The Human Predicament Exam 1

What are this course’s two subdivisions?

1. Among living things, what makes human beings constitutionally unique?

2. What are the contextual factors that affect an individual human being’s situation?

Be familiar with the three quotations on page 2 of the syllabus 

1. “Who precisely are we? What sort of creature is the human being?” -Aldous Huxley, The Human Situation

2. “(T)he reason the human predicament is really a predicament is that we are caught between a rock and a hard place. Life is bad but so is death.” -David Benatar, The Human Predicament

3. “The uniquely human characteristic for abstract self-awareness – our ability to think consciously about ourselves – is the single psychological characteristic that most clearly distinguishes human beings from all other animals.” -Mark Leary, Understanding the Mysteries of Human Behavior 

Philosophy (definition and Greek origin of the word)

1. ‘Philo’ (love) and ‘sophia’ (wisdom)

   1. ‘Love of wisdom’

2. The study of fundamental aspects of human existence, including the meaning of life (the search for wisdom and the study of proper behavior)

“The unexamined life is not worth living” -Socrates (What does this mean)

1. The richest life is one in which you understand why you think, act, and feel as you do

What are epistemology, logic, ethics, value theory, aesthetics, and metaphysics? (What question/topic does each address?)

1. Epistemology: the investigation of what distinguishes justified belief from opinion

   1. What can we know with certainty?

2. Logic: reasoning conducted or assessed according to strict principles of validity 

   1. What are the principles of right reasoning?

3. Ethics: moral principles that govern a person’s behavior or the conducting of an activity 

   1. How should we behave?

4. Value Theory: how we determine the worth of something 

   1. How do we assign worth?

5. Aesthetics: the sensual experience

   1. How do we experience pleasure?

6. Metaphysics: discusses the extent of reality 

   1. What is reality?

7. These are the 6 subcategories of Philosophy and they are intended to address all aspects of human life

Why is This Is Water an appropriate title for David Foster Wallace’s book?

1. The book examines the often overlooked portions of life, despite the fact that they are essential, similar to how fish would not know that they live in water despite it being all around them

2. We don’t realize our natural position is self

Hedonic adaptation 

1. The ability of people to return to a stable level of happiness after experiencing a positive or negative event

“Philosophy bakes no bread” -William James (What does this mean?)

1. The first job of philosophy is to convince people that the study of philosophy is practical 

2. Nobody asks a baker why they are baking bread 

3. We have to remember that our work can be practical (and it better be) but it's not as obvious as the work of a baker 

4. We have to respond with a convincing narrative that studying philosophy will enrich your life 

The Mind-Body Problem/Debate (Monism vs. Dualism)

1. Monism: reality is only physical

2. Dualism: 2 categories of life 

   1. Physical (5 senses)

   2. Non-Physical (6th sense)

What do the “Cheese-Vomit Experiment” and Professor Bruce Hood’s “Objective Provenance Experiment” imply about the monism-dualism debate?

1. Bruce Hood’s Experiment:

   1. He passed around a sweater and offered the students $20 to put it on, then he told them it belonged to a serial killer and no one wanted to put it on

   2. Students couldn't give a reason why they wouldn't put the sweater on = dualism; non-physical realm to reality

   3. The decision was emotional

   4. Humans will associate emotions to inanimate objects (belief that objects can hold emotions or properties from previous owners)

2. Cheese-Vomit Experiment

   1. When people were told they were smelling cheese, they thought it was good

   2. When people were told they were smelling vomit, they thought it was bad

   3. Both groups were smelling the same cheese and therefore were having an emotional reaction to thinking it was vomit 

   4. Dualism 

The Free Will-Determinism Debate: What is the issue being debated?

1. To what extent are our behaviors freely selected rather than caused by factors outside of our control 

2. Free Will advocates argue for individual autonomy and moral responsibility

3. Determinism suggests that all events, including human actions, are determined by prior causes

The Free Will-Determinism Debate: Antinomy and “Causation is not coercion” (Think about the term “compatibilism”)

1. The phrase "causation is not coercion" emphasizes that while choices may be influenced by prior causes, they are not forced

2. Compatibilism reconciles free will with determinism, suggesting that individuals can act freely within a deterministic framework

3. Antinomy refers to the contradiction between the belief in free will and determinism

Abnormal behavior: statistical, dysfunctional, and distressful

1. Statistical: ‘But, is playing golf an abnormal behavior’

2. Dysfunctional: ‘But, consider Jean-Paul Sartre or Sir Winston Churchill’

3. Distressful: ‘But, some people are distressed by a behavior that doesn’t need to change’

   1. E.g. Anthony Storr’s Solitude  

   2. E.g. Christopher Lane’s Shyness: How Normal Behavior Became a Sickness

   3. E.g. Max Malikow’s Relax, You’re Normal

4. There is no definition of abnormal behavior but when we consider a particular behavior, do less than 50% of people do this (statistical), does this behavior prevent them from meeting their responsibilities (dysfunctional), does this behavior bother the person who has it (distressful)

Dr. Thomas Szasz: The Myth of Mental Illness

1. How can a behavior be sick if there is no baseline for determining how a person should behave? 

2. If there is visible damage to the brain that can be located (such as schizophrenia) it is classified as a brain disease

William James’ “Imaginary Lover” Thought Experiment 

1. If you were to develop a perfect relationship with someone and then you found out they were an android, would you care?

2. Monism: would not care because the relationship is the same and there is nothing deeper than the physical realm

3. Dualism: would care as there would be something missing from the relationship (belief in something beyond the physical) 

Irvin Yalom’s 4 Philosophical Issues with Psychotherapy (life’s meaning, free will, ultimate aloneness, and death)

1. Life’s meaning: Creating meaning through language, culture, and relationships

2. Free will: Recognizing the responsibility that comes with freedom

3. Ultimate aloneness: Experiencing isolation from others, from parts of oneself, or from all other beings

4. Death: Acknowledging that death is inevitable and using this insight to enrich life

What is the common interest of philosophy, psychology, and religion? How do each of these disciples differ with regard to information gathering?

1. Philosophy: reflection

2. Psychology: research

3. Religion: revelation 

4. All have interest in human behavior 

What did Albert Camus consider philosophy’s only question? What did he mean by his analysis?

1. Is the life we are living worth the effort it takes to live it 

2. If the answer is no, theoretically the answer is suicide 

Robert Sapolski: his definition of the frontal cortex and Why Zebras Don’t Get Ulcers

1. Neuroscientist 

2. The frontol cortex is the front of the brain that enables you to do the harder thing when the easier thing is available 

3. ‘Why Zebras Don’t Get Ulcers’ communicates the idea that animals live in the present, whereas we worry about the future and feel guilty about the past and this ability can cause ulcers (stress, guilt, anxiety)

What are thought experiments and what is their purpose?

1. No particular answer can or should be found 

2. Encourages speculation, logical thinking, and changing paradigms 

3. Push us outside our comfort zone by forcing us to confront questions we can’t answer with ease

4. Reveals we do not know everything and some things cannot be known

Sam Krasniqi Case (how does it relate to abnormal behavior)

1. His daughter was sitting on his lap and he patted her in the genital area, and was arrested after people called the police

2. He stated that this was acceptable in Albanian culture and was found not guilty because this is true for Albanian culture 

3. The children were never returned to the Krasniqi parents 

Dr. Max Schur and Sigmund Freud

1. Dr. Max Schur:

   1. Physician of Sigmund Freud who gave him his lethal injection of morphine

   2. Moral responsibility to alleviate suffering, but also a moral responsibilty to not kill your patient

   3. Determined that Freud wanted to die and that the greater good was to alleviate the suffering of Freud with his own consent

2. Sigmund Freud:

Gilbert Ryles RE: Monism vs. Dualism

1. “There is no ghost in the machine”

   1. There is no separate, non-physical mind or consciousness controlling a physical body

2. The term “mind” is a category error 

   1. Thinking of the mind as a separate entity from the body, like a ghost in the machine, is a mistake because it wrongly categorizes the mind as a thing when it is actually a collection of abilities and dispositions, not a separate substance

Poneros (Greek definition), evil, Richard Kuklinski, and Albert Fish

1. Deliberate defiance of the moral law without regard to the pain and suffering brought to others by such offense 

2. Evil

   1. Acting

      1. Major Hugh Thompson at My Lai

      2. Do Unto Others: Extraordinary Acts of Ordinary People, Samular Oliner

   2. Redeeming 

      1. Recall: Whoever Fights Monsters, Robert Ressler

      2. Park Dietz’s Interview with Richard Kuklinksi

   3. Forgiving 

      1. “Forgiveness” Defined

      2. Edgar Farrar, Sr.’s Remarkable Letter

      3. Elie Wiesel’s request made to the German President

      4. The Sunflower, Simon Wiesenthal

   4. Punishing

      1. Nuremberg Trials (1945)

         1. “What is the place of justice in the human predicament?”

      2. Witness

         1. How did it feel to see the bully punished?

         2. You stole my car and killed my dog” -John Wick (John Wick III)

      3. The Equalizer III (Denzel Washington)

3. Richard Kuklinski

   1. Killed up to 200 people with no remorse 

4. Albert Fish 

   1. Serial killer, rapist, child molester, and cannibal

The Holocaust and Stanislaw Jerzy Luc’s quotation (“In an avalanche every snowflake says, I’m not responsible”)

1. When people believe that they are not responsible for what is occurring (indifference), it allows those who are in power to get away with whatever they want 

Teleology and deontology; relativism and absolutism (ethical concepts)

1. E.g. atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki

2. E.g. the adulterous man in Crimes and Misdemeanors 

3. Teleology: the end justifies the means 

4. Deontology: right moral action must be consistent with moral principle

What does the suicide of David Foster Wallace imply?

1. David Foster Wallace had a neurological depression that could not be cured

2. Correlation with depression and creative success

3. One’s life circumstances doesn’t necessarily prescribe whether or not they’ll kill themselves (had a family and success)

Stanley Milgram’s Obedience and Compliance Experiment, the Holocaust, and the My Lai massacre- Each of these was a part of our consideration of which question? 

1. Stanley Milgram’s Obedience and Compliance Experiment:

   1. 2 subjects

   2. They were told they were doing an experiment to see if the infliction of pain causes a person to remember

   3. One of them is the student, one is the teacher

   4. Given material to study, asked questions based on material

   5. If right, you move on

   6. If wrong, you're shocked (5-450 volts)

   7. Increase voltage with each incorrect answer

   8. How far will the teacher go to administer the shocks?

   9. 75% of teachers went to 400 volts

   10. Supervising psychologist said to teachers to keep them shocking: "if anything happens, it's not your fault, it's mine."

   11. Teachers were detached from the outcome

   12. People are quite capable of harming other people even if they aren't provoked

2. Holocaust

   1.  

3. Mai Lai Massacre

   1. American soldiers, there were no enemy combatants, but around 300 women, children, and elders were shot down

   2. Hugh Thompson, an Army helicopter pilot on a reconnaissance mission, landed his aircraft between the soldiers and the retreating villagers and threatened to open fire if they continued their attacks.

   3. March 16, 1968, American soldiers in Vietnam entered a village and killed hundreds of unarmed civilians. Group evil dispersed responsibility, providing a cloak of anonymity for the perpetrators.

Naive realism 

1. The tendency to believe our perceptions of the world are objective and unbiased

Emotional intelligence: why it matters more than IQ (Daniel Goleman): emotional awareness, emotional management, self-restraint/self-discipline, empathy, and interpersonal skill

1. Goleman's meta-analysis found that people successful at home and work had 4 traits, leading to a 5th. Emotional awareness, emotional management, self-discipline, and empathy, when combined, led to interpersonal skills

Walter Mischel’s Stanford Marshmallow Experiment as an example of emotional intelligence 

1. Walter Mischel's Stanford Marshmallow Experiment as an example of emotional intelligence

2. An experiment in self-control

3. Gave preschoolers a plate with one marshmallow on it and told them they could have two marshmallows if they could wait for him to come back

Jonathan Haidt, David Hume, and Ernest Hemingway’s agreement on decision-making and emotion

1. They believe that judgments are made based on both reason and gut feelings (emotion)

Dr. John Maltsberger’s analysis of why people commit suicide: rage, despair, and aloneness 

1. Rage: 

   1. Being so incredibly angry that you feel you have no other options 

2. Despair:

   1. Decrepit of hope

3. Aloneness:

   1. Quite literally being alone in the world (or feeling like it)

4. 85%-90% of people who are diagnosed with depression do not commit suicide 

Michelle Fox, Francesco Clark, Paul Wittgenstein, and Charles Krauthammer

1. Michelle Fox: Had her face shot off by her ex-husband, she was asked whether she wanted to live, and she said yes, and that mindset is what helped her recover (resilience)

2. Francisco Clark: He became paralyzed after diving into a pool and despite being told he would have to live life on a ventilator, he works daily to regain function in his body (resilience)

3. Paul Wittgenstein: His right hand was amputated during WW1, yet he went on to continue his successful piano career using only his left hand (resilience)

4. Charles Krauthammer: He became paralyzed after diving in water that was too shallow during his first year of Harvard Medical School, but went on to continue medical school, become a successful political columnist, and write philosophy books (resilience)

What part did “death by immolation” and Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother (Amy Chua) play in our consideration of abnormal behavior?

1. Law professor at Yale 

2. A book on parenting that criticizes Western parenting 

3. Believes people should be stricter on their children to make them more successful 

4. Western parents are concerned with children having fun and children liking them, she said this isn't her priority cause her children are her responsibility and this is how she prepares them for adulthood