The Inherency of Philosophy

The following is an excerpt from A Fool's Folly.

PART I: The Consolidating Worldview

Chapter 2: The Inherency of Philosophy

Type "Steve Jobs 1980" into YouTube. You should find a talk in which Jobs explains the philosophy behind Apple. He makes mention of an article that he read in Scientific American magazine. It ranked creatures by the amount of energy each required to get from point A to point B. He explained that human beings come about a third of the way down the list, whilst the concord is the most efficient creature. But, if you allow human beings to use a bicycle (a tool created by the species), we become 3x more efficient than even the concord.

Jobs made the point that our tools have the power to amplify human ability. He explained that Apple aimed to do this by getting out of the way. A writer would be able to write without knowing how to program a computer, input the required prompts and so on.

I found the talk interesting. As I pondered this new insight I found myself connecting Jobs idea to an idea I'd been thinking on. The idea that human beings have an inherent philosophy. We have an innate love of becoming more wise. Efforts typically described as philosophical are aimed at getting us out of our own way, rather than at stretching us further.

I assert that philosophical efforts are a return to an inherent love of wisdom that had gone adrift. Through mass culture we find ourselves ruminating on dissatisfaction. Through philosophical effort we can negate culture and develop individuality. Thus, we return to a state where we can experience the joy of becoming more wise.

Where this idea becomes powerful is in answering why it is that we need to get out of our own way. Let's return to the idea that our tools amplify human ability.

Think about how much we use tools in our lives. Language is a tool, we use tools to eat, to sit on, to run with, to sleep with. You right now, are using a tool of my creation. There isn't a moment of our lives where we are not in the presence of our tools.

Tools amplify ability and thus the use of ability for any purpose. The use of any ability, such as writing, can produce a worthy or ignoble result, or some intermediate. Thus tools have the power to boost human expression, or to suppress it. The amplification goes both ways, making our actions more or less human.

Recently I learned that Salvador Dali, later in his life, designed the Chupa Chups logo. This discovery made me laugh, for what is the most surreal thing that a prominent surrealist could do, other than design a corporate logo? But more than that, it demonstrates that there is a right approach to anything. A great many people design logos for a living. Few of them will do so whilst being as human as Dali, and most will use their tools and ability to dehumanize their own lives.

Jobs was right. Tools are great when they work to amplify elegance. That is how he orientated Apple with the "Think Different" marketing campaign. Despite all this, there is nothing to prevent a person from using a MacBook to dehumanize his own life, by spending his days creating uninspired logos on the cheap. This is the ugly truth; that all tools can also amplify vulgarity. Thus we will tend toward either elegance or vulgarity.

Most tend toward vulgarity more often for it is easier than the tending toward elegance. Vulgarity too, is supported by cultural norms. Vulgarity is that which is expected of us by mass culture. Those who meet these expectations are sure to meet with vulgarity.

Elegance is the more difficult, for one must have the sincerity to admit to the inadequacies of initial attempts. Elegance too, requires that we take aim at a renewed target with improved bow and enhanced technique.

Yet there exist individuals who choose elegance over and over again despite social rejection. Some only gaining recognition after they've passed away. This illustrates that the trade off is worthwhile, massive as it may seem. The question becomes; what does the artist receive in exchange? The answer is an amplification of life experience, through an amplified ability to live.

As time makes its steady march forward, the human condition will continue its divergence. Social norms and mass culture in support of increasing vulgarity. A union of artists advancing elegance. As tools proliferate this polarity will grow, and social rejection of one camp by the other will become more conspicuous.

To be human one must avoid vulgarity or he will become mechanical. That is, we must avoid becoming the tools of our tools. Your car will take you to a job that you hate with little trouble. Without the car, you might have to march through snow and ice to arrive at work. Your inclination to tend toward elegance - to quit for something better - would be higher. With tools the vulgar life becomes easier and easier with the passage of time. Not compelled into action by discontent, one becomes the physical manifestation of his apathy.

There must be good reason that many philosophers have such great appreciation of nature. Going to nature is to rid oneself of tools. One can remember why we use these tools, and how we should use them. When one's diet becomes poor, nature will show us why we eat, and in what manner a stove should be used.

Beyond avoiding vulgarity, one must tend toward elegance. That is, we must become a master of tools. Not merely of ones own tools, or those supplied, but of tools that are a common resource - such as freely expressed ideas.

Without a doubt, there is a massive expansion of psyche in those tending toward elegance. But more subtle and harder to notice is that there is a narrowing of personality in those who tend toward vulgarity. Ten years along, the vulgar have more reasons why they cannot tend toward elegance - they own more well dressed excuses. In terms of a man's psyche there is no constancy. Of that I am certain.

The good news is that tending toward elegance produces a rewarding experience, far superior to those had by vulgar beings. Through our subjectivity, the tending toward elegance has been made an inherent ability. Philosophy is thus inherent due to the fact that we are subjective beings.

The human condition is expanding and your position within it is decided by your actions. Let those actions you choose be in accordance with human nature. In accordance with your innate joy in becoming wiser.