Lewis vs Tolkien vs Pullman: Death Match in the Cage!

[inked]

"I remember as an ardent young atheist eagerly sitting down to embrace this great and noble work of materialist philosophy...."

Do tell!

I suspect you have been reading entirely too much Lewis than is good for an ardent young atheist, especially as you toss "An Experiment in Criticism" about handily.

Pray tell, what does a materialist base an ethical standard upon? I am all ears!

[GrayMouser]

I was an ardent young atheist; alas, it's been many years since I was either young or ardent about much of anything.

Having come upon the "Experiment" much later, after first encountering critics like Stanley Fish and Wolfgang Isser, I was quite surprised to see Lewis as being more in tune with them and Reader Response theory, as opposed to the New Critics and their "affective fallacy", which was the dominant mode at the time.

Though I think Fish is far too slippery an eel- I'm more of a barnacle than that, and as far as litcrit goes would be happy to consider myself as part of the tribe of Abrams- Doing Things With Texts and all that.

[GrayMouser]

Originally Posted by inked

Pray tell, what does a materialist base an ethical standard upon? I am all ears!

As far as a historical account , it goes back to our origins as members of a social species living in co-dependent kinship-based small groups. As such we relied upon others, and they relied upon us.

Kinship-based altruism says you should help others who share your genes; while reciprocal altruism says you should help others in hope of getting future benefits. Both operated in the small bands we lived in on the savannas and woodlands of East Africa- and can be observed in our closest relatives, the chimps and bonobos.

If we had originated in a hive like the ants, bees and wasps, we would have been totally group-oriented, lacking in individuality. If we had evolved from solitaries like leopards or tigers, the idea of morality would never have arisen.

Thus we see the "natural law" operating in human societies:help others when you can, but not to the extent of sacrificing yourself except in extreme circumstances, and generally extend that help to those closest to you.

People who are not "one of us" should be regarded with suspicion; and it's usually okay to treat them with less regard.

Do the right thing in general; it keeps society turning over; but be prepared to cheat, especially if times are tough.

[GrayMouser]

Now, do I say that those limitations are correct, or what we should base our society on?

No, because over the course of our history our wonderfully adaptive brains have taken those instincts and gradually expanded them, just as our early daubings of pleasing colours have led to the glory of our art; the pounding of sticks and hooting around the campfire has led to music; and the telling of stories of why you shouldn't stray from the safety of camp, or how Ug-Ug fought Glup-Glup to gain the privilege of mating with the desirable Weena has developed into our tales of terror and romance.

Just so, the idea that we should treat others justly- because, in a small group what goes around comes around- leads to the freedom to expand that idea to others who were originally excluded from the group of "us".

This has been defined as the essence of liberalism- to expand as widely- as possible the circle of "us" as opposed to "them"- whereas conservatism is the opposite- "don't trust them, they're not like us; they don't share our values"- both traits are valuable and have been necessary at different times, but the trend has been strongly one way.

[GrayMouser]

Does this give us any "Absolute" value to base our morals upon?- No, but the idea of an "Absolute" standard is fallacious to start with.

Where do you find it? In the Bible, where God Himself erupts in anger because his followers have spared captive women and children, and commands that babies be torn from their mother's breasts, and have their heads smashed against rocks before their mothers are run through with spears?

In the glories of the reign of Christendom, where Jews were confined to ghettos, forced to wear distinguishing clothing and subjected to random slaughter every time a wave of holiness swept over their neighbors?

On the multi-culti thread, you keep posting items on the savage intolerance of Islam- advocating murder for apostasy, imposing religious edicts on secular society- IOTW, exactly the things that Christian Churches imposed through out their history before they got too weak and were forced into compromises by the forces of secularism.

I've focused on Christianity here because that's what's generally defended- but every culture has the same problems arising from a belief in an absolute standard of morals.

[GrayMouser]

So, no, I don't have a rock to build morality on- and the search for that, going back to Plato (and beyond) is a quest for an illusion. There is nothing to tie our human standards to in the ultimate bedrock of Reality- the morality we live by belongs to our peculiar little species; is explained by the social order we have created and can only be justified in relation to each other; it has no connection to the foundations of the Universe, or the Essence of the Way Things Really Are.

[inked]

Well, an no-longer ardent no longer young atheist, at least admits he has not basis for morality beyond hypothesizing. That's something. But, I fear, you betray an absolute value assessment in the midst of saying there are no absolutes, the line about progressing in one direction. Or do I misunderstand you?

[GrayMouser]

Martin Luther King quoted aboltionist Thomas Parker in saying " the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice."

I'd more agree with Obama's extension of that: "It bends towards justice, but here is the thing: it does not bend on its own. It bends because each of us in our own ways put our hand on that arc and we bend it in the direction of justice."

IOTW, what has happened is a historical contingency, and need not have happened this way. I don't believe that there is some Hegelian World-Spirit marching inevitably to the Ideal - nor the Marxist materialist version, or even the Macauley Whig interpretation of history "in every day in every way we're getting better and better".

Nor is it a straight-forward progress to the glorious enlightened uplands.

Modern racism, for example, is something new-- a product of the 19th and 20th Centuries, different from age-old ethnocentrism, not found in Classical, Christian, Muslim, Hindu or Confucian societies, and a definite New and Bad Thing.

I could equally easily see someone in the future looking back and applauding all the great and humanitarian progress and spread of tolerance in our times, and still be horrified by the moral blindspot of the widespread acceptance of abortion, just as we are when we look back at the spread of 'scientific' racism in the previous few centuries-

"How could they believe in the Constitution, democracy, and equality and still enslave black people?"
"How could they extend human rights to women, other races, and homosexuals, and yet still murder innocent children?"

Likewise, the rise of 20th C. totalitarianisms

a) need not have happened in the first place and

b)could have had a much less happy eventual outcome- a few different decisions on the part of Hitler could have resulted in either a Nazi dictatorship dominating the Old World in partnership with Japan, or a stalemate between Germany and the Soviet Union.

Or we could have set off WWIII and whoever was left of us would be hidng in a cave trying not to get eaten by marauding packs of cannibals

(Interesting thought experiment- take an educated European from 1910, flash freeze and wake him/her up in 2010- give them a quick description of the political/economic set-up of the world today, and they'd probably be totally unsurprised at the general spread of liberal democracy and benevolent capitalism, and conclude that the 20th century must have been historically very dull indeed.}

[inked]

But what would they think of the enormous effort expended to make what has happened happen, do you think? Or of that illustrious list Stalin, Pol Pot, Mao, and Hitler who ventured for communism via their socialist systematic?

[GrayMouser]

Originally Posted by inked

But what would they think of the enormous effort expended to make what has happened happen, do you think? Or of that illustrious list Stalin, Pol Pot, Mao, and Hitler who ventured for communism via their socialist systematic?

Well, other than the fact that Herr h was in no way a communist... that's the point- our hypothetical believer in Whig progressivism would be totally astonished at seeing what actually had happened to bring about his vision.

Anyway, a little OT (not that that's stopped either of us before

Back to the match...

[GrayMouser]

Came across this will digging up some background:

http://www.thefreelibrary.com/The+ma.....-a0227196957

The authors talk about the very strong parallels between Lewis and Pullman, and claim Pulman, by deliberately trying to be the anti-Lewis was tremendously influenced by him. They also show some of the many times Pullman pays tribute to Lewis. They draw a distinction between Pullman-the-Reader (hates Lewis and all he stands for), Pullman-the-Writer (strongly influenced by Lewis), and Pullman-the-Critic ( highly appreciative of Lewis-the-Critic).

[GrayMouser]

I also came up with this:

'Fantasy, Myth and the Measure of Truth: Tales of Pullman, Lewis, Tolkien, MacDonald and Hoffmann. William Gray.

Despite Philip Pullman’s endearingly inconsistent claims that His Dark Materials is not fantasy, to readers and critics alike the series represents one of the most notable achievements of mythopoeic fantasy to date. William Gray’s Fantasy, Myth and the Measure of Truth is the most ambitious and detailed demonstration of just how deep Pullman’s trilogy is rooted in the fantasy tradition stretching back through C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkien, George MacDonald and on to German Idealist authors and philosophers such as Novalis and E.T.A. Hoffmann. Gray argues that His Dark Materials “may be seen as in certain respects the culmination of this tradition of mythopoeic fiction infused with [...] a particular kind of Romanticism.” Such fantasy appropriates “older mythologies in a new key” and addresses “some central religious questions that have major cultural implications” (1).

http://www.irscl.com/review_myth_and_measure_truth.html

which annoys me a bit because I though of it, well, not first, but independently.

Though I would take a slightly different angle.

While Pullman's writing style , like most (all?- haven't read a lot of post-Tolkien stuff) High Fantasy, is in the Romantic tradition which runs from the Germans through Coleridge and Wordsworth to MacDonald and on to Lewis and Tolkien, his philosophy, while also rooted in Romanticism, comes from a different branch.

The German Romantics were a reaction to the Enlightenment, and under the influence of Coleridge in particular, that led to one school of Romanticism- conservative, Christian, often Catholic or Anglo-Catholic, medievalist, monarchist, anti-democratic, reactionary- not only The Return of the King, but 4 out of the 7 Narnia books are about restoring a King (or Kings and Queens), while the Magician's Nephew deals with establishing the first king ( it's made clear that those silly Animals are not fit to rule themselves).

The other tradition, the one that Pullman draws from, is the Romanticism of the early Blake and Wordsworth- Blake who said that Milton "was a true poet, and thus of the Devil's Party without knowing it"

and the Wordsworth who, looking back at his younger self at the time of the French Revolution, said
"Bliss was it in that dawn to be alive, But to be young was very heaven."

(I know what you mean Willy, I remember the 60s.)

the tradition of the Great Rebellion against God ( not the Enlightenment's mere dismssal) which was continued in Byron and Shelley, not to mention whole hordes of bad heavy-metal bands.

[inked]

Herr h was not a communist but a fascist; obverse and reverse, IMHO. The only difference is the allegation of who is in charge. In communism as actually engaged in in the 20th century (and its derogated socialistic forms) alleged the people; fascism, the state, particularly the LEADER. In practice, not much separated them ... except the numbers of people killed in the name of the government.