[Buddha-l] Re: S. Pinker

[Richard P. Hayes]

On Sat, 2005-07-02 at 14:02 -0400, SJZiobro at cs.com wrote:

> Allow me briefly to think this through.  You are right to point out
> that secular humanism has made serious inroads upon the American
> religious scene, rendering it ambiguous.  The reasons why are varied,
> and to discern them is to discern even partially the social (and
> philosophically grounding) mechanisms used to advocate and propogate
> this world view.  The reasons are grounded in systemic (read
> educational and academic, judicial, commercial) attacks upon the
> family

I do not believe anyone ever set out to "attack" the family. I think the
American family fell apart all by itself. Probably the biggest factor is
the mobility of Americans. My father grew up in a big house in Michigan
in which his grandparents and several aunts and uncles and cousins
lived. My generation has been scattered to every part of this continent.
What is interesting to note is that the states in which people are most
obsessed with so-called "family values," the divorce rates are highest
as are the rates of pregnancies out of wedlock. These are also states in
which opportunities for employment tend to be less than elsewhere, and
where wages are very low. So people either stay where they are and live
in poverty, or they move on down the line. Whichever they do puts a huge
strain on the family. In this case, philosophical persuasion and
ideologies have followed economic realities rather than creating them.
(Sorry to sound so Marxist on a Buddhist forum; if it's any consolation,
I tend to prefer Weber to Marx in most matters pertaining to the
relationship between ideology and economics.) 

> an understanding of custom and tradition as oppresive horizons rather
> than as vehicles of enculturation and socialization

Outside a fairly small circle of people, I just don't believe this is a
widespread "understanding" of things. But then I hang out mostly with
people who, like me, have a very positive regard for custom and
tradition. (People tend to hang out with people with whom they agree, I
reckon.)

> the understanding of authority de facto as necessarily based on
> tyranical dominance and bureaucratic unaccountability

Again, I don't think this "understanding" is very widespread.
Admittedly, most of my friends think of Republican authority as actually
(but not necessarily) based on tyrannical dominance and bureaucratic
unaccountability. But that is only because Republicans have, since
Nixon's presidency, been far more prone than Democrats to abuse their
power. When I was a child it was the other way around. But, as the
Buddha observed long ago, things change.

> ideological and philosophical anthropologies that subordinate the
> person to the state or some one aspect of the society (the economy)

You've got to be joking, Stan! This is the United States, not Poland or
the former USSR. This country has got to be one of the most paranoid
places on earth when it comes to fearing giving powers to the state.
What I think can be said accurately is that many Americans have a deeply
irrational fear of the subordination you speak of, but it has to be
admitted that that very fear has always prevented the subordination of
which you speak. I can think of hardly anyone in the USA who advocates
such subordination. Can you?

> philosophical arguments for relativism and their implementation (via
> the educational and judicial systems)

Relativism does not need anyone to argue for it. It exists mostly
because of the dramatic failures of all claims to absolute truth. It
exists because people have for millennia tried, and consistently failed,
to defend various traditional world-views. Hardly anyone I know WANTS to
be a relativist, just as hardly anyone I know WANTS to be mortal. That
notwithstanding, some people are intellectually and emotionally honest
enough to realize that we are all mortals and that no system of absolute
values is defensible. The educational system tends to select for
intellectual honesty rather than fidelity to dogma. As for the judicial
system, it is far more prone to dogmatism than the educational system.
Just look at the voting records of the Supreme Court justices. They are
so predictable that the whole system is something of a farce. That
aside, it could hardly be said that the judicial system has implemented
relativism.

> the reduction of the person to a means of gratification, etc.

Again, this "reduction" has probably taken place pretty much by itself.
Human beings, according to almost all observers of any religious or
philosophical persuasion, are driven largely by a desire for pleasure.
Technology has delivered pleasure in an abundance that previous
generations could only dream of. If I had been writing this 50 years
ago, I would be sitting in a sweltering room trying to get a ballpoint
pen to write on sweat-stained paper. I now live two blocks from where I
lived 50 years ago, and I am sitting in an air-conditioned room using a
computer. It is quite a bit more comfortable now than things were 50
years ago. And, unfortunately, no one has been able to come up with
reasons that are powerful enough to convince people that all this
comfort they are enjoying is being bought at prices that future
generations will have to pay. This feebleness of reason has not been
anything that anyone deliberately brought about. The breakdown of
religion was not anyone's plan. It broke down because of the weight of
its own unsustainable dogmatism.

> Yes, I concede your point here, Richard, inasmuch as the organs of
> government, finance, education, the judicary, the media have ceased to
> be based on Christian principles.

Only because the Christian churches themselves ceased to be based on
Christian principles. No one set out to destroy Christian institutions.
They fell apart through the individual hypocrisy of the people whose job
it was to maintain them. How many Catholic dioceses right now are in
financial trouble because they have had to pay reparations to people who
as young boys were sexually abused by priests? It has been situations of
that sort that have made people cynical--not the government, the
educational system, the judiciary and the media. I you would like to
make things better, don't lay the blame on the wrong people. That's like
trying to mend a broken arm by putting a cast on your knee.

> It is reasonable to understand that those who ally themselves
> knowingly and willingly with the ideological and philosophical
> justifications for the current ethos of these sociological organs can
> be termed non-Christian in point of fact. 

In point of fact, a good many people who are examining the sad state of
religion and acknowledging the factors that have led to its
deterioration may seem to be allying themselves with ways of thinking
that have not in recent times been perceived as traditional
Christianity, but in fact they are deeply committed Christians who are
trying to heal a broken church and a broken society. I have more
confidence that they will succeed than I have in those of you who wallow
in a culture of blaming an imaginary other. Sad to say, that culture of
blaming the other is at the heart of neo-conservatism in this country.
It will eventually prove to be bankrupt, but I suppose it will do quite
a bit of damage before the bankruptcy is fully acknowledged.

> I agree that people do and can delude themselves

But only other people, eh?

> My stance is to consider good will on the part of anybody unless or
> until actual hypocricy becomes evident.

How long does that take? Five minutes? Ten?

> Often ignorance and/or some ideological or emotional blockage accounts
> for the discrepancy between profession and praxis.

Rarely is the blockage ideological. Almost always it is due to
unacknowledged but highly active emotional drives. Ideology is
conscious. Most of what gets us into serious trouble is psychological
factors in ourselves of which we are unconscious. (But then I am a
Jungian, not a Jesuit, so I would say such things, wouldn't I?)

> I only find offensive actual hypocricy and malice.

How do you distinguish hypocrisy (as we spell it here in New Mexico)
from weakness of will (akrasia, as they spell it in Greece)? How to do
discern malice from incompetence? I have never been able to make those
distinctions with anything like accuracy. So I prefer to think simply
that people often fail to do what they set out to do. That is simply a
fact. Overlaying that fact with a value judgement, such as when one
decides without really knowing that failure is hypocrisy or malice,
rarely helps anyone find a remedy. Moralizing as often as not worsens
the problem rather than ameliorating it.

-- 
Richard Hayes