Free choice and personal responsbility?

[Dubversion]

probably worth looking at Berlin and Rawls' conceptions of negative and positive liberty, it does tie-in

 

[nosos]

Obviously it's a nonsense to say that people are purely passive victims of circumstance, but it's an equal nonsense to say that everyone has equally free choices (or that "free choice" even means anything - surely it implies abstract individuals all equally "free" to do whatever they like).

There's two extreme and (psychologically, sociologically and philosophically) implausible models of the self here: the self as radically free (entirely self-subsistent and devoid of external commitments which partly constitute it) and the self as radically situated (entirely constituted by its social roles). There's also two different questions here. In terms of responsibility, the only plausible response to these two extremes is to take the middle way: the structures within which the self is situated determine the range of its options but the self is still capable of choosing. I'm responsible for my choice but not responsible for the structures which determine the range and feasibility of the options from which I choose.

However the picture gets more complex because the seperation of "self" (agency) from "structure" is a fiction used so we can talk about these issues in the abstract. In reality the two are interconnected and they're co-constitutive: structures are made through the actions of agents and agents are constituted through the structures in which we find ourselves. They're not self-subsistent wholes capable of surving on their own. Each is perpetually contaminated by the other. It's not just the material options available to me that are determined by the structures in which I find myself situation. Those structures actually partially constitute my selfhood: in ways I'm entirely unconcious of, in ways I'm entirely concious of and in a multitude of ways between the two poles of awareness. On the most abstract (in a sense the most basic level) the concepts we use to order our universe aren't created anew by each child. We take them on board during socialisation.

More specifically in terms of selfhood, I occupy many social roles within those structures but I am not those social roles. There's more to me than that. However those social roles are also an integral part of who I am. I have freedom but it's not a freedom of radical choice, it's a freedom consisting in a constant possibility of reassessment of the roles I occupy and struggling to break free from them. My individuality needs recognition from the group: without the group I'm no individual. Yet the group also represents the threat to that individuality. If I become too near to the group my individuality is negated. If I become too far from the group my individuality is negated. The preservation of my individuality depends on a perpetual renegotiation of the relationship between self and group. It's the way this abstract tension is negotiated in childhood and adolesence which is largely responsible for how each and every one of us is fucked up in our own way.

No man share in joint undertakings with his fellows without imposing limits on he degree to which he differs from them, for these endeavours presuppose common values and beliefs. But to become fully transparent to others and to lose all sense of them as antagonistic wills, his understandings and ends would have to coincide with theirs. Thus, he would case to be an individual. […] [This manifests itself in] the experience of the conflict between the hope that one might think for oneself and the need to be understood or, to rephrase it in a stronger and negative form, between the fear of enslavement and the fear of madness.

A life spent entirely in public, in the presence of others, becomes, as we would say, shallow. While it retains its visibility, it loses the quality of rising into sight from some darker ground which must remain hidden if it is not to lose its depth in a very real, non-subjective sense. The only efficient way to guarantee the darkness of what needs to be hidden against the light of publicity is private property, a privately owned place to hide in

If we don't have somewhere to hide, we cease to be what we are. However the disengaged (abstract) individual is one who is perpetually hiding from others. That's why its caused such harm to the social world as its spread. Charles Taylor suggests that the idea manifests an earlier urge to spiritual purity: it's a secularisation of our desire for spiritual freedom through leaving behind the constraints of the material world.

 

[Brainaddict]

The preservation of my individuality depends on a perpetual renegotiation of the relationship between self and group.

I think that 'perpetual renogotiation' will make sense in a very literal way to members of this society. What I find interesting is that there were traditional societies, very community based but who also valued the idea of the individual very highly, for whom there seemed to be little or no struggle in terms of positioning themselves within the group. A balanced approach seemed to be embedded in their culture.
It interests me because in our atomised culture I think the fact that people have to position themselves in relation to the group, starting almost from scratch, causes enormous amounts of stress and has a high failure rate.

But this is digressing slightly.

 

[nosos]

It interests me because in our atomised culture I think the fact that people have to position themselves in relation to the group, starting almost from scratch, causes enormous amounts of stress and has a high failure rate.

The individualism of our cultures has gone hand-in-hand with the decline of the beurocracy with the advent of the knowledge economy (the neccesity of corporate flexibility, the causalisation of the work force, global mobility of capital) and the fracturing of an (apparantly) unified moral horizen. Individuals are under more stress than ever before to self-narritivize while the resources they are able to utilise (shared moral, political and cultural material) and the socio-political moorings they have to orientate themselves are in terminal decline. We are more free than ever before and yet also more lost. Hence the growth of unreason given that the progress of enlightenment reason has dissolved all those markers of certainity and security on which we used to rely. People turn away from reason because reason has destroyed our maps then set us lose in a world we didn't create.

 

[Johnny Canuck3]

and agents are constituted through the structures in which we find ourselves.

What does that mean?

 

[danny la rouge]

We are social animals; our relationship with others is very literally part of who we are. As the OP suggested, we construct our notions of Self from feedback from others. In the most basic formulation, that follows this pattern:

Individual action => social reaction (SR) => individual’s assimilation of SR => modified individual action.

However, within those middle two steps is contained almost the whole discipline of social science, so you’ll understand there is more to it than that.

First of all, in the case of psychopathy and other similar conditions, the SR might be ignored, or used in different ways to that which you might expect.

Secondly, the SR – the feedback – needs to be viewed as trustworthy and accurate. Many people will be thinking of children learning. It is a good model. But though a child will assimilate information from a variety of social sources, deliberate feedback – praise from a teacher, say - might be one of the least valued feedback sources. If the teacher is not giving specific feedback - “the way you’ve drawn the head of that dog has a lot of good detail” rather than “what a lovely drawing” - it might be discarded. The child will be adept at knowing whether all drawings are uniformly pronounced “lovely”.

In primary schools, children are often organised into groups. Seldom are these called The Stars, The Average Group, and The Duffers. But children know very well which is which; my own daughter told me recently that she was in the green group in maths now, which meant she’d been “put up a group”. The teacher says he’d never call it “being put up” or “being put down” and has never discussed which group is which, but the kids know, nonetheless.

So, the information used to form the Self is not always obvious, and not always intended.

Furthermore, there is not one uniform Society giving uniform feedback. There are conflicting feedbacks, and numerous societal groups giving them. A member of a subgroup might see the disapproval of one group as a motivating factor; something that will stand them in good stead in the group they seek approval from.

In all of this, the individual is not the passive recipient of feedback, which they unquestioningly assimilate. The individual is an agent in that process. We are social animals, but the relationship between society and the individual is one that both are party to. I don’t mean this is the sense of a Rousseau-like social contract, but in the sense that social behaviour is not unthinkingly mechanical.


In a hurry now, but more to come.

 

[Blagsta]

What I'm especially interested in, is the psychological/emotional aspects. Given that current research strongly suggests that our early years are vitally important in how we form relationships in later life, our emotional security/stability etc, how responsible are we when it comes to our emotional reactions in later life? Doing the work that I do, I ponder on this all the time. Example - someone who was brought up in care and sexually abused in care by several different people who later went on to have a crack habit and work as a male prostitute. Presents as very rational, good rapport, good insight. Has a history of depression, self harm and violence to others. Gets very paranoid and mistrustful, experiences internal voice of abuser when under emotional stress and acts out the huge anger he is carrying around onto other people. No psychiatric diagnosis, but I would suspect borderline personality disorder. Now this person gets into extreme emotional states and acts out - I wouldn't say he has full free choice when this happens or has full personal responsibility. It's only with help that he can gain insight into why he gets like this. As I said, he presents as rational and definitely not psychotic (although I would argue that when under emotional strain and acting out, he is in a state akin to psychosis). How much personal responsibility does he have? How much choice did he have in how his life turned out? Obviously with the insight he is gaining, he can now exercise more choice and responsibility, given that he is starting to identify situations where he may lose it and act out. However, how much choice and responsibility did he have as a teenager when acting out? This is just one example among many.

I realise that I'm presenting an extreme case (although sadly, all too common a story), but in some ways we are all like this. Hardly anyone feels in full control of their emotions at all times, we all get angry, a lot of us have experienced the "red mist" and the irrationality of extreme emotion (whether it be anger, love, grief, anxiety, whatever). How conscious and in control we are of this seems to have a lot to do with how we were cared for as very young children. The best we can do as adults is try to become more conscious of these unconscious and irrational states we can all experience...but this can be very hard.

I'm grappling with where this leaves free will - we obviously have it, we have agency in all this, but how much?

 

[Blagsta]

The individualism of our cultures has gone hand-in-hand with the decline of the beurocracy with the advent of the knowledge economy (the neccesity of corporate flexibility, the causalisation of the work force, global mobility of capital) and the fracturing of an (apparantly) unified moral horizen. Individuals are under more stress than ever before to self-narritivize while the resources they are able to utilise (shared moral, political and cultural material) and the socio-political moorings they have to orientate themselves are in terminal decline. We are more free than ever before and yet also more lost. Hence the growth of unreason given that the progress of enlightenment reason has dissolved all those markers of certainity and security on which we used to rely. People turn away from reason because reason has destroyed our maps then set us lose in a world we didn't create.

I think one of the problems also, is that the enlightenment was a transition in thinking from the irrationality of the world/humans/gods to reason and rationality. Unfortunately, humans aren't rational all of the time, reason alone isn't enough to understand human experience and the human condition.

 

[Blagsta]

In the most basic formulation, that follows this pattern:

Individual action => social reaction (SR) => individual’s assimilation of SR => modified individual action.

I'm not sure if we can start with "Individual action". None of us are ever soley individuals. Babies have mothers, carers, they receive feedback all the time, even before birth. The concept of the dyad is more useful here I think.

 

[laptop]

The concept of the dyad is more useful here I think.

Rhizome, innit

 

[Blagsta]

Rhizome, innit

Hmmmm...makes me think of Deleuze & Guattari.

*shudders*

 

[laptop]

Hmmmm...makes me think of Deleuze & Guattari.

'Fraid so

*shudders*

Ah, but was that a socially-constructed shudder?

 

[Donna Ferentes]

What is 'a nonsense'?

It's just 'nonsense'.

Nonsense.

 

[Blagsta]

'Fraid so

Arggghh! I have a copy of Brian Massumi's "A User's Guide to Capitalism and Schizophrenia" that a friend gave me a few years ago. Apparently it makes D&G more accesible. Can't make head nor tail of it personally.

Ah, but was that a socially-constructed shudder?

Indeed. Reminds me of too many Nathan Barley wannabes wanking on about D&G in the late 90's/early 00's.

 

[xenon]

How can we have both free choice and be products of our environment?

Doesn't the free choice aspect just mean a level of autonomy to interact with that environment? Sounds obvious I know. But I mean as opposed to total free will whereby you can carve out your own reality and within practical limits, escape your physical surround.

*Disclaimer. High bollox quotient due to just thinking allowed*

 

[xenon]

On the face of it yes they're contradictions. With interesting implications for the concept of freedom; it being a scared value within secular democratic societies.

I don't really see them as totally mutrilly exclusive. Maybe I'm devaluing the idea of free choice. But I see it as merely freedom to operate within certain parameters. Some have more of these parameters imposed on them by their social circumstances or personal reasoning abilities of course.

Absolute freedom doesn't exist.

 

[Demosthenes]

How can we have both free choice and be products of our environment?

Kant said something along the lines of:

In the phenomenal reality, we're subject to the law of causation, but in the noumenal reality we're free, because since time and space are features of the phenomenal world, they're not features of the noumenal Reality, and so since causation depends on temporality, it doesn't exist in the noumenal Reality.

I think..

 

[Blagsta]

Kant said something along the lines of:

In the phenomenal reality, we're subject to the law of causation, but in the noumenal reality we're free, because since time and space are features of the phenomenal world, they're not features of the noumenal Reality, and so since causation depends on temporality, it doesn't exist in the noumenal Reality.

I think..

I don't understand this.

 

[Fruitloop]

I wouldn't let that trouble you overmuch.

 

[xenon]

What's the noumenal reality?

 

[Demosthenes]

Yeah cause anything that fruitloop doesn't understand is by definition bollocks, - he practically defines understanding.

I'm not sure I understand it myself. I just put it down as kant's resolution of the free will determinism problem.

Because leaving aside mechanistic determinism, - we reckon in human reality, that we do things for reasons, and if we do things for reasons, then those reasons are the causes of our actions, - but if our actions have causes, and are effects of those causes, then how can we say they're free, and if we can't say they're free, how can we talk about moral responsibility?

Which was blagsta's question, and it's not a new one.

kant's solution was that space and time, and cause and effect are the filters that define the human experience of Reality(noumena) and create the human reality(phenomena)

As we exist in two worlds, it's possible for actions to be caused in one world, but free in the other.

 

[Blagsta]

It's an idealist/dualist explanation? Have I understood that correctly? I reject idealism and dualism. I'm a materialist and monist.

 

[butchersapron]

It's a total and utter misreading of kant. How could you even know what did or didn't exist in the noumenal world? The existence of classifiying structural categories of phenomenal experience (not the phenomenal 'world') mean precisely nothing in relation to noumena.

 

[Demosthenes]

It's an idealist/dualist explanation? Have I understood that correctly? I reject idealism and dualism. I'm a materialist and monist.

something like, - I don't think it's idealist/dualist in quite the way you think of it, - . It's very sophisticated, - takes an entire book to explain, (and mainly, I've only read what other people say about it)- some guy once had a dream, apparently, that he'd discovered some unknown book by Kant that really explained everything, in an antiques shop, but when he opened it, he discovered it was written in a language nobody could understand....

But if you're a materialist and monist, - I don't see how you're going to possibly answer your own question. There just isn't anyway I can see of making sense of morality in a materialist monist worldview.

Not that I think there's anything wrong with monism, maybe, - it's the materialism and the monism together that make it problematic.

 

[Demosthenes]

It's a total and utter misreading of kant. How could you even know what did or didn't exist in the noumenal world? The existence of classifiying structural categories of phenomenal experience (not the phenomenal 'world') mean precisely nothing in relation to noumena.

Well, it's not a total misreading of Kant, as some respected kantian philosophers are known by me to have thought that he said something of the sort.

And, by logical argument, if space and time and cause and effect are the categories through which we construct phenomonenal reality, then, they don't exist in noumenal reality.

But it's not an argument I want to have particularly,

if you insist on it, quote chapter and verse in Kant, with page references, to show I'm wrong.. otherwise leave it.

 

[butchersapron]

It's an idealist/dualist explanation? Have I understood that correctly? I reject idealism and dualism. I'm a materialist and monist.

It's nothing to do with any of that. it's quite simple really. We are set up to interpret things in certain ways - i.e in terms of time and space, we put that stamp on everything we experience - we don't and can't know what it was before we put that stamp on it. After it gets the stamp it's phenomenal and known to us through going through our filter, before that it's unknown, noumenal -wre have no idea whatsoever.

 

[Demosthenes]

It's nothing to do with any of that. it's quite simple really. We are set up to interpret things in certain ways - i.e in terms of time and space, we put that stamp on everything we experience - we don't and can't know what it was before we put that stamp on it. After it gets the stamp it's phenomenal and known to us through going through our filter, before that it's unknown, noumenal -wre have no idea whatsoever.

that's basically right, but, we can have a very limited knowledge of the noumenal, by knowing what it's not. And we can guess that somehow, the phenomenal world supervenes on the noumenal.

 

[butchersapron]

Well, it's not a total misreading of Kant, as some respected kantian philosophers are known by me to have thought that he said something of the sort.

And, by logical argument, if space and time and cause and effect are the categories through which we construct phenomonenal reality, then, they don't exist in noumenal reality.

But it's not an argument I want to have particularly,

if you insist on it, quote chapter and verse in Kant, with page references, to show I'm wrong.. otherwise leave it.

I bet it ain't an argument you particularly want to have

 

[Blagsta]

It's nothing to do with any of that. it's quite simple really. We are set up to interpret things in certain ways - i.e in terms of time and space, we put that stamp on everything we experience - we don't and can't know what it was before we put that stamp on it. After it gets the stamp it's phenomenal and known to us through going through our filter, before that it's unknown, noumenal -wre have no idea whatsoever.

Oh, that. My take on that is that it's meaningless then to talk about the noumenal, we only know what we can experience. I'm not sure what it has to do with my OP though?

 

[Demosthenes]

No I don't.

But if you insist on having it, I will prove you wrong. But, you'll have to do the hard work of trawling through the critique of pure reason, not me.