Before I get to the third chapter, I'd like to thank everyone for taking the time to participate in the conversation. I think I speak for PJ as well as myself when I say that I hope you stick around.
Now, to Mill. Having discussed, at some length, the importance of freedom of thought, Mill defends freedom of action, albeit with a very reasonable caveat:
The liberty of the individual must be thus far limited; he must not make himself a nuisance to other people. But if he refrains from molesting others in what concerns them, and merely acts according to his own inclination and judgment in things which concern himself, the same reasons which show that opinion should be free, prove also that he should be allowed, without molestation, to carry his opinions into practice at his own cost.
Again, Mill fails to define his limits to my satisfaction, but as I have been similarly unable to do so, I have trouble faulting him. He then proceeds to connect this principle to that of individuality, upon which he places a value as high as he believes it lacking among his contemporaries.
It is desirable, in short, that in things which do not primarily concern others, individuality should assert itself. Where, not the person's own character, but the traditions of customs of other people are the rule of conduct, there is wanting one of the principal ingredients of human happiness, and quite the chief ingredient of individual and social progress.
If he is not strictly an opponent of custom, he loathes a blind attachment to it, and longs for more than empty ritual from his fellow men.
But society has now fairly got the better of individuality; and the danger which threatens human nature is not the excess, but the deficiency, of personal impulses and preferences.
Mill is not terribly fond of the mass of men; he notes that democratic government will be mediocre at best. Individuals, he believes, are few and far between.
The greatness of England is now all collective: individually small, we only appear capable of anything great by our habit of combining; and with this our moral and religious philanthropists are perfectly contented.
Churchill, living some decades later, would have vehemently disagreed. In any case, Mill, quoting Wilhelm Von Humboldt, notes that two things are necessary for individuality: "freedom, and a variety of situations". This individuality is important, not only to the men who are fortunate enough to possess it, but to all of mankind, who may be roused from their stupor by the extraordinary men walking in their midst.
The biggest flaw in this chapter is Mill's tendency to see individuality only as it breaks from custom. True individuality is more than, say, producing offensive art for the sake of "originality". Nor is it true that those who favor custom are incapable of individuality; the conservative Dr. Johnson comes to mind as a counterpoint. Perhaps I am reading him incorrectly, but his plea for individuality struck me as little more than a silly attempt to be different from the mob for the sake of being different. Still, it must be granted that individuality is not an easy thing to coax people into becoming.
The largest achievement of the chapter is in his observation that the increase of trade--the gradual flattening of the world--and the disappearance of any real diversity--despite our attempts to manufacture it--would only exacerbate the problem. One doubts that Mill would be excited by the stock of individuality in the world today, to say nothing of his England.
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"The liberty of the individual must be thus far limited; he must not make himself a nuisance to other people. But if he refrains from molesting others in what concerns them, and merely acts according to his own inclination and judgment in things which concern himself, the same reasons which show that opinion should be free, prove also that he should be allowed, without molestation, to carry his opinions into practice at his own cost." —J.S. Mill
WMTI: Again, Mill fails to define his limits to my satisfaction, but as I have been similarly unable to do so, I have trouble faulting him.
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Hi, WMTI:
I share your dissatisfaction but don't attribute it to Mill. Instead, I attribute it to the nature of sociality and morality.
On my view, there are two major sticking points above — what constitutes a "nuisance?" and which actions concern only the "individual" and not others?
Since one person's nuisance is another's pleasure and since any action whatsoever can be expansively construed to involve others, it appears that we're hopelessly lost in Millian vagueness.
Is there a way out?
No, if we're looking to Mill for a final solution to perplexing moral questions.
Yes, if we're looking for inspiration and a vocabulary to deal with ever-changing moral problems.
Instead of looking to God, Mill encourages us to look to ourselves, our own interests, and our own conception of what's best for us.
Instead of consulting intense private feelings, Mill encourages us to distinguish between self and others and to critically evaluate and weigh competing preferences: mine, yours, and others.
By naturalizing morality and making explicit its social character, Mill helps us escape egoism (i.e., others' preferences matter, too) and cultivate the very difficult art of practical reasoning (i.e., measuring, balancing, and evaluating self-interest and other-related interests, while focusing the mind's eye on near- and long-term consequences).
Does belief in God or intense private feeling help us rationally decide whether to climb Everest over the protest of wife and kids, engage in whistle blowing, use recreational drugs, terminate a pregnancy, euthanize a loved one, and so on?
No.
But thinking about them in the crucible Mill helps provide most certainly does.
Best,
Kevin
Instead of looking to God, Mill encourages us to look to ourselves, our own interests, and our own conception of what's best for us.
Naturally, as a Catholic, I find the turn inward to be, not only a bit too near solipsism for my tastes, but distinctly less edifying and beneficial than the turn to revealed truth.
Still, I applaud Mill for making his argument. At the same time, however, I fear that his essay will suffer unless he chooses to confront the issue of harm.
"Nuisance" is too light a term; it may be readily applied to almost anyone, at least at certain times. If we may pronounce it more serene, it is to be doubted that a society which disallowed nuisances would be one especially favorable toward liberty.
Hi Eric,
You're quite right to emphasize Mill's concerns with homogenization and the possibility of authentic individuality, but I don't think his conception of the individual is quite as weak as you make it out to be when you describe as the greatest flaw of the chapter "Mill's tendency to see individuality only as it breaks from custom." See for instance a few pages into the chapter:
"Nobody denies that people should be so taught and trained in youth as to know and benefit by the ascertained results of human experience. But it is the privilege and proper condition of a human being, arrived at the maturity of his faculties, to use and interpret experience in his own way. It is for him to find out what part of recorded experience is properly applicable to his own circumstances and character. [....] The human faculties of perception, judgement, discriminative feeling, mental activity, and even moral preference are exercised only in making a choice. He who does anything because it is the custom makes no choice."
So there is plenty of room here to affirm one's membership in a tradition. Custom as such is neither good nor bad. What's important is that one genuinely understand the merits of one's heritage and appreciate its distinctive personal and cultural contributions. Mill regards a certain amount of critical distance as a necessary condition of full individuality: "He who lets the world, or his own portion of it, choose his plan of life for him has no need of any other faculty than the ape-like one of imitation." The idea here is that understanding itself provides a kind of spiritual freedom that is an integral part of human flourishing; even if one's ultimate decision is to go on acting in the customary way in which one was raised, these same actions will acquire a depth and authenticity for having been freely reaffirmed as truly one's own.
(There is also a separate argument, its form familiar from the last chapter, to the effect that the more people you have conducting their own experiments in living, the more lively your cultural marketplace, the more innovation, the more genius, the more contrast and variety, etc., your society will attain.)
On a separate note, where's the textual support for your observation, "[Mill] notes that democratic government will be mediocre at best"?
I'll try to put together some further remarks on the leveling tendency Mill observes in modern society.
Cheers, PJ
P.S.: "Nuisance" got an marginal exclamation in my copy too -- Mill can't possibly mean this. Perhaps "nuisance" had a stronger connotation of objective harm in the 19th Century? Or, more likely, he was running low on good synonyms for "harm."
Kevin -- Nicely put. I very much agree, though I do hope there's a bit more we can say in an appropriately general kind of a way.
Cheers, PJ
Hi WMTI, Mill's turn isn't solipsistic — he doesn't deny the existence of other minds, for instance. But he does turn away from God because faith in "revealed truth" is neither a rational nor a moral guide to action.
This can be demonstrated thusly.
According to Mill, belief that the Bible is revealed truth is an opinion. It's one of many opinions, including the opinion that the Bible is a secular document written by man without any direction from God.
Since opinions are fallible, we must engage in lively open discussion, lest we confuse self-satisfied convictions for likely truths.
Any rhetorical move that begins with "I know revealed truth and you don't" short-circuits the very dialogical process that helps us acquire understanding.
Of course, you can argue for the belief that you know revealed truth, but this step involves you in the practice of theoretical and practical reason and forthwith removes you from matters of faith.
This is a Millian-inspired response, but there's also a Platonic one, too.
If God thinks murder is bad, then He either thinks its bad for a reason or not.
If He thinks murder is bad without a reason (and it's simply bad because he thinks it's bad), then His belief is arbitrary and hence non-binding.
If He thinks murder is bad for a reason (and He thinks it's bad because of this reason), then there's a standard to which we can appeal independently of God.
In either case, we don't need God, even if He exists, to assist us in our moral reasoning.
Not only is there a Millian- and Platonic-inspired response, there's also a Dostoevskyan one. A final coup de grâce.
If murder is bad because God says it's bad, then everything is permissible, so long as God says it's okay: Divine relativism of the rankest, most arbitrary sort.
Best regards,
Kevin
PJ,
Thanks for your clarification. I was probably too hard on Mill.
As for the bit on democracy, he notes, "No government by a democracy or a numerous aristocracy, either in its political acts or in the opinions, qualities, and tone of mind which it fosters, ever did or could rise above mediocrity, except in so far as the sovereign Many have let themselves be guided (which in their best times they always have done) by the counsels and influence of a more highly gifted and instructed One or Few."
There is an out there, and one I was probably wrong in excluding; since Mill was a large proponent of women's suffrage he couldn't have been that opposed to democracy. I should have quoted him in full.
Kevin,
The Euthyphro dilemma doesn't apply to the Christian God, Who is Simple. Essentially, God is His Goodness. I'll get into this further if you'd like, but Aquinas is going to be your best source on this.
I would suggest that goodness cannot exist apart from an absolute Good, namely, God. PJ and I have already discussed this at length, so we should probably avoid getting into it again.
The application to Mill is that his insistence that we have more individuality is largely dependent on what sorts of individuals we produce. I'm not suggesting that Mill believes that even bad individuals are a good thing, only that the recent history has been dominated by a rather large number of individuals, who, like Judas, would have done better to have not been born.
Hey Eric,
I interpret the passage you cite as an argument for representative democracy. Some people are better qualified to govern than others, but they must appeal to and advance the interests of the governed as a condition for earning and holding office. Furthermore, society must always be arranged so to enable the flourishing of exceptional few -- both for their sakes as individuals with a right to self-actualization and also for all of society that stands to benefit from their innovations.
Cheers, PJ
PJ,
You're basically correct, although given the tone of the rest of the section, I think Mill provides evidence that even representative democracy, like any government, will be full of flaws.
Essentially, if you have someone who is not a real individual, and only blindly follows custom, I don't think it makes any sense to place a lot of confidence in his ability to elect someone competent.
Certainly any government will have its flaws. What's important is that it also have the resources to recognize and address them as they arise. Since the flaws of a government are to be measured by the well-being of its citizens, what is important is that a government be responsive to their needs and desires, insofar as it is able to do so without impeding upon the rights of others. That every government has some flaw or another is no argument for libertarian anarchy, which would be an unmitigated disaster.
To your second point, I'm not so sure. After all, practices sediment into custom because, in some respect or another, they work. Sometime they work to promote the interest of one group at the expense of another, and so on, and therefore it is important to encourage critical reflection and protect free speech. But not everyone needs to study Chomsky and Foucault, or Ron Paul, or whomever. Lots of custom works; it promotes the real interests of real people. Authenticity or self-actualized individuality have no direct relation to the significance of one's political contributions, and are downright irrelevant with regards to one's claim to be treated with equal concern and respect by the government.
That every government has some flaw or another is no argument for libertarian anarchy, which would be an unmitigated disaster.
I'm not making an argument for libertarian anarchy. Instead, I'm remarking on the curious fact that despite Mill's insistence that there are few individuals--and I agree with him here, by the way--democracy is still a desirable form of government. It's only tangentially related to the discussion at hand, but I think it well worth pondering.
Authenticity or self-actualized individuality have no direct relation to the significance of one's political contributions, and are downright irrelevant with regards to one's claim to be treated with equal concern and respect by the government.
As to the first point, someone without individuality is liable to be led by others with more of this particular quality. This is an argument many have made in regards to President Bush, especially concerning his foreign policy.
As to the second, while taking away the rights of individuals who lack individuality would be uncalled for, I retain my doubts concerning their ability to choose their leaders well.
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