Contra Nos

How can you say to your brother, ‘Brother, let me take out the speck that is in your eye,’ when you yourself do not see the log that is in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take out the speck that is in your brother's eye.
-Luke 6:42

It has been my hope with all my posts to compose them in such a fashion so as to facilitate broad discussion in which even those folks who are not intimately familiar with my ways of looking at the world can find them stimulating and relevant. Unfortunately, this post may tend towards relevance to a more limited audience, but I still hope, however, that any reader can appreciate the rather conflicted nature of my thought at times.

The Spanish philosopher Jose Ortega y Gasset is responsible for one of the most brilliant summaries of the plight of modern European man. Ortega, who wrote in the early part of the 20th century, was clearly ahead of his time in his analysis and predictions concerning the state of Europe. Seeing Ortega’s commentary as exceedingly relevant today, many of us have used his framework to launch our own criticisms of contemporary Euro-American culture which we see as just a further deterioration in the direction Ortega predicted.

It is those of us, myself included, who share in Ortega’s perspective that this post is directed as a challenge against. As I have stated in previous posts, I do believe we live in strange times. Whether the issue is the immanent disaster of an energy crisis, climate change, economic upheaval, social chaos, loss of culture, the demoralization of European peoples, the increasingly corrupt, evil nature of American politics or any number of other ills, the problems seem relevant and urgent. But it is not merits of such beliefs that I would like to address on this post. Many of these questions are being thoughtfully discussed on the previous post, an important discussion which I hope will continue.

In this post, however, I would like to use Ortega’s analysis against ourselves. I will explain why, but first I think it’s necessary to provide a bit of background on what Ortega is actually saying. What I think makes Ortega such a brilliant philosopher is that his analysis always begins at the bottom, at the level of the dirt so to speak. It is here that I want to bring in his analysis of the nature of thought.

Ortega says that thought is a vital function much like digestion or the circulation of the blood. All three of these are emanations from an organism. I think my thoughts as my heart pumps blood or my stomach rearranges the chemical constituents of my food. In all three cases we are concerned with vital necessities. To understand a biological phenomenon is to understand its necessity to the preservation of life. This by definition is a vital necessity. My thought therefore finds its justification in myself as an organic individual: it is an instrument for the benefit of my life. This is what Ortega calls the biological necessity or the demands of “spontaneous life.”

From another point of view, however, to think is to set before our individuality the phenomena of nature. The fact that we are sometimes in error confirms the generally truthful nature of thought. The business of thought is to reflect the world of phenomena: in short, to think is to think truth just as to digest is to assimilate victuals. Error does not deny the general truth of thought any more than indigestion annuls the normal digestive process.

Thought then has two distinct facets: on the one hand it comes into being as a vital need of the individual and is governed by the law of subjective utility: on the other hand it consists, actually, in the adaptation to phenomena and is directed by the objective law of truth. In other words thought is both the spontaneous product of the living person and has its cause in the organic individual, but also is bound by an inner necessity to submit to a law which is objective. Both aspects are interdependent. I cannot think usefully, for my biological purposes, if I do not think that which is true. If human thought had been generally erroneous, it would have led to many practical errors and human life would have disappeared. (Though many of us may think we are just reaching that threshold)

Anyway, we are dealing with two kinds of pressure, one which Ortega calls the demands of vital, biological spontaneous life and the other which is extra-vital and belongs in the realm of the objective, geometrical. These two are meant to be in equilibrium. Any straying from this equilibrium produces a degeneration, either into a state of barbarism or devitalization.

So to take it to the next step, we see that it is not enough for a scientific or political concept to appear true for "geometrical" (purely rational) reasons, if we are to support it. A moral system that is geometrically perfect but leaves us cold and unfeeling is subjectively immoral. There must be a harmony between these two facets. What we think must be true, but its truth alone in the external, non-human realm of logic is not enough for it to merit our thought. In cases such as the ones above, we have the subjugation of the demands of vital life under the tyranny of an idea, which according to Ortega, is an inversion. Unfortunately, it is an inversion that Europeans are particularly prone to making. This is where Ortega believes European thought and culture have gone post-Descartes.

Ortega says that we must be sure that what we believe does indeed stimulate the deeper energies of our personality. Culture (as manifested through ideas) only survives when it receives a constant flow of vital energy.

Starting with the above described framework, Ortega goes on to show how Europe has fallen into this devitalization by disconnecting life from ideas. Reason, which operates in a realm completely separate from human life, and in fact could care less of the demands of “spontaneous life” has taken charge and has orchestrated the surrender of human life at its hands. Examples from history abound, one of the most spectacular being communism. But to a greater or lesser extent, Ortega as well as many of us, claim that all of European culture is afflicted with this debilitating disease.

Those of us who are keen to this disease are quick to point out its various manifestations. But as I stated earlier, the particular manifestations are not what I am interested in with this post. I am now going to switch gears but I hope the reader will follow the various strands which I will try to tie together at the end.

I recently wrote a paper in which I severely criticized Protestant Christianity for its essentially operating in Enlightenment principles even though these were the very principles that it attempted to rebel against. I will not go into the details of this argument except to say that my main point was that the fundamental philosophical framework of an age, the tenor, or “beliefs” to use Ortega’s word is so pervasive that it is almost impossible to truly escape its tentacles in any significant way. I briefly alluded to C.S. Lewis in a comment on the previous post but now I will quote him more extensively; (He is talking about the need to read "old books")

Every age has its own outlook. It is specially good at seeing certain truths and specially liable to make certain mistakes. We all, therefore, need the books that will correct the characteristic mistakes of our own period. And that means the old books. All contemporary writers share to some extent the contemporary outlook - even those, like myself, who seem most opposed to it. Nothing strikes me more when I read the controversies of past ages than the fact that both sides were usually assuming without question a good deal which we should now absolutely deny. They thought that they were as completely opposed as two sides could be, but in fact they were all the time secretly united - united with each other and against earlier and later ages - by a great mass of common assumptions. We may be sure that the characteristic blindness of the twentieth century - the blindness about which posterity will ask, "But how could they have thought that?" - lies where we have never suspected it, and concerns something about which there is untroubled agreement between Hitler and President Roosevelt or between Mr. H. G. Wells and Karl Barth.

It was my argument that Protestantism, by using only a “contemporary” outlook, (in its overthrow of church tradition and implementation of reason, which is anti-historical) was unable to avoid the tenor of its age and that it is, in its essence, an Enlightenment baby.

Now I would like to apply this same analysis in a new way. Assuming, as most of us Ortega disciples do, that the tenor of our own age is the subjugation of vital human life to reason, on what grounds do we feel so confident that we have escaped this very phenomenon that we so viciously criticize in the culture at large?

Even assuming our apocalyptic vision of peak oil, our utter pessimism for the state of our culture, etc., etc., is true (again that is not the debate on this post), do these ideas inject us with a vitality or are they themselves demoralizing in nature? And perhaps as we retreat further into social isolation, paralysis, and passivity, is it not time for us to follow our own Ortega’s words and re-evaluate the very nature of our assumptions and find out if they rest on a vital core or if they stand in opposition to the demands of our biological organism? The set of ideas those of us Ortega-heads have in common, however true they may be, perhaps do not pass muster in the first part of Ortega’s test concerning the demands of ideas. I find it rather unlikely that I or anyone else has been able to escape the ever pervasive state that Ortega so vividly portrays.

The Seeking of Asylum

I want to bring to light an interesting phenomenon which I have been thinking about lately. Before proceeding, however, I will offer the following disclaimer. This post will doubtless fall short of any measure of scientific integrity and may be nothing more than a broad generalization of my own rather limited experiences. In fact, I was hesitant to even post this piece, so unsure I am of the already tentative conclusions I have reached. But this is an interesting topic to me, and has been the subject of a great deal of my thought, so I will throw it out there.

I wish to speak about the propensity of the brightest and most capable young people of my generation to seek their place overseas and in other cultures. I am not talking about the desire to simply see other parts of the world or have adventures. I think practically all young people harbor such ambitions, and thus my proposed phenomenon would be of little meaning. This is something of a deeper nature. I have in mind the cultivation of a deep sympathy for another culture, people, way of life, etc. But more than that, it is a sympathy that longs to be included. I think it's more than just the trying on of new clothes, but the search for clothes themselves.

If I am perhaps able to detect this tendency in others, it is only because I became aware of it in myself as was manifest by my yearning for all things Russian, my delight in learning how to fit as seamlessly as possible into the fabric of Russian life, Russian history, the consciousness of the group of people who are distinctly defined as Russians. While people are complex, and their actions can not be simply reduced to a few distinct motives, I do think that somewhere amidst the many and complex reasons for my fascination for Russia was a sense of identity and belonging that was lacking in my own culture. Of course, ‘identity’ and ‘belonging’ are at best vague terms, at worst mere physco-babble. But I will leave them in such a state of vagueness as I do not yet have the clarity of thought that could produce a more clear explanation.

Anyway, I feel like this search was best captured during one of my last nights in the Russian town of Yaroslavl. Even though I had chosen to leave after just two weeks, I was finding myself becoming very comfortable in this quiet town of cobbled narrow streets with onion domed Orthodox churches rising over an odd mix of old Russian houses and Soviet-style block apartment buildings. It was during these last days that I began to think deeply about the possibility of returning to such a place to live permanently. It was also then that I made friends with a somewhat rowdy group of young Russian men, most of whom had never met an American. They worked a variety of low paying jobs at restaurants, as delivery truck drivers, etc. Their lives were harder than mine. In their more sensitive moments, they would all express to me a desire to live in America. They were astounded at the general orderliness, the high wages, the honest police force that I told them about. As they described their desire to live here, I told of mine to stay in Russia. This they could not understand.

I felt like I was searching for something very different but no less important than my Russian friends, and that this search had put me in a strange juxtaposition to them. What was missing in me, they could not understand. Their lack of understanding, however, was not due to their being materialists, or in someway operating on a plane lower than me. Not in the least! I think they already had what was missing in me. Or to put it another way, they did not feel those particular pressures that I was escaping.

I do not know if this story is worthy of generalization, or even if my entire Russia experiment is in anyway indicative of a greater phenomenon. I only began to suspect that I am not alone in this feeling after having emerged from this phase of my life and being able to reflect on it with a bit of perspective. It was then that I started noticing this in others. In fact, I can say that the vast majority of my acquaintances have expressed a desire to live in, or be somehow a part of an another culture. The more I have spoken to them about this, the more I sensed a common theme, however divergent their individual stories or personalities were. As I said at the beginning, it is difficult for me to put my finger on exactly what is going on, or even to be sure I am correct. But if this is indeed the case, the difficult question begs, why? What is missing in this country that is driving our young people to search elsewhere, even at great inconvenience? Or perhaps it is not something missing, but a negative pressure that slowly and subtly is driving our youth to contort their paths much like a tree bending to reach the sunlight. It is this explanation that has been seeming more and more plausible.

Perhaps the distant cultures are a refuge from the guilt-mongering, anti-vitality, anti-masculine, anti-culture nature of our present country. After all, we live in the most unnatural of conditions right now, where men are disparaged or simply poked fun at (have you seen how almost every single television commercial depicts men?), where white people are under a self-inflicted, suicidal attack from their own treasonous elite. It is perhaps the only culture where we are told to feel guilt at the circumstances surrounding the very founding of our country. Our folklore is scorned or forgotten. It seems that in the context of this homogenization/demoralization, we are being compelled to do what no human can ever do; namely live without a history, community, or sense or strength. And it is from this most unnatural circumstance that our youth flee. In a strange irony of the modern world, the adoption of an utterly alien culture is the only way to have an identity which we can be proud of, and communities that are not denigrated.

Dancing with Death

On Saturday night my dear friend Mike (also a regular contributor on this blog) and I attended a performance by Chicago's Joffrey Ballet in Pittsburgh. Of the four shorter pieces performed that night, one in particular, the Green Table, was particularly moving and thought provoking. The Green Table was first conceived in 1932 by the German choreographer Kurt Jooss. It can be broadly described as an anti-war work though it touches on much more.

I was initially skeptical about another in what seems like an endless line of anti-war pieces, many of which have no more moral and spiritual depth than the wars which they criticize. I am not, for example, particularly impressed with that which emerged in the arts in the Vietnam era. This piece, however differs from your standard fare of anti-war material in the depth with which it deals with a wide array of questions, many of which transcend the politics that serve as the overriding theme and backdrop to the ballet. I will say a few words about this piece and use it as a starting point for a more general discussion of some of the themes it touches.

The piece begins with a dozen or so dancers, dressed in formal attire and wearing frightening masks depicting them as the political elite (specifically diplomats) of the WW I era. (think: those twisted, mocking costumes of WTO protestors) In hazy light, they are hovered around a table covered in green felt that brings to mind a blackjack table in a sordid casino, but is meant to represent the table of negotiation. These are the folks responsible for beginning the war and then for the vicious Versailles Treaty which in part precipitated the second World War. The cyclical nature of corruption is a symbol in this ballet and is a startlingly accurate prediction of the second World War.

Both the table and the politicians are gone from the second scene only to return at the end to repeat the initial scene exactly. This forms a chilling inclusio for the rest of the piece, which unlike the first and last scenes, is full of emotion, expression and depth. The second scene begins with the soldiers marching in. These are young men clearly meant to be in military attire but are dressed sensually in tights with no shirt. The beauty of their soon to be destroyed forms stands out, as does their individuality, unhomogonized by the one size fits all military costumes. Their wives, mothers, and sisters also appear on the scene, and finally the most interesting character of them all, Death.

What is most fascinating about this piece is the delicate and poignant interplay between the character of Death and the other characters, minus the politicians of course, who are never touched by death. Death was played brilliantly by the hulking Fabrice Calmels, an unusually tall dancer who fits this role perfectly. He was generally robotic and forceful, moving up and down, relentlessly claiming victims. At certain moments, however, he would break out, thus revealing an imaginative, sometimes sensual, often ethereal character whose dances with the women were intricate, and expressive in some sort of 'other-worldly' sense. His was a dynamic character, often seductive, at times comforting, sometimes in center stage, sometimes lurking in the shadows. I will think long and hard about the role of Death in this ballet and what he symbolized in a greater sense.

Certainly the piece was presented with a great deal of cynicism, as demonstrated from the grotesque masks of the diplomats around the table to the exact repetition at the end of the "negotiations" from the first scene. The indifference and corruption of the elite is presented relentlessly and with no hope of change. But was this a hopeless ballet?

I do not know what the standard interpretation is, nor do I know exactly what Jooss had in mind almost eighty years ago. But despite the aura of cynicism pervasive in the ballet, I felt there was something very moving in the ordinary characters (soldiers, wives, mothers, etc). In fact I believe they were presented with a vivid vitality. And despite the omnipresence of death, and the desertion (even betrayal) of their leaders, they managed to maintain their dignity and beauty. Perhaps I am reading too much into this, but I saw a reflection of the Norse ideal of courage and integrity even in the midst of an ultimately doomed fate. For me, this ballet provided a measure of hope. Despite everything, there was a transcendent beauty to the human lives presented that seemed just as eternal as the corruption. Given my already much publicized pessimism concerning the state of affairs generally, I find this to be a demonstration of possibility amidst despair.

But as I said at the top, I want to use this performance as a starting point for a number of issues that I believe this ballet raises.

I had a professor at Grove City who argued that World War I was truly a watershed moment in European history as it marked a drastic loss of confidence in the old European elite. I have been thinking recently about the delicate but stable balance that Europe enjoyed for centuries in the tense interplay between the aristocracy and the crown. A human system no doubt, and not lacking in flaws, but it managed to preserve the balance of power in Europe as well as maintain the moral and spiritual capital that is so vital to the preservation of the institutions that we hold dear.

Emerging from the first World War was a world in which that balance was once and for all shattered, opening the doors for the emergence of a radically new sensibility, the effects of which have been utterly disastrous. Certainly I could point to the rise of the Soviet Union, and Nazi Germany as rather direct effects of this loss of balance, but I think the profundity of this event is greater than any immediate political consequences, no matter how severe. It is a loss of place with the corresponding loss of will, courage and faith.

It certainly could be argued that WW I was merely the manifestation of a decline that had long ago taken place and was not actually the cause. Fair enough. But the chicken or the egg question is not central to my point. I think the tragedy of this loss has been of the deepest variety for the West. As this ballet demonstrates, something hollow and deeply cynical emerged.

But historical matters aside, I find myself contemplating the nature of virtue in a degenerate system (perhaps even ultimately self-sacrificing), the affirmation of the mystical, and the desperate need for leaders of courage.