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Show Rationality and the Structure of the Self, Volume I: The Humean Conception 17 unqualified contempt for his philosophical opponents. As contempt never trumps compassion or curiosity as an intellectual virtue, the Bullfinch thereby merely confesses his felt disinclination - or inadequacy - to meet the standards of engagement that rational dialogue requires. 4. Philosophy, Power, and Historical Circumstance These brief character sketches provide a practical counterpoint to the Socratic ideal that Hampshire describes - an ideal that finds only partial realization at best. They do not exhaust the styles and strategies of intimidating philosophical practice, and there are more lethal ones than these: to treat philosophical contributions from others as though they had not been made; or as though they had been made by someone of higher professional status; or as autobiographical rather than philosophical in import; or as symptoms of mental illness; as well as the more subtle variants Keynes describes. The common motive that underlies all of these styles of dialogue is an egocentric desire to establish and maintain hierarchical übermenschlichen superiority, by silencing philosophical exchange rather than inviting it. This motive is not entirely foreign to any of us. But it is meant to stifle the exercise of transpersonal rationality that seduced most working philosophers into the field to begin with, and that virtually all, with varying degrees of success, genuinely strive to practice. As such, it is, in effect, an effort to obliterate the point and practice of philosophical dialogue altogether - dialogue that indeed very often does begin with the best of intentions, reflective of the Socratic ideal which virtually all of us learned to revere as undergraduates. Philosophers who manage to persevere in the patience, generosity of spirit, and thickness of skin necessary for withstanding these assaults on the core of the practice without stooping to respond in kind are often singled out and revered for the philosophical paragon they offer to the rest of us. It is worth asking what it is about the practice or profession of philosophy in general that kindles the impulse to obliterate it; and how it is that this impulse can co-exist within the same field of inquiry as those successful practitioners of Hampshire's Socratic ideal. For this impulse does not signal merely our moral and intellectual inadequacy to the ideal. It expresses the lethal and ultimately suicidal desire to eradicate it. We have certain external procedural devices for cloaking this suicidal impulse. There is the authoritarian device, of supplying spoken discussion with a strong-willed moderator; and the democratic device, of scrupulously invoking Robert's Rules of Order to govern every verbal contribution; and the juridical, testimony-cross-rebuttal-jury deliberation device, of the standard colloquium format. But if we were all as civilized as Hampshire's description supposes, we would not need any of these external devices. We would not need a moderator to end filibusters or umpire foul balls because no one would be tempted to hog the allotted time or hit below the belt. We would © Adrian Piper Research Archive Foundation Berlin |
