Blaise Pascal On The Contradictory Nature of Human Beings

What follows is a short analysis of fragments 164, 19, 142, and 80 from Blaise Pascal's philosophical work Pensées.

 “What a chimera is man! What a novelty, what chaos, what a subject  of contradiction.”- Blaise Pascal, Pensées (1657-58)  

Beginnings: Fragment 164 of Pascal's Pensées

Blaise Pascal (1623-1662)

Let us begin with fragment 164 of the Pensées where Pascals likens human beings to a freakish chimera, an amalgam of different natures: a monster with the combination of lion's head, goat's body, and a serpent's tail (p. 41). Pascal's thesis is the human condition is contradictory in nature. Subjectivity emerges out of conflict. Knowledge emerges out of paradox. A "cesspool of uncertainty" and "storehouse of truth," the modern subject is a novelty and a monster, the "glory and reject of the universe" (p. 41). "Man is beyond man," Pascal writes (p. 42). In his ability to see himself as mere man, as finite, contingent, yet uniquely novel and independent, man is able to transcend himself through self-awareness. But, as we will see, despite the human capacity to reflect on our own condition we become distracted by the banal and mundane and are bored easily. We often prefer distraction to thinking but we realize that through thinking we are little more than the animals but less than the gods. What makes us who we are as humans is an oscillation back and forth between our greatness and our wretchedness, our distractibility and our insightfulness; in effect, we are a mixture of sense, natural reason, and the ways of the heart.

Pascal and Montaigne

The truth of man's condition is not revealed solely by natural reason nor is it based on dogmatic assertions. Similar to Montaigne, Pascal argues truth is "neither within our grasp nor is it our target" (p. 42). Truth lies in the lap of God. For Pascal to be a skeptic is to deny incarnate nature. To be a dogmatist is to "repudiate reason." For Pascal, the answer lies somewhere in between these two, between nature and reason.

     The incarnation is a key theological point for Pascal (barely mentioned by Montaigne). Jesus is an ideal concept for Pascal, both fully human and fully divine, "begotten not made," "one in being with the Father." Christ is the new man - a manifestation of man as he would have been in his preternatural state. Because of original sin, ordinary man has lost his divinity except for a fragmentary shard which still remains. Unlike Christ, who revealed himself as God through his divine humanity, Man is a shard of a lost divinity; his greatness lies in his lack, his wretchedness. Pascal’s uncanny psychological insight gleaned from a traditional Catholic Christology becomes a radical statement on the human condition. Man's greatness lies in his capacity to recognize his wretchedness. Unlike a tree man is endowed with a capacity to both recognize his futility and simultaneously derive greatness from it. When Pascal writes, "Within this gnarled chasm lie the twists and turns of our condition," he is acknowledging man's in-betweenness (p. 43). Our animality is mechanistic and made redeemable through the operation of grace, a concept Pascal employs to explain how man is able to understand God at all. Grace makes man "as if on the level of God, participating in his divinity." Without grace we would be "deemed equivalent of brute beasts" (p. 43).

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I used to write this post.

Man Doesn't Know What Level to Put Himself

In fragment 19 Pascal says man's quandary is that he does not know what level to put himself (p. 8). Resonating with later existential themes concomitant with Kierkegaard or early existential writing, Pascal paints a modern picture of man lost and unable to find himself. Pascal modifies Augustine's thought that man is restless until he rests in God by stating man is restless and looks for God in “impenetrable darkness” (p. 8). We are neither Protagoras's ideal of "man is the measure of all things" nor are we the scum of the earth, either. We are thinking scum. What makes human beings great is the capacity to acknowledge our fallible, fallen nature. Pascal writes, evoking the Psalmist: we are a "thinking reed". Our wretchedness is a "felix culpa" (happy fault).

Pascal writes, "...without this most incomprehensible of all mysteries we are incomprehensible to ourselves" (p. 43). The oracle of Delphi with its inscription "know thyself" is too naive for Pascal nor is the promise of idle distraction the answer either. Reason cannot untangle the mystery of our wretched human condition, Pascal contends, but through "simple submission" can "we truly know ourselves" (p. 43). Humility is crucial for knowledge. Humility is counter to the claim of an all-encompassing logos that can know everything. Pascal equates total submission to logos as hubris. Access to knowledge does not depend on mental acuity or even keen understanding, but possession of a "humble heart and [those] who embrace lowliness" (p. 7).

Our Entire Knowledge is Not Made Uncertain

Pascal argues in fragment 142 that reason is not enough. Just because reason reveals the fallible nature of the mind, Pascal insists that "our entire knowledge is not made uncertain." Pascal is not a skeptic in the negative sense. He does not distrust reason outright. It is rather that he sees reason as part of the larger story of what constitutes thinking. The ancient skeptics taught we cannot know reality. Montaigne's skepticism is suspicion of scholasticism while Pascal is a skeptic of univocal reason. Reason, Pascal claims does not have to reveal knowledge of first principles: time, space, numbers, etc. We know first principles through the heart (p. 35). The "reasons of the heart" ground knowledge. Pascal's concern is faith in empirical reason. A plank wide enough to hold a philosopher yet suspended over a precipice will be unable to quell panic and -- "his imagination will prevail" -- and he will go pale and start sweating (p. 17). Even with the certainty of clear and distinct reason, we become powerless when our imagination takes over. 

Everyone Should Study their Thoughts

In fragment 80 Pascal writes that "Everyone should study their thoughts," but he leaves the impression, apparent in the immediacy and the urgency of his prose style, that humanity has not taken thinking seriously. Our reading for today ends with disappointment in humanity: "How hollow and full of filth man's heart is" (p. 49). Pascal is keen to see how diversion and distraction intertwine and disrupt a path to knowledge (see fragments 170, 171, and in other places).

Diversion is a promise of happiness man makes for himself. Man knows he is not a God. He knows he is mortal. In spite of this, man still wants to be happy; so he entertains himself. Man cannot stop himself from wanting to be happy even though he knows he is wretched so he chooses to not think about it: "Not having been able to conquer death, wretchedness, or ignorance, men have decided to stop himself from thinking about it" (p. 44). We are equally incapable of either absolute happiness or total access to truth. Pascal's diagnosis is man lives in despair. Pining for happiness, man searches for it through distraction and diversion. Yet he remains hollow and empty. The task of giving up diversion is likened to a king who has many courtiers filling up his empty moments. A king left alone would think. If we removed duty, preoccupation, diversion, distraction, and work from man he would "then see and think" about himself, removed from superfluous duty man would think about what he is, where he comes from, and where he is going" (p. 49).

References

Pascal, Blaise, Honor Levi, and Blaise Pascal. Pensées and Other Writings. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008. Print.

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Turning the Page to Proust

Journal & Rant: Eating Dinner at the Lan Café

One night in the East Village for dinner I ate at the Lan Café with some friends.

Eating Dinner at Lan Café
The sanguine salute Sham gives is accompanied tonight with a warm cup of tea and a smile. To fancy a cup of tea is a prelude to friendship. An exchange executed with grace and humble style; cooped together in his tiny East Village apartment, Steve and I, along with Srngara, his wife, and Nitai, their son, quibble about theater, Krishna, and whether the Lan Café is the best vegetarian restaurant in Manhattan. Or anywhere. Steve says drinking their freshly squeezed carrot juice is like drinking a garden.

Stones of Erasmus does not purport to be a food column. So I do not claim an argument for culinary taste on these pages. But I feel compelled to write about the Lan Café.

The waiter greeted us with pleasant monosyllables. "Good," "Everything," "Yes?" "No." Then a few choice two worders. "Of course," "You like?" "Heh heh."

The "heh heh" was for Steve who said the food tasted like kissing Woodrow Wilson's wet lips. That was meant as a compliment.

Vegetarian Dishes are Palatable (Yum-Yum)
I should say, along the lines of a food critic, the Vegetarian Shrimp Papaya Salad is doubly sweet and spicy without a hint of overindulgence. It's made from pieces of vegetarian shrimp with a healthy dose of bean sprouts. The sauce makes the dish.

The kitchen staff prays a mantra over every cooked meal.

The dining room is intimate which encourages conversation with other guests. Two couples dined next to our boisterous table. Across from us a group of New York intelligentsia dined while chugging Brooklyn Lager.

When people popped in to check the place out, Steve would opine, "Come in. This place is the best restaurant in Manhattan." The lady next to me wondered if Steve was being paid for every promotional sentence he uttered.

And for Dessert? Something Carrot-y.
When Nitai tasted my carrot juice (like drinking a whole ripe carrot) his eyes widened and he danced a jig. A kid dancing a jig is enough for everyone in the place to stop what they're doing and stare. He told the captive audience (the other restaurant-goers) that the carrot juice was "soooooooo goooooood" but, he said, "it just needs some chocolate on top." I told him chocolate would spoil it. Nitai didn't seem to agree.

Who can argue with a six-year-old? A woman crooned, "Oh, he's so cute." I waited for her to say, "Can I take him home with me?" People do not talk like that.

We walked home with freshness in our bellies and guava candy in our mouths.

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Location: East Village, New York City

Teaching: On Whether It Matters If Students Care

Teachers do care about whether or not their students care.

I hear teachers say: "My students just don't care. They come to class late. They text in class. They just don't care."

While I certainly agree that some students chronically show up late, text, yawn, seem detached, and so on -- I don't think these facts alone demonstrate a lack of caring.

I teach at a community college in New York City. My students juggle family obligations, multiple jobs, and for some of them, court appearances and meetings with a probation officer. Most of them are looking for a second chance. In their late 20s to early 40s, they turn to community college to help them gain an "edge." It's a mixture of chance and hard work that will determine their success.

We live in a society that deems college is for the few. Community colleges want their cake and eat it too. Is it possible to offer everyone a college chance?

The problem is the concept of community college has been a conflation of "trade school" and "associate college." At one time in America, the two were distinct entities. One went to a trade school if you wanted a certificate in air conditioning repair or a plumbing license. The term is seldom used. The elevator I take every morning reveals a vestige of this past. Engraved on an inconspicuous plaque one can see the school I teach used to be a trade school. The moniker has now been mostly eradicated. We say "college" now but we remain ambiguous about what such a "college" should provide.

I teach Introduction to Philosophy. It's better suited to an associate or bachelor undergraduate program. But at my school, it's offered as an elective. The students in my classroom want to be police officers, medical assistants, pharmacist aids, or paralegals. The majority of them do not see the value of philosophy.

Does this mean they don't care?

A teacher who teaches College Algebra also complains her students don't care. "They come in late." I ask her if they see Math as important. "Nothing is important to them," she says.

I too am irked by the tardiness, the texting, the seeming lack of care. But is it lack of care or confusion about what a community college should be.

I'm not sure if you will ever need philosophy to be an effective medical assistant.

Nor will you need "system of equations" or "slope-intercept form" to be a successful police officer.

The confusion lies in what it means to be college-educated.

I'm not saying throw out Introduction to Philosophy or College Math from the community college curriculum.

But we should as teachers address the issue of "care" head-on.

I'm suspicious of teachers who claim students don't care. It's not a matter of students not caring, but more precisely it's a matter of students not knowing HOW to care.

If students don't seem to care then it suggests they were never instructed how to care.

How to teach students to care? Show you care.

Even this alone will win over a few.

The sad reality is that all our students care (this fact alone does not determine their success). They care very much (or they would have never enrolled in the first place). But care is not enough. Other things take hold of our students. Things we can't control.

So all we can do is hope. Hold fast to our expectations. Start class on time (even when only two students out of twenty are on time). Hope.

If we say, "our students don't care" then what we are saying is "I don't care either."

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Story of a Vocation: There and Back Again

A Story from My Fifteen Year Old Self
I was fifteen years old: naive, mischievous and lonely, awkward with my body, my voice ~ and my words - my very being. The gash of Mom and Dad's divorce was still raw; I felt ripped apart inside, hurt and distanced, unsure how to appease the increasing emptiness in the pit of my middle. I read novels in a walk-in-closet. Nicholas, my little brother, would peek in on me and wonder what the hell I was doing! When I wasn't absorbing the back of a cereal box or a Vonnegut, I used my bicycle to broaden my geographical horizons. I befriended a beloved librarian, a resilient French survivor of the guerre mondiale, a cassocked conservative priest and an existential liberal Jew. Those were my comrades. Even, very briefly, a traveling antique salesperson who voyaged in a Volkswagen van became my friend. In between visits with all my friends I took refuge in the church, hugging the venerable wood pew, using my spiritual imagination to conjure some image of a future. I would ask my reluctant mother to bring me to Sunday Eucharist - at first she thought it was a phase, like my recent attempts to collect every matchbox car ever made, then she became more hostile when I told her I wanted to be confirmed. Then I told my family I wanted to be a priest!

A Warm Christmas Fire Was Burning

Maybe it was in those bike rides to confirmation class, or in those angry

battles with my parents about my life, about our life, about freedom. Or with my

great friends, the realization that someone outside your clan can love and accept

you for who you are - you grow to love and accept them, that I realized in a

process (that is still continuing) churning away inside of me like a warm Christmas

fire was the hearth of calling.

Now I teach philosophy and write about art. Is this my new religion?

Learning About Folk's Faith Journey I am interested in people's journey of faith. Where did it lead you? Are you the same "faith" as you were when you were younger? Why or why not?

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Quote from Auntie Mame: "Life's a Banquet"

Rosalind Russel as Auntie Mame (1958)

Life is a banquet and most poor sons of bitches are starving to death. ~Auntie Mame 

What is so great about Auntie Mame's advice to her young nephew is not so much the hedonism that it espouses, but the grim observation that most of would not know pleasure even if it hit us smack dab in the face.

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The Calm Before the Storm is Lugubrious: So Says the Doleful Statue of Liberty

In this post, I write a "Journal & Rant" piece about superstorm Sandy — an Atlantic hurricane that hit the New York City region hard and caused massive amounts of damage to the city's infrastructure.

image source: nasa

A hurricane is a white circular atmospheric daub of cotton candy from the perspective of space. It looks as though the Northeast is about to get cotton swabbed. For us terrestrials, a hurricane is a force of nature that knows no equality or justice.

I cannot help but think of Irene in connection with all the other hurricanes I have known: kind of like bad relationships you sort of wished had never come into your life, but nevertheless, they sit there like a bad taste in your mouth.

All seems pleasant so far.
My Sunset Park apartment affords a view of New York's Upper Bay; I have a clear view of the Statue of Liberty. She looks slightly lugubrious in the dewey hours before a hurricane (or tropical storm, whichever forms she decides to take) hits the New York City region.

My roommates promptly filled every available empty gin bottle with water. I bought a token Infant of Prague votive candle to stave off the night in case of power loss.

I write this post in a sort of blasé anticipation. Come on Irene. I know: I could not resist.
Katrina in New Orleans: a sheer catastrophe. This one: who knows? Plenty of rain. Wind. Power outages. Normality will get a jolt to the left. Can we really afford a Katrina redux? Everyone knows New York City is certainly vulnerable to a head-on attack. We are crossing our fingers: denial is so much softer than reality.

The MTA shuts down public transit in the region at noon today: subway, bus, Metro North, and the Long Island Railroad. Mayor Bloomberg seems to be stalwart: hope for the best, prepare for the worst. His answer to a worst case scenario: people will die. Thanks for that reminder of mortality. Denial, remember!

People are uncharacteristically cheerful when awaiting a vengeful storm. A woman was skipping home yesterday in the breezy calm of pre-hurricane weather. Adults in Brooklyn do not usually skip. At the Safe-way the manager's mug creased an overly zealous grin as he watched the wads of cash unfold by people picking up loads of goods in the event of lockdown. Who isn't manic during an impending disaster?

We speak not of death but of anticipation. What will happen next? Are our lives so dull that a hurricane gets people talking about the end of the world as if they were talking about an upcoming birthday party?

What will I do?
I will do as I always do. Remain indecisive. Drink the last gin. Read Proust. I hope the Internet does not flicker out for long.

Last week an Earthquake: I barely felt it. This week: Irene (which means peace) rains (reigns).

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