If a
scientist states it as an axiom [p.418] that the sensations of heat and
light which we feel correspond to some objective cause, he does not
conclude that this is what it appears to the senses to be. Likewise, even
if the impressions which the faithful feel are not imaginary, still they
are in no way privileged intuitions; there is no reason for believing that
they inform us any better upon the nature of their object than do ordinary
sensations upon the nature of bodies and their properties. In order to
discover what this object consists of, we must submit them to an
examination and elaboration analogous to that which has substituted for the
sensuous idea of the world another which is scientific and conceptual.
This is precisely what we have tried to do, and we have seen that this
reality, which mythologies have represented under so many different forms,
but which is the universal and eternal objective cause of these sensations
sui generis
out of which religion is made, is society. We have shown
what moral forces it develops and how it awakes the sentiment of a refuge,
of a shield and of a guardian support which attaches the believer to his
cult. It is that which raises him outside himself; it is even that which
made him. For that which makes a man is the totality of the intellectual
property which constitutes civilisation, and civilisation is the work of
society. Thus is explained the preponderating role of the cult in all
religions, whichever they may be. This is because society cannot make its
influence felt unless it is in action, and it is not in action unless the
individuals who compose it are assembled together and act in common. It is
by common action that it takes consciousness of itself and realises its
position; it is before all else an active cooperation. The collective ideas
and sentiments are even possible only owing to these exterior movements
which symbolise them, as we have established. (footnote: see above, pages
230 following). Then it is action that dominates the religious life,
because of the mere fact that it is society which is its source.
Durkheim, E. 1914a The Dualism of Human Nature
Durkheim1914a p.
Society has its own nature, and consequently, its requirements
are quite different from those of our nature as individuals:
the interests of the whole are not necessarily those of the
part. Therefore, society cannot be formed or maintained without
our being required to make perpetual and costly sacrifices.
Because society surpasses us, it obliges us to surpass
ourselves; and to surpass itself, a being must, to some degree,
depart from its nature-a departure that does not take place
without causing more or less painful tensions.
Durkheim, E. 1914/1955 Pragmatism and Sociology
Durkheim1914/1955 par.15.1
Before examining the value of pragmatism as a form of logical
utilitarianism, let us look first at the characteristics of truth. We see
at once that it is linked to:
1 a moral obligation. Truth cannot be separated from a certain moral
character. In every age, men have felt that they were obliged to seek
truth. In truth, there is something which commands respect, and a moral
power to which the mind feels properly bound to assent;
2 a de facto necessitating power. There is a more or less physical
impossibility of not admitting the truth. When our mind perceives a true
representation, we feel that we cannot not accept it as true. The true idea
imposes itself on us. It is this character that is expressed in the old
theory of the evident nature of truth; there emanates from truth an
irresistible light.
Durkheim1914/1955 par.15.2
Is pragmatism, as a form of logical utilitarianism, capable of explaining
these two characters? It can explain neither of them.
1 Seeking the useful is following nature, not mastering it or taming it.
There is no place here for the moral constraint implied in the idea of
obligation. Pragmatism indeed cannot entail a hierarchy of values, since
everything in it is placed on the same level. The true and the good are
both on our level, that of the useful, and no effort is needed to lift
ourselves to it. For James, the truth is what is 'expedient', and it is
because it is advantageous that it is good and has value. Clearly this
means that truth has its demands, its loyalties, and can give rise to
enthusiasm, but at the level of the useful, this enthusiasm is only related
to what is capable of pleasing us, that which is in conformity with our
interests.
2 Nor is it possible to see how pragmatists could explain the necessitating
character of truth. Pragmatists believe that it is we who construct both
the world and the representations which express it. We 'make' truth in
conformity with our needs. How then could it resist us? Pragmatism no doubt
accepts that beneath those intellectual constructions which make up truth
there is nevertheless a prime matter which we have not created. For
pragmatism, however, this prime matter is only an ideal limit which we
never reach, although we always tend towards it. It is wiser, says
Schiller, to ignore it, since absolute truth could 'give us no aid', and is
rather an obstacle to a more adequate knowledge of realities which are in
effect accessible to us. Besides that prime matter, there is of course the
whole system of mental organisation, acquired truths and 'previous truths'.
But that is 'a much less obdurately resisting factor' which 'often ends by
giving way': ideas are soft things, which we can twist as we like when
there is no objective reality (provided by sensations) which prevents us
from doing so.
In short, when pragmatists speak of truth as something good, desirable and
attractive, one wonders whether a whole aspect of it has not escaped them.
Truth is often painful, and may well disorganise thought and trouble the
serenity of the mind. When man perceives it, he is sometimes obliged to
change his whole way of thinking. This can cause a crisis which leaves him
disconcerted and disabled. If, for example, when he is an adult, he
suddenly realises that all his religious beliefs have no solid basis, he
experiences a moral collapse and his intellectual and affective life is in
a sense paralysed. This sense of confusion has been expressed by Jouffroy
in his famous article Comment les dogmes finissent. Thus the truth is not
always attractive and appealing. Very often it resists us, is opposed to
our desires and has a certain quality of hardness.
3 Truth has a third character, and one which is undeniable: impersonality.
The pragmatists themselves have indicated this. But how can this character
be reconciled with their definition of truth? It has been said, with some
justice, that moral utilitarianism implies moral subjectivism. Is the same
not true of logical utilitarianism?
Durkheim1914/1955 par.15.3
The notion of the useful is, moreover, a very obscure one. Everything is
useful in relation to certain ends, and even the worst things are useful
from a certain point of view. Inversely, even the best, such as knowledge,
have their disadvantages and can cause suffering: those ages in which
knowledge has increased must have been the most anguished. Any phenomenon
has infinite repercussions in the universe, some of them good and others
bad. How could we weigh advantages against drawbacks? It would probably be
possible to trace all effects back to a cause and consequently to a
criterion which would both be single and determining. One could, for
example, accept the existence of an impersonal and universal moral end
which all men are obliged to seek. But pragmatism excludes any
determination of this kind. The truth, says James, is what is 'expedient in
almost any fashion; and expedient in the long run and on the whole of
course; for what meets expediently all the experience in sight won't
necessarily meet all further experiences equally satisfactorily'. And yet
not everything can be true. A choice has to be made, but on what basis?
Only on that of personal experience. If something causes us more
satisfaction than discomfort, we can say that yes, it is useful. But the
experience of other people can be different. Although pragmatism does not
totally accept this consequence, truth can be totally subjective in such
conditions. It is a question of temperament: the temperament of the
ascetic, for example, and that of the man of action; both have their reason
for being, and thus correspond to two different modes of action.
Durkheim1914/1955 par.15.4
But here a problem arises. If truth thus has a personal character, how can
impersonal truth be possible? Pragmatists see it as the ideal final stage
towards which all individual opinions would ultimately converge." What then
are the causes which would determine such a convergence? Two are mentioned
by the pragmatists.
(1) just as experience varies with individuals, so does its extent.
The person who possesses the widest and best-organised experience is in a
better position to see what is really useful. Gradually, his authority here
imposes itself and attracts the commendation of others. But is that a
decisive argument? Since all experience and all judgements are essentially
personal matters, the experience of others is valid for them, but not for
me.
(2) There are also social considerations. 'Every recognition of a judgement
by others is a social problem', says Schiller. Everyone, in fact, has an
interest in acting in concert with his fellow men, since if he does he
feels himself to be stronger and consequently more efficient and more
'useful'.
But the usefulness of joint action implies shared views, judgements and
ideas. The pragmatists have not disregarded this entirely. The difficulty
is that we do not in fact picture things as we desire them to be, and that
the pragmatist theses run the risk of making us not see this gap, and
consequently of making us see as true that which conforms to our desires.
In order to overcome this difficulty, we should have to agree to see the
general opinion, not as something artificial, but as an authority capable
of silencing the differences between individuals and of countering the
particularism of individual points of view. If, however, public opinion is
to be able to impose itself in this way it is essential that it should have
an extra-individual origin. But this is not possible in pragmatist
doctrine, since it holds that individual judgements are at the root of all
human thought: no purely individual judgement could ever become an
objective truth.
Durkheim1914/1955 par.15.5
Moreover, above all these dialectics, there is one fact. If, as pragmatism
maintains, the 'common' truth was the product of the gradual convergence of
individual judgements, one would have to be able to observe an ever-greater
divergence between the ways of thinking of individuals as one went further
and further back through history. However, what happens is exactly the
opposite." It is in the very earliest ages that men, in every social group,
all think in the same way. It is then that uniformity of thought can be
found. The great differences only begin to appear with the very first Greek
philosophers. The Middle Ages once again achieved the very type of the
intellectual consensus. Then came the Reformation, and with it came
heresies and schisms which were to continue to multiply until we eventually
came to realise that everyone has the right to think as he wishes.
Durkheim1914/1955 par.15.6
Let us also go back in the series of propositions of pragmatist doctrine.
We see that if pragmatism defines the true as the useful, it is because it
has proposed the principle that truth is simply an instrument of action.
For pragmatism, truth has no speculative function: all that concerns it is
its practical utility. For pragmatists, this speculative function is
present only in play and dreams. But for centuries humanity has lived on
non-practical truths, beliefs which were something quite other than
'instruments of action'. Myths have no essentially practical character. In
primitive civilisations they are accepted for themselves, and are objects
of belief. They are not merely poetic forms. They are groupings of
representations aimed at explaining the world, systems of ideas whose
function is essentially speculative. For a long time, myths were the means
of expression of the intellectual life of human societies. If men found a
speculative interest in them, it is because this need corresponded to a
reality.
Durkheim, E. 1918/1960 Rousseau's Social Contract
Durkheim1918/1960 p. 82
[Durkheim quoting Rousseau. The quotation is from the Geneva Manuscript of
The Social Contract. See
Christopher Bertram's 1999 translation at the University
of Bristol
]
A society is
"a moral entity having specific qualities distinct from those
of the individual beings which compose it, somewhat as chemical compounds
have properties that they owe to none of their elements. If the aggregation
resulting from these vague relationships really formed a social body, there
would be a kind of common sensorium that would outlive the correspondence
of the parts. Public good and evil would not be merely the sum of
individual good and evil, as in a simple aggregation, but would lie in the
relation that unites them. It would be greater than that sum, and public
well being would not be the result of the happiness of individuals, but
rather its source"
Durkheim1918/1960 p. 83
... Rousseau was keenly aware of the specificity of the social order. He
conceived it clearly as an order of facts generically different from purely
individual facts. It is a new world super-imposed on the purely
psychological world. A conception of this kind is far superior even to that
of such recent theorists as
Spencer, who think they
have grounded society in nature when they have pointed out that man has a
vague sympathy for his fellow men, and that it is in his interest to
exchange services with them. Feelings of this kind may make for momentary
contacts between individuals, but these intermittent and superficial
relationships which, as Rousseau puts it, lack the "connection between the
parts, that constitutes the whole," are not societies. Rousseau realised
this. In his view, society is nothing if not a single definite body
distinct from its parts.
Durkheim, E. 1925a Moral Education. A study in the
Theory and Application of the Sociology of Education
The editor's introduction, by Everett K. Wilson, to the 1965 translation,
contains a number of quotations that I cannot find in the text. These
include:
"to act morally is to act in terms of the collective interest... the domain
of the moral begins where the domain of the social begins" (p.xi)
Durkheim1925a p.3
Chapter 1: Introduction: Secular Morality
Anything that reduces the effectiveness of moral education, whatever
disrupts patterns of relationships, threatens public morality at its very
roots
...
It is in our public schools that the majority of our children are being
formed. These schools must be the guardians par
[p.4]
excellence of our
national character. They are the heart of our general
education system. We must, therefore, focus our attention on them, and
consequently on moral education as it is understood and practised and as it
should be understood and practised.
Durkheim1925a p.9
... if, in rationalising morality in moral education, one confines himself
to withdraw from moral discipline everything that is religious without
replacing it, one almost inevitably runs the danger of withdrawing at the
same time all elements that are properly moral. Under the name of rational
morality, we would be left only with an impoverished and colourless
morality. To ward of this danger, therefore, it is imperative not to be
satisfied with a superficial separation.
We must seek, in the very heart of religious conceptions, those moral
realities that are, as it were, lost and dissimulated in it. We must
disengage them, find out what they consist of, determine their proper
nature, and express them in rational language. In a word, we must discover
the rational substitutes for those religious notions that for a long time
have served as the vehicle for the most essential moral ideas.
An example will illustrate precisely what I mean. Even without pushing the
analysis, everybody readily perceives that in one sense, a very relative
sense... the moral order constitutes a
sort of autonomous order in the world. There is something about
prescriptions of morality that imposes particular respect for them. While
all opinions relating to the material world - to the physical or mental
organisation of either animals or men - are today entitled to free
discussion, people do not admit that moral beliefs should be as freely
subjected to criticism. Anybody who questions in our presence that the
child has duties towards his parents or that human life should be respected
provokes us to immediate protest. The response is quite different from that
which a scientific heresy might arouse. It resembles at every point the
reprobation that the blasphemer arouses in the soul of the believer.
There is even stronger reason for the feelings incited by infractions of
moral rules being altogether different from those provoked by ordinary
infractions
[p.10] of the
precepts of practical wisdom or of professional technique.
The domain of morality is as if surrounded by a mysterious barrier which
keeps violators at arm's length, just as the religious domain is protected
from the reach of the profane. All the things it comprises are as if
invested with a particular dignity that raises them above our empirical
individuality, and that confers upon them a sort of transcendent reality.
Do we not say, casually, that the human person is sacred, and that we must
hold it in reverence?
Durkheim1925a p.12
... if we have felt with greater force than our fathers the need for an
entirely rational moral education, it is evidently because we are becoming
more rationalistic.
Rationalism is only one of the aspects of individualism: it is the
intellectual aspect of it. We are not dealing here with two different
states of mind; each is the converse of the other. When one feels the need
of liberating individual thought, it is because in a general way one feels
the need of liberating the individual.
Intellectual servitude is only one of the servitudes that individualism
combats. All development of individualism has the effect of opening moral
consciousness to new ideas and rendering it more demanding. Since every
advance that it makes results in a higher conception, a more delicate
dignity of man, individualism cannot be developed without making apparent
to us as contrary to human dignity, as unjust, social relations that at one
time did not seem unjust at all. Conversely , as a matter of fact,
rationalistic faith reacts on individualistic sentiment and stimulates it.
Consequently, a given advance in moral education in the direction of
greater rationality cannot occur without also bringing to light new moral
tendencies, without inducing a greater thirst for justice, without stirring
the public conscience by latent aspirations."
Part 1: The Elements of Morality
Chapter 2: The First Element of Morality: The Sprit of Discipline
Durkheim1925a p.18
On the other hand, if, beyond this second period of childhood
i.e., beyond school age - the foundations of morality have not been laid,
they never will be. From this point on, all one can do is to complete the
job already begun, refining sensibilities and giving them some intellectual
content i.e. informing them increasingly with intelligence. But the ground
work must have been laid.
Durkheim1925a p.23
In the first place, there is an aspect common to all behaviour
that we ordinarily call moral. All such behaviour conforms to
pre-established rules. To conduct one's self morally is a matter of abiding
by a norm., determining what conduct should obtain in a given instance even
before one is required to act. The domain of morality is the domain of
duty; duty is prescribed behaviour.
Durkheim1925a p.27
... the function of morality is, in the first place, to determine conduct,
to fix it, to eliminate the element of individual arbitrariness. Doubtless
the content of moral precepts - that is to say, the nature of the
prescribed behaviour - also has moral value... However, since all such
precepts promote regularity of conduct among men, there is a moral aspect
in that theses actions - not only in their specific content, but in a
general way - are held to a certain regularity.
This is why transients and people who cannot hold themselves
to specific jobs are always suspected. It is because their moral
temperament is fundamentally defective - because it is most uncertain and
undependable. Indeed, in refusing to yield to the requirements of
regularised conduct, they disdain all customary behaviour, they resist
limitations and restrictions, and they feel some compulsion to remain
'free'.
Chapter 3: The Sprit of Discipline (continued)
Durkheim1925a p.34
... since moral requirements are not merely another name for personal
habits, since they determine conduct
imperatively from sources outside ourselves, in order to fulfil
one's obligations and to act morally one must have some appreciation of the
authority
sui generis that informs morality. In
other words, it is necessary that the person be so constituted as to feel
above him a force unqualified by his personal preferences and to which he
yields.
Durkheim1925a p.43
Thus, we should not see in the discipline to which we subject children a
means of constraint necessary when it seems indispensable for
preventing culpable conduct. Discipline is in itself a factor,
sui generis, of education.
There are certain essential elements of moral character, that can be
attributed only to discipline. Through it and by means of it alone we
are able to teach the child to rein in his desires, and to set limits to
his appetites of all kinds, to limit and, through limitation, to define the
goals of his activity.
Durkheim1925a p.44
Imagine a being liberated from all external restraint,... a despot that no
external power can restrain or influence. By definition, the desires of
such a being are irresistable. Shall we say, then, that he is all-powerful?
Certainly not, since he himself cannot resist his desires. They are masters
of him, as of everything else. He submits to them; he does not dominate
them.
Durkheim1925a p.45
A
despot is like a child; he has a child's weaknesses because he
is not
master of himself. Self-mastery is the first condition of all true power,
of all liberty worthy of the name. One cannot be master of himself when he
has within him forces that by definition, cannot be mastered. For the same
reason, political parties that are too strong - those that do not have to
take account of fairly strong minorities - cannot last long. It is not long
to their downfall, simply because of their excessive power. Since there is
nothing to restrain them they, they inevitably go to violent extremes,
which are self destroying....
Someone who was, or believed himself to be, without limits, either in fact
or by right, could not dream of limiting himself without being
inconsistent; it would do violence to his nature.
Durkheim1925a p.47
Chapter 4: The Sprit of Discipline (concluded); and the second element
of morality: Attachment to Social Groups
Morality... is basically a discipline. All discipline has a double
objective: to promote a certain regularity in people's conduct, and to
provide them with determinate goals that at the same time limit their
horizons.
Discipline promotes a preference for the customary, and it imposes
restrictions. It regularises and it constrains. It answers to whatever is
recurrent and enduring in men's relationships
with one another.
Durkheim1925a pp 67-68
Individual and society are certainly beings with different natures. But far
from these being some inexpressible kind of antagonism between the tow, far
from its being the case that the individual can identify himself with
society only at the risk of renouncing his own nature either wholly or in
part, the fact is that he is not truly himself, he does not fully realise
his own nature, except on the condition that he is involved in society.
... the need for containing one's self within determinate limits is
demanded by the person's nature. Whenever such limits are breached,
whenever moral rules lack the necessary authority to exert, to a desirable
degree, a regulatory influence on our behaviour, we see society gripped by
a dejection and pessimism reflected in the curve of suicides.
Similarly, whenever society loses what it should normally have, the power
of promoting identification of individual wills with itself, whenever the
individual dissociates himself from collective in order to seek only his
own interests, we see the same result and phenomenon, and suicide
rates go
up. Man is the more vulnerable to self-destruction the more he is detached
from any collectivity, that is to say, the more self-centred his life.
Suicide is about three times more frequent among bachelors than among
married people, twice as frequent in childless homes as in those with
children. It seems, as a matter of fact, inversely related to the number of
children.
Durkheim1925a p. 72
... during periods when society is disorganised and...has less power to
exact the commitment of individual wills, and when, consequently, egoism
has freer reign - these are calamitous times....
... just as morality limits and constrains us, in response to the
requirements of our nature, so in requiring our commitment and
subordination to the group does it compel us to realise ourselves...
Society is the producer and repository of all the riches of civilization,
without which man would fall to the level of animals. We must, then, be
receptive to its influence, rather than turning back jealously upon
ourselves to protect our autonomy.
Durkheim1925a p. 73
Someone who does not live exclusively of, and for himself, who offers and
gives himself, who merges with the environing world and allows it to
permeates his life- such a person certainly lives a richer and more
vigorous life than the solitary egoist who bottles himself up and alienates
himself from man and things.
Society, therefore, goes beyond the individual; it has its own nature
distinct from that of the individual; consequently it fulfils the first
necessary condition for serving as the object of moral behaviour. But, on
the other hand, it rejoins the individual. There is no gulf between it and
him. It thrusts into us strong and deep roots. The best part of us is only
an emanation of the collectivity. This explains how we can commit ourselves
to it and even prefer it to ourselves.
Up to this point we have talked of society only in a general way, as if it
there were only one. As a matter of fact, man always lives in the midst of
many groups. To mention only the more important, there is the family in
which one is born,
(p.74) the nation or political group, and
humanity. ought one to commit oneself to one of these groups to the
exclusion of others? This is out of he question....
Family, nation and humanity represent different phases of our social and
moral evolution, stages that prepare for, and build upon, one another.
Durkheim1925a p. 85
... the function of morality is to link the individual to one or several
social groups... morality presupposes this very attachment. So it is that
morality is made for society.
Durkheim1925a p.88
If society itself has instituted the rules of morality, it must also be
society that has invested them with their authority, which we seek to
explain.
What is it, in fact, that we label authority? Without pretending to settle
a problem as complex as this in a few words, we can nonetheless suggest the
following definition: authority is a quality with which a being, either
actual or imaginary, is invested through his relationship with given
individuals, and it is because of this alone that he is thought by the
latter to be endowed with powers superior to those they find in themselves.
It is of no importance, as a matter of fact, whether these powers are real
or imaginary. It is enough that they exist as real in peoples' minds. The
sorcerer is an authority for those who believe in him. This is why
authority is called moral: it is because it exists in minds, not in things.
Having stated the definition, it is easy to demonstrate that the being that
best fulfills the necessary conditions as constituting an authority is the
collective being. For it follows from all that we have said that society
infinitely surpasses the individual, not only in material scope, but beyond
that, in moral power. Not only does it command incomparably greater power,
since it derives from the mutual re-enforcement of all the individual
forces, but in it is found the source of that intellectual and moral life
to which we turn to nourish our thought and our morality. For the
fashioning of a newly born generation implies the assimilation, little by
little, of the cultural milieu; it is only gradually as the animal—as we
are born—incorporates the elements of his culture that the human being
emerges. For it is society that is the repository of all the wealth of
civilization; it is society that accumulates and preserves these treasures
transmitting them from age to
[Durkheim1925a
page 89]
age; it is through society that these riches reach us. Thus it is that we
are obligated to society, since it is from society that we receive these
things.
One can understand, therefore, how a powerful morality, of which our
conscience is merely a partial embodiment, must be invested with such
authority. Even that element of mystery that seems inherent in all
conceptions of authority is not lacking in the feeling we have for
society. As a matter of fact, it is natural that any being having
superhuman powers should baffle man's intelligence. This is why authority
achieves its maximum impact above all in some religious form.
Durkheim1925a p.91
... authority does not reside in some external, objective fact, which
logically implies and necessarily produces morality. It consists entirely
in the conception that men have of such a fact; it is a matter of opinion
and opinion is a collective thing. It is the judgement of the group.
Furthermore, it is easy to understand why all moral authority must be
social in origin. Authority is that quality in a man who is lifted up above
other men; he is a superman. But the more intelligent man, or the stronger,
or the one who is more righteous is still a man; it is only a matter of
degree that differentiates him from his fellows. Only society is beyond the
individual. It is therefore from society that all authority emanates.
Durkheim1925a p.146
To act morally is to conform to the rules of morality. Niw the moral law is
outside the consciousness of the child;... he begins to have contact with
it only after a given point in his life...
All that he has at birth are some very general dispositions, which are
crystallised in one way or another according to how the educator exerts his
influence, that is, according to the manner in which this potential is put
to work.
... this putting to work can and must begin in the family and from the
cradle...
... the parents have at their disposal the means of develping in the
child... something like a first feeling for moral authority.
This we may suppose that when the child enters school he is not in the
state of moral neutrality that characterised him at birth...
[However]
Durkheim1925a p.147
The family, especially today, is a very small group of persons who know
each other intimately and who are constantly in contact with one another.
As a result, their relationships are not subject to any general,
impersonal, immutable regulation...
By virtue of its natural warmth, the family setting is especially likely to
give birth to the first altruistic inclinations, the first feelings of
solidarity; but the morality practised in this setting is above all a
matter of emotion and sentiment. The abstract idea of duty is less
important here than sympathy, than the spontaneous impulses of the heart.
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