Techne

The more I think about it, the more I like the idea of morality as a sort of technology. That is in perfect congruence of the Greek understanding of techne as knowledge about how to do something. Morality is the technology by which we can live happily as individuals and in groups. As technology, if it doesn’t work, then it isn’t true.

In my view, the hedonistic mindset, which rejects the necessity of pain, has done more to FACILIATE pain than the most severe Puritanisms did. One could, as a de facto ascetic, at least take pride in being self possessed, and in adhering to a coherent moral code.

The person who lives for themselves–picture here a stereotypical Californian in a Hawaiian shirt–is someone who doesn’t stand for anything. They are not willing to take a position that involves difficulty. The only value they hold is that no one should ever expect anything from them. They will go to protests to protect that right. No one should ever make them go to war. No one should demand that everyone pay their own way, if possible. No one should demand life-long fidelity, unless it met the whims of both people. No one should demand hard thought on complex issues.

And since it feels good feeling generous, no one should interfere with the process of taking money from people who have it, and giving to people who have less.

Seemingly benign, this mindset leads quickly to a loss of self respect, and constant frustration. You always seem to be on the verge of self discovery. You “fall in love”, and it feels forever, but then one or both of you flake out. You take your nice drives along the coast, and wonder what it’s all about, but it eludes you. You attend meditation conferences, and do yoga, and become a vegetarian, and it all seems like it should work. Everyone smiles and talks about how happy they are, but late at night something still doesn’t feel right.

You go to a therapist, and say you are depressed. Maybe you get meds, maybe she says it isn’t your fault, that your parents or ex-wife or ex-husband or someone did something that you haven’t processed yet.

Everywhere, there is this idea that happiness is simply an absence of pain. If you just do what you like, you will be fulfilled.

That simply isn’t how life works. It is unwise.

Meaning is a function of doing DIFFICULT things, of persevering across harrowing fields of battle, because it is the RIGHT THING TO DO.

It is a little reported fact, but the men and women who served in our military in Vietnam are actually much better adjusted and successful, on average, than those who didn’t go. This makes perfect sense.

Techne, then, consists in correct understandings of how life does and does not work. Buddha had his eightfold path http://buddhism.about.com/od/theeightfoldpath/a/eightfoldpath.htm

Christians have service. Muslims have their 5 Pillars. Hindus have dharma. All of these make a happy life possible. None of them, pursued correctly, are wrong in their practical effects.

The task I have set myself is to figure out what is common to them all. What I have come up with is that the absolute minimal requirements to live happily are to reject self pity, persevere through trouble, and treat each day as a new miracle. The last one I frame very broadly as perception, of which the key element is to not get stuck. Obviously, every religious order tends to foster dogmatism. Dogmatism is the death of the spontaneous order of genuine goodness.

In my own view, modern psychology does what traditional moral orders did, but far less well, and quite frequently–by fostering self pity–it actually makes people weaker and less able to persevere happily through lifes challenges.

The only exception to this is that modern anti-psychotic drugs are useful.

I have mixed feelings about anti-depressants. I do agree some types of depression reach the level of an organic disease. Yet, I feel most of the time that point is reached as a result of poorly structured cognition, and would thus be preventable if we were wiser as a culture. The rates of monopolar depression in pre-industrial civilizations is measurably something very close to zero, and when it happens, it is typically in response to a tragedy, which makes it closer to mourning than a disease.