Mention of the word ‘philosophy’ switches many people off, possibly because they associate it with long dead Greeks. That is a pity because, contrary to the view that philosophy is irrelevant to modern life, it is the determinant of the direction we take. It is the hidden hand that guides our actions and controls the way we think. This came to mind recently when someone argued cogently in support of the ‘rule of law’. So, at the risk of switching people off, I wish to make a few points about the prevailing philosophy presently guiding Britain.
The philosophical ground on which we stand has never been stable, and its movement accounts for most of the political and social conflict witnessed over centuries, but a significant shift occurred in the nineteen-seventies when a stream of psychological-philosophical theories crossed the Atlantic.
There were a number of theories involved, transactional analysis being the one that I found myself contesting in particular, but the thrust of them all was the promotion of individual ‘autonomy’. I happened to be working in a management college when a couple of my colleagues became enamoured with TA and began to promote the theory. It is inappropriate to go into my theoretical objections here, I published two attacks at the time, but the crux of the matter is the pursuit of individual autonomy.
Autonomy is not simply another word for individualism, but gives credence to a form of individualism that is essentially a lie. The insubstantial theories that promoted that lie have long since evaporated, deservedly, but the deception buried itself deep in the psyche so that it survives today. Ironically, it is the people who most firmly believe themselves autonomous that are the least free: projecting themselves as cheap copies of some adman’s version of reality.
There is an alternative form of individualism that rejects the falsehood: authenticity. A skilful painter could copy a Rembrandt masterpiece, perhaps producing a more attractive image than the original, but it can never be an authentic Rembrandt. Similarly, a person who basis his identity on what is claimed to be fashionable at the moment, is neither authentic nor genuinely free.
Those embracing autonomy rather than developing the authentic self are walking into a philosophical cul-de-sac, and there are many of them. Indeed, given the state of Britain today, they appear to be in the majority.
Boadicea's Chariot 
Help let me out!
Hello Jazz, the door is open.
I know what you mean Tom, but if we think too much, too deeply, we find ourselves getting more depressed about something we, as individuals, have little power over. I’m not burying my head in the sand here, I’m just being philosophical….or am I? See what I mean?
Hello Val, I don’t agree that we have little power over what we become. I thought you were being philosophical when you wrote about the old men. It doesn’t have to be ‘deep’.
“Ironically, it is the people who most firmly believe themselves autonomous that are the least free: projecting themselves as cheap copies of some adman’s version of reality.” If an individual does not know that he is not free how does he change? I happen to agree with your analysis. I think western democracy, the US in particular, has been selling a lie. Americans are not free despite the tag line.
By the way Tom, have you read Alain de Botton’s ‘The Consolation of Philosophy’ ? Interesting read.
Hello again, Val. I’m afraid I haven’t. Sipu, Good question. I believe it is the duty of parents and teachers to encourage authenticity in self development.
Interesting post, Tom.
I agree with you about philosophy; everything has a philosophy!
I have never heard of TA. Having Googled the subject, it sounds like complete psychobabble to me.
Individualism is fine, but TA sounds as though it somehow promotes a selfish and shallow approach to life.
You have it in one, Araminta. TA came into being as a breakaway from Freudian psychotherapy, kicked started by a man called Eric Berne, an American. Others piled onto the bandwagon, including Thomas Harris, who wrote ‘I’m OK, You’re OK’. Berne’s orginal thoughts were intersesting, but others pushed the ideas to an extreme. Psychobabble, indeed.
All this philosophy stuff – leaves Backside cold. 😦
I rather think that here you have the roots of the consumer economy. Extrapolation to, you are what you purchase, is the next step from your premise.
You are only as ‘individual’ as the next fashion item.
When the right to consume becomes all important, rather than the right to create, good balanced economies slide into service only mode.
People have not protested at their manufacturing bases being quietly slid out the door to the East or the trashiness of the consumer goods they are encouraged to purchase.
Only when sufficient jobs are lost and there is no longer the money to afford successively more and more trashier goods is there an awakening that things are not right in society.
Unfortunately with the dumbing down of the mass media, education and the cretinous nature of society’s role models the majority of the population is now unable to think their way out of a paper bag let alone take the requisite steps to correct things.
I’m quite sure that aesthetic living, moral rectitude, personal accountability and a more judgemental attitude will not overtake the population of the west without sufficient seismic convulsions as to remove all vestiges of our previously successful civilisations.
I have to say I see a dreary slide into totalitarian prole control with one elitist group world wide as a culmination.
I feel that the dystopian literature of the 30s is all too likely to come to pass. Equally I do not think that the majority of humanity are actually worth saving from such a fate, they conspire to their own demise every time they buy some cheap garment or watch X factor.
Inchoate virtually silent protest and feelings of doubt are no substitute for serious thought and action, regrettably I do think that women have been the architects of this fall, woolly sentimental thinking and consumerism being their specialities and men too often fall into the trap of anything for a quiet life.
Equally I feel that education is not giving the young the tools with which to think, quite deliberately, thinking people cause trouble, consumers, facilitators and apparatchiks are all that is needed by this new society!
Look at the individuals who started both the French and Russian revolutions, all were intelligentsia, not proles.
I’m quite sure governments do not want that to happen again!
Wandering off the subject, Tom, I do remember when psychometric tests were all the rage. I have no idea if they still are but I remember applying for a job with an American company and after three interviews, one of which was one such test, they offered me the job as super duper PA to the CEO.
The one crucial question they forgot to ask was to do with my typing skills, which were practically non-existent at the time.
I didn’t accept the job and politely told them why. They didn’t mention typing skills in the advertisement at all!
Now I’ve got rid of Backside for a moment – I think you are in danger of giving philosophy a bad name here. What you are referring to seem to be theories about management styles, behavioural psychology and life-style choices. The old Greeks didn’t philosophise about such things. 🙂
Christina I like your ‘you are what you purchase theory’. You know that we’re divided into socio economic groups and that products are targeted at the appropriate group(s). I can foresee a time when this grouping is placed on a more formal not to say statutory level (entered on your identity card and so forth).
Hello, Janus. No, while you are right to identify the context in which these theories were advanced, my concern is with the philosophy behind them.
Araminta there was exponential growth in the use of personality profiling and aptitude tests in the eighties, principally because employers lost faith in educational qualifications.
Christian, your comments remind me of a recent incident when I spotted some attractive china mugs, apparently hand-painted, in a shop. On closer examination I saw they were made in China. I did not buy.
Another rare instance of agreement with Janus. Philosophy has nothing to to with management theory. It’s to do with basic truth, something that most managements try to avoid, particularly when it’s staring them in the face.
So Tom I think you are incorrect when you say “…..context in which these theories were advanced, my concern is with the philosophy behind them…..”. There was no philosophy only some rather flawed thinking.
So to sum up, the readers of the ‘Sun’ care not who runs the country as long as she big tits.
OMG
Think you’re on the wrong post chief.
tom, neither do I!
I no longer shop, I refuse utterly to buy chinese crap. Even some of the food here is now coming from China!
Not in my household.
When you live as far out of the mainstream as I do it is very easy to step back and see it all for what it is worth, the modern equivalent of beads for the natives!
Jazz
My point was about the collective nature of herd instinct but in a style that cuts to the chase, JPS would have approved.
Christina
Not all Chinese stuff is crap.
That right, it’s clap.
OMG
…and there’s nothing wrong with big tits per se, not that I’m a big fan of them myself. I prefer a more graceful shape.
The Chinese are great craftsmen and good engineers. But if you ask them to produce cheap junk (geddit) I’m sure they’re more than happy to oblige.
It’s time we woke up in this country, we’re the ones with the problem.
Tom, OK. I’ll buy it. What are the ‘philosophies behind them?’?
PS, I think you mean ‘theories’. Nowt to do with philosophy (op.ct. #13).
Janus, have your way. My conncern is not with the semantics, and going down that route simply distracts from the point I was making about the nature of relationships and values in our society?
Sorry, T, but you can’t slide out so easily. I am not making a semantic point at all. I am asking you to state in a couuple of sentences and in words of one syllable (always a good test of logic) what those philosophies (your definition) are. I can’t find them in your post.