Abstract
It is a common pessimistic worry among both philosophers and non-philosophers that our lives, viewed sub specie aeternitatis, are meaningless given that they make neither a noticeable nor lasting impact from this vast, cosmic perspective. The preferred solution for escaping this kind of pessimism is to adopt a different measure by which to evaluate life’s meaningfulness. One of two primary routes is often taken here. First, one can retreat back to the sub specie humanitatis perspective, and argue that life is meaningful only when viewed within the local context of human values, cares, and concerns. Or, second, one can distinguish between perspectives and standards for meaningfulness, arguing that the latter are independent of the former and are the most appropriate means by which evaluations of life’s meaningfulness are made. Importantly, none of these issues can be sufficiently addressed without first answering a prior question, and one that is surprisingly under-addressed in the literature: What is the sub specie aeternitatis perspective? Unfortunately, many philosophers who employ this perspective do so without carefully defining or clarifying it, or, if they do clarify what it means, they only note its time and spatial components. I will argue that, in addition to these components, this perspective includes something like a modal component (following Thomas Nagel), and an ontological Normative component. I will then apply this more nuanced understanding of the sub specie aeternitatis perspective to the question of whether perspectives can be distinguished from standards for meaningfulness.
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Notes
Nicholas Rescher notes that it is primarily those with a naturalist orientation (or those who provisionally adopt a naturalist ontology) who encounter pessimistic worries when viewing life SSA or, in his words, from the “vast cosmic scheme of things” or “the grand scheme of things” (Rescher 1990, p. 153). I will return to Rescher’s use of these two locutions (cosmic scheme of things and grand scheme of things) in §II of this paper in defending my claim that SSA includes an ontological component.
It is worth noting here, however, two exceptions. First, Thomas Nagel notes that even God and his providential economy can be viewed SSA (Nagel 1971). If this is the case, then the same worry which is normally applied to human workings can then be applied to God’s workings. I will not enter the debate here about whether a similar kind of argument, appealing to SSA, can be made against God and his activities. For what it is worth, I am inclined to think that it cannot given the classical theistic idea of God existing necessarily. Second, someone who believes in God, but believes God has forsaken her may conclude that one’s life is meaningless from a theistic SSA perspective.
By naturalism, I mean metaphysical naturalism, not methodological naturalism or naturalized epistemology. I am here concerned with naturalism as an ontological thesis about what is real.
I will use the phrase “meaningfulness of life” in this paper and not “meaning of life.” The two phrases have different connotations, and using them interchangeably obscures discussion over an issue that is already obscure enough. The first is overtly normative, whereas the second is not. Furthermore, the first is individualist in orientation, whereas the second is holistic or global. For a more detailed analysis of the difference between the two phrases, see the General Introduction of my edited volume Exploring the Meaning of Life: An Anthology and Guide (Seachris 2012). I will leave “meaningfulness” and “meaninglessness” largely undefined in this paper. Roughly, they likely come in degrees and possess, among others, connotations of mattering, significance, value, being worthwhile, and being held in high esteem among others (and the opposites in the case of meaninglessness).
Not all of the philosophers that I quote actually use the term sub specie aeternitatis; however, it is clear that whether they use the term or not, they are all talking about roughly the same kind of perspective.
An analogy here would be a human observer taking notice of an ant colony. From the human’s wider standpoint nothing the ants do really seems to matter, have significance, or impact the human observer’s world in very noticeable, lasting ways (unless of course they invade your kitchen!), if at all. But perhaps that should not matter for the ants. Might it be the case that what is most important for appraising the meaningfulness of the ants and their lives is how things appear from the ant-inside as it were? If one draws the context no wider than the horizon of their own unique set of “values” and “concerns,” then their lives can be deemed meaningful, so the argument goes. The same can be the case for human lives, insofar as we are like ants to some hypothetical cosmic observer with all of space and time in view.
I say “possibly” because those who think adopting the SSH is necessary for a meaningful life do not ipso facto think that it is sufficient.
For a more detailed analysis of why humans are so concerned with endings, especially as the concept of ending relates to death, futility, and pessimism vis-à-vis life’s meaningfulness, see my “Death, Futility, and the Proleptic Power of Narrative Ending” (Seachris 2011).
That Nagel’s worry can be read in terms of the universe not caring is evidenced in the following remark, “I certainly wouldn’t have been missed!” (Nagel 1986, p. 213).
Unless, for example, one follows Leibniz whereby there are no contingent, synthetic truths, but only necessary, analytic truths.
I borrow these terms from Mario De Caro and David Macarthur, Naturalism in Question (De Caro and Macarthur 2008, pp. 7, 11).
This is reminiscent of George Mavrodes’s term, “Russellian world.” Such a world is one where: (a) phenomena such as minds, mental activities, consciousness, and the like are products of entities and causes that give no indication of being mental themselves, (b) mental phenomena—and life itself—are comparative latecomers in earth history, (c) human life is bound by physical death, with each individual permanently ceasing to exist upon her physical death, and (d) the human race as a whole is doomed to extinction as the universe approaches its own “death” (Mavrodes 1986, pp. 215–216).
Use of the word scheme may be telling here, as it probably has temporal, spatial, and conceptual/hierarchical dimensions.
Notice that we do not say, “Well, given the real standards for evaluation, what happened is not that important.” Rather, we say, “Well, in the grand scheme of things, what happened is not that important.” That we use the phrase grand scheme of things, and that we are very likely not referring to something only temporal and/or spatial, is instructive. Ironically, the June 21, 2012, ESPN story on professional golfer Webb Simpson deciding to skip the British Open is quite relevant here. When asked about his decision to skip the 2012 Open Championship at Royal Lytham in light of the impending birth of his second child, he responded by saying, “After winning [the U.S. Open], it’s certainly a little bit harder to not go . . . But in the grand scheme of life, it’s a decision I know I’ll always be happy I made” [emphasis added]. (http://espn.go.com/golf/britishopen12/story/_/id/8080061/webb-simpson-miss-2012-british-open). It is very doubtful that Simpson is taking temporal and spatial considerations as being important here. Rather, he is likely highlighting, though probably not consciously aware of it, something about the web of normativity embodied in the grand scheme of life by which to evaluate his decision to skip the British Open.
This leads to an interesting tension, but one that is instructive. GST, in the meaningfulness of life context, can be used to generate pessimistic worries, whereas in the context in which I considered it, we employ it to make ourselves feel better. Here is a possible reason for this evaluative asymmetry. The ontologicalNormative component (combined with the modal component in meaningfulness of life contexts) is central to both GST and SSA, but in the meaningfulness of life context it is the naturalistic species of GST that generates pessimism, because one worries that (a) there is no deep reason for why we exist (modal component), and (b) there exists no objective, mind-independent matrix of normativity by which to ground human values, cares, and concerns (ontologicalNormative component). One can also imagine cases where a person adopts pessimism vis-à-vis life’s meaningfulness via GST, but is an optimist about a given unfortunate event in life via GST (i.e. this event is not that big a deal because life itself is not that big of a deal).
I remind the reader that I use the sub specie aeternintatis (SSA) perspective in this paper as shorthand for naturalistic SSA, given that pessimistic conclusions, most often, are reached in considering a naturalistic version of SSA. Cf. footnote 2.
A qualification is in order here. Given that a doctrine of post-mortem survival often accompanies theism, it is somewhat misleading to say that human life is temporally fleeting on theistic versions of SSA. However, if natural human life is in view, then even on a theistic SSA, human life is temporally fleeting.
Cf. footnote 3.
Some may grant me that this is a prima facie worry that threatens securing a meaningful life (even if they conclude that it is not a legitimate worry), but then argue that viewing human life from the vantage point of what is ultimately real at the most fundamental ontological level is not part of the SSA perspective. I think the reasons I give in this section sufficiently demonstrate that something in the neighborhood of the ontologicalNormative component is an aspect of the SSA perspective.
I take Russell to here be advocating semantic, epistemological, and ontological interpretations of metaphysical naturalism.
I concede that Russell could be interpreted as highlighting the modal component of SSA and not the ontologicalNormative component. That is to say, it could be argued that he is concerned with purposes and intentions, and not a system of normativity for which a completed ontology either does or does not make room. I thank an anonymous referee for this important point.
A similar point has already been made by Ronald Dworkin. Here he compares two metrics by which the good life can be measured: (1) the model of impact and (2) the model of challenge. He notes that for those who use something like a model of impact as a metric, the good life (or a meaningful life in the context of this paper) requires a person to make a positive impact on the objective value in the world. Dworkin argues, however, that this metric fails to include other features of the good life, for example, mastering a musical instrument simply for the sake of the activity done well. The lesson here is that a plausible metric for measuring the good life (or a standard for meaningfulness) need not require making an impact on the universe. For a more detailed analysis, see his Sovereign Virtue (Dworkin 2001, pp. 245–254).
Landau does largely ignore this very issue. He states, “I will largely ignore other issues that arise in this context, such as whether it is possible to disregard the external perspective (as Rescher, Blackburn and Camus believe we can do, but Nagel denies), whether the two perspectives could be completely reconciled (as Nagel, again, denies), or what the authors mentioned above precisely mean in notions such as ‘sub specie aeternitatis’ or ‘a witness with the whole of space and time in its view’ [emphasis added]. (Landau 2011, pp. 728–29). The locution, “distinguish sharply” is Landau’s (2011, p. 729).
Of course, if the ontologicalNormative component is central, then the prospects of Landau’s argument working are even worse.
Landau’s sharp separation of perspectives and standards for meaningfulness leads to an interesting consequence. If he is correct that perspective can be sharply distinguished from standards for meaningfulness, then this seems to call into question an entire class of normative evaluations that we make on a regular basis. Often, when we are faced with pain, hardship, or adverse circumstances in life, we remind ourselves or are reminded by well-meaning others that in the grand scheme of things or in the big picture what is happening is not as significant as it seems to be at the present moment. We tell ourselves and we are told by others to “put things in perspective.” This is an entrenched way of responding to certain circumstances in life where we take the perspective one adopts to have some sort of normative significance for evaluating those circumstances. The interesting point here, and one that I will not discuss in further detail in this paper, is that it seems like Landau is faced with two options. Either he can concede that his claim about being able to sharply distinguish between perspective and standards for meaningfulness is weakened, or we should be suspicious of the reasonableness of this deeply entrenched way of responding to certain life circumstances. It seems as though we cannot have it both ways at once. For more on GST (the grand scheme of things perspective) and its connection with SSA, see §II of this paper.
Cf. footnote 27.
See, for example, (Frankfurt 1988).
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Acknowledgments
I thank the anonymous reviewers for their incisive criticism and suggestions. I also thank Christian Miller for carefully reading and commenting on the first draft of this paper.
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Seachris, J.W. The Sub Specie Aeternitatis Perspective and Normative Evaluations of Life’s Meaningfulness: A Closer Look. Ethic Theory Moral Prac 16, 605–620 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10677-012-9379-y
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10677-012-9379-y