forum for week of 28 November: pragmatism

Talk of absolute truth boils down to a discussion of whether humans can speak of things 'objectively.' Finding an absolute truth in say, ethics, we could "attach" things to this truth, i.e. we could see how everything else we feel, see, perceive, know, etc, is related to this "one, absolute truth." Everything is given its position, its weight, its meaning; there is no shifting of the value of a thing or idea: Compassion is good, and that is the end of the matter. Never can compassion have its value to a person undermined, subverted, or changed; never can compassion be a harmful thing to you or others.

This seems to be a tragic flaw. It is the hanging on to certainty that some people cherish that is at work here. Instead of leaving our ethical questions "up for discussion," we close off the discussion. Part of the reason is fear, I believe. Instead of admitting imperfection in life, in others, and in our way of relating to others, the hangers-on-to-certainty (absolute truthists, dogmatic people of any faith or belief system, etc) would rather cover over this uncertainty and say "there is a moral T-truth to be discovered, there is a "way things just are ethically." The hanging on to certainty seems romantic, not in the candles and fireplace kind of way, to me; it is holding out for something "perfect" (a capital-t Truth in ethics, that is, in the way humans relate to one another), trying to discover the perfect way that we can get along.

But instead of aiming for perfection here, why not say that we will relate to one another imperfectly from the start. And why not ask ourselves "how can we do better?" The other question, the one opposite to the one I just proposed, "how do we find a way things are (in ethics)" seems to imply that we can find this "way things are," and then, seemingly, do something as a result of finding this Truth, this "way things are." But what would we do? Do people actually expect this to work out for humans?

It is hard to engage Rorty head-on. This is because much disagreement with his ideas will boil down to first-order principles. So, you gotta ask yourself: Do I want to find a way things are? OR Do I want to find a way to make things better? Does the first option really seem reasonable? Does the first option really seem desireable? Does it seem desireable, in the face of all the effort it would take, to find the way things are? OR Should we admit our flaws and imperfections and see if we can spend our energies, whether physical, emotional, or psychological, on making things a bit better.

It is hard to engage Rorty head-on. This is because much disagreement with his ideas will boil down to first-order principles. For my money, fear (of admitting imperfection, and admitting that ethics is subjective) seemsto be at work in the first option, and its corollary. But so does hope, and romanticism. But it is, I argue, and so would Rorty, that this hope is misguided.