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PHILOSOPHY John Locke & the Age of ReasonMeeting chaired by Dr Donald Cameron Dennis Poole BRLSI Member, 6 July 2004 Introduction I link this talk with the previous one I gave in 2000 on ‘The Modern Idea’ and the one I gave in Jan last year on ‘Ayn Rand and her concept of Authentic Man’. This talk begins with Locke’s Political and Religious ideas and progresses via Hume, Bentham, Mill and Marx etc. to Nietzsche, whose Philosophy challenges the very existence of God. The Challenge to Medievalism and the Divine Right of Kings. As the Renaissance led to the Reformation there arose the duality of the Christian Catholic/Protestant systems of belief. This led to the tragedy of the Civil War which was not simply one religious belief in conflict with another but a challenge to what had been a core principle of the Governance of all European States – that of the Divine Right of Kings. It was in fact a protest against the hubris of a King’s claim that whatever he did it was God’s Will with the sanction of the Pope, God’s representative on Earth – the King and his court being a romantic conception of an anthropomorphic god in Heaven, creator and ruler of Earth. James 1st who came to the English throne in 1603 and his son Charles were firm believers in their divine right. Following Charles’ execution in 1649, England became a Commonwealth under the dour control of Cromwell until 1660 when the Monarchy was restored. England seemed to breathe a sigh of relief and entered into a period of expanding ideas and secular interests. Newton, Hooke, Boyle, Wren and many others initiated a scientific approach, which would sweep Europe and threaten the medieval Mindset - already shaken by Galileo and Descartes. After the Glorious Revolution of 1688 had set William of Orange on the throne a new atmosphere of freedom began to pervade English society and consequently John Locke felt free to publish his "Essay concerning Human Understanding" and his Two Treatises of Government". The Age of Reason In Locke’s time, one lived with three possibilities, Catholic, Protestant or Heretic! And two theories – either there is a controlling force or energy that operates the Universe – or there is not and man must get on with his life and with each other in the best way he can. It seems to me that whichever theory one holds, that birth, living and dying is the same for all. One may hold both theories in one’s head and get on with life. History has revealed just how contentious religious and political theories were (and still are). The difficulties arise when people think they have to establish the Truth of the theory that they are attached to. John Locke thought that people’s beliefs were private and promoted Tolerance and Reason. Roy Porter in his recently published Flesh in the Age of Reason delineates the detail of the struggle of the Individual to throw off the shackles of religious persecution and political tyranny. Locke – The Enlightenment Philosopher In Locke’s time the Roman Catholic faith was being eroded by Protestantism following the Reformation. In addition, the Anglican Church of England was trying to re-establish itself as the State Religion and at the same time the Christian world was challenged by Islam. All these had adherents ready to die (and kill) to maintain their True Faith above all others. The question may be asked why I elected Locke to be the philosopher of the Enlightenment instead of Bacon or Descartes. The reason is that Locke produced a Philosophy that suited his time – his words fell on fertile ground – look at the Time Line and see the number of thinkers that were contemporary and those that followed him who carried forward his message of "Reason". TIMELINE, a slide showing many of the philosophers and writers of the 18th & 19th centuries was exhibited. Essay ‘Concerning Human Understanding’ 1690 This work is an inquiry into the extent and limits of human knowledge together with the grounds and degrees of belief, opinion and assent. Locke is keen to establish the kinds of things we can know and acknowledge those things we cannot know. Human knowledge is derived from sense experience and there are no innate ‘ideas’. His theory of perception is ‘causal’. Physical stimuli cause ideas in the mind. We perceive only the ideas that are caused by the stimulation of the senses. (This however seems to ignore ideas originating in the memory and how can we know God.) Contemporary scientists, Newton and Boyle, sought to explain the World in terms of ‘Structures’. (Which can be measured and quantified, and are very different from the medieval world of Mystery, Myth and Superstition) Locke elaborated on this by explaining that these are primary qualities (Bulk, Figure and motion of parts) It is thought that Locke was struggling to define ‘substance’ but was not able to do this adequately. Sound, taste, smell and colour are considered secondary qualities that may be reduced to Primary qualities. The Essay is a major philosophical work but for this talk I am not concerned with the epistemological issues of Knowledge, Opinion, Language and Abstraction except to say that it shows how philosophical interests were taking precedence over theological issues. The Two Treatises of Government (1690) The Treatises and Locke’s Essay Concerning Human Understanding were published three years after Newton’s Principia had shown that mathematical investigation of the Universe was possible (thus initiating modern physics). The invention of the telescope and microscope had also begun to change the way that man viewed the world. It established that instruments could assist and verify theories of the World beyond our small planet. Thus Empiricism, the idea that knowledge is derived from the senses and not innate was born. Empiricism. Locke is regarded as the first of the three Empiricist Philosophers, Berkeley and Hume the other two. His Essay famously states that the mind is a ‘tabula rasa’. The Mind of Man is also endowed with the ability to reason and thus think in a rational manner. This statement alone would establish Locke as ‘Modern’. The First Treatise of Government is a forceful critique of Sir Robert Filmer’s Patriarcha, which tries to prove the ‘Divine Right of Kings’. Locke in his Introduction ironically tears this to shreds. Locke goes on to deny that Filmer’s idea that men are not naturally free. This idea is based on fatherly authority but goes back to sovereignty of Adam, God’s creation. As the father rules the son, so the sovereign rules the father. The father has total control over the children, his manservant and his maidservant. Today this would be regarded as nonsense but Locke knew he had to break the arguments down in detail if he was to persuade his readers that Adam’s title to Sovereignty was false. In Chapter 5, Locke discusses Adam’s sovereignty over Eve and denies that God gives this but agrees that natural law supports the control of the father over the wife and the children. The Second Treatise of Government embodies Locke’s long experience of Monarchy, Parliament, Power and the organisation of the State. It begins by establishing that Man is born free (Man’s Natural State). This is fundamental to Locke’s Philosophy. ‘The State of Nature’. Quote: ‘To understand political power right, and derive it from its original, we must consider what state all men are naturally in, and that is, a state of perfect freedom to order their actions, and dispose of their possessions, and persons as they think fit, within the bounds of the law of nature, without asking any leave, or depending on the will of any other man’. This is not about the rights of man as bestowed by the State; for Locke it is a simple statement of fact. For Locke, only God could bestow Rights. Despite this Age of Reason there was huge opposition. Witches were still burnt, the position of the stars could foretell the future and Heresy was still a problem for those who would challenge the existence and power of God. Locke was extremely careful to establish an all-powerful God, but He was a God of Reason, of love and of understanding. The Second Treatise covers a great deal, of the State of War, Property, Paternal Power, and Political Society. The forms of Commonwealth, the extent of Legislative Power, Tyranny, Conquest and the Dissolution of Government. These are all worth examination as the origin of modern ‘Democratic’ government and have had a great influence throughout the western World. Thomas Paine and the American Constitution are in its debt. From Locke to Nietzsche Spinoza and Leibniz, Locke’s contemporaries were philosophers of great intellectual power. Spinoza was a Jew and was branded a Heretic, and Leibniz was engaged in proving that a perfect being must exist and argued forcibly for a-priori knowledge - both by demonstrating that ‘Reason’ may challenge ‘Belief’, and weaken the Medieval mindset. Neither Spinoza nor Leibniz had the popular appeal of Locke. George Berkeley hated the idea that the Universe was a vast machine as suggested by Newtonian thought. He insisted that Matter did not exist and this was common sense! His Philosophy remained isolated but interesting as a contrary view to the prevailing Enlightenment. David Hume was directly opposed the religious doctrine which accepted Miracles. He objected to Ontological and Cosmological ‘proofs’ of God. He said that no reasonable man could believe Religion without evidence. Kant’s religious views were focussed on Morality and announced his categorical imperative: Act only on the Maxim which you can at the same time will to be a Universal Law. Bentham and Mill were concerned with Man’s efforts to create a better society. Their principle of Utilitarianism replaced religion in the minds of men disaffected by the opposition to by the Church to progress towards improvement of man’s life on Earth and the diminishing of their power over the people. Marx opposed power of Religion and Capital and preached freedom for the masses. Addison, Steele, Swift, de Mandeville and Johnson. Journalists and Writers carried the Enlightenment message to the educated general public. Joseph Addison and Sir Richard Steele began the Tatler and the Spectator (published following the lapse of the Licensing Act of 1695) the aim of these ‘magazines’ was to refashion man – and woman – for the bewildering post 1688 age of opportunity. Addison and Steele were the first of the new breed of media-men. The Coffee Houses, there were more than 3000 in 1708 in London, were the meeting places of the Intelligentsia, the Merchants, Whig and Tory Politicians, the Writers, the Poets and Playwrights - everyone who mattered to the culture of the day. You might see Steele and Addison with Congreve, Vanbrugh, and Dryden in any of these coffee houses. The weekly magazine Spectator promoted gentile living, cheerfulness, religion, physical exercise and cleanliness. It discouraged drunkenness and any kind of coarse behaviour. This was a remarkable change in public life and more than anything else expressed the optimism of the age of reason. The 3rd Earl of Shaftsbury, Anthony Ashley Cooper, a philosopher in his own right and educated by Locke famously said "We are now in an Age, when Liberty is in the ascendant and we ourselves are a happy nation". For Shaftsbury, charmed by his own flair and creativity, was in love with life and determined to live it to the full. Bernard de Mandeville, a contemporary of Shaftsbury was Dutch but settled in London was a Physician and Satirist. He wrote the popular poem "The fall of the Bees" which tried to show how Vice was the driving force of Empire and Civilization! How far we had progressed from the Christian immortal soul and its narrative of Sin and Redemption! This satirical approach points to Nietzsche. Friedrich Nietzsche He is in my view the first truly Modern Philosopher. In Thus Spake Zarathustra Nietzsche insists that Man has to be replaced by Superman. This means that Man has to ‘grow up’ by abandoning the mental crutches he uses to overcome his fear of living in full awareness of his existence. Nietzsche had a tormented love of mankind expressed in TSZ (a book for every one and no –one) Christianity says N, is a grotesque distortion of Christ’s own vision and is inherently decadent. ‘What really is it in us that want the Truth?’- What gives us the confidence to recognise it when we see it? Nietzsche’s anxiety is for our readiness to deceive ourselves as to what is true and accept what others want us to believe. He is irritated by the dogmatism that insists on polar distinctions ‘truth – falsity’, ‘good- bad’. Although we think of Christianity as a Religion, it is like all other systems of Religious belief based on a set of views of how things are, in other words a Metaphysic. He calls into question the value of the drive to gain Knowledge and denies that it is a basic urge – we always pursue knowledge in the interests of supporting a moral order, which is a dressed up version of how we want things to be or how we want them to be forced to be. This is Nietzsche’s Will to Power in action. What he finds intolerable is the lack of ‘intellectual hygiene’ among philosophers posing to discover their real opinion through self-evolution of a cold pure divinely imperturbable dialectic - While what is happening is a prejudice, a notion, a desire of the heart made abstract and defended by reason after the event! Kant and Spinoza are cited as flagrant examples of this. Supermanship: One should live without regret, converting every Thus it happened to Thus I willed it. Perspectivism: We create our Values, they are not forced upon us by the nature of things. Values are not out there. Our apprehensions of the world are Value–laden. There are no facts only Interpretations. We must realise the extent to which our drives colour all our dealings with what we like to think of as reality, existing independently of us, which we can neutrally investigate. Nietzsche’s Morality. We create our values and standards to meet our needs. Nietzsche claimed that all Christian values and ideals were false. For example, compassion for a person who cannot cope without help results in pity and he who is pitied is diminished by it. A pound to a beggar confirms his uselessness! The strong able person may be compassionate – but on his own account, not anyone else’s he should not be burdened with a false Christian morality. ‘Religious faith demands the sacrifice of all freedom, all pride, and all self-confidence of the spirit.’ The Will is the source of Authentic Man’s strength and enables man to ‘conquer all that is comfortable, all that is cowardly within himself and he who been through the pain of this will not find it easy to be aggressive to another’ and ‘the tolerance of the strong is the understanding of one’s own weaknesses that have been vanquished’. My Conclusion for the 20th Century Man has to decide for himself whether he asserts that he is free to choose the kind of life he wants or needs or whether he must succumb to what he believes is a higher authority, God or some other will greater than his own, political or divine. Most men appear to feel that they are anchored to a belief and are unable to appreciate that the flexibility and freedom that comes with admitting that one does not know and that whatever the belief or idea that appears in life is an assumption, not a truth. Nietzsche said "There are no facts, only interpretations". The good things about our world, our Culture, our Art, our Science are being destroyed by the Power Games that Nations play. These games are Religion, War and Political Power. Games of Pomp & Protocol played by Politicians, Peers, Popes, Presidents and Personages with crown and regalia and chests full of medals. We have lived through a century where millions marched to their death in two world wars – needlessly, for what was achieved? Have we evolved sufficiently to face the future with Reason, Tolerance and Responsibility and the Will to carry out the actions that are necessary for our survival? Do not ask: ‘Have I the right?’ Ask instead: ‘Have I the Will?’ Do not ask: ‘What is Freedom?’ or ‘Do men have Freewill?’ But ask: ‘Am I free?’ and ‘Do I have the will?’ Dennis Poole References John Locke, Two Treatises of Government Friedrich Nietzsche, Twilight of the Gods Basic Writings of Nietzsche (transl.by Walter Kaufmann) Roy Porter, Flesh in the Age of Reason
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