Chapter 4.               Part D

         And now, Rationalism’s really disturbing implications start to occur to us. Wouldn't I love to believe that there is some hidden dimension in which the "forms" exist, perfect and eternal? Of course, I would. Then I would "know" that I was "right". Then I and a few simpatico acquaintances might agree among ourselves that we were the only people truly capable of perceiving the finer things in life or of recognizing which are the truly moral acts. Our training and our natural gifts have sensitized us; we are able to detect the beautiful and the good. For us to persuade the ignorant masses would be only rational. Considering how incapable they really are, why it would be an act of mercy! Quality people do exist. Of course, they do. 

            This view is not just theoretically possible. It was the view of some of the disciples of G. E. Moore almost a century ago and, even more blatantly, of some of the followers of Herbert Spencer a generation before that. (Accessible explanations of the views of Moore and Spencer can be found in wikipedia articles online.) (3.) (4.) 

              

                                                                        G.E. Moore

               

                                                                     Herbert Spencer 

            I am being sarcastic about the sensitivity of those aristocrats, of course. Both my studies and my experience of the world tell me that there are more than a few of these kinds of “sensitive” aristocrats roving around in today's world, in every land. (The "neocons" of the West?) We underestimate them at our peril. The worst among them don't like democracy. They yearn to be in charge, they have the brains to get into the positions of authority, and they have the capacity for life-long fixation on a single goal. Then, they have the ability to rationalize their way into truly believing that harsh and duplicitous measures are sometimes needed to keep order among the ignorant masses, i.e. everyone else.

            The conclusion that I came to about rationalism was that it was far too often a close companion of totalitarianism. The reason why was not clear to me until I was in my thirties when I learned about cognitive dissonance, and I finally figured the puzzle out.

I see how inclined toward rationalization other people are and how easily, even insidiously, they give in to it. On what grounds can I tell myself that I am above this very human weakness? Shall I tell myself that my mind is somehow more aesthetically and morally aware, or more disciplined, and is, therefore, immune to such self-delusions? I am aware of no logical grounds for that kind of conclusion about myself or anyone else whom I have ever met or whose works I have ever read.

            In addition, evidence which reveals this capacity for rationalization in human minds, even some of the most brilliant of human minds, litters history. How could Duhem, the brilliant French philosopher, have written off Relativity Theory just because a German proposed it? (In 1905, Einstein was thought of as, and thought of himself as, a German.) How could Heidegger or Heisenberg have endorsed the Nazi's propaganda? The "Fuehrer" principle. "German Science" yet!! Ezra Pound, arguably the best literary mind of his time, on Italian radio defending the Fascists! Decent people today recoil and even despair.

    

                                                              George Bernard Shaw

                                       

                                                               Jean-Paul Sartre      

How could George Bernard Shaw or Jean-Paul Sartre have become apologists for Stalinism? So many brilliant minds falling into this same trap. We have to wonder how so many geniuses of the academic, scientific, and artistic realms could have made such mistakes in the practical, everyday one. Once we understand how cognitive dissonance reduction works, the answer is painfully obvious. Brilliant thinkers are just as brilliant at self-comforting thinking – namely, rationalizing – as they are at clear, critical thinking. And the most brilliant specious terms and fallacious arguments that they construct (i.e. the most convincing lies that they tell) are the ones that they tell themselves. Yes, even these brilliant minds! Look at the evidence!

The most plausible, cautious, and responsible reasoning that I can apply to myself leads me to conclude that the ability to reason skillfully in abstract, formal terms is a guarantee of nothing in the realm of practical affairs. Brilliance with formal thinking systems has been just as quick to advocate for totalitarianism and tyranny as it has for pluralism and democracy. We are going to have to work out a moral code that counters at least the worst excesses of the human flaw called “rationalization”, especially the forms found in the most intelligent of human beings, if we want to survive. 

Rationalism appears to be a regular precursor to intolerance. Rationalism in one stealthy form or another – oh, those secret truths that only the members of our secret in-group know! – has too often been a dangerous and even pathological affliction of human minds. The whole design of democracy is intended to remedy, or at least attenuate, this flaw in human thinking. In a democracy, decisions for the whole community are arrived at by a process that combines the carefully sifted wisdom and experience of all, backed up by references to observable evidence and a process of deliberate, open, cooperative decision-making. One of the main intentions of the democratic model is to handle secret in-groups. For example, in the sub-culture of democracy called "Science", no theory gets accepted until it has been tested repeatedly, and the tests have then been peer-reviewed.

Of course, while some of my argument against Rationalism may not be familiar to all readers, its main conclusion is familiar to Philosophy students. It is Hume's conclusion. The famous empiricist stated long ago that merely verbal arguments which do not begin from material evidence, and yet later claim to arrive at conclusions which may be applied in the material world, should be “consigned to the flames”. (5.) Cognitive dissonance theory only gives modern credence to Hume's famous conclusion.

Rationalism cannot serve as a firm and reliable base for a full philosophical system; its method of progressing from idea to idea, without reference to physical evidence, is at least as likely to end in rationalization as it is in rationality. Or, to be exact, trying to find a beginning point for a complete, life-regulating system of ideas – a philosophy – is far too important to my well-being for me to risk myself, my kids, my everything on a beginning point that so much historical evidence says is deeply flawed. In order to build a universal moral code, we are going to need to begin from a better base model of the human mind. 

Rationalism's failures lead us to conclude that Rationalism's way of ignoring the material world, or trying to impose some pre-conceived model onto it, doesn't work.

But beginning from sensory impressions of the material world, which is Empiricism's method, doesn't work either. It can't adequately describe the thing doing the "beginning". Besides, if we lived by pure Empiricism, i.e. if we just gathered experiences, we would become transfixed by what was happening around us. At best, we would become “collectors” of sense data, recording and storing bits of experience, but with no idea what to do with these memories or how to do it or why we would even bother. We would have no larger model or vision to work under, and therefore, no strategies for avoiding the same catastrophes that our ancestors fell into and had to learn, by pain, not to fall into.

Even the most dedicated of empiricistic/scientific researchers need concepts and theories - i.e. general systems for organizing their ideas - to enable the researchers to formulate hypotheses that they then can test in their research. Otherwise, what would they do with a lab but stumble in and stare at the equipment?

Meanwhile, in the practical affairs of real, daily life, a purely empiricist, naive, unsophisticated, innocent outlook – one with no theories or models to begin from – actually wouldn’t be that pleasant. Without concepts and models of reality learned from the mentors of our cultures to guide us, we would inevitably have to build some, in order to survive the daily hazards of the real world. Hunger, disease, and wolves lurk. In the purely empiricist scenario, we would have to recapitulate all the painful errors of human history. 

So where are we now in our larger argument? I have to have a comprehensive system that gives coherence to all of my ideas and so to the patterns of behavior that I design and implement by basing them on those ideas. But if both of the big models of human thinking and knowing that traditional Western Philosophy offers – namely, Rationalism and Empiricism – seem shaky and unreliable, then what model of human knowing can I begin from? The answer is complex and controversial enough to deserve a chapter of its own. 

   

Notes 

1. Aronson, Elliot; "The Social Animal", pp. 99 to 106; 

   W.H. Freeman and Company; 1972, 1976, 1980. 

2. Stark-Vance, Virginia and Mary Louise Dubay; "100 Questions and Answers About Brain Tumors"; Josh and Bartlett Publishers;    2011.

3. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G.e._Moore

4. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herbert_Spencer

 

5. Hume, David; "An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding"; cited in the wikipedia article "Metaphysics".     http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metaphysics#British_empiricism