Philosophy 101 Unit 1

The Virtue of Thought, Techne, refers to craft knowledge.  Aristotle states, “Every craft is concerned with coming to be; and the exercise of the craft is the study of how something that admits of being and not being comes to be, something whose origin is in the producer and not in the product.”  I don’t feel that the production of craft and art are on the same level.  An artist and craftsman have very different intentions for their work.  Making art is an act through which an artist can channel his or her emotions.  Craftsmanship is concerned with producing devices that are of use to society.  A craftsman can be artistic in producing his craft, but the intention is not to produce art.  A chair is a “means to an end”, but a work of art is not just that.  A work of art is not a “means to an end”, but rather a beginning to your own interpretation and realization.  There is nothing that can be taken from a chair more than acknowledging it as a device for resting.  Art can permanently capture what the artist was feeling when the work was created.  Art is a source of the kind of inspiration that cannot be expressed otherwise. 

Music is one of the most sacred things to me.  I have been a musician for a majority of my life.  Playing and listening to music has become my emotional outlet.  John Coltrane once said, “To be a musician is really something. It goes very, very deep. My music is the spiritual expression of what I am - my faith, my knowledge, my being…When you begin to see the possibilities of music, you desire to do something really good for people, to help humanity free itself from its hang-ups.  I think music can make the world better and, if I’m qualified, I want to do it. I’d like to point out to people the divine in a musical language that transcends words. I want to speak to their souls.”  John Coltrane devoted his entire life to the pursuit of performing improvisational music.  His music followed a logical progression starting with playing early bebop.  By the end of his short life he was playing music that had no boundaries.  His records, “Meditations” and “First Meditations” contained tracks such as “Love”, “Joy”, and “Serenity”.  Coltrane freely expressed himself on these records.  You can feel all that Coltrane has felt by listening to his music. 

It is easy for someone to listen to a serious musician such as John Coltrane and claim that it is “hard” to listen to him.  Coltrane’s intention was not for quick and easy satisfaction for the listener.  He played what he felt and was not worried about what was going to please the public.  It takes time and patience to be able to soak in what he has to say.  A lot of great music is similar to this, and is therefore overlooked.  A vast majority of our society’s popular music has very little to no artistic integrity.  This is NOT just a mere opinion.  This music’s intention is for commercial success rather than to showcase musical integrity.  I define musical integrity by mastering a craft to the point that free emotional expression can be achieved.  Some may say that Fall Out Boy has mastered their craft and plays what they hear and feel.  My response would be that they must have a shallow meaning of what is beautiful in the world.

Essentially my aim is to examine which of Aristotle’s virtues of (human) thought can be applied to animals (maybe we’re not such a unique species after all?).  I seek also to raise debate in the comments to questions like:

• To what extent can an animal think?
• To what extent are an animal’s actions instinct?  choice?  emotionally influenced?
• Is the animal making a thoughtful choice, or is he genetically predispositioned to respond in this way?

1.) Scientific Knowledge (Episteme): Unfortunately this is the one I probably have the least to say about. Of course animals don’t write down formulas and write textbooks.  The one example I have is a dog’s apparently instinctual sense of the most efficient path to take (a human would have to do calculus to find it).  I have no evidence either way, however.  Check out the article here.

2.) Craft Knowledge (Techne): This is the one absolute stance I am willing to take: that animals can and do use craft knowledge. Unfortunately the more scientific footage I wanted to post here is not available online, so this will have to suffice (please ignore obnoxious commentary).  In all cases, these animals manipulate and use tools (tool being defined as something that does no good in itself, it’s simply a means to an end).  In all cases, the animal has a goal which he uses the tool to accomplish.  The dog moves (manipulates) the chair to reach his goal of eating the food off the counter.  The bird COULD eat that bread as an end itself, but uses it to fish, gaining a bigger reward — not even all humans can delay gratification that long (tangent article here if you’re interested).  The badger manipulates objects in his enclosure to create a simple machine (ramp) and escape.

3.) Intelligence (Phronesis): While animals certainly do not have intelligence to the extent that humans do, animals are capable of problem solving.  Aristotle would say intelligence is “a state grasping the truth, involving reason” and also “concerned with action about what is good” (pg 14 course packet).  Here is an example of elephants who have grasped the truth about a simple situation (truth: the baby elephant is drowning).  They attempt to save the baby, which is an action concerned with what they feel is “good” (not letting it die).  They also use reason: the first attempts to just pull do not work, so one gets in to push while the other pulls (skip ahead in the video.. it’s long!).  Once they discover that this won’t work either, they move the baby through the water to a less steep incline, which they can maneuver the baby out of more easily.  Perhaps the elephants do not “know” that it’s not working because the incline is too steep, I can’t prove otherwise; nevertheless they find an shallower incline that does work. Based on Aristotle’s definitions, I feel that this problem solving is a facet of intelligence.

4.) Understanding (Nous): It is incredibly difficult to find a video to demonstrate this, because “either you have understanding or you don’t” to quote from class.  This one’s open for debate.  Do you think animals have an understanding of their actions?  Can you argue that they are simply mimicking learned behaviors?

One example I would like to bring up for debate is chimpanzee wars over territory, as documented by Jane Goodall (the same scientist that first documented chimps using tools). Goodall commented in her bibliography about the family groups in the Gombe region of her research: “I didn’t see aggression to start with. There’s no question that chimpanzees become more aggressive as a result of crowding, as a result of competition for food.” (J. Goodall).  The motivation for the battles was clear, and the group efforts involved (again, animals using team work) makes this phenomenon more than just a fight.  Do you think chimp groups have the same understanding of attacking, displacing, killing and the consequences?  Might they feel the same emotions?  (More here)

5.) Wisdom (Sophia): Check out Lihy’s view on this in her post!  I’ll comment there with my thoughts as well.

I hope one of my many links interests you.  I’d appreciate it if you even just watched/read one and gave me your thoughts.  Let’s get some good debate going!