Man as Onion?

Eric Hoffer, The Passionate State of Mind and Other Aphorisms (New York: Harper & Bros., 1955), p. 62, Aph. # 96: 

Man's being is neither profound nor sublime. To search for something deep underneath the surface in order to explain human phenomena is to discard the nutritious outer layer for a nonexistent core. Like a bulb man is all skin and no kernel.

I disagree completely. Man is no onion or bulb, surface all the way down, with a nonexistent core. "Man is a stream whose source is hidden." (R. W. Emerson, "The Over-Soul") The central task of life is not to write merely clever aphorisms, but to return to the Source.

Or perhaps I should say that what the stevedore says is true — of extroverts.

Related: Seriousness as Camouflage of Nullity.  (On the topic of death.)

An Unsound Argument Against National Borders

The Dark Ostrich extracts the following argument from a TED video:

(1) It is wrong that anyone subject to the force of the law should not be subject to its protection, but

(2) those immediately outside the border and forcibly prevented from entering are subject to the force of the law but not its protection, ergo

(3) this is wrong.

The conclusion follows from the premises, but the conclusion is false. Therefore, one of the premises is false.  Which one? The first. To accept (1) is equivalent to rejecting nations and their sovereignty.

If you insist that the above deductive argument is sound in the technical sense in which most philosophers use the term (valid in point of logical form and possessing premises all of which are true), then I will point out that it is not rationally compelling.  

For it can be run in reverse with no breach of logical propriety.  "One man's modus ponens is another man's modus tollens."

I could also say that the above argument begs the question at the first premise.

If you accuse me of begging the question, then I say we have a stand-off. I will then suggest that you leave my country and go live in the borderless world of your dreams.

…………………………..

Jacques responds:

"If you accuse me of begging the question, then I say we have a stand-off. I will then suggest that you leave my country and go live in the borderless world of your dreams."

I think it's not even a stand-off (rationally).  Either premise 2 is patently false, or the argument is just invalid, or 1 has to be interpreted in such a way that 1 is patently false: 

First of all, when American immigration agents (legally) deport people or keep them from entering the country, they usually do so in ways that are legal relative to American law.  And they can be charged with crimes themselves if they don't.  They don't mow down would-be illegal immigrants with machine guns or drop them back in Mexico from helicopters.  They don't force them to convert to Islam or steal their pocket change.  When aliens [are] being deported or prevented from entering [,] the legal standing or rights assigned to such people by American law are generally respected, and are supposed to be respected under American law.  So 2 is patently false on one reasonable interpretation. 

BV: I agree.

Maybe the meaning of premise 2 is that illegal aliens, or would-be illegal aliens, are not legally granted exactly the same protections (rights or powers or whatever) as some other people–American citizens, for example.  But then, in order for the argument to be valid, premise 1 would have to say something like this:

BV: That is the way I read premise (2).

(1*) It is wrong that anyone subject to the force of the law should not be subject to all the same legal 'protections'  to which any other arbitrary person subject to the force of the law is subject.

BV: And that is the way I read premise (1).

But 1* is even more absurd than 1.  If 1* were true, then all the following scenarios would be morally wrong:

i. The President of the United States is legally protected by the Secret Service in ways that some Americans are not.

ii. Some citizens who are poor and unemployed are legally protected against starvation and life-threatening illness by means of welfare payments and publicly subsidized healthcare but the President of the United States is not.

iii. Some citizens who are not convicted child molesters are legally protected against certain forms of invasion of privacy in ways that citizens who are convicted child molesters are not.

iv. Some citizens who are not in the process of carrying out an armed robbery are legally protected against gunfire from police officers but some of those who are in the process of carrying out armed robberies are not.

v. Female citizens are legally protected against sexual harassment in ways that male citizens are not.

vi. Citizens who are 7 years old are legally protected against certain forms of self-harm–doing tequila shots at strip clubs, for example, or having sexual relationships with people who are 30 years old–but some other citizens are not. 

BV: Those are all good points.

Well, this could go on for a while.  So either 2 is patently false or 1, on the relevant interpretation, is patently false. 

BV: I say that (1) is false, (2) is true, charitably interpreted, the argument is valid but unsound. I think we agree or could agree on this.

Why then did I say that it is a stand-off?  Because the open borders defender could bite the bullet and insist on (1)/(1*).  To so insist is equivalent to denying the moral legitimacy of nation-states and their sovereignty. If he is denying said legitimacy, and I am affirming it in virtue of running the argument in reverse, then we are at loggerheads and we have a stand-off. 

Of course I could go on to argue why we have need of nation-states and why they are morally justified. But then we are deep into the bowels of political philosophy. What if the opponent turns out to be a (philosophical) anarchist who denies the moral justification of states and their coercive powers?  We will soon encounter other stand-offs. For example, we will soon enough enter the philosophy of human nature (philosophical anthropology).  What if he takes the anarchist line that people are by nature good and that states and their laws are corrupt and corrupting? Of course, one can argue against that too, and as a conservative I will, but have sophisticated anarchists been decisively refuted to the satisfaction of all competent practitioners of political philosophy?

The task of the political philosopher is to dig down to the deepest underpinnings of the 'surface' debates such as DACA, the need for a border wall, etc.  Unfortunately, when we dig deep, we find that we cannot get to bedrock, a bedrock upon which we can all agree.

I fear that I must now open the ComBox.

Democrats Undermine the Foundations of Rational Discourse

Rational discourse requires observance of a few simple procedural rules. One of the most basic is to use words and phrases in their commonly accepted senses and to refrain from distorting them for partisan purposes.  Take 'chain migration.' According to Wikipedia, a usually reliable source, 

Chain migration is a term used by demographers since the 1960s[1] to refer to the social process by which migrants from a particular town follow others from that town to a particular destination city or neighborhood. The destination may be in another country or in a new, usually urban, location within the same country.

Chain migration can be defined as a “movement in which prospective migrants learn of opportunities, are provided with transportation, and have initial accommodation and employment arranged by means of primary social relationships with previous migrants.”[1] Or, more simply put: "The dynamic underlying 'chain migration' is so simple that it sounds like common sense: People are more likely to move to where people they know live, and each new immigrant makes people they know more likely to move there in turn."

As you can see, 'chain migration' is a phrase that has been in use for a long time. It is no more a racist slur than 'black hole' is.  Why then does Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D NY) say it is?  You know the answer.

Jonah Goldberg:

A more recent example comes in the novel claim that the term “chain migration” is a racist shibboleth. Chain migration is — or was — an utterly neutral term for the process by which legal immigrants sponsor members of their extended family to become citizens as well.

Rep Chris Murphy, D-Conn., tweeted recently, “Reminder: ‘chain migration’ is a made-up term by the hard-line anti-immigration crowd. Its purpose is to dehumanize immigrants. If you're using that word, you're declaring a side.”

Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., refuses to even use the phrase. Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., insists the term — which he used as recently as 2010 — is offensive because African Americans came here in chains. Sen. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, insists that " 'chain migration' is an epithet. It was invented. The term is ‘family immigration,’ and it’s the way America has literally always worked.” Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., made a figurative clown of herself when she literally said, “Let's be very clear: When someone uses the phrase 'chain migration,' it is intentional in trying to demonize families, literally trying to demonize families and make it a racist slur.”

This is just more evidence that our political opponents are not fellow citizens with whom we can have productive discussions. They are domestic enemies and we are in a war. You may not want to accept that. I didn't for a long time. But the fact is now unblinkable.

Don't imagine that you can reason with them. They will ignore what you say and go right back to the recitation of their defamatory litany: racist, white supremacist, xenophobe, . . . . You need to disembarrass yourself of the notion that they are basically decent people. They are not. 

Presentism and the Existence Requirement

Why do some find  the Existence Requirement self-evident? Could it be because of a (tacit) commitment to presentism?  

Here again is the Existence Requirement:

(ER) In order for something to be bad  for somebody, that person must exist at the time it is bad for him. (D. Benatar, The Human Predicament, 111,115)

Assuming mortalism, after death a person no longer exists. It is easy to see that mortalism in conjunction with the Existence Requirement entails that being dead is not bad for the person who dies. (of course it might be bad for others, but this is not the issue.)  Our Czech colleague Vlastimil V., though he is not a mortalist, accepts this line of reasoning. For he finds (ER) to be well-nigh self-evident. Vlastimil's view, then, is that if one is a mortalist, then then one ought to hold that the dead are not in a bad way; they are not, for example, deprived of the goods they would have had had they been alive.

Initially, I thought along the same lines. But now it seems less clear to me. For now I suspect that a tacit or explicit commitment to the questionable doctrine of presentism is what is driving the sense that (ER) is self-evident. Let's think about this.

At a first approximation, presentism is the ontological thesis that only present items exist. But 'present' has several senses, so we'd better say that on presentism, only temporally present items exist.  If so, then what is wholly past does not exist, and likewise for what is wholly future. But let's not worry about future items. And to avoid questions about so-called abstract objects, which either exist at all times or else timelessly, let us restrict ourselves to concreta. So for present purposes, pun intended,

P. Presentism is the ontological thesis that, for concrete items, only temporally present items exist.

Note that 'exist' in (P) cannot be present-tensed on pain of siring the tautology, Only what exists now exists now. The idea is rather that only what exists now exists simpliciter.

Consider Tom Petty who died recently.  On mortalism, he no longer exists. On presentism, what no longer exists (i.e., what existed but does not now exist) does not exist at all. So on presentism, Petty does not exist at all. If so, dead Petty cannot be subject to harms or deprivations. 

It is beginning to look as if presentism is what is driving the Existence Requirement. For if presentism is true it is impossible that a person be subject to a harm or deprivation at a time at which he does not presently exist. For a time at which he does not presently exist is a time at which he does not exist at all. And if he does not exist at all, then he cannot be subject to harm or deprivation.  

What if presentism is false? One way for it to be false is if the 'growing block' theory is true. We could also call it past-and-presentism. On this theory past and present items exist, but no future items exist.

On the 'growing block' theory, dead Petty exists. (This is obviously not a present-tensed use of 'exists.') He does not exist at present, but he exists in the sense that he belongs to the actual world.  Once actual, always actual. Is this wholly clear? No, but it is tolerably clear and plausible. After all, we are making singular reference to Petty, a concrete actual individual, as we speak, and this is a good reason to hold that he exists, not at present of course, but simpliciter.

But what does this mean? It is not easy to explain. But if we don't have a notion of existence simpliciter, then we won't be able to make any of of the following substantive (non-tautological) claims:

A. Presentism: Only what exists now exists simpliciter.

B. Past-and-Presentism: Only what exists now and what did exist exists simpliciter.

C. Futurism: Only what exists in the future exists simpliciter.

D. Eternalism: All past, present, and future items exist simpliciter.

We understand these theories, more or less despite the questions they raise; we understand how the theories differ, and we understand that (C) is absurd. So we have an understanding of existence simpliciter. Perhaps we could say that x exists simpliciter just in case x  is actual as opposed to merely possible.

I consider (B) preferable to (A). 

We don't want to say that a dead man becomes nothing after death since he remains a particular, completely determinate, dead man distinct from others. If the dead become nothing after death then all the dead would be the same. If your dead father and your dead mother are both nothing, then there is nothing to distinguish them.  I am assuming the reality of the past. The assumption is not obvious. An anti-realist about the past might say that the past exists only in memory and thus not in reality. But that strains credulity unless you bring God into the picture and put him to work, as presentist Alan Rhoda does in Presentism, Truthmakers, and God.

Nor do we want to say that a person who dies goes from being actual to being merely possible. There is clearly a distinction between an actual past individual and a merely possible past individual.  Schopenhauer is an actual past individual; his only son Willy is a merely possible past individual.

Now suppose that something like the 'growing block' theory is true. Then one would have reason to reject the Existence Requirement.  One would have reason to reject the claim that a thing can be a subject of harm/deprivation only when it exists (present tense).  One could hold that Petty is deprived of musical pleasure on the strength of his having existed. Having existed, he exists simpliciter. Existing simpliciter, he is available to be the subject of harms, deprivations, awards, posthumous fame, and what all else. 

Summary

If I am on the right track, one who subscribes to the Existence Requirement must also subscribe to presentism. But presentism is by no means self-evident. (ER) inherits this lack of self-evidence.  This supports my earlier claim that the following aporetic triad is rationally insoluble:

1) Mortalism: Death ends a person's existence.

2) Existence Requirement: For something to be bad for somebody, he must exist at the time it is bad for him.

3) Badness of Death: Being dead is bad for the one who dies.

The Epicurean denies (3) and accepts (1) and (2). Benatar denies (2) and accepts (1) and (3). I say we have no rationally compelling reason to go either way. 

Related articles
Benatar on Annihilation and the Existence Requirement
Benatar, Death, and Deprivation
David Benatar on Death and the Challenge of the Epicurean Argument in its Hedonist Form

DACA: It’s About Sovereignty

W. Hunsecker:

Schumer, in his bid for political prominence, did much more than simply, temporarily put the interests of illegal immigrants ahead of the American public who he was elected to serve.  Rather, he endorsed a program – DACA – which does nothing less than facilitate threats to U.S. security and, ultimately sovereignty. DACA has emboldened a population – which has no standing in the American electoral process – to disenfranchise legitimate American voters by participating in an array of political actions which are meant to shape the government and influence policy.  This same population also erodes U.S. elements of national power by claiming places – and potentially displacing citizen and legal permanent resident candidates – in institutions of higher education. Finally, the DACA population represents a potential fifth column for state and non-state actors seeking individuals with little allegiance to (and demonstrated animosity against) the U.S. government.

Democrats: The New Palestinians on Immigration

Roger L. Simon:

Just as the Palestinians twenty-five years and four significant offers after Oslo have demonstrated they really don't want a two-state solution with the Israelis, Democrats have now revealed they don't want to solve the U.S.e immigration problem.

As with the Palestinians, it's all a shell game.

Donald Trump just offered the Dems an agreement on DACA that gives two million "Dreamers" a pathway to full citizenship after 10-12 years — something not even done by Barack Obama! — and the Dems didn't even want to discuss the proposal.  All that happened was their increasingly unhinged minority leader screamed Trump was "making America safe for white people!"

Wonder if the rabid press dogs who all but rolled on the floor begging that Navy doctor to say Trump was somehow unfit or senile after scoring 100% on a cognitive test would demand the same thirty questions be put to Ms. Pelosi?

Never mind.  The point is that Pelosi revealed herself to be a repellent racist… or racialist (someone who plays the race card no matter what). More importantly, the Democratic Party unmasked themselves as not all that interested in the "Dreamers" as people.  They just want to make the Republicans look, well, racist and lose elections. Otherwise they would be jumping up and down for this proposal.

Nancy Pelosi is the stupidest woman in American politics as is obvious if you simply listen to her rants. Stupid and vile, though not as vile as Maxine Waters. Nancy's fund-raising abilities, however, endear her to the destructive Dems. 

Related: Nancy Pelosi on the Word. You won't believe it.

Hillary the Irrelevant

Poor Hillary is reduced to reading from a crummy book  at the Grammys while President Donald J. Trump prepares for his first State of the Union address.

Hillary the Inevitable has become Hillary the Irrelevant.

Meanwhile, Hollywood liberals 'argue' that border control, a constitutionally-mandated function of the Federal government, is 'white supremacist' and that a physical barrier is a symbol of hate.  Actress Alyssa Milano tweets:

Let’s be clear: Donald Trump’s attacks on immigrants are rooted in white supremacy. His racist wall is a symbol of hate.

How could any reasonable person disagree with that?

On Making a Splash and Making a Dent

Years ago an acquaintance wrote me about a book he had published which, he said, had "made quite a splash." The metaphor is unfortunately double-edged. When an object hits the water it makes a splash. But only moments later the water returns to its quiescent state as if nothing had happened.

Perhaps it would have been more in the spirit of self-promotion to say that his book had made quite a dent. A splash is ephemeral and what makes it sinks. A dent, however, lasts and the denting object remains in sight.

On second thought the first is the more apt metaphor given the quality of the book in question. It captures both the immediate significance of an event and its long-term insignificance.