| Sunday, March 31, 2002 | |
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The Objectivist Center, Posner, and Lindsey
By Diana Hsieh @ 10:54 AM   
Back in October, The Objectivist Center published their position statement on the 9/11 terrorist attacks. The last paragraph of that statement caused me a fair amount of consternation. It reads:8. Just as our government may take action against other countries and groups that pose a genuine threat, even if they have not actually attacked us, so it may use its police powers domestically to identify and deal with threats from individuals and groups even if they have not yet acted violently. The first responsibility of government is to ensure the security of its citizens--i.e., protect their right to life. In doing so, however, it must also respect their rights to liberty, property, and privacy. Measures that limit the latter rights are justified only if they are objectively required for security and are tailored to minimize restrictions on other rights. This formulation of a tradeoff between security and liberty seems to embody the sort of pragmatic approach to rights that Objectivism has always rejected. We are most emphatically not more secure by limiting our liberties, but rather less secure. Increased security measures which restrict liberties may better protect us from criminals, but at the great cost of allowing the leviathan to trample over us as it sees fit. Unchecked governments, not criminals, have been and continue to be the greatest threat to human life. Nevertheless, the government also does need to protect our security in the sense of our right to life. If a government does not prevent us from bring blown up by terrorists, then it is not doing its job, just as it would not be doing its job if it stood idly by while murderous thugs roamed the streets looking for fresh prey. And, of course, the paragraph does specifically say that the government must respect "rights to liberty, property, and privacy" in protecting the right to life. I suspect that much of my discomfort with this section of the position statement is the result of a serious lack of context. There is little explication of the origin and justification of the ideas. There are no concrete examples to clarify meaning. (Such explication need not have been included in the position statement; a separate article would have been just fine.) In light of these intellectual reservations, I was very interested to read some rather interesting comments by Brink Lindsey concerning the legitimacy of the notion of a tradeoff between security and liberty. Responding to Richard Posner's comments at Cato, Lindsey writes: Posner's formulation -- that liberty is just one competing value among many -- is not one that libertarians like myself are likely to cotton to. But the fact is that, in the case of civil liberties, even libertarians with a principled commitment to the protection of individual rights should acknowledge that tradeoffs and balancing are unavoidable. The reason is that, with respect to civil liberties, considerations of protecting individual rights are found on both sides of the equation. Lindsey seems to be arguing the same essential point as the troublesome last paragraph in the TOC statement. But because Lindsey's comments include argument and explication, rather than mere statement, the issue is far more clear to me. However, there is still much to be explored about this idea of balancing security and liberty. For example, how do we determine what constitutes an appropriate tradeoff? What measures are legitimately negotiable depending upon the particular circumstances faced by a government? What measures would be intolerable no matter what? In order to prevent ourselves from sliding down a slippery slope, we need specific principles to guide our decisions as to what would constitute a legitimate tradeoff and what would not. Additionally, this problem of protecting security seems related to other (potentially) legitimate government powers to initiate coercion, such as the power of a subpoena to force an unwilling person to testify. Rand endorsed such subpoenas on the grounds that a refusal to testify would subvert justice. But perhaps a better argument could be made on the grounds that the security-liberty interest of all people is much greater than the liberty-liberty interest of the witness in most of these cases. Such an argument might even point to reasons for rejecting subpoenas where the person faces significant risk of death (from the Mafia, perhaps) as a result of his testimony, as then the security-liberty of the witness is at stake. (That's a confused explanation. I'll have to try to do better later.) As I said, much to explore. Update: Due to serious philosophic and moral objections, I am no longer associated with The Objectivist Center in any way, shape, or form. My reasons why can be found on my web page on The Many False Friends of Objectivism.  E-mail Diana Hsieh
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| Saturday, March 30, 2002 | ||||||||||
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Primacy of Evasion and Lies of Omission
By Diana Hsieh @ 1:44 PM
On March 19th, I posted my blog entry about the relationship between self-deception and evasion to OWL. Michelle Cohen responded with an excellent analysis of the relationship between self-deception and evasion. She seems to agree with my basic understanding of evasion as "faking reality by refusing to accept what you know or suspect to be true" and self-deception as "faking reality by persuading yourself of what you know or suspect to be false." However, Michelle disputes my notion that evasion and self-deception are "two sides of the same coin." She writes: I think they are rather two degrees on the same continuum of dishonesty. Evasion is an earlier stage in the shift away from reality, while self deception is a more advanced stage. The dishonest person begins by refusing to accept what he knows to be true and continues by convincing himself that what was negated by the facts he evaded was possible. Then the person has to keep evading the facts that negate his faked reality in order to perpetuate his fantasy... Self deception depends completely on evasion. Michelle's post prompted an immediate exclamation of "Ah ha! That's it!" from me. I think her analysis really captures the nature of the relationship between evasion and self-deception. Evasion is the primary phenomena. In order to deceive ourselves into believing something, we must always first blind ourselves to what we know or suspect to be true. (Thanks Michelle!) My confusion on the relationship between self-deception and evasion resulted, I think, from the fact that self-deception is so often coupled with evasion. As Robert Campbell noted to me in a March 21st e-mail, "human beings are (understandably) uncomfortable living in an explanatory vacuum, so alternative explanations of dubious soundness are the more likely outcome." Evasion is often insufficient protection from unpleasant truths; self-deception provides an additional buffer. Over time, these two forms of dishonesty become intertwined, with self-deceptions supporting evasions and evasions supporting self-deceptions. Imagine a dishonest mother whose teenage son has just been brought home by the police for vandalizing a neighbor's fence. First, the mother must deny that her son did anything wrong. "Not my boy!" she says to herself. Then she starts seeking alternative explanations, telling herself, "Oh, he was just at the wrong place at the wrong time" or "His rowdy friend John must have put him up to it." In order to support these self-deceptions, she must evade some more, perhaps by ignoring what the officer tells her or by refusing to think about the previous times her son has been brought home by the police. These evasions might then be supported by further self-deceptions, perhaps that this officer just has it in for her boy for no good reason. Although, the evasions and self-deceptions become entangled and mutually supporting over time, the avoidance of truth is primary. Without the evasions, the self-deceptions would never be plausible. In fact, the intertwining of self-deception and evasion indicates just how dangerous such dishonesty with ourselves often is, because it is usually not an isolated, containable phenomena. Each evasion risks more self-deceptions and evasions. And each self-deception risks more evasions and self-deceptions. We cannot limit such internal dishonesty to only certain areas because, as I argued in my paper Excuses Excuses: Undermining Moral Growth in the Concealment of Wrongdoing, any such effort would bring the very facts that a person wishes to avoid into the harsh light of conscious awareness. I suspect that the primacy of avoiding truth over constructing falsehoods also applies to lies to other people. In The Truth about Lying, Stan Walters uses the term "evasion" to refer to lies of omission, while "deception" seems to refer to lies of commission. This conceptual scheme correlates very easily with the distinctions and terminology that I have been using in talking about dishonesty with oneself. In fact, it fits nicely into a four-square grid:
I suspect that lies by omission are more fundamental than lies by commission in dishonesty with others, just as evasion is more fundamental than self-deception is dishonesty with ourselves. The first task of the deceiver of others must be to avoid revealing the truth, for without such concealment, outright falsehoods will be immediately recognized for what they are. The "explanatory vacuum" created by the avoidance and denial of truth is what then necessitates outright falsehood. So if a man wants to deceive his wife about an affair, he must first avoid telling her anything about his activities that would raise suspicion, like that he had lunch this other woman. His next task is to construct alternate explanations for his behavior, such as a big project at work that regularly keeps him late. Only by avoiding suspicious truths do the man's falsehoods have a chance of being believed. This is not to say that dishonesty with others first requires lies by omission, then a switch to lies of commission only when those evasions become inadequate. Rather, in both dishonesty with ourselves and with others, unless the truth is deliberately and consistently avoided, the contradiction between the truth and the lie will be too clear. Evasion/omission is required for self-deception/commission. So there seem to be some interesting parallels between the workings of dishonesty with ourselves and dishonesty with others. How dishonesty with others encourages dishonesty with oneself and vice versa is, however, an issue for another day. E-mail Diana Hsieh
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Peep Science
By Diana Hsieh @ 11:21 AM
The mystery of everyone's guilty springtime pleasure, marshmallow Peeps, are unlocked by a team of intrepid scientists.
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The No Spin Zone
By Diana Hsieh @ 11:17 AM
I wrote this review last week, but forgot to post it. Oops.
I was a rather disappointed with Bill O'Reilly's latest book The No Spin Zone. As a fan of The O'Reilly Factor for the past few years, most of the interviews and issues were old hat to me. (In contrast, O'Reilly's earlier book, the semi-memoir The O'Reilly Factor, was a far more interesting read.) Both O'Reilly's greatest faults and strengths shine though in this new book. His anti-conceptualism is apparent in his contradictory ideas, like his stance on drugs versus alcohol. But the honesty, forthrightness, and dogged pursuit of the truth that make his show worth watching are also evident. So here's my advice: For those who are already failiar with O'Reilly's show, don't bother with this book. For those that are not, don't bother with this book either -- but do check out his show instead. E-mail Diana Hsieh
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| Friday, March 29, 2002 | |
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Two Drinks! Heaven Forbid!
By Diana Hsieh @ 10:28 PM
First cigarettes got pounded. I thought fatty foods were next. But alcohol might actually be the next target. I'm growing weary already.
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Announcement
By Diana Hsieh @ 7:48 PM
I suppose I should announce that I was accepted into the Masters program in philosophy at University of Colorado at Boulder. I will be starting classes in the fall. (The 60 minute/60 mile commute will give me plenty of time to listen to a great many of the awesome lectures from The Teaching Company.)
Given that I didn't conceal my interest in Ayn Rand, I shouldn't have been surprised to be rejected for the Ph.D program. Although my honesty may have cost me, I'm glad to be entering the program without an Objectivist closet wrapped around me. It got stuffy in there as an undergrad. If I decide to pursue the Ph.D, I can always reapply armed with letters of recommendation from four Boulder faculty, as well as more published writings and lectures under my belt. E-mail Diana Hsieh
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Memory Jumble
By Diana Hsieh @ 3:54 PM
As I was writing my review of Heavy Drinking (posted below), I most unpleasantly realized that certain clear, distinct, and consistent memories of Herbert Fingarette's article "Alcoholism and Self-Deception" were, in fact, entirely wrong.
I read "Alcoholism and Self-Deception" in January, just a few months ago. Although my reading of the article was rushed, it was of sufficient interest that I ordered Fingarette's book on alcoholism shortly thereafter. I remembered the article as arguing against the disease concept of alcoholism and the view that problem drinkers experience a loss of control over their drinking. Instead, Fingarette argued that the central feature of alcoholism is self-deception. I even vividly remembered the story of the man who, in full knowledge of the horrible consequences of his drinking, proceeded to deceive himself into drinking again by telling himself that if he put the shot of whiskey into a glass of milk, his full stomach would protect him. Then, since that whiskey didn't affect him, he proceeded to have another. And so on. All of these recollections seemed perfectly clear and distinct. Additionally, the summary of the article that I wrote on the title page read "discusses the medical model of alcoholism, claiming that the phenomena can be better understood in terms of self-deception rather than disease." And my February 28th letter to Tim Lynch of Cato about the article involved the same interpretation. In that letter, I said "Fingarette's analysis of problem drinking in terms of self-deception rather than 'loss of control' certainly fits well with my experience with alcoholics." All seemed well. So I wrote the following in my review of Heavy Drinking: To my surprise, Heavy Drinking doesn't argue, as the earlier "Alcoholism and Self-Deception" did, that self-deception is the central feature of problem drinking. Rather, in Heavy Drinking, Fingarette's notion of drinking as a "central activity" takes center stage, while self-deception is not even mentioned. At this point, I wanted discuss the role of self-deception in problem drinking, particularly citing the whiskey-in-milk story, so I quickly perused through the article looking for it. I couldn't find it. I skimmed the article again, this time a bit more slowly. I noticed that Fingarette didn't seem to advocate self-deception as a central feature of problem drinking. Reading the article again more slowly, I noticed that the introductory paragraph claimed that one of the purposes of the paper was "to show how the widely believed by unwarranted claim that alcoholism is a disease serves to encourage self-deception" (52). Oh dear. And, the whiskey-in-milk story was nowhere to be found. Oh oh dear dear. By the time I reached the end of the paper, I knew that my clear and distinct and consistent memories of both the central thesis of the paper and the particular whiskey-in-milk story were wrong. (When I googled for whiskey milk alcoholism self-deception, I found that the whiskey-in-milk story is from Chapter 3 of AA's Big Book.) I am very puzzled by this whole experience. I can (sort of) understand misreading the central thesis of "Alcoholism and Self-Deception" because I was so rushed to finish CU Boulder application at the time. But I have absolutely no idea where I might have read the whiskey-in-milk story recently. I am desperate to find out. I don't remember reading any material on alcoholism, other than Fingarette's article, around that time. There is only one reasonable conclusion to draw: I must be going mad. E-mail Diana Hsieh
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Heavy Drinking
By Diana Hsieh @ 3:53 PM
After reading Fingarette's essay "Alcoholism and Self-Deception" in Self-Deception and Self-Understanding, I was eager for more of his unique and interesting perspective on problem drinking in Heavy Drinking: The Myth of Alcoholism as a Disease. In this short and very readable book, Fingarette steadily and easily demolishes the prevailing opinion that alcoholism is a disease in which the alcoholic loses control over his drinking. (The scientific community long ago abandoned this view, but it lives on as dogma through therecovery movement.) Fingarette instead explains problem drinking as the result of choices that elevate drinking into a "central activity" in the drinker's life. He argues that the motivations for the choices that make drinking a core value are as many and varied as are the individuals making them. My only serious objection to the book comes in the final chapter on social policy; Fingarette would seem to be happy to turn this country into a totalitarian state to prevent some people from making stupid choices about alcohol. Despite that flaw, Heavy Drinking presents an impressive and well-reasoned case against the disease model of problem drinking. Similar arguments, I suspect, would apply to any so-called addiction.
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Tenure and Retirement
By Diana Hsieh @ 1:25 PM
Shane Bodrero e-mailed me that professors no longer have to retire at age 65 because the government regards such mandatory retirement as age discrimination. Just as I suspected. He also sent this rather fascinating 2000 NYT article Tenure Gridlock: When Professors Choose Not to Retire on a president's attempts to reform the tenure system at Muhlenberg College. I wonder how successful those efforts have been.
Most revealing was this passage: "He [the president of the college] makes it quite plain that he views older faculty members as an encumbrance," said Richard C. Hatch, 63, a chemistry professor who has been on the faculty since 1962. "He would just as well see those nearing retirement get out as soon as possible, and I guess I'm one of those." So this ancient chemistry professor isn't really able to do his job anymore and is offered a great retirement package. But he's resentful! Amazing! E-mail Diana Hsieh
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| Thursday, March 28, 2002 | |
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The Middle East
By Diana Hsieh @ 6:53 PM
Mila 18 is a fictional account of the Warsaw Uprising, in which a small number of Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto fought off the Germans for a surprisingly long time. The book is a good read, but not great literature. Philosophical issues such as collaboration and the prudence of armed resistance are explored through the conflicts between the characters before the uprising. The German determination to exterminate the Jews, even at the cost of undermining their war effort, is made horrifyingly clear. The willingness of Christian Poland, including the Catholic Church, to not only stand idly by, but also actively turn Jews over to the Germans, is also evident. The characters are well-drawn, but you do not live among them as in John Hersey's novel The Wall. A novel about such an event should be overwheming, but Mila 18 did not reach those heights. Nevertheless, the book was hardly a waste of time or money; it was a good read.
Reading Mila 18 does provide a convenient excuse to re-read The Wall, which is one of my favorite novels of all time. But I should probably read a historical account of the Warsaw Uprising first. Any suggestions? The right of Jews to defend themselves against those who wish to slaughter them is, sadly, no less relevant today than it was in Nazi Germany. The face of the enemy may no longer be the deluded Aryan Master Race, but the threat is the same. For our government to preach forebearance to the Israelis in the face of suicide bombers killing innocent civilians on an almost daily basis is an insult to all people who value their own lives. It is hypocricy in its worst form, particularly after 9/11. My only hope is that GW is trying to calm down the area until he can neutralize Israel's greatest threat -- Iraq -- who likely has weapons of mass destruction. (My understanding is that we need a few months to restock our supplies of weapons for a war with Iraq.) As Andrew Sullivan notes, the Arab states may be gearing up for another war on Israel. Although Israel could certainly kick all their primitive asses back to long before the stone age, the death toll may be terribly high if someone uses nuclear, biological, or chemical weapons against Israel. By knocking out Saddam, we largely eliminate that risk. Additionally, the Arab states may not be so eager to get their asses kicked again without the promise to weapons of mass destruction. And they may not want the US to join the fight either. In any case, I just hope Bush isn't really cruising down the morally indefensible path of appeasement. E-mail Diana Hsieh
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Eugenics
By Diana Hsieh @ 9:51 AM
I recently finished Mila 18 by Leon Uris, a fictional account of the Warsaw Uprising. (I'll post a review later.) So some articles on eugenics popped out at me last night.
In Reason, the article Eugenics Rides a Time Machine takes peek at the eugenics of The Time Machine, comparing the ideas in the new movie to H. G. Wells' book. Even more provocative and fascinating is the article by Jonah Goldberg on NRO entitled Westminster Eugenics Show. It talks about the AKC obsession over pure dog breeds as the result of lingering eugenicist views about racial purity. Personally, I am all too familiar with the costs of focusing on purity of bloodlines and conformation in physical appearance in dogs, rather than temperament or health. One of my German Shepherds, Kate, has very bad hip dysplasia. (We adopted her from a shelter in January of 2000, when she was about 4 years old, so we didn't select the breeder.) She has just had the first of what will be three expensive surgeries. Without these surgeries, I suspect that we would have to put Kate down in about a year; the pain simply would have been unbearable for her. However, she is a stunningly beautiful dog, with a very regal appearance. She would certainly pass the AKC conformation standards. Any dog, of course, can develop expensive medical problems. But the likelihood is simply so much greater with purebreds than with mixed-breeds. I will certainly never adopt another purebred dog, for fear of yet more careless breeding. E-mail Diana Hsieh
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| Wednesday, March 27, 2002 | |
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Whoo-Hoo-Fabulous Gay
By Diana Hsieh @ 10:30 PM
The What Do You Think? on gay adoption in The Onion was hysterical this week. I almost died laughing.
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Dishonesty in the Media
By Diana Hsieh @ 10:31 AM
In pursuit of a dramatic story, the Seattle times seems to have mislead its readers about whether patients in a clinical trial actually gave informed consent. Laura Landro's article gives all the details. The editor of the Seattle times responds and WSJ replies. Fascinating.
But the dishonesty doesn't stop there. Pete Du Pont also has an article on OpinionJournal about environmentalists falsifying data. Mr Du Pont writes: So why the lying? It seems deceit is the only way the greens can advance their Luddite agenda. They are ideologically inspired to try to limit, slow and if possible stop economic growth, for they believe that prosperity is harmful to the environment. But our nation's and the world's environments are getting better all the time, in fact so much better so much faster that it is hard to wave the green shirt based on honest data. Subterfuge and misrepresentation are thus left to energize the greens' antiprosperity cause. E-mail Diana Hsieh
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| Tuesday, March 26, 2002 | |
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Objectivism 101
By Diana Hsieh @ 4:57 PM
I've been hard at work these past few days on my six-lecture course "Objectivism 101" to be given at the 2002 Summer Seminar of The Objectivist Center. I have to turn in a detailed outline in the beginning of May, so I have about a week to work on each lecture. Of course, I'm already behind schedule. :-)I'll probably be privately posting my lecture notes in advance of the seminar so as to get some feedback from cool people. Cool people are defined as those that give me interesting answer to questions like these: Questions for Objectivists and Sympathizers: What issues do you think are absolutely critical to cover? Were there particular issues that you remember being confused over in learning the philosophy? What kinds of common misunderstandings do you see in other people new to Objectivism? Questions for Everyone Else: What would you like to learn about the philosophy? Where do your most serious reservations lie? What would make taking such a course enticing? Thanks in advance... Update: Due to serious philosophic and moral objections, I am no longer associated with The Objectivist Center in any way, shape, or form. My reasons why can be found on my web page on The Many False Friends of Objectivism. E-mail Diana Hsieh
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Why Stick People Are Extinct
By Diana Hsieh @ 9:42 AM
My husband Paul (of GeekPress) sent me to this visual demonstration of why stick people are extinct. Seems to me that it's at least on par with some sociobiological just so stories!
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| Monday, March 25, 2002 | |
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Marriage is Good
By Diana Hsieh @ 9:11 AM
Maggie Gallagher has a good piece on whether divorce is all that it's cracked up to be. (She's reviewing Hetherington's new book For Better or for Worse: Divorce Reconsidered.)
Two interesting facts stand out. First, people usually aren't better off after a divorce. Many seem to be far worse off, particularly women. They are often poorer, depressed, miserable, embittered, and so forth. Second, most people don't divorce "to escape from violent hellholes" but rather because "they are lonely, bored, depressed, dissatisfied." A "minority of divorces" are the result of the three A's: adultery, abuse, and alcoholism. People make all kinds of philosophical mistakes in their marriage that make divorce seem like an attractive option. They expect the other person to fill all their needs. They develop bad habits. They don't think creatively about how to solve their problems. They dwell on minor problems, blowing them completely out of proportion. They ignore critical issues, allowing them to become entrenched and difficult to resolve. They focus on the other person's problems, rather than their own. They think that the mere change of a divorce will alleviate their troubles. Given the amazing and wondrous potential of a good marriage, such failures are depressing, precisely because they are usually so unnecessary. E-mail Diana Hsieh
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| Sunday, March 24, 2002 | |
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Pain and Suffering
By Diana Hsieh @ 11:16 PM
My weekend started off grumpy and ended up in searing pain. Thankfully, the middle wasn't so bad.
As for the searing pain, let me just say that I'll never again chop up hot chilies while wearing contacts. The passage of hours and multiple hand washings did not remove all the hot hot hot oils from my hands. Repeatedly sticking my fingers in my eyes in a desperate attempt to remove my contacts was not an experience I ever want to repeat. E-mail Diana Hsieh
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| Friday, March 22, 2002 | |
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Benevolent Honesty
By Diana Hsieh @ 3:38 PM
Peter Saint-Andre recently attended my presentation to FROG entitled The Virtue of Honesty. He thus blogged:
I attended an informal talk she gave on the topic about a week ago, and it was pretty interesting, even though I thought the small audience in attendance (and Diana herself) skirted some of the tough issues and hard cases. Let me first thank Peter for his honesty. Then let me defend myself for a moment. With honesty, perhaps more than any other moral issue, the hard cases are in the eye of the beholder. People have, as I have discovered, a rather wide variety of "weak spots" where honesty is concerned. What seems like a difficult dilemma for Peter will seem easy to Paul, but what seems easy to Paul will seem difficult to Peter. Such variation poses a rather serious problem for my speaking and writing on honesty, as I will have to work diligently use examples that explicitly cover most types of dilemmas. Thankfully, I think my idea of telling "the contextually relevant truth" is a useful general principle, one that resolves many of these apparent moral dilemmas without too much difficulty. I first presented that idea in the FROG discussion, so let me elaborate upon it for a moment before turning to Peter's example. Honesty isn't just the virtue of not telling lies. After all, we can technically tell the truth while consciously and intentionally misleading someone, often by omitting critical information. A woman, for example, might tell her husband that she went over a friend's house to fix his computer, while conveniently omitting the sex before and after the computer repair. Given the nature of the commitment in marriage, the husband has a reasonable expectation to such information in a way that a co-worker or casual acquaintance would not. The wife isn't being honest just because she's avoided deliberate falsehood. In short, the technical truth is not sufficient for honesty. But honesty isn't the virtue of telling the whole truth either. When a husband asks a wife about her day, he isn't looking for a blow-by-blow of every event, but rather the significant highlights. (This process of selective recounting teaches us what is important to another person, after all.) When a woman asks a co-worker whether a medical procedure went well, she doesn't need or want to hear about the workings of the colostomy bag. Honesty does not require us to live in glass houses, so that our lives are visible for all the world to see. In short, the whole truth is not necessary for honesty. Speaking generally, one of the more difficult aspects of our relationships is determining what information to reveal and what information to conceal. The virtue of honesty should help us with those decisions, but at present, such important details are left unspecified in the Objectivist ethics. As I was reading David Nyberg's defenses of dishonesty in The Varnished Truth, I realized that the unifying principle for honesty in concealing and revealing is that we ought to tell the contextually relevant truth. So what determines contextual relevance? In the FROG meeting, I proposed six issues which tend to bear upon contextual relevance. The two most important considerations are the nature of the information and the nature of the relationship. Is the information public or private? Is the relationship close or distant? A couple might announce the birth of a child to anyone and everyone, but reserve the details of difficulties of the labor to close family members. The issue here is not whether or not people have a right to the truth or a need to know that obliges revelation. Rather, if we wish to have a particular sort of relationship with a particular person, then we ought to be sharing particular types of information. I cannot have a close relationship with my husband if I don't tell him about the even barely significant events in my life. I cannot keep a coolly polite relationship with someone I dislike if I reveal personal, intimate details to him. We actively manage intimacy in relationships by revealing and/or concealing information. So first and foremost in contextual relevance is the nature of the information and the nature of the relationship. The next four considerations of contextual relevance may or may not apply in any particular situation. But they do take hold often enough to warrant consideration. First, we must pay attention to the background information that a person may require to come to reasonable conclusions regarding our communications. So a teenage boy might come home and tell his mother that another kid in school punched him, even though he didn't touch this other kid. But her sympathy and outrage is not well-founded, for he neglects to tell her that he hit the other kid's younger brother first. He is being dishonest because he deliberately gave a false impression. As Nathaniel Branden says in Basic Principles of Objectivism, "one must always judge the full context of a situation and act in a manner which will not give anybody an objective (that is rational) reason to misinterpret one's actions and be deceived by them." We need to take responsibility for other people's reasonable inferences. Second, the present situation may or may not be appropriate for the communication of particular types of information. A friend's dinner party would be a bad place to tell your boyfriend about lunch with an old fling that aroused long-forgotten passions. This consideration, however, ought not be used as a rationalization for putting off honest communication indefinitely. The truth ought to be revealed at the earliest possible appropriate moment. Nevertheless, the virtue of honesty does not always require immediate truth-telling. Third, the information sought by a questioner does not always match the actual question asked, so a person can be perfectly honest by answering only the implied question. If a woman asks her husband whether she looks fat in some dress, she is not asking to be compared to Kate Moss or Calista Flockhart, but rather to her usual appearance. (The question stated more baldly would be: Do I look fatter than usual in this dress? However, that question lacks a certain dignity, which is why women do not ask it.) If a husband asks his wife whether she would marry again if he died, he is likely looking for reassurance that she deeply loves him, not a calculus as to the probability of her finding another suitable husband. Honesty does not require us to take every inquiry literally. Fourth and finally, in certain limited circumstances, dishonesty is known by all to be part of the fun of a game, so misleading others is morally acceptable. Bluffing in poker games, for example, often requires more than a straight face, but also actively giving false impressions about your hand. Gentle teasing, in which a technically false statement is made in an obviously mocking tone of voice, is also not a moral problem. (Morality, after all, ought not outlaw fun had by all.) However, mere desire for or expectation of dishonesty on the part of another person does not justify dishonesty, as such lies often have pernicious consequences, such as undermining integrity or supporting self-deception. And some lies told apparently in fun often conceal hostility. But the virtue of honesty does not forbid untruthful silliness between willing participants. Given those six criteria, let's take a look at Peter's example: The example I brought up at Diana's talk was that of a good friend who is rushing in to give a presentation to the board of the company and asks me quickly how she looks. Now, the 100%-honest reply is something along the lines of "You've got bags under your eyes and look like you haven't slept in three days, and actually now that you mention it you could definitely stand to lose a few pounds, have you thought about starting an exercise program?". Is that a helpful or caring thing for me to say? No. But it is "honest". In this situation one could argue that my friend is not actually asking me for information about her appearance, but rather for support and encouragement -- which is what I'll give her when instead of being fully honest I say something like "You look great, knock 'em dead!" Peter is right that his friend isn't seeking information about her weight. To tell her that she needs to lose weight would be worse than unhelpful given the context; it would be morally deflating and terribly rude. And she probably isn't looking for information about the bags under her eyes, as she likely saw them in the mirror that morning. But she probably would like to know whether she has spinach in her teeth or if some bit of hair is wildly out of place, as those problems could be fixed in the moments before her presentation. And, as Peter said, she'd like some encouragement. That analysis largely falls under the "information sought" criteria. Looking deeper and to my delight, this example demonstrates the need for a seventh criteria of contextually relevant truth, namely whether the information will make a positive difference to someone. Identifying painful facts that cannot be addressed due to physical, temporal, or other constraints is often merely pointless and hurtful. The spinach in the teeth can be fixed in time for the presentation, but the excess weight cannot. So mention the spinach, but don't mention the weight. Not all truths are worth saying. Of course, determining what truths can make a positive difference is often tricky business. Personally, I would tend to err on the side of tactful and gentle revelation for people close to me, as the information might be useful to them in a way that I might not be able to predict. More information is usually better than less, provided that the method and moment of communication is appropriate. Returning to Peter's example, I would argue that the lie "you look great" isn't necessary to be either caring or encouraging. There are benevolent and truthful alternatives open to us in such situations. We might make a more bland statement about the friend's appearance like "You look fine" while emphasizing the "Knock 'em dead!" part. We might only answer the implicit question by saying "You're going to knock 'em dead!" Or we might say, "Oh, you look a bit harried. Stop for a second and take a deep breath! ... Okay, now go knock 'em dead!" There is no necessary conflict between benevolence and truthfulness. Honesty is not an impediment to good relationships, but a boon to them. The problem is that people tend to be unskilled in the arts of benevolent honesty, so lying too often seems like the only option. But instead of simply falling back on dishonest habits, which may cause serious trouble down the road, we can choose to actively cultivate the skills needed for benevolent honesty. Miss Manners' delightful book The Right Thing to Say is excellent training in such techniques. I hope that analysis adequately addresses Peter's hard case. (Thanks for the example, Peter!) I'm always interested in more, so bring them on! E-mail Diana Hsieh
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More on Tenure
By Diana Hsieh @ 9:13 AM
OpinionJournal has an interesting piece on the fairly legitimate grievances of grad students pushing for unionization. Many of those problems, the article argues, stem from the tenure system. The irony of all those leftist university professors overseeing "the closest thing America has to serfdom" is certainly not lost on me. In e-mail, someone brought up the difficulties of moving from a tenure system to any other system (like multi-year contracts with a good grievance system). Perhaps professors who already have tenure would simply have to be aged out of the system. Incoming and untenured professors would only be offered the new system. Tenured professors would have the option of moving to the new system, but if they chose to retain tenure, they would not have access to the grievance system and some other benefits. Some might choose the new system, some would stick with the old. Eventually, tenure would die. Also, why don't professors have to retire at age 65 anymore? Is it government regulations or something else? E-mail Diana Hsieh
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| Thursday, March 21, 2002 | |
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Gun and Rights
By Diana Hsieh @ 10:06 PM
According to that bastion of liberty known as China, Americans are violating rights by allowing private ownership of firearms. See David Kopel's commentary in NRO. How rich!
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Horror is Good (Sometimes)
By Diana Hsieh @ 5:13 PM
Jonah Goldberg has a good article entitled Bring Back the Horror on NRO which argues that the media shouldn't be avoiding the terrible images of September 11th. "Oh dear, people might be disturbed!" they say. Hogwash. We ought to be disturbed! It is an excellent statement of many of the unformed thoughts that have been rolling around in my head over the past few weeks.
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| Wednesday, March 20, 2002 | |
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Cultural Relativism and Deafness
By Diana Hsieh @ 1:13 PM
Cathy Young has an article entitled Sound Judgment on the opposition to cochlear implants and other cures for deafness by advocates for deafness. As wonderful as deaf culture may be, surely being unable to hear and unwilling to learn to speak seriously limits a person's opportunities. For parents to force such a life on their children is barbaric.
I wonder whether the refusal of such defect-fixing medical treatment (presuming affordability) constitutes a violation of a child's rights at any point. If a fifteen year old wants the cochlear implants and a rich aunt is willing to pay for them, are the parents violating the child's right by refusing? I'm inclined to grant children a fair amount of authority in their own medical decisions because such decisions may greatly impact the child later in life as an adult. (Yes, I know there is lots of complexity here that I am ignoring. Another time...) E-mail Diana Hsieh
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Politics of Beauty
By Diana Hsieh @ 12:24 PM
The patriarchy seems to be oppressing itself by focusing on beauty in politicians. Fancy that.
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| Tuesday, March 19, 2002 | |
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Evasion and Self-Deception
By Diana Hsieh @ 8:52 PM
The phenomenon of self-deception has received a great deal of attention in recent years from philosophers and psychologists. The general account of self-deception that has emerged is, as one might expect, strikingly similar to the Objectivist understanding of evasion.
In The Varnished Truth, David Nyberg describes self-deception as "voluntary blindness, numbness, dull-mindedness, and ignorance" (81). According to Nyberg self-deception is an active purposeful process, for "remaining ignorant on purpose requires effort" (82). The centrality of purposefulness to self-deception appears earlier in Herbert Fingarette's book Self-Deception (16). Fingarette notes that "this element of internal purposefulness is reflected in such phrases as 'persuades himself to believe', 'makes it appear to himself', 'lies to himself'" (28). Mike Martin's Self-Deception and Morality describes self-deception as "the purposeful or intentional evasion of fully acknowledging something to oneself" (7). Such characterizations of self-deception do sound fairly similar to the Objectivist account of evasion as the refusal to think. (However, it cannot be emphasized strongly enough that self-deception is commonly regarded as unavoidable and morally acceptable by philosophers and psychologists.) In Atlas Shrugged, Ayn Rand presents the basics of evasion in Galt's Speech: [Man's] basic vice, the source of all his evils, is that nameless act which all of you practice, but struggle never to admit: the act of blanking out, the willful suspension of one's consciousness, the refusal to think--not blindness, but the refusal to see; not ignorance, but the refusal to know. It is the act of unfocusing your mind and inducing an inner fog to escape the responsibility of judgment--on the unstated premise that a thing will not exist if only you refuse to identify it, that A will not be A so long as you do not pronounce the verdict 'It is.' (944) Despite the similarities between evasion and self-deception, I do not think the concepts of self-deception and evasion are quite identical. Rather each concept emphasizes a slightly different aspect of a single mental phenomena. Both evasion and self-deception involve attempting to fake the facts to ourselves. Evasion specifically refers to the process of avoiding and suppressing knowledge or reasonable suspicions. This emphasis fits well with the other meanings of evasion as avoidance of something. Thus, a criminal might evade capture by a policeman by running away physically, just he evades awareness by running away mentally. Self-deception, in contrast, focuses on what that person is running towards, on the false (or suspected to be false) belief that he convinces himself of instead. Self-deception is like the friend's apartment in which the criminal hides while the police are looking for him. So, let's separate out self-deception from evasion using the example of the father of the drug addict from Sabini and Silver's Emotion, Character, and Responsibility: A loving father notices that his normally ebullient daughter is becoming more and more withdrawn, listless, and grouchy. She loses her appetite. She gets calls at odd hours and then leaves abruptly, yet her old friends don't stop by anymore. She starts wearing long-sleeved blouses even though it's summer and refuses to go to beach, once her favorite spot. She begins to lock her room, something she rarely used to do. He occasionally asks if she's feeling all right, but she dismisses him with a laconic "yeah." One day she is discovered dead with a needle in her arm. When the police tell him the news, he says that he can't believe that his daughter was a junkie, that he is dumbfounded, that it's all impossible (106). The father's evasion consists of refusing to consider the implications of his daughter's changed behavior. Any thought that she might have a drug problem is immediately pushed out of his mind. He refuses to follow up on any suspicions to confirm or deny them. He won't connect the dots, no matter how numerous they become. He is avoiding truth. The father's self-deception consists of the alternative theories and explanations that he concocts for himself to explain his daughter's behavior. Her long sleeves are just the latest fashion. Her emotional withdrawal is just the usual teenage angst. She locks her door because she doesn't want anyone to walk in on her while she's undressed. He is pursuing fiction. Whatever conceptual distinctions we might make between self-deception and evasion, the fact is that usually these processes are usually tightly intertwined like a Gordian Knot. The self-deception supports the evasion and the evasion supports the self-deception. So, for example, to make the self-deception that long sleeves are just the latest fashion, the father has to evade the fact that other fashionable teens don't seem to be wearing long sleeves. To avoid the obvious implications of her strange behavior, the father needs to self-deceive with alternate explanations. It does seem, however, that evasion might be possible without self-deception. A person might push something out of her mind, but not latch on to some other false or dubious idea in its stead. So evasion is faking reality by refusing to accept what you know or suspect to be true. And self-deception is faking reality by persuading yourself of what you know or suspect to be false. They are, as Ayn Rand might say, two sides of the same coin. So the question to my readers, particularly those familiar with the Objectivist theory of evasion, is: Does this sound plausible? Would you describe the differences and similarities between self-deception and evasion differently? E-mail Diana Hsieh
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Choosing Life
By Diana Hsieh @ 12:43 PM
I recently re-listened to one of my favorite lectures, David Kelley's Choosing Life, which delves into both the theoretical and practical implications of the choice to live within the Objectivist ethics. Perhaps the most memorable aspect of the lecture is DK's connection between serious depression, meaning in life, and the choice between life and death. But more suggestive philosophically is his distinction between achievement and experience. (Both, he argues, are necessary for a meaningful life.) The distinction paves the way for an excellent response to simple hedonism, but I wonder where else it might be of use. Unfortunately, my love of this lecture does not extend to the Q&A section, which I found to be confusing. But that is a minor flaw in an otherwise excellent lecture.
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Soviets, Muslims, and Children
By Diana Hsieh @ 10:28 AM
I can't adequately describe Jonah Goldberg's article Biology and Ideology. It's chilling.
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Honesty and Tenure
By Diana Hsieh @ 10:02 AM
Steve Simpson pointed me to this op-ed by Robert Bartley on the myriad of recent scandals in the "supposedly high-minded quarters" of society, from academia to the Catholic Church. Dishonesty seems to be on a rampage. But there may be reason for hope, as Bartley suggests towards the end of his piece:On whether we have experienced a general erosion of standards, I think I can rest my case. Human nature, of course, remains a constant over time and across fields of endeavor. What matters is accountability, that is, whether we as a society are willing to sit in judgment on each other. And perhaps the anecdotes above in fact suggest that in this post-Clinton era we're making some progress; at least the issues are coming to light and creating some agony in church, government and universities. But it only gets more interesting. Barley goes on to suggest businessmen do not share the "immunity from accountability" that tenured academics and civil servants have. They are not protected from their own immorality by the cushion of a more-or-less guaranteed job. In my opinion, the tenure system doesn't really protect professors against political ax-grinding. Those with unpopular opinions are simply weeded out before tenure is awarded. The downsides to the tenure system, in terms of ensconcing terrible professors and permitting little effort, are considerable. A system requiring competence and diligence while protecting professors against unjust politics would surely not be impossible to construct. Labels: Academia E-mail Diana Hsieh
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| Monday, March 18, 2002 | |
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The Wolf in Sheep's Clothing
By Diana Hsieh @ 11:43 PM
As Paul has been away at a conference for the past few days, I have spent a few hours in those days in rather dubious pursuits. Perhaps the worst was a few night ago. After watching my beloved Batman Beyond, I stuck around the Cartoon Network to watch some bizarre Japanese cartoon. As it turns out, the cartoon contained an interesting moral lesson, although not the one intended.
In the cartoon, a young boy has died. But there is a possibility of his returning to life if he properly cares for a magic egg. If he behaves badly, the egg will hatch a terrible monster which will bite his head off. If he behaves well, the egg will hatch a powerful creature necessary to return his spirit to his body. But his house catches fire and threatens to destroy his body, without which he will not be able to return to life. A girl he cares for runs into the blazing house to rescue his body, but she gets trapped by the fire. The boy is thus faced with a stark moral choice. He can throw the egg into the fire to save the girl, but thereby ruin his chances of returning to life. Or he can save the egg for himself and allow his friend to die. (Of course, if the boy allows the girl to die, his body will also be destroyed, along with any hope of rebirth. But the cartoon doesn't consider this fact.) The boy overcomes his "selfish" desire for life and throws down the egg. The gods are so impressed with this noble act that they return him to his body despite the destruction of the egg. In fact, the gods inform the boy that had the egg hatched, the creature would have surely eaten him for his bad behavior. (Sorry for the long summary, but the story line was too bizarre for a short synopsis.) The moral of the story, of course, is that selfless behavior is rewarded. By acting to save the life of his friend, he ends up saving both of their lives. If he had acted to save his own life, both he and the girl would have died. Only by acting against his own apparent interests can the boy has all of his wishes realized. This moral message is fairly common, particularly in children's literature. Adults sell the ideal of altruism to children by giving it an egoistic veneer. They claim that rewards will be heaped upon those who act selflessly. Those rewards may come from God after death, from other people, or even from psychological satisfaction. Those rewards may be delayed, but they will come. In essence, this dressed-up altruism asserts that the best way to obtain happiness is to not pursue it. Or even more strongly: the best way to obtain happiness is to pursue the happiness of others at the expense of one's own happiness. Of course, when the issue is put so starkly it seems rather ridiculous. Imagine a person who has $50 in his wallet. He wants to buy a $75 gift for his beloved wife. Would the best way to acquire the extra $25 be to give away the $50 dollars he has? Should he then expect to magically receive $75 back? Or should he just directly pursue the needed $25 by going to the ATM and removing the funds from his account? Obviously, we get the stuff we want by pursuing it, not renouncing it. That's how life works. Two objections could be made to this simple observation when applied to happiness. First, we do occasionally receive good stuff unexpectedly, like an inheritance from an aunt we never knew existed. Such gains cannot be relied upon, precisely because they are unexpected and unusual. Most of the time, we must work to achieve what we want. Second, some people pursue their happiness in all the wrong ways, thereby making themselves miserable. But the irrationality of some people's means of acquiring something says nothing about the actual value of that thing. Just because some people attempt to obtain a job by threatening lawsuits doesn't mean that pursuing a job is bad. Altruism, if presented honestly, would advocate the sacrifice of oneself to others as an end-in-itself. To motivate altruism with hope or expectation of reward, as the cartoon did, is to appeal to egoism. But egoism and altruism are not compatible, no matter how often people accept the silly contradiction. Kant understood this problem, which is why his moral theory seems so harsh and extreme. He, at least, was consistent on this issue. (Although not well-grounded, as Will Wilkinson argues in this essay.) I'm not advocating any form of psychological egoism. People clearly can and do act against their interests, both in full knowledge and in ignorance. My point is rather that to make altruism a palatable moral theory for a wide audience, its advocates must sugar-coat it with a veneer of self-interest. They must promise people rewards for their sacrifices. They falsely promise a positive cost-benefit analysis in the long run. Why? Because naked altruism would be abhorrent to most even moderately self-respecting people. But by dressing up the wolf in sheep's clothing during childhood, the indignity of altruism remains hidden from the sight of most people. E-mail Diana Hsieh
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| Sunday, March 17, 2002 | |
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Encouraging Honesty
By Diana Hsieh @ 10:13 PM
In Why Kids Lie, Eckman talks about reducing the temptation to lie. Speaking of his son, who he caught in a big lie two years earlier, Eckman writes:
Whenever something has come up that [my son] might be tempted to lie about, I have been very careful about questioning him in a way that would encourage him to be truthful. Not "Who broke the vase?" or "Did you break the vase?" But "We shouldn't have kept that vase in such a vulnerable spot; it would be too easy to knock over. Was it you or your sister?" In other words, Eckman is recommending asking leading questions that put the wrongdoing in the most favorable light so that truthfulness isn't so scary for the child. The child feels safer in telling the truth, with fewer worries about harsh punishment to come. However, the most charitable explanation for behavior isn't always the most accurate. The son might have broken the vase playing baseball inside or smashed the vase in a fit of anger. In such cases, the leading question encourages the child to confess to the wrongdoing -- but only superficially. The child might honestly admit to causing the damage, but then lie (either by omission or commission) about the reasons for that damage. In essence, the leading question provides a ready-made false excuse. So using this method of leading, charitable questions in an attempt to promote honesty and responsibility may instead promote habits of dishonesty and irresponsibility. In contrast, Linda and Richard Eyre's book Teaching Your Children Values contains some excellent suggestions for teaching honesty to children of all ages. Perhaps the most interesting is implicit in the opening story of the chapter on honesty. Pulling into the driveway one way, I noticed a broken milk bottle on the pavement. I asked nine-year-old Josh and his friend, Chip, if they knew how it happened. Chip quickly said no. Josh looked over at him, somewhat startled, then walked over and put his hand on Chip's shoulder and said, "It's okay, he'll understand." Then to me, "The basketball hit it, Dad. Sorry. We were going to clean it up, but we forgot. Come on, Chip, I'll get the dustpan." Despite his father's direct question, Josh isn't afraid to answer honestly. But most importantly, he knows what to do to fix the situation: clean up the mess he made. Not all wrongdoings can be so easily fixed, but most can be fixed with a bit of thought and effort. By focusing the child's attention on the constructive task of making amends rather than awaiting punishment, the admitting the truth becomes less scary. In other words, children ought to be explicitly taught the skills of redemption as part of learning about the necessity of honesty. The former will make the latter easier. E-mail Diana Hsieh
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