They don’t make philosophers like they used to.
There are exceptions to the rule, of course. Donald Trump, for example. And Taylor Swift.
But in general, our public schools and universities no longer turn out people like Bertrand Russell.
In 1950, Dr. Russell was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature for “his varied and significant writings in which he champions humanitarian ideals and freedom of thought.” He also wrote a pretty good book explaining the Theory of Relativity, but I’m personally more interested in “freedom of thought” since it’s a necessary element of humor columns… which the Theory of Relativity is not.
On December 11, 1950, 78-year-old Dr. Russell stepped up to the podium in Stockholm, to summarize a lifetime of thinking philosophically about the human condition. Most of us probably haven’t spent more than a few minutes thinking about that topic, so we might want to consider Dr. Russell’s comments, in the interests of saving time.
He titled his speech, “What Desires Are Politically Important?”
Good question. To judge by the recent U.S. election, the most important desire, here in America, is to round up millions of Spanish-speaking immigrants and deport them to Mexico.
Of course, that wasn’t in the cards when Dr. Russell gave his Nobel speech in 1950. So he spoke in more general terms about the “four desires” that drive humans to do unpleasant things.
But man differs from other animals in one very important respect, and that is that he has some desires which are, so to speak, infinite, which can never be fully gratified, and which would keep him restless even in Paradise. The boa constrictor, when he has had an adequate meal, goes to sleep, and does not wake until he needs another meal. Human beings, for the most part, are not like this.
In reality, I often go to sleep after an adequate meal, and I bet many Daily Post readers do the same. But when we wake up, we still want to deport immigrants. So the desire for food is not what Dr. Russell wanted us to consider. It was a different set of desires.
He identified four infinite desires that can never be satisfied.
The desire to acquire (money, property, vintage baseball cards). The desire to fight (about politics, mostly, but also, about who should take out the trash). The desire for fame (even if it means being a big fish in a small pond).
And last but not least, the desire for power.
I confess to be especially susceptible to that last one. It’s a desire of mine that has never been satisfied.
And Dr. Russell also suspected “the desire for power” was the primary source of humanity’s inclination to engage in mass murder. Most of his speech in 1950 focused on war and its unfortunate effect on men, women and children.
His solution? Stop having wars.
So simple.
And so infinitely impossible?
Dr. Russell left us in 1970, at age 97. We can’t be sure where he went, when he left, because he was an atheist. But we have thus far failed, as a species, to produce his replacement.
I blame that failure on a lack of desire to produce philosophers.
In 1918, Dr. Russell spent six months in prison for publicly lecturing in opposition to British involvement in World War I. He later said of his imprisonment:
I found prison in many ways quite agreeable. I had no engagements, no difficult decisions to make, no fear of callers, no interruptions to my work. I read enormously; I wrote a book, “Introduction to Mathematical Philosophy”… and began the work for “The Analysis of Mind”. I was rather interested in my fellow-prisoners, who seemed to me in no way morally inferior to the rest of the population, though they were on the whole slightly below the usual level of intelligence as was shown by their having been caught.
But even philosophers can get caught.