Critical Thinking in a Crisis

Arguing for Our Lives: Critical Thinking in Crisis Times  by Robert Jensen 

My own opinion is that this book fails to deliver what it promises and I was very disappointed in it.

The author is clearly a very agreeable and thoughtful academic teacher. He takes the view that we need active, committed citizens for democracy to work.  It is important to have opinions and to discuss them socially on topics that matter, including politics, religion, economics, the environment.  This requires effort, under the much maligned label of "intellectual," and it is hard work.  We need to confront those who are unwilling to make the intellectual effort and who use the concept of "my opinion" to cover a thoughtless and unreflecting adherence to prepackaged viewpoints put about by others.  We need also to understand the way people with power and wealth use their resources to mislead the public and promote their selfish interests.  Of course such topics provoke argument, but this is desirable, and he advocates specific rules of thumb which will help us to participate in such arguments competently, critically and also politely and respectfully.

If you accept these laudable sentiments, then this short book will yield another quick and useful entry towards your Goodreads reading challenge. However, if we imagine a scenario where an American Republican candidate carries this book openly into a television debate, and is not struck by lightening as a result, then I predict it will be used for only one purpose - to demonstrate the left wing bias of university academics.

I just have no experience to suggest that political debate is going to remain good natured or respectful once people start to question what assumptions lie beneath "just my opinion" or why those assumptions may have no factual basis or may not lead by any logical pathway to the irrational beliefs expressed or may, in fact, be nothing better than the unquestioned acceptance of media lies. I do not need to be told how to conduct a polite discussion - I need to be told how to deal with trolls and bigots, how to confront direct and blatant lies, how to detect and dodge rhetorical debating tricks and techniques for misrepresentation, how to get a fair hearing for unpopular truths and how to attempt all this without becoming depressed or crazy. The point is that people are not simply too stupid to see the truth - they actively want to be deceived and will get very nasty with anyone who exposes that attitude for what it is.

I can suggest a more effective reading list for people who really do want an argument.

Thinking Fast and Slow by Kahnemann (how we are manipulated)
The Logic of Real Arguments by Alec Fisher (how to work out what is going on)
Taming the Ox by Charles Johnson (how to stay sane while being politically engaged!)
The Contours of American History by William Appleman William  (a dated but excellent guide to the political ideology of the USA)

Of course, this is just my own opinion.

Buddhist Reflections on Politics

Taming the Ox: Buddhist Stories and Reflections on Politics, Race, Culture, and Spiritual Practice

by Charles Johnson

I have learned silence from the talkative, toleration from the intolerant, and kindness from the unkind; yet, strange, I am ungrateful to those teachers.

Kahlil Gibran [p161]

In this interesting and provocative little book, Charles Johnson self-identifies as a black / African American, an artist and a long standing Buddhist. What makes this commentary on Buddhist teaching provocative is its application to politics, and particularly the politics of black Americans. You just know we are going to be walking on eggshells.

He takes issue with the notion that there can or should be a version of Buddhist teaching that is specific to black people or African Americans. “What I do have a problem with is the condescending notion that any subject, Buddhism included, must be presented in a supposedly ‘black’ style in order for black Americans to find it accessible, for there is no single, monolithic black style.  It is refuted by black (and Hispanic) Soka Gakkai Buddhists who do not need copies of the Lotus Sutras written in “black English.” … For if the truth be told, the same “letting go” of the (black) self that is the fruit of practice is also required, at least in part, for the first steps on one’s journey.” He describes the “illusory” black self as “the snare of ethnic dualism.” [p109]

This may seem a tricky line to adopt but it is not based on a denial of racism or the harm it does. He is describes and condemns American racism and how that harms the lives of every black person in America. He rejects the suggestion that black Americans seek their salvation by becoming more like white Americans, albeit always from a position of disadvantage. In fact, he suggests that white Americans have a huge challenge to overcome the harm to their own lives arising from racist thinking and behaviour.  (“Peggy McIntosh sums it up very well when she observes: “I think whites are carefully taught not to recognise white privilege, as males are taught not to recognise male privilege.  I have come to recognise white privilege as an invisible package of unearned assets which I can count on cashing in each day, but of which I was ‘meant’ to remain oblivious.” [p119] ) Nor is he saying we are all the same;  he points to the genetic evidence that there is far more diversity within than between so called “races”. He just flatly rejects the dualistic thinking that classifies people as black or white.

Most importantly he is not advocating political pacifism or disengagement.  He not only questions the popular misunderstanding that Buddhism is apolitical, but has caustic words to describe the very political, competitive and materialistic world of the Buddhist religion itself as an institution: “Toshiro decided he did not want to teach or try to work his way up through the politically treacherous Buddhist hierarchy and rigid, religious pecking order in Japan, which was brutally competitive and had corrupted the Sangha, or community of spiritual seekers, by the greed and hypocrisy of the world…” [p154]

He seems to me to have two major comments to make about political activism.  Firstly, it must be built on an accurate and well supported description of the relevant issues, escaping from confusing labels and misrepresentations. Secondly, he wants us to approach activism in a way that does not self-harm the activist.  “Because, as the first line of the Dhammapada says, “All that we are is the result of what we have thought.” “  [p30]

He cites with approval Master Shen Yeng of the Dharma Drum Cultural Foundation in Taipei:  "I follow four dictates: face it, accept it, deal with it, let it go." This is a formula that merits  examination.  I take the first dictate as emerging from the principles of mindfulness, which train us to see what is before us as it presents itself and not through the filter of our assumptions. To face things as they are requires considerable skill, since it is very hard not to reduce our world to simplistic (very often illusory) labels and categories. As Johnson emphasises repeatedly, mindfulness is far from a passive approach to life, including political life; it is instead challenging and difficult to sustain. I am reminded of my favourite line from Isaiah Berlin: “If we have the possibility of knowing the truth why would we choose to be deceived?”  The point is that we often do prefer to avoid the truth.  The second principle follows very logically from this.  It does not imply that we fail to criticise or challenge the reality we encounter but it does suggest that, before we can ever hope to change things, we must first recognise the reality of what is there and what is required to achieve any change; in that way, our decisions are more likely to be realistic and therefore achievable. The third dictate says to me that if we face up to reality and accept its implications, then a serious moral commitment is required of us to act on our understanding, to make decisions and to see them through. That is not the philosophy of a passive observer, though it may be that we do learn to be more selective about the battles we take on. The duty to act on our knowledge of the world is a tough one to honour. Finally and most difficult, “let it go” implies, among other things, learning that we can deal with even difficult and troubling matters without sacrificing our dignity and capacity for peace. It is very difficult to be politically engaged without experiencing continuing anger and even rage but that is self destructive and, if anything, it undermines our capacity to be effective.  All this is my reading of the four dictates listed above but also captures some of my response to Johnson’s book.

I expected to find this book sanctimonious but was surprised at how sharp it really is.  Johnson may not succeed in turning any large proportion of African Americans to Buddhism, and I am not sure he expects to.  However, I think his book will have considerable value to anyone at all caught up in political debate who needs to find a way to stay “grounded” and sane.  His voice turns out to be quiet but deeply penetrating.

“Bhikku Bodhi once explained mindfulness this way: The task of Right Mindfulness is to clear up the cognitive field. Mindfulness brings to light experience in its pure immediacy.  It reveals the object as it is before it has been plastered over with conceptual paint, overlaid with interpretations. To practice mindfulness is thus a matter not so much of doing but of undoing, not thinking, not judging, not associating, not planning, not imagining, not wishing. “ p 96

American guns: a thought experiment

Today I argued in a forum against the following proposition: "It isn't the lawful use of guns that kill people. You can look at Chicago and see a city with some of the harshest guns laws on the books and people are getting killed all the time there, lawless don't care about laws. Disarming the lawful isn't going to end this type of behavior, the end of most gun violence is typically a good guy with a gun ending the bad 
guys life."  

This was my response. 


America's gun culture is lawful and enshrined (allegedly) in the constitution. It is lawful to harbour violent thoughts and fantasies. It is lawful to promote violent ideas and fantasies. It is lawful to purchase guns. It is lawful for a total nutcase to possess and carry around an arsenal of weapons having no relation whatever to his personal safety; it is lawful right up to the point where he opens fire (even that might arguably be lawful) and commences a massacre, which is finally unlawful. 

Only in retrospect does the chain of causation emerge. In retrospect, one might argue that some steps in that chain required intervention and some might have entered the territory of unlawful conspiracy. In that case, an act which is lawful for most people might arguably have become unlawful in retrospect for some, such as for this mass murderer, but it can only become unlawful in retrospect - as though there is a chain of causation working backwards in time, from the massacre to the firing of the gun (now unlawful, not of itself, but because people were killed as a result) to the possession of the weapons arsenal (arguably this ought to be unlawful) to the purchase of guns (arguably this ought to be unlawful or, if not, regulated effectively), to the dissemination of violent ideas and fantasies (pretty certainly not unlawful and yet clearly part of the chain of causation and open to discussion about the acceptability of verbal violence and promoting violent attitudes) to America's gun culture (which needs removing from the constitution to permit proper safeguards). 

What comes from this? It is empty to say that the lawful use of guns is not the problem, because there is no difference between a lawful act leading to neutral outcomes and a lawful act leading to a massacre. In other words, lawfulness is not a useful criterion, because if it can only be determined in retrospect, then it serves no useful function whatever. The problem is not the lawfulness of guns - the problem is their prevalence - their existence in the population is the problem. 

Here is a thought experiment. At the gates of a large school, place a glass cabinet with a set of fully loaded, ready to use guns. Put a sign over the cabinet - in case of need, break the glass: only for use in self defence, not to be used unlawfully. Possibly, as an afterthought, add a note: if you massacre people then you may be shot and will otherwise probably be executed by the state in an incompetent and ethically troubling manner. Leave the cabinet unsupervised, secure in the knowledge that the use of such weapons would usually be unlawful, except for self defence. If used lawfully, the guns might help prevent or bring to an end an illegal massacre in this school. 

Why is that idea not ok? Would you send your kids to this school? Would you teach there?