Commentary: Mill's "Of Individuality"

http://philo218sum2012.blogspot.com/2012/07/mills-of-individuality.html

Why does society not support the development of individuality?

           

            Our society seems to encourage the development of the individual, on paper at least. We have freedoms of speech, religion, etc, that protect the right for us to follow our own paths and ideas. However, it is very different in actuality. There are many norms that people are expected to follow in order to be considered a productive member of society. For example, we are all taught that we should get an education, obtain a well-paying job and then settle down in a nice house and have two kids. This path to “success” is somewhat flexible but it cannot possibly satisfy each individual’s wants. Many people wish to pursue a career in fields such as music, art, writing, etc, but end up pursuing more traditional, stable careers because of family pressure and the promise of financial stability. Societal norms also affect everyday expressions of individuality. A person who acts or dresses differently is looked upon as eccentric rather than as a person who is maintaining their individuality.

           

            It seems clear to me that society does not foster individuality, for the most part. The pressures to conform to a standard are implicit and subtle, yet in some respects custom carries more weight than any explicit law our governments pass. Is it to the advantage of society as a whole that we are not “too” individualistic? Some people would probably say yes. If individuals go by the book and don’t do anything unexpected, society will not suffer any unpleasant surprises and life and its daily operations will continue to run smoothly. However, the basis of our society is dependent on individuality. As stated in the fourth premise, “genius can only breathe freely in an atmosphere of freedom” (Mills 62). Many of our scientific advancements, as well as the fundamental principles of the American government, are due to brilliant and/or daring acts of individuality. Social and political revolutions are driven by the demand to express one’s own individuality.

            
             So why do these pressures to conform to a convention still exist so powerfully? It is not the work of some powerful, malevolent group that pulls the strings of our society. I believe each individual is to blame. Custom is only kept in place because we allow it to remain there. Part of it is because we are afraid to go against the grain for fear of being ostracized. However, I think that the main reason is that expressing individuality is a scary thought in many ways. It is not pleasant to think that we have to forge our own unique path, relying almost exclusively upon ourselves. It is very easy to be lured by the simplicity and comfort of following an established set of rules. While it certainly requires less suffering and thought to do so, it can only be detrimental to us in the end. It is a habit that each individual is responsible of breaking from. Perhaps then we can create a custom of individuality. 

Introspection and Verifiability

http://philo218sum2012.blogspot.com/2012/07/peirce-some-consequences-of-four.html

            Peirce denies the power of introspection, suggesting that instead, all our internal mental phenomena are understood via hypothesis based on our experience with the external world (230). Despite this assertion, we can recognize that history has shown us a genuine power of introspection, in the form of insights into the human mind that could not have been arrived at via comparison to the external world, in the thinking of David Hume, among others. Further, Peirce’s motivation for denying such a power, ostensibly his concern that the power of introspection leaves truth in the hands of the individual and is thus not amenable to his method for the pursuit of truth, aimed at creating consensus within the community of conscious observers, may have resulted from a mistaken understanding of the divide that exists between the individual and the community.

            In disputing Peirce’s assertion that there is no genuine power of introspection, that all internal phenomena must be understood in terms of the external, we need look no farther than Hume’s Treatise on Human Understanding, in which Hume engages in introspection to generate the foundations of his psychology. Discredited by modern psychologists for his method of “arm chair psychology”, in which claims are derived solely from the examination of ones own mind, Hume nonetheless shaped the way we have come to understand our thoughts. The principles of association, the connecting strands that unify conscious thought and guide the progression from one thought to another, could have been derived through no other method than introspection, yet maintain a measure of truth as Peirce conceives it. These principles, of contiguity, resemblance and cause and effect, which serve to guide consciousness, could not have been derived from the external world, the external world lacking anything observable which functions in the way consciousness itself does, forged as it is by the flow of thoughts. Hume’s principles of association, founded in introspection, served all the same to generate a degree of consensus within the community. These ideas shaped the progress of psychology and the theoretical framework that individuals employ in making sense of their own minds, in this way bringing about a truth from the method of introspection alone.

            With this historical refutation in hand Peirce’s purpose in denying the power of introspection comes under scrutiny. No one will deny that allowing for and recognizing the validity of introspective inquiry gives priority in truth claims to the individual, allowing them to make non-verifiable claims, in the sense of the verifiability of the external world, about there own mind. This privilege of introspection makes the individual’s claims less amenable to Peirce’s understanding of the pursuit of truth, with its fundamental interest in the consensus of the community (230). Peirce’s worry is that to allow introspection would be to recognize as legitimate an area of inquiry that cannot pursue truth via the method proposed. While introspection may pose unique difficulties to this aspiration of community consensus, such difficulties are not enough to discount the validity of such inquiries. This is seen clearly, as even Peirce might recognize, in the consensus that has historically been attained for truths derived from introspection.

            Granting that introspective truths cannot be verified in the sense of the external world, in which multiple observers view identical phenomena, these internal hypotheses are still amenable to community consensus, via a slightly more nuanced route. In the pursuit of consensus, the individual’s thoughts and feelings are not open to public verification. However, each individual member of the community, in assessing the truth of certain observations and theories, may turn inward to his or her own thoughts in search for verification. This method, of introspection verified through the multiple introspections of the community of individuals, has been the route by which consensus has historically been gained in the exploration of internal phenomena. One need look no further than the acceptance of Hume’s contributions to psychology, truths which were evaluated, debated and agreed upon based on their ability to hold up to scrutiny within the landscape of the thoughts of other individuals.

Peirce might further attempt to bar introspective inquiry on grounds of his view of the real. Peirce understands the real as the knowable (247). On this view, if something is inherently unknowable, it is not to be considered real. By this same thinking, if we are inherently unable to understand the error of a statement, to know its falsity, than the statement can only be understood as true (248). In this way our collective inability to know the individual’s state of consciousness makes that individual’s consciousness unreal, containing no reality. Further, if we are to allow a claim regarding an individual’s conscious experience to be accepted as meaningful, our inability to know an error in their presentation or theory makes this claim intrinsically true, wholly incompatible with refutation. In Peirce’s understanding of reality we are left with a two-tiered account of the impossibility of meaningful introspective inquiry.

This reasoning holds so long as we accept the traditional understanding of the essentially private nature of individual experience. By this classical account we as individuals are wholly isolated from the experience of any other conscious entity, each of their thoughts and feelings shrouded in mystery, cut off from our alien conscious existences. Breaking from tradition, we might recognize a different interpretation of the apparent isolation of each individual consciousness. We may infer from much of our experience with other individuals that our minds are not so clearly isolated as to prohibit meaningful insight, via the mediation of our own thoughts, into the mind of another. If our thoughts and feelings are similar enough to those of others then our own minds may function as an acceptable substitute for access to the mind of another. If we understand our own minds to be essentially akin to those of others, than their feelings, if adequately described, can be known to us. If the thoughts of the individual are capable of being known to us, than the individual consciousness may be understood to be real, a boon to Peirce’s theory and a more palatable conclusion. By the same token, of the congruency of like-minds, our examinations of our own thoughts offer us a meaningful way to attend to the error in a proposed theory of internal phenomena. When we read Freud or Hume’s psychological writings, we may examine our own thoughts for such consistencies as these authors note, or address their inaccuracies, thereby opening introspection to fallibility, and granting it meaning in our discussions of truth.

Beyond the mere suggestion, we are not without reasons for accepting this break from Cartesian individuality. A substantive qualitative overlap between individual conscious experiences may be inferred from our ability to communicate effectively, a phenomenon that seems likely to occur only when our experiences have a marked similarity. The historical mistake regarding the isolation of the individual can be ascribed to mere contingent limitations in our language, in our ability to adequately describe our internal states. This amounts to a circumstantial constraint, rather than an intrinsic isolation between individuals, a distinction that leaves Peirce’s denial of introspection unnecessary. Beyond communication, the predictability and regularity of a group of individuals’ reactions, given the same stimuli, offers behavioristic evidence for the overlap of experience. Physiologically, the architectural, chemical and neurological similarities of our organs of sense and conscious experience also suggest a significant overlap in the experiences produced by these mechanisms, such as would provide for meaningful interpersonal understanding. This probable similarity in human experience across individual lines opens the doors to viewing individual consciousness as collectively knowable. While none of these phenomena make an irrefutable proof that the experiences of one individual can be understood in the mind of another, each asserts the possibility and probability of this claim. If these arguments are accepted, we are confronted with every reason to accept that the claims an individual makes regarding their own mind may be both meaningfully understood and examined for error by the community of introspective individuals. In this way introspective inquiry may be viewed as real, susceptible to refutation, and ultimately open to Peirce’s criteria for truth.

-Hegel.

To understand Peirce’s contribution one might notice that this argument only attempts to reconcile the individual’s power of introspection with Peirce’s desire for verifiability. Peirce’s ultimate concern for verifiability is maintained. This method is not to be discounted, its claim to truth is important to keep in mind in assessing the value of philosophical claims, as a quick look at Hegel’s metaphysics illustrates. Any claim regarding a metaphysical entity, such as Spirit, would, on Peirce’s account, be meaningless, being unverifiable and ultimately unknowable. This take is enlightening and may be evidenced when we examine the way an amorphous concept such as Spirit can be used to substantiate both sides of a given argument. Hegel employs the concept to validate the absolute authority of the monarchy, while in my previous commentary Spirit was instrumental in justifying the people’s right to oppose the monarchy*. This dual employment of Spirit, spawned from its amorphous nature, suggests that such a claim as to the nature or existence of Spirit lacks genuine meaning. Peirce’s criterion for meaning, that a claim must be susceptible to verification, makes a substantial contribution to our ability to discern the meaningful from the meaningless in philosophical inquiry.

* http://philo218sum2012.blogspot.com/2012/07/httpphilo218sum2012.html

Commentary: On Liberty Chapter I

Question: Why is it important to set limitations on states when seeking individuality and what liberties are presented?

     For many years individuals were ruled  by some sort of ruler who exploited their position.  It came to a point when there needed to be some form of checks and balances to set limits to the powers these rulers had and to make room for the subjects to have rights. For as long as "mankind were content to combat one enemy by another, and be ruled by a master on condition of being gaurenteed more or less effaciously against his tyranny, they did not carry their aspirations beyond this point." Individuals became to realize that the state was only self-interested and had little concern for individual rights. Mankind wanted to limit the states powere and that the states main priority should be of the people it governs.
     This leads to a democratic society where there lies individual independance and social control. Howeve,r this independance is consantly threatened by what Mills call tyrranies this is in refernce to premis 3. The main tyranny is of the magistrate where it can take away the responsibility of political infractions, create it oen mandates that silence it oppressed, create unfair mandate that adds to oppression and in turn digging them deeper in the whole with no return in sight. There is another tyranny that is in dyer need of beeing protected from, tyranny of opinion and feeling where society tends to impose its own policies and practices to which penalties would be charged against those who opposed. This was to prevent any form of individuality and to conform mankind to what socity wants to be potrayed.
    The main issue at had is where to find the medium or limit to public opinion insofar as individual independance and to protect it from encroachment (pg 5). Society wants mankind to follow traditions and customs that are already inplace. That an individual should ignore his own inner thoughts, feelings, and beleif through natural occurances. However, even society through religion states that individuals have irrevocable rights. Although society uses religion on when it is to its benifit.
    The individually whether independant or collectivly should have liberty of self protection, and that the individual should be free to be independant so long as he does not harm others. His independant is absolute, he has rights "over himself, over his own body and mind, the individual is sovereign" (pg 9).
     In referanc eto  premise 5, Mills want restrictions to individulity when in return it harms others. One of the exception to this is freedom of speech or opinion. The interest of individual must be protected (pg 11).
     When going back to a society not forcing their opionions on the individual, Mills "demands, liberty of conscience...liberty of though and feeling, abdolute freedom of opinion and sentiment on all subjects, practical or speculative, scientific, moral, or theological" (pg 11). That society cannont impede on "liberty of taste" even if it thinks its foolish or will harm the individual. Lastly individuals should have the liberty to unite (pg 12).

Pizza: Inside the Box, A Discussion of Mill's Aversion to Custom

Question:  Is custom inherently bad for the cultivation of genius?

Everyone has heard that the line between madness and genius is a thin one, or a matter of perspective. Without social structure, I would argue that there would be no line at all. Mill has an overactive aversion to any sort of uniformity and the central question of this commentary is first of all, why does he see all forms of uniformity as such a negative force, and secondly, is he right to view it this way? Premise 3 and 4 concerning the argument of Individuality concern genius and custom. The idea is that genius needs freedom to thrive, because, for Mill, divergent opinion breeds genius, and that conformity and custom inhibit the developing of faculties.

Mill is making an argument about the liberty of individuals and such is predisposed to make an argument (as a utilitarian) for the useful aspects of the freedom to form opinions. In fact, it is common sense that the most brilliant members of society tend to be out of the box thinkers, but without any intellectual/historical structure any genius would presumably not amount to much. I would argue that one can only be as intelligent as the smartest man of their time, that is intelligence needs structure upon which to build itself. For example, no one in the Macedonian empire would conceive of the atomic bomb, because not only would they be working from the structure of knowledge of nuclear power, but they would also not have the technology to create it. There may be genius's continually pushing society forward, but they owe much to the pre-existing structures and even conformity that Mill despises. Society has a way of preserving certain norms, and while some may need to be abolished, and all may need reform, they preserve potential historical structures which at some point were aimed at some good. All genius is owed to this historical development, for it as much as it is the geniuses moving history forward, so it is the opposite.

Mill's argument still holds water, in that revolutionary thinkers are just that, revolutionary. Though, without custom, brilliance would not have a language with which to speak, Mill is not speaking of a time without a large structure of history to build upon, he is instead speaking of the utility of a lack of constraint on free thought. It seems that persons are already enshrouded by their cultures and customs, born into them, and as thus, it is not very useful to praise them. The utility of freedom of speech and thought has obvious ties to an aversion to custom. The freedom to express new ideas is easily shown to be beneficial to intellectual pursuits, for if one could not express new ideas freely there would be, well, no new ideas. Diversity in thought is certainly beneficial to the progression of ideas, but all these diversities need structure through which to communicate these new ideas. To say that the faculties of a conformed member of society is useless is to go too far. Firstly, can it be said that any two people are so conformed by custom that they lack in some diversity between them. Simply by virtue of separate spacial existences they are bound to have different ideas in some respect, regardless of how related to custom. And secondly, perhaps the genius of pizza making has some revolutionary new ideas, but I still could go for a classic slice made by my run-of-the-mill pizzeria, whose usual recipe is most likely some version of a custom. That is to say, many customs become customs because they are good and should be remembered. Thus, while Mill is right that freedom of thought and speech has immense utility to the progression of thought, he does not give due credit to custom.

Commentary on John Stuart Mill, Chapter IV

Is there any distinction between self-regarding acts and other-regarding acts under Harm Principle?              

Are these distinctions clear?

In Chapter #4, Mill attempts to make Harm principle clear. It seems clear to Mill that there are self-regarding acts and other-regarding acts. Self-regarding acts are usually “beyond morality” and should affect other people’s feelings. Other people may feel intense dislike, but this does not amount to harm to them. Harm is different from mere dislike. Other-regarding acts directly harm others. Mill believes that all individuals have a duty to obey the other-regarding rules, “every one who receives the protection of society owes a return for the benefit, and the fact of living in society renders it indispensable that each should be bound to observe a certain line of conduct towards the rest.” (73) Under the harm principle, does Mill give us the distinction or distinctions between self-regarding acts and other-regarding acts?

Mill connects Harm principle with social duty, an act. As long as an individual action does not amount to or link to a duty, this is a self-regarding act. If an act does involve a duty, it is considered other-regarding acts. Mill uses Harm principle is slightly different from Premise #1, “Mill's idea on "Harm Principle" leads towards limiting liberty in order to avoid any harm to society in any way.” The claim of Premise #1 is somewhat stronger than Mill’s. For instance, if a drunkard is too addicted to alcohol, he can drink himself to death—this is a self-regarding act. He has done nothing wrong so that the government should let him drink to death if it is his choice to live this way, as long as he does not have any dependent. If a society has laws that force an individual to take care of his/herself, then he/she has a legal duty to him/herself to take care of his/her own health. Otherwise, he/she can do what he/she pleases. If harming oneself is considered harming a society because an individual is a member of the society, then he has the duty to look after his own health. Mill does not take this stand. Thus, the phrase to “avoid any harm to a society in any way” is somewhat a stronger claim than Mill’s. 

   

Mill gives us the distinction between self-regarding act and other-regarding act and how Harm principle plays a role in it. Mill says that if a person’s self-injurious act causes himself and others harm, it is other-regarding act. If a self-regarding act of an individual is connected to a violation of another person’s legal right and two of them are not separable, then the self-regarding act becomes other-regarding act. For example, a person has a duty to pay his annual tax. If he fails, he owes his legal duty to pay. A drunkard soldier, because of his habit, cannot serve while it is his duty to serve. When self-regarding act and other-regarding act join as one, “the case is taken out of the province of liberty, and placed in that of morality and law” Mill asserts. Here, a private act becomes a social act. Mill gives us another example. He says, “the act of drinking fermented liquors’ is self-regarding, whereas selling fermented liquors…is trading, and trading is a social act. (87) Once an act becomes social, it is punishable. Thus, social acts are other-regarding acts.

Religious intolerance blurs and undermines the distinction between self-regarding act and other-regarding act. Harm principle, for Muslims, does not work this way, but it works in a paternalistic way. Muslims do not like the idea of eating pork and regard the meat as unclean, and ban pork consumption in their countries. Under the Harm principle, as long as you do not harm anyone, you can do what you please. However, Muslim countries act like a father-figure and tell their citizens what they should eat: the individual choice is taken away by these governments. Even though eating pork is a personal choice, it is a paternalistic choice if you are living in these countries. Thus, eating pork becomes neither self-regarding act nor other-regarding, but it is a paternalistic act: it is for your own good. Don’t eat it. We make the choice for you.

With Premise #4, it seems like it is used to support the conclusion, but it is not that straight forward after all. 

The distinction between self-regarding acts and other-regarding acts under Harm principle is clear except in religious case. With all other three premises, they seem to go along with the conclusion. But with premises #1 and #2, they seem to go against it. The conclusion is somewhat broad. The conclusion might be more focus if you only focus on Harm principle alone.

Commentary on Mill’s “Of Individuality”

Question: If custom does not develop the qualities of a human being then how do we account for the social morality that develops directly from these customs?

 

The outline on “Of Individuality” holds a premise that custom doth not educate and develop the “distinctive” human being (p 56). Therefore the customary imitation is destructive to the development of the individual. Though Mill is critical of imitation in regards to the individual, we must concede that through customary imitation a large portion of our morality is learned and transferred (p 56). Humans being the social animals that we are will inevitably lean towards customary experiential learning especially in regards to social morality. It is the very nature of learning these moral traits that imitation is of necessity. 

Mill emphasizes that the individual’s most important work is the perfection of the self (p 56). However, no person can contain “perfection” as a solitary endeavor. Mill desires to free the prime human specimen of imitation and conformity while under-valuing these social tools that help to maintain a structure that allows one to pursue a “perfection”.  Mill seems to forget that although the human species has no prescribed “model” set for it; its development on the single unit of the individual depends wholly on the collective entity of the mass of which the individual belongs (p 57).

The fact is that Mill, in his pursuit of the individual perfection throws a negative light on the social imitation that is present in all society since time immemorial and is necessary not only for the societies survival but as well for the individual’s development.

However, Mill may agree with this point entirely and say that no doubt the use of custom and imitation in development of the societal whole is a necessary agent. Here, though,
I  believe that he would pause and state that all though custom is a necessary step it has in recent age usurp the rights of the individual and a case must be made to allow the individual to regain some of its authority over itself (p 58). 

The balance between the individual and the masses is a sticky one and it seems that they are in ways opposed and yet this opposition seems needed for social “progress”. I think Mill would agree that a society must allow the freedom of the individual spirit as it is often the calculated and intelligent individual that challenges the social institution and pushes human morality and value beyond a point of which it once knew (p 59).

Commentary: Is Civil Liberty an Illusion?

Question:

Is civil liberty an illusion or is truly guaranteed by society?

Society has the power over an individual, it certainly may limit his/her freedom, but because it has power over others, it may also provide and expand one’s freedom. Therefore, power that society controls does not have only restrictions, but also may include the expansion of freedom, considering that it can prevent the tyranny of some individuals to constrain the freedom of others (p.4).

Furthermore according to Mill, freedom is not the organizing element of society. Thus, an essential element of society is its power over the individual, the power of collective identity (p.1). However, it is impossible not to agree that this power usually had destructive consequences of freedom. If necessary, power contains within itself the possibility of suppression, although not indispensable fact of suppression. If this possibility of suppression protects the individuum from the violence of others, it even would be a tool of freedom. Thus, people can act freely inasmuch as, they are aware of a protected public power from private violence. Hence, to determine the limits of the power of society does not mean, to determine the boundaries where civil liberty begins.

Inaccuracy of the definition is clear from how he notes that there is a free society, the course of his thoughts is as follows. Civil liberty, he said, begins where ends the power of society over the individual (p.1). Ipso facto, the more civil liberties are developed then the more constricted would be the power of society over an individual. Let us assume that society has no authority over the individual. For Mill, one must recognize that in such a state, civil liberty would be ideally high. This idea is purely anarchical. Assume for a moment that this idea is correct. Although one may ask: in this powerless (anarchist) society, where, according to Mill's logic, we should recognize the ideal of civil liberty?, Would there actually exist some kind of freedom?

According to Mill, the response would be negative. Precisely, society is not considered as free if an individual has no freedom of thought and expression, freedom to live as he/she wants, freedom of association (p.12), and only then society would be conceded free if all of these types of individual freedoms are absolute and equally indifferent to all its members (p.11). Accordingly, majority of mankind did not and still does not know what freedom is; such a statement can be stated inasmuch as the content of civil liberty had been defined quite arbitrarily.

Moreover in life, an individual is protected only with the establishment of certain rights that constitute the content of civil liberty. However, that guarantee is more formal than real (i.e., façade), since the law would not be determined by an individuum but via common law and protected within the the state. The real guarantee of a free existence is only in the internal need of an individual; only the spiritual essence of the person creates the need for rights, which he/she continually would try to defend. Thus this way, society and government would recognize the individual rights and might preserve their implementation.