Professor Moore: “I now think it is time to turn to the matter at hand.”

An uncontroversial beginning one might have thought, but rarely are things so simple at a gathering of the philosophical “great and good”:

“I object to that!”  offered Professor Bradley, more sharply than was normal on these occasions, “there is no ‘matter’  to be ‘at hand’ if by that you intend to refer to some underlying substrate in which ‘matter’ might inhere. I might give you a ‘hand’ but there will be no accompanying ‘matter’ to place next to it. Or underneath it. Or anywhere else for that….And any ‘hand’ whose existence I am prepared to assent to would not be individuated separately but would be part of an inclusive Whole.”

My colleagues appeared restless at this. For Professor Bradley had a point: if we could not agree on the existence of matter then  it followed a fortiori  that there could be no matter at hand and that further discussion was therefore pointless. Luckily Professor Ayer, his mind no doubt on a later assignation, was keen to move things along…

Professor Ayer: “We can accept, following Berkeley, that to talk of ‘matter’ in this way is literal nonsense. There can be no discussion of the matter in hand since any proposition which includes the term ‘matter in hand’ will be neither analytic nor verifiable. We might, however, following Russell (following Hume), agree to refer instead to ‘the logical construction out of sense data at hand’. We could then proceed in a manner that preserves the requisite clarity and rigour. We can if you like (and following me) resume discussion of the matter in a hand in a way that is analogous to the discussion of other minds…” there were nods of assent at this sage proposal and it looked as if Professor Ayer might have saved the day. But then, not for the first time, he overreached himself, “…and anyway time is marching on.”

At this there was a sharp intake of breath for we all knew what was coming…

“I would ask you to retract that Sir!” thundered Professor McTaggart, “I have not spent the best part of the last decade proving that time does not exist only for you to glibly ascribe to it not merely existence but some peculiar species of causal powers! “Marching on” indeed! I did not come here only to be confronted by your obnoxious conflation of the A-series with the B-series! Were there such a thing as time you would undoubtedly be wasting mine Sir!”

At this the idealists sided with McTaggart against the empiricists whom they accused of attempting to hijack the agenda of the meeting. The rationalists took the side of the idealists whilst the contrarians took the side of nobody. At one point Professor Wittgenstein demanded that everyone be quiet. And, as head of department, Profeesor Moore appealed in vain for common sense to prevail. It fell to the department’s token Kantian, Professor Strawson, to effect an uneasy truce between these disparate camps.

Discussion of the matter at hand was eventually deferred until the next meeting of the academic committee where it appears on the agenda as Item 3: “the logical-construction-from-sense-data-at-hand-in-a-way-that-is-metaphysically-and-ontologically-neutral”.

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The proposal to bring Khalid Sheikh Mohammed to New York City for trial created considerable controversy. While some of it was manufactured for political purposes, there are significant issues here.

First, there is the practical issue: bringing Khalid Sheikh Mohammed to the city for trial will cost millions of dollars. Interestingly, some folks have expressed a willingness to hold the trial in their town so as to bring that money into their community. In any case, holding the trial on a military facility would presumably be cheaper-the security is presumably already in place.

Second, there is the concern that NYC will be targeted again if the trial is held there. Of course, this concern applies to anyplace the trial is located and, of course, NYC is presumably already a prime target for terrorists (that is, after all, where the 9/11 attacks took place). Also, to use some Bush era talk: if we do not hold the trial in NYC because we are afraid, then the terrorist win by turning us into cowards in the face of their threats.

Third, there is the moral and political statement of holding a civilian trial. It shows that we are committed to the rule of law, justice and due process. In contrast, our terrorist foes are outside of the limits of civilization, law and justice. In a very important sense, our battle against the various terrorist groups is a struggle between our values and their values. You do not win a moral battle over values by abandoning those values-anymore than you defend a city by abandoning that city to the enemy.

Fourth, holding a civilian trial casts the terrorist as a criminal and not a combatant. In a sense, a combatant is a fighter in a war and treating him as such would seem to grant him a certain status. Treating him as the criminal he is makes a statement about the nature of terrorism and terrorists: they are not enemy combatants fighting a war. They are mere criminals engaged in the murder of the innocent.

Fifth, it has been contended that trying a terrorist rather than just executing them entourages terrorists by showing that we are weak. In reply, the same argument could apply to any criminal and thus would justify getting rid of the notion of holding trials at all. This seems rather absurd, so the argument should be rejected. As another reply, it is the terrorists who are weak. After all, if we can hold such trials, this shows that we are so strong that we can offer justice even to our worst enemies. Executing people without trials and without justice is the way of the terrorist, not the way of the just.

The other philosophical type, much more common, is the opinionated philosopher, the philosopher who is entirely convinced of her position, presuppositions, worldview, definitions, arguments, etc.  Such a peron will fight her corner constantly, relentlessly, hammering all intuitions to fit her propositions.  Counter-examples make no sense, other views are incoherent, objections unfounded, and on and on.

Who is the better philosopher?  Different question:  who is more likely to have tenure?

Zoom out a little and think about the wider world.  Those of us with settled opinions are more likely to speak up, take action, and get results in line with our settled views than head-scratchers reading books in the shade of trees.  The movers and shakers, if we still have those, are largely people who think what they think regardless.  Flexible thinkers look weak by comparison.  I’m told by friends in the states that opinions there are so entrenched and divided that rational debate is no longer possible.  You get a view, a blank stare, and the opposing view, another blank stare and maybe an insult or knowing head shake, and on and on.  How can reason get a hearing when opinion shouts so loudly?

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When the issue of the ethics of eating meat comes up, people often regard the matter as being primarily of academic concern. Or, far worse, a matter than only really matters to those who hug (and perhaps eat) trees. However, the ethics of meat does matter on a much broader scale.

Since the subject is rather substantial, I have decided to devote a short series of blog posts on this matter. I’ll begin with making the case as to why meat matters. I will, of course, endeavor to do so without begging any questions for or against meat.

One obvious way to motivate the concern is to point out that what we do to animals would be regarded as rather evil if it were done to human beings. A little dialogue should illustrate this point nicely.

Bill: “Hi Sally. Wow, that sandwich you’re eating smells great! And are those new shoes and a new leather jacket?”

Sally: “Why yes.”

Bill: “Can I have a bite?”

Sally: “Sure.”

Bill: “Yum! What is it?”

Sally: “One of my neighbors. They crossed me for the last time, so I had to kill them. I didn’t want the meat to go to waste, so I barbecued them using my mother’s secret BBQ sauce. Of course, the secret is she buys it at the supermarket.”

Bill: “Gaaaah….I don’t believe it!”

Sally: “No, really. I just bought the sauce right off the shelf.”

Bill: “Not that…I can’t believe that you are eating human meat!”

Sally: “Well, you did, too. Plus, you eat meat all the time. Hmm, I probably shouldn’t tell you that I made my coat and shoes out of their skins. Waste not, want not…as my mom used to say.”

Bill: “I’m going to be sick…”

Sally: “Oh, you silly goose. Of course I didn’t skin and cook my neighbors! This is just a pulled pork sandwich and the boots and shoes are cow leather!”

Bill: “Oh, that is okay!”

Sally: “But why?”

On the face of it, things that are wicked and evil to do to humans should also be wicked and evil to do to animals. As such, we should not just assume that eating animals is okay-anymore than we should assume that killing and eating humans is okay. There might be relevant differences between humans and animals that justify the difference in treatment, but this is something that must be argued rather than merely assumed. At the very least, the possibility that we are doing great evil is something that should give us pause-if only between bites.

A second reason that shows why meat matters is based in religion. Interestingly enough, Christian thinkers such as St. Augustine and St. Aquinas took the issue of killing animals very seriously. After all, killing is supposed to be a sin and animals can obviously be killed. While, as we will see, Augustine and Aquinas concluded that eating meat was both theologically and morally acceptable, they did show that it is an issue well worth considering. There are, of course, religions that take a rather strict theological and ethical position about meat and killing animals. As such, this makes the matter worth considering. Naturally enough, religion and ethics are distinct, but it is possible to make inferences from the one normative domain to the other (provided that the proper steps are taken).

A third reason is based in practical concerns. The raising of meat for food is rather resource intensive and it generally takes several pounds of feed/grain to produce a pound of meat. Given the limited resources of our planet, this does raise both a practical and a related moral concern about eating meat (or at least certain types of meat). Another practical concern is the matter of health. While there is some debate about the details, it is well established that meat intensive diets are less healthy when compared to diets that are less meat intensive. Since how we treat our bodies can be taken as a moral concern, this also provides moral grounds as to why meat matters.

In this post I have just sketched out some reasons why the issue matters. In my next post on the subject I will start examining the morality of meat.

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In my previous post I mentioned that reading an  article in Newsweek entitled “Vegetarians Who Eat Meat”,  got me thinking about two issues. The first is whether a person can be a vegetarian and also eat meat. The second is whether the way the meat animal is raised impacts the morality of eating it. I addressed the first issue in that post and I now turn to the second issue.

Some folks who were (or still claim to be ) vegetarians have returned to eating meat and justify their consumption by making a moral argument. The gist of the argument is that the morality of eating meat rests not on the eating of meat but on how the animal was treated prior to becoming meat. To be more specific, the idea is that if the animal is lovingly raised in an environmentally sustainable way, then the consumption of its dead flesh is morally acceptable. In contrast, eating meat raised in the usual way (such as factory farming) is not acceptable.

There does seem to be some merit to this argument. If it is assumed that the unhappiness and happiness of animals matters, then a stock utilitarian argument can be trotted out. Treating food animals well generates more pleasure for the animals and, in contrast, treating them badly generates more pain. If pain and pleasure are the currency of morality, then treating food animals well would be morally better than treating them badly.

From this it would presumably follow that folks who only eat the animals who were well treated would have the moral high ground over those who eat animals who suffered before becoming meat. This is because the folks who eat the happy dead are not parties to the mistreatment of animals. Except, of course, for the killing and eating part. After all, both the happy cow and the sad cow meat…I mean “meet” the same end: death and consumption.

The fact that the animals, happy or sad, end up as meat might be seen as what is important to the ethics of the situation. This seems reasonable. After all, if someone intends to kill me my main concern is with my possible death and not whether the killer will be nice or not.

But it also seems reasonable to be concerned about what comes before. To use an analogy, imagine two legal systems. While both hand out the same punishments, one system treats suspects horribly: they are locked in fetid cells, poorly fed and treated with cruelty. The other legal system treats suspects reasonable well: they can get out on bail, cells are clean, the food is adequate and cruelty is rare. There seems to be a meaningful distinction between the two and this would also seem to hold in the case of meat.

As such, I do think that the folks who eat the happy dead can claim a slight moral superiority over those who dine on cruel food. But, there is still the obvious concern about whether the consumption of meat itself is acceptable or not.

Yes, this is a shameless act of self-promotion. But, it is not commercial in nature so it is okay. Right? :)

This is an important question because apparently people have a need to feel that they are living a meaningful life, or that human life itself has meaning. However, the question is not like that about the meaning of words, smoke or the stock market. So, what kind of meaning are people seeking? Perhaps the felt need for meaning originates in an existential dissatisfaction with life not shared by the other animals. A distant observer would never know this by looking at us. If intergalactic zoologists spent a few centuries simply observing life on earth from a space ship and cataloging its inhabitants, would they have any special reason to distinguish human life from the life of other animals? I doubt it. Human beings are unique, but no more so than the other animals. What the zoologists would see are simply various kinds of animals living out their species-specific life cycles.

For example, they would see humans going about their lives eating, sleeping, excreting and reproducing, things all animals do. However, no one asks what the meaning of life is for badgers or skunks, nor do badgers and skunks seem to ask that question. They simply live out their lives, replace themselves and die. How different are we? To the intergalactic zoologists, I believe humans would appear on a par with other animal species.

Somehow it is not enough for humans to live an animal life, die an animal death, and simply vanish into the mists of time. Such a life seems to lack meaning for creatures who are aware of the prospect of death, change and how everything ends. Perhaps the question of meaning is important for humans because it would be reassuring to believe that something is saved from the wreck of time. The dream of immortality, in whatever form, is also part of the attempt to elevate human life beyond the natural realm. Religion also speaks to this search for a transcendent meaning of life.

What I believe the intergalactic zoologists would note about the human animals under their purview is that they are essentially meaning machines. Humans generate meanings wherever they go, and so it is only natural that they would ultimately ask about the meaning of life itself. The trouble is that the concept of meaning has boundaries beyond which it no longer makes any sense to speak of meaning. This is similar to Kant’s complaint that concepts having their proper applications in one area are inappropriately applied to another. An example is Kant’s criticism of the use of the concept of causality beyond its use in understanding the empirical world to explain the existence of the universe as a whole.

Does the same thing happen when we start asking about the meaning of life? Is it possible to extend the concept of meaning beyond its many legitimate applications to the concept to life itself? The answer would give human life a transcendent meaning, or ‘Meaning’ with a capital ‘M’. The search for this kind of meaning leads directly to thoughts about God making the universe and human life meaningful. This is where reincarnation and immortality come in, so that this life we live is not ‘just for now’ but has an eternal import. There is a great fear that if this kind of Meaning is absent from human life, then human life is utterly meaningless.

The search for transcendent meaning and the thought that life would be meaningless without it is very like a category mistake. The truth is that humans cannot help living meaningful lives, even without any greater meaning. Indeed, the view that life is meaningless itself confers meaning on life, if only in a negative sense.

There may be no transcendent meaning of life, but there is something to the quest for it that many people believe makes their lives meaningful. Perhaps what people are looking for is a meaning for their lives that goes beyond their own merely particular concerns and activities. We feel better if we think that our lives are part of a larger concern. Such a concern gives us a sense of belonging to something bigger than ourselves. However, this is a meaning that life can have without projecting some even greater meaning upon it.

On a lower level, personal meanings permeate the lives of individuals. Things and people matter to us and give our lives meaning with a little ‘m’. Without those ‘little meanings’ life would indeed be empty and meaningless in a way that causes true distress. Little things like small acts of kindness, support for friends, gatherings in celebration, condolences in times of sadness, all give life meaning even if not a transcendent ‘Meaning’.

So, in conclusion, I would argue that there are three levels of meaning to human life. One is misguided and two are legitimate. First is the misguided search for a ‘Great Meaning’ that gives significance to life as a whole. Next is the meaning conferred on a life that cares for something more than the simple satisfaction of personal desires. Examples are political or humanitarian causes in which we join together with others to do something beyond the power of any individual. Finally, there are the little meanings of everyday life that come from living with others and acting in the world. These include the memories and anticipations of daily life, as well as the things of personal significance that surround us. On these lower levels of meaningfulness, there is no doubt that human life has meaning. On the higher level, the question of whether human life is meaningful is itself meaningless.

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I recently ran across an article in Newsweek entitled “Vegetarians Who Eat Meat”, which got me thinking about two issues. The first is whether a person can be a vegetarian and also eat meat. The second is whether the way the meat animal is raised impacts the morality of eating it.

On the face of it, a vegetarian cannot eat meat and remain a vegetarian. To use an analogy, just as a bachelor cannot be married, a vegetarian cannot be a meat eater.  Of course, some folks might wish to be able to call themselves “vegetarians” yet have the occasional cheeseburger. A conversation with such a person  at a party might go like this:

Vegetarian: (loudly) “Does this have meat in it? I’m a vegetarian, so I want to avoid eating any meat.”

Me: “Yes, that ham salad has ham in it. That’s meat, you know. But, I’ve seen you eat meat recently-like that cheeseburger you had the other day.”

Vegetarian: “Well, I do have a little meat now and then. But I’m still a vegetarian.”

Me: “Ah. I know some people who practice abstinence that way: they only have a little sex now and then.”

But perhaps being a vegetarian is not like being abstinent, but rather like being honest. An honest person does not stop being honest just because they tell a fib now and then. What matters is that such a person is mostly honest. As such, perhaps being a vegetarian is like being honest: they do not have to always avoid meat to justly keep the label, they just have to do so the majority of the time.

Also, there are many variations on the vegetarian theme, so a person could (with a suitable category choice) be a vegetarian and still consume meat. This, of course, does lead to some questions about what it means to be a vegetarian if people can claim that title despite consuming meat. But, as I see it, as long a they are not too self-righteous about it there is no harm in letting them enjoy their self applied title.

I’ll address the second issue in my next blog post.

Jackson’s “knowledge argument” against physicalism has its detractors. These days they include Jackson himself who has, in his own phrase, “capitulated” to the orthodoxies of scientific materialism. More generally we can ask the question: what should we do when the results of a thought experiment are inconsistent with the prevailing view? Abandon the thought experiment? Or abandon the prevailing view? And is there a core philosophical principle, some piece of metaphilosophy, to which we can appeal in order to settle the matter?

Some argue that thought experiments tend to confuse what is possible (in the conceptual sense) with what is imaginable (in the epistemic sense). Thus Hilary Putnam: you can imagine that you can imagine that you are a “brain in a vat” and that what you take to be your thoughts and sensations are a collective and systematic misrepresentation of the world “as it really is”  but what you imagine you imagine is in fact no such thing. A brain in a vat would not be able to imagine itself to be a brain in a vat: the very notion is incoherent (an implication, Putnam argues, of a true theory of meaning). Similarly Bernard Williams has suggested that thought experiments which invite us to imagine ourselves in this or that scenario will often overlook that we are embodied originators of our own projects and goals, and that this fact describes an ineliminable feature of our personal identity. Thus when John Rawls constructs his version of political liberalism via the imagined consent of a freely choosing rational agent operating from behind a “veil of ignorance”, Williams will point out that when the free agent takes the veil she ceases to be an agent at all.

Small wonder then that the thought experiment passes in and out of fashion. The late philosopher of mind and freedom activist Kathy Wilkes described her own book on personal identity as being philosophy without thought experiments. John Searle in a series of exchanges with Paul and Patricia Churchland complained that the problem with thought experiments was their failure to preserve the philsophically salient features of the problem they are intended to illuminate. Pretty cheeky perhaps, from the inventor of the Chinese Room. But not without chutzpah.

Some of the great exponents of the thought experiment appreciate also the value of the genuine experiment. None more so than Berkeley who on one occasion attempted to hang himself in order to generate a near death experience. The episode is described by Oliver Goldsmith who noted that it was agreed that:

….his companion would take him down at a signal agreed upon…Berkeley was therefore tied up to the ceiling, and the chair taken from under his feet, but soon losing the use of his senses, his companion it seems waited a little too long for the signal agreed upon, and Berkeley had like to have been hanged in good earnest; for as soon as he was taken down he fell senseless and motionless upon the floor….

So take note: the next time you hear of a pop star or actor who has passed away in embarrassing circumstances things might not be so tawdry as first appears. Their final thoughts might have been deep ones.

Pat Robertson recently claimed, in effect, that God has struck Haiti with an earthquake because of the practice of Voodoo. This is, of course, based on the 1st Commandment that folks are not to have any gods before God.

As a hypothesis, this seems rather implausible. After all, if God was in the practice of smiting people who violate His rules, then there would certainly be much more smiting going on. God’s rules are routinely violated, yet God does nothing. It seems rather odd that if God enforced His rules, He would just elect to strike Haiti and ignore so many other violations.Or perhaps God works in arbitrary ways, punishing violations of His rules randomly or just when He feels like it. While this is a possibility (and seems to match the Old Testament in some ways) such behavior seems to be inconsistent with a God who is rational and good.

Also, if God is good then He would presumably strike only those who deserve to be struck. Yet, the earthquake has harmed young children and infants, who surely have committed no offense against God. Since God is supposed to be all powerful, He surely could smite with greater precision. After all, we have precise weapons in our arsenals, so the supreme being should be able to at least match our capabilities. Or perhaps God only has weapons of mass destruction on hand and hence has to slaughter the innocent in order to smite those who have earned His wrath.

As such, it seems rather unreasonable to claim that God has struck Haiti as punishment. The most plausible hypothesis is that the earthquake was a purely natural phenomenon and, having no will or purpose, struck everyone impartially.