On Authority and Morality

Read this article by Glenn Greenwald titled Authoritarian Temptation. What stands out (frighteningly so) is a reference to this quote from Rudy Giuliani

What we don’t see is that freedom is not a concept in which people can do anything they want, be anything they can be. Freedom is about authority. Freedom is about the willingness of every single human being to cede to lawful authority a great deal of discretion about what you do.

Obviously, Giuliani isn't the first person to subscribe to this kind of ghastly philosophy. One of the core assumptions made when someone maintains such an authoritarian philosophy is that human beings are fundamentally bad and that left to their own devices will commit all kinds of evil acts. This is a fundamental fallacy and takes a rather bleak view of human nature. I think that human beings are fundamentally good, and imposing authority and strict moral standards is extremely counterproductive. Authority is rarely justified except in basic cases of parental authority such as telling a child not to run in front of an oncoming vehicle and so on, but even parental authority must be earned, not imposed.

Instead of letting humans retain their intrinsic good nature, Authority creates Fear and Resistance where there was none before and Morality creates Vice and Sin where there was none before. Authority and Morality are the bane of human existence.

Finally, some parting quotes on Authority and Morality

Whenever there is authority, there is a natural inclination to disobedience.
--Thomas C.Haliburton,1796-1865, Canadian Jurist, Author

The more laws and order are made prominent,
The more thieves and robbers there will be.
--Lao Tzu

"When you make your peace with authority, you become authority."
--Jim Morrison

Morality is always the product of terror; its chains and strait-waistcoats are fashioned by those who dare not trust others, because they dare not trust themselves, to walk in liberty.

--Aldous Huxley

The people who are regarded as moral luminaries are those who forego ordinary pleasures themselves and find compensation in interfering with the pleasures of others.
--Bertrand Russell

In spite of everything I still believe that people are really good at heart
--Anne Frank (one of the most renowned and discussed of Holocaust victims)

Scientific Materialism

A distinction can be made between Science (in its "unadorned" form) and the philosophy of Scientific Materialism. Science is concerned with rigorous and detailed observations/experimentation which aim to understand the nature of the surrounding world. Hypotheses are made which can be debunked by empirical observations and/or reasoning and new hypotheses can be formed.

The typical steps in the Scientific Method are:

1. Identify the problem
2. Gather relevant information/make observations
3. Propose a solution (scientific hypothesis)
4. Test the hypothesis (via an experiment or by making further observations)
5. If the hypotheses fails, modify or abandon it.
6. Form (or cast doubt) on a scientific theory.
7. Communicate or publish to allow for independent verification.

Unfortunately, one of the key assumptions of Science is itself unproven. This is what one would call a metaphysical assumption (i.e. an assumption about the nature of reality which cannot be proven). So what is this key assumption in Science ? This is where Science (which is by itself a mode of inquiry, a technique) moves into the realm of philosophy known as Scientific Materialism.

There are several layers of philosophical assumptions around Science, the key of which is that the objects of scientific inquiry exist independently of an observer, i.e. an objective "external" reality exists whether it is being perceived by a subject or not. Another assumption is that everything that exists is physical in nature (or can be reduced to a complex interaction of physical processes). This also means that all physical events are caused by other physical events.

In other words, scientific materialism assumes that any mental phenomenon (i.e. non physical events, the obvious one being the fact that we are all conscious and experience subjective thoughts, feelings, desires, fears etc.) cannot affect physical reality, but rather are an epiphenomenon of the complexity of matter. The dictionary defines epiphenomenon as "a secondary mental phenomenon that is caused by and accompanies a physical phenomenon but has no causal influence itself".

Scientific Materialism thus contends that matter and energy are the only true reality while downgrading the subjective experience to the dustbin of the universe. Scientific Materialism would thus appear to be extremely bottom-up in its approach in that it investigates elementary components and tries to explain high-level features (such as consciousness) COMPLETELY in terms of these elementary particles. This bottom-up approach also seems to be at odds with the concepts in Gestalt psychology where the brain is considered to have self-organizing tendencies and where the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.

A very important problem that reductionist science has is dealing with the concept of Qualia and the 'Hard Problem of Consciousness'. The most familiar example concerning Qualia has to do with the 'Bat Argument' in Thomas Nagel's paper "What is it Like to Be a Bat?". From Wikipedia, here is a concise description of the problem:

Nagel argues that consciousness has an essentially subjective character, a what-it-is-like aspect. He states that "an organism has conscious mental states if and only if there is something that it is to be that organism — something it is like for the organism. Nagel also suggests that the subjective aspect of the mind may not ever be sufficiently accounted for by the objective methods of reductionistic science. He claims that "if we acknowledge that a physical theory of mind must account for the subjective character of experience, we must admit that no presently available conception gives us a clue how this could be done." Furthermore, he states that "it seems unlikely that any physical theory of mind can be contemplated until more thought has been given to the general problem of subjective and objective."

So, in other words, we must be prepared to face the very real possibility that science cannot solve the ultimate and only problem that really matters. Even if various components of our conscious experience such as vision, sound, emotion, creativity etc. are mapped to corresponding neuronal firings, computation algorithms etc. there would still be something left over that cannot be explained solely via purely physical mechanisms.

Scientific Materialism by paying such scant attention to the subjective experience has certainly resulted in material and technological conquest of the world. Although this has bought a lot of us many comforts and alleviated the suffering caused by physical disease, materialism tends to impose a materialistic lifestyle on people. It has also failed quite badly in improving human lives on the subjective front via happiness, peace and compassion. It also fails to provide satisfying answers to fundamental existential questions by reducing us to the state of mechanical beings driven by purely physical process in pursuit of illusory material gains.

It find it extremely intriguing that many Eastern philosophies make very different assumptions from Scientific Materialism. The subjective experience takes center stage in a world of Mind and Form. Mind and Form are not considered different. Form is Mind and Mind is Form (thereby avoiding the problems with dualism)


References:
Scientific Thinking and the Scientific Method
The Taboo of Subjectivity: Toward a New Science of Consciousness by B. Alan Wallace
A Course in Consciousness
Taped Lectures by John R. Searle on "The Philosophy of Mind"
Qualia and The Bat Argument

Tortured Logic

First, lets look at the main points of the National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) on Iran's nuclear program (thanks to Ray McGovern who wrote here)

• We judge that in fall 2003, Tehran halted its nuclear weapons program...
• We assess with moderate confidence Tehran has not restarted its nuclear weapons program as of mid-2007.
• We do not have sufficient intelligence to judge confidently whether Tehran is willing to maintain the halt of its nuclear weapons program indefinitely...
• We judge with moderate confidence Iran probably would be technically capable of producing enough highly enriched uranium sometime during the 2010-2015 time frame.
• We judge with high confidence that Iran will not be technically capable of producing and reprocessing enough plutonium for a weapon before about 2015.

The same NIE also has the following in bold:

This NIE does not assume that Iran intends to acquire nuclear weapons. Rather, it examines the intelligence to assess Iran’s capability and intent (or lack thereof) to acquire nuclear weapons, taking full account of Iran’s dual-use uranium fuel cycle and those nuclear activities that are at least partly civil in nature.

Now look at the Presidents comments:

Look, Iran was dangerous, Iran is dangerous and Iran will be dangerous if they have the knowledge necessary to make a nuclear weapon

So, I view this report as a warning signal that they had the program, they halted the program. And the reason why it's a warning signal is that they could restart it

In just these few words, the deeply racist nature of the establishment becomes painfully clear. It also leads to the dark and inescapable conclusion that even a million new Intelligence Reports will be completely useless against a barbaric, racist and genocidal policy.

As Arthur Silber points out in his very informative and insightful blog

The decision to go to war is one of policy, and the intelligence -- whatever it is alleged to show -- is irrelevant. Don't argue in terms of intelligence at all. If you do, you'll lose. The administration knows that; many of its opponents still haven't figured it out, even now.

Johnny Gaddaar

Johnny Gaddaar (or Johnny Traitor) by director Sriram Raghavan is a delicious blend of film noir and thriller/suspense/caper genre elements, with 70s Hindi movie Retro ambiance deftly weaved into the fabric of the film. If you haven't seen it yet, I suggest you skip the rest of this post (spoiler warning) and go watch the movie now. Otherwise, enjoy the various pieces of trivia that follow:

Best Scenes:

• Undoubtedly, the 15 minute or so train sequence is the most brilliantly executed part of the movie. There is something surreal about the relentless presence of the ambient sounds at various points as the train moves from one location/time to another. The compartment is perfectly claustrophobic as well.
  
• When Seshadri discovers who the 'Gaddaar' is (whirring fan, dead wife's tapes ...awesome)
• Shardul's expression when he realizes who the Gaddaar is (Gaddaar, indeed! in several ways)

Key Stuff:

• Movie-Parwana (source of Johnny G's plan)
• Movie-Johnny Mera Naam (source of Johnny G's alias)
• Homage to Vijay Anand's movies (Jewel Thief, Teesri Manzil and Johnny Mera Naam)
• During the fateful train journey, Johnny G is reading the novel 'The Whiff of Money' by James Hadley Chase ('Crime Never Pays' is a common moral in Chase novels)
  
• Story comes full circle. The Gaddaar is revealed right at the beginning (so this isn't a whodunit). The events that lead up to the final surprise hold center stage.
• The protagonist isn't evil, but chance plays a key role in how the character mutates.
• Terrific soundtrack, weaving in 70s songs which you can never be quite sure if they really existed in some 70s movie or if they just sound like 70s songs made in 2007 (I'm guessing some are remixes of old songs, some of them are original, but 70s sounding)
• Some resemblance between personalities of Johnny G and Talented Mr. Ripley
• The money counting machine fails to detect the counterfeit notes.
• The movie 'Pulp Fiction' is full of homages to other movies (the story comes full circle as well). Same for Johnny G.
  

Other movie/book references within the movie (no major plot connection):

• The Guide (character reading the novel by R.K. Narayan)
• Amitabh Movies: Zanjeer, Deewaar, Sholay, Amar Akbar Anthony, Don, Satte pe Satta
• Anand
• Shaukeen
• Scarface
• Eyes Wide Shut
• Titanic, Citizen Kane (Shardul's marriage is not working, wife doing jigsaws)

Next on my list: Manorama Six Feet Under