From another angle - Walter Lippmann's
Hey Folks,
In a recent column David Brooks who is ALWAYS a limp conservative wiener quoted something I found striking (although HE drew a stupid conclusion from it - which is his habit):
"Walter Lippmann got to the crux of the matter in a speech 65 years ago. People don't become happy by satisfying their desires, he said. They become happy by living within a belief system that restrains and gives coherence to their desires: 'Above all the other necessities of human nature, above the satisfaction of any other need, above hunger, love, pleasure, fame - even life itself - what a man most needs is the conviction that he is contained within the discipline of an ordered existence.' "
I've long noticed the zealous effort evident in many people to protect whatever personal structure they have imposed on reality and adopted as an absolute (see recent posting "Rocket surgery" http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=9617686&postID=115596112795786235).
Examples of this "putting on of blinders" abound:
my country/class/religion/"race"/heritage/gender/tribe/group/party/etc. over everything else - REGARDLESS of ANY challenges from facts in the real world.
Even when the challenges are overwhelmingly convincing, these folks won't budge. Only when enough of them die can younger people discard the long-discredited illusion and replace it with an updated illusion of their own.
I had never thought of this as a "need" - especially a need "above all other" needs - certainly not a need "above hunger, love, pleasure, fame - even life itself."
As striking as I found Lippmann's comment to be, I still don't. The "need" Lippman describes is a shadow of a need, not the thing itself.
A hamburger satisfies a need; it is not the need. Likewise, zealously defending the notion that we are "contained within the discipline of an ordered existence" is not a need but rather an attempt to satisfy some actual need.
This is an important point to consider. If Lippmann is right and I am wrong (which might be the case), then humanity has no hope of ever being more than the self-defeating, self-deluding, willfully hallucinating creatures we have been throughout history.
For as long as humanity survives, one arbitrary, essentially ridiculous (in retrospect) array of "disciplined and ordered existences" will follow another - satisfying, yes, but irrelevant to reality - psychologically practical but objectively destructive and delusional - consecutive Lala Lands seen as ultimate reality and accepted as such only because the majority feels much better "thinking" that way.
I would argue that the drive to be "contained within the discipline of an ordered existence" is an attempt to satisfy a deeper aspect of humanity: Fear.
One could argue that all fear emanates - in the end - from Death, from our knowledge that inevitably we will die. If we ache, or bleed, or break something, these are shadows of death. If we are cold or hot or hungry, these are shadows of death. If we are shunned by our peers or ostracized or demonized or imprisoned, these are shadows of death. And Death and its children are to be feared (at least according to our culture and most others as well).
It is the fear of Death itself that gave rise to religion in the first place - "creating"order that, if blindly accepted, assuages the fear of ultimate annihilation. "You won't die; you'll go to Pluto's Underworld or Valhalla or Heaven and eat pomegranates or engage in mock combat on the plains of Asgard or hang out with Angels."
Once cultures have addressed Death itself, they take on Death's children, creating magical and absolute structures to "protect" themselves from death-in-life. Scapegoating and pecking orders are established, myth and dogma are promulgated, taboos are declared, "wise laws" and practices are devised (i.e. all things are "ordered") in ways that make humanity (at least those of us in control) feel secure, satisfied that we are "contained within the discipline of an ordered existence").
Hence the wisdom of human sacrifice, witch-burning, the Crusades, decimation of indigenous peoples, slavery, the holocaust, and all wars - blessedly in the name of maintaining the satisfaction of an "ordered existence."
It's all so much crap, but unexamined crap is the only crap worth spreading. It doesn't exist because IT is good. It exists because it makes us FEEL good.
This is easily observed in older, defunct cultures. Often we laugh at the "childish" or "transparently self-serving" or "superstitious" nature of these "failed" predecessors. We just won't look at our own because it's perfect; that's official; everyone knows it.
If Lippmann is correct, humanity will always be buried in shit up to its ears, and no amount of self examination will serve to change things. In fact, self examination is impossible in the face of Lippmann's prime directive - essentially, we create what we pretend exists for fear of discovering what actually exists; and we don't dare question our invention!!
Check mate. Game over - now and forever. Praise _________ (choose your favorite imaginary friend).
If I am correct - hope I am - we have nothing to fear but fear itself.
It seems to me that we CAN develop the courage to withdraw ever-increasingly from the soothing embrace of magic, superstition, and arbitrary authority to face real problems with intelligence and rationality.
What Lippmann describes is not a "need" but a drug to salve our need to escape fear. Like a drug, it makes us oblivious of our difficulties, but it does nothing to solve them, and more often than not - as with drugs - it makes matters worse.
I think we can do better than that.
- Uke Man
In a recent column David Brooks who is ALWAYS a limp conservative wiener quoted something I found striking (although HE drew a stupid conclusion from it - which is his habit):
"Walter Lippmann got to the crux of the matter in a speech 65 years ago. People don't become happy by satisfying their desires, he said. They become happy by living within a belief system that restrains and gives coherence to their desires: 'Above all the other necessities of human nature, above the satisfaction of any other need, above hunger, love, pleasure, fame - even life itself - what a man most needs is the conviction that he is contained within the discipline of an ordered existence.' "
I've long noticed the zealous effort evident in many people to protect whatever personal structure they have imposed on reality and adopted as an absolute (see recent posting "Rocket surgery" http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=9617686&postID=115596112795786235).
Examples of this "putting on of blinders" abound:
my country/class/religion/"race"/heritage/gender/tribe/group/party/etc. over everything else - REGARDLESS of ANY challenges from facts in the real world.
Even when the challenges are overwhelmingly convincing, these folks won't budge. Only when enough of them die can younger people discard the long-discredited illusion and replace it with an updated illusion of their own.
I had never thought of this as a "need" - especially a need "above all other" needs - certainly not a need "above hunger, love, pleasure, fame - even life itself."
As striking as I found Lippmann's comment to be, I still don't. The "need" Lippman describes is a shadow of a need, not the thing itself.
A hamburger satisfies a need; it is not the need. Likewise, zealously defending the notion that we are "contained within the discipline of an ordered existence" is not a need but rather an attempt to satisfy some actual need.
This is an important point to consider. If Lippmann is right and I am wrong (which might be the case), then humanity has no hope of ever being more than the self-defeating, self-deluding, willfully hallucinating creatures we have been throughout history.
For as long as humanity survives, one arbitrary, essentially ridiculous (in retrospect) array of "disciplined and ordered existences" will follow another - satisfying, yes, but irrelevant to reality - psychologically practical but objectively destructive and delusional - consecutive Lala Lands seen as ultimate reality and accepted as such only because the majority feels much better "thinking" that way.
I would argue that the drive to be "contained within the discipline of an ordered existence" is an attempt to satisfy a deeper aspect of humanity: Fear.
One could argue that all fear emanates - in the end - from Death, from our knowledge that inevitably we will die. If we ache, or bleed, or break something, these are shadows of death. If we are cold or hot or hungry, these are shadows of death. If we are shunned by our peers or ostracized or demonized or imprisoned, these are shadows of death. And Death and its children are to be feared (at least according to our culture and most others as well).
It is the fear of Death itself that gave rise to religion in the first place - "creating"order that, if blindly accepted, assuages the fear of ultimate annihilation. "You won't die; you'll go to Pluto's Underworld or Valhalla or Heaven and eat pomegranates or engage in mock combat on the plains of Asgard or hang out with Angels."
Once cultures have addressed Death itself, they take on Death's children, creating magical and absolute structures to "protect" themselves from death-in-life. Scapegoating and pecking orders are established, myth and dogma are promulgated, taboos are declared, "wise laws" and practices are devised (i.e. all things are "ordered") in ways that make humanity (at least those of us in control) feel secure, satisfied that we are "contained within the discipline of an ordered existence").
Hence the wisdom of human sacrifice, witch-burning, the Crusades, decimation of indigenous peoples, slavery, the holocaust, and all wars - blessedly in the name of maintaining the satisfaction of an "ordered existence."
It's all so much crap, but unexamined crap is the only crap worth spreading. It doesn't exist because IT is good. It exists because it makes us FEEL good.
This is easily observed in older, defunct cultures. Often we laugh at the "childish" or "transparently self-serving" or "superstitious" nature of these "failed" predecessors. We just won't look at our own because it's perfect; that's official; everyone knows it.
If Lippmann is correct, humanity will always be buried in shit up to its ears, and no amount of self examination will serve to change things. In fact, self examination is impossible in the face of Lippmann's prime directive - essentially, we create what we pretend exists for fear of discovering what actually exists; and we don't dare question our invention!!
Check mate. Game over - now and forever. Praise _________ (choose your favorite imaginary friend).
If I am correct - hope I am - we have nothing to fear but fear itself.
It seems to me that we CAN develop the courage to withdraw ever-increasingly from the soothing embrace of magic, superstition, and arbitrary authority to face real problems with intelligence and rationality.
What Lippmann describes is not a "need" but a drug to salve our need to escape fear. Like a drug, it makes us oblivious of our difficulties, but it does nothing to solve them, and more often than not - as with drugs - it makes matters worse.
I think we can do better than that.
- Uke Man
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