Interview with L C Land

Firstly, thank you for doing this interview at such short notice.

My pleasure. Thank you for taking an interest.

I know you’re on a tight schedule today, so I’ll make this as quick as I can. Your latest novel The Fantastilicious Episode of the Diminishing Error tackles the philosophical idea of mind-body dualism. Do you subscribe to dualism?

Absolutely not, and the novel is a sort of fiction-as-refutation of the idea largely attributed to the 17th century French philosopher Rene Descartes, although dualism's origins are much older. Without wading into a pool of metaphysical jargon, this story sets out to counter the rather persistent belief in a disembodied soul or self that is independent of, or only tenuously connected to, the body.

So what is the story about?

Without giving away too much, the heroes are a young brother and sister whose parents, a scientist and an engineer, are charged with treason and sentenced to hard labour for life by a repressive theocracy that preaches dualism as a means of controlling the populace. But our irrepressible heroes meet some unlikely allies in their quest to find and rescue their parents.

Imagining the Self (2)

In chapter nine, The Sensory Room, of Raymond Tallis’s book The Kingdom of Infinite Space, under the subchapter The Mystery of the Head-Room, Tallis devotes a few pages to expounding on his Selfhood. How, he asks, do we account for ‘the fact that there is such a thing as ‘the first person’ – the I, here, now – to which all this variety [of conscious experience] is ultimately referred’?

Like the French philosopher Rene Descartes was roughly 400 years ago, Tallis is both puzzled and amazed by this unique human ability to perceive one’s Self, to know oneself as an ‘I’. And like Descartes, Tallis attributes this special power to something outside the body. He makes what is referred to in some philosophical circles as the Cartesian Error; the Mind (the Self) must be separate from the Body (the brain). Thus Tallis dismisses the claim that the mind is, or comes from, the brain as ‘neuromythology’, an overextension by overconfident neuroscientists.

Without… a unifying ‘I’, the brain or mind would simply be a colloidal suspension of unhaunted modules – which is how the cognitive scientist seems to present it. That is why many neuroscientists deny that there is such a thing as a self. If they can’t find it or conceive of it in neurological terms, it can’t exist.

Imagining the Self (1)

In his book The Kingdom of Infinite Space, Raymond Tallis disparagingly refers to the (scientifically supported) idea that we are our brains as ‘neuromythology’. While I agree with Tallis’s argument that though the brain is a necessary condition for consciousness, it is not a sufficient condition in itself, I think he underestimates the importance of the brain as the seat of consciousness. He is (partially) correct to assert that

Selves require bodies as well as brains, material environments as well as bodies, and societies as well as material environments.

However, this presumes a conventional, organic kind of Self, one shaped by a human body and by a human-centric material environment and society. As a thought experiment, say we hook up a living human brain to a sophisticated piece of machinery, effectively creating a cyborg. One could argue that the cyborg would thus be conscious and so have a Self, but a Self that would be very different to the Self that Tallis argued depended on non-brain factors. The brain remains the prime ingredient, without which we wouldn’t be able to even speak of Selves.

The folly of 'future value'

In Issue 6 (November 08) of Standpoint magazine, the 'Dialogue' section featured a discussion between Samuel Brittan and Edward Hadas on the topic 'Is capitalism morally bankrupt?' Regarding the financial system's questionable viability, Brittan remarked that it was 'when people are acquiring objects... for their resale value that the system gets rather wonky', creating 'asset bubbles'. This tendency for people to buy things for their future value rather than for their present 'use value' manifests itself in actions like purchasing investment homes, not to live in, but in the hope of the building's value appreciating over time for a profitable resale. All sorts of financial speculation is essentially future-oriented rather than focused on the present pleasures to be had from products and assets.

Investments, speculation, financial forecasts; these spheres of economic activity emphasize the gaining of greater wealth over the actual enjoyment of products or experiences. The dominant mentality is that of a gambler, rather than an aesthete. No need to recommend the ascetic life as the moral ideal. There's nothing reprehensible in wanting and appreciating things. And it is in acquiring things that money shows its utility. But to chase more of it at the expense of delighting in the very stuff that it has delivered is a sad and vulgar exercise.

Brittan has placed a finger on one contributor to the global financial crisis. The complex economics that underpins his observations escapes me, but I agree with Richard Todd, who in his book The Thing Itself: On the Search for Authenticity, declared that 'We need to be better materialists.' I interpret Todd's opinion as a call for us to reassess our material priorities, for we all have material priorities, even the most austere world-renouncers amongst us (it's only a matter of degree). Better that we love and respect things for their 'use value' now, and not merely for their economic value later.




9.1.09

Remember, it's 'philo-sophia', not 'niko-philia'

Given its etymology, the study and practice of 'philo-sophia' should produce a sophiaphile - a lover of wisdom - rather than a philosopher, a term that suggests a mainly academic approach to philosophy. If we are to be true to the spirit of philosophy, one exemplified by luminaries like Socrates, the Buddha, Seneca, Montaigne and Thoreau, its study should shape us into a wiser, braver, more compassionate, more temperate, more equanimous person. Yet much academic philosophy seems to focus on acquiring - and subsequently sharpening - a set of tools (weapons?) with which to win arguments, subjugate opponents, intimidate laymen and browbeat critics.

This isn't to say that there is no place for healthy debate, civil argument and informed polemics in philosophy. Such things are crucibles from which knowledge and truth are produced. But we are creatures with delicate egos, and too many philosophical engagements take the form of heated duels fought over personal honour rather than co-operative discussions with the goal of discovering answers to questions, solutions to problems.

It would be good to complement the proper pursuit of knowledge and truth with an equal dedication to cultivating personal virtue. It would be good for each of us to be both an intellectual philosopher and a virtuous sophiaphile.




4.1.09