The Puzzle of Human Nature

A while back over at Wretchard's place I posted the following comment:

////

The challenge facing us lies chiefly in defining the way forward with sufficient abstraction to include all of us, but with sufficent positive detail to inspire cooperative action. Simply opposing jihadism is reactive, leaving us without the capacity for positive change, while being vaguely for freedom and human rights is merely pro-active (somebody do something!). We need a more active, positively defined philosophy!

The hard left seems to think that if we reached out to and understood the jihadis, they would not fight us, but they give the political right no quarter and no attempt at understanding. The vigorous democracy expansionists on the right maintain that we can transform a radically different culture overseas through human universals like the desire for freedom, but many of them write off our own militant pacifists (or passive-ists!) of the left as unsalvageable.

In short, we need a new, robust statement of a humanist philosophy with which to fire the imaginations of people everywhere on all parts of the political spectrum. Anybody got one?

////

I haven't got one yet, but I have been giving some thought to a conceptual framework for human nature which might support one, and have finally reached the point where writing something down is possible! I have been wrestling with the problem from two primary angles: 1) bottom up: identifying "universal truths" of human nature that when assembled and interacting accomodate everything we see people do around us, with absolutely no exceptions; and 2) top down: assuming that a robust humanist philosophy is in fact possible, trying to figure out what shape human nature would have to take to allow that possibility, and searching to find out whether anything in human experience invalidates that shape. The two angles of approach inform each other.

By focusing on the nature of humanity, rather than the nature of God, I hope to avoid discussing the correctness of any particular religion (e.g., what about human nature allows for such vast differences between religions, and why are relatively small differences often so much more inflammatory? is to my mind a more fruitful question with less chance of an unresolvable answer). Similarly, I am not out to bash any particular political stripe, but rather to articulate the fundamental structure that allows so many to exist. To take one example, American conservatives and liberals, even when in disagreement so total as to render meaningful communication impossible, could both be characterized by a shared belief that the other is working from deeply flawed assumptions about human nature. If a sufficiently deep and powerful model of human nature could be agreed upon, it could serve as a basis for restarting communication by starting from the basic foundational blocks of the model and working logically upward to the point where disagreement begins.

Why a "humanist" philosophy? Because I am persuaded by both intuition and experience as a teacher and a performer that individual people have incredible untapped potential, and that under the right circumstances it can be unlocked. Everyone has memories of personal high points, and we have all seen others rise to overcome seemingly insurmountable obstacles, whether in politics, sports, war, or everyday life, and not for individual glory but for the aid of family, team, or country. To tap this energy source efficiently and sustainably is to transform society. On a darker note, if this powerful force is not universal, then by implication democracy has never been possible, and we are either doomed to some form of aristocracy/peasant apartheid or to the genocidal solution. Because of my convictions, and not least because the other possibility provides little by way of hope, I have assumed universality to see whether the logical implications of doing so can survive contact with the experimental data provided by the human race.

Although this post probably paints me into the role of philosopher, I have not been a student of other philosophizing, so I may be re-inventing a few wheels. Feel free to point any of them out! I will be trying to post some of my quasi-articulated fundamental blocks as my work load permits, and I am open to debate, criticism, and persuasion, although I would naturally prefer a constructive angle. 8-)

More soon, when Brain and Schedule permit!