As a student of history and philosophy, one of the best items of advice that I have received is: "Learn how to essentialize." So, I have been a student of essentializing, and I am still looking for ways to improve. Following is my interim summary.
WHAT IS ESSENTIALIZING? As a noun, the term essential is shorthand for the phrase "essential characteristic." Characteristic of what? Of any existent--a table, a man, a society, or a philosophy.[1]
In a metaphysical (ontological) perspective, an essential is a certain kind of feature of a thing--a feature that causes all, most, or many of the thing's other characteristics to be what they are.[2] For example, in a philosophical (not biological) context, an essential characteristic of man is his ability to reason. That ability does not cause his chromosome count to be what it is, but his ability to reason does enable him to write symphonies, plan a garden, design a computer program, choose a suitable spouse, measure a board for framing a new house, and debate laws.
BENEFITS. Epistemologically, an essential is a characteristic which explains all, most, or many of the other characteristics of a thing. (What is a cause in reality is an explanation in cognition of that reality.)[3]
As a second benefit, identifying essential characteristics also allows me to simplify my mental activities. Holding all of a thing's characteristics in mind at one time is impossible. Rather than needing to remember thousands of characteristics of a thing, when I think of that thing, I can remember an essential characteristic that causes and thereby explains all, most, or many of the other characteristics.
When I recall the definition of a thing, I am recalling its essential characteristics. A table is an "item of furniture, consisting of a flat, level surface and supports, intended to support other, smaller objects."[4] In part, its essential characteristics are its structure (a flat surface raised off the floor to a level accessible to human hands) and its purpose (to support other objects in a way accessible from all sides). Remembering structure and purpose is much easier than trying to remember a table's many other, inessential characteristics.
A METHOD. Essentializing is a mental method. It is looking for the underlying characteristic of a thing -- whether the thing is a perceptible object, such as a table, or a set of wide abstractions, such as a philosophy. For example, an examination of Ayn Rand's philosophy leads to an identification of an essential characteristic ("essence") of Objectivism as the concept of objectivity.
The process of essentializing is analogous to harvesting a carrot: Follow the many little green leaves to the single large root, and then extract it. The process of essentializing is a form of integration, that is, a form of finding the One from which the Many appear.[5] Consider an example. For students of philosophy of history, Leonard Peikoff has sketched a method of finding the philosophical roots (the fundamental ideas that cause it to be what it is) of a particular society, such as Germany in the 1920s.[6] Generalizing his comments further, I would suggest that the method of essentializing has four main steps:
1. Immerse yourself in identifying the many characteristics of the thing you are examining. The question to ask at this stage is Aristotle's basic question of all inquiry: "What is it?"[7] Whatever you are studying -- whether a new life-form in the jungle of the Amazon River Valley or a long paragraph in a philosophy textbook -- ask yourself particular questions whose answers will help you characterize the object. Examples for a physical object are: How much does it weigh? What color is it? Does it have parts? If so, how do they interconnect? At this stage, do not be concerned with the importance, breadth, or relationship of the characteristics. Simply collect them.
2. Classify the answers. For example, for a rare monkey, red hands and purple ears might fall under the heading of skin color, and skin color and shape of eyes fall under the heading of physical characteristics.
3. Sort the characteristics by fundamentality--that is, by cause and effect. Which of the characteristics are effects, and which are causes of other characteristics? An illustration: Philosophically speaking, man's ability to reason is a cause (an enabling cause) of man's ability to create music--not vice versa.
4. Look for the characteristic that explains most other characteristics. It is the essential characteristic. Sometimes, the thing being essentialized may have more than one essential characteristic. For example, an essential characteristic of Nazi philosophy was a set of three ideas--irrationalism (in epistemology), altruism (in ethics), and racial collectivism (in politics)--working together.[8]
CONCLUSION. What is the essential nature of the method of essentializing? Ask questions to find the "root," the characteristic of a thing that causes and thereby explains all, most, or many of the other characteristics of the thing.
Burgess Laughlin
Author, The Power and the Glory: The Key Ideas and Crusading Lives of Eight Debaters of Reason vs. Faith
[1] For Ayn Rand's discussion of essential characteristics: Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology, Ch. 5 ("Definitions"), especially pp. 42, 45-46, and 52; also see pp. 230-231. Leonard Peikoff discusses essentializing in Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand, pp. 96-101. [2] For the meaning of "fundamental" and "essential," see: Ayn Rand, ITOE, p. 45. [3] For the distinctions between metaphysically fundamental as cause and epistemologically essential as explanation: Rand, ITOE, 2nd ed., p. 45. [4] For the quoted definition of "table," see: Rand, ITOE,, 2nd ed., p. 41. [5] For integration: Leonard Peikoff, OPAR, p. 77. [6] For the example of philosophical detection, a form of essentializing, in analyzing a culture: Leonard Peikoff, Ominous Parallels, pp. 143-144. [7] For the basic questions of inquiry: Aristotle, Analytica Posteriora, Bk. I, Ch. 1, lines 89b21-25. [8] For the essential philosophical characteristics ("the essence") of Nazism: Peikoff, Ominous Parallels, p. 97.
May 2, 2008
Apr 17, 2008
In Hebrews 11.1, what is "faith"?
Leonard Peikoff notes that Aquinas is "the greatest of all religious thinkers," one who openly champions reason--with faith as a supplement.[1] In this post, my purpose--as a layman, not as a specialist--is to suggest an interpretation of a Biblical passage that underlies Aquinas's view of faith.[2]
The passage is Chapter 11, Verse 1 of The Letter to the Hebrews, in the Christian New Testament. The anonymous author of the Letter probably lived c. 100 CE.[3]
Verse 1 is the theme statement for Hebrews Ch. 11. It says, "... faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen." Subsequent verses chronologically present examples of Old Testament men and women who had faith.
Now take a closer look at the two main parts of the Letter writer's definition.
1. The things hoped for are values. Judging from the context, the values are not merely any values, but a Christian's highest values, such as everlasting life in heaven. (Verse 16 says that for those who have faith, "God ... has prepared for them a city," presumably the City of God, as Augustine will later call it.)[4] Thus, half of faith is having confidence in receiving something of value--in the next world. In part, this is a matter of ethics, one branch of the Christian worldview.
2. In the second half of the writer's definition, the conviction of things not seen is belief in ideas which have no basis in sense-perception of this world. Earlier in the New Testament, in The Second Letter to the Corinthians, 5.7, the writer, the apostle Paul (Saul of Tarsus), encourages Christians to walk in this world by faith, not by sight. That is appropriate advice if this "world was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was made out of things which do not appear" (Hebrews 11.3). Such advice is a matter of epistemology and metaphysics (ontology), two more branches in the Christian worldview.
Conclusion: The anonymous writer of the Letter to the Hebrews is presumably competing with Judaism, Roman paganism, and other religions in his time. To a steadily growing, potentially Christian audience, he offers the essentials of an integrated worldview. The metaphysics, epistemology, and ethics of early Christianity are interlocked: An invisible God created this world from nothing; and He tells us, without offering evidence, to spend our miserable, sinful lives seeking values available only after we die and, even then, in another world.
Burgess Laughlin
Author, The Power and the Glory: The Key Ideas and Crusading Lives of Eight Debaters of Reason vs. Faith
[1] Leonard Peikoff, "Religion versus America," The Objectivist Forum, June, 1986 (Vol. 7), New York, TOF Publications, 1993, pp. 3 and 7-8. The same essay appears in The Voice of Reason. [2] Mark D. Jordan, translator and editor of On Faith: Summa theologiae, Part 2-2, Questions 1-16 of St. Thomas Aquinas, Notre Dame, University of Notre Dame Press, 1990, p. 14, lists Hebrews 11 and First Corinthians 13.2 as two passages underlying Thomas's view of faith. [3] For discussion of the identity of the author of The Letter to the Hebrews: Pheme Perkins, Reading the New Testament: An Introduction, second ("revised") edition, New York, Paulist Press, 1988, Ch. 17 ("Hebrews"), pp. 270, 272 and 273. [4] The Biblical quotations come from The Holy Bible: Revised Standard Version, Meridian Books, 1962.
The passage is Chapter 11, Verse 1 of The Letter to the Hebrews, in the Christian New Testament. The anonymous author of the Letter probably lived c. 100 CE.[3]
Verse 1 is the theme statement for Hebrews Ch. 11. It says, "... faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen." Subsequent verses chronologically present examples of Old Testament men and women who had faith.
Now take a closer look at the two main parts of the Letter writer's definition.
1. The things hoped for are values. Judging from the context, the values are not merely any values, but a Christian's highest values, such as everlasting life in heaven. (Verse 16 says that for those who have faith, "God ... has prepared for them a city," presumably the City of God, as Augustine will later call it.)[4] Thus, half of faith is having confidence in receiving something of value--in the next world. In part, this is a matter of ethics, one branch of the Christian worldview.
2. In the second half of the writer's definition, the conviction of things not seen is belief in ideas which have no basis in sense-perception of this world. Earlier in the New Testament, in The Second Letter to the Corinthians, 5.7, the writer, the apostle Paul (Saul of Tarsus), encourages Christians to walk in this world by faith, not by sight. That is appropriate advice if this "world was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was made out of things which do not appear" (Hebrews 11.3). Such advice is a matter of epistemology and metaphysics (ontology), two more branches in the Christian worldview.
Conclusion: The anonymous writer of the Letter to the Hebrews is presumably competing with Judaism, Roman paganism, and other religions in his time. To a steadily growing, potentially Christian audience, he offers the essentials of an integrated worldview. The metaphysics, epistemology, and ethics of early Christianity are interlocked: An invisible God created this world from nothing; and He tells us, without offering evidence, to spend our miserable, sinful lives seeking values available only after we die and, even then, in another world.
Burgess Laughlin
Author, The Power and the Glory: The Key Ideas and Crusading Lives of Eight Debaters of Reason vs. Faith
[1] Leonard Peikoff, "Religion versus America," The Objectivist Forum, June, 1986 (Vol. 7), New York, TOF Publications, 1993, pp. 3 and 7-8. The same essay appears in The Voice of Reason. [2] Mark D. Jordan, translator and editor of On Faith: Summa theologiae, Part 2-2, Questions 1-16 of St. Thomas Aquinas, Notre Dame, University of Notre Dame Press, 1990, p. 14, lists Hebrews 11 and First Corinthians 13.2 as two passages underlying Thomas's view of faith. [3] For discussion of the identity of the author of The Letter to the Hebrews: Pheme Perkins, Reading the New Testament: An Introduction, second ("revised") edition, New York, Paulist Press, 1988, Ch. 17 ("Hebrews"), pp. 270, 272 and 273. [4] The Biblical quotations come from The Holy Bible: Revised Standard Version, Meridian Books, 1962.
Apr 4, 2008
Philosophical Ripples?
My purpose in these notes is to summarize my understanding of the general process of spreading a philosophy.
TRANSMISSION vs. DISSEMINATION
Philosophical transmission is the passage of a philosophy from one generation to the next or from one society to another. In the west, a long line of scholars transmitted Aristotle's philosophy from Greek society to Roman society; in the east, Greek writers transmitted it to Syriac and then Arabic society; and from these earlier cultures, scholars transmitted it to the world of Thomas Aquinas.
In contrast, philosophical dissemination is the passage of a philosophy down a socio-intellectual hierarchy from a philosopher to the man in the street, within one society. The philosophers of the Italian Renaissance disseminated Aristotle's philosophy into their society--as some philosophers are today disseminating Ayn Rand's philosophy, Objectivism, into modern society.
CHAIN OF DISSEMINATION
A new philosophy enters a society like a stone dropping into a pond. The effects ripple through the society.[1] The ripples pass along a chain of individuals.
1. Primary philosophers create radically new philosophical systems. Each presents his philosophy to a few students. In the 2500-year history of philosophy, only four primary philosophers have emerged: Plato, Aristotle, Kant, and Rand.[2]
2. In the generations following the introduction of each primary philosophy, secondary philosophers build their own philosophical systems. Whereas primary philosophers create radically new philosophical ideas and integrate them into a system, secondary philosophers start with some of the essential elements of a primary philosopher's system and then develop their own variation from those and other essential elements. Example secondary philosophers are Plotinus (600 years after Plato) and Kierkegaard (50 years after Kant).
Primary and secondary philosophers systematize their philosophical ideas in their thinking but not in their presentations of their own philosophies. Perhaps the reason for the lack of a single-volume presentation of the whole philosophy is that each primary and secondary philosopher is fascinated with (1) solving particular philosophical problems (such as the problem of universals) and (2) mentally integrating the solutions into a system, but he is bored with presenting the system as a whole to beginners.
3. Tertiary philosophers are individuals who immerse themselves in a primary or secondary philosophy but do not create systems of their own. Example tertiary philosophizers are academics who (1) think about and teach philosophy fulltime; (2) specialize in the study of a particular philosophical system; (3) adopt it as their own; (4) make its implicit elements explicit; and (5) systematically present it in their own lectures and books. A partial example is John Rawls (chairman of the Department of Philosophy at Harvard and author of Theory of Justice); he applied Kant's metaphysics, epistemology, and ethics to his own politics of egalitarianism.[3]
4. Philosophers of the sciences develop the basic principles (the foundation, the "philosophy") of each science. Example specialized sciences are physics, history, and psychology. Unlike primary, secondary, and tertiary philosophers, philosophers of science characteristically do not work directly with whole philosophical systems. Philosophers of science apply parts of a philosophy--especially its metaphysics and epistemology--to their particular field. For example, besides being a physicist, Galileo (1564-1642) was a philosopher of the emerging science of physics. He placed physics partly on a foundation of Aristotle's philosophical method--logic--and partly on elements of Aristotle's epistemology.[4]
5. Intellectuals apply philosophical principles (formulated by others) to their specialized studies in particular sciences and arts. Intellectuals continue the process of selecting pieces of a whole philosophy for narrower applications. Thus intellectuals develop and spread new specialized ideas as well as philosophical ideas. Example intellectuals are university professors who think about, write about, and lecture on specialized sciences. Today, in such fields as economics, biology, architecture, political science, art criticism, and history, intellectuals write and lecture outside universities too -- e.g., in "think-tanks" and specialized weblogs.
An intellectual activist is a person who (1) is intrigued by at least some philosophical principles and their application to his milieu, and (2) takes action to spread the applications and their underlying philosophical principles into his society. An intellectual activist, as distinct from a professional intellectual, need not be an originator of new ideas.
(The term "intellectual" can also be used very broadly to name anyone who is concerned about fundamental ideas and their application to society; in this sense, "intellectual" is not a matter of profession but of interest.)
6. Broadcasters further disseminate particular philosophical ideas (e.g., "Nobody can be certain of anything") and their applications ("Someone has to help the people who do not plan for their old-age"). Broadcasters do not develop new ideas, either philosophical or specialized. Example broadcasters can be teachers in lower schools, local newspaper columnists, and intellectually articulate politicians--but not all teachers, columnists, and politicians are broadcasters. Broadcasters spread philosophical ideas and their applications by talking directly to the "man in the street," for instance, to the truck driver whose actual philosophy ("Aw, hell, who knows--and who cares anyway?") determines whether he accelerates or brakes as he drives toward you when you walk across an intersection.[6]
UNDERLYING PRINCIPLE OF DISSEMINATION
Philosophically, the idea that underlies dissemination is the movement from the universal to the particular. Each disseminator applies a philosophy more narrowly (while implicitly retaining the whole). Socially, the process of dissemination affects more and more people. Thus, in dissemination from a primary philosopher to truck drivers, the philosophical and social hierarchies are parallel.[7]
Burgess Laughlin
Author, The Power and the Glory: The Key Ideas and Crusading Lives of Eight Debaters of Reason vs. Faith
[1] For innovative, general insight into the hierarchy of a philosophical army: Ayn Rand, For the New Intellectual: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand, hardback, p. 25. To better meet my needs as a student of history, I have added stages in the hierarchy and I have used additional terminology.
[2] For the idea of primary philosophers: Dr. Andrew Bernstein's recorded lecture, "Four Giants of Philosophy"; and Dr. Gary Hull's recorded lecture, "The Two False Theories of Concepts." Both lectures are available from The Ayn Rand Bookstore.
[3] For an example of a primary philosopher's influence, 175 years later, on an academic philosophizer: indirectly, a discussion of work by John Rawls (a Harvard philosophy professor, author of *A Theory of Justice*) in Ayn Rand, "An Untitled Letter," Philosophy: Who Needs it, pp. 131-137 and 140-144. For the transmission and dissemination of Kantianism, from Kant to Rawls: Leonard Peikoff, Ominous Parallel, especially Chs. 2, 6, 14 and 15.
[4] For Galileo as philosopher of science and as scientist: "Preface," William A Wallace, Galileo Logic's of Discovery and Proof: The Background, Content, and Use of His Appropriated Treatises on Aristotle's Posterior Analytics, Vol. 137 (a philosophy of science series), Kluwer Academic Publishers, Boston, 1992. As elsewhere, I am offering this example tentatively. I am not a specialist in any of their philosophies.
[5] For philosophy's effect on the man in the street: Ayn Rand, Philosophy: Who Needs It, p. 5 of the title essay.
[6] I have discussed dissemination here only as a process of spreading ideas down a social hierarchy. Dissemination also includes spreading ideas "laterally," for example, tertiary philosophers who have adopted Kant's philosophy may advocate that philosophy to their peers, inside or outside of academia.
[7] "Enablers" can play a role at each stage of dissemination, but without themselves being disseminators of the ideas. For example, a philosophically mute but wealthy businsessman might provide free lodging to a philosopher who is developing a book presenting a key element of his new philosophy; a scientist immersed in his own specialized work might donate part of his salary to an institution dedicated to spreading a particular philosophy; and a carpenter might donate a new philosopher's book to a local library.
TRANSMISSION vs. DISSEMINATION
Philosophical transmission is the passage of a philosophy from one generation to the next or from one society to another. In the west, a long line of scholars transmitted Aristotle's philosophy from Greek society to Roman society; in the east, Greek writers transmitted it to Syriac and then Arabic society; and from these earlier cultures, scholars transmitted it to the world of Thomas Aquinas.
In contrast, philosophical dissemination is the passage of a philosophy down a socio-intellectual hierarchy from a philosopher to the man in the street, within one society. The philosophers of the Italian Renaissance disseminated Aristotle's philosophy into their society--as some philosophers are today disseminating Ayn Rand's philosophy, Objectivism, into modern society.
CHAIN OF DISSEMINATION
A new philosophy enters a society like a stone dropping into a pond. The effects ripple through the society.[1] The ripples pass along a chain of individuals.
1. Primary philosophers create radically new philosophical systems. Each presents his philosophy to a few students. In the 2500-year history of philosophy, only four primary philosophers have emerged: Plato, Aristotle, Kant, and Rand.[2]
2. In the generations following the introduction of each primary philosophy, secondary philosophers build their own philosophical systems. Whereas primary philosophers create radically new philosophical ideas and integrate them into a system, secondary philosophers start with some of the essential elements of a primary philosopher's system and then develop their own variation from those and other essential elements. Example secondary philosophers are Plotinus (600 years after Plato) and Kierkegaard (50 years after Kant).
Primary and secondary philosophers systematize their philosophical ideas in their thinking but not in their presentations of their own philosophies. Perhaps the reason for the lack of a single-volume presentation of the whole philosophy is that each primary and secondary philosopher is fascinated with (1) solving particular philosophical problems (such as the problem of universals) and (2) mentally integrating the solutions into a system, but he is bored with presenting the system as a whole to beginners.
3. Tertiary philosophers are individuals who immerse themselves in a primary or secondary philosophy but do not create systems of their own. Example tertiary philosophizers are academics who (1) think about and teach philosophy fulltime; (2) specialize in the study of a particular philosophical system; (3) adopt it as their own; (4) make its implicit elements explicit; and (5) systematically present it in their own lectures and books. A partial example is John Rawls (chairman of the Department of Philosophy at Harvard and author of Theory of Justice); he applied Kant's metaphysics, epistemology, and ethics to his own politics of egalitarianism.[3]
4. Philosophers of the sciences develop the basic principles (the foundation, the "philosophy") of each science. Example specialized sciences are physics, history, and psychology. Unlike primary, secondary, and tertiary philosophers, philosophers of science characteristically do not work directly with whole philosophical systems. Philosophers of science apply parts of a philosophy--especially its metaphysics and epistemology--to their particular field. For example, besides being a physicist, Galileo (1564-1642) was a philosopher of the emerging science of physics. He placed physics partly on a foundation of Aristotle's philosophical method--logic--and partly on elements of Aristotle's epistemology.[4]
5. Intellectuals apply philosophical principles (formulated by others) to their specialized studies in particular sciences and arts. Intellectuals continue the process of selecting pieces of a whole philosophy for narrower applications. Thus intellectuals develop and spread new specialized ideas as well as philosophical ideas. Example intellectuals are university professors who think about, write about, and lecture on specialized sciences. Today, in such fields as economics, biology, architecture, political science, art criticism, and history, intellectuals write and lecture outside universities too -- e.g., in "think-tanks" and specialized weblogs.
An intellectual activist is a person who (1) is intrigued by at least some philosophical principles and their application to his milieu, and (2) takes action to spread the applications and their underlying philosophical principles into his society. An intellectual activist, as distinct from a professional intellectual, need not be an originator of new ideas.
(The term "intellectual" can also be used very broadly to name anyone who is concerned about fundamental ideas and their application to society; in this sense, "intellectual" is not a matter of profession but of interest.)
6. Broadcasters further disseminate particular philosophical ideas (e.g., "Nobody can be certain of anything") and their applications ("Someone has to help the people who do not plan for their old-age"). Broadcasters do not develop new ideas, either philosophical or specialized. Example broadcasters can be teachers in lower schools, local newspaper columnists, and intellectually articulate politicians--but not all teachers, columnists, and politicians are broadcasters. Broadcasters spread philosophical ideas and their applications by talking directly to the "man in the street," for instance, to the truck driver whose actual philosophy ("Aw, hell, who knows--and who cares anyway?") determines whether he accelerates or brakes as he drives toward you when you walk across an intersection.[6]
UNDERLYING PRINCIPLE OF DISSEMINATION
Philosophically, the idea that underlies dissemination is the movement from the universal to the particular. Each disseminator applies a philosophy more narrowly (while implicitly retaining the whole). Socially, the process of dissemination affects more and more people. Thus, in dissemination from a primary philosopher to truck drivers, the philosophical and social hierarchies are parallel.[7]
Burgess Laughlin
Author, The Power and the Glory: The Key Ideas and Crusading Lives of Eight Debaters of Reason vs. Faith
[1] For innovative, general insight into the hierarchy of a philosophical army: Ayn Rand, For the New Intellectual: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand, hardback, p. 25. To better meet my needs as a student of history, I have added stages in the hierarchy and I have used additional terminology.
[2] For the idea of primary philosophers: Dr. Andrew Bernstein's recorded lecture, "Four Giants of Philosophy"; and Dr. Gary Hull's recorded lecture, "The Two False Theories of Concepts." Both lectures are available from The Ayn Rand Bookstore.
[3] For an example of a primary philosopher's influence, 175 years later, on an academic philosophizer: indirectly, a discussion of work by John Rawls (a Harvard philosophy professor, author of *A Theory of Justice*) in Ayn Rand, "An Untitled Letter," Philosophy: Who Needs it, pp. 131-137 and 140-144. For the transmission and dissemination of Kantianism, from Kant to Rawls: Leonard Peikoff, Ominous Parallel, especially Chs. 2, 6, 14 and 15.
[4] For Galileo as philosopher of science and as scientist: "Preface," William A Wallace, Galileo Logic's of Discovery and Proof: The Background, Content, and Use of His Appropriated Treatises on Aristotle's Posterior Analytics, Vol. 137 (a philosophy of science series), Kluwer Academic Publishers, Boston, 1992. As elsewhere, I am offering this example tentatively. I am not a specialist in any of their philosophies.
[5] For philosophy's effect on the man in the street: Ayn Rand, Philosophy: Who Needs It, p. 5 of the title essay.
[6] I have discussed dissemination here only as a process of spreading ideas down a social hierarchy. Dissemination also includes spreading ideas "laterally," for example, tertiary philosophers who have adopted Kant's philosophy may advocate that philosophy to their peers, inside or outside of academia.
[7] "Enablers" can play a role at each stage of dissemination, but without themselves being disseminators of the ideas. For example, a philosophically mute but wealthy businsessman might provide free lodging to a philosopher who is developing a book presenting a key element of his new philosophy; a scientist immersed in his own specialized work might donate part of his salary to an institution dedicated to spreading a particular philosophy; and a carpenter might donate a new philosopher's book to a local library.
Mar 3, 2008
What do historians owe to their audiences?
Having written the Jan. 2 and Jan. 10, 2008 posts as preliminary steps, I can now answer the title question in a straight-forward manner: Historians owe their audiences whatever their contracts require them to provide--and nothing more. If there is no contract, a historian owes his audience nothing. He is free to provide as much information as he chooses to offer.
1. OBJECTION: Doesn't a historian owe his listeners a complete proof of whatever assertions he makes?
No writer or speaker can provide a complete proof. The best that any historical writer or speaker can do is point the way and sketch the major steps of a proof. A complete proof of a complex assertion--e.g., the most fundamental cause of the U. S. Civil War was a radical and mutual opposition in the worldviews of the two sides--could require years of effort and its exact path would differ from one individual to the next according to their differences in knowledge of the subject matter.
2. OBJECTION: Doesn't every historian owe his audience some kind of substantiation for every conclusion he reaches?
No, unless his contract requires him to do so. Take an obvious example first: An editor of a magazine interviews 10 historians and asks them for their conclusions about the role of Aristotle's works on logic in advancing medieval culture toward the Renaissance. Each historian complies--by providing his conclusions and nothing more. The editor then collects the 10 conclusions and publishes them in an article on the diversity of views among historians. Some readers might be left with wanting more. Too bad. If they want more, and are willing to pay for it, in one way or another, then they should do so without complaining that the participating historians were being elitists of the Ivory Tower who won't address their audience on an equal level.
Take another example: An online forum consults a history professor as an (unpaid) expert on the religiosity of John Locke. The professor responds with a very brief answer. His unstated, private purpose is simply to keep his name visible among individuals who might buy his books or attend his for-fee lectures. He promises nothing more. He adjusts the length of his answer to fit his purposes, not the generally unknowable individual purposes of an anonymous audience.
3. OBJECTION: Isn't a historian being arrogant or even arbitrary if all he provides is a terse answer to a question, a question that the asker wants to discuss further or even debate?
This is an issue that comes up especially in formal lectures. For example, listen to the Q&A periods for the first few lectures in Dr. Leonard Peikoff's 2007 discussion of "The DIM Hypothesis" (available through the Ayn Rand Bookstore). In each case, Dr. Peikoff finishes a session (which was typically a walkthrough* of his upcoming book, rather than a formal, self-contained lecture) and then calls for questions.
A few of the questioners do not merely ask a question. Instead, after Dr. Peikoff's answer, they persist in trying to discuss or even debate his answer. The error here is an instance of context-dropping. In particular it is dropping the law of identity as applied to the Q&A sessions. A question-and-answer period is a question-and-answer period. A question-and-answer period is not a discussion period. A question-and-answer period is not a debate forum. Dr. Peikoff rightly refuses to allow individuals in the audience to draw him into either discussion or debate.
If an advertisement for a lecture promises a Q&A session, but makes no other specification, the lecturer is not obligated to turn questions (even if they are pertinent and properly worded) into discussions or debates. If an audience member pays to hear an expert, and the expert speaks, then the audience has heard him. If audience members think the answers are wrong or insufficient for their needs, then the audience members can in the future take their business elsewhere--or, better yet, they can offer a superior product of their own.
In summary, I would say that, in the absence of any contractual requirements to the contrary, no historian has an obligation to provide any particular amount of elaboration or proof of his assertions.
Burgess Laughlin
Author, The Power and the Glory: The Key Ideas and Crusading Lives of Eight Debaters of Reason vs. Faith
* A "walkthrough" is a form of communication I witnessed in the electronics industry several decades ago. It was a form used by designers of electronic instrumentation, especially the sofware and firmware aspects. A software designer, for example, would address a small group of other designers, as well as manufacturing and marketing engineers. He would "walk through" his partially completed design, describing its intended functions step by step. In some steps, he could display code that he had written. In other steps, he could show only a block-diagram of what he intended the operation of the software to be when finished. His purpose was to present enough information that his audience could (1) have a general idea of what the design is; and (2) offer informed criticism (that is, pointing out possible errors and offering superior alternatives).
In Dr. Peikoff's 2004 DIM Hypothesis sessions, which are no longer available, he was fully engaged in a walkthrough. He explained the provisional nature of his hypothesis at that time; and he invited criticism. By contrast, Dr. Peikoff's 2007 walkthroughs are, I infer, much more oriented toward presenting his conclusions as a test of his ability to present them and his audience's ability to understand them, as presented, than of their correctness.
1. OBJECTION: Doesn't a historian owe his listeners a complete proof of whatever assertions he makes?
No writer or speaker can provide a complete proof. The best that any historical writer or speaker can do is point the way and sketch the major steps of a proof. A complete proof of a complex assertion--e.g., the most fundamental cause of the U. S. Civil War was a radical and mutual opposition in the worldviews of the two sides--could require years of effort and its exact path would differ from one individual to the next according to their differences in knowledge of the subject matter.
2. OBJECTION: Doesn't every historian owe his audience some kind of substantiation for every conclusion he reaches?
No, unless his contract requires him to do so. Take an obvious example first: An editor of a magazine interviews 10 historians and asks them for their conclusions about the role of Aristotle's works on logic in advancing medieval culture toward the Renaissance. Each historian complies--by providing his conclusions and nothing more. The editor then collects the 10 conclusions and publishes them in an article on the diversity of views among historians. Some readers might be left with wanting more. Too bad. If they want more, and are willing to pay for it, in one way or another, then they should do so without complaining that the participating historians were being elitists of the Ivory Tower who won't address their audience on an equal level.
Take another example: An online forum consults a history professor as an (unpaid) expert on the religiosity of John Locke. The professor responds with a very brief answer. His unstated, private purpose is simply to keep his name visible among individuals who might buy his books or attend his for-fee lectures. He promises nothing more. He adjusts the length of his answer to fit his purposes, not the generally unknowable individual purposes of an anonymous audience.
3. OBJECTION: Isn't a historian being arrogant or even arbitrary if all he provides is a terse answer to a question, a question that the asker wants to discuss further or even debate?
This is an issue that comes up especially in formal lectures. For example, listen to the Q&A periods for the first few lectures in Dr. Leonard Peikoff's 2007 discussion of "The DIM Hypothesis" (available through the Ayn Rand Bookstore). In each case, Dr. Peikoff finishes a session (which was typically a walkthrough* of his upcoming book, rather than a formal, self-contained lecture) and then calls for questions.
A few of the questioners do not merely ask a question. Instead, after Dr. Peikoff's answer, they persist in trying to discuss or even debate his answer. The error here is an instance of context-dropping. In particular it is dropping the law of identity as applied to the Q&A sessions. A question-and-answer period is a question-and-answer period. A question-and-answer period is not a discussion period. A question-and-answer period is not a debate forum. Dr. Peikoff rightly refuses to allow individuals in the audience to draw him into either discussion or debate.
If an advertisement for a lecture promises a Q&A session, but makes no other specification, the lecturer is not obligated to turn questions (even if they are pertinent and properly worded) into discussions or debates. If an audience member pays to hear an expert, and the expert speaks, then the audience has heard him. If audience members think the answers are wrong or insufficient for their needs, then the audience members can in the future take their business elsewhere--or, better yet, they can offer a superior product of their own.
In summary, I would say that, in the absence of any contractual requirements to the contrary, no historian has an obligation to provide any particular amount of elaboration or proof of his assertions.
Burgess Laughlin
Author, The Power and the Glory: The Key Ideas and Crusading Lives of Eight Debaters of Reason vs. Faith
* A "walkthrough" is a form of communication I witnessed in the electronics industry several decades ago. It was a form used by designers of electronic instrumentation, especially the sofware and firmware aspects. A software designer, for example, would address a small group of other designers, as well as manufacturing and marketing engineers. He would "walk through" his partially completed design, describing its intended functions step by step. In some steps, he could display code that he had written. In other steps, he could show only a block-diagram of what he intended the operation of the software to be when finished. His purpose was to present enough information that his audience could (1) have a general idea of what the design is; and (2) offer informed criticism (that is, pointing out possible errors and offering superior alternatives).
In Dr. Peikoff's 2004 DIM Hypothesis sessions, which are no longer available, he was fully engaged in a walkthrough. He explained the provisional nature of his hypothesis at that time; and he invited criticism. By contrast, Dr. Peikoff's 2007 walkthroughs are, I infer, much more oriented toward presenting his conclusions as a test of his ability to present them and his audience's ability to understand them, as presented, than of their correctness.
Jan 10, 2008
How much proof must a historian offer?
PROBLEM: In communicating his ideas to others, how much proof must a historian offer?
IMAGINARY EXAMPLE: Let's say historian Dr. A writes an essay whose purpose is to persuade readers to adopt a certain idea. His publisher, the Journal of the Intellectual History of France in the Central Middle Ages, sets a length limit at only 2000 words. Within that limit, the historian must present and prove his thesis: Siger of Brabant--a teacher of liberal arts in the university at Paris, c. 1265--was the first academic to try to establish philosophy as an autonomous discipline, that is, a field of university study that is independent of the demands of the "science" of theology (the mistress whose handmaiden is philosophy).
Given the circumstances (for example, the brevity of the essay and the fact that an essay allows no question-and-answer process for clarification or elaboration), Dr. A realizes that he must hold modest expectations of success. He intends only to sketch the basic points of a line of proof for his theme.
In Dr. A's essay, a single sentence states his theme. Directly or indirectly, the other sentences (all statements about past reality) are elements of his proof of his theme. By citing primary and secondary sources in medieval and modern texts, the essay's footnotes elaborate some of the proofs or at least lead readers to further information and argumentation. By citing examples at various stages of his argument, he is connecting his theme to (past) reality, even if he is not offering a full, explicit chain of proof back to sense-perceptible reality.
Dr. A's essay is completely objective (that is, the conclusions follow logically from facts of reality) and yet it contains not even one self-evident statement. A proof is one form of validation, the form in which a thinker connects evidence (ultimately, sense-perceptible) step by logical step to his conclusion, the one to be proven.
In the chain of Dr. A's proof, reaching back from the theme to sense-perceptible reality, there is a "gap" between the lowest links in the chain of his proof and the sense-perceptible reality subsumed by his theme. This gap often appears in historical writing, wherein the "reality" of the past consists in a few artifacts--such as a thousand-year-old manuscript or an inscription chiseled on a stone monument--surviving from past times; such evidence must be interpreted and is not self-evident.
What an objective writer ultimately relies on to connect his theme to sense-perceptible reality, besides the immediate and necessarily abbreviated argument (proof) he presents, is the fact of shared context. In our example essay, Dr. A defines his intended audience as being at least graduate students in the field of medieval French history, specializing in 13th Century philosophical transmission.
By defining his audience in this narrow way, he is trying to ensure that he and his target readers have the same context--that is, the same set of relevant knowledge outside the immediate content of his essay. Presumably the writer and his readers can then, on demand, connect that shared context to sense-perceptible reality. For instance, given his theme and his definition of audience, Dr. A does not need to prove that a university existed in Paris in 1265. What he does need to prove, to some contextually-determined degree, is that Siger held and advocated the idea of autonomy for philosophy as a field of study in the university.
Especially outside the field of philosophy, objective writers seldom need to prove their themes down to the level of explicit self-evidencies. The writers and their intended audiences share a context of knowledge which, in turn, presumably they can, on demand, connect to sense-perceptible reality.
CONCLUSION. A writer needs to offer enough proof of his theme to achieve his purpose for the audience he is addressing in the chosen circumstances. All three factors--the writer's purpose, his intended audience, and his circumstances--set the context that drives the writer's decision to provide such-and-such amount of proof for his theme.
Burgess Laughlin
Author, The Power and the Glory: The Key Ideas and Crusading Lives of Eight Debaters of Reason vs. Faith
P. S. 1 -- Corollary: Criticizing an author, in a particular piece of writing, for "failing" to prove his case down to sense-perceptible reality is to expect the impossible. An author need only provide as much proof as his purpose, audience, and circumstances demand. In certain contexts, he can rightly assume that his audience can take the remaining steps on a path to a complete proof.
P. S. 2 -- My January 2, 2008 article on self-evidency was preliminary to this article on amount of proof. This article on amount of proof, in turn, is preliminary to another problem I have been wrestling with: What is the proper relationship between an intellectual and his audience? What do they owe each other, if anything? Originally these various subjects were a single cognitive traffic-jam. At least I have now sorted them onto three--interconnecting--roads. I am making progress.
IMAGINARY EXAMPLE: Let's say historian Dr. A writes an essay whose purpose is to persuade readers to adopt a certain idea. His publisher, the Journal of the Intellectual History of France in the Central Middle Ages, sets a length limit at only 2000 words. Within that limit, the historian must present and prove his thesis: Siger of Brabant--a teacher of liberal arts in the university at Paris, c. 1265--was the first academic to try to establish philosophy as an autonomous discipline, that is, a field of university study that is independent of the demands of the "science" of theology (the mistress whose handmaiden is philosophy).
Given the circumstances (for example, the brevity of the essay and the fact that an essay allows no question-and-answer process for clarification or elaboration), Dr. A realizes that he must hold modest expectations of success. He intends only to sketch the basic points of a line of proof for his theme.
In Dr. A's essay, a single sentence states his theme. Directly or indirectly, the other sentences (all statements about past reality) are elements of his proof of his theme. By citing primary and secondary sources in medieval and modern texts, the essay's footnotes elaborate some of the proofs or at least lead readers to further information and argumentation. By citing examples at various stages of his argument, he is connecting his theme to (past) reality, even if he is not offering a full, explicit chain of proof back to sense-perceptible reality.
Dr. A's essay is completely objective (that is, the conclusions follow logically from facts of reality) and yet it contains not even one self-evident statement. A proof is one form of validation, the form in which a thinker connects evidence (ultimately, sense-perceptible) step by logical step to his conclusion, the one to be proven.
In the chain of Dr. A's proof, reaching back from the theme to sense-perceptible reality, there is a "gap" between the lowest links in the chain of his proof and the sense-perceptible reality subsumed by his theme. This gap often appears in historical writing, wherein the "reality" of the past consists in a few artifacts--such as a thousand-year-old manuscript or an inscription chiseled on a stone monument--surviving from past times; such evidence must be interpreted and is not self-evident.
What an objective writer ultimately relies on to connect his theme to sense-perceptible reality, besides the immediate and necessarily abbreviated argument (proof) he presents, is the fact of shared context. In our example essay, Dr. A defines his intended audience as being at least graduate students in the field of medieval French history, specializing in 13th Century philosophical transmission.
By defining his audience in this narrow way, he is trying to ensure that he and his target readers have the same context--that is, the same set of relevant knowledge outside the immediate content of his essay. Presumably the writer and his readers can then, on demand, connect that shared context to sense-perceptible reality. For instance, given his theme and his definition of audience, Dr. A does not need to prove that a university existed in Paris in 1265. What he does need to prove, to some contextually-determined degree, is that Siger held and advocated the idea of autonomy for philosophy as a field of study in the university.
Especially outside the field of philosophy, objective writers seldom need to prove their themes down to the level of explicit self-evidencies. The writers and their intended audiences share a context of knowledge which, in turn, presumably they can, on demand, connect to sense-perceptible reality.
CONCLUSION. A writer needs to offer enough proof of his theme to achieve his purpose for the audience he is addressing in the chosen circumstances. All three factors--the writer's purpose, his intended audience, and his circumstances--set the context that drives the writer's decision to provide such-and-such amount of proof for his theme.
Burgess Laughlin
Author, The Power and the Glory: The Key Ideas and Crusading Lives of Eight Debaters of Reason vs. Faith
P. S. 1 -- Corollary: Criticizing an author, in a particular piece of writing, for "failing" to prove his case down to sense-perceptible reality is to expect the impossible. An author need only provide as much proof as his purpose, audience, and circumstances demand. In certain contexts, he can rightly assume that his audience can take the remaining steps on a path to a complete proof.
P. S. 2 -- My January 2, 2008 article on self-evidency was preliminary to this article on amount of proof. This article on amount of proof, in turn, is preliminary to another problem I have been wrestling with: What is the proper relationship between an intellectual and his audience? What do they owe each other, if anything? Originally these various subjects were a single cognitive traffic-jam. At least I have now sorted them onto three--interconnecting--roads. I am making progress.
Jan 2, 2008
Meaning of "self-evident"?
In Objectivism, the phrase "self-evident" refers to a certain kind of truth, that is, a certain kind of statement that identifies a fact of reality. Example statements about reality are:
- This table is brown.
- My computer is a Mac-mini.
- Most dogs bark.
- To survive and flourish, man requires freedom in society.
- Existence exists.
Which of these statements are self-evident? Ayn Rand observes: "The layman's error, in regard to philosophy, is the tendency to accept consequences while ignoring their causes--to take the end result of a long sequence of thought as the given and to regard it as 'self-evident' or as an irreducible primary, while neglecting its preconditions. [...] As a philosophical detective, you must remember that nothing is self-evident except the material of sensory perception."[1]
In the philosopy of Objectivism, there are no self-evidencies except philosophical axioms. An example axiom is: "Existence exists."[2] You look around, and you see things that are. Proof, in the form of an argument, is required to validate all other ideas.
An axiom is the widest of all abstractions, but it requires no further validation than sense-perception. The same rule applies, I would suggest, to particular, sense-perceptible concretes. An example is: "This table is brown." The fact that this particular table exists and is brown is self-evident to me. Not self-evident are what it is, in all its characteristics (weight, dimensions, and so forth); how it works (screws hold it together); and how much value it has for me (resale, very little).[3]
CONCLUSION. "Self-evidency" refers to the fact that sense-perception--and only sense-perception--is cognitively self-justifying, requiring no proof. "Self-evident" applies only to (1) philosophical axioms, which are validated by reference to sense-perception, and (2) the existence (but not the nature) of individual sense-perceptible entities. So, ironically, "self-evident" applies only to particular, sense-perceptible concretes and to the widest of abstractions.
Burgess Laughlin
Author, The Power and the Glory: The Key Ideas and Crusading Lives of Eight Debaters of Reason vs. Faith
[1] Ayn Rand, "Philosophical Detection," Philosophy: Who Needs It?, p. 15. I assume "sensory perception" here includes introspection of mental concretes. (For mental concretes: Ayn Rand, Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology, 2nd ed., p. 156.)
[2] Leonard Peikoff, Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand, p. 8.
[3] In informal discussion, an objective speaker might loosely say something like this: "The conclusion is self-evident." What he would mean is: "You who are listening to me have all the information you need. Draw a conclusion. And there is only one conclusion you can draw logically within the limits of our shared knowledge."
- This table is brown.
- My computer is a Mac-mini.
- Most dogs bark.
- To survive and flourish, man requires freedom in society.
- Existence exists.
Which of these statements are self-evident? Ayn Rand observes: "The layman's error, in regard to philosophy, is the tendency to accept consequences while ignoring their causes--to take the end result of a long sequence of thought as the given and to regard it as 'self-evident' or as an irreducible primary, while neglecting its preconditions. [...] As a philosophical detective, you must remember that nothing is self-evident except the material of sensory perception."[1]
In the philosopy of Objectivism, there are no self-evidencies except philosophical axioms. An example axiom is: "Existence exists."[2] You look around, and you see things that are. Proof, in the form of an argument, is required to validate all other ideas.
An axiom is the widest of all abstractions, but it requires no further validation than sense-perception. The same rule applies, I would suggest, to particular, sense-perceptible concretes. An example is: "This table is brown." The fact that this particular table exists and is brown is self-evident to me. Not self-evident are what it is, in all its characteristics (weight, dimensions, and so forth); how it works (screws hold it together); and how much value it has for me (resale, very little).[3]
CONCLUSION. "Self-evidency" refers to the fact that sense-perception--and only sense-perception--is cognitively self-justifying, requiring no proof. "Self-evident" applies only to (1) philosophical axioms, which are validated by reference to sense-perception, and (2) the existence (but not the nature) of individual sense-perceptible entities. So, ironically, "self-evident" applies only to particular, sense-perceptible concretes and to the widest of abstractions.
Burgess Laughlin
Author, The Power and the Glory: The Key Ideas and Crusading Lives of Eight Debaters of Reason vs. Faith
[1] Ayn Rand, "Philosophical Detection," Philosophy: Who Needs It?, p. 15. I assume "sensory perception" here includes introspection of mental concretes. (For mental concretes: Ayn Rand, Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology, 2nd ed., p. 156.)
[2] Leonard Peikoff, Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand, p. 8.
[3] In informal discussion, an objective speaker might loosely say something like this: "The conclusion is self-evident." What he would mean is: "You who are listening to me have all the information you need. Draw a conclusion. And there is only one conclusion you can draw logically within the limits of our shared knowledge."
Dec 16, 2007
What is a story?
In her essay "Art and Sense of Life," Ayn Rand differentiates "a real-life news story and a fiction story."[1] Her comments and my own interest in history lead me to wonder about stories in general, regardless of type. Following is my personal--not philosophical--definition. What I seek is (1) improvement on the basic approach of understanding a commonly-used but often ill-defined concept, and (2) comments on the basic nature of stories.
EXAMPLES. Stories may be short or long; fictional or factual; vast or minute in scope; and fast or slow in pace. Stories may be told from memory to a single listener, read aloud to a large audience, or read silently alone. Excluding borderline cases, a range of examples from my experience includes: (1) Short stories like the Br'er Rabbit tales, written for children, about imaginary, anthropomorphized animal heroes and villains. (2) Lloyd A. Brown's The Story of Maps (with 86 illustrations and hundreds of endnotes), describing 2000 years of the art and science of map-making. (3) Stories, true or false, that a person tells to explain a fading scar or why he was late for work this morning. (4) Stephen Ambrose's D-Day, a story of the causes and effects of the events happening on one day in one place: the Allied invasion of Normandy in World War II. (5) Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged, an 1168-page novel that has the widest of all possible themes, a metaphysical one: the relationship between consciousness and reality.
DEFINITION. What essential, distinguishing characteristics do all these stories have in common? In other words, what makes a story--a story? I don't yet have a completely satisfactory definition. I can suggest an approach. After collecting a range of examples from personal experience, an early step in defining an idea is deciding what kind of thing it refers to. This is the genus in the definition.
A story is a kind of accounting for things, that is, a story combines (1) identification, (2) explanation, and (3) evaluation of events. A story identifies a series of human events (or natural events important to people, such as a story of the rise and fall of dinosaurs); explains their relation to each other; and evaluates their significance, within the context set by a certain purpose valuable to the storyteller and listener. For example, if a man and his young son are walking through their neighborhood, and the young boy asks why a certain house they pass is decrepit and abandoned, the father might tell a story of how the house came to be that way.
The storyteller chooses which events will be the beginning and end of the story, based on the story's purpose, which may be implicit or explicit. The coherence resulting from an essential purpose distinguishes a story from a mere chronology or random collection of events.
Stories tell a sequence of events that lead causally to an end. The storyteller selects the events. A novelist creates from his imagination the events which will concretize his theme. A historian, as storyteller, picks those events which show the essentials of what happened, why it happened, and why it is important.
USES OF STORIES. I have seen people of all ages -- from toddlers to elders -- enthralled by stories. Why is there nearly universal interest in stories, in one form or another? A storyteller chooses a few events from a multitude of events, ties them together, and offers them as an explanation of something. For example, Leonard Peikoff's Ominous Parallels: The End of Freedom in America, tells two stories from history, in parallel: the philosophical slide from the age of enlightenment to the age of nihilism, first in Germany and then, increasingly, in the United States.
For the reader, Ominous Parallels will, says Ayn Rand, "bring order into the chaos of today's events."[2] I think that stories serve a function analogous to the unit-economy function of concepts.[3] In daily life we encounter a myriad of events. They may be large or small, nearby or distant, known through our own experiences or described by distant reporters. Stories help us make sense of those events.
The function of stories is both epistemological (in connecting disparate events) and psychological (in confirming that the world is intelligible). That is true of all stories. Certain stories--the "stand up and cheer" stories, whether they are fact or fiction--can be refueling as well.
SUMMARY. A story is a selective account of logically connected events, told for some purpose that offers values to the storyteller and audience. Stories confirm that events are causally connected, that we can make sense of them, and that--like all facts--they have value implications.
Burgess Laughlin
Author, The Power and the Glory: The Key Ideas and Crusading Lives of Eight Debaters of Reason vs. Faith
Notes: [1] The essay "Art and Sense of Life" appears in The Romantic Manifesto: A Philosophy of Literature, and the quote comes from the hardback edition, pp. 47-48. [2] Ayn Rand's comment about a use of Ominous Parallels comes from her Introduction to Leonard Peikoff, Ominous Parallels: The End of Freedom in America, p. ix (hb). [3] See Ayn Rand, Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology, Ch. 7, for unit economy of concepts.
EXAMPLES. Stories may be short or long; fictional or factual; vast or minute in scope; and fast or slow in pace. Stories may be told from memory to a single listener, read aloud to a large audience, or read silently alone. Excluding borderline cases, a range of examples from my experience includes: (1) Short stories like the Br'er Rabbit tales, written for children, about imaginary, anthropomorphized animal heroes and villains. (2) Lloyd A. Brown's The Story of Maps (with 86 illustrations and hundreds of endnotes), describing 2000 years of the art and science of map-making. (3) Stories, true or false, that a person tells to explain a fading scar or why he was late for work this morning. (4) Stephen Ambrose's D-Day, a story of the causes and effects of the events happening on one day in one place: the Allied invasion of Normandy in World War II. (5) Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged, an 1168-page novel that has the widest of all possible themes, a metaphysical one: the relationship between consciousness and reality.
DEFINITION. What essential, distinguishing characteristics do all these stories have in common? In other words, what makes a story--a story? I don't yet have a completely satisfactory definition. I can suggest an approach. After collecting a range of examples from personal experience, an early step in defining an idea is deciding what kind of thing it refers to. This is the genus in the definition.
A story is a kind of accounting for things, that is, a story combines (1) identification, (2) explanation, and (3) evaluation of events. A story identifies a series of human events (or natural events important to people, such as a story of the rise and fall of dinosaurs); explains their relation to each other; and evaluates their significance, within the context set by a certain purpose valuable to the storyteller and listener. For example, if a man and his young son are walking through their neighborhood, and the young boy asks why a certain house they pass is decrepit and abandoned, the father might tell a story of how the house came to be that way.
The storyteller chooses which events will be the beginning and end of the story, based on the story's purpose, which may be implicit or explicit. The coherence resulting from an essential purpose distinguishes a story from a mere chronology or random collection of events.
Stories tell a sequence of events that lead causally to an end. The storyteller selects the events. A novelist creates from his imagination the events which will concretize his theme. A historian, as storyteller, picks those events which show the essentials of what happened, why it happened, and why it is important.
USES OF STORIES. I have seen people of all ages -- from toddlers to elders -- enthralled by stories. Why is there nearly universal interest in stories, in one form or another? A storyteller chooses a few events from a multitude of events, ties them together, and offers them as an explanation of something. For example, Leonard Peikoff's Ominous Parallels: The End of Freedom in America, tells two stories from history, in parallel: the philosophical slide from the age of enlightenment to the age of nihilism, first in Germany and then, increasingly, in the United States.
For the reader, Ominous Parallels will, says Ayn Rand, "bring order into the chaos of today's events."[2] I think that stories serve a function analogous to the unit-economy function of concepts.[3] In daily life we encounter a myriad of events. They may be large or small, nearby or distant, known through our own experiences or described by distant reporters. Stories help us make sense of those events.
The function of stories is both epistemological (in connecting disparate events) and psychological (in confirming that the world is intelligible). That is true of all stories. Certain stories--the "stand up and cheer" stories, whether they are fact or fiction--can be refueling as well.
SUMMARY. A story is a selective account of logically connected events, told for some purpose that offers values to the storyteller and audience. Stories confirm that events are causally connected, that we can make sense of them, and that--like all facts--they have value implications.
Burgess Laughlin
Author, The Power and the Glory: The Key Ideas and Crusading Lives of Eight Debaters of Reason vs. Faith
Notes: [1] The essay "Art and Sense of Life" appears in The Romantic Manifesto: A Philosophy of Literature, and the quote comes from the hardback edition, pp. 47-48. [2] Ayn Rand's comment about a use of Ominous Parallels comes from her Introduction to Leonard Peikoff, Ominous Parallels: The End of Freedom in America, p. ix (hb). [3] See Ayn Rand, Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology, Ch. 7, for unit economy of concepts.
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