"Yet to remain who we are in the face of enticement to wickedness requires a power most people today have lost: the wisdom to know who you are, and the courage to maintain that sense of self despite temptation or hardship."
I'm wondering is this really something we have lost? Did we have this in spades before? Who is the "most people" we are talking about now and in the past.
This is one of those situations where the 3-minute read (750 word) format betrays me, because I run out of space and end up hinting at things that might need spelling out. But I do indeed see this as a discarded human capacity, and its tied up with the doom that befell virtue ethics after the Enlightenment.
Alasdair MacIntyre (who is overdue for an appearance at Stranger Worlds) presents the history of virtue as being one in which the narrative structure of human life is tied to an understanding of human virtues. He traces this through classical cultures (Greece, Rome), Medieval times, and so on until roughly the Enlightenment. But these practices take a hit in the nineteenth century, and it all comes to a breaking point with the existentialists of the twentieth century. There is a direct clash here between two different narrative forms of human life at this point: the virtue ethical approach of seeing one's entire life as a singular narrative, and knowing who you need to be within that story, and the existentialist approach of 'inventing yourself', making 'choices' etc.
These two are incompatible. Either you know who you are in the story of your life (virtue) or you are free to reinvent yourself (existentialist). Both philosophies are 'true', in the sense that both paths are open to us all. But as we leaned ever deeper into the existentialist solution and ever further from the virtue ethics traditions, we lost something, something that was only possible within a particular understanding of the narrative structure of human life. And crucially for this piece on Galadriel, if you take the existentialist path there is nothing to stop you being corrupted by power, because there is no story maintaining who you are across the length of your life.
This is what these remarks in the final paragraph refer to. The relevance to Tolkien is that I would suggest that he is still writing from within the virtue ethical tradition (which must therefore have survived, in at least some form, into the twentieth century), and I see this story of Galadriel as directly tied into MacIntyre's discussion of the collapse of the virtue tradition.
Hope these remarks are helpful! I'll try and get some MacIntyre into September.
SEE DIFFERENTLY #RGdiff_1: Virtue Versus Existentialism
Hi Chris. Nice piece. I’m not sure I really understand it, though.
I’m living what I take to be the last chapter of my life. Except for the past few years, most of my memories are dim, but it seems to me I have lived a single story. Has it been virtuous? I don’t know. I never thought of it that way. I was/am very much molded by my life experiences. Given different experiences I’m quite sure I would have been/be a different person. I imagine it’s the same for many other people.
For me, it’s axiomatic that for each of us, one’s life’s narrative is wholly determined by (a) one’s genes, (b) the totality of all the physical reality influences one has been exposed to since one was a single cell, (c) the totality of all the social reality influences one has been exposed to since one emerged from their mother’s womb, and (d) what one’s mind has spontaneously generated. The wild card is what one’s mind spontaneously generates.
I don’t remember any Galadriel moments in my life’s narrative, but I think that others could experience such moments. Still, although one is always free to choose between several alternatives, the mechanisms operating in one’s brain-mind in any interval enable only a limited number of choices. Whatever choice one makes becomes part of one’s narrative. It seems to me that what you’re saying is that for a virtuous person these choices are more tightly constrained (predetermined?) than they are for one living existentially.
Is it fair to say that you take a dim view of existentialism? Others, of course, have different views. For example, see the SEP introduction to Existentialism. With my present understanding I would place myself in the existentialist camp rather than “the virtue ethics tradition.” But I dispute your assertion that it indisputably follows that “there is nothing to stop [me from] being corrupted by power.” I see myself as but a smaller than subatomic particle in the unfolding of a magnificent universe in which the whole cosmic orchestra plays. While I place a declining value on continuing my own existence, I would go to the mat to ensure that all future generations of humankind have their chance to play their part.
It seems to me that for any society/civilization to survive long term it must have a set of principles that are strongly held for at least several generations, even though slow alterations are possible, and some flexibility may be essential. Indeed, at present it appears that many societies have lost their anchors and are now dangerously adrift. Humans cannot live by bread alone.
This is a wonderful commentary, Frank. Let me respond to a few points.
"Is it fair to say that you take a dim view of existentialism?"
Not at all! I consider Moorcock to have been an existentialist (inspired by Camus) for most of his writing career. I lived a large portion of my own life in an existentialist style. I admire the virtue ethical tradition, but it has mostly been from the outside that I have done so. Because this is a piece about Tolkien, I included the virtue ethical angle, as it is my judgement that this was very much 'in play' for him - and Galadriel is a good example. (Faramir is also a good example, but people know this part of the tale less well.)
However, just as the virtue ethical tradition can go off the rails and undermine its own purposes, so the existentialist tradition can do the same. At the moment, we have an excess of existentialism coupled with an unreasonable certainty that it is well grounded (metaphysics is, by definition, never well grounded). This is a serious problem with many unfortunate consequences...
"Whatever choice one makes becomes part of one’s narrative. It seems to me that what you’re saying is that for a virtuous person these choices are more tightly constrained (predetermined?) than they are for one living existentially."
This framework - that *after* an event it becomes incorporated into your narrative, is existentialist in its approach. We are writing the story 'live', nothing is established firmly, anything can change. The virtue ethical approach entails an awareness of being part of a narrative even *before* the events - and yes, this does entail constraints. Although I would like to evoke the adage that 'all constraint is design', here, to suggest that our view of limits as inherently negative is never the whole story.
"I don’t remember any Galadriel moments in my life’s narrative, but I think that others could experience such moments."
You were never tempted to abuses of power, thankfully, but it is clear that others do face this temptation. Rationalising after the fact provides infinite scope for excusing one's terrible behaviour. I see two plausible paths: to maintain traditions of virtue (in some form), or to eliminate all power. Of the two, only one is plausible, however unlikely.
"It seems to me that for any society/civilization to survive long term it must have a set of principles that are strongly held for at least several generations, even though slow alterations are possible, and some flexibility may be essential. Indeed, at present it appears that many societies have lost their anchors and are now dangerously adrift. Humans cannot live by bread alone."
Amen. Virtues are habits, and habits are self-supporting behavioural structures. Virtues are not principles, but they support principles. The virtues entailed in upholding principles are a requirement for principles to hold. Kant understood this, and anyone in the virtue tradition, such as Tolkien, understood it as well. I would suggest that because we lost our sense of civic virtue (a consequence of the forms of secularism we adopted, but not an inevitable one) we have found it harder to maintain principles because our habits regarding upholding principles are no longer engrained.
I do not know if it is possible to maintain secular virtue ethics. The evidence suggests it is not. But without some kind of revival here, we will struggle to maintain our principles at all. I am not without hope, but I am also acutely aware of the challenges....
Only at the end do I feel I lose you:
"Yet to remain who we are in the face of enticement to wickedness requires a power most people today have lost: the wisdom to know who you are, and the courage to maintain that sense of self despite temptation or hardship."
I'm wondering is this really something we have lost? Did we have this in spades before? Who is the "most people" we are talking about now and in the past.
Hey Matt,
This is one of those situations where the 3-minute read (750 word) format betrays me, because I run out of space and end up hinting at things that might need spelling out. But I do indeed see this as a discarded human capacity, and its tied up with the doom that befell virtue ethics after the Enlightenment.
Alasdair MacIntyre (who is overdue for an appearance at Stranger Worlds) presents the history of virtue as being one in which the narrative structure of human life is tied to an understanding of human virtues. He traces this through classical cultures (Greece, Rome), Medieval times, and so on until roughly the Enlightenment. But these practices take a hit in the nineteenth century, and it all comes to a breaking point with the existentialists of the twentieth century. There is a direct clash here between two different narrative forms of human life at this point: the virtue ethical approach of seeing one's entire life as a singular narrative, and knowing who you need to be within that story, and the existentialist approach of 'inventing yourself', making 'choices' etc.
These two are incompatible. Either you know who you are in the story of your life (virtue) or you are free to reinvent yourself (existentialist). Both philosophies are 'true', in the sense that both paths are open to us all. But as we leaned ever deeper into the existentialist solution and ever further from the virtue ethics traditions, we lost something, something that was only possible within a particular understanding of the narrative structure of human life. And crucially for this piece on Galadriel, if you take the existentialist path there is nothing to stop you being corrupted by power, because there is no story maintaining who you are across the length of your life.
This is what these remarks in the final paragraph refer to. The relevance to Tolkien is that I would suggest that he is still writing from within the virtue ethical tradition (which must therefore have survived, in at least some form, into the twentieth century), and I see this story of Galadriel as directly tied into MacIntyre's discussion of the collapse of the virtue tradition.
Hope these remarks are helpful! I'll try and get some MacIntyre into September.
And thanks for wading in!
Chris.
SEE DIFFERENTLY #RGdiff_1: Virtue Versus Existentialism
Hi Chris. Nice piece. I’m not sure I really understand it, though.
I’m living what I take to be the last chapter of my life. Except for the past few years, most of my memories are dim, but it seems to me I have lived a single story. Has it been virtuous? I don’t know. I never thought of it that way. I was/am very much molded by my life experiences. Given different experiences I’m quite sure I would have been/be a different person. I imagine it’s the same for many other people.
For me, it’s axiomatic that for each of us, one’s life’s narrative is wholly determined by (a) one’s genes, (b) the totality of all the physical reality influences one has been exposed to since one was a single cell, (c) the totality of all the social reality influences one has been exposed to since one emerged from their mother’s womb, and (d) what one’s mind has spontaneously generated. The wild card is what one’s mind spontaneously generates.
I don’t remember any Galadriel moments in my life’s narrative, but I think that others could experience such moments. Still, although one is always free to choose between several alternatives, the mechanisms operating in one’s brain-mind in any interval enable only a limited number of choices. Whatever choice one makes becomes part of one’s narrative. It seems to me that what you’re saying is that for a virtuous person these choices are more tightly constrained (predetermined?) than they are for one living existentially.
Is it fair to say that you take a dim view of existentialism? Others, of course, have different views. For example, see the SEP introduction to Existentialism. With my present understanding I would place myself in the existentialist camp rather than “the virtue ethics tradition.” But I dispute your assertion that it indisputably follows that “there is nothing to stop [me from] being corrupted by power.” I see myself as but a smaller than subatomic particle in the unfolding of a magnificent universe in which the whole cosmic orchestra plays. While I place a declining value on continuing my own existence, I would go to the mat to ensure that all future generations of humankind have their chance to play their part.
It seems to me that for any society/civilization to survive long term it must have a set of principles that are strongly held for at least several generations, even though slow alterations are possible, and some flexibility may be essential. Indeed, at present it appears that many societies have lost their anchors and are now dangerously adrift. Humans cannot live by bread alone.
This is a wonderful commentary, Frank. Let me respond to a few points.
"Is it fair to say that you take a dim view of existentialism?"
Not at all! I consider Moorcock to have been an existentialist (inspired by Camus) for most of his writing career. I lived a large portion of my own life in an existentialist style. I admire the virtue ethical tradition, but it has mostly been from the outside that I have done so. Because this is a piece about Tolkien, I included the virtue ethical angle, as it is my judgement that this was very much 'in play' for him - and Galadriel is a good example. (Faramir is also a good example, but people know this part of the tale less well.)
However, just as the virtue ethical tradition can go off the rails and undermine its own purposes, so the existentialist tradition can do the same. At the moment, we have an excess of existentialism coupled with an unreasonable certainty that it is well grounded (metaphysics is, by definition, never well grounded). This is a serious problem with many unfortunate consequences...
"Whatever choice one makes becomes part of one’s narrative. It seems to me that what you’re saying is that for a virtuous person these choices are more tightly constrained (predetermined?) than they are for one living existentially."
This framework - that *after* an event it becomes incorporated into your narrative, is existentialist in its approach. We are writing the story 'live', nothing is established firmly, anything can change. The virtue ethical approach entails an awareness of being part of a narrative even *before* the events - and yes, this does entail constraints. Although I would like to evoke the adage that 'all constraint is design', here, to suggest that our view of limits as inherently negative is never the whole story.
"I don’t remember any Galadriel moments in my life’s narrative, but I think that others could experience such moments."
You were never tempted to abuses of power, thankfully, but it is clear that others do face this temptation. Rationalising after the fact provides infinite scope for excusing one's terrible behaviour. I see two plausible paths: to maintain traditions of virtue (in some form), or to eliminate all power. Of the two, only one is plausible, however unlikely.
"It seems to me that for any society/civilization to survive long term it must have a set of principles that are strongly held for at least several generations, even though slow alterations are possible, and some flexibility may be essential. Indeed, at present it appears that many societies have lost their anchors and are now dangerously adrift. Humans cannot live by bread alone."
Amen. Virtues are habits, and habits are self-supporting behavioural structures. Virtues are not principles, but they support principles. The virtues entailed in upholding principles are a requirement for principles to hold. Kant understood this, and anyone in the virtue tradition, such as Tolkien, understood it as well. I would suggest that because we lost our sense of civic virtue (a consequence of the forms of secularism we adopted, but not an inevitable one) we have found it harder to maintain principles because our habits regarding upholding principles are no longer engrained.
I do not know if it is possible to maintain secular virtue ethics. The evidence suggests it is not. But without some kind of revival here, we will struggle to maintain our principles at all. I am not without hope, but I am also acutely aware of the challenges....
Many thanks, as ever, for sharing your thoughts!