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The hierarchy we were presented with by Socrates in “The Republic” appeared out of the blue without any discussion of the origins or History of actual political regimes. This, of course, was a reflection of the Platonic conviction that there is only one possible regime that fully manifests the range of virtues that are subsumed under the Form of the Good. Aristotle, in his reflections on Politics, disagrees with this position on the Grounds given in his Nichomachean ethics, namely, that Good has many meanings. One man, a few men or many men may all rule wisely in accordance with the Principle of the Golden Mean and the range of virtues required for wise rule. The condition of the possibility for such good government is, of course, that a range of vices including the life of luxury and arrogance have not permeated the souls of either the citizens or the rulers.
It was Aristotle’s Political vision, rather than Plato’s, which would millennia later, inspire Kantian Ethical/Political Philosophy. Kant in his political reflections also referred to human nature, claiming that men essentially manifest a characteristic he terms “unsocial sociability” which, in turn, is associated with a tendency toward antagonism in relation to his fellow man. This, for Kant, was the source of the arrogance Plato referred to in “The Laws”. Both this antagonism and arrogance have to be overcome if Aristotles ideal of friendship or fellowship between all citizens is to be actualised in the polis. Cleinias, at the opening of book 4 refers to this issue:
“But you wanted to explain what the legislator ought to aim at in the matter of friendship and good judgement and liberty.”(P.143)
The Athenians response to this is:
“There are two mother constitutions, so to speak, which you could fairly say have given birth to all the others. Monarchy is the proper name for the first, and democracy for the second. The former has been taken to extremes by the Persians, the latter by my own country; virtually all others, as I said are varieties of these two. It is absolutely vital for a political system to combine them, if (and this of course is the part of our advice, when we insist that no state formed without these two elements can be constituted properly)it is to enjoy freedom and friendship allied with good judgement.”(P.143-4)
The Athenian then engages in a narrative of the History of Persian government in which he mentions that Cyrus, a Persian ruler, was a relatively enlightened monarch allowing both free speech and the pooling of ideas from many different sources. This form of government declined into a more authoritarian form , the Athenian claimed, partly because of a problematic system of upbringing, partly because of a lack of education, and partly because of the lack of experience in running households. Authoritarianism, it is argued, deprives people of their freedom, and destroys friendship and community spirit.
The state has duties, the Athenian claims, for example, to both educate its citizens but also to praise them for manifesting a range of virtues and blame them for manifesting a range of vices but this should not be done in an authoritarian manner. The Athenian notes that neither a respect for education, nor a respect for freedom, was present in the declining Persian authoritarian regime.
The second mother constitution of Attica was then discussed against the background of the threat of the Persians, and the Athenian notes the lack of allies in the war with Persia. Spartan non-participation is especially mentioned including the late arrival of the Spartans to the battle of Marathon. Standing alone in the face of this huge threat had positive results for the Athenians, it is argued, including:
- The emergence of a spirit of friendship and solidarity
- Increased respect for their own legal and political systems
- A modest attitude toward the history and future of Athens
The Athenian then begins an account of the decline of Attica from a position of strength after the Persian wars. He begins this account, rather surprisingly, with the changes that occur in relation to the music of the period:
“In those days, Athenian music comprised various categories and forms. One type of song consisted of prayers to the gods, which were termed “hymns”; and thee was another quite different type which you might have called “laments”. Paeans made up a third category, and there was also a fourth called a “dithyramb”(whose theme I thinks was the birth of Dionysus). There existed another kind of song too, which they thought of as a separate class, and the name they gave it was this very word that is often on our lips, “nomes”. Once these categories and a number of others had been fixed, no one was allowed to pervert them by using one sort of tune in a composition belonging to another category. And what was the authority that had to now these standards and use its knowledge in reaching its verdicts and crack down on the disobedient? Well, certainly no notice was taken of the catcalls and uncouth yelling of the audience, as it is nowadays, nor yet of the applause that indicates approval. People of taste and education made it a rule to listen t the performance with silent attention right through to the end; children and their attendants and the general public could always be disciplined and controlled by a stick…..Later, as time went on, composers arose who started to set a fashion of breaking the rules and offending good taste. They did have a natural artistic talent, but they were ignorant of the correct and legitimate standards laid down by the Muse.. They jumbled together laments and hymns, mixed paeans and dithyrambs, and even imitated pipe tunes on the lyre. The result is total confusion of styles…they misrepresented their art, claiming that in music there are no standards of right and wrong at all, but that the most correct criterion is the pleasure of a man who enjoyed the performance, whether he is a good man or not. On these principles they based their compositions, and they accompanied them with propaganda to the same effect. Consequently they gave the ordinary man not only a taste for breaking the laws of music but the arrogance to set himself up as a capable judge…instead of a “musical meritocracy” a sort of musical “theatrocracy” arose.” (p.153-4)
This passage confirms the earlier Socratic argument relating to the lover of “sights and sounds” that made up the crew of a ship, each of whom believed they could replace the captain whose authority on the basis of the knowledge of mathematics and astronomy they questioned. The problem with this argument is that just as the pleasure related to sights and sounds is a more simple pleasure than that related to the Captains knowledge of navigation, so pleasures of the composers in overturning the standards regulating artistic performances are also less complex than the pleasures associated with the discipline of adhering to an accepted standard. We are also reminded of the Platonic position in the Republic which argued against allowing artists to be part of the ideal Callipolis. The artists imitation of the forms, according to this argument, would threaten the citizens respect for the ultimate standard of the form of the good: which even Homer violated by representing the gods committing violations of the moral and legal codes of the time. In “The Laws”, we see an uncomfortable juxtaposition of excessive freedom, arrogance and narcissistic pleasure. The Athenian argues that this decline in the respect for the authority of musical standards is a precursor to the decline in respect for the authority of the laws of the polis, the decline in the respect for the roles of oaths and promises as well as the respect for religion in general. The particular form of regime the Athenian is criticising is, of course, that of democracy, where excessive freedom is the vice that is associated with the other vices of narcissistic pleasure and arrogance.
In the Republic Socrates argues that the artist is using his freedom and arrogance for representations in a part of the soul that does not concern itself with the calculation of the truth :
“And thus we should at last be justified in not admitting him into a city that is going to be under good laws, because he awakens this part of the soul, and nourishes it, and by making it strong, destroys the calculating part, just as in a city when someone, by making wicked men mighty, turns the city over to them and corrupts the superior ones. Similarly, we shall say, the imitative poet produces a bad regime in the soul of each private man by making phantoms that are very far removed from the truth and by gratifying the souls foolish part which does not distinguish big from little, but believes the same things are at one time big and at another little.”(The Republic of Plato, Trans. Bloom, A.,USA, Basic Books, 1968) (P. 289)
This argument asks us to consider the excesses of the instinct for imitation and refers to the sensible power of the imagination that is regulated by a pleasure-pain principle which is at odds with the reality principle whose domain of concern is knowledge and the Form of the Good. Plato also points out in the Republic that when the poets write about a battle they do so without adequate knowledge of the principles of warfare. Such accounts, Plato, argues, are not to be trusted by those interested in seeking to understand and reason about the phenomenon of warfare.
Kant adds another dimension to this debate by pointing out even if man wishes to be a master, he is in need of a master, principally because rationality, which is an aspect of the calculating part of the soul, has not as yet actualised itself in the entire species of man–the human form of psuché. Until this actualisation occurs, man remains a discoursing animal with the potentiality for being rational. The power of Language, of course, is an important power in mans repertoire of powers but, in its spoken and written forms, it is perhaps underestimated in everyday mass communication, which appears to prize the communication of images and emotions above the truth, knowledge and respect for established traditional standards. Public performances involving language in singing, for example, becomes an important litmus test for the spirit of a society if simple pleasures become the focus of the performances.
Aristotle’s view of the Arts also grappled with this problem. Aristotle viewed Rhetoric as an art, claiming its primary telos was persuasion, maintaining that the means of such rhetorical persuasion concerned not the verbal images of the imagination, but rather the enthymemes produced by the part of the soul that houses the powers of the understanding and reason. Arousing the emotions of pity, fear, anger and other similar emotions is not the central concern of this art, which like all other arts, aims at the Good. Rhetoric, Aristotle argues, is addressed to a judge, and his example is drawn from the context of trial in a legal system. Political rhetoric, designed as it is to argue for the law and its place in the constitution, is less inclined than appeals in the courtroom, to appeal to non-essentials such as pity, fear, anger, pleasure, etc(Complete Works of Aristotle, Ed Barnes, J., Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1984( (P.2152-3):
“..persuasion is a sort of demonstration…; the orators demonstration is an enthymeme: the enthymeme is a sort of deduction; clearly then he who is best able to see how and from what elements a deduction is produced will also be best skilled in the enthymeme, when he has further learned what its subject matter is and in what respect it differs from the deductions of logic. For the true and the approximately true are apprehended by the same faculty: it may also be noted that men have a sufficient natural instinct for what is true, and usually do arrive at the truth.”(P. 2153-4)
The end of this process of persuasion is conviction on the part of the audience. It is this end which ensures that the process is educational and instructional. The supporting argument provided by Aristotle for this is:
“The underlying facts do not lend themselves equally well to the contrary views: No. Things that are true and things that are better are, by their nature, practically always easier to prove and more persuasive. (P.2154)
It is also important to point out that rhetoric is not an imitative art as is poetry which Aristotle also provides an analysis of . Poetry, he argues relates to the nature of man and his activity:
“It is clear that the general origin of poetry was due to two causes, each of them part of human nature. Imitation is natural to man from childhood, one of his advantages over the lower animals being this, that he is the most imitative creature in the world, and learns at first by imitation. And it is also natural for all to delight in works of imitation. The truth of this second part is shown by experience: though the objects themselves may be painful to see, we delight to view the most realistic representations of them in art, the forms, for example, of the lower animals and of dead bodies. The explanation is to be found in a further fact: to be learning something is the greatest of all pleasures not only to the philosopher but also to the rest of mankind, however small their capacity for it; the reason of the delight in the seeing of the picture is that one is at the same time learning—-gathering the meaning of things, e.g. that the man there is so-and-so: for if one has not seen the thing before, ones pleasure will not be in the picture as an imitation of it, but will be due to the execution or colouring, or some similar cause.”(P.2318)
Aristotle also argues that the purpose of the different arts vary with the means, manner and objects of the imitation. The objects being, “agents who are necessarily either good men or bad”(P.2317). What Plato outlined as “decline” in this book of “The Laws” is what happens when these imitations lose their cultural bearings because they function in relation to the telos of pleasure in general rather than in relation to the means which brings about the best of all pleasures (according to both Plato and Aristotle) namely, the pleasure of learning. The process of decline delineated in Plato’s “The Laws” is not merely of classical interest and because this is such a slow and complex process we still see its effects today in our so-called “Modern societies” in general and “Modern Art” in particular.
Stanley Cavell in his work “Must We Men What We Say?”(Cambridge, CUP, 1969) helps to define and articulate this nebulous idea of the “Modern”:
“The essential fact of the modern lies in the relation between the present practice of an enterprise and the history of that enterprise, in the fact this relation has become problematic.”(P. XIX)
Plato hinted at this problem early in this part of book three when he blamed the role of pleasure and arrogance for the dissolution of the boundaries of the different stylistic categories of music. Cavell identifies another factor for us, namely the lack of agreement between critics of Art, and in this context he cites Humes example of two wine critics who, asked for their opinion about a particular wine, offer seemingly different criticisms, the one claiming to detect the presence of a taste of leather and the other claiming to detect the presence of the taste of iron in the wine. It appeared to the bystanders that both could not be right but this judgement proved problematic when the barrel was drained and a key attached to a leather thong was discovered at the bottom. Cavell points out correctly that this kind of taste is not in the same category as the taste of reflection Kant discusses in his “Critique of Judgement”. This latter form of Judgement is not based on the sensations of taste but rather on the more complex powers of perception, the categories of the understanding in harmony with the power of the imagination and the harmony of these faculties, which in turn allows us to speak with a universal voice in aesthetic judgement. Cavell, in his discourse on the problems with modern art also points to the defining role of the emotions and attitudes when audiences who experience art objects that do not fall into traditional categories or genres impulsively shout “fraud” or leave the performance or exhibition without further participation. Is this arrogance on the part of the audience or is there some justification for their responses? It can perhaps be argued more convincingly that there is arrogance in those artists who produce an object which we have difficulty in even calling a “work” of art (e.g. Duchamps “ready-made urinal”).
Plato argues in these passages that the mass-responses of the aesthetic audiences he is referring to, risk contaminating other cultural arenas such as those relating to the laws of the land. These latter more serious cultural matters, if viewed from the point of view of the master who does not wish to be mastered, can have the consequence of putting into question the validity of the laws of the polis. Hence the Platonic response of excluding artists from the ideal Callipolis.
Aristotle provides us with the complex criteria for the evaluation of works of tragedy which includes the task of the mass-catharsis of pity and fear. Firstly, his argument refers to the differentiation of different kinds of performance which are distinguishable in terms of the fundamental criteria of the means, manner and objects of the imitation-activity. Rhythm, language and harmony belong to the means, and those arts using the means of language can be either dramatic or epic. The objects are characterised as follows:
“The objects the imitator represents are actions with agents who are necessarily either good men or bad…since it is by badness or excellence men differ in character. It follows therefore that the gents represented must be either above our own level of goodness , or beneath it, or just as we are.”(P.2317)
These criteria will be important in the way in which both areté and epistemé are involved in tragedy and its catharsis of pity and fear in the design of the plot which is more essential to the work, Aristotle argues, than the depiction of the characters. Plots must have a beginning, a middle, and an end, and be of a length that can be remembered. Aristotles remarks amount to a formula for the excellent design of a plot containing characters of interest for us:
“A good man must not be seen passing from good fortune to bad, or a bad man from bad fortune to good. The first situation is not fear-inspiring or piteous, but simply odious to us. The second is the most un-tragic that can be: it has no-one of the requisites of tragedy: it does not appeal either to the human feeling or to our pity or to our fears. Nor, on the other hand, should an extremely bad man be seen falling from good fortune into bad. Such a story may arouse the human feeling in us, but it will not move us to either pity or fear: pity is occasioned by undeserved misfortune, and fear by that of one like ourselves. “(P2325)
Caregories of the Understanding/Judgement and principles of reasoning are clearly evident throughout Aristotles account of aesthetic experience and aesthetic objects, but perhaps the most important fact to register in the context of this debate relates to the “form of life” to be found in Ancient Greece during Aristotle’s lifetime. Bowra gives us a detailed picture of this:
“The peculiar nature of man determines the Greek notion of pleasure. They had no ascetic or puritanical hostility to it: in some respects they regarded it as a supreme good. But at the same time they felt it must be kept in its place and not allowed to upset the harmony of either the individual or the city. They felt too that the strongest pleasures are suitable mainly for the young, and that in due course a man passes beyond them to others which are less exciting. This distinction follows the general distinction which the Greeks made between man and the gods. If the gods enjoy power and freedom, men have responsibility: and through their use of it attains their own dignity, which is different from anything available to the gods. The advantage of this system is that it combines a natural taste for enjoyment with a real respect for proved capacities in action and in thought……it also means that goodness and happiness are brought together in a balanced harmony: for the Greeks believed that if a man is good he is happy, but also that if he is happy he is good.” (The Greek Experience, London, Weidenfield and Nicholson, 1957)
Since the above was written there has been much discussion about whether there is another meaning of eudaimonia, rather than “happiness”, that is at issue, namely the meaning of “good-spirited flourishing life”. The idea of the importance of freedom to both man and the gods is also a variation on a Kantian theme which attempts to chart the connections between freedom, responsibility and dignity. The complex form of pleasure associated with the moral form of life may, however, be no simple matter to understand, requiring an account of the relation man has to the God Kant conceived of in his later work: a God that guarantees happiness only if man is worth it.
Adrain Stokes in his work “Greek Culture and the Ego” refers to the above work by Bowra and elaborates upon the above discussion in Kleinian erms:
“The Good and the Beautiful were brought closer than heretofore. I consider this accommodation, both then, and in the early Italian Renaissance; to issue from an adjustment between the good objects of the superego and the ego….The gods represent justice, the superego, also the id….Human dignity is founded partly in the pursuit of an integrative balance or Mean. The alarming envy of man imputed to the gods is a guilty projection of mans envious attitude to their bountiful powers: the pursuit of the Mean will instruct that cycle. It would not be temperate, however, to refuse pleasure nor to obscure the face of death: the ego disregards them at the peril of some mastery in the psyche.” (P.81) (The Critical writings of Adrian Stokes, Vol. 3., London, Thames and Hudson, 1978)
Both Stokes and Freud point to the danger of excessive enveloping experiences that blur the fundamental distinction between subject and object. This is, Stokes argues, always involved in the invitation that Art extends to its appreciators. In authentic great works of art this invitation is always complemented with a work of the mind which constitutes a self-sufficient independent object as illustrated by the QuattroCento artists of the Renaissance period. Since this period, however, the role of the artist and objects of art in society have changed dramatically, sometimes so radically that some audiences have even questioned whether particular putative objects of art are what they claim to be, namely “works of art”.
For Stokes, Freud, and Melanie Klein the ideas of Eros, Thanatos and Ananke play decisive roles in the harmony and unity of mans thought speech and action as manifested especially in the four virtues of courage, temperance, justice, and wisdom:
“The truest wisdom lay in the properly balanced personality, in which neither side triumphed at the expense of the other. What this meant can be seen from the place given to eros, which means , in the first place passionate love, but extends its meaning far beyond physical desire, to many forms of intellectual and spiritual passion. For Parmenides it is the child of necessity and the force which makes men live and thrive: for Democritus it is the desire for beautiful things: for Euripides it is the inspiring spirit of the arts: for Pericles it is what devoted citizens feel for their city: for Socrates it is the pursuit of noble ends in thought and action. these different forms of eros agree in making it a power which drives a man to throw his full personality into what he does, which sustains him in powerful exertions and impels him to unusual efforts which sets his intelligence fully and actively to work and gives him that unity of being, that harmony of his whole nature, which is the spring of creative endeavour… if the complete force of mans nature works as a single power, he is a full man, and no Greeks of the great days that this was the right and natural way to behave.”(Bowra)
Stokes connects the above form of reasoning to the enveloping characteristic which Freud characterised as the “oceanic feeling experienced by the infant whilst breast feeding:
“but he made no connection with the surrender in favour of massive identifications of which he had written in “Group Psychology and the Analysis of the Ego”. He, there stressed that all groups are based on some exercise of this identification process. The enveloping bias of primitive mechanisms, whether passive to active, introjective or projective, is as essential to understanding civilisation, and to human intercourse as the bias of the integrated ego in favour of self-sufficient objects. But it seems likely that even a passive identificatory mechanism where it is culturally exalted at any expense—we shall see that one side of the aesthetic process strongly partakes of it–will connect with the manic merging of ego with superego and with all overriding superego attitudes.”(Greek Culture and the Ego, P.85)
In the political context of the Group it is the mark of the “Integrated ego” that it possesses a capacity to deal with the persecutory anxiety that threatens such integration. Stokes notes a support of this position from the biological level from Klein when she cites Ferenczi who claimed that all life forms react to unpleasant stimuli through a fragmentation of powers rather than an integration, and this becomes a threat to the flourishing life we all wish for.
The formation of the superego through the defence mechanism of identification is, according to these theories, the condition of the problematic group behaviour of the masses that are politically mobilised by populist politicians preaching a message of “everything is possible” to a mob that has come to believe that nothing was possible. The advantage (in this context of discussion) of hylomorphic theory is its explanatory power across all forms of group-life as well as its validity in explaining the different phases of development of a form of life. Groups can be more easily fragmented than living organisms and even when formed, are prone to regression to the primitive. The identification of a group with its leader becomes more likely when simple emotions such as fear and anger are mobilised in the name of descriptions of states of affairs that may be inaccurate. Hannah Arendt in her work on Totalitarianism has charted this process both psychologically and historically.
Group behaviour and discourse is not located in a unitary body and integration of powers are therefore more difficult. The tendency toward the more simpler negative emotions such as pity, fear, and anger and the presence of manic states of exaltation all relate to the absence of an inhibitor mechanism in the group itself. All inhibition is up to the judgement of the leader. Needless to say there is no understanding of the complex meaning of death since groups die only metaphorically and this might partly explain the lack of the presence of the more complex defence mechanisms such as sublimation which we find encoded in Greek myths. Sublimation, according to Freud is the non-sexual substitute form of satisfaction which contributes positively to ego-integration (an ego whose first priority is to protect the body). Greek myths also, however, contain a form of idealisation that sometimes has narcissistic connotations. One test of whether narcissism is present in any pattern of behaviour or thought process is the tendency in the agent toward melancholia (clinical depression) upon the loss of any highly idealised valued object. Narcissists do not go through the normal mourning process/work in such circumstances, which, if successful, strengthens the ego against further loss by installing anxiety free “memories”. For Freud the ego is defined as the precipitate of lost objects, and this is evident in his triangle of demand-refusal-wounded ego. The artist who is using the defence mechanism of sublimation is, according to this account, striving after the substitute satisfactions that his created objects provide for both himself and his appreciators. The object, must, of course, be capable of invoking more than simple sensations of pleasure and be more connected to the more complex form of aesthetic pleasure we find articulated in Kant’s Critique of Judgement.
Paul Ricoeur, in his work “Freud and Philosophy An essay in Interpretation.”(Trans. Savage, D., New Haven, Yale University Press,1970) points out that Sublimation is a vicissitude of the instincts but he also points out that, according to Freud the inner causes of this vicissitude (or “constitutional disposition) are unknown. Ricouer develops a theory in which Sublimation is related to what he calls the “symbolic function”:
“symbols represent the projection of our human possibilities onto the area of imagination. These authentic symbols are truly regressive-progressive: remembrance gives rise to anticipation: archaism gives rise to prophecy….True symbols are at the crossroads of the two functions which we have by turns opposed to and grounded in one another. Such symbols both disguise and reveal. While they conceal the aims of our instincts, they disclose the process of self-consciousness…Because of their overdetermination symbols realise the concrete identity between the progression of the figures of spirit or mind and the regression to the key signifiers of the unconscious.”(P.497)
The symbolic function, Ricoeur insists, is formed by language, and relates to spheres of meaning such as possession, power, and worth (Kantian areas of value). These three arenas of activity were very present in Plato’s Republic as well as in Aristotle’s “The Politics”. Ricouer, however, then goes on to invoke the Phenomenology of Hegel, rather than the Critical Philosophy of Kant:
“The sphere of power is likewise constituted in an objective structure. Thus Hegel used the term “objective spirit” to designate the structures and institutions in which the relation of commanding-obeying, essential to political power actualises and engenders itself; as we see at the beginning of the Principles of the Philosophy of Right man engenders himself as spiritual will by by entering into the relation of commanding-obeying. The “feelings” centring around this “object”, which is power, are specifically human feelings, such as intrigue, ambition, submission, responsibility: so too the alienations are specifically human alienations. The ancients already described these alienations in the figure of the tyrant.”(P.509)
Socrates in the Republic notes how the vices connected to tyrannical figures also include bloodthirstiness, persecution complexes, and other manifestations of the death instinct. The tyrant is a tragic figure well represented in the literature in general, and Shakespeare in particular. Modern conceptions of power, however, are culturally laden and centred upon the ideas of worth: freedom, duty, dignity and human rights of individuals. The Kantian picture of man needing a master he does not want, also plays an important role. There is in this account antagonism against those wanting obedience to commands. This picture, however, does not quite fit our modern political situation where modern constitutional democracies run by a large middle class have neutralised the divisive effects of the rich vs poor-conflict. Yet we do not have to travel that far back in time to witness how fragile our constitutions are. and how easy it is for potential tyrants to become actual tyrants using the democratic process to their own evil ends.
Freud, we ought to recall, claimed that his Psychology was Kantian, and thanks to his work we have a more technical and up-to-date academic psychological understanding of the phenomenon of the tyrant. In the light of such knowledge we have modified many institutions such as The Law to reduce the risk of tyrants obtaining and using constitutional powers. As Plato noted art, literature, and philosophy are also important contributors to the strengthening of those institutions which mirror the strength of the Ego and its degree of harmony with the external world, the id, and the superego.
As we claimed above Groups do not possess a corporeal body with organs, limbs, hands and a nervous system, sensations, appetites, consciousness, etc. The wishes, fears and suffering of the individual therefore do not correspond symmetrically to the wishes, fears and suffering of the group. Freud notes , in this connection, that being part of a group alters the mental state of the individual. Does it even make sense to say of the group that it has an ego when there are no internal stimuli to regulate in relation to the protection of the body? The group is not strictly speaking a form of life but rather a collection of life forms tied together by non biological psychological bonds, e.g. language. Perhaps though we can attribute powers to a group, insofar as it manifests group behaviour initiated not by the leader, but spontaneously. The problem of characterising group behaviour is reminiscent of the problem of correctly characterising the behaviour of computers and artificial intelligence. The computer may have a corporeal unity because it is an enclosed system, but the nature of this system is not that of a living system . Any self-protective behaviour the computer is programmed to manifest may not actually deserve that description, since a computer cannot die if it is not alive. Yet the group would appear to be more intimately related to the soul because it might be, if large and complex enough, in Socrates words, “the soul writ large”. It does, however, have the power to alter the mental state of the individual.
We know Freud was influenced by both Darwin and Anthropological studies of primitive societies, and that as a consequence believed that the origin of our life in groups began in a primitive horde ruled violently by a dominant male. The next stage of the groups development, for Freud, was constituted by a band of brothers murdering their leader. Very soon afterward they were struck with the realisation that the leaders fate would inevitably be the new leaders fate unless some change was made to the structure of the group. This change was initiated by laws of the group prohibiting certain specific actions.
Freud notes that a groups aim can be altruistic, especially if there is a group awareness of the importance of obeying the laws. This recalls Aristotle’s claims that the citizens of the polis ought to be bound by ties of friendship or fellowship which, of course, is far more likely if they are ruled by a Phronimos, rather than a dominant male leading a primitive horde. The suggestion is that given that a group is a collection of objects that are not internally stimulated to act by, for example, an act of will, as is the case for the individual, the alternative is to “bind” otherwise separate entities together by an external cause such as The Law. This recalls the Latin word “ligare” which means to bind and of course the Latin “religio” which means to re-bind. It is not clear, however that this is what Aristotle thinks is important in his claim that it is friendship or fellowship driven by eros that is important for a state to be self-sufficient. The Law, Institutions such as Universities and Schools, Government departments and aesthetic objects(including written works) are all Eros and Ego-related objects created with reference to areté, diké, arché, eistemé, and techné. Such entities all possess the characteristics of being both good-in-their-consequences and good-in-themselves. Kant claims that a government has duties to its citizens given the fact that they possess innate human rights, and many of our modern governments are measured by both this criterion and the extent to which they respect the freedom of their citizens to lead independent self-sufficient lives.
Adrian Stokes complains about ugly architecture and its numbing affect on our senses. Space, time and appropriate function seem to disappear and leave us with a sense of emptiness or loss.Unjust laws can have a similar effect with an added element of irritation of the wasted effort which is then added to the sense of pity for the “victims” of this wasted effort: victims that have suffered under such laws. What is missing in such phenomena is eros working through an integrated ego capable of bringing seemingly opposed states together into a good unity that is both good-in-itself, and good-in-its-consequences. Such an ego is capable of restorative activity without any idealisation of its objects, and without the involvement of any destructive impulses. Such an integrated ego may be important for scientific activity, Stokes argues, a search which ought to aim at a theory that is both good-in-itself and good-in-its consequences. The good object is obviously more valuable than the idealised object, and this might serve to differentiate the aesthetic object from the scientific object. For Freud the psychoanalyst, it is obvious that Science did not meet his criteria for the satisfactory explanation of the phenomena he was being forced to deal with in his consulting rooms. He was in need of a Psychological form of Medicine which did not exist at the time he was active. The science of Freud’s time tended toward either positivism or atomism and it in its turn did not appreciate the Freudian return to hylomorphic and Kantian Critical Theory. This was a time in which Psychology attempted to distance itself from Philosophical reflection by focussing on empirical, experimental, inductive science via a materialistic reductionist approach that sought to investigate sensations, feelings, and behaviour in the laboratory.
Stokes points out correctly that theory at an unnecessarily high level of abstraction has an enveloping quality that blurs the distinction between the subject and the object and therefore cannot be regarded as Knowledge as defined by the Greeks: Justified True Belief. It is important to note here that both the logical atomists and the logical positivists of Freud’s time regarded the theories of both Aristotle and Kant as idealistic abstractions. This was a curious position given the fact that both Philosophers synthesised the materialism and idealism of their time. Freud’s later view of science (along with gardening) was to regard it as a deflection from the serious business of living and the serious business of providing an account of The Good. These deflections are substitute satisfactions which attempt to diminish our misery and discontent with the lives we lead and the civilisations we live in. Aristotle and Kant would never accept that the science they embraced was some form of substitute satisfaction. For them a correct view of science was essential for engaging in the science of Psychology which was one important area of knowledge for the Delphic oracle who challenged humanity to “Know thyself”. The key idea for the grounding of such knowledge is that of arché (principle). William James we know, wrote a work entitled “Principles of Psychology” but instead of the knowledge we were looking for, what we were provided with was a plethora of instincts and emotions which were ambiguously described rather than essentially characterised in their essence (via Principles). The definition of Psychology that James provided us with, namely, “The science of mental life: its phenomena and conditions”, in its turn gave good descriptions of relevant phenomena but there was no clear structure relating the conditions to what is conditioned. Perusal of the index of both volumes reveals, for example, that there are no recorded references to Aristotle and only one reference to Plato’s realm of ideas which is described on P 462 as “stiff and immutable”. Part of the problem with providing content for the definition of Psychology by James was that of acknowledging that knowledge of psuché needed to stretch over a number of Aristotelian “fields” (Theoretical, practical, and productive science). Another problem, solved by the account provided by Freud, was to correctly determine the role of consciousness in the integrated account of mans powers. James to some extent provided us with an account of the function of the will and the brain which was to provide useful in later theorising but even here there was a tendency toward phenomenological description embedded in a context of exploration/discovery, rather than Critical reflection upon the conditions of phenomena (arché--principles) in a context of explanation/justification.