Friday, May 30, 2014

Character Remains The Key


As a sponsor to an event dubbed "Truth, Tolerance and Civility: The Distortion of Virtues That Matter" featuring Christian author and apologist Ravi Zacharias and media personality and social observer Dennis Prager, the President of The Foundation for Economic Education said this in his opening remarks:

"The biggest problem we face is the erosion of character...No people in all of history who have lost their character, have kept their liberties. That's how important the connection is between liberty and character."


In a recent on line forum, discussion participants had been looking at the direction that psychology has taken in terms of how we view human nature. We, that is those who were taking a course in "learning to think scientifically everyday" were being given a crash course in psychology. We had been learning about the "fundamental attribution error".

You will know immediately what that means when I give an example: You are coming up to a busy traffic intersection and someone appears out of nowhere and without any indication cuts you off, even if they do indicate, you are no doubt fuming at their ignorance, attributing their rude and reckless driving either to a massive ego, impatience or any other number of negative human traits. What you don't stop to think of is that he may have been rushing his pregnant wife off to hospital to have a baby. Well- maybe, you did think of that and so gave him the benefit of the doubt, but are we guilty of other situations where we attribute a situation to their bad character?

This exercise shows up the very human propensity and readiness to condemn others actions and vilify them for their moral failures without any regard for the situation while for ourselves we justify our actions and our own questionable behaviour, willing to attribute it to the situation rather than our own moral character. We exhibit our readiness to do the exact opposite much of the time, when we observe others shortfalls. In that case we point to their character, not the situation.

In our course, the emphasis seemed to be on the situation rather than the character of the person but we were questioning that reality. Surely we cannot divorce moral responsibility from the situations we find ourselves in? Will we not encourage a victim mentality,  a blame shifting behaviour rather than one that takes responsibility? In the end, the course designers were asking us to change our view of things by making the same allowances for other people's behaviour as we are evcr so willing to offer ourselves. Fair enough of course, but, and this is the point that another made, after all then- it is character that makes a difference and that is what they appeared to be negating. Their position was somewhat contradictory.

Here is how it went:






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It seems to me there's something contradictory in the whole issue. On one hand I'm invited to accept logical thinking and use all scientific tools available (a noble project, by the way); on the other hand if I want to "make it happen" it's a change in "personality" that I need to bring about. A change in that same "subjectiveness" the course is fighting against. I put it in different words: what the course expounded were the methods and the means; but I need to change my attitude first: from emotional to deliberative, from passive to active, from discouraged to inventive, from pessimistic to confident ... Character remains the key. (emphasised)

I think further to this whole issue is this: If we think our culture has indeed deteriorated in a real sense we need to ask why? What are the causes?

I can remember as a kid, no-one bothered to lock their houses or cars, we all used to play with the neighbours kids on the quieter streets without harm or interference. Often there were kids who had both parents off at work and it might have been a couple of hours where there was no parent present, and very little harm came of it. Can we imagine that now in certain contexts? I don't think so.

I think it's fair to say that there have been "dehumanizing" forces at work in our culture that have undermined the moral fibre of people.

I will always refer to what psychoanalyst Viktor Frankl said in this regard. He was a holocaust survivor who endured the horrors of Auschwitz firsthand and made some astute observations about the origin of these dehumanizing forces. I think he ought to know. Interestingly he did not foot the blame immediately at the hand from whom he had received this evil. He did not, ultimately blame Hitler or the Nazis. In fact we have been learning about the "fundamental attribution error", he did not fall into that trap. Instead of laying the blame at his immediate torturers he looked beyond that, to the "scientific" and philosophical causes. If you ever get the opportunity to, listen to the audio book by Eli Weisel, about his experiences in the camps. Truly heartrending.

While looking for the quote I wanted, I was again reminded of the wisdom of this man and invite anyone to  look as them as well [1], many of these quotes would be antithetic to our recent foray into "behaviour versus situation". Anyway for what it's worth this is what Frankl said about the Nazi era:


  "If we present man with a concept of man which is not true, we may
  well corrupt him. When we present man as an automaton of reflexes … as
  a pawn of drives and reactions, as a mere product of instinct,
  heredity and environment, we feed the nihilism to which modern man is,
  in any case, prone. I became acquainted, with the last stage of that
  corruption in … Auschwitz.  
The gas chambers of Auschwitz were the ultimate consequence of the theory that man is nothing but the product of heredity and environment—or, as the Nazis liked to say, of ‘Blood and Soil.’ I am absolutely convinced that the gas chambers of Auschwitz, Treblinka, and Maidanek were ultimately prepared not in some Ministry or other in Berlin, but rather at the desks and in the lecture halls of nihilistic scientists and philosophers."

It is well known that Hitler was inspired by the atheist philosophy of Neitzsche and eugenics and the philosophy of racist superiority had some "justification" in Darwinism.

All of this reminds me of an incident that is in the news just recently: A young man, Elliot Rodger- a loner- takes his hatred out on people targeting young women in a shooting spree. Seven people died that day at his hand, and thirteen others injured. Before he does this he makes a deliberate statement of his intentions and his reasons. Several times he mentions the phrase "alpha male" with which he self-identifies. This seems an admission of an understanding that he equates himself with an animal. The "alpha male" is the sociological construct of a biologist studying wolf pack hierarchies. It seems the study was highly flawed and artificial, nevertheless the phrase has stuck. It was not even an accurate study of wolves in nature, but rather, in a very contrived situation. Not only has it stuck, it has had an impact on how humans see themselves thanks to comparative psychology.

Again, Darwin is implicated:

 Charles Darwin was central in the development of comparative
 psychology; it is thought that psychology should be spoken in terms of
 "pre-" and "post-Darwin" because his contributions were so
  influential. Darwin's theory led to several hypotheses, one being that
  the factors that set humans apart, such as higher mental, moral and
 spiritual faculties, could be accounted for by evolutionary
  principles. [Wikipedia][2]

If we self identify as animals, and this can be seen as a result of scientific studies, even psychology, and therefore accepted as "truth" is that not a case of exactly what Frankl was talking about? "If we present man with a concept of man which is not true, we may well corrupt him..."

I find it absolutely fascinating that religions are written off as mere anthropomorphisms by the scientists who believe in metaphysical materialism while all the time pushing their own anthropomorphic principles.

 "Faces in the Clouds", anthropologist Stewart Guthrie proposes
  that all religions are anthropomorphisms that originate in the brain's
  tendency to detect the presence or vestiges of other humans in natural
  phenomena. [Wikipedia][3]

This is very much the leaning towards which Western culture has been heading, implying that religion is the result of "seeing patterns" which are not there, and projecting our own psychological need onto them. And yet when the scientists do the same thing and equate humanity as comparative to animals it is acceptable. This is also an anthropomorphism:

  In response to the vehement opposition to Darwinism was the "anecdotal
  movement" led by George Romanes who set out to demonstrate that
 animals possessed a "rudimentary human mind."[3] Romanes is most
  famous for two major flaws in his work: his focus on anecdotal
 observations and entrenched anthropomorphism.(my ephasis) [Wikipedia][4]

While it is commendable that this anthropomorphism has been recognized, what harm has been done in the meantime by people who have self identified as just animals with a quantitatively different makeup instead of a completely  qualitative difference in life?

If self identification with animals ultimately undermines our ability to be moral agents is it not attributable at least in part to the insistence that we are qualitatively no different to other organisms, and is that not almost entirely due to the current "scientific" view of humanity?

There is a tremendous irony in that it is especially the scientific community who espouse the philosophical position of a strict materialism who ridicule religion for "creating" an anthropomorphic god while all the while busily creating a view of human nature that morphs into an animal!

Just who is doing more damage?

If God is truly a benevolent being who wills good and has all the highest qualities and virtues that are possible, then to see ourselves "made in his image" creates a powerful impetus to be like that, to live up to that ideal.

On the other hand, what is it like to think of ourselves as animals? What is that to aspire to? The alpha male? An amoral being? Just what view is damaging?

In the book "Letter From A Christian Citizen" by Douglas Wilson, which is a response to atheist Sam Harris's book "Letter To A Christian Nation" Wilson quotes a Southern Presbyterian theologian- Robert Louis Dabney (1820- 1898). In this piece Dabney "describes the atheists's dilemma by pointing out that a person's starting point [presupposition] leads to an inevitable conclusion:
To borrow [Thomas] Carlyle's rough phrasing: "If mine is a pig's destiny, why may I not hold this 'pig philosophy'?"
Again, if I am but an animal refined by evolution, I am an animal entitled to live an animal life. Why not? The leaders in this and the sensualistic philosophy  may themselves be restrained by their habits of mental culture, social discretion and personal refinement (for which they are indebted to reflex Christian influences); but the herd of common mortals are not cultured and refined, and in them the doctrine will bear its deadly fruit. [5]
At face value, one could be forgiven for wondering if Carlyle had seen a vision of the future, and yet-on reflection- he was merely extrapolating the result from consistently applying the beliefs of atheists. The future is governed to a great degree by what has gone before. When these views are lived out consistently no one should be surprised at the results. The results are virtually foregone conclusions.

The shift away from the religious voice has now been bequeathed to "The Scientist". With the huge responsibility that the prestigious mantle of authority they now carry, this only makes it all the more important to answer the question: 


WHICH VIEW IS THE TRUTH?

Professor of History Richard Weikart writing of  "The Dehumanizing Impact of Modern Thought", and from whom I quoted Viktor Frankl above, says this in his closing paragraph:

  “false conceptions of humanity can lead to destructive behavior and
 harmful policies, both by societies and by individuals. It can and
 does affect the way we treat other human beings. Human rights are
 meaningless in a world of determinism or social (or individual)
 constructivism”.
Again I point to what a psychologist pointed out after a very long career:

For several decades we psychologists looked upon the whole matter of sin and moral accountability as a great incubus and acclaimed our liberation from it as epoch making, But at length we have discovered that to be "free" in this sense, ie, to have the excuse of being "sick" rather than sinful, is to court the danger of also becoming lost. This danger is, I believe, betokened by the widespread interest in Existentialism which we are presently witnessing. In becoming amoral, ethically neutral, and "free", we have cut the very roots of our being, lost our deepest sense of self-hood and identity; and, with neurotics themselves, find ourselves asking: Who am I? What is my destiny? What does living (existence) mean?
Orval Hobart Mowrer (January 23, 1907 – June 20, 1982) was an American born psychologist and professor of psychology at the University of Illinois from 1948 to 1975 known for his research on behaviour therapy. Mowrer practiced psychotherapy in Champaign-Urbana and at Galesburg State Research Hospital. In 1954 Mowrer held the position of president of the American Psychological Association. (Wikipedia)




  [1]: https://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/2782.Viktor_E_Frankl
  [2]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparative_psychology
  [3]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropomorphism
  [4]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparative_psychology
  [5] "Letter From A Christian Citizen" by Douglas Wilson. American Vision (2007) Fwd. xvi