RE: "...not withstanding some nuanced differences, it is hard for me to believe that the governing elites of other nations are, or would be, different. People everywhere are much the same when they are tested in action."
There are two logically unrelated propositions here. The first might be true while the second is false, and vice versa. The first statement is an empirical claim that strikes me as prima facie false. Surely, there is a stark difference between the governing elites of, say, Germany, and Iran.
I take the second thesis to be that there is some sort of universal human nature. This is a very old philosophical chestnut, of course. I don't propose to know the answer, but the evidence isn't overwhelming for a universal human nature that is indifferent to individual survival. So, I doubt that there is much use in speculating about a universal human nature that goes beyond the capacity for reason, sensitivity to pain and pleasure, a fear of death, reproductive instincts, and the desire to protect those who are close to us. There are more specific features such as compassion, anger, malice, envy, respect, contempt, love, hatred, etc. All of these are highly variable from person to person and susceptible to modification by internal and external causes.
This extreme malleability of basic features of human nature is likely the basis for Hume's famous observation that "reason is, and ought only to be the slave to the passions." Hume's natural virtues such as courage, kindness, and benevolence are natural in the sense that we all have the capacity for them, but also control over whether we choose to develop them.
So, not even having sympathy for the suffering of others is universally distributed, although Hume clearly believed that most people do in fact have sympathy for others. But, the passions can incorporate one another:
Since passions, however independent, are naturally transfus'd into each other, if they are both present at the same time; it follows, that when good or evil is plac'd in such a situation, as to cause any particular emotion, beside its direct passion of desire or aversion, that latter passion must acquire new force and violence. This happens, among other cases, whenever any object excites contrary passions. (A Treatise of Human Nature, Book II, Part III, Section IV)
I argue that some features of human nature--universal or not; malleable or not--are worth promoting and some are not. Some are contrary to human flourishing and some advance human flourishing. Any nation that would advocate indifference to another nation that attacks fundamental conditions of human flourishing would be morally untethered and a truly failed state.
Thanks, Daryl, I hope we can continue this with others in a thread. I think that these ideas are probably more central than most realize to the discussions we should be having about American foreign policy and how we understand both our past and our future.
I agree that “people everywhere” is a bit extreme and may imply too great an emphasis on some idea of common humanity. This has been an overworked theme. But even the government of Uganda (with a Bunyoro President) may fit roughly this description. I intend, however, to stress the similarity of elites in states with a common past (i.e. Judeo-Christian, Greek-Roman, “enlightenment” ideas) who have engaged in civilizing or imperial missions. And, I am stressing the economic similarities as well as the ideological.
The context of the remark was the questions I listed in the preceding paragaphs. I think they are all in play across a broad range of societies in the present world. Whether or not the mix is similar enough across this range of states to justify “a grouping,” for analytical purposes needs to be studied. Comparative political analysis, as you point out, is always a “reach.” But I still think helpful, or at least suggestive.
Wouldn’t it be better to see differences as greater or lessor dependent upon which factors seem relevant to the comparison? In an absolute sense each is different, but what is “stark” probably depends upon focus, i. e. choice of factors.
I think we are probably saying much of the same thing when we accept as common the capacities that you list—in combination, and the combinations will differ with circumstance (perhaps at the will of emotion, but also in terms of direct self-interest (economic and social).
As for a common moral sense, wasn’t this also a heritage of the Scottish Enlightenment, if not explicit in Hume. As the intellectual historian, John Murrin, writes Francis Hutcheson for one, insisted that all humans ”possess an inherent moral sense that tells them without any need to reflect on the subject that certain acts are abominable and other benevolent.”
But my claim is larger, I think, than this. I see various attempts at “national building” as tending toward the creation of “rentier states,” and a rule characterized by corrupt displays of power. Not perhaps the intention, but while one can point to examples of human flourishing in Afghanistan under U.S. rule the overall result does seem to fit your phrase, a “moral untethering.”
That I can imagine many ways in which Taliban rule will constrain “human flourishing” (a phrase given a lot of currency these days that we might want to interrogate further) does not mean that I don’t tend to see them as following in the tradition of imposed and alien rule, with benevolent as well as very tragic consequences for many parts of the society. I tend to use tragic rather than evil, as I think evil is too heavy loaded with religious meanings, carrying an absolute sense.
More and more I think Afghanistan can lead to new thinking about America’s role in the world. Or maybe I should say about the direction that our present established elites are taking us.
RE: "...not withstanding some nuanced differences, it is hard for me to believe that the governing elites of other nations are, or would be, different. People everywhere are much the same when they are tested in action."
There are two logically unrelated propositions here. The first might be true while the second is false, and vice versa. The first statement is an empirical claim that strikes me as prima facie false. Surely, there is a stark difference between the governing elites of, say, Germany, and Iran.
I take the second thesis to be that there is some sort of universal human nature. This is a very old philosophical chestnut, of course. I don't propose to know the answer, but the evidence isn't overwhelming for a universal human nature that is indifferent to individual survival. So, I doubt that there is much use in speculating about a universal human nature that goes beyond the capacity for reason, sensitivity to pain and pleasure, a fear of death, reproductive instincts, and the desire to protect those who are close to us. There are more specific features such as compassion, anger, malice, envy, respect, contempt, love, hatred, etc. All of these are highly variable from person to person and susceptible to modification by internal and external causes.
This extreme malleability of basic features of human nature is likely the basis for Hume's famous observation that "reason is, and ought only to be the slave to the passions." Hume's natural virtues such as courage, kindness, and benevolence are natural in the sense that we all have the capacity for them, but also control over whether we choose to develop them.
So, not even having sympathy for the suffering of others is universally distributed, although Hume clearly believed that most people do in fact have sympathy for others. But, the passions can incorporate one another:
Since passions, however independent, are naturally transfus'd into each other, if they are both present at the same time; it follows, that when good or evil is plac'd in such a situation, as to cause any particular emotion, beside its direct passion of desire or aversion, that latter passion must acquire new force and violence. This happens, among other cases, whenever any object excites contrary passions. (A Treatise of Human Nature, Book II, Part III, Section IV)
I argue that some features of human nature--universal or not; malleable or not--are worth promoting and some are not. Some are contrary to human flourishing and some advance human flourishing. Any nation that would advocate indifference to another nation that attacks fundamental conditions of human flourishing would be morally untethered and a truly failed state.
Thanks, Daryl, I hope we can continue this with others in a thread. I think that these ideas are probably more central than most realize to the discussions we should be having about American foreign policy and how we understand both our past and our future.
I agree that “people everywhere” is a bit extreme and may imply too great an emphasis on some idea of common humanity. This has been an overworked theme. But even the government of Uganda (with a Bunyoro President) may fit roughly this description. I intend, however, to stress the similarity of elites in states with a common past (i.e. Judeo-Christian, Greek-Roman, “enlightenment” ideas) who have engaged in civilizing or imperial missions. And, I am stressing the economic similarities as well as the ideological.
The context of the remark was the questions I listed in the preceding paragaphs. I think they are all in play across a broad range of societies in the present world. Whether or not the mix is similar enough across this range of states to justify “a grouping,” for analytical purposes needs to be studied. Comparative political analysis, as you point out, is always a “reach.” But I still think helpful, or at least suggestive.
Wouldn’t it be better to see differences as greater or lessor dependent upon which factors seem relevant to the comparison? In an absolute sense each is different, but what is “stark” probably depends upon focus, i. e. choice of factors.
I think we are probably saying much of the same thing when we accept as common the capacities that you list—in combination, and the combinations will differ with circumstance (perhaps at the will of emotion, but also in terms of direct self-interest (economic and social).
As for a common moral sense, wasn’t this also a heritage of the Scottish Enlightenment, if not explicit in Hume. As the intellectual historian, John Murrin, writes Francis Hutcheson for one, insisted that all humans ”possess an inherent moral sense that tells them without any need to reflect on the subject that certain acts are abominable and other benevolent.”
But my claim is larger, I think, than this. I see various attempts at “national building” as tending toward the creation of “rentier states,” and a rule characterized by corrupt displays of power. Not perhaps the intention, but while one can point to examples of human flourishing in Afghanistan under U.S. rule the overall result does seem to fit your phrase, a “moral untethering.”
That I can imagine many ways in which Taliban rule will constrain “human flourishing” (a phrase given a lot of currency these days that we might want to interrogate further) does not mean that I don’t tend to see them as following in the tradition of imposed and alien rule, with benevolent as well as very tragic consequences for many parts of the society. I tend to use tragic rather than evil, as I think evil is too heavy loaded with religious meanings, carrying an absolute sense.
More and more I think Afghanistan can lead to new thinking about America’s role in the world. Or maybe I should say about the direction that our present established elites are taking us.