Notes on public philosophy

A recent salon made me think about "public philosophy" for the first time in a while. An odd omission, on my part, given that 80,000 Hours and effective altruism can easily be thought of in this light, and I've often thought of our work as centrally about popularising the ideas of Parfit, Bostrom, Ord.

"Public philosophy" is a broad and diverse category.

Most obviously, there are different "publics": someone writing in the LRB is addressing a university-educated high/middle-brow, while Alain de Botton makes books and videos for more or less everyone.

A lot of public philosophy is "educational" in spirit: a focus on accessibile introductions to the existing debate, not original ideas.

Some people operate in "public philosopher" mode most of the time. Most great philosophers put on this hat at least some of the time.

A few modes of public philosophy:

1. Bringer of clarity

The philosopher makes some distinctions, points out some common confusions, considers cases for and against.

The aim is to improve the debate on a particular issue.

More generally, they model and hope to spread various intellectual virtues: disintested truth-seeking, care and precision, interest in counterarguments.

Example articles: #todo

2. Creator of doubt

The philosopher says "you know less than you think you do", "it's worse than you think".

Example articles: #todo

3. Moral entrepreneur

A clear moral agenda, beyond the mere promotion of intellectual virtues. They aim to change people's beliefs about what matters and/or what one ought to do, in a particular direction.

Wikipedia:

A moral entrepreneur is an individual, group, or formal organization that seeks to influence a group to adopt or maintain a norm, altering the boundaries of altruism, deviance, duty or compassion.

[...]

Moral entrepreneurs often take the lead in labeling a particular behaviour and spreading or popularizing this label throughout society.

The "moral crusader" is a sub-type of the moral entrepreneur, who is concerned "chiefly with the successful persuasion of others, but is not concerned with the means by which this persuasion is achieved."

The public philosopher wants to distinguish themselves from the crusader. The public philosopher claims to limit themselves to a set of "kosher" methods, often called "rational persuasion". They usually present themselves as impartial, disinterested truth-seekers who humbly follow the arguments where they lead (rather than a particular individual with particular interests, dispositions, tastes, agendas).

Example articles: #todo

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For the public philosopher, the ideals of truth and truthfulness are stubborn attachments. The philosopher's love is wisdom: she hopes to inspire this love in others, and to teach the art.

The nature of rational persuasion, and the social role of moral philosophers, will be another early theme for this blog. So too, will be Nietzsche's question: "why do we not prefer untruth? And uncertainty? Even ignorance?"

Nietzsche on objectivity

In all seriousness, there is good reason to hope that all philosophical dogmatizing, however solemn, conclusive, or definite its manner, may have been nothing but the infantile high-mindedness of a beginner. And we may be very near to a time when people will be constantly recognizing anew what in fact it was that furnished the cornerstone for those lofty, unconditional philosopher's edifices once built by the dogmatists: some folk superstition from time immemorial (such as the superstition about souls, which even today has not ceased to sow mischief as the superstition about subject and ego);* some play on words perhaps, some seductive aspect of grammar, or a daring generalization from very limited, very personal, very human, all-too-human facts.

[...]

It seems that in order to inscribe themselves into men's hearts with eternal demands, all great things must first wander the earth as monstrous and fear-inducing caricatures: dogmatic philosophy has been such a caricature, the teachings of Vedanta in Asia, for example, or Platonism in Europe. Let us not be ungrateful towards them, even though we must certainly also admit that of all errors thus far, the most grievous, protracted, and dangerous has been a dogmatist's error: Plato's invention of pure spirit and of transcendental goodness.

[...]

In order to speak as he did about the spirit and the good, Plato had to set truth on its head and even deny perspectivity, that fundamental condition of all life

[...]

Having long kept a strict eye on the philosophers, and having looked between their lines, I say to myself: the largest part of conscious thinking has to be considered an instinctual activity, even in the case of philosophical thinking; we need a new understanding here, just as we've come to a new understanding of heredity and the 'innate'. Just as the act of birth is scarcely relevant to the entire process and progress of heredity, so 'consciousness' is scarcely opposite to the instincts in any decisive sense-most of a philosopher's conscious thinking is secretly guided and channelled into particular tracks by his instincts. Behind all logic, too, and its apparent tyranny of movement there are value judgements, or to speak more clearly, physiological demands for the preservation of a particular kind of life.

[...]

What provokes us to look at all philosophers with a mixture of distrust and contempt is not that we are always uncovering how guileless they are-how often and easily they lose their grasp or their way, in short how childish and childlike they are. It is rather that they are not honest enough, however loud and virtuous a racket they all make as soon as the problem of truthfulness is touched upon, even from afar. For they act as if they had discovered and acquired what are actually their opinions through the independent unravelling of a cold, pure, divinely unhampered dialectic (whereas mystics of every order, who are more honest, and more foolish, speak of 'inspiration'); basically, however, they are using reasons sought after the fact to defend a pre-existing tenet, a sudden idea, a 'brainstorm', or, in most cases, a rarefied and abstract version of their heart's desire. They are all of them advocates who refuse the name, that is in most cases wily spokesmen for their prejudices, which they dub 'truths'; and they are very far from having a conscience brave enough to own up to it, very far from having the good taste to announce it bravely, whether to warn a foe or a friend, or simply from high spirits and self-mockery.

Beyond Good and Evil, Preface and Chapter 1.

Advocates who refuse the name

I'm suspicious of the stories that some moral philosophers tell about themselves. Specifically those who think—or perhaps merely claim—that there are eternal, mind-independent truths about what matters, and that we can have (at least some) knowledge of them.

I find this claim sufficiently hard to understand that I feel I must be missing something.

Developing my views on this will be an early theme for this blog.

Katarzyna de Lazari-Radek on the attractions of monistic hedonism

I don't like dilemmas, I want to overcome them. I feel that there must be a guidance. Maybe there is this desire in me to find a proper guidance, and I worry that with pluralistic theories, its impossible, or maybe you need to end up with particularism, i.e. a pluralistic theory where you need to decide every time what to do. I think you are very right that I am the kind of person who wants to get the troubles out of my way, even if getting into another one, that is namely putting everything under the umbrella of pleasure.

I also believe that we make quite a lot of mistakes in terms of choosing our values. And that some choices of those values depend on the culture and the religion that we are in. And so that worries me as well, that simply our pluralistic judgements about values are sometimes irrational.

For example we have this discussion in Poland now, about the rationality of the Warsaw Uprising in 1944. We started an uprising against Nazis and it brought a terrible devastation to the whole city, deaths of hundreds of thousands of people, it made no sense at all in terms of consequences. But some people said that it was a sign of our honorable thinking. So there was this honour, this virtue of "doing what needs to be done" even if the consequences were terrible. I think now you can see how people have changed their thinking about values, how now, the value of fighting, even against your enemy, is taking less importance than the value of presevation of your life.

So to answer your question: it's not only a desire to make things easier, and to give reason the possibility of a guidance, but also I simply worry that some of the values that we choose are irrational to have, and that they are based on culture and religion and so on.

YouTube

Tyler Cowen: what kind of stories should we be suspicious of?

It's the stories, very often, that you like the most, that you find the most rewarding, the most inspiring. The stories that don't focus on opportunity cost, or the complex, unintended consequences of human action, because that very often does not make for a good story.

So often a story is a story of triumph, a story of struggle; there are opposing forces, which are either evil or ignorant; there is a person on a quest, someone making a voyage, and a stranger coming to town. And those are your categories, but don't let them make you too happy. (Laughter)

As an alternative, at the margin - again, no burning of Tolstoy - but just be a little more messy. If I actually had to live those journeys, and quests, and battles, that would be so oppressive to me! It's like, my goodness, can't I just have my life in its messy, ordinary - I hesitate to use the word - glory but, like, it's fun for me. Do I really have to follow some kind of narrative? Can't I just live?

So be more comfortable with messy. Be more comfortable with agnostic, and I mean this about the things that make you feel good. It's so easy to pick out a few areas to be agnostic in, and then feel good about it, like, "I am agnostic about religion, or politics." It's a kind of portfolio move you make to be more dogmatic elsewhere, right?

Don't fall into the trap of thinking because you're agnostic on some things, that you're being fundamentally reasonable about your self-deception, your stories, and your open-mindedness. (Laughter)

[Think about] this idea of hovering, of epistemological hovering, and messiness, and incompleteness, [and how] not everything ties up into a neat bow, and you're really not on a journey here. You're here for some messy reason or reasons, and maybe you don't know what it is, and maybe I don't know what it is, but anyway, I'm happy to be invited, and thank you all for listening.

https://www.ted.com/talks/tyler_cowen_be_suspicious_of_stories/