Our Moral Cataclysm | Peterson vs. Harris
We are in the throes of a massive moral catastrophe,
and so, to keep everyone positive, here’s
a kitten… and a puppy, and another kitten,
and another puppy, and a Kickstarter page,
and well, more on this late.
“All right, ladies and gentlemen, please
welcome to the stage Douglas Murry, Jordan
Peterson and Sam Harris!” *Applause*
It’s been just over a year since I reviewed
the first live debate between Jordan Peterson
and Sam Harris, and I’m very eager to finally
move on their subsequent debates, but I’m
going to do so in a significantly different
way. Rather than dedicating a long video to
each debate, I’m going to give each contention
its own dedicated video, as this will keep
things concise, dispense of distractions,
is a lot more convenient for me as a creator,
and it’s a great way to stay in shape. So
with that, this video is dedicated to the
very moral cataclysm that underpins all four
conversations. This is between order and chaos.
“Sam believes that there are two fundamental dangers to psychological and social stability
– religious fundamentalism essentially on
the right, and moral relativism and nihilism
on the left – and so the danger of the right
wing position is that it enables people to
arbitrarily establish certain revealed axioms
as indisputable truths, and then to tyrannize
themselves and other people with the claims
that those are divine revelations […] So
that’s on the right. And then on the left,
well, the problem with the moral relativism,
nihilism position is that it leaves us with
no orientation, and it also flies in the face
of common sense observations, that there are
ways to live that are bad, and that there
are ways to live that are good.”
A question I’ve asked myself of late, is
why exactly were so many so excited to hear
Jordan and Sam debate? Why was their conversations
so prominent? What caused them to sell out
massive arenas?
“So what is it specifically about your message
or you as a person that's drawing these crowds
of young men? […] It's necessary to find
in life something truly engaging and meaningful,
because otherwise life is so hard it will
make you bitter and cruel, and everyone knows
that.”
Well, to name just a few reasons, Jordan was
at the height of his fame, he had proven himself
to be extremely insightful on a plethora of
topics, he had said some quite frankly absurd
things about atheists (“You can’t be a
non-believer in your action. You see, because,
Harris’ metaphysics is fundamentally Christian.
So he acts out of Christian metaphysics, but
he say well, I don’t believe, well, yeah,
you do, because you’re acting it out. You
just say you don’t believe it.”), and
both he and Sam had recently had a major epistemic
disagreement on Sam’s podcast (“Jordan...
Jordan, you have to grant one thing here.
There’s one piece that doesn’t get moved
here. You cannot move the piece that because
you killed yourself it's not true that she
was having an affair – that move is not
open to you, and yet you're acting like it
is!”).
But I’m convinced that the primary reason
for the excitement was simply the mere whiff
of potential moral progress. As Jordan touched
upon when Steelmanning Sam’s position, the
world is slowly but surely out-growing the
dogma of religion, and thus we’re evermore
rejecting religion’s assertion of divine,
objective morality. But we’re having very
serious teething problems; we have largely
succumb to what Nietzsche forewarned: moral
relativism – the notion that morality is
merely an opinion, shaped predominantly by
the whims of culture.
“Religious fundamentalism essentially on
the right, and moral relativism and nihilism
on the left.”
Indeed, as it stands, most religions claim
jurisdiction over everyone’s experience
based on faith, whilst most irreligious people
won’t claim moral superiority whatsoever.
While each religion confidently claims to
know the answers to moral questions (and thus
each religion sees it as their duty to enforce
their dogma on others), most irreligious people
claim that there are no answers, and the result
is what Sam would call “suffering” and
Jordan would call “chaos”.
“There's two things you want to avoid. Two
catastrophes, let's say; one is the catastrophe
that you identified with religious fundamentalism
and the other is the catastrophe that's associated
with moral relativism […] and that's something
that I think we really agree on, because I've
conceptualized that slightly different than
you, and that might be relevant, but I think
of that as a pathology of order and a pathology
of chaos. So the terminology is slightly different,
but I think we're working on the same axis.”
Now what’s fascinating is that both Sam
and Jordan believe that they have a way in
which to extinguish this moral cataclysm – or
at least in Jordan’s case, he “acts”
as if he has solution. Sam’s is direct – as
is the thesis of his book titled The Moral
Landscape: How Science Can Determine Human
Values – he believes that questions of right
and wrong relate to well-being, and that David
Hume was mistaken when he voiced that we can’t
get an ought from an is. Sam thinks that we
can. To be clear, while I share Sam’s view
on morality relating to well-being, and I
also believe in an objective moral framework,
I do not think that one can get an ought from
an is (more on this in just a moment). Jordan,
on the other hand, acts as if the answer resides
within what Carl Jung termed our collective
unconscious. That is, he believes that our
unconscious mind, which is predicated on instincts,
symbols and archetypes, such as The Great
Mother, The Wise Old Man, and The Tree of
Life, underpins not only our moral framework,
but our entire being – and he believes that
these stories are most perfected in religious
narratives. Thus, he believes that religious
stories, such as Genesis, contain immense
value, and that people such as Sam discard
them at great cost. But as for whether Jordan
actually believes that these archetypes and
motifs constitute an objective moral framework,
or if he just believes that they are the closest
thing we have to one, I’m not so certain
– and I’m also not so sure on why he particularly
elevates Christianity over other religions
(other than the fact, of course, that he was
born in a country in which Jesus’ cock is
rammed down everyone’s throat). As it stands,
at this moment, I’ve watched all four debates
several times, but perhaps after a few more
views, I’ll finally ascertain the answer.
“Someone once asked you whether you thought
Jesus was literally resurrected, and you said
it would take me 40 hours to answer that question.”
Or, maybe not.
“How's this for an answer: almost certainly
not!"
Now as for my own views on morality, I’ll
give you a brief description, as I think it’s
only fair that you know my disposition. With
that said, know that I’m operating at the
peak of my knowledge here. While I’ve spent
a significant amount of time ruminating morality,
and consider myself relatively well-read,
I am nevertheless entirely self-taught, and
I so I might be missing something crucial.
I’ve never had teachers to guide me. I’m
a lone wolf, as it were.
“Well that’s good wolf ethics!”
But in a nutshell, I believe that Jeremy Bentham
was bang on when he said that our sovereign
masters are pain and pleasure (though I think
that the word “suffering” is a more accurate
than the word “pain”). Absolutely everything
we do, at base, is in service of these two
masters. Natural selection has a hard-wired
sentient organisms to avoid suffering as doing
so leads to survival, and in turn, propagation.
Hence, we are not born with a blank slate
– we are born with the axiomatic goals of
avoiding suffering and seeking pleasure, and
there are scientifically, objectively, right
and wrong ways to achieve these goals. Now
to be clear, there is nothing to say we must,
or ought, to obey these sovereign masters,
but despite this, in every act, we do. We
are their slaves. To quote Bentham, “Every
effort we can make to throw off our subjection,
will serve but to demonstrate and confirm
it. In words a man may pretend to abjure their
empire: but in reality he will remain subject
to it all the while.” Thus, there is no
violation of Hume’s Guillotine – I’m
not getting an ought from an is, I’m getting
an is from an is; I’m stating that there
is scientifically, objectively, right and
wrong ways in which to achieve our axiomatic
goals, but I’m not stating that we ought
to achieve our goals. Lucky for me, however,
I don’t need to convince you that that,
since nature has already done that for me.
Now to put this in context of an example:
If Allah really exists, then treating women
as second class citizens is objectively the
right thing to do, since they will suffer
far more in Hell than they will under ruthless
misogyny. But if Allah does not exist, then
treating women as second class citizens is
objectively the wrong thing to do, since it
causes suffering for no gain (and not just
to women, of course, but also to men). Again,
there’s nothing to say that we ought to
fulfil our desire of avoiding suffering, but
I don’t need to convince you of that – you
already accept it. Now, crucially, in most
domains of discourse (be it climate change,
vaccines, etc.) we can debate the validity
of the proposition, conduct empirical research,
and we will only claim jurisdiction over one
another once we have an overwhelming amount
of evidence, but when it comes to the domain
of religion, all of this goes out the damn
window. To quote Tim Minchin, “Science adjusts
its views based on what's observed. Faith
is the denial of observation so that belief
can be preserved.” What’s that? You think
that we should debate whether Allah exists?
Off with your head! How dare you use the brain
that Allah gave you. This is why Sam, I, and
many others, say that the problem is dogma…
but when it comes to dogma, religion is King,
Queen and board. So for what it’s worth,
that’s my views. I believe in an objective
moral framework, but I differentiate from
Sam in very important ways. Sam says that
it is factually wrong to murder, whereas I
say that it’s factually wrong for YOU to
murder, since it negates your goals (and by
the word “wrong” I just mean that it’s
not conducive to your goal). And Jordan says
that would take him forty hours to tell you
that it depends on what you mean by clean
your room.
*Applaud* “Why are you-- why are you-- why
are you all applauding about that?” 1, 151
But sas aside, while I find Jordan’s particular
fixation on Christianity unjustified, I believe
that there is indeed immense value in religious
stories, and that we are yet to mine them
for all they’re worth. Again, we’re not
born with a blank slate, and our religious
stories and narratives very likely reflect
this in ways that we’re yet to comprehend.
There’s an archetypical goldmine, if you
will, and we are on the margins of a potentially
great harvest, but the dogma HAS to be rejected,
and if we can only mine these stories by giving
the dogma a free pass, then I’d sooner collapse
the whole damn thing. Religion has had it’s
fill of blood, and I won’t intentionally
give it another drop. We need to respect our
past, but be brave enough to embrace the future.
Anyhow, before wrapping up, I’d like to
give a shout-out to the Kickstart project,
Kittens vs. Puppies. The creator is one of
my close friends, and he’s someone who’s
helped me significantly improve my own game,
Debunked. He’s played tabletop games for
over a decade, and this really shows in his
own game. In short, Kittens vs. Puppies is
a deck-building card game, in which you lead
a three adorable champions to capture your
opponents. Your fluff balls start of weak,
but within a few short turns of strategic
deck-building, they become absolute monsters.
If this sounds up your street (and I mean,
it’s kittens, puppies and fun), please follow
the link below to find out more – it’s
truly an incredibly fun game. Anyhow, I’m
Stephen Woodford, and as always, thank you
kindly for the view, and an extra special
thank you to my wonderful patrons and those
of you who’ve supported the channel via
other means. You are all legends.
