Date: Sat, 15 Nov 2003 09:44:21 +0000
Subject: Re: BHA: Flourishing, Aristotle, etc.


No I'm not saying that. The same kind of issue came up in the 
Bhaskar-Callinicos debate, and since I'm out of time, here's what 
transpired:

CALLINICOS
Sure, capitalism depends on free creativity, and I think that Roy is 
absolutely right that every human act has a creative dimension, that it 
goes beyond the established routines. Enterprises couldn't function for 
a moment without the creative intervention of the workers they exploit. 
But there's a huge leap from saying that to saying that every social 
phenomenon involves an act of love. Take the case of the Einsatzgruppen, 
the SS death-squads who machine-gunned to death 1,500,000 Soviet Jews 
during the summer and autumn of 1941. Sure there's solidarity between 
the soldiers involved in these obscenities--but love? To suggest that 
all the acts of violence in the world are in some sense acts of love is 
to enchant reality in an ideologically mystifying way.

[snip]

BHASKAR

[snip]

Let's talk now specifically about love. Actually it's wrong to talk 
about an act of love. Love is a motive, a ground-state motive, not a 
quality of an act. If I say something, I may manifest my love, but at 
that level of that act, it's not an act of love or not. The act of what 
we call 'making love' may or may not manifest love. Everything in some 
way depends on love, it will use love in a certain form, but we must be 
very careful when we use terms like 'love'. If you take the case of the 
bank robbers, it's not insignificant that no bank robbery could ever 
occur without a degree of solidarity between the bank robbers. You can 
engage the bank robbers in a conversation. They might of course have a 
perfectly coherent understanding of what they are doing, they might be 
Robin Hoods--they might have a social rationale, a justification of it. 
In which case you might say it's not to the point to engage them in an 
understanding, but you can show them perhaps how the capitalist mode of 
production depends on systematic analogues of what they are doing, the 
forms of collusion it makes use of; and you can perhaps orient their 
imposed anti-socialness in a more positive direction. I think it's not 
fair game at all to talk about horrendous acts because no one is going 
to say that they are acts of love.

********

Bhaskar's general point is that love sustains evil, but not vice versa 
(an ontological, not an empirical point, following from a transcendental 
argument).  At least in the human world, *it's possible that there could 
be just love but not that there could be just evil.*  (Cf. the complex 
argument in DPF about the ontological priority of absence over 
presence). There's much else to be said, including at the level of 
scientific research Jamie invokes; but philosophical arguments are 
something, it's important engage at all levels.

Mervyn

"Moodey, Richard W" <MOODEY001-AT-gannon.edu> writes
>Hi Mervyn,
>
>Are you saying that the eaten cooperate with the eaters in the food 
>chain?  That these acts of eating and being eaten are acts of mutual 
>love?  I do not ask these questions in the spirit of reductio ad 
>absurdum, but with a real openness to this as a possible interpretation.
>
>Best regards,
>
>Dick
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: Mervyn Hartwig [mailto:mh-AT-jaspere.demon.co.uk]
>Sent: Thursday, November 13, 2003 4:16 PM
>To: bhaskar-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
>Subject: Re: BHA: Flourishing, Aristotle, etc.
>
>
>OK, one could equally argue that competion and aggression have been
>necessary for biological evolution to proceed, and a eudaimonian society
>might well want to retain competition in various forms. But I think it
>remains the case that co-operation is ontologically prior within
>communities. The ability of the wolf to successfully attack the deer
>derives from co-operation and social love--if they spent most of their
>time fighting each other they couldn't do it, and what fighting they do
>do with each other is sustained by co-operation in a way that doesn't
>apply vice versa.
>
>Mervyn
>
>
>jamie morgan <jamie-AT-morganj58.fsnet.co.uk> writes
>>Might it not be that competition and aggression has proved successful
>>within evolution as much as cooperation and thus both have had their
>>place in species evolution and also in human social development -
>>implying that both are aspects of nature and of society where the
>>concept of primacy or triumph is not necessarily the best way of think
>>about what we want to take from each?
>>
>>
>>----- Original Message -----
>>From: "Mervyn Hartwig" <mh-AT-jaspere.demon.co.uk>
>>To: <bhaskar-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu>
>>Sent: Wednesday, November 12, 2003 6:18 PM
>>Subject: Re: BHA: Flourishing, Aristotle, etc.
>>
>>
>>> Hi Dick,
>>>
>>> But it hasn't, i.e. notwithstanding inter-(and intra-)specific
>>> aggression, species have proliferated and flourished. If aggression
>>> dominated both inter- and intra- the whole show would come to a halt
>>> (as of course it might yet owing to contingent aggression within a
>>> contingently powerful species, i.e. ours; it would remain the case
>>> that there could be no process of biological evolution if love did
>>> not triumph over evil, Eros over Thanatos).
>>>
>>> Mervyn
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>  "Moodey, Richard W" <MOODEY001-AT-gannon.edu> writes
>>> >Hi Mervyn,
>>> >
>>> >You wrote:
>>> >
>>> >"One can argue that, given that biological evolution proceeds, it
>>> >must be the case that co-operation, care etc prevails over
>>> >self-preservation, aggression etc within species."
>>> >
>>> >But isn't it possible that conflict among (between)different
>>> >communities may prevail over co-operation among (between)them, even
>>> >as this conflict requires high degrees of co-operation within each
>>> >of these communities?
>>> >
>>> >I don't write this out of any basic disagreement with the other
>>> >arguments for the either the existence or the fundamental goodness
>>> >of something (not yet fully specified, perhaps) that we can point to
>>> >with the
>>heuristic
>>> >concept, "human nature."
>>> >
>>> >Regards,
>>> >
>>>
>>>
>>>
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>>>
>>
>>
>>
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>
>
>
>
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>
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