The question "why should we
continue living", cannot be seen as a purely philosophical
question. There are interests at stake which lie on top of it, and
smother it's purity. We could talk about it, but the words would have
to compete with ingrained habits; the necessary connections that are
created by our expectations. To truly ask the question “Why Live”'
means a terrifying leap into the abyss of existential nihilism - to
start again, from yourself, with nothing taken for granted.
This is why we cannot get honest
answers from power. Power has at its heart only its own interests,
and not your own as an individual (there is no such thing as a power
which respects individuals). The question of why one should live does
not even occur to one swept away by power. It knows why it should
live, and that is to compete and win, to triumph, against other
powers (be they natural or artificial). All other reasons to live -
if indeed there are any - are subordinated to the ambitions of power.
Dissidents will be tolerated so long as they do not pose a perceived
threat to power. Indeed, dissidents can be part of power, themselves
being defined through struggle with it. They become obsessed with it,
hating it as they fight it. Dissidents may also give those within the
bosom of power purpose and belonging. The people will choose a
familiar dictator before they embrace the unfamiliar liberator.
Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts
absolutely. Perhaps corrupt is the wrong word - power is an
expression of human purity. And that purity is the purity of an
answer, which strife and contest provides. Nothing provides purpose
like war. The question is not whether men will war, but only by what
means. Castles and fiefdoms have today become replaced with ASDAs
but the tigers on the train to Canary Wharf have all been reading A
Game of Thrones the last time I checked.
But do we not have a natural drive
toward happiness, peace, equality? No. How can self-hatred survive in
so many people and how can so many deny their own interests for
others if this were the case. Why do some people have unhealable
wounds? The answer is that we human beings do not have a drive toward
life and happiness, we have a drive toward purpose and meaning, even
if that means maintaining our own suffering and stunting ourselves.
We are context machines, and we will destroy ourselves, literally our
own bodies, in the name of meaning and belonging. Nowhere more will
we find our answers than in the bosom of power.
Mind / Body and Life -
If we take the above seriously, then we
are posed with a simple criticism. It sounds as if I am saying that
there are drives and forces beyond our control; as much within us as
they are without us. How can this be justified? Are we two people?
An effective argument for mind/body
dualism (the type I refer to states that a human being is made up of
two 'components', and that the mind is not identical to the brain)
lies out there, in the real world. It is also evident in our own
bodies. Mind/Body dualism can explain human hypocrisy, or paradox,
more than anything. The 'physiological morality' - that is, the
morality of the body, consists in drives. We are not separate from
them, but nonetheless do not know where they come from, when they
will come, and we cannot turn them off. If we could turn them off by
force of our own will, how could we turn them back on?
Greed, war, tribalism, these things are
not the result of 'moral evil' nor individual selfishness. They are
the product of physiology, and the playing out of natural drives;
they are often, if anything, done for the sake of love. There is such
thing as a human being, a human essence, that can be discovered. It
is forever changing, it is not always the same, but it is still
fairly predictable.
The awakened mind rests inside this
irresponsible animal. I was once criticised, rightly so, for
suggesting that the human body works like machine. So we know it does
not, it is a forever changing, and subject to irregularity. This does
not take away the fact that it is a creature of appetite. Just
because something is not set in stone, that does not mean it is
completely fresh and new with every passing moment; human nature will
change with evolution, but it will bring with it patterns of
behaviour which indicate what it is.
If you have accepted this, then you
agree that we cannot hold human beings responsible for their actions
precisely because of their unchosen natural imperatives. Our natural
urge is to become powerful (in relation to a weaker body), or at
least reach a basic level of power (ownership of space, resources and
so forth). We may not consciously do these things at the expense of
those immediately around us, but when one power rises, another will
often fall.
The natural imperatives for power and
belonging are encouraged by customs. We are social animals, and we
are never alone - individualism is impossible, and desirable only for
genii and philosophers. The masses are social animals, their
internal, innate drives provoked by the outside world, for even at
the smallest level of biology, genes require an environment to
stimulate them. And the people cannot be held responsible for wanting
to be part of power, for that is how they will hoard wealth, how they
will find a sense of purpose, how they will fornicate and create
children - in short, how they will become a human being. As each
person is not responsible for their nature, nor are they then
responsible for allowing it to actualize them. This will to life is
separate from the conscious will! The drive to life is not you - as
in, you the entity who is reading now.
It is only Inhuman Beings who we may
hold responsible, those who are aware enough and willing to shut out
the drive for life and outer-power. They have existed throughout
history, in the form of monks and holy people (self-denying
ascetics). However, the Inhuman Beings of the past had something we
do not have - the ignorance of obsessive religiosity. We are left
with no such escape route from ourselves, and this is why human
civilization has not progressed beyond that of a bee seeking a
colourful flower, or the enchantment of a politician's lie.
To advocate a world less wretched than
our own, is to be inhuman. And as an (In)Humanist, I can only welcome
the destruction of natural values - which allow a man to say one
thing and then do another, and get away with it so easily. Which
allow such a vast disconnect between idea (mind) and action (body).
Whose Justice is so utterly, blatantly non-existent. Who permits evil
so long as it is evil done within a custom. Where natural instincts
to protect one's own lead to favouritism and inefficiency. And where
every two steps forward have been accompanied by one backwards.
So why live?
In light of this, why live? If you are
of nature it will be to execute your imperatives - to breed, to play,
to cling, to gather, to power, and to fulfill your appetite. If you
are not, then there is no reason to live. This does not make death
any more of an inviting prospect - one does not need a reason to live
to continue living. It simply means that there is no actual reason
for it beyond what is dreamed up, or argued for. Certainly there is
no appeal to nature; the easier answer!
The reasons to live given by
institutions or power are just reflections of their own goals. This
is obvious insofar as they provide a final answer which falls into
the boundaries of their great plans. No institution will ever
entertain the notion that life is goalless - their very power lies in
the ability to get people to put themselves, body and soul (as it
were) into their projects.
I am apart from the human sea, and my
head is above water, so it is impossible to return to the flow. Out
here, there is only the stark beauty of a fleeting, decaying,
imperfect world to live for, and the 'romance' of solitude. That, and
the warm glow of philosophy which may be a better guide to surviving
the void than any religious belief or hiding hole. Who knows.
St. Zagarus
