Wednesday, September 17, 2008
Vices Cancelling Out Vices
One point that Taylor brings up but fails to fully flesh out is that both lust and gluttony seem to be a sort of savior from sloth. Taylor says that those having either vice could slip into sloth if they lost those traits, but I wonder if Taylor doesn’t emphasize enough the perhaps positive values of having even these vices over the vice of sloth. Is not having some constant source of pleasure, however fleeting, superior to having the little or no pleasure that someone with sloth has? Though Taylor’s example of sloth, Oblomov, occasionally finds pleasure in day dreams and illusions, Taylor sees these as completely empty and even argues that Oblomov probably experiences more pleasure than the average sloth. Indeed, someone fully given over to sloth would seem to have absolutely no pleasure at all, as they would be so lacking in willpower that they would never even attempt to experience anything. The life of the glutton, even one so given over to food that they quickly die of a heart attack, would seem to be superior to the life of the sloth. Even the life of the lustful has an advantage in purpose and pleasure over that of the sloth, however quickly that lusty person might end up in jail in modern society. So while lust and gluttony might be vices, it should be stated that they are also vices that cancel out at least one other, more harmful, vice, and so have some good qualities.
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2 comments:
While Chris makes an interesting observation about the possible salvation from sloth that lust and gluttony might provide, I doubt Taylor's omission of this possibility is accidental. The reason sloth is dangerous, from Taylor's perspective, is that having a slothful attitude, being a slothful person, interferes fundamentally with being a complete agent. There is something essential about sloth that corrupts the slothful person’s selfhood, and it is that corruption that makes sloth dangerous - it is not the lack of activity, but the lack of interest in activity, that identifies sloth. The reason, I think, that Taylor does not mention overmuch the salvation offered by lust or gluttony is that, in her view, they, too, pose an equal (though different) threat to the essential self. The glutton, of food or of any other target, is in some way incomplete, and by the fact of his gluttony must always be incomplete – the glutton requires his sustenance – food, drink, drugs, etc – to be complete, but (in Taylor’s view) every possible subjectively-determined “worthwhile life” must in some way include completeness of being. To replace the corruption of the self, by surrender of agency, with corruption of the self, by self-imposed incompleteness of self, is no salvation. Equally, the perspective of the lustful regarding their essential target – sexual contact with another – ensures that they can never be satisfied: the constant search for intimacy, because of its constancy, is necessarily impossible to complete, and thus again the self will be essentially incomplete.
At the end of the chapter, Taylor addresses the fact that sloth looms ever-present over the lustful and the slothful, should they realize the fundamental impossibility of their project, and thus they must, to keep themselves safe from sloth, self-deceive. Sloth prevents lust and gluttony as lust and gluttony prevent sloth, and I doubt Taylor thinks that replacing one with another is a good choice. If anything, because sloth essentially prevents engagement, it might be preferable, because then the one vice prohibits many, while lust and gluttony (as well as the rest we’ve discussed so far) all require passionate commitment to a self-destructive goal – and one vice may be preferable to many.
I agree that Taylor does not emphasize the better part of the vices and how they may cancel each other out. The book is directed at identifying why vices are bad, however she fails to point out how even a bad thing can bring about better consiquences. Should a person be slothful and then willingly decide to take on gluttony as another vice, that person could use that to escape their vice of sloth. while it could be argued that if a person did that they would not be guilty of sloth, or that a person cannot voluntarily take on a vice, i believe that it can. I find it virtuous to take a flaw in yourself and turn it into something good, ergo taking a flaw willingly to benefit yourself must also be good.
A person does not change overnight. if a person is trying to escape their sloth and they use gluttony, or even lust, to contradict that vice that overall they ahve benefited themselves. Then, once that person is free for that vice, can them deal with their self given vice of gluttony. While some may argue that this is a self deprecating process, if it works the person would be free from vice, at least sloth. I believe that if vice were used for overall benefit then those actions would be virtuous.
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