Philosophy Now

IMAGE BY CAROL BELANGER GRAFTON Philosophy Then

Looking to the Past

Peter Adamson on when philosophers write history.

Being a historian of philosophy, I cion might be that if war is, as Clausewitz to fall short of that standard, but like archers
have a soft spot for philosophers put it, the continuation of politics by other aiming too high, they will none the less
who were also historians. I don’t means, then history is the pursuit of politi- reach as far as possible. Already in Machi-
mean those who wrote about the cal philosophy by other means. Since avelli’s Discourses, though, we start to see
history of philosophy, though I admit it is medieval historical works were written in misgivings about this personality-based
flattering to be in the company of figures an age where autocratic rule (or to be more approach to history as politics. Here his
like G.W.F. Hegel and Bertrand Russell. polite, monarchy) was the norm, writers preference for Roman republican govern-
What I mean is philosophers who wrote tend to put the personality of rulers at the ment becomes clear. It’s an early example of
straightforward history, often gaining center of attention. The aforementioned the use of history to explore successful kinds
more renown for their work as historians Byzantine historians illustrate the point of political institution rather than to learn
than for their philosophy. There are many well: Psellos’s Chonographia consists of a the individual traits of successful rulers.
examples. Two key figures in Byzantine series of portraits of emperors whose indi-
philosophy, Michael Psellos and Anna vidual strengths and weaknesses are closely This tendency is fully developed by the
Komnene, are best known to modern-day linked to the success and failure of the state. time we get to Hume, who is interested in
Byzantinists for their historical writing. Komnene, meanwhile, writes a history cen- large-scale structural explanations for his-
The same goes for Miskawayh, a contem- tered on the excellent character of her own torical change. Thus Hume explains the
porary of the great Ibn S n (Avicenna) father, Alexios. Similarly favorable treat- growth of liberty in England by pointing to
who was not nearly as innovative or influ- ment was given by Miskawayh to rulers the impact of wealth flowing from the so-
ential as him philosophically but did write such as ‘Adud al-Dawla, and his own called New World; this wealth empowered
a massive historical work called The Expe- patron, Abu l-Fadl. The unwritten philo- the gentry to stand up against the crown.
riences of the Nations (c.1000 CE), which is sophical claim in all these texts is that virtu- He celebrates this shift away from despotic
still today consulted by historians of the ous rulership is both the necessary and the forms of government, regardless of the
Islamic world. sufficient condition for a flourishing state. personal virtue of the ruler: “even when
good Queen Elizabeth sat on the Throne,
Turning to the English language, Right up to the time of the Renaissance, there was very little Roast Beef, and no
Thomas Hobbes is probably known to you only a blurry line separated historical writ- Liberty at all.”
as the author of a ‘social contract’ political ing from so-called ‘mirrors for princes’ –
theory designed to avoid violent conflict. works of advice for rulers. Thus the What a modern European philosopher-
But he also wrote at length about one such Renaissance humanist Lipsius, best known historian such as Hume had in common
conflict he’d lived through, the English for his revival of Stoicism, wrote a pair of with his medieval forebears was the convic-
Civil War. Then there was David Hume. In linked works, one on political philosophy, tion that history can tell us about the pre-
his own day he was at least as well known for the Politica (1547), and one gathering sent and future. The experiences of past
his six-volume History of England (1763) as examples of good rulership from which generations reveal universal patterns, if not
for his philosophy. His approach to history, powerful readers might learn. ironclad laws. Machiavelli assumed that
as we might expect from a famous skeptic whatever worked for the Romans before
and empiricist, was marked by a cautious Or consider a more famous name from the birth of Christ would still work for
and critical attitude towards the evidence. the Renaissance: Machiavelli (1469-1527). Renaissance Italians; on these grounds, he
When common sense tells us that a claim in His most important works were that noto- even doubted the importance of gunpow-
a historical text is intrinsically implausible rious contribution to the ‘mirrors for der! No less a reader than Adam Smith
(for instance the huge number of soldiers princes’ tradition, The Prince, and his Dis- praised Hume for discerning one such gen-
supposedly involved in ancient battles), we courses on the histories of the Roman histo- eral rule: that with the growth of trade
should dismiss the evidence as unreliable. rian Livy. (We also have a History of Flo- between nations, peace between them
Here we may be reminded of Hume’s state- rence from Machiavelli’s own pen.) becomes more likely.
ment about reports of miracles requiring
exceptional evidence – and so we should be. The Prince and the Discourses were inti- Whether this search for universal pat-
Among the miracle reports he scoffed at mately related. In The Prince, Machiavelli terns should be the goal of the discipline
were those mentioned by the ancient histo- illustrates many of his points with examples that attracted Hume, Machiavelli, and the
rian Livy. from ancient Rome. His typically cynical others, I can’t really say. You’d have to ask
advice to found and then exploit colonies not a historian of philosophy, but a
It’s rather satisfying to see Hume’s phi- comes along with the observation that the philosopher of history.
losophy mirrored by his work as a historian Romans did very nicely out of this strategy.
in this way. But we should ask why he and so When he strikes the more inspiring note of © PROF. PETER ADAMSON 2022
many other philosophers wanted to write encouraging the princes of his own day to
about history in the first place. One suspi- seek glory, he advises them to imitate great Peter Adamson is the author of A History of
rulers of the past. Of course they are likely Philosophy Without Any Gaps, Vols 1-6,

available from OUP. They’re based on his
popular History of Philosophy podcast.

April/May 2022 Philosophy Now 51

Books This issue we consider ultimate human realities as

Raymond Tallis has the intention of proving free will,

Rutger Bregman gives a hopeful spin on our species, and
Chris Paley wants us to leave morality behind completely.

Freedom: subject or agent, as these thoughts about (p.29). To me this is a puzzling claim, for
An Impossible Reality something are for someone. After all, an why would the partial understanding of
by Raymond Tallis object itself can represent something else nature encapsulated in our current scientific
without the ‘aboutness’ of intentionality, theories not be part of nature itself?
IN THE SUBTITLE OF HIS such as the way a painting can on its own
highly intriguing new represent a landscape. But it only becomes Tallis’s key argument here is that the way
book, Prof. Raymond about a landscape when it’s observed. we scientifically study nature shows that our
Tallis calls free will ‘an impossible reality’. scientific understanding of it must lie
Though presumably somewhat tongue-in- Tallis argues that intentionality allows for outside of it. This independence is shown
cheek, this phrase is appropriate in capturing genuine agency. Intentionality allows us to particularily by our ability to examine
something of what has fascinated philoso- engage in forms of action that are best nature through the isolation or manipula-
phers about free will over the centuries: it understood as “a kind of interruption in the tion of variables, such as when we test
seems it cannot be, and yet nevertheless it otherwise uninterrupted flow of events in Boyle’s Law concerning the relation
must be. Given that all events in the natural the material world” (p.8). Being able to think between pressure and volume of a gas by
world seem to follow the unbreakable about other things (that is, have intentionality) keeping a constant temperature. This inde-
patterns which we call ‘laws of nature’, it opens up a reflective space or “virtual or non- pendence he says is evidence for free agency.
might appear that our actions could not be spatial outside” (p.2) for us which separates Tallis writes that “preparing the experi-
free, at least in the significant sense of having us and our thoughts in some way from the ment, carrying it out, repeating it on numer-
genuine alternative options for action avail- constraining laws of nature and allows us to ous occasions, and collating the results of
able to us. If all natural events follow natural have genuine alternatives for action. Inten- endless repetitions, demonstrating it to
laws without exception, our actions could tionality therefore demonstrates the poten- fellow scientists to persuade them of its
never have been otherwise, and thus cannot tial for an agency that is not simply plugged truth, do not look like an expression of
be freely chosen. Such a conclusion, though, into a physical causal framework that slav- nature’s habits” – it seems to be the work of
is antithetical to our cherished self-image as ishly follows the laws of nature. “an agent, rather than a reagent” (p.40).
beings with genuine agency, and thus it
seems to many to be unacceptable. If philos- Here Tallis seems to need the key While we may agree that the behaviour
ophy declares human beings to be unfree, assumption that intentionality doesn’t form in scientific experimentation makes it
then so much the worse for philosophy. part of the physical world, or as he puts it: unlikely to be carried out by anything other
Rather than taking this path, Tallis seeks “While intentionality is a fundamental and than a free agent, it is not entirely clear to
to establish a compatibilist position, which universal feature of mental states or entities, me why scientific behaviour is more evidence
says that genuine free will can exist in a world no physical entity has this feature” (p.1). In of our agency than any other sort. We could,
entirely ordered by the laws of nature. One order to meet the commitment to genuine on the contrary, argue that all aspects of our
potential compatibilist strategy is to redefine alternative options for action for free will, behaviour presuppose a partial and ever-
the traditional notion of freedom, perhaps the agent we are looking for must have some changing understanding of the workings of
by rejecting the idea that free will requires form of semi-independence from the deter- nature, not just when we are controlling
alternate options. Tallis takes the perhaps minate laws of nature. The task Tallis sets variables in the rather artificial atmosphere
more difficult route of embracing our himself, then, is to identify the type of agency of a scientific experiment. Further, we may
conventional understandings of both the that could only stem from a subject who is question whether behaviour per se can be
law-governed universe and free will, and non-physical and ‘virtually outside’ in the used as part of an argument for free will in
arguing that the appearance of conflict manner he suggests. So, can he find one? the strong sense Tallis is committed to. Any
between the two is illusory. behaviour we could point to could arguably
After deftly outlining some of the chal- be manifested by an agent determined by
Intentional Agency lenges the physicalist picture of the world the laws of nature as much as by an incom-
The overall argument of the book centres on poses to the notion of free will in Chapter 1, pletely determined agent. A capacity to
the notion of ‘intentionality’. This is a philo- and rightly rejecting experiments in neuro- reflect upon and manipulate the workings
sophical jargon term that doesn’t mean what science as having any bearing on this issue, of nature seems a neutral point of evidence
people normally mean by ‘intention’. We Tallis begins his argument proper in Chap- concerning whether or not we could have
can understand intentionality as the ‘about- ter 2 with a discussion of agency and scien- acted otherwise, and so, freely.
ness’ of a mental state: so, for example, my tific method. We can make a distinction
desire to have a cat as a pet shows intention- between the ‘habits of nature’, and the ‘laws In Chapter 3 Tallis considers the impor-
ality in being about a cat, or my perception of science’ understood as our evolving tant notion of physical causation. If all events
of the cup on the table is about that particular conception of these habits. Tallis argues for in the material world are brought about by
physical object. Intentionality requires a our formulation of scientific laws as “not chains of causes, then it may seem that all
being identical with the inherent habits of our physical actions are constrained by what
nature… [It] must belong to a virtual space has come before. As Tallis succinctly puts it,
outside of nature, occupied by humanity” “If causation were an intrinsic property of

52 Philosophy Now April/May 2022 Book Reviews

Books

nature, a material necessity binding all the Tallis’s point that our identification of causes phers have found the problem of free will so
events in the material world, we might be can be somewhat subjective. There is also the difficult, but the arguments Tallis offers
justified in viewing our actions as mere links rather pressing challenge that Tallis faces of seem insufficient to justify his commitment
in a causal network that weaves itself unbro- telling us how observers came about if there to a strong notion of free will which involves
ken from the Big Bang to the Big Crunch” were no causation before observation. having “several possibilities genuinely open
(p.79). In order to safeguard our free agency, to us such that we could have done or chosen
then, Tallis argues that causation is not an Moving on to Chapters 4 and 5, we find a otherwise” (p.12). The most obvious option
intrinsic property of nature; rather, it is a very interesting discussion of how our actions to safeguard free will may instead be to offer
result of the way in which we view the world seemingly depend on a complex network of a reduced notion of agency that does not
as free agents. Pointing out, quite rightly, intentions, reasons for action, and relations involve a commitment to alternative possi-
that our identification of causes for particular with other agents. Tallis argues that we can bilities. This is the alternative path many
effects often depends upon our practical see as an aspect of this complexity that our other philosophers have chosen to take.
interests (for example, I might say a house behaviour relies upon a kind of intentionality However, this may strike many as giving up
fire is caused by the relatively unusual once again involving envisaged possibilities on free will too soon, and it’s particularly
circumstance of the electrical short-circuit that mark out human minds as embodied problematic if it means that philosophers are
rather than by the somewhat unavoidable subjects semi-independent from nature: no longer talking about the kind of free will
condition of there being oxygen present) “Actions that take place in the material world that would be recognisable to a non-philo-
Tallis concludes that causation is a subjective draw on the (physically) absent and yet sophical audience. If we offer such a reduced
structure projected onto the world in order [mentally] present past and are motivated by definition of free will, instead of saving free
to connect events that hold our interest. possibilities… that are located in the [physi- will, have we not simply abandoned it?
cally] as yet absent future. To this extent
However, our picking events as causes in agents are not solely the products of material I highly recommend Freedom: An Impossible
a manner that reflects our interests does not events but requisition them… to bring about Reality to anyone interested in the free will
necessarily imply the causal anti-realism other events” (p.168ff.). debate. Many of Tallis’s arguments I have
Tallis advocates. Following something like been unable to address in this short review.
J.L. Mackie’s account as offered in his classic Conclusions And although I think some of them don’t go
work The Cement of the Universe (1974), we As interesting as Tallis’s discussion is, the far enough to convince free will sceptics, I
can hold that events arise out of a concate- argument needs to go beyond what agency would encourage them to read this very
nation of circumstances or conditions that seems to involve. Both sides of the debate can thought-provoking book and decide for
we understand as a general ‘causal field’ while agree that free choice is how agency seems to themselves. I greatly enjoyed the food-for-
allowing that we may want to pick out any operate; but the free will sceptic will not thought on offer, always couched in Tallis’s
particular condition(s) of an event as espe- thereby feel compelled to accept the reality entertaining style.
cially important from our own practical of agency on that basis alone. In order to
standpoint. In this way, we can both believe establish free agency, we need to show that © JONATHAN HEAD 2022
that causal necessity binds all the events in freedom is not merely some cherished illu-
the material world in a manner that poten- sion we’re simply unwilling to give up. Jonathan Head is Lecturer in Philosophy at
tially threatens our agency, and agree with Keele University.
The book illustrates well just why philoso-
• Freedom: An Impossible Reality, Raymond Tallis,

Agenda, 2021, £25 hb, 280 pages, ISBN:

1788213785

Humankind:
A Hopeful History
by Rutger Bregman

HUMAN BEINGS ARE SELFISH.
This is a core premise of both
old and modern theories of politics,
economics, and philosophy. It is a notion that
has over the years been proved by psycholo-
gists, zoologists, and biologists, who then go
on to explain how our social world is
constructed on this selfish basis. Highly influ-
ential books have been written by the likes of
Richard Dawkins (The Selfish Gene, 1976) or
Steven Pinker (The Better Angels of our Nature,
2011) purporting to show that humans are
selfish by nature. But suppose it isn’t true?
What if, rather than being inherently selfish,
humans are in fact inherently kind?
Rutger Bregman has addressed this ques-

Book Reviews April/May 2022 Philosophy Now 53

Books

tion in his book Humankind: A Hopeful nature is just a belief we have, and not actu- processes that only appear to follow the scien-
History (2020). “This is a book about a radi- ally a good depiction of how things were tific method. Ben Blum’s 2018 article ‘The
cal idea” Bregman opens his first chapter before states existed. Jean-Jacques Lifespan of a Lie’ (available at en.medium.com)
with: “One that has long been known to Rousseau, argues Bregman, has a closer shows strong evidence that the Stanford
make rulers nervous… That most people, affinity to how things really were. The open- Prison experiment, in which some volunteers
deep down, are pretty decent” (p.2). By re- ing sentence to Rousseau’s book The Social were given the roles of prisoners, and others
evaluating common anecdotes about war, Contract (1762) is “Man is born free yet of guards, was manipulated into having a
prison experiments, and democracy, Breg- everywhere he is in chains.” For Rousseau, particular set of results. The guards were in
man pushes one, if not to accept his radical people were better off and happier without on this, and even manipulated each other into
idea, at least to question the foundation of the state and social institutions we find acting more aggressively. Or Gina Perry’s
how we conceive human nature. ourselves imprisoned by today. Bregman book Behind the Shock Machine (2012)
builds on this idea with evidence that before provides damning evidence against how Stan-
Bregman starts off by talking about one farming and individual property, humans ley Milgram conducted his famous experi-
of the most prominent representations for would generally interact with other groups ment in which volunteers were easily
how we perceive human nature, William with a natural trust and friendliness. Sure, persuaded into giving other volunteers elec-
Golding’s novel Lord of the Flies (1954). In there were disputes about all kinds of things. tric shocks of increasing intensity. The book
the story a group of schoolboys are ship- The main point however is that humans also re-evaluates the potential reason why the
wrecked on an island with no parental super- weren’t in a state of all against all, but instead ‘67%’ agreed to give the shocks. Rather than
vision. As time goes by the children become often wanted to find peaceful solutions. simple ‘obedience to authority’, the reality is
more animalistic, leading to chaos, destruc- that given the location – Yale University –
tion, and eventually murder. For most of us, What is most important to Bregman’s these people believed they were helping a
this story has an intuitive truth about it. investigation is factual evidence. The argu- prestigious school carry out vital experiments.
ment claiming humans are selfish has a lot of
But Golding’s fiction is just that: a piece evidence. Over the past sixty years, both the With all this in hand, Bregman draws on
of fiction. Trying to build a more scientific Stanford Prison and Milgram’s Shock exper- recent studies which re-affirm his doubts
picture, Bregman tells the true story behind iments seem to indicate this. But Bregman is about the inherent wickedness of human
the Lord of the Flies. “Turns out” Bregman sceptical. Such tests have been the bedrock of nature. The conclusion is that, rather than
writes, “it’s a heart-warming story” (p.36). our understanding of human nature for years. being inherently selfish, we are naturally
The real-life group of boys who were ship- Yet, as one delves into how the canonical friendly. Indeed, there are many accounts in
wrecked on an island without parental experiments were conducted, it becomes the book of situations where, given the
supervision, rather than turning into clear that they were riddled with questionable opportunity to act selfishly, people don’t.
savages, worked together as friends and None are more surprising than in real-life
survived for over a year on the island.

Most people don’t know the real-life
story. It wasn’t really picked up by the
papers, and it took ages for Bregman to find
the original source. Yet Golding’s novel is
still in the curriculum. We continue to be
taught that human beings are inherently
selfish from a young age. There is something
eerie in this. And despite not necessarily
being true, we are still somewhat indoctri-
nated into it. Yet it does feel obvious that,
left unchallenged, we would find ourselves
in a state of anarchy. Most of our political
thought is premised on the belief that
humans are selfish, and that it is only by
using this selfishness against ourselves that
we can live in a civilisation.

Possibly no one else articulates this better
than Thomas Hobbes. In his most famous
work, Leviathan (1651), Hobbes describes
the state of nature before laws or states exist.
He conceives of this world as being pure
anarchy, a war of all against all, because there
is no one controlling us. This same line of
reasoning then helps him justify the exis-
tence of states, legal authority, and top-
down hierarchical power.

Bregman starts to build a case that
suggests that Hobbes’ central premise is
incorrect; that the brutality of the state of

54 Philosophy Now April/May 2022 Book Reviews

Books

accounts of prisoners. In Norway, for species’ unique capacity for conflict-manage- ing what they want and intend. “What we
instance, there are maximum security pris- ment and cooperation (what Jonathan Haidt glean [of others] is a product of our own
ons where the guards don’t have batons or dubs ‘groupishness’); and altruism/morality brains as much as theirs”, says Paley, and,
riot gear, and the prisoners aren’t locked is ‘an optical illusion of the mind’, or deferred equally, we each have to construct our own
away for twenty-three hours a day. In fact, gratification for genes. He adds a pinch of self-model ‘from the outside-in’ – via what
they could easily escape if they wanted to. Nietzsche in diagnosing that moralism arose others have fabricated of us. Even pain, says
Yet here you’ll find hardened criminals from pleasure in vengeance, but views moral Paley, is largely an ‘inference’ as to ‘what
gardening, cooking in communal kitchens, approval or disapproval mainly as others would infer’. Indirectly, then, moral-
and recording music. The premise of this is: outgrowths of a tribesman’s need to signal ity has provoked the development of minds.
treat others as humans and they will act allegiance. To seem, rather than be, morally
humanely. And one result is that Norway has good, was from the outset the essential thing, But, if minds are just a mutual collusion
the lowest rate of re-offending. This system says Paley. But although in the modern world concoction of mirages, how can ‘getting
also saves money for the government. we still ‘click into moral gear’, in fact morality minds right’ be important, or even possible?
has become redundant: “Today, we trade Paley inadvertently suggests that there is
Humankind: A Hopeful History is radical. with people we’ll never see again” so our some (physical, neural) reality at the core of
Fundamentally, Bregman is seeking to reputations are not at risk. the smoke and mirrors, and that we need to
unchain us from a dogmatically pessimistic conjure ideas of our own and other people’s
perception of human nature. I believe that he Really? Isn’t he aware of social media thinking only because “we don’t [as ideally we
has achieved this, although as you read it you echoing round the global village; of the exac- should] carry around brain scanners with
may find yourself questioning not only erbated moralism of cancel culture; of which to probe the inside of others’ heads.”
whether humans are inherently selfish, but also people being sacked and denounced when Yet we’d be no wiser if we did. Observing
Bregman’s own position. I think that is a good their long-ago youthful tweets are resur- neural imaging would in itself be uninforma-
thing. The book’s intention is to make you rected, dusted off, and touted around? Paley tive without accumulated, systematic correla-
question, and that is absolutely what it does. is at least original in bucking the moralistic tions, by neuroscientists, between what is
trend, but he’s out of sync with reality. observed in brains and what is reported by
© TWJ MOXHAM 2022 brain-owners. Paley’s mind-fabrication argu-
Of course he is right that moral behaviour ment, though intriguing, is circular.
Tim Moxham is a social and political researcher is riddled with sanctimony, self-righteous-
with a Masters from the University of Sheffield. ness and hypocrisy – but why invoke scien- Perhaps I should feel guilt at reviewing
tific experiments to ‘prove’ what has been this book so harshly. Since, however, it
• Humankind: A Hopeful History, Rutger Breg- immemorially acknowledged and analysed? exhorts me to ditch my morals, I’m without
His claim that morality should be jettisoned compunction.
man, 2021, Bloomsbury, £9.99 pb, 496 pages, ISBN: is more novel, but to vindicate an assertion
of such consequence would require detailed © JANE O’GRADY 2022
9781408898956 examples of how and when the jettisoning
could be done rather than facetious rhetoric. Jane O’Grady helped found the London School of
Beyond Bad The only example provided of ‘amoral social Philosophy and writes philosophers' obituaries for
by Chris Paley behaviour’ is climate change activism, and The Guardian. She co-edited Blackwell's
the most Paley establishes is that so far it has Dictionary of Philosophical Quotations with
“MORALS ARE FOR SUCKERS”, been ineffective. A.J. Ayer, and wrote Knowledge in a Nutshell:
whereas “amorality will lead Enlightenment Philosophy (Arcturus, 2019).
you to worldly success” says Chris Paley, who Yet Paley allows that morality has been
has a Cambridge doctorate in evolutionary useful after all. Its function is to change • Beyond Bad: How Obsolete Morals Are Holding
biology and was briefly an investment banker. people’s behaviour, and that requires gaug-
He cites an experiment in which the majority Us Back, Chris Paley, 2021, Coronet, £11.99 hb, 272
of drivers who refused to stop for pedestrians
at a crossing in California were driving expen- pages, ISBN 9781529327090
sive cars. It is through such experiments,
apparently, that ‘science’ has enabled us, in
the last few decades, to understand what
moral philosophers have been trying to
explain for the last three millennia – why and
how we moralise. Apparently, after reading
Beyond Bad (2021) we will be able to junk not
only moral philosophy, but morality itself.
“I’ll argue” announces Paley on p.2, “that
humans have the mental machinery to
moralise because it was in our ancestors’
genes’ interests.” However, since it is
axiomatic in evolutionary psychology that
any human behaviour is the product of
genetic advantage, this is hardly an argu-
ment. Nevertheless, Paley takes the standard
line: moral behaviour, he says, is allied to our

Book Reviews April/May 2022 Philosophy Now 55

Androids At The Cinema

Film Alessandro Colarossi looks at how Hollywood draws
and blurs the line between human and machine.

“Putting his lips together David whistled a few soft, Maria attempts to improve conditions for android character is Michael Fassbender.
carefully modulated notes. Head cocked to one side, the factory workers and overcome the class Not only has he played a robot in multiple
the alien watched and listened. Then it exhaled divide between them and the city's rulers. A films, but he’s even played multiple robots
softly, trying to duplicate the sounds. Since it crazed scientist called Rotwang creates a in the same film. Most memorably, he
possessed a very different respiratory mechanism, it seductive android. The ruler of Metropolis portrayed the scheming android David in
failed in the attempt. That did not matter to David. asks him to use the android to sow distrust the 2012 Ridley Scott film Prometheus, a sci-
What was important and what prompted him to among Maria's working-class followers, so fi horror prequel to Alien. Fassbender
tears was the fact that the creature tried.” he finds a way to exactly capture Maria's reprised the David role in 2017 Alien:
appearance and give it to the android. Here Covenant, in which he also played a second
(Ridley Scott, Alien: Covenant) we see some of the possibilities of artificial android, Walter. David exhibits human
intelligence. The android Maria is a tool of emotions, which had been added to his
One of the dreams in AI is the both deception and liberation, an object of programming in Prometheus with disas-
creation of a machine that’s love and revulsion in equal measure. trous consequences, but the even-keeled
indistinguishable from its Walter is essentially emotionless. “I wanted
creators. This was the core of Since Metropolis, cinematic depictions of Walter to be more Spock-like, devoid of
Alan Turing’s idea that a ‘thinking machine’ robots have evolved as movie production human characteristics or emotional
should be able to fool a human that it’s values have progressed. So too has the contents that are programmed into David,”
human after a few minutes of conversation emotional complexity with which robots are Fassbender says: “I want him more like a
across a textual interface. More recent cine- imbued by their actors. Actors’ portrayals of blank canvas one can project things upon.”
matic forays imagine this indistinguishability onscreen robots have developed multiple In commenting on Fassbender’s perfor-
to be more than merely conversation-based. layers: a human actor playing an android mance, Forrest Wickman writes: “Many
Popular media representations of AI intro- indistinguishable from humans – two char- actors have leapt into the discomfiting
duce fully-fledged automata that would be acterizations at once, separated by the gulf chasm between the human and the inhu-
indistinguishable from their human counter- between nature and technology. Note how man… but few actors have as gracefully
parts if it weren’t for the gap between how the far this nuanced idea of a ‘human playing a danced to-and-fro across the divide. He’s
robot acts and how it would need to act in robot trying to be human’ has changed from such a robot! He’s such a human! That eerie
order to transcend its mechanistic roots. the original cinematic conception of robots territory has never been so much fun” (‘I,
Inhabiting this ‘uncanny valley’ is a feature of as mere tin men. The days of expressionless, Actor: Cinema’s Finest Robot Perfor-
many cinematic androids. stiff of movement, monotone-speaking mances’, slate.com, June 9, 2012). To
robots apparently are done. Too old school. prepare Fassbender to play the robot in
Hollywood has been putting a face to Prometheus, Scott instructed him to watch
artificial intelligence at least since the One actor who stands out in recent three films: The Man Who Fell to Earth, with
groundbreaking 1927 silent film Metropolis, productions as moving fluidly between the rocker/actor David Bowie as an alien who
In it, an idealistic young woman called natural and the artificial required by an never fits in; Lawrence of Arabia, starring
Peter O’Toole as a man caught between two
Android Maria cultures; and The Servant, a film in which
Dirk Bogarde plays a manservant to a rich,
gets a wake-up aimless Englishman – of which Fassbender
subsequently told Scott, “I get it – I’m a
call in Metropolis butler.” He also explains that O’Toole’s
Lawrence is neither British nor Arabic but
METROPOLIS IMAGE © FRITZ LANG 1927 an outcast to both. “There’s something in…
the robot [David] not being accepted by any
of the humans,” says Fassbender, who for
the role cut his hair to match O’Toole’s
unique Lawrence cut and even internalized
some of O’Toole’s mannerisms.

Another actor familiar with robot roles is
Anthony Daniels, who featured as C3PO in
the Star Wars series between 1977-2019.
Although his character is a cinematic icon,
Daniels can walk down any street in the world

56 Philosophy Now l April/May 2022

Android twins Walter and David
in Alien: Covenant

ALIEN: COVENANT IMAGE © 20TH CENTURY FOX 2017 Film

unlikely to be recognized, since onscreen he colonies in where they had served in various the story moved along and HAL became
was always covered head to toe with the slave-like roles to return to a dystopian Earth malevolent” Neil Genzlinger, New York
gleaming gold exterior of the fussy, well- to seek more life from their creator. Burnt- Times, November 12, 2018). In ‘2001: A
mannered protocol droid. We never see out cop Rick Deckard (Harrison Ford) is Space Odyssey’ Turns 50: Why HAL
Daniels’ face, but the audience hears him tasked to locate and terminate them. It’s an Endures’ (Christian Science Monitor, April 3,
plenty as he flaunts his fluency in some of the assignment he takes with reluctance, aware 2018), Eoin O’Carroll and Molly Driscoll
seven million languages he knows, whether of his prey’s advanced (artificial) intelli- describe HAL as “modernity gone awry, and
expressing befuddlement, proudly tapping gence, physical prowess and humanlike such a fitting vessel for our collective anxiety
into his recall, or reacting in stark terror to yet emotions. Rutger Hauer plays Roy Batty, about an eventual evolutionary showdown
another imminent danger. C3PO is every bit the imposing, violent leader of the replicants against our own creations.”
the ‘throwback’ robot, wholly mechanized, with a combination of menace and anguish.
with stiff-armed, stiff-legged movements, yet Also particularly memorable is Daryl Both 2001: A Space Odyssey and Blade
he’s still demonstrably human-like. That’s a Hannah as the ingenue-ish Pris, designed as Runner received mixed reviews upon their
credit to Daniels’s keen expressiveness a ‘basic pleasure model’, but whose deadly releases, only to eventually be recognised as
coupled with gifted, often-comedic timing. acrobatic moves almost end Deckard. classics. Both had iconic directors at the helm.
Both movies also were unprecedented in their
This uncanny valley inhabited by Hauer, who passed away in 2019, called insightful depictions of artificial intelligence.
Daniel’s and Fassbender’s portrayals is not Blade Runner his favorite of the films he was
gender-exclusive. Discussing her portrayal in. He plays his robotic role superbly convinc- If there is a common thread to the most
of the robot Ava in Alex Garland’s Ex ingly; on one hand he’s fearless, making him intriguing cinematic android portrayals, it is
Machina (2014), Alicia Vikander says that every bit the daunting foe; on the other, he’s the infusion of character flaws into artificial
actors look for parts that will take them out a ‘man’ with a conflicted conscience, who beings that otherwise are models of mecha-
of their comfort zone, which is what she ends a rainy rooftop fight scene with an unex- nized perfection. The possibilities here are
found with Ava in that “she’s a more sublime pected demonstration of humanity. conceivably infinite for an innovative actor,
human.” She adds that if she had aimed for given the freedom to paint on a ‘blank canvas’
physical perfection in the physicality aspect While HAL in Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A in whatever manner they choose (at the
of her role it would have made her character Space Odyssey (1968) is a mainframe Director’s discretion). Wickman sees this as
more robotic. To sell Ava as more human, computer not a robot, his remarkably an opportunity for an actor to ‘show off,’ to
as a girl – key to the plotline – she took a nuanced personality, including petulance, ‘convey life’: “Then there are the layers!
different approach, making her character indecisiveness, apprehension, remorse, and There are so many! Rather than merely
more offbeat, with flaws and inconsisten- dread, present him as plausibly humanlike. simulating emotion (yourself), you have to
cies. She says, “By being a bit more perfect His most distinguishing characteristic is his play someone who simulates emotion” (Ibid).
in her movements, she became weirdly voice – bland, dispassionate, implacable,
enough a bit more robotic. It was not about soothing – all of which makes his menace and The nuances of cinematic androids are
trying to play a robot while playing a robot, deceitfulness all the more disturbing. Like limited only by the imaginations and savvy of
instead about trying to play a girl who is Anthony Daniels with C3PO, we don’t actu- their creators in all departments. However, it
aiming to be a perfect human.” ally see Douglas Rain in 2001, but the voice is clear that the image of robots has moved
and mannerisms of HAL are a performance steadily towards an embrace of subtle artifice.
The theme in which androids or cyborgs worthy of a Shakespearean stage actor, Androids in cinema may have begun with
attempt to blend in with humans is which Rain was. Rain took a day and a half springs and cogs for hearts and minds, but
widespread. A case in point is another Ridley to record his lines without benefit of inter- they now regularly feature means of simulat-
Scott movie Blade Runner (1982). It features action with either his fellow cast members or ing synthetic biology. At the same time, the
four fugitive replicants – synthetic superhu- dailies. Instead, Kubrick explained the characterizations of androids in movies have
mans bio-engineered and implanted with scenes to him, “giving him only the sparsest become more nuanced, problematizing the
fake memories, but with only a four year of directorial notes… His readings were cool division between natural and artificial that
lifespan. The replicants escape the off-world to the point of being chilling, especially as seems reinforced in the very term ‘Artificial
Intelligence’. As such depictions continue to
develop, we will use cinema as we always have:
as a dark mirror reflecting a combination of
what we are and what we might become.

© ALESSANDRO COLAROSSI 2022

Alessandro Colarossi is a technical consultant
from Toronto. He is the co-author of Becoming
Artificial (Imprint Academic, 2020,
becomingartificial.com).

April/May 2022 l Philosophy Now 57

Perception as a

allis Controlled Hallucination

T in Raymond Tallis argues against calling
Wonderland everyday experience a ‘hallucination’.

Over the festive season, in the point upstream to the events that have caused term that is put to most use in this context
intervals between eating, drink- them, and to transform those events into the – indeed it is worked to death – is ‘informa-
ing, Covid-secure socializing, basis of the experience of an object encoun- tion’. The brain, we are told, is an informa-
and giving and receiving gifts, I tered by a conscious subject, such as the expe- tion processing device. This seems obvious
read Anil Seth’s Being You: A New Science of rience of seeing a flower. The gap between to those who a) think of the brain as a
Consciousness (2021). Beautifully written, neural activity and consciousness is even computer, and b) believe that stand-alone
with its wonderful erudition worn lightly, it wider where intentional consciousness is computers process information.
is a must-read. It gathers up in one relatively shared or joined with that of the conscious-
short book the strongest possible case for ness of others so that a community of Calling what happens in a physical object
believing that we are getting closer to under- conscious minds – the world of our daily life such as a brain ‘information processing’ is
standing “how the various properties of – is created and maintained. It is conse- hardly controversial if it is accepted that infor-
consciousness depend on, and relate to, the quently difficult to identify anything that mation is everywhere. Indeed, if information
operations of the neural wetware inside our happens in the darkness inside my skull with does not require conscious subjects who are
heads” (p.5). Yet after reading Being You, the my being a citizen of many worlds. There are informed, or who inform others, there is no
reader may see why ‘the strongest possible also other characteristics of persons and their limit to where information can be found.
case’ falls well short of being strong enough. minds that cannot be revealed by even the David Chalmers raised fewer eyebrows than
most careful inspection of neural activity; for he should have done when he asserted that
Regular readers of this column will be example, experiential unities, such as those in “wherever there is causal interaction, there is
familiar with my allergy to Neuromania – a visual field, where many elements are information… One can find information
the conviction that the brain is not only a brought together and yet are kept distinct, so states in a rock – when it expands and
necessary condition for human conscious- that we can simultaneously see both individ- contracts, for example – or even in different
ness and indeed personhood, but also a suffi- ual objects and the landscape of which they aspects of an electron” (The Conscious Mind: In
cient condition: the idea that consciousness are a part. And then there is memory. The Search of a Fundamental Theory, 1996, p.297).
‘is only’ brain activity. explicit presence of the past (which also
informs an envisaged future) has no place in If, however, information really is every-
There are many reasons for acknowledg- the physical world. A brain at time t is where, then seeing the brain as an informa-
ing the brain as a necessary condition for citi- confined to time t. By contrast, a person at tion-processing device contributes nothing
zenship of the community of minds. Brain time t reaches back into time t-1 and forward to explaining how it is the seat of conscious-
damage results in loss or impairment of into time t+1 – to many-layered realms of the ness. This is one of the reasons why Seth
consciousness and of aspects of personhood, no-longer and the not-yet, which are neces- rejects the idea that the neural
and there are rough correlations between the sary for our present moments to have explicit activity/consciousness gap can be closed by
sites of damage and the mental deficits that meaning and significance. describing both as ‘information’. He
result. What’s more, localized stimulation of remains, however, in the penumbra of this
the cerebral cortex in waking subjects may Information, Information, Information! conceptual framework, and retains its associ-
result in the production of a range of experi- ated personification of the brain as a predic-
ences, from simple tingles to the evocation of A good deal of ingenuity is therefore needed tion machine: “what we see, hear, and feel, is
detailed memories. There are, however, also to leap over the yawning gap between nothing more than the brain’s ‘best guess’ of
many reasons for not concluding from this persons and their neural wetware. One the causes of its sensory inputs” (p.76). From
that what goes on in the brain is sufficient for strategy can be summarized as brainifying this he draws an interesting conclusion: the
consciousness and personhood, or that brain the person by personifying the brain, which experienced world is ‘a neuronal fantasy’. It
activity is identical with the contents of the brings me back to Seth’s Being You. Accord- is the product of ‘top-down predictions’
conscious mind. Most obviously, neural ing to Seth, notwithstanding that they are generated by cerebral tissue rather than
discharges are nothing like, for example, the tenseless material objects, brains are ‘bottom-up’ sensory input. Perception is,
experience of the colour yellow, of knowing ‘prediction engines’: they reach into the apparently, a controlled hallucination.
that Paris is the capital of France, or experi- future with guesses, hypotheses, inferences,
encing nostalgia or regret. More fundamen- and so on. Personifying the brain in this sort A Fantasy of Hallucination
tally, physical events such as nerve impulses in of way is of course commonplace in neuro-
the brain are radically different from anything science, and in physicalist philosophy, If we set aside the qualification ‘controlled’
that has the ‘intentionality’ or ‘aboutness’ that which identifies consciousness with neural for the moment, this sounds like a radical,
is the mark of the mental. Events in the visual activity and persons with their brains. The indeed radically disturbing, claim. Seth’s
cortex do not seem to have the capacity to appeal to well-known illusions such as Adel-
son’s checkerboard to support his thesis

58 Philosophy Now April/May 2022

EYE HALLUCINATION © PAUL GREGORY 2022 WoTndaeilnlrisland

should, however, raise our suspicions, not what we thought it was all along? only part of a surface of the object, and does
the least because illusions are not hallucina- Seth’s further claim that our conscious so from an angle and at a distance and in a
tions. More significantly, if perception really light which the object itself has no part in
were universally hallucinatory, we should not perceptions are “indirect reflections of defining. Generally speaking, how objects
be able to identify within that perceptual hidden causes that we can never directly are perceived is influenced by the nature of
experience a small sub-set of our experiences encounter” (p.80) also seems to undermine their interaction with the perceiving subject.
betraying or illustrating this fact. But that I itself in similar ways. By what (indirect) This is not however distortion or conceal-
can be tricked into getting things wrong, and means did we discover those hidden causes? ment; not the least because when, for exam-
then recognize this, itself shows that I don’t And how did we discover that our predic- ple, I see an object from a certain angle, I see
always, or even typically, get things wrong. tions are “tied in useful ways to their causes” that I am seeing it from that angle and make
if the causes are hidden? allowances. When I see something in
If, moreover, the brain generates only a unfavourable conditions, I am conscious that
‘top-down fantasy’, how would we get to Of course, our experiences prompt my seeing is dodgy guesswork.
know this supposed truth about our experi- expectations arising out of the objects of our
ence? By what means would we get past the perception, and those expectations may be Challenging the ‘revelation’ that brain
fantasy to call it out? ‘Science!’ is not an unfulfilled. Life is speckled with surprises, science has exposed perception as a neuronal
answer here because ultimately science too and we sometimes make mistakes. When I fantasy also throws into question the adja-
depends on perceptions. If perception were see a coffee cup, I expect I will be able to pick cent claim that we’re closing in on an expla-
the ever-deceptive epistemological prisoner it up. I may be proved wrong: some joker has nation of how there come to be subjects
of the brain, there would be no means by super-glued it to the table. On the over- facing a world of objects. The intact mystery
which scientists could expose what the brain whelming majority of occasions, however, can be highlighted by noting an asymmetry:
is up to, never mind share the news that daily my implicit expectations about the world of while there is a realm of material objects,
experience is a controlled hallucination. everyday perception will be borne out. I may states, and events present to subjects like you
occasionally encounter a trip-wire, but the and me, we are not present to the material
It would appear, after all, then, that the rarity of such events justifies the usual belief world. The cup I experience does not expe-
‘neuronal fantasy’ is so completely reined in that any ‘top-down inferences’ I may make rience me. Fancy footwork - around
by reality that it is not a fantasy at all. Sense in my perception are located in a sea of expe- supposed causal interactions between extra-
experience is no kind of hallucination, riences that are not merely the ‘guesswork’ cerebral entities and bits of the brain cred-
controlled or otherwise. If I have the experi- of a personified brain. ited with the capacity to guess or predict
ence of seeing a cup in front of me and there what it is that is outside the body of the
is a cup in front of me (as is usually the case), It may seem as if I am being wilfully dim. person whose brain it is - does not cast any
this is not a question of experiencing any kind Of course, there is a sense in which we never light on this fundamental asymmetry.
of hallucination, controlled or not. An ‘hallu- see objects as they are in themselves, and
cination’ so tightly controlled by the kind of there are obvious grounds for taking the It is in the context of this thought that we
reality that we can all see if we are correctly deliverances of our senses with a pinch of may judge the promise with which Seth’s book
positioned, seems indistinguishable from salt. Groping in the dark is an incomplete ends: that “We will see how our inner universe
veridical perception. So isn’t the situation just revelation of the item groped. And even the is part of, not apart from, the rest of the
most object-friendly sense, vision, reveals universe” (p.276). To look half-way persuasive
this promise of a journey towards a completed
naturalism requires more than the arguments
and experimental findings set out in the
preceding 275 pages. I nevertheless urge you
to read Being You: A New Science of Consciousness.
There could not be a better account of the
state of the art of the scientistic philosophy
of mind – and hence no more elegant, if
inadvertent, exposure of its limitations.

© PROF. RAYMOND TALLIS 2022

Raymond Tallis’s latest book, Freedom: An
Impossible Reality was published recently, and
reviewed in this issue’s review section.

April/May 2022 Philosophy Now 59

Subscribe to Philosophy Now

philosophynow.org/shop

6 IDEA-PACKED ISSUES FOR £18/US$35

By subscribing to the print edition of Philosophy Now you
can save up to 43% off the newsstand price, have your
copies delivered to your door and enjoy unrestricted
access to our vast online archive of past articles!
Subscribe today at philosophynow.org/shop or fill out and
return one of the coupons below.

Subscription inquiries: [email protected] or phone 01959 534171
To tell us about a change of address, please email [email protected]

UK / Rest of World United States

Name _____________________________________________ Name _____________________________________________
Address ___________________________________________
Address ___________________________________________ __________________________________________________

__________________________________________________ Email (for password) ________________________________

Email (for password) ________________________________ Subscribe to Philosophy Now for 6 issues ($35)
Subscribe to Philosophy Now for 12 issues ($64)
Subscribe to Philosophy Now for 6 issues (1 year) starting with Issue #149/Issue #150 (delete as appropriate)

Subscribe to Philosophy Now for 12 issues (2 years) Buy The Ultimate Guide to Theory of Knowledge

UK £18/£32 (GBP)

Canada $39/$71 (CAD)

New Zealand $49/$89 (NZD)

Australia $50/$84 (AUD)

Europe 25€/45€ (EUR)

Rest of World £23/£39 (GBP)

starting with Issue 149/Issue 150 (delete as appropriate)

Buy The Ultimate Guide to Theory of Knowledge Buy back issues in PRINT (please specify issue numbers)
______________________________________
Buy back issues in PRINT (please specify issue numbers)
______________________________________ Buy _____ binders to hold back issues (insert quantity)

Buy _____ binders to hold back issues (insert quantity) TOTAL AMOUNT PAYABLE: $_________

TOTAL AMOUNT PAYABLE: _________ Please make your check payable to ‘Philosophy Documentation
Center’ or fill in your Mastercard /Visa /Maestro card details below:

Please make your cheque payable to ‘Philosophy Now’ or fill in your Card no.
Mastercard /Visa /Maestro card details below:
Expiry_________________ Security Code__________

Card no. Name on card _______________________________________________

Expiry__________________ Security Code___________ and send it to: Philosophy Documentation Center,
P.O. Box 7147
Name on card _______________________________________________ Charlottesville, VA 22906-7147
U.S.A.
and send it to: Philosophy Now Subscriptions
Kelvin House, Grays Road,
Westerham, Kent TN16 2JB, (You can also order on 800-444-2419 or email [email protected])
United Kingdom

60 Philosophy Now April/May 2022

Back Issues & Digital Editions

Back Issues in Print The Ultimate Guide Series

Issue 144 Modern Moral Problems: protest, fat Each Ultimate Guide is a col-
shaming, racism & stoicism, election lection of some of the best
meddling, animals, artificial wombs / articles from past issues of
Deleuze & Guattari / C.S. Lewis Brief Life Philosophy Now, and some
new material too. Each is
Issue 148 Love & Romance: what is love?, Iris Murdoch divided into five chapters
on love, Spinoza’s love trouble, / cancel covering the main aspects of
culture / David Chalmers on VR / defining a core philosophical topic.
evil / Superman vs Ubermensch Full colour, 116 pages.

We still have copies of these earlier back issues: The Ultimate Guide to Theory
39-40, 55-80, 83-89, 91-98, 100-106, 108-116, 118-122, 124-139, 142, 143 of Knowledge is out now. You
You can also buy PDFs of all past issues. For full details, please visit can find it on newsstands,
philosophynow.org/shop buy it from our website
shop, or order it on the
Back issues in print cost £4.75 each if you live in the UK (inc p&p) or opposite page. The Ultimate
US$10/9€/A$15/C$15/NZ$16/£8.50 elsewhere via airmail. For every Guide to Ethics, The Ultimate Guide to Metaphysics and The
three you buy, we’ll give you a fourth for free (please tell us which Ultimate Guide to Mind are available as PDFs or on Kindle.
you would like).
Including postage The Ultimate Guide to Theory of Knowledge
Binders: Our smart green Philosophy Now binders with gold lettering costs: £8.25 (UK), $18.95 (USA), 13.75€ (Eur), Aus$28,
Can$26, NZ$29, or £15 (Rest of World). Or you can buy the
each hold 12 magazines. UK£10, US$25, Europe 22€, Australia $35, PDF file from our website shop for a lower cost.
Canada $35, NZ$37 or Rest of World £19.

Digital (see philosophynow.org/digital) Gifts and Merch

Website Subscriptions A wide range of Philosophy Now t-shirts, coffee mugs, tote
bags and other gifts in a bewildering variety of designs are now
Print subscriptions to Philosophy Now do not include access to available from our partners Spreadshirt. All sales help to keep our
the digital editions below, but do include access to our website editors and illustrators supplied with gin and biscuits.
which has over 3,000 articles from past issues. A password is
available on request to print subscribers or is sent automati- Please follow the link at the foot of the philosophynow.org/shop
cally if you subscribe online. You can also buy a website-only page to visit our store on the Spreadshirt website.
subscription from our store at:
philosophynow.org/shop

IP-based online access is available for Philosophy Now
schools and colleges – please visit
philosophynow.org/institutions

App Available in the Apple App Store.
Free sample issue included.

Kindle Buy a single issue or an ongoing
subscription. (30 day free trial)

Nook Available in the USA via Barnes & Noble’s Nook
reader and the Nook app. (14 day free trial)

Zinio There is an edition for the Zinio app on iPad and
Android. Single issue or ongoing subscription.

Pocketmags There is an edition for the Pocketmags app on
iOS and Android. Single issue or ongoing subscription.

April/May 2022 Philosophy Now 61

Brief Lives

Diogenes meets Alexander
by Langetti c1650

Diogenes the Cynic (c.404-323 BC)

Martin Jenkins recalls what we know for sure about the philosopher in the barrel.

Socrates notoriously never wrote anything down, but recorder of his thoughts. We have to reconstruct his life and
we at least have dialogues written by his contempo- ideas from quotations and anecdotes in sources long after his
raries Plato and Xenophon claiming to record what he lifetime. Some are probably genuine, others less so. It’s like
said. Diogenes may or may not have written some- trying to do a jigsaw puzzle without a picture to work from,
thing: later sources quote the titles of lost works attributed to knowing that you probably don’t have all the pieces, and that
him. We also have letters alleged to be by him, although these some of the pieces that you do have might not belong to the
are generally agreed to be fakes. But he had no contemporary puzzle at all.

62 Philosophy Now April/May 2022

Brief Lives

Let us start with what seems to be reasonably certain. Dio- Not surprisingly, for his ‘natural’ or ‘animal’ behaviour he became
genes the Cynic was born in the Greek city of Sinope, on the known as Diogenes ‘the Dog’, and his philosophy was called ‘dog-
southern shore of the Black Sea, at the very edge of the Hellenic like’, or ‘cynical’, from the ancient Greek kunos meaning ‘dog’.
world. Go any further east and you encountered the Scythians,
horse-borne nomads whom the Greeks considered barbarians. Diogenes’ Philosophy
Sinope was a major trading centre. It lay at the end of a trade But what, and how, did Diogenes teach? The ‘how’ is easier to
route from Mesopotamia and forwarded luxury goods to the answer. He set out to teach by example, by the way he lived.
heart of the Hellenic world.
Diogenes put forward not a systematic philosophy but a sys-
Diogenes’ father Hikesias was a banker and also in charge of tematic challenge. The challenge was to the assumptions of
the Sinopean mint. This led to a scandal involving either Dio- civilised Greek society. Yet another story about him was that he
genes or his father, or both. It is usually said that someone ‘re- lit a lamp in full daylight and walked around with it, saying, “I’m
stamped’ the currency. Later, Diogenes would describe his aim searching for an honest man.’’ He meant that he was looking for
as to ‘re-stamp’ human beings. Has this term been read back into an individual, someone who would think and act for himself
the scandal, or did he adopt the term in remembrance of the rather than follow the instincts of the crowd. As Diogenes was
scandal? The latter would be perfectly in character. In any case, coming out of the baths, someone asked if there were many men
Diogenes was exiled from Sinope. This gave rise to the first great bathing in there and he said “No”; but when asked if there was
one-liner attributed to him: when someone said, “The Sinopeans much of a crowd, he said, “Yes indeed.’’ (In Athens at that time
have condemned you to exile”, he allegedly replied, “Yes, and individualism was only available to house-owning males.)
I’ve condemned them to stay where they are.”
His attitude towards religion was, to say the least, sceptical.
Diogenes went into exile at Athens, then the intellectual He delighted in pointing out where it conflicted with morality:
centre of the Hellenic world. He studied under Antisthenes, a “When the Athenians urged him to have himself initiated, and
follower of Socrates. Antisthenes has a walk-on part in said that initiates obtain a privileged position in Hades, he said,
Xenophon’s Symposium and is recorded as not being ‘of pure ‘It would be absurd if Agesilaos and Epaminondas are to lie in the
Athenian birth’ – so, like Diogenes, he was something of an out- mud while utterly worthless people, just because they have been
sider. He was also reluctant to take on pupils; but, the story goes, initiated, are to dwell in the Isles of the Blest’.’’ (Diogenes the
when Diogenes insisted and Antisthenes threatened him with his Cynic: Sayings and Anecdotes, Robin Hard, 2012. This is the
stick, Diogenes replied, “Strike me if you wish, I’ll offer you my source of all the quotes and stories here.)
head, but you’ll never find a stick strong enough to drive me away
from your discourses.” “And,” says the biographer Diogenes Like Socrates, Diogenes was basically a moralist. He was
Laertius, “from that time forth he became his pupil, and being an asking the question, How should human beings live? But he
exile, strove to live a simple life.” offered a far more radical solution than Socrates ever contem-
plated; and he answered it not by talking, but by doing and show-
Socrates, who died when Diogenes was an infant, had also ing. Perhaps the showing went a bit too far, as he was often
tried to live a simple life. He usually went barefoot (although he accused of reverse vanity. A saying about him attributed to Plato
would wear sandals when the occasion demanded it) and he wore is, “How charming your unaffectedness would be, if only it were
shabby old clothes; but he had a house and a family. Walking not so affected!” Still, he was a master of the put-down – espe-
through the market, Socrates famously said, “How many things I cially when it involved things which in his judgement were irrel-
don’t need!” Diogenes took Socratic simplicity to its logical con- evant to how people should live:
clusion, so much so that Plato, Diogenes’ contemporary,
allegedly called him ‘Socrates gone mad’. The story goes that “An astronomer was pointing in the market place to a diagram repre-
Diogenes saw a mouse eating the crumbs from the coarse bread
on which he had been dining, and was inspired to reduce his own senting the stars, and was saying that ‘these here are the wandering stars’
life to the bare minimum. So he reduced his clothing to a single
cloak that he could fold in two, making him cool in summer and [the Greek planetes means ‘wanderers’, so, our planets]; on hearing this,
warm in winter. He consistently went barefoot. He carried a Diogenes said, ‘Don’t lie, my friend, it’s not these that are wandering
knapsack for such possessions as he needed – basically his food.
He lived by begging, but was willing to be invited to dinner – astray, but those over there’ – pointing to the people standing around.”
though he once refused to dine a second time with a host whom
he felt had not been properly grateful for his presence the first So far, so plausible. It is when he leaves Athens that the stories
time round. He had no house, but notoriously slept in a large about him become more questionable. One tells that while sailing
ceramic jar (which has often been called a ‘barrel’). Another story to Aegina he was captured by pirates and sold into slavery (a
about his austerity is that he had a wooden cup but threw it away common pitfall of travel at the time, it once happened to Plato too).
when he saw a lad drinking out of a cupped hand, and realised Allegedly Diogenes’ response to this treatment was to say, “How
that he already had what he needed for drinking. extraordinary it is that if one has pigs or sheep which one is intend-
ing to sell, one fattens them up with choice food until they are
One of the better-attested stories about Diogenes is that he plump, and yet when one has charge of that finest of creatures, a
acknowledged his need for sexual relief, which he met by himself, human being, one lets him starve and constantly keeps him short of
yet often in public. (But he also allegedly criticised a victorious food until he has been reduced to a skeleton, and then sells him for
wrestler for staring too long at a beautiful woman, saying, “Look at a song.” This logic convinced the pirates to feed him and his fellow
that, the athlete has been caught in a neck-lock by a slip of a girl.”) captives well until they reached the slave market at Corinth. The
story may be apocryphal; but the argument is worthy of Diogenes,
in that it points out the irrationality of his captors’ behaviour.

April/May 2022 Philosophy Now 63

Brief Lives

Arriving at Corinth, the story goes, he was put up for sale. less activity, so I too will undertake some pointless activity. This
The auctioneer asked, “What do you know how to do?” Dio- story, however, seems more appropriate to Athens than to Corinth.
genes answered: “How to govern men.” “Then I’ll do excellent Athens was Philip’s main opponent and target; and presumably at
business, if anyone wants to buy a master!” But apparently some- Corinth Diogenes lived in his owner’s house rather than in a jar.
one called Xeniades did; and Diogenes did proceed to tell Xeni-
ades how he should conduct himself and run his household. Cynical Conclusion
Diogenes sought to show by example how to live an honest and
It’s important for the legend of Diogenes that he should get to autonomous life by keeping as self reliant and close to nature as
Corinth because that’s the only way of explaining the most possible. It is an aspiration that becomes ever more relevant. But
famous encounter of his life, with Alexander the Great. Accord- if we cannot go to his extremes – and maybe should not – we
ing to this (rather dubious) story, Diogenes was sunning himself should at least ask how far down this road we should follow him.
in a grove near Corinth when Alexander, having heard of his rep-
utation as a sage, came out to meet him. Standing over him, Diogenes’ followers did ask this question, and on the whole
Alexander said, “Ask whatever you wish of me!” Diogenes did not follow him all the way. However, there was also a Cynic
replied, “Stand out of my light.” This ambiguous phrase can school of philosophy which later greatly influenced the Stoics.
mean, “Stop blocking my sunlight”, but it can also mean, “Don’t They too were deeply committed to the importance of the indi-
block the light I am giving to the world.” Allegedly Alexander vidual and his/her autonomy and choice.
said, “If I were not Alexander I would be Diogenes.” But Alexan-
der, who was committed to conquering Asia, could never been a The death of Diogenes is again shrouded in legends. One of the
Diogenes, who was content with nothing. milder ones is that he died on the same day as Alexander. Accord-
ing to one version he committed suicide by holding his breath;
If Diogenes ever wrote anything it was probably at Corinth, another says that he died after eating raw octopus to prove that
where as a house slave he would have had easier access to writing there is no need for cookery. A variant has it that he was cutting up
materials. His biographer cites the titles of thirteen dialogues the octopus to feed to some dogs, and one of the dogs bit him on
and, improbably, seven tragedies (Diogenes called tragedies ‘big the foot. This would be doubly elegant: Diogenes ‘the Dog’ killed
puppet shows for fools’). One of the dialogues was apparently by a dog, and, like the hero Achilles, by a wound to the foot.
entitled Pordalos – roughly, Fartery – which sounds like the kind
of thing that Diogenes would have written, if he wrote anything. He is said to have left instructions that he should not be
buried but that his body be thrown into the river Ilissos. But, says
Corinth also provides an anecdote which perhaps sums up Dio- Pausanias in his Guide to Greece: “As one approaches Corinth,
genes as no other story could: “When it had been reported that one sees among other memorials alongside the road that of Dio-
Philip [of Macedon] was about to attack Corinth, and all the citizens genes of Sinope, who is buried near the gate, and is known
were hard at work and absorbed in their tasks, Diogenes began to among the Greeks as the Dog.” Buried? And a monument raised
roll his jar back and forth; and when someone asked, ‘Why are you to him? Probably the Corinthians did it, knowing how much it
doing that, Diogenes?’ he replied, ‘Because when everyone is toiling would have annoyed him. It’s called getting your own back.
away, it would hardly be proper for me to do nothing; so I’m rolling
my jar, having nothing else to turn my hand to.” To put it another © MARTIN JENKINS 2022
way: everybody else is indulging in the crowd mentality of meaning-
The late Martin Jenkins was a Quaker, a retired community
worker, and a frequent contributor to Philosophy Now.

CARTOON © ALEXEI TALIMONOV 2022

64 Philosophy Now April/May 2022

Fiction

IMAGE © MILES WALKER 2022 PLEASE VISIT MILESWALKER.COM

The Determined Will

Stephen Brewer’s couple are determined to argue about free will.

An old redbrick warehouse right next to the rail track dividing the city animals have a ‘determined will’ in this sense – the ‘will for
in two has become a popular downtown bar, with a shaded patio along- life’. We must, however, freely choose the path most likely to
side the track. On a humid summer’s day, Freya and Max’s conversa- achieve these ends, using all our available resources. Yet the
tion is stopped for several minutes by the loud rumbling and squealing path itself cannot be predetermined, since our relationships
as a mile of shipping containers stacked two high trundle past them. with the world are much too complex to predict them. Uncer-
tainty means the universe can’t ever be completely determined,
Freya: Being that close to such a monster is an awesome expe- can it? What’s more, humans have demonstrated their free-
rience. I just love it! What made you choose this fantastic bar? dom to overcome even our most basic drives, by choosing a
life of celibacy and self-sacrifice, for example.
Max: The short answer is, it was recommended by a friend, and
I thought it would be the sort of place you would like as well. Max: Your concept of a ‘determined will’ striving to survive is
a delusion. Instead, everything we are is ultimately determined
Freya: And what’s the long answer? by the motion of inanimate atoms and molecules that cannot
feel desire, have goals, or the will to achieve them.
Max: That I didn’t choose it at all. Our being here was predeter-
mined by a network of past causes and events: how we came to Freya: But that mechanical view can’t apply to the living world.
live here, the history of the city, the building of the rail-track Just look around you: that wasp you’ve been trying to swat seems
through the centre of this town, the heat of the day... the chain very determined to get at your drink, and those ants are making a
of cause and effect stretches all the way back into the past… So resolute beeline for the crumbs on the floor. Even you yourself
in fact it was destined to happen. seem very determined to pursue your tenureship. It’s obvious that
you must overcome all sorts of unforeseen obstacles to reach
Freya: I don’t know how you can believe such nonsense. your goal. Same for everyone else too. This shows that every-
one’s futures, and their histories too, are the result of their
Max: Well you don’t believe you have free will, do you? choices.

Freya: Our will is determined in the sense that it’s a result of a Max: You only believe this because you’re rewriting history to
powerful animal drive for survival and reproduction. In fact, all show that what was going to happen anyway was the result of

April/May 2022 Philosophy Now 65

Fiction

choices and goals. But however much it upsets your beliefs, objects with new properties. After all, this process is supposed
science has no room for anything – including living objects – to have produced us clever social animals with the delusion
to be independently influenced by any purpose. There’s no way that we have a will and the freedom to achieve our ends.
to alter the universe’s unstoppable course.
Max: Yes, that is how evolution works.
Freya: Just because the concept of will doesn’t fit your
mechanical explanations of the world and life, that’s no good Freya: And that includes the occurrence of random mutations
reason to deny the obvious evidence that these little beasts leading to beings with unexpected behaviours? If the events are
have a purposeful will. You need to adjust your science to random, this means the future of life cannot be predetermined.
include it, not deny what’s obvious!
Max: You should drop the idea of randomness. In our deter-
Max: All you’re seeing is the operation of these insects’ prede- mined universe there are no truly random events – events with-
termined inbuilt programs. You’re simply projecting your own out causes – just a lack of knowledge of those causes. If we had
goals and desires onto to dumb animals. all the facts then we would see that everything is predetermined
– including how evolution could produce deluded machines pro-
Freya: How can I project my goals onto other animals if we grammed to think they are creative and have a ‘determined will’.
don’t have any goals to project? And do you think we’re a spe-
cial creation? Freya: But even your mechanical process of nature can pro-
duce an infinite diversity of complex objects, some of which
Max: No. Just a self-deluded creation! have unforeseen properties and powers. After all, you claim
this process produced us deluded machines. If it can produce
Freya: So that would mean all the work you did for your PhD consciousness – even deluded consciousness – then it might
on quantum mechanics was all predetermined, not your choice also be able to produce entities with real choice and freedom.
at all. But did you have no freely chosen goals making you
study for all those years, working sixteen hours a day – no Max: What you life-scientists fail to understand is that there
burning desire to prove yourself amongst other physicists? And are no really random mutations, and no emergence of unpre-
did you have no original thoughts on quantum processes? dictable properties. Because everything’s determined, every-
thing’s predictable, at least in principle.
Max: But I could only discover preexisting quantum processes. If I
truly created anything, my thesis would just be a work of fiction! Freya: Okay, so what’s the goal of your deterministic mechani-
cal science?
Freya: Perhaps your work should have told you that all these
myriads of objects in motion collide and sometimes make new Max: To completely understand everything! There are only a
finite number of facts and processes in the universe, and once
these are all known we will be able to determine the entire his-
tory and future of the universe. When that is achieved our
work will be complete.

Freya: However, after all your researches and studies, you now
conclude that your hard work can’t achieve its goal of knowing
everything, because in your deterministic world the very con-
cept of goals is itself a delusion! And now you’ve reached the
conclusion that your work is itself delusional nonsense, how
can you carry on with it?

Max: That’s easy! (Pointing to himself) This machine is pro-
grammed to enjoy such delusions – just like it’s programmed
to enjoy eating and drinking.

Freya: Well, here’s the menu. So, what does your program tell
you to eat?

Max: Now this is a problem. Will it choose a starter of nachos
or wings, or perhaps both?

Split Decisions (detail) by Dror Rosenski, 2022 © STEPHEN J. BREWER 2022

66 Philosophy Now April/May 2022 Steve Brewer is a retired biochemist and the author of The Origins
of Self (2015), available for free download from originsofself.com.



MA Philosophy
& Artificial
Intelligence

Poised at the intersection of
the humanities and technology

This cutting-edge masters degree teaches a unique
combination of analytical, technical & ethical skills with
an opportunity to acquire relevant coding knowledge
increasingly sought by employers.

APPLY NOW Devon House
FOR 2023: 58 St Katharine’s Way
London E1W 1LP
nchlondon.ac.uk United Kingdom

nchlondon.ac.uk
[email protected]
+44 (0)20 7637 4550