Why Labour Will Lose: the damage done by idealism – an essay in process language. 9.
- A gradual loosening of our habituation to a-t heuristics: Protestantism, Nietzsche and engineering, politicians notwithstanding.
We could easily discuss such issues in relation to that other more recent version of conviction politics that championed individuality and market forces and validated Thatcher’s figuration to destroy so many people’s lives. This essay is not a polemic against socialism; it is a polemic against our committed and uncritical acceptance of applying a-t heuristics. Sadly from my point of view, in allowing an a-t heuristic such as socialism to govern their policy making, Attlee’s figuration was thacting normally and duly delivered us down a well-trodden idealistic road built on fantasy that very predictably ended in failure and electoral disenchantment. These theometaphysical heuristics are so habituated into our thactivity that they seem as natural as drinking water: from this perspective we are by nature logical, structured by God’s divine hand. In fact these heuristics are human inventions and so desensitizing to our critical faculties that we persist in obsessively pursuing impossible aims, whilst ignoring more fruitful, mundane, engineering heuristics. 300 years of engineering triumphs speak for themselves as a means of delivering substantive answers to human problems. In addition, these remarkable successes have made us very aware of inadequacies in much ancient theometaphysical technology, especially theological, but also, philosophical a-t heuristics.
To some degree our unwillingness to apply engineering heuristics to political problems is explained by habit. However, applying engineering heuristics implies a closer engagement with comparatively uncertain mundanities, and interdependently, a recognition that a-t heuristics have less validity. Living with these changes decreases our feelings of certainty, security and control, such that thacting with conviction becomes much more difficult both in personal and figurational terms. As we engage more and more closely with comparative uncertainties, a-t heuristics become less and less viable and may even need to be abandoned altogether in favour of more practical evidence-oriented, engineered heuristics – an example being proverbial beliefs (p-b heuristics). P-b heuristics are at best contingent, assessable only as probabilities not certainties: too many cooks may spoil broths, but not always so. Living according to p-b heuristics increases cognitive dissonance by denying complete self-belief/conviction and making domination more difficult to sustain. Correspondingly, relying on p-b heuristics amplifies feelings of personal responsibility as justification for thaction cannot be off-loaded via dogmatic belief: what we call terrorist killing is often validated by an a-t heuristic whether religious, secular or an amalgam of both. When we confront dilemmas and make decisions with comparative uncertainty we do so without reliance on some external ultimate authority. As engineered heuristics don’t offer any ultimate authorities, living with them is more insecure and anxiety laden, and for many just too difficult.
Protestants are a good example of people who in rejecting Roman Catholic infallible Papal/priestly authority and needing to know God for themselves, took a significant democratizing step towards comparatively uncertain mundanities. Concomitantly, Protestants, especially non-conformists, engage with mundane experiences much more directly through personal bible reading. For such a possibility, biblical translation out of Latin was necessary and with it potential reinterpretation of a sacred text. A re-authored bible written according to Protestant a-t heuristics made a single, authoritative, specific apostolic meaning much more difficult if not impossible to ascertain. Very predictably, these re-writes attracted serious often violent resistance from established Catholic figurations. Divine texts can only be corrupted when meddled with by ordinary, grubby human hands. Every time they are re-written further interpretation/uncertainty emerges and ancient a-t heuristics will struggle to command authority: Tyndale’s biblical translation was used in producing a later King James Bible thereby delivering mundane interpretation upon interpretation of God’s word. Not unsurprisingly Protestant religious thactivities spawned schism upon schism.
We can see what happens with still closer secular engagement with mundanities by considering Nietzsche’s philosophy. He was brought up in a Protestant tradition, but eventually abandoned supernatural authority and safety altogether. In addition, by denouncing post-Socratic philosophers and pure mathematicians he leaves us very sceptical of any a-t heuristic. From my perspective Nietzsche’s work is where philosophy ends. Philosophers are ultimately truth finders. By engaging with comparatively uncertain mundanities and discovering that there are no absolute truths they lose their raison d’être as per Nietzsche. Mundane experiences if taken as read without a-t heuristics to confuse our perceptions and cloud our judgements are for engineers not philosophers. Nietzsche’s philosophy of solitude is as far as philosophers can go without becoming engineers. He was punished for his heresy by being ostracized and stigmatized. Life for Nietzsche was a journey of agony and ecstasy, which is to a large extent a process of ‘overcoming’ our habituation to ancient theometaphysical ways. I would interpret his work as an impossible struggle to make philosophical sense of his engagement with comparative uncertainties.
Nietzsche was less compromising than other philosophers in that he did engage thoroughly with comparative uncertainties and tried to make sense of what he found. Philosophers generally have been fighting a rear-guard thaction against engagement with mundane uncertainties since engineers became so successful: Descartes began a process of change that was modified by Locke, Hume, Kant, Hegel, Nietzsche et al., as philosophers had to deal with historical evidence. They and their theological allies could no longer write off mundane uncertain experiences as logical aberrations, as illusions to be swept away: ‘homo clausus’ was having difficulty making comparative uncertainties fit with its preconceived a-t heuristics. As far as I’m concerned, Nietzsche needed to develop engineering heuristics to explain more substantively his closer engagement with comparative uncertainties. But as Nietzsche so bravely affirmed, to challenge a-t heuristics at all in 19th century Europe was very isolating and dangerous. I would argue that this state of affairs still largely prevails, especially in politics, where a-t heuristics such as capitalism, socialism, democracy, justice and equality remain very influential as default hubs for figurational formation and every day functioning. This is partly explained by our personal need for control/safety and sufficient conviction to resist/dominate others. Such needs make us vulnerable however to political opportunists who use ideal heuristics to take us on flights of fancy in order to win our vote: ‘strong and stable government’ being a recent example. This is a serious mistake!