Title: Idealism and Abstraction as Keynotes of The World in Crisis Name: Richard Perriam Swinney Affiliation: University of Kwa-Zulu Natal (UKZN), prospective PhD candidate Postal address: P. O. Box 236 Mtunzini Kwa-Zulu Natal South Africa Postal code: 3867 Phone: +27767257611 Email: yenniwsr@gmail.com Book reviewed: Maxwell, Nicholas. The World in Crisis—And What to Do About It: A Revolution for Thought and Action. Singapore, MY: World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., 2021. 1 In his 2021 book, The World in Crisis—And What to Do About It, Nicholas Maxwell presents a sustained critique of the role universities have played in exacerbating the contemporary world crisis. My reading of The World in Crisis is Marcelian, which is at once both concrete and anti-abstractionist. The reading is concrete inasmuch as it is based in existentially lived human experience, and its points-of-departure are the everyday situations in which this living experience unfolds. The reading is anti-abstractionist inasmuch as it is neither based in thought-in-general (pure or absolute thought, or denken Überhaupt in German), nor are its points-of-departure first principles or clear and self-evident ideas. Overview of The World in Crisis Maxwell’s contention is that universities worldwide must be reformed to shake them out of their complacency of pursuing blind knowledge-production as an end in and for itself, blind because divorced from the social realities that humanity faces in a world in crisis. Maxwell explains and describes the current world crisis with startling clarity:1 the climate crisis and enhanced global warming, the destruction of natural habitats, pollution and the use of fossil fuels, growing inequality and poverty, proliferation of war, and so on. Maxwell argues that the current world crisis is the result of having failed to solve the second “great problem of learning,” of how the create a civilised, wise society.2 The first “great problem of learning,” of learning how to gain knowledge of the world, was solved, according to Maxwell, with the advent of modern science. The solution to the second problem, Maxwell argues, is found by learning from how the first problem was solved.3 By generalising the progress-achieving methods of science and applying them to the second problem, one can thus achieve the same 1 Nicholas Maxwell, The World in Crisis (Singapore: World Scientific, 2021), 1-21 (Chapters 1 and 2). Maxwell, The World in Crisis, 6ff. 3 Maxwell, The World in Crisis, 23ff. 2 2 progress in the social order towards a wise world, as science has made in gaining knowledge of the world. Maxwell locates the origins of the current global crisis in the bungled implementation of the Enlightenment.4 The blunder was that universities adhered to what Maxwell calls “knowledge-inquiry”.5 Knowledge-inquiry is of course devoted to the pursuit of knowledge and its application. But, because of this, says Maxwell, it necessarily excludes problems of value, of living a human life.6 Hence, knowledge-inquiry is divorced from the realities of social life, subordinating them to the pursuit and application of pure knowledge. Universities have accordingly become blinded by their knowledge-inquiry. Instead of helping to solve social problems, the opposite has happened: universities have essentially contributed to exacerbating the world crisis. Against knowledge-inquiry, Maxwell advocates “wisdom-inquiry” as the corrective for the blunders made in implementing the Enlightenment-project.7 The bulk of The World in Crisis is dedicated to elucidating Maxwell’s wisdom-inquiry. Wisdom-inquiry is an advance on, and a restorative to, knowledge-inquiry because it explicitly subordinates the pursuit and application of pure knowledge in favour of solving the problems of social reality. By doing so, it thereby can take into account the problems that knowledge-inquiry necessarily excludes. The mode of reasoning for wisdom-inquiry is “aim-oriented rationality”.8 Aim-oriented 4 Maxwell, The World in Crisis, 29ff. Maxwell, The World in Crisis, 41ff. 6 Maxwell, The World in Crisis, 41–42. 7 Maxwell, The World in Crisis, 42ff. 8 Maxwell, The World in Crisis, 68–70. 5 3 rationality is a new conception of rationality itself, according to Maxwell.9 It differs from previous conceptions by explicitly including the aims—not only the solutions—towards which problems tend. Whereas, traditional rationality, that of knowledge-inquiry, works in the void by ignoring the aims to which problems tend. Aim-oriented rationality therefore “provides a meta-methodological framework for the improvement of ideas for action, and of action itself, in the light of what we experience when actions are performed, or what we imagine we would experience if ideas for action were to be performed”.10 The result is a progressive improvement of the aims not of the solutions. And, by improving the aims of the problems, one can thereby improve the solutions in conjunction with the improved aims. Hence, wisdom-inquiry, based on aim-oriented rationality, can realistically tackle the problems of a world in crisis, because it is a unique position to elucidate and improve the aims of the problems humanity faces today, not simply to provide empty solutions. Maxwell cannot be praised enough for highlighting the stultification of universities worldwide, obsessed as they are with the staid pursuit of knowledge alone, and of linking this stultification to our world crisis, paramount as it is for humanity’s future survival. The argument of The World in Crisis, however, is not without problems. These problems are primarily methodological in nature, which is viciously abstract and idealistic. First, though, I highlight an unexamined paradox that runs throughout the text, and which has a devastating impact on Maxwell’s argument, considerably limiting the soundness of his views. The paradox is that Maxwell propounds global solutions to global problems but he does not take a global perspective. Maxwell’s point-of-view is identifiably Anglo-American/Eurocentric, and a 9 Maxwell, The World in Crisis, 68. Maxwell, The World in Crisis, 69. 10 4 narrowly British one at that. Maxwell’s blinkered view of the world is betrayed in a number of ways, all apiece with his methodological idealism. To show this, I consider his arguments from an African perspective in general, and from my own South African point-of-view in particular. The Enlightenment: an African viewpoint From an African perspective, the claims Maxwell puts forward on behalf of the bungled Enlightenment are dubious to say the least. In fact, some of the claims stand in stark relief to reality. Maxwell writes, The Traditional [bungled] Enlightenment has had an immense impact, not just on universities, but on our whole social world. It has had a profoundly beneficial impact on our world. Most of us today live longer, healthier, safer, wealthier, freer, happier lives than most lives lived before the 18th century.11 When Maxwell says “most of us today” here, whether knowingly or not, he has in mind a very select group of people. From an African perspective, the “most” invoked by Maxwell is, in reality, a tiny minority of the world’s population, past or present. While it may be true that many people today are healthier and live longer, the reality is that most of the world’s peoples have only ever been victims of the Enlightenment-project. Most people today—the world over, not only in Africa—have never before been so unsafe, so poor, so unfree, so very unhappy. The truth is that the benefits of the Enlightenment-project have accrued to a tiny minority, and it is this minority which Maxwell inexplicably identifies as “most people”. 11 Maxwell, The World in Crisis, 31. 5 Maxwell will perhaps respond, that his project to rehabilitate the Enlightenment by instituting wisdom-inquiry, aims to overcome these very issues, issues of global inequality, and so on. Accordingly, Maxwell presents a list of twenty-three structural changes that should be implemented for universities to transform from knowledge-inquiry to wisdom-inquiry, thereby bridging the deficiencies of the bungled Enlightenment.12 Many of the items are deeply flawed because of Maxwell’s unexamined Anglo-American/Eurocentrism, but the final points 21 to 23 are of particular concern. Item 21 states: Natural science needs to create committees in the public eye, and staffed by scientists and non-scientists alike, concerned with highlighting and discussing failures of the priorities of research to respond to the interests of those whose needs are the greatest — the poor of the [E]arth — as a result of the inevitable tendency of research priorities to reflect the interests of those who pay for science, and the interests of scientists themselves.13 While this suggestion is very commendable, the problem is that the poor and disenfranchised will be the very people excluded from such discussions. By whom are committees formed and staffed? Committees are staffed by people who have the power (wealth and leisure) to form committees and attend regular discussions, but this is beyond the power of the poor. Hence, committees are formed by people who would decide what is best for the poor in their absence, who have no experience of poverty themselves, but who would nevertheless impose 12 13 Maxwell, The World in Crisis, 87–91. Maxwell, The World in Crisis, 91. 6 their vision of the world on those they purport to emancipate, exactly as it has always been done. Next, item 22: “Every national university system needs to include a national shadow government, seeking to do, virtually, free of the constraints of power, what the actual national government ought to be doing.”14 Firstly, Maxwell explicitly reveals his narrow, Anglo-American/Eurocentric point-of-view by using the phrase “shadow government”. This is an idiosyncratic term from British political rhetoric, rarely used outside of that particular context. To most people in the world, it has little or no meaning. Secondly, who is to staff this “shadow university government”? In a democratic regime, government is open to all: anybody can run for office. But, a “shadow university government” would not be open to everybody. It could only be staffed by those who can afford to attend university. University is expensive, far beyond the means of most of the world’s population, save the fortunate few awarded scholarships. Accordingly, a “shadow university government” could only be staffed by a certain elite section of the population. Maxwell is in reality proposing a heavily disguised plutocracy, not a “democratic shadow government”. Lastly, and most worrying from an African perspective, item 23: The world’s universities need to include a virtual world government which seeks to do — or at least seeks to imagine — what an actual elected world government ought to do, if it existed. The virtual world government would also have the task 14 Maxwell, The World in Crisis, 91. 7 of working out how an actual democratically elected world government might be created.15 Such a democratic world government is impossible in practice, if not in theory or imagination. Does anyone who is not wilfully blind to experience and history believe that the poor and disenfranchised would be given a voice in such a world government? In a democratic world government, would the wealthy, developed nations—or, to avoid an illegitimate abstraction, the citizens of such nations—would they ever sanction a world president elected from a poor, undeveloped nation? I doubt it very much. Besides, wealthy nations will have the lobbyingpower to ensure that their own candidates are elected. Further, how can some “world president”—more than likely elected from a wealthy, developed nation—how can such a person have any notion of the problems facing people living on the other side of the Earth? None whatsoever. It could only be through hearsay, that is, by treating people as so many cases to be dealt with, which ends in dictating to them what their problems are in their absence. To call such a world government “democratic” is to stretch the meaning of the word beyond breaking-point. In sum, Maxwell’s blinkered Anglo-American/Eurocentric point-of-view prevents him from taking a global perspective of the problems of a world in crisis. This, in turn, limits the applicability Maxwell’s conclusions to a certain elite section of the world’s population. In consequence, if academics such as Maxwell dare propose global solutions and advocate a world government to implement them, but cannot comprehend a global view because of their 15 Maxwell, The World in Crisis, 91. 8 failure to identify other viewpoints, then such a world government will paradoxically be the most terrifying incarnation yet of totalitarianism, leading to tyranny on a truly global scale. Maxwell will respond that the foregoing criticisms do not refute his core thesis of wisdominquiry. However, I think that the foregoing problems are symptoms related to the deeper issue of Maxwell’s methodological deficiencies, and it is in his theory of wisdom-inquiry that the deficiencies are most evident. Idealism and abstraction Recall that aim-oriented rationality is the basic mode of reasoning for wisdom-inquiry: According to aim-oriented rationality, we need to represent problematic aims in the form of a hierarchy, aims becoming increasingly unspecific and unproblematic as we ascend the hierarchy. As a result, we create a framework of relatively unproblematic aims, and associated methods, high up in the hierarchy, within which much more specific and problematic aims, and associated methods, low down in the hierarchy, can be improved as we act.16 To claim that aims become increasingly unproblematic as one ascends the hierarchy is simply untrue, not even “relatively” so. Instead, the reverse is the case. At Level 7 of Figure 3—the apex of wisdom-inquiry—the aim is, “That ideal social order (whatever it may be) we ought to try attain in the long term”.17 The ideality of that imagined18 social order is most problematic of all. The problem is the very fact that it is ideal. What is this ideal? Who is going to imagine it? Is it not radically absurd to suppose that such an ideal social order can be 16 Maxwell, The World in Crisis, 68, see Figure 3 overleaf. Maxwell, The World in Crisis, 69. 18 See The World in Crisis, 69ff, for the wholly unrestricted use of the imagination in wisdom-inquiry. 17 9 established by committee? What happens if there are conflicting ideals? Maxwell’s wisdominquiry gives one no means of deciding between conflicting ideals at Level 7. After all, Maxwell claims that Level 7 is unproblematic, so no conflicting ideals should even be possible. How, then, is one to decide between conflicting ideals? At bottom, the choice must be arbitrary. Wisdom-inquiry cannot decide between conflicting ideals because there is no difference between it and the knowledge-inquiry Maxwell so deplores. From a concrete, antiabstractionist perspective, they are inseparable. Both “knowledge-inquiry” and “wisdominquiry” are valid for thought-in-general, valid for no matter whom might be placed in the same circumstances as oneself. In other words, both are equally abstract and idealistic. The reason wisdom-inquiry cannot decide between conflicting ideals is because it, itself, is an abstract idea, and it is impossible for an abstract idea to judge the reality of another abstract idea. Maxwell’s idealistic abstraction is revealed in various places in the text. Cutting to the heart of the matter, Maxwell makes a bold claim about wisdom-inquiry, bold because unfounded. Maxwell states that, “Aim-oriented rationality puts desire and intellect in touch with one another”.19 This claim is a gross distortion of reality. Wisdom-inquiry does not reconcile, and is in principle prohibited from reconciling, intellect and desire. As Gabriel Marcel has shown, there is no possible metaphysical transition from the order of ideas to the order of feelings, that is to say, of existence.20 The transition can only be accomplished verbally, or by using certain misappropriated words in certain combinations in order to bring about certain effects 19 20 Maxwell, The World in Crisis, 70. Gabriel Marcel, Metaphysical Journal (London: Rockliff, 1952), 44, 281, 331. 10 in the understanding, in the present case, the idea that wisdom-inquiry can reconcile intellect and desire. Maxwell’s philosophy resides squarely in the order of ideas. There is a complete lack in it of what Marcel calls the “existential index,”21 and this lack renders incoherent Maxwell’s claim of effecting the transition from ideas to existence. The metaphysical impossibility of the transition from ideas to existence is particularly evident in Maxwell’s treatment of intersubjectivity, of what he calls “person-to-person understanding”. Maxwell states that wisdom-inquiry does justice to the personal understanding of one another.22 But it does not and cannot. To reiterate, Maxwell’s wisdominquiry is valid for thought-in-general, meaning he assumes that there are certain verifiable propositions entailing a set of conditions which are general in principle, or understood as applicable to any agent capable of announcing valid judgments. Such an assumption, however, as Marcel23 has again revealed, necessarily results in a depersonalised subject, contradicting Maxwell’s very stance. In short, person-to-person understanding between depersonalised subjects is radically impossible. Precisely because wisdom-inquiry is valid for the “anybody” of thought-in-general, it results in a depersonalised subject, and therefore cannot furnish the metaphysical or existential conditions required for intersubjective understanding. For example, Maxwell’s claim that person-to-person understanding “ideally … goes in both directions to create mutual understanding”24 is false. It is false simply because intersubjectivity is not an ideal relation. While intersubjectivity does indeed “go in both directions” (as the word itself indicates), it is an existential relation, not an ideal one. 21 Marcel, Metaphysical Journal, 319. Maxwell, The World in Crisis, 104. 23 Gabriel Marcel, Creative Fidelity (New York: Fordham University Press, 2002), 6. 24 Maxwell, The World in Crisis, 104. 22 11 Intersubjectivity cannot be compared or assimilated to an ideal without negating and destroying that very relation. Thinking of intersubjectivity in terms of ideas (or, indeed, of objects) replaces the living relation with an abstract mental scaffolding, because it replaces the real, living person with a depersonalised subject. To sum up, Maxwell’s various claims that wisdom-inquiry is a restorative to, and an advance on, knowledge-inquiry, are metaphysically and existentially baseless. As a result, Maxwell’s claims retain truth only within a very narrow idealistic framework. Outside of that rigid framework, the claims lose all meaning, becoming spurious assertion. Notice the congruency between this conclusion and the conclusion I reached above in discussing Maxwell’s unexamined Anglo-American/Eurocentrism. Maxwell’s blinkered, Anglo- American/Eurocentric viewpoint is corelative to his abstract, idealistic methodology. On the one hand, Maxwell’s conclusions retain truth only within a rigidly abstract idealism. On the other hand, because of Maxwell’s unexamined Anglo-American/Eurocentric viewpoint, his conclusions are only applicable to a certain elite section of the Earth’s population. Maxwell’s unexamined Anglo-American/Eurocentrism supplements and reinforces his abstract idealism, together constituting a vicious circle from which there is no escaping except verbally. Conclusion The great merit of Nicholas Maxwell’s, The World in Crisis, is to stress the immense urgency of the global emergency and to propose practical solutions. Unfortunately, the merits of the book are overshadowed by the author’s blinkered, Anglo-American/Eurocentric viewpoint and restrictively abstract, idealistic methodology. Unfortunate because of the huge potential and far-reaching implications of Maxwell’s overall project. The attempt to propose global 12 solutions to global problems, while being unable to comprehend a global perspective because of a blinkered methodology and viewpoint, is clearly incoherent and should be condemned as such by any thinking person. Maxwell seems incapable of breaking free from the abstract, idealistic categories of thought and modes of reasoning imposed on him by his own specialised sub-discipline, the philosophy of science. Consequently, Maxwell remains the prisoner of a viciously abstract idealism, which metaphysically and existentially prohibits him from taking the global perspective that the problems he identifies demand. Errata • Pp. 1ff: throughout the text, for “earth” and “earth’s” read Earth and Earth’s respectively, except for the instances where the author uses the word “earth” to mean “soil” in the context of pollution • P. 1, l. 5: for “attach” read attack • P. 96, l. 2: for “so to” read to so • P. 105, l. 28: for “person-to person” read person-to-person References Marcel, Gabriel. Creative Fidelity. Translated by Robert Rosthal. New York, US-NY: Fordham University Press, 2002. Marcel, Gabriel. Metaphysical Journal. Translated by Bernard Wall. London, UK: The Rockliff Publishing Corporation Ltd., 1952. Maxwell, Nicholas. The World in Crisis—And What to Do About It: A Revolution for Thought and Action. Singapore, MY: World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., 2021. 13