellectuals and exposing them to new, Objectivist, ideas – was for men of reason to cease sacrificing themselves to the mystics. By this tactic, the mystics lose their incentive for upholding philosophies of unreason, and thus the intellectual culture can be cleansed.
Towards a Different Tactic
I do not object to the ‘classic’ interpretation which I have laid out (and forgive me if you think I’ve got it wrong – better yet, correct me). However, I think it is not quite focused enough.
I think this classic interpretation fails to properly account for incentives as they operate for individuals. As such, I will reexamine the contradiction which I have earlier pointed out.
Man needs reason to live. Man historically has chosen unreason, and lived in misery, dying young. Why is this? Why would man be so often so quick to work against himself?
I have a theory that resolves this contradiction.
Different Levels of Identity
Man’s identity is defined simply. It includes many parts, such as his physical body, his ideas, his history, his desires, his name, his consciousness and so forth. Nevertheless, the union of these components as man’s identity is easy enough for even any child to grasp. This, I posture, is because consciousness itself has its basis in self-awareness. The primary for consciousness is that there is a self, which is a thing apart from everything else.
The question remains: what is this self? Specifically: how does one define it? I’ve pointed out all of the components that are included in the definition of self. The answer, then, is that context determines which definition is relevant in particular. For example, a man in relation to his children is a father. A woman in relation to her employee is a boss. And so on.
These contextual definitions differ along epistemological levels as well. Perceptually, a man who has not eaten in a long time is hungry, or hunger is part of his identity at that moment. Likewise, a man who accomplishes a goal might be considered successful. These last two definitions relate adjectives to a definition of identity. Consider that the identity itself would be: “a hungry man”.
After a certain point, there are concepts which are open-ended that can be included in the definition of a man’s identity. Virtues are an example of this. A man who consistently accomplishes his goals as a matter of character, would have the virtue of industriousness – perhaps. This sort of definition doesn’t refer to specific instances of what a man does, but generally refers to whom he is. This is important because this sort of characteristic can be predictive of what man will do in the future.
An argument might be made that these character traits are the only proper way to define man. One would not answer: “Hungry” to “How is Bob like?” The reason for this is critical to revealing my theory.
Man’s Spiritual Identity
When one asks, “How is Bob like?” they are specifically asking about the man’s man-ness. They know Bob is a mammal, they know he has two legs, and so forth. Now, Bob might be hungry, but this trait does not relate to those characteristics that distinguish Bob as a human being.
Character traits, virtues, vices, and so forth, speak towards a higher, abstract, conceptual level of man’s identity. This level exists only because man is a creature of reason. Man’s actions are the product of his reason – whether he chooses to believe it or not. Even brute instincts are indulged because at some point a man has chosen to evade his rational abilities, because he has chosen to place himself in a situation where instinct would rule him.
The key concept to understand in order to see this requires looking at the big picture of a man’s life. A man in a hotel room about to commit adultery, unable to resist temptation; a series of choices led him to that situation. Therefore, regardless of any contextual definition of man’s identity, there exists a more refined definition of his identity that links the different contexts together.
In other words: man, in the context of his rationality, is defined by the uniting purposes that link his decisions and actions together over the course of his life. Rationality defines man as man. Man’s rational purpose defines his essential identity as a man. Most of man’s follies are derived from a failure to identify this fact.
It is base and dehumanizing to define man by his conscious-state. Such a definition would imply that life is nothing more than an arbitrary chain of instinct-gratification. Such a life would not be possible to a creature of reason. Reason and awareness demand some opinion of self-purpose. In order to be a brute, a man would be forced by his nature as a rational animal to first view himself as a brute.
How is purpose defined? My conclusion is that a man takes all his memories, thoughts, understandings, ideas, perspectives, opinions, feelings, fears, hopes, dreams, aspirations, experiences, and does his best in retaining all the information for how those things have produced value in his life, omitting the measurements. This concept, an automatic holistic conclusion that results from introspection, is the basis of man’s soul. The extent to which this ‘soul’ is well-developed depends on the effort exerted in introspection, and the rationality and wisdom of the introspective individual.
A well-developed soul will lead an individual to obtain the most self-relevant values for himself in his life. In a word, this is called ‘harmony’.
Why People Fail to Achieve a Well-Developed Spiritual Identity
Note the apparent contradiction in how I’ve defined ‘soul’. On the one hand, a holistic conceptual understanding of one’s life and values specifically takes the form of purpose. On the other hand, by omitting the measurements, that purpose is open-ended.
The error that many fall into is to equate purpose with destiny.
Purpose, as I have defined it, is open-ended. Evidence from the world, properly integrated, that speaks towards possibility, does not determine the outcome of action. The omitted measurements are: what will yet be accomplished in reality. Purpose is defined by potential.
Nevertheless, identity exists. A well-developed person has a specific purpose. That purpose exists in reality. The stark reality of purpose in defining man’s most important level of identity makes it foundational in a person’s rational, purposeful, living. When fate doesn’t fulfill the promise of potential, a person might enter into an existential crisis.
This is to be expected. Purpose as a product of reason is what sustains man’s life. When a man’s plans fail him, he ought to react strongly. His plans existed to sustain his life, and so he must double down in his efforts to construct a new purpose when the first fails.
This effort to construct a new purpose requires reason, as always. Also as always, a person can improperly integrate the facts of his life.
The process of constructing purpose, and a sense-of-life, is ongoing throughout a man’s life.
Destiny is a stop-gap primitive concept that assists the epistemological process for those operating with primitive knowledge. Believing that one’s fate is inherently programmed to fulfill a purpose-linked destiny allows a person to retain the greater measure of their sense-of-life as fate fails to fulfill their expectations. “I don’t know why this happened to me, but there has to be a reason.”
Religion, Spirituality, and the Intellectual State of Civilization
My theory, after this lengthy explanation, is that the utility of destiny (providence, God, etc.) as a primitive stop-gap for enhancing the epistemological process that man uses to construct a sense of his own purpose leads man to fall into, and to too readily accept, destiny as a proper concept existing in reality.
All religion and unreason, I believe, is derived from this – or any similar – failure by man to rationally determine his purpose in life.
More critically, when pseudo-conceptual stop-gaps – such as God, or ‘the Party’, or ‘the Fuhrer’ – meant to free man from uncertainty and solidify his sense-of-life succeed in redistributing gains from the rational to the irrational, these pseudo-concepts produce temporary real effects. Once validated to man, these concepts are infamously difficult to eradicate from his sense-of-self. And because sense-of-self is at the core of a man’s rationally determined purpose, he is committed to defending it perhaps more fanatically than even all his other values.
If you agree with me that self is one’s highest value (as a matter of fact), the truth of this is self-evident.
Those that hold that self-sacrifice is a value, I believe, have improperly integrated the concept of self (they don’t actually accept self-sacrifice). Specifically, I think they conflate destiny with some sort of amorphous meta-identity. A man’s spiritual identity, if tied to destiny, forms a component of God’s identity. Because ‘self’ is equated more essentially with ‘God’ than with the tangible self, then self-sacrifice is not ‘self’-sacrifice. This is the conceptual essence of altruism, and religion, and conscious-state ethics, and Kantian duty, and eastern nihilism, and so on and so forth.
The failure of world philosophy to properly and objectively pursue knowledge is because of subjective bias based on this one single flaw.
The flaw lies with failing to understand how man’s spiritual identity is to be integrated.
Western philosophy demands that a man’s purpose be tied to some analytically determined outcome. But purpose is open-ended.
Eastern philosophy denies that purpose can have any tangible relationship with reality. Purpose and desire are to be denied, and left to fate. But purpose is the product of man’s identity, and identity exists.
It’s the analytic/synthetic dichotomy all over again.
In Conclusion
The proper, objective, definition of man’s purpose and spiritual identity takes into account the fact that it is open-ended but defined.
When men can rationally understand that their focus is not determined by the outcome they receive, but is instead determined by the outcome they work towards, then they can live fully rationally.
If you don’t believe me, try this experiment: produce something. Ask yourself if your sense-of-life, self-esteem, self-awareness - whether you feel alive - are more actualized while you are working to produce that thing, or whether you are enjoying it later.
This specific, almost self-help style of knowledge is what needs to be taught. Once a man grasps this concept, he will be liberated. Well explained, unattached to preconceptions or superstitions, I believe this understanding will be easily adopted. My opinion is that much of the energy expended by people to defend broken ideologies is directly the consequence of their souls seeking to be found. But the soul isn’t found in some transcendent answer ‘out-there’, it is found as man applies his reason in his work and efforts to live.
The tactic I propose is developing this idea as a well-formulated concept, and teaching it as a ‘spiritual’ solution. I don’t propose founding a movement, though, because any spiritually-oriented insitution automatically grows dogmatic because of the reasons I have outlined previously.
I know I have produced quite a few sentences here, and before you conclude that my idea is hopelessly complicated, consider the past. America was founded on philosophical principles that had their origins in Aristotle, who essentially was nothing more than an advocate for reality.
In the Declaration of Independence, the listed self-evident rights are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. This was adopted from Locke’s life, liberty, and property. That a subtle appreciation for reality would translate the importance of property to the “pursuit of happiness” is a testament to the reality of man’s nature.
While the values he must obtain are what are important to man, his focus is more greatly directed on what he must do to obtain them.
An animal consumes value. A rational animal pursues value. That is the secret of man’s success.