LECTURE 5: THE MEDIEVAL SYNTHESIS: THOMAS ACQUINAS
BEING GOOD AND BEING SUCCESSFUL: THE MEANING OF LIFEEthics is about three things (review); 1. social ethics: good behavior
and manners... which raises 2. individual ethics: what kind of person
should you be yourself. What are the virtues and vices? And hidden in
these is the 3. WHY should I be a good person? why should we live a
good life? what's the point the purpose the value in human life,
what's the meaning of life? This is the most important of all. The
issue of the ultimate end or goal of human life. Somehow, this is
related to the idea of success... that this goal is something that can
actually be achieved. Success means attaining an end. On the scale of
an individual life, some successes may come: at war or sport means
winning. success at finance means money, courtship means marriage,
education means knowledge and wisdom, and the certification is
supposedly a good grade. But who wants to get good grades but flunk
life?
No one. So, success at life means attaining life's end. But this
assumes life has an end. a point, a goal purpose or meaning. Almost
everyone, in every culture, before modernity, did assume just that.
They had different answers to the question of what the meaning of life
was, but philosophers and regular people thought that life had a real
meaning. Today is radically different. In fact, this may be the most
radical difference between our present modern culture, and all others.
Many people, and most intellectuals, do not believe that life had a
real meaning, a point, goal end or ultimate good. At least not an
objective one that is true for everyone, and is not subjective:
varying from one group to another. Aristotle, as we have seen, argued
that life did have an end for everyone: happiness. Conceived of as
perfection: real attainment of our true end, not subjective
contentment.
So, we must look at this most important question, is not raised much
today, and in fact is ignored by our intellectuals. And we must survey
the 8 most popular answers to it. How do we know this is the MOST
important question? Well, think about the campfire, think about
storytelling. This is the most typical and universal human art:
storytelling. Why does everyone, everywhere like stories? Because they
are about life. Conversely, life is like a story, like a play or
novel. So the question "What is the meaning of life?" Means, what kind
of story- are we in?
In Lord of the Rings, that is the question that Sam asks Frodo as they
trudge into Mordor, on their pretty much hopeless quest. What kind of
a story are we in? Sam wanted to know if it would be a happy or sad
ending. But there is a deeper meaning in it: both comedies and
tragedies are meaningful- is our story meaningful? Does it have an
end, point, purpose, telos, summum bonum at all! Or it might be just
sound and fury, signifying nothing. Few premodern thinkers thought
that. The writer of Ecclisiastees did. Thats about it. For him, life
was 'vanity of vanities,' and then in the last few verses, he says
that life is not a vanity of vanities, but has a meaning: religion.
Fear God and keep His commandments, and thou shalt be fulfill the duty
of man.
The Greek Sophists also though that life had no meaning and purpose.
They were subjectivists, skeptists and relativists. They thought truth
was unattainable, whatever you wanted it to be. Another untypical
school were the Cynics also said life was meaningless- they were
pessimists about human nature (humans are stupid etc and selfish)...
but that's not really meaninglessness, its just pessimism. Life has
meaning, virtue and wisdom, humans are just too stupid to get at it.
Its not nihilism.
In a TS Eliot play the Cocktail Party where Celia the protagonist, a
typically modern, confused, alienated girl, tells her psychiatrist: "I
really hope you tell me that I'm insane. Because if I'm not insane,
than the universe is insane. And I couldn't live with that."
Even if you are pessimists like the cynics, even if you think you are
insane- as Cylia hopes to find she is, life is meaningful, reality is
meaningful, and there is hope: hope of being reconciled to reality.
Conformed to reality. But if there is no meaning, no purpose or
objective reality, why, it doesn't matter who we are or what we do. No
matter what lines we speak in the play, the whole thing is
meaningless. If the play is Sound and Fury, it doesn't matter if you
are a good actor or a bad one, it doesn't matter how you interact with
the other actors or what you do. If there is no golden castle at the
end of the road, then it doesn't matter which road we choose. Life is
like a play, and the 3 questions of ethics: Social, Individual and
Summum Bonum, are the plot, characters and theme of the play. But if
there is no THEME, then the characters cannot be heroes or villains.
So, the hardest thing to sell in modern America is the serious heroic
epic. The only sin in america is judging someone a sinner or evil. We
don't believe in heroes and villains anymore. Because, we don't
believe we are in the kind of story that allows for them.
Judge not, we say, and by saying so, are judging against
judgementalism. Something else to connect this to: why are we so
afraid of suffering? Why are we such softies? Why do we lack courage
today in contrast to all premodern cultures? This question was asked
by Solzhenitsyn in 1978's Harvard Commencement. Its because we lost
the conviction that suffering is meaningful. The intellectuals, the
opinion moulders, the teachers- they have. CS Lewis wrote up an essay
called "the 1st and 2nd things." He said that when we rank the good
things in life, if we put 1st things 1st, we can hope to get both. But
when we put 2nd things 1st, we not only miss the 1st things, but
pervert the 2nd things. Example: an alcoholic perverts alcohol by
putting it 1st, so it does not gladden the heart, and cannot enjoy the
proper pleasure of alcohol. When you make a false god, moving a 2nd
thing, like money, a creature, sex, power, self esteem. You remove
God, and pervert the thing that you have made into your god by putting
divine expectations on it.
Lewis then asks, as far as 1st and 2nd things, what our civilization
puts first. The answer: life. Survival. Material and quantative goods
in life. But, if we don't know WHY we should survive, we probably
won't very long. Cultures have given many different answer to "Why
should we survive?" But they all had some reason, some motive to live
for. If all we have as an answer is "to live longer," or 'surviving',
we probably won't. Ships at sea who do not have a mission, will almost
certainly fail. They will not accomplish their mission by accident.
So, this apparently abstract philosophical question of the greatest
good, the summum bonum, the meaning of life, is actually the most
practical question we could possibly ask. In ethics, if we have no
answer to this question of the greatest good, it is not likely that we
will get the lesser goods. The sailing ship have their orders (how to
cooperate), how to stay afloat and their purpose of mission (meaning
in life). The first two depend on the third.
Meaning in life for us means purpose, or goal, or good. Everything we
have and do is either a means or an end:
MEANS ENDS
money pleasure
tools beauty
food
CONTINUUM
telescopic rifle sight --- using a rifle --- winning a battle ---
winning a war --- peace
but, what is peace for? eventually you get to the 'end', the summum
bonum. If there is no summum bonum, the others are stripped of their
meaning. The ancients would say that this is moral insanity.
In MacBeth, after he has committed murder, and is in despair, and is
on the way to hell, he makes this speech: life's but a walking shadow.
a poor player that struts for his hour on the stage, and then is heard
no more. It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
signifying nothing.
Victor Frankl wrote that, "Everyone's most basic need is an answer to
this question: the question of meaning. The men who had some answer,
any answer, usually survived, and those who didn't didn't. The
physically strongest were not the ones who always survived. Many
doctors see that the Will to survive is the great unpredictable factor
in recovery. That is the mind over matter. But there is another step:
the will to live requires a reason to live. If you have a reason to
live, you also have a reason to suffer, to endure suffering. If life
has a meaning, suffering has a meaning too. Nietzsche: a man can
endure any how, if only he has a why. You can endure even in
Auschwitz, if only you have an ultimate reason for it. For some, it
was revenge, some, work, some, family, some, God. But all, needed a
summum bonum. The meaning of life. An answer to the question: what is
the sonnum bonum?
Frankl is right. That is why suicide is directly proportional to
wealth. The less you have, the less suicide. All Western,
post-Christian nations have suicide: Hungary, Russia, Sweden, Holland,
USA. Lowest are poor: Bangladesh, Haiti, Chad, and the Austrialian
Aborigines. Reason is not hard to find: if you are poor, your life's
meaning is to survive. To escape your poverty and move up the ladder.
If you're already high on the ladder, then what is your life's
meaning? You can still have one, but its not obvious. And if you lack
an answer to the primary question of the meaning of your life, you're
much, much more likely to kill yourself. Because you are deprived of
your PRIMARY NEED. It more primary than life itself, than freedom,
than liberty, than pleasure, than all the things you have. If its all
meaningless and valueless, nothing else matters.
Every great philosopher has had an answer to this question: moses,
solomon, buddha, krishna, buddha, confuicius, lau tzu, socrates,
plato, aristotle, jesus, paul, augustine, mohammad, aquinas,
machiavelli, bacon, descartes, hobbes, rousseau, neitzsche,
kirkegaard, marx, freud, sartre... all thinkers think about that. And
all philosophical story tellers too. Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides,
Virgil, Dante, Shakespeare, Milton, Dickens, Tolstoy, Dostoyevsky,
Tolkien. All stories are about that too, implicitly or explicitly- and
your answer to this question colors and shapes the answers to
everything else. Question II in Aquinas' Summa is the greatest
summarization of it. Called "Of those things in which man's happiness
consists." He quotes Aristotle and Boethus, who wrote a book called
Consolation of Philosophy, 5th C, also a great summary. Like Socrates,
Boethius will be killed, cause his philosophy upsets the political
bosses. And he wonders why bad things happen to good people. And, what
does happiness consist in?
Here goes, the 8 most pop-ular answers to this question, a real Quest-ion.
WEALTH. The stupidest of the popular answers. Happiness seems to
consist in wealth, and most people say this first. Its the first thing
that comes to mind! But why should the first thing that comes to mind
be the most important. Think... this might be true for fool, but we
should not listen to the council of fools, but the wise. There is a
second argument for money: its like an umbrella- spread out in the
sky- everything can be bought. Although money can buy everything money
can buy, it can only buy what money can buy. That is, physical goods
and services. It cannot buy non physical goods, like wisdom,
knowledge, or peace, or goodness, or neighborliness, or happiness. The
most practical man who ever lived once said, "for what is the profit
of man if he has won the world but lost his soul? You would rather be
in love in the Bronx than divorced in Hawaii. "But wait! The desire
for wealth is unlimited!" Maybe... but differentiate between
artificial wealth and natural wealth. Artificial wealth is money,
natural wealth is the real things that money can buy. The desire for
natural wealth is actually limited: one can only eat so much, enjoy so
many houses, cars, prostitutes. Even kingdoms and palaces. But the
desire for artifical wealth is indeed unlimited: if you are a
millionaire you want to be a billionaire. But this is only a MEANS to
the end of buying natural wealth. Therefore it is not an end, and
therefore not the telos of life. Contrary to the really stupid saying
"he who dies with the most toys wins." Wins WHAT? Aquinas conclusion:
wealth is not it because it is a means, given away, exchanged etc.
Happiness is not like that, possessing that is an end in itself.
HONOR. Being held in high esteem by others. Does happiness consist in
this? Honor is twofold: the old way was aristocratic- that you were
honored for being superior or better. Being held in high esteem. For
being different. Today's version is egalitarian, by being one of the
crowd. By not being different. Both are crushed by Aquinas. He ask if
happiness is honor because honor is the reward of virtue. But it is
not, because it is NOT the reward of virtue: happiness is. When you
work hard in school, your reward is the happiness you get from the
knowledge you get from the course. The grade you get the A? That is
just a sign that points to something else. You don't go to the school
for an A, you go for what it signifies. You are a fool if you seek
only the grade... the zen buddhists say "a finger is good at pointing
at the moon, but whoa to he who mistakes the finger for the moon! Its
like going on an expensive vacation only for the taking of pictures
for later bragging. Well... what about the fact that some people will
lose anything except their honor?!? That is a more premodern
situation. A male situation. But as we observe people wanting honor,
they want it for having some other virtue, not for "honor" itself.
GLORY (FAME). Glory seems to be the reward for being great. Yet, it
can be given by fools. And anyway the glory you have after you die, is
in the minds of other people, not you, so you are not enjoying it on
earth.
POWER- It could be crude like the power of a conquerer, or it could
mean freedom! Huh? Think of empowerment... freedom and power both mean
the lack of impotence, the opposite of enslavement, of not being able
to do or go where you want. We spontaneously say "Almighty God",
thinking of God's power before his goodness. We even say 'Good God' as
a swear word! But this is a canard. Its bad theology. God's power is
nothing if not his goodness. God cannot use his power for evil,
because God is infinitely good. But we can use our power for evil. If
we want to be like God, we want to be as powerful as God, not as Good
as God. Anyway, we fear losing power a lot, that is an argument for
its being happiness. In fact, we would rather have a difficult life
freely chosen than an easy life of servitude. But WHY do we so hate
servitude? Because it hinders our ability to use power for good, not
because power is a supreme end. Power is not happiness for the same
reason money can't, because its a means, not an end. Here's another
way to look at power: power makes you anxious of losing it. Hegel
said: a master is really the slave, because he is enslaved to the need
for his slave. How about us today? We don't own other people anymore,
but we do own gadgets and electronics. It explains why we don't get
happier as we get more technologically powerful. Our slaves are our
machines and we just don't get happier.
So, none of these four are the supreme good. Because, they are all
external goods. Their satisfaction is partial, they can harm you, and
so on. So, what about internal goods? Lets look at these.
HEALTH. This candidate is well known. "Ahh, at least you still have
your health!" The old Jewish grandma says. True. And important. But,
it is still a means to a further end. The soul, the I, the
personality, the self. And since the body is a means, and happiness is
an end, they don't match. Anyway, man surpasses all animals in
happiness, and, as well, unhappiness. No ape can be happy or unhappy
as a man. But in bodily goods, man is surpassed in many respects. In
longevity, the elephant lives longer. The stag runs faster, the lion
in strength. Again, they do not match. Mr. Universe is Mr. Universe,
not Mr. Happiest Man Alive.
PLEASURE- This is closer to happiness, because it is more internal. In
fact, it is a function of happiness. It is sought as an end, not as a
means, and so it is confused. When we have happiness we are indeed
pleased. But, Aquinas calls pleasure an EFFECT of happiness, not a
cause of it. It is not the essentiality of happiness. Also, we often
regret pleasures later on. Hmm...
WISDOM AND VIRTUE- Well, we've gone from the external material, to
the bodily, and now to the soul. Closer still... virtue. Happiness
must consist in the goods of the soul! The perfection of the soul must
be is rational understanding and wisdom, and moral virtue, and this
must be happiness. Those two powers, which separate the soul of man
from the animal world. We have rational understanding and freewill.
BUT, says Aquinas, there is this catch: the soul cannot be its own
last end. A soul cannot be its own telos. Yes, by the soul, by virtue
and wisdom does the soul grow... but there's the rub. It grows. It
changes. If an archer shoots an arrow at a bullseye, the arrow is the
soul and what is it shooting at? It flies, grows, changes... what is
the target?
GOD- The good that is greater than the soul. The only thing that is
not an external good, bodily good, or good of the soul... God.
Augustine said, "thou hast made us for thyself and therefore our
hearts are restless until they rest in thee." Nothing in this world
perfectly satisfies our desires, and so either there is not such thing
as perfect happiness, anywhere, ever, or there is something more than
this world. But we have a natural desire for happiness! We have a
lovers' quarral with the world: but even after Shakespeare and
Beethoven, we ask, "Is that all there is?" Now, if nature makes
nothing in vain, if every natural desire corresponds to something real
that can satisfy it (which IS true for EVERY other desire, food,
drink, survival, sex, knowledge, beauty, peace... exist somewhere)
well than this biggest desire too, the desire for supreme Happiness
and the Good, must also correspond to something that really exists.
Whenever we get some finite good, it only satisfies us finitely. The
goods of this world and ourselves are limited, but our desire is
unlimited. So there must be something that is an unlimited good that
satisfies all our desires. And that is Aquinas argument that the
ultimate human good is the existence of God.
Aquinas argued for the existence of God like this in the Kosmos: In a
universe of movement, there must be Unmoved mover. The chain of causes
depends on a First Cause of things. Perishable things depend on an
imperishable being. The relative degrees of perfection we see in all
things requires a real absolute standard and perfect being. The design
of nature in which many things are ordered requires an orderer
(designer).
But the most poignant argument for God, the most challenging one, is
the one of desire. The physical ones are there. But the 'human desire'
argument as God as a final End, directly impacts ethics. This is not
religion, but philosophy. Not faith in divine revelation like the
bible, but logical reasoning. If you reason about self knowledge, this
is what you get.
About 300 years after Aquinas, Machiavelli will also use reason to
come up with as radical a different set of conclusions as you can get.
Read the Prince and be ready to enter a completely different world.
READING FOR THE NEXT LECTURE
