Rethink needed for deniers of free will

From the graphic with Oliver Burkeman's article in The Guardian

Oliver Burkeman is an award winning journalist who is well-practised in tracking the ebb and flow of debates on the important issues relating to human psychology. He is a Guardian writer based in New York and between 2006 and 2020 he wrote a weekly column on psychology. In 2015, he won the Foreign Press Association's Science Story of the Year for a piece on the mystery of consciousness. He has had books published, with Farrar, Straus and Giroux releasing Four Thousand Weeks: Time Management for Mortals later this year.

His credentials are important in assessing the state of affairs with regards our ability to continue to recognise that free will is a human capacity that differentiates ourselves from the animal world. Many big names have used findings in neuroscience or from their philosophical probing to reject the view that humans can rise above whatever other influences on them there might be to decide what to do - or not do - and how to live. They see the person, because of activity of the brain when responding to stimuli, acting fully and only in a way beholden to causes going back to the Big Bang.

Burkeman turned his attention to the state of play with regards free will with a long article in The Guardian of April 27, 2021. He first presents the case for the rejection of free will and concludes with might-be deniers' all-encompassing view: "If you’d been born with Hitler’s genes, and experienced Hitler’s upbringing, you would be Hitler – and ultimately it’s only good fortune that you weren’t."

Furthermore:

 “For the free will sceptic,” writes Gregg Caruso in his new book Just Deserts, a collection of dialogues with his fellow philosopher Daniel Dennett, “it is never fair to treat anyone as morally responsible.” 

However, that argument is, in fact, held by a only minority of philosophers:

According to a 2009 survey, conducted by the website PhilPapers, only about 12% of them are persuaded by it. And the disagreement can be fraught, partly because free will denial belongs to a wider trend that drives some philosophers spare – the tendency for those trained in the hard sciences to make sweeping pronouncements about debates that have raged in philosophy for years, as if all those dull-witted scholars were just waiting for the physicists and neuroscientists to show up. 

In one chilly exchange, Dennett paid a backhanded compliment to [Sam] Harris, who has a PhD in neuroscience, calling his book [Free Will] “remarkable” and “valuable” – but only because it was riddled with so many wrongheaded claims: “I am grateful to Harris for saying, so boldly and clearly, what less outgoing scientists are thinking but keeping to themselves.”

Dennett is suggesting that many scientists are positing much more than their findings support. On the other hand,  Burkeman goes on to describe how "... most of those who defend free will don’t reject the sceptics’ most dizzying assertion – that every choice you ever make might have been determined in advance". Instead, "they think determinism and free will are compatible". Accordingly, adherents to this line of thought are termed “compatibilists”. As well:

There are many other positions in the debate, including some philosophers, many Christians among them, who think we really do have “ghostly” free will; and others who think the whole so-called problem is a chimera, resulting from a confusion of categories, or errors of language.

After I have highlighted the features of Burkeman's scrutiny of the free will debate I will explore how Christians have used their intellectual firepower through millennia to come to an understanding of how free will is, indeed, part of the God-given capacities that reflect the dignity of the human person. 

So Burkeman reports criticism of free will deniers:

“Harris, Pinker, Coyne – all these scientists, they all make the same two-step move,” said Eddy Nahmias, a compatibilist philosopher at Georgia State University in the US. “Their first move is always to say, ‘Well, here’s what free will means’” – and it’s always something nobody could ever actually have, in the reality in which we live. “And then, sure enough, they deflate it. But once you have that sort of balloon in front of you, it’s very easy to deflate it, because any naturalistic account of the world will show that it’s false.”

And again:

A doctrinaire free will sceptic might feel obliged to argue that a person hypnotised into making a particular purchase is no less free than someone who thinks about it, in the usual manner, before reaching for their credit card. After all, their idea of free will requires that the choice wasn’t fully determined by prior causes; yet in both cases, hypnotised and non-hypnotised, it was. “But come on, that’s just really annoying,” said Helen Beebee, a philosopher at the University of Manchester who has written widely on free will, expressing an exasperation commonly felt by compatibilists toward their rivals’ more outlandish claims. “In some sense, I don’t care if you call it ‘free will’ or ‘acting freely’ or anything else – it’s just that it obviously does matter, to everybody, whether they get hypnotised into doing things or not.”

To those who find the case against free will persuasive, compatibilism seems outrageous at first glance. How can we possibly be free to choose if we aren’t, in fact, you know, free to choose? But to grasp the compatibilists’ point, it helps first to think about free will not as a kind of magic, but as a mundane sort of skill – one which most adults possess, most of the time. As the compatibilist Kadri Vihvelin writes, “we have the free will we think we have, including the freedom of action we think we have … by having some bundle of abilities and being in the right kind of surroundings.” 

The way most compatibilists see things, “being free” is just a matter of having the capacity to think about what you want, reflect on your desires, then act on them and sometimes get what you want. When you choose the banana [from a fruit bowl] in the normal way – by thinking about which fruit you’d like, then taking it – you’re clearly in a different situation from someone who picks the banana because a fruit-obsessed gunman is holding a pistol to their head; or someone afflicted by a banana addiction, compelled to grab every one they see. In all of these scenarios, to be sure, your actions belonged to an unbroken chain of causes, stretching back to the dawn of time. But who cares? The banana-chooser in one of them was clearly more free than in the others.

To get to the crux of another part of the debate - neural activity and decision-making - Burkeman  presents this retort from free will defenders:

Like everything else, our conscious choices are links in a causal chain of neural processes, so of course some brain activity precedes the moment at which we become aware of them.

Further:

We need only ask whether someone had the normal ability to choose rationally, reflecting on the implications of their actions. We all agree that newborn babies haven’t developed that yet, so we don’t blame them for waking us in the night; and we believe most non-human animals don’t possess it – so few of us rage indignantly at wasps for stinging us. Someone with a severe neurological or developmental impairment would surely lack it... But as for everyone else: “Bernie Madoff is the example I always like to use,” said Nahmias. “Because it’s so clear that he knew what he was doing, and that he knew that what he was doing was wrong, and he did it anyway.” He did have the ability we call “free will” – and used it to defraud his investors of more than $17 billion.

Burkeman displays a great deal of wisdom in his thoughts concluding his article:

I personally can’t claim to find the case against free will ultimately persuasive; it’s just at odds with too much else that seems obviously true about life. Yet even if only entertained as a hypothetical possibility, free will scepticism is an antidote to that bleak individualist philosophy which holds that a person’s accomplishments truly belong to them alone – and that you’ve therefore only yourself to blame if you fail. It’s a reminder that accidents of birth might affect the trajectories of our lives far more comprehensively than we realise, dictating not only the socioeconomic position into which we’re born, but also our personalities and experiences as a whole: our talents and our weaknesses, our capacity for joy, and our ability to overcome tendencies toward violence, laziness or despair, and the paths we end up travelling. There is a deep sense of human fellowship in this picture of reality – in the idea that, in our utter exposure to forces beyond our control, we might all be in the same boat, clinging on for our lives, adrift on the storm-tossed ocean of luck.

Of course, the Christian knows that we are influenced as an individual by our genes (and the history of those genes); by the character of our parents and the material circumstances of our upbringing. That's why perhaps Christians most of all will inquire, in the case of a young person seeking a job reference, as to the standing in the community of the hopeful's family and about the good character of that young person him or herself. Has the young person developed good habits rather than bad habits, both of  which can affect their decisions?

To borrow from Christian teaching, an individual's freedom is rooted in reason and will, which allows a person to perform deliberate actions on their own responsibility. "By free will, one shapes one's own life".

Yes, we can have psychological problems or be manipulated by people and the cultural "ocean" we live in, often without our realising it. Therefore, we need to cultivate habits and practices that allow us to listen to our heart - our conscience.

In this, moral theology is rich with all that can diminish a person's ability to be responsible for their sins. (The priest's role is to help discern the degree of culpability). More broadly, the Christian is accustomed to being warned to avoid the occasions of sin - if your companions think it's smart to shoplift, don't go into a shop with them. In addition, there's the saying to the effect that the sin is committed in the bar, not later with a "friend" in the hotel room.  

What this all means is that our decision-making, here meaning our ability to exercise free will, can be influenced in many ways. But the Judeo-Christian understanding of the human person is that each person, by using their reason and will, which is the capacity to stand above contending choices, is free in the ultimate sense, and is responsible for their life journey, which is accomplished by cooperating with the grace of God.  

As to the "luck" that Burkeman refers to, we can respond as in the old Chinese tale: "What is good luck? What is bad luck?" Where Burkeman sees each person as having to contend with "luck", the Christian knows that God is with us in whatever happens that is beyond our control and that we have the power to cooperate with Him to ensure we succeed on the journey to our final destination, which is to be with Him. 

Sam Harris should give his practice of Buddhism away and delve into the Christian tradition for more success in reading the reality of human nature. From the Catholic Catechism (dating from 1994) he will find these insights:

Imputability and responsibility for an action can be diminished or even nullified by ignorance, inadvertence, duress, fear, habit, inordinate attachments and other psychological or social factors.

But we are not victims in life. Personal freedom, the ability to exercise our free will, can grow:

Freedom makes a person responsible for their acts to the extent that they are voluntary. Progress in virtue, knowledge of the good, and self-discipline enhance the mastery of the will over its acts.

This is our challenge - to give more respect to our ability to control our decisions as to right and wrong; to understand that our freedom can be limited and riddled with mistakes if we are not careful; to use self-discipline in order to avoid the slavery of self-imposed blindness. Finally, the more a person does what is good, the freer they become. May we all be free as we should be!

[] Oliver Burkeman - The Clockwork Universe: Is Free Will an Illusion? 

[] See some reader responses here

[] Catechism of the Catholic Church Online

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Time to relax

A video time-out with a salute to the era of the Yardbirds and Led Zeppelin

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To be unprovable in principle, and self-evidentally so

The Cambridge University cosmologist John D Barrow died late last year, and I have just read something that he wrote that has significance because of its relevancy beyond his own field. His statement shows his deep thought relating to the interface between the search to know God and the scientific enterprise.

His statement came as part of the 2005 Edge.org "big question", which was: "What do you believe is true even though you cannot prove it?" Unlike many others', Barrow's answer was short but pithy. He submitted this statement:

That our universe is infinite in size, finite in age, and just one among many. Not only can I not prove it but I believe that these statements will prove to be unprovable in principle and we will eventually hold that principle to be self-evident.

John D Barrow

Of course, it's the second sentence that holds most significance for those who are dismayed at the adversary nature of science and religion, when science is reductionist on the basis of what is material or physical when it comes to evidence for God, the mind and will (or the soul), and - on the oposing side -  religious fundamentalists (and not all believers) who refuse to recognise well-established scientific findings.  

"Unprovable in principle and ... [holding] that principle to be self-evident." This has echoes of Stephen Jay Gould's principle of Non-Overlapping Magisteria (NOMA) of 1997: "Science tries to document the factual character of the natural world, and to develop theories that coordinate and explain these facts. Religion, on the other hand, operates in the equally important, but utterly different, realm of human purposes, meanings, and values—subjects that the factual domain of science might illuminate, but can never resolve."

Simply put Barrow might say, for example, that science will never be able to prove the source or dimensions of the transphysical mind, so it should stick with the facts concerning the material or quantifiable, such as the body and brain, or even the size and number of how many universes there might be around us. 

In fact, Barrow did try to illuminate areas that would be unprovable, and met knockbacks for that effort from rigid colleagues. 

However, Professor Paul Davies, a cosmologist at Arizona State University, had this to say in his Scientific American tribute to Barrow: "A truly great scientist not only makes significant technical contributions but also reshapes a discipline’s conceptual landscape through a commanding depth and breadth of vision."  And Barrow's vision allowed him to be creative within physics:

The centerpiece of this approach was a remarkable book published in 1986 and co-authored with physicist Frank Tipler entitled The Anthropic Cosmological Principle. It built on the recognition that if the initial state of the universe or the fundamental constants of physics had deviated—in some cases, by just a tiny amount—from the values we observe, the universe would not be suitable for life. The book is a detailed and extensive compilation of such felicitous biofriendly “coincidences,” and it became a canonical reference text for a generation of physicists. It also provoked something of a backlash for flirting with notions of cosmic purpose and straying too close to theology in some people’s eyes. Nevertheless, its style of “anthropic” reasoning subsequently became a familiar part of the theorist’s arsenal, albeit a still contentious one.

From this summary above we see that even in science there are approaches that are shunned simply because they are not in fashion given the prejudices of the elite of the field, without regard to whether the new ideas are intellectually sound or not. Barrow was strong enough to forge ahead:

His adventurous choices of research problems typified Barrow’s intellectual style, which was to challenge the hidden assumptions underpinning cherished mainstream theories. Fundamental problems in physics and cosmology may appear intractable, he reasoned, because we are thinking about them the wrong way. It was a mode of thought that resonated with many colleagues, this writer included, who are drawn to reflect on the deepest questions of existence.

Perhaps Barrow's success arose because of the breadth of his interests. His was not a blinkered existence and that allowed his science to range widely and appreciate insights from beyond the confines of the material world. Davies describes this element in Barrow's life and work:

Barrow’s scholarship and writing extended to art theory, musicology, history, philosophy and religion—a grasp of human culture aptly recognized by an invitation to deliver the prestigious Centenary Gifford Lectures at the University of Glasgow in 1989 and also by the 2006 Templeton Prize [for Progress Toward Research or Discoveries About Spiritual Realities]. These acknowledgments were in addition to many notable scientific and academic honors, including being made a Fellow of the Royal Society.

To conclude, the Edge question for in 2005 was: What do you believe is true even though you cannot prove it? Answers were given by 120 scientists and intellectuals. Each expressed the fact that they believed something but could not prove it. That humility as to the limits at any one time of science and technology is welcome. 

[] Those interested in exploring the evidence for the existence of the mind, our transcendental or transphysical nature (our "soul") should avail themselves of the resources at the Magis Center. 

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Morals and markets and the common good Part 2

                                       - New York Times headline April 24, 2021

The New York Times story makes this point: "The coronavirus plunged the world into an economic crisis, sent the U.S. unemployment rate skyrocketing and left millions of Americans struggling to make ends meet. Yet at many of the companies hit hardest by the pandemic, the executives in charge were showered with riches."

My March post on this topic focused on how markets must not be regarded as a morality-free zone. The way the individuals in the business elite plump for self-interest within their select group leaves a stain of corruption on all who are business leaders. I had these deplorable figures in my information:

On Twitter this week the US figures were again highlighted with tweets discussing data that CEO pay growth from 1979-2019 was 1167%, whereas worker pay growth from 1979-2019 was 13.7%. These US figures came out last year in a report by the Economic Policy Institute.  

The Times has this information:

Boeing had a historically bad 2020. Its 737 Max was grounded for most of the year after two deadly crashes, the pandemic decimated its business, and the company announced plans to lay off 30,000 workers and reported a $12 billion loss. Nonetheless, its chief executive, David Calhoun, was rewarded with some $21.1 million in compensation.

Norwegian Cruise Line barely survived the year. With the cruise industry at a standstill, the company lost $4 billion and furloughed 20 percent of its staff. That didn’t stop Norwegian from more than doubling the pay of Frank Del Rio, its chief executive, to $36.4 million.

And at Hilton, where nearly a quarter of the corporate staff were laid off as hotels around the world sat empty and the company lost $720 million, it was a good year for the man in charge. Hilton reported in a securities filing that Chris Nassetta, its chief executive, received compensation worth $55.9 million in 2020. 

 As a final comment, a quotation used in my previous post:

But that behaviour is the logical consequence of the individualism that has been our substitute for morality since the 1960s: the ‘I’ that takes precedence over the ‘We’. How could we reject the claims of traditional morality in every other sphere of life and yet expect them to prevail in the heat of the marketplace?

Read on my Substack website for a new perspective 

Dramatic realism of the resurrection event

From the Jesus Pantocrator icon, about the 6th Century, at St Catherine's Monastery, Mount Sinai, Egypt

"Look, I'm not a ghost”, Jesus told his followers. “A ghost doesn't have flesh and bones as you can see that I have." Then he said: “Do you have anything to eat?”, and they gave him a piece of baked fish. It’s this realism that Bishop Robert Barron of Los Angeles finds so dramatic and significant about the Easter events. Barron’s examination of the account is thorough:

Today, I'm going to harp on something. I'm going to harp on it because a) the Bible harps on it a lot, and b) because our culture often misses it. What I'm going to harp on is the very strangeness of the resurrection.

Maybe it's 10 years ago or longer, when David Cameron was prime minister of Britain, he was giving a little speech on Easter, and he was trying to articulate the significance of Easter. Here's what he said: "The message of Easter is kindness, compassion, hard work, and responsibility."

Now, I know he was trying to appeal very broadly to anyone that'd be listening. And don't get me wrong, I'm for kindness, compassion, hard work, and responsibility, too. But my guess is that any decent person would be, believer or nonbeliever. A Hindu, Muslim, Jew, Buddhist —anybody would be in favor of these values.

Therefore, that can't be the meaning of Easter. That can't be the meaning of the resurrection.

It's a typical attempt, though, in our contemporary setting to kind of domesticate the resurrection.

What does the resurrection mean? It means that Jesus of Nazareth, who in his public ministry consistently acted and spoke in the very person of God, who was brutally put to death by the Roman authorities, rose bodily from the dead and appeared alive to his disciples — not an abstraction, not a symbol for some moral or spiritual state of affairs, but this bodily resurrection of this particular man from the dead.

I'm going to read a little bit here from this magnificent twenty-fourth chapter of Luke, which is filled with these marvelous accounts of the resurrection. This is right after the Emmaus account, and the Eleven are gathered in the upper room.

And it says, "While they were still speaking about this, he [Jesus] stood in their midst and said to them, 'Peace be with you.' But they were startled and terrified and thought that they were seeing a ghost.... [But he said,] 'Look at my hands and my feet, that it is I myself.

Touch me and see, because a ghost does not have flesh and bones as you can see I have.'"

I submit to you, everybody, that's a very strange text. Just as they were startled and terrified by the appearance of Jesus, I think we should be a little startled and terrified by this message.

Turning it into a bland statement about "Be a nice person" is entirely missing the point of the resurrection.

Let me try to shed some more light on this by setting up a contrast between this extraordinary account and what a first-century Jew might've been thinking about what happens to us after we die. Because this didn't happen in a vacuum — Jews of the first century had ideas, based in the biblical tradition, about what happens to people when they die. These are all on display in the Bible.

First of all, a view —and it was still held by many, still widely held by many Jews today— that death is just the end. That when we die, we go back to dust and that's it. We're dead. It's over.

A second view, also on display in the Bible, is that the dead go to a kind of shadowy underworld. It's called Sheol in the Scriptures. It's a bit like Hades, what you find in Greek and Roman mythology — this kind of unappealing underworld where people are present, they're alive, but not the way they used to be. That's Sheol.

Another view, you can find it in the book of Daniel. This is read, by the way, at almost every Catholic funeral. It says, "The souls of the just are in the hand of God and no torment shall touch them." This idea is that, after we die, the body goes into the earth, but the soul survives.

Now, that's not entirely unlike what some of the Greek philosophers held. So Socrates and Plato would have held some version of that: that our souls escape from the prison of the body, and they live on.

Here's still another view that's on display in the Bible, and in Jesus' time, the Pharisees would have held to this very strongly — namely, that we can hope, at the end of time, all the righteous dead will come back to life in the general resurrection.

Okay. All of those views were on offer. They were held by people in Jesus' time and place.

I want you to notice, what's being described here in Luke 24 — it's not any of that. Certainly not the case that, well, the dead just die and that's it. No, here's Jesus, who died, and he's alive. He's present to them. They're not talking about someone who's gone down to the shadowy realm of Sheol. They're not talking about that.

Remember in the Old Testament when, it's the Witch of Endor calls forth the shade of the prophet Samuel from the realm of Sheol. That's not what's being described here at all,

but someone who stands before them, and he says, "Look, I'm not a ghost. A ghost doesn't have flesh and bones as you can see that I have."

This is not the view that Jesus died, his body went into the earth, and his soul went to heaven.

That's not being described here at all. This is not a disembodied soul. No, no. Here he is, standing in their midst.

Maybe the closest we've come is to say, what many Jews expected of all the righteous dead at the end of time has happened to this man in the midst of history.

Jesus, alive, body and soul, standing before them. Jesus, who had been killed, brutally put to death, now through the power of the Holy Spirit alive again in their midst.

I love this detail. It's unique to Luke. It says, when they were "incredulous for sheer joy and amazed." By the way, what a beautiful reaction to the Resurrection: incredulous for sheer joy, and they were amazed. He said to them, "Have you got anything here to eat?"

Don't you love the realism of that?

Here's the risen Jesus, wants something to eat, and they give him, it says, “a piece of baked fish," and "he took it and ate it in front of them." May I say again here—and this maybe is for people today who want to domesticate the resurrection, turning it into a bland symbol — this has nothing to do with dreams, and hallucinations, and vague ideas, and velleities [mere wishes without action].

No, no; this man, once dead, now standing before them, with flesh and bones, and eating fish that they gave to him.

Everybody, that's the strangeness, that's the radicality of the resurrection.

Do you believe it, or not? Do you find deep joy in it? That's the question. That's the challenge that Easter gives us year after year.

Okay? Now, once we see that, can we also discern why this matters so much?

And can I suggest just two implications by looking at the first two readings?

First of all, we have this, in the Acts of the Apostles, magnificent speech of St. Peter.

It's a kerygmatic sermon. "Kerygma" means the basic message of the Gospel. So when Peter in the earliest days gets up and tells the people what Christianity is all about, that's the sermon. Now listen to him:

"The God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob ... has glorified his servant Jesus, whom you handed over and denied in Pilate’s presence.... You denied the Holy and Righteous One and asked that a murderer be released to you. The author of life you put to death."

May I suggest, by the way, this is not someone tickling the ears of his listeners. This is not someone trying to ingratiate himself with his audience. No, no; he's laying it out pretty clearly.

St. Peter is seeing the resurrection as an affirmation of Jesus. The one who spoke and acted in the very person of God is revealed not to be a liar or a fraud, but true, righteous.

But more than that, the message of the resurrection is also a judgment on all of us sinners, who, in varying ways and to varying degrees, put him to death.

Again, let this line sink into your heart as I let it sink into mine. "The author of life you put to death."

You see how the resurrection of Jesus —and I don't mean some vague fantasy; I mean, God raising Jesus bodily from the dead —is a judgment on all of those who contributed to his crucifixion.

It's a judgment on the cruelty, and the hatred, and the injustice, and the self-absorption that produced the crucifixion.

See, if the resurrection's a vague symbol, then I am not all that challenged in my sin. Then these words of Peter aren't going to cut me to the heart if the resurrection’s a vague symbol.

But if through the power of the Spirit, God the Father raises Jesus from the dead, and he stands before me, I see in his wounds a judgment on me. An extraordinary implication of the resurrection.

And look how Peter's sermon ends.  "Repent, therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be wiped away."

Again, this is not ingratiating rhetoric. This is drawing out a very important moral and spiritual implication of the resurrection: that we must come to repentance.

And here's a second implication now, drawn from our second reading from that marvelous First Letter of John. John speaks of an Advocate we now have in heaven. That’s beautiful, isn't it?

What does the resurrection mean?

It means that this Jesus who was a denizen of the earth, this Jesus who walked among us, bodily present among us, has now been raised to a participation in the very life of heaven.

See, biblical religion, everybody, is not like Greek philosophy. It's not a story of let's endeavor to escape from matter to a higher realm. No; it's a story of how heaven and earth are meant to come together.

Remember in the Our Father: "Your kingdom come. Your will be done on earth, as it is in heaven." That's a prayer that these two realms might meet.

How beautiful that the resurrected Christ eats this piece of fish they gave him. That means that this lowly humanity of ours in Christ has been elevated to the heavenly place.

We have an Advocate — a brother of ours who walked the same earth, breathed the same air. A brother of ours has now been brought into the heavenly space. And in that advocacy, we find extraordinary hope.

Can I suggest, next time you go to Mass, attend to the language of the prayers. They're often this language of heaven and earth meeting, because that's exactly what Jesus means. "The Word became flesh and dwelt among us"; Jesus' flesh now elevated to heaven. You see how a connection between heaven and earth has been established.

That's what the Resurrection means.

Turn the Resurrection into a vague myth or symbol? Then none of this powerful cosmological truth is expressed.

So, the bottom line: Can I urge you, sometime [especially] during this Easter season, open up your Bibles to Luke chapter 24, a kind of masterpiece within the masterpiece.

Enter into these accounts of the resurrection and realize the full radicality of what is being claimed: Jesus Christ, truly risen from the dead.

See this also at Substack here. 

Do something creative every day to be happy

Another film by Sam Fathallah, who is still making films, both for artistic reasons and for a living. However, I hope the young people we meet are as creative now as they were eight years ago. Enjoy!

 

Harari's list falls short on preparation for next pandemic

London protest against Covid lockdown and masks

Yuval Noah Harari, the author of Sapiens, Homo Deus, and 21 Lessons for the 21st Century, offers fatally limited advice to readers of Britain's Financial Times on how to prepare for the next pandemic. 

In his February article "Lessons from a year of Covid", Harari rightly praises the scientific effort that has quickly delivered useful vaccines, though he is scathing at the job done by politicians - "All too often the political wisdom has been missing" because of the habitual feuding in the political arena, and the focus on personal and national interests.

However, what counts is that politicians are society's elected leaders and scientists should leave to them the decision-making in the fight against the pandemic. 

The argument Harari presents as he makes his case also highlights from my point of view how essential it is that science and technology be held up to "human" or "social" scrutiny. He explains why science should not be granted the position of ultimate power in matters of life and death:

The Covid year has exposed an even more important limitation of our scientific and technological power. Science cannot replace politics. When we come to decide on policy, we have to take into account many interests and values, and since there is no scientific way to determine which interests and values are more important, there is no scientific way to decide what we should do.

For example, when deciding whether to impose a lockdown, it is not sufficient to ask: “How many people will fall sick with Covid-19 if we don’t impose the lockdown?”. We should also ask: “How many people will experience depression if we do impose a lockdown? How many people will suffer from bad nutrition? How many will miss school or lose their job? How many will be battered or murdered by their spouses?”

Even if all our data is accurate and reliable, we should always ask: “What do we count? Who decides what to count? How do we evaluate the numbers against each other?” This is a political rather than scientific task. It is politicians who should balance the medical, economic and social considerations and come up with a comprehensive policy.

Similarly, engineers are creating new digital platforms that help us function in lockdown, and new surveillance tools that help us break the chains of infection. But digitalisation and surveillance jeopardise our privacy and open the way for the emergence of unprecedented totalitarian regimes. In 2020, mass surveillance has become both more legitimate and more common. Fighting the epidemic is important, but is it worth destroying our freedom in the process? It is the job of politicians rather than engineers to find the right balance between useful surveillance and dystopian nightmares.

He's right in these matters: "there is no scientific way to decide what we should do"; likewise, without safeguards imposed by society, engineers could could end up "destroying our freedom" and delivering the stuff of "dystopian nightmares".  

This analysis is accurate but the advice arising from it as to preventing or combatting a future pandemic  is anemic. Here is the advice in summary:

First, we need to safeguard our digital infrastructure. It has been our salvation during this pandemic, but it could soon be the source of an even worse disaster. Second, each country should invest more in its public health system. This seems self-evident, but politicians and voters sometimes succeed in ignoring the most obvious lesson. Third, we should establish a powerful global system to monitor and prevent pandemics. 

The reason Harari falls short is that he offers no insight on how to lift the standard of human capacity in what citizens and politicians alike are willing to bear with regard solidarity and self-discipline and altruism - each demanding loving generosity and good will to others - and adherence to the common good rather than to the individualistic hedonism now well embedded in most Western nations, and increasingly to be observed elsewhere, such as in Vietnam, from where this blog originates.  

In other words, Harari fails to attend to the need to develop human capacity, which involves the ability of each person to learn across generations and within each society as to how to reason well, how to respect the dignity of others, and how important it is to serve, if that society is to be sucessful in its goal of ensuring human thriving. 

How to make it more likely that humankind will be ready to face the next pandemic or perhaps technological calamity? Buying Sam Harris's Waking Up app will not get to the heart of the human predicament;  nor by reading Enlightenment Now, where Steven Pinker celebrates the achievements of the human family just at the time where his homeland, the most prominent exemplar of enlightenment's child, individualistic materialism, is coming unstuck through the fraying of the bonds of religion, with the consequences of the destruction of discourse by both left and right, and the deluge of cases of early death and of the feeling of meaninglessness in life, which was Pinker's starting point for his book ("Why should I live?" - see his introduction to Part 1). 

Of course, Harari might expect us all to wait around until we reach the state of homo deus, but that book is as baseless as Pinker's on the big picture, on what is most important about human life. Let Harari build on his success in hitting the target on what needs to be done to avoid future catastrophes and focus on ways to solidify the moral foundation of human life, and on ways to generate the unending eruption of mutual love and respect. Enabling the divine spark to engulf each and every person's heart and mind is the certain way to "determine which interests and values are more important, [since] there is no scientific way to decide what we should do".  

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