Pandemic
Now that
the coronavirus rules the world, what can philosophy do for us? In recent blogs
I have tried to give a few tools that help us answer difficult questions. But I
think that some people expect something different. Isn’t is so that one of the
main purposes of philosophy is to give us meaning, practical help if not
consolation in difficult situations? Although you can see from my blogs that I
don’t think that this is the main purpose of philosophy, I do think that it can
be a purpose of philosophy. Therefore, in these days that life often seems
to stand still (and then again to run), in these days that we need interpretation
of what is happening, I have written down a few points of what philosophy has to
say. Since I always need a handle to write my blogs, I have let myself be
inspired by Alain de Botton’s The consolations of philosophy.
1) Our
world has become restricted. Some of us even are not allowed to leave their
homes any longer or they can only for very special reasons. Many things we were
used to do and maybe loved to do, we cannot do any longer. On the other hand,
now we must do, can do or choose to do things we would never do in normal circumstances;
things we may have neglected too much in the past, like giving more attention
to our family, reading a good book, being creative etc. In other words, your
rat race has suddenly come to a halt. Now you can ask yourself: What is important
for me? Is my job really so important, or is my family? Do I really need to go
out so often? Do I need my friends, or which friends do I need? Is it really so
annoying that I cannot get on holiday? Etc.
2) A lesson
we should learn from Socrates’s life is, so de Botton, that we must be careful not
to listen too much to “the dictates of public opinion”, but instead we must “listen
always to the dictates of reason”. (p. 42) Many strange stories go around about
the origin and spread of the virus and many people deny the most reasonable
explanation, namely that the virus has a natural origin. Some even belief that
the virus is spread by G5 antennas! But ways of reasoning that are incredible in
the coronacrisis, are often accepted and believed in normal times when they are
used by some politicians on other subjects. So, here the lesson is: be critical
(more in my blog dated 9 March 2020).
3) Happiness
is the highest good in life, so Aristotle, Epicurus and other classical
philosophers. However, what makes us happy? For Epicurus happiness is the same
as pleasure. Now that you must stay at home, you have time to think. You live
now in a life experiment: Before and after the (semi-)lockdown. Compare what
you like and don’t like in both situations and adapt your life to your
conclusions. Following Epicurus, so de Botton, “the only way to evaluate their
merits is according to the pleasure they inspire … [the feeling of pleasure] is
our standard for judging every good. And because an increase in the wealth of societies
seems not to guarantee an increase in pleasure, Epicurus would have suggested
that the needs which expensive goods cater to cannot be those on which our
happiness depends.” (p. 70) I wouldn’t identify happiness and pleasure but judge
yourself.
4) Things often
happen to us, and we cannot prevent that they happen. So it is with the coronacrisis.
As long as no reliable medicine and no vaccine will have been developed, the
only thing we can do is adapt ourselves and make the best of it. That’s also
what Seneca would have told us. Accept the facts, even if it is death, he taught
us. So when the Roman emperor Nero ordered him to commit suicide, he did it with
stoical calm, and slit his veins without protest. As he once had written: “In
certain places we may meet with wild beasts or with men who are more
destructive than any beasts … And we cannot change this order of things … it is
to this law [of Nature] that our souls must adjust themselves, this they should
follow, this they should obey” (p. 111). Do what is possible and don’t try what
is not possible.
5) The
French president Macron compared the coronacrisis with a war. Seen that way, it’s
cynical that this crisis seems to subdue real wars, for instance in the Middle
East. Also the number of crimes in corona infected regions has decreased much. Therefore,
one of the main philosophical lessons we can learn from the coronacrisis is
what de Botton writes in the last sentence of his book (p. 244): “Not
everything which makes us feel better is good fur us. Not everything which
hurts is bad.” Was pre-coronacrisis life really good for us, even if we felt well
then? Is the coronacrisis only bad for us? Anyway, the good thing is that the
crisis makes us think about life and existence.
But let me stop
here. Too much of what I have written so far is derived from what others have
said. As Montaigne told us: “There are more books on books than on any other
subject: all we do is gloss each other. All is swarm with commentaries: of
authors there is dearth.” (Essays, Book III-13). So go to the authors
and read them and find then consolation in philosophy.
Inspiration
Alain de Botton, The consolations of philosophy.
London: Penguin Books, 2001.
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