Mostrando entradas con la etiqueta Conciencia. Mostrar todas las entradas
Mostrando entradas con la etiqueta Conciencia. Mostrar todas las entradas

sábado, 6 de agosto de 2022

Selección natural del Espectador Imaginario

Examinamos las implicaciones evolucionistas de dos conceptos clave de Adam Smith, la mano invisible y elespectador imparcial, así como los elementos que tienen en común, y sus retroalimentaciones mutuas. Se pretende así entender mejor el origen de la idea de conciencia, de la idea de Dios, y de la idea de Selección Natural. O, puesto de otro modo, se trata de explicar el origen de Dios como resultado de la selección natural. También observaremos al pasar ciertas funciones de la religión en la vida social y en la psicología (occidental), así como las raíces profundas y consecuencias lejanas de la sociabilidad dramatística a la hora de entender la naturaleza humana y sus creaciones culturales.

Texto completo:

Selección natural del espectador imaginario

http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4142795

21 Pages Posted: 8 Jul 2022

Jose Angel Garcia Landa

Universidad de Zaragoza

Date Written: March 15, 2022



English abstract:

The Natural Selection of the Imaginary Spectator

This paper examines the evolutionary implications of two key concepts in Adam Smith, the Invisible Hand and the Impartial Spectator, as well as their common ground and mutual feedback. The aim is a better understanding of the origin of the idea of conscience, of the idea of God, and of the idea of natural selection. Or, put otherwise, an explanation of the origin of God as a result of natural selection. We will also note in passing some of the functions of religion in (Western) social life and psychology, as well as the deep roots and far-reaching consequences of dramatistic sociality in the the understanding of human nature and its cultural productions.

Note: Downloadable document is in Spanish.

Keywords: Adam Smith, Philosophy, Sociability, Dramatism, Conscience, Self, God, Religion, Natural selection, Cultural evolution, Intersubjectivity, Social interaction, Interactionism

Garcia Landa, Jose Angel, Selección natural del espectador imaginario (The Natural Selection of the Imaginary Spectator) (March 15, 2022). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=4142795 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4142795

 

 

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 También en:

_____. "Selección natural del Espectador Imaginario." In García Landa, Vanity Fea 15 March 2022.*

         https://vanityfea.blogspot.com/2022/03/seleccion-natural-del-espectador.html

         2022

_____. "Selección Natural del Espectador Imaginario." SSRN 8 July 2022.*

http://ssrn.com/abstract=4142795

         2022

         History of Western Philosophy eJournal 8 July 2022.*

         https://www.ssrn.com/link/History-of-Western-Philosophy.html

         2022

         Philosophy of Science eJournal 8 July 2022.*

         https://www.ssrn.com/link/Philosophy-Science.html

         2022

         Philosophy of Mind eJournal 8 July 2022.*

         https://www.ssrn.com/link/Philosophy-Mind.html

         2022

         Social & Political Philosophy eJournal 8 July 2022.*

         https://www.ssrn.com/link/Social-Political-Philosophy.html

         2022

         Philosophy of Religion eJournal 8 July 2022.*

         https://www.ssrn.com/link/Philosophy-Religion.html

         2022

         Climate & Environmental Psychology eJournal 8 July 2022.*

         https://www.ssrn.com/link/Climate-Environmental-Psychology.html

         2022

         Social & Personality Psychology eJournal 8 July 2022.*

         https://www.ssrn.com/link/Social-Personality-Psychology.html

         2022

_____. "Selección natural del espectador imaginario." In García Landa, Vanity Fea 6 Aug. 2022.*

https://vanityfea.blogspot.com/2022/08/seleccion-natural-del-espectador.html

         2022





martes, 12 de noviembre de 2019

A Speculative Hypothesis of the Origin of Conscience


The hypothesis on the origin of conscience is Adam Smith's in The Theory of Moral Sentiments. It is a genetic one, and to that extent at least, a contribution to evolutionary psychology. The following commentary is by D. D. Raphael in his commentary of that work, The Impartial Spectator: Adam Smith's Moral Philosophy (Oxford UP, 2007):

I turn now to Smith's distinctive development of the impartial spectator. In Chapter 6  I said that Smith's theory of moral judgement on one's own actions was too complicated to be acceptable; but I also said that the criticism arises from his account of approval and that his concept of the impartial spectator seems persuasive when taken with an unanalysed notion of approval. That persuasive element is what I see as his enduring contribution. It is a genetic theory of conscience, a speculative hypothesis on the origin of conscience.  Its essence lies in the social experience of being a spectator of the conduct of other persons and of knowing that others are spectators of one's own conduct. The experience leads us to imagine, not what others think of our deeds (we do not need imagination to learn of that), but what they would think if they had all the relevant information that each of us has from our own awareness of motive and intention. If they had that, they would be well-informed and impartial spectators—informed to a degree that they cannot be in fact, and impartial because they are not practically involved and so not liable to be swayed by self-interest, as the agent himself is. But if the agent is liable to be swayed by self-interest, how can he reach an impartian judgement? He can do so because the imagination can free itself from the ties of practical desires.
 Notice that there is an imaginative element involved here, an ability to imagine a hitherto non-existing perspective which combines other people's spectatorship with our own internal knowledge and self-assessment. Conscience involves an implicit, or rather structural and genetic, recognition of the difference between other perspectives and our own. It involves secrecy an dissimulation. The construction of  conscience is thus both a supplementation of others' uninformed perspectives, which are subordinated to our own privileged self-knowledge, and a correction (a sublation, in Hegelian terms) of our mere internal topsight, a blending of self-observation and self-judgement with social observation and (potential) judgment of our actions. 


What, then, endures from Adam smith's moral philosophy? It connects moral judgment with social relationship in a novel way, explaining its origin by reference to the reaction of spectators. The most interesting feature of the account is its application to conscience, judgement about one's own behaviour: it explains this as a complex reaction to the feelings of approval and disapproval by disinterested spectators. That gives conscience a social origin and a social function.

Raphael goes on to conclude his book arguing for a socio-psychological account of conscience rather than a merely logical analyis.  

This is surely appropriate, but I would like to put some additional emphasis on the dramatistic and interactional element in Smith's theory of conscience. And on the role of hypothetical reconstructions, and of the play of points of view, involving an imaginative and empathic projection into other minds (other social subjects and moral identities; i.e. the play of intersubjectivity).  These different perspectives are then integrated, with a reflexive turn, into a more comprehensive virtual theatre of social judgement, one which somewhat recalls Henry Fielding's description of social evaluation as a theatrical spectacle in Tom Jones (VII.i):

A Comparison between the World and the Stage

The world hath been often compared to the theatre; and many grave writers, as well as the poets, have considered human life as a great drama, resembling, in almost every particular, those scenical representations which Thespis is first reported to have invented, and which have been since received with so much approbation and delight in all polite countries.

In all these, however, and in every other similitude of life to the theatre, the resemblance hath been always taken from the stage only. None, as I remember, have at all considered the audience at this great drama.
But as Nature often exhibits some of her best performances to a very full house, so will the behaviour of her spectators no less admit the above-mentioned comparison than that of her actors. In this vast theatre of time are seated the friend and the critic; here are claps and shouts, hisses and groans; in short, everything which was ever seen or heard at the Theatre-Royal.

(...)
 
As for the boxes, they behaved with their accustomed politeness. Most of them were attending to something else. Some of those few who regarded the scene at all, declared he was a bad kind of man; while others refused to give their opinion, till they had heard that of the best judges.
Now we, who are admitted behind the scenes of this great theatre of Nature (and no author ought to write anything besides dictionaries and spelling-books who hath not this privilege), can censure the action, without conceiving any absolute detestation of the person, whom perhaps Nature may not have designed to act an ill part in all her dramas; for in this instance life most exactly resembles the stage, since it is often the same person who represents the villain and the heroe; and he who engages your admiration to-day will probably attract your contempt to-morrow. As Garrick, whom I regard in tragedy to be the greatest genius the world hath ever produced, sometimes condescends to play the fool; so did Scipio the Great, and Laelius the Wise, according to Horace, many years ago; nay, Cicero reports them to have been “incredibly childish.” These, it is true, played the fool, like my friend Garrick, in jest only; but several eminent characters have, in numberless instances of their lives, played the fool egregiously in earnest; so far as to render it a matter of some doubt whether their wisdom or folly was predominant; or whether they were better intitled to the applause or censure, the admiration or contempt, the love or hatred, of mankind.
Those persons, indeed, who have passed any time behind the scenes of this great theatre, and are thoroughly acquainted not only with the several disguises which are there put on, but also with the fantastic and capricious behaviour of the Passions, who are the managers and directors of this theatre (for as to Reason, the patentee, he is known to be a very idle fellow and seldom to exert himself), may most probably have learned to understand the famous nil admirari of Horace, or in the English phrase, to stare at nothing.
A single bad act no more constitutes a villain in life, than a single bad part on the stage. The passions, like the managers of a playhouse, often force men upon parts without consulting their judgment, and sometimes without any regard to their talents. Thus the man, as well as the player, may condemn what he himself acts; nay, it is common to see vice sit as awkwardly on some men, as the character of Iago would on the honest face of Mr William Mills.
Upon the whole, then, the man of candour and of true understanding is never hasty to condemn. He can censure an imperfection, or even a vice, without rage against the guilty party. In a word, they are the same folly, the same childishness, the same ill-breeding, and the same ill-nature, which raise all the clamours and uproars both in life and on the stage. The worst of men generally have the words rogue and villain most in their mouths, as the lowest of all wretches are the aptest to cry out low in the pit.


Pursuing the analogy, one might argue that conscience is that spectator "behind the scenes", experienced at theatricals, and not much surprised at human actions. These are contemplated with disapproval but also with a higher understanding attentive not merely to the image those human actions offer to the public, but also to more complex motivations and less public aspects of the same. The theatre of conscience understands the public evaluation received by actions and goes as far as to partially share it, but that public standpoint is synthesized with other perspectives which prevent conscience from being a only the voice of others in our mind, or nothing but the social evaluation of our actions from an external perspective.






—oOo—












martes, 12 de julio de 2016

Love of Praise and Love of Praiseworthiness




sidney

A penetrating analysis by Adam Smith on our love of praiseworthiness as distinct from our love of praise.  This is a crucial passage from the Theory of Moral Sentiments ("On the Sense of Duty", II):

Chap. II
Of the love of Praise, and of that of Praise-worthiness; and of the dread of Blame, and of that of Blame-worthiness

Man naturally desires, not only to be loved, but to be lovely; or to be that thing which is the natural and proper object of love. He naturally dreads, not only to be hated, but to be hateful; or to be that thing which is the natural and proper object of hatred. He desires, not only praise, but praise-worthiness; or to be that thing which, though it should be praised by nobody, is, however, the natural and proper object of praise. He dreads, not only blame, but blame-worthiness; or to be that thing which, though it should be blamed by nobody, is, however, the natural and proper object of blame.

The love of praise-worthiness is by no means derived altogether from the love of praise. Those two principles, though they resemble one another, though they are connected, and often blended with one another, are yet, in many respects, distinct and independent of one another.

The love and admiration which we naturally conceive for those whose character and conduct we approve of, necessarily dispose us to desire to become ourselves the objects of the like agreeable sentiments, and to be as amiable and as admirable as those whom we love and admire the most. Emulation, the anxious desire that we ourselves shoul excel, is originally founded in our admiration of the excellence of others. Neither can we be satisfied with being merely admired for what other people are admired. We must at least believe ourselves to be admirable for what they are admirable. But, in order to attain this satisfaction, we must become the impartial spectators of our own character and conduct. We must endeavour to view them with the eyes of other people, or as other people are likely to view them. When seen in this light, if they appear to us as we wish, we are happy and contented. But it greatly confirms this happiness and contentment when we find that other people, viewing them with those very eyes with which we, in imagination only, were endeavouring to view them, see them precisely in the same light in which we ourselves had seen them. Their approbation necessarily confirms our own self-approbation. Their praise necessarily strengthens our own sense of our own praiseworthiness. In this case, so far is the love of praise-worthiness from being derived altogether from that of praise; that the love of praise seems, at least in a great measure, to be derived from that of praise-worthiness.

The most sincere praise can give little pleasure when it cannot be considered as some sort of proof of praise-worthiness. It is by no means sufficient that, from ignorance or mistake, esteem and admiration should, in some way or other, be bestowed upon us. If we are conscious that we do not deserve to be so favourably thought of, and that if the truth were known, we should be regarded with very different sentiments, our satisfaction is far from being complete. The man who applauds us either for actions which we did not perform, or for motives which had no sort of influence upon our conduct, applauds not us, but another person. We can derive no sort of satisfaction from his praises. To us they should be more mortifying than any censure, and should perpetually call to our minds, the most humbling of all reflections, the reflection of what we ought to be, but what we are not. A woman who paints, could derive, one should imagine, but little vanity from the compliments that are paid to her complexion. These, we should expect, ought rather to put her in mind of the sentiments which her real complexion should excite, and mortify her the more by the contrast. To be pleased with such groundless applause is a proof of the most superficial levity and weakness. It is what is properly called vanity, and is the foundation of the most ridiculous and contemptible vices, the vices of affectation and common lying; follies which, if experience did not teach us how common they are, one should imagine the least spark of common sense would save us from. The foolish liar, who endeavours to excite the admiration of the company by the relation of adventures which never had any existence; the important coxcomb, who gives himself airs of rank and distinction which he well knows he has no just pretensions to; are both of them, no doubt, pleased with the applause which they fancy they meet with. But their vanity arises from so gross an illusion of the imagination, that it is difficult to conceive how any rational creature should be imposed upon by it. When they place themselves in the situation of those whom they fancy they have deceived, they are struck with the highest admiration for their own persons. They look upon themselves, not in that light in which, they know, they ought to appear to their companions, but in that in which they believe their companions actually look upon them. Their superficial weakness and trivial folly hinder them from ever turning their eyes inwards, or from seeing themselves in that despicable point of view in which their own consciences must [or should] tell them that they would appear to every body, if the real truth should ever come to be known.

As ignorant and groundless praise can give no solid joy, no satisfaction that will bear any serious examination, so, on the contrary, it often gives ral comfort to reflect, that though no praise should actually be bestowed upon us, our conduct, however, has been such as to deserve it, and has been in every respect suitable to those measures and rules by which praise and approbation are naturally and commonly bestowed. We are pleased, not only with praise, but with having done what is praise-worthy. We are pleased to think that we have rendered ourselves the natural objects of approbation, though no approbation should ever actually be bestowed upon us: and we are mortified to reflect that we have justly [incurred or] merited the blame of those we live with, though that sentiment should never actually be exerted against us. The man who is conscious to himself that he has exactly observed those measures of conduct which experience informs him are generally agreeable, reflects with satisfaction on the propriety of his own behaviour. When he views it in the light in which the impartial spectator would view it, he thoroughly enters into all the motives which influenced it. He looks back upon every part of it with pleasure and approbation, and though mankind whould never be acquainted with what he has done, he regards himself, not so much according to the light in which they actually regard him, as according to that in which they would regard him if they were better informed. He anticipates the applause and admiration which in this case would be bestowed upon him, and he applauds and admires himself by sympathy with sentiments, which do not indeed actually take place, which he knows are the natural and ordinary effects of such conduct, which his imagination strongly connects with it, and which he has acquired a habit of conceiving as something that naturally and in propriety ought to follow from it. Men have [often] voluntarily thrown away life to acquire after death a renown whih they could no longer enjoy. Their imagination, in the mean-time, anticipated that fame which was in future times to be bestowed upon them. Those applauses which they were never to hear rung in their ears; the thoughts of that admiration, whose effects they were never to feel, played about their hearts, banished from their breasts the strongest of all natural fears, and transported them to perform actions which seem almost beyond the reach of human nature. But in point of reality there is surely no great difference between that approbation which is not to be bestowed till we can no longer enjoy it, and that which, indeed is never to be bestowed, but which would be bestowed, if the world was ever made to understand properly the real circumstances of our behaviour. If the one often produces such violent effects, we cannot wonder taht the other should always be highly regarded.

Nature, when she formed man for society, endowed him with an original desire to please, and an original aversion to offend his brethren. She taught him to feel pleasure in their favourable, and pain in their unfavourable regard. She rendered their approbation most flattering and most agreeable to him for its own sake; and their disapprobation most mortifying and most offensive.

But this desire of the approbation, and this aversion to the disapprobation of his brethren, would not alone have rendered him fit for that society for which he was made. Nature, accordingly, has endowed him, not only with a desire of being approved of, but with a desire of being what ought to be approved of; or of being what he himself approves of in other men. The first desire could only have made him wish to appear to be fit for society. The second was necessary in order to rrender him anxious to be really fit. The first could only have prompted him to the affectation of virtue, and to the concealment of vice. The second was necessary in order to inspire him with the real love of virtue, and with the real abhorrence of vice. In every well-formed mind this second desire seems to be the strongest of the two. It is only the weakest and most superficial of mankind who can be much delighted with that praise which they themselves know to be altogether unmerited. A weak man may sometimes be pleased with it, but a wise man rejects it upon all occasions. But, though a wise man feels little pleasure from praise where he knows there is no praise-worthiness, he often feels the highest in doing what he knows to be praise-worthy, though he knows equally well that no praise is ever to be bestowed upon it. To obtain the approbation of mankind, where no approbation is due, can never be an object of any importance to him. To obtain that approbation where it is really due, may sometimes be an object of no great importance to him. But to be that thing which deserves approbation, must always be an object of the highest.

To desire, or even to accept of praise, where no praise is due, can be the effect only of the most contemptible vanity. To desire it where it is really due, is to desire no more than that a most essential act of justice should be done to us. The love of just fame, of true glory, even for its own sake, and independent of any advantage which he can derive from it, is not unworthy even of a wise man. He sometimes, however, neglects, and even despises it; and he is never more apt to do  o than when he has the most perfect assurance of the perfect propriety of every part ofhis own conduct. His self-approbation, in this case, stands in need of no confirmation from the approbation of other men. It is alone sufficient, and he is contented with it. This self-approbation, if not the only, is at least the principal object, about which he can or ought to be anxious. The love of it, is the love of virtue.



End of quote. (TMS, Oxford UP, 1976, 114-16).

Note Smith's careful analysis of the role of point of view and of mind-reading in the generation of moral sentiments, in this case those of praise and praiseworthiness. Not only actual or points of view, or other persons' points of view constructed through our theory of mind, but also virtual, hypothetical, possible (or quite impossible) and non-existent points of view, which have nonetheless an operational psychological role. Social evaluations are constructed in such a way that we shuffle all possible combinations of knowledge about ourselves and about others in order to provide an assessment of our own position and conduct, and of that of our neighbours and peers, should they know about us, for instance, what we know about ourselves. The way they would evaluate us knowing what we know, or the way they would evaluate us were they morally reliable (i.e. their evaluation of our actions as compared to that of an all-seeing God, or a scrupulous conscience). Nobody's point of view, resulting for instance from a blend of our personal information and of the other person's values, is a relevant player in the game of perspectives, just like the actual points of view of our misinformed or benighted friends and fellow beings. Social evaluation is a complex game of masks and perspectives, a play in which naked and unmasked virtual actors play their scenes alongside the real ones. The presentation of the self in social life involves this complex imaginative mutual role-taking, and trying-on of perspectives, in a fairground of multiplying and infinitely receding mirrors.


praiseworthy cicero

All of which brings to mind this discussion on the motivation of human conduct according to Girard, Bourdieu, and Marcel Mauss: René Girard / Pierre Bourdieu: des affinités méconnues. I summarize: according to the second speaker, we are not driven merely by a desire of emulation, as Girard's mimetic theory would lead us to think, or by a desire of being distinguished (Bourdieu's 'la distinction' owes much in this respect to Veblen's discussion of status symbols in The Theory of the Leisure Class). We are driven by a desire for the recognition of our contribution to society (whether the contributions are real or sincerely imagined by us, that's another matter). We want to be valued as value-givers, as creators of positive content, as those who bring a Gift to our peers. That is, we desire to have our praiseworthiness recognized —which is quite congruent with Smith's view.

It is to be presupposed that the Gift which makes us aspire to praiseworthiness is inherently valuable both in the eyes of the giver, and in those of the recipients. Still, some well-meaning and well-received gifts may nonetheless be, in some cases, poisonous gifts. Ask the Germans if you don't trust me.




—oOo—

jueves, 30 de junio de 2016

The I in the Sky, c'est les Autres


La idea de Dios es una idea tan simple y tan compleja a la vez, que sus causas son a la vez simples y evidentes, y complejas y múltiples. Demasiados ingredientes van a parar a esa sopa divina, como para desconstruirla y desclasificarlos y desentrañarlos y volverlos a poner en la despensa, y sin embargo, algunos son evidentes. Para Gustavo Bueno, en El animal divino, los dioses en origen son los animales. Y sin duda el cocido contiene en parte carne de animal divino (aún comulgan algunos con el sacrificio ritual). Pero al igual que en los secretos mejor guardados, se puede encontrar fácilmente a otros sospechosos: si los Reyes son los padres, y al final todo el mundo se entera, con la misma tranquilidad se puede decir que los dioses son los padres, y de esto ya muchos no llegan a enterarse. Aunque les hablen de Dios Padre.

Cuando algo tan evidente produce semejante bloqueo mental, y no puede reconocerse, es que hay una inversión psíquica muy fuerte en mantenerlo oculto—como esas cosas que decía René Girard que están ocultas desde la fundación del mundo: el papel social de la imitación mutua, de la violencia ritual, del chivo expiatorio que funda la sociedad. Pobres críos, llegaron al mundo creyendo que había dioses, que eran sus padres, y luego no pueden desprenderse de ellos, y siguen teniendo padres toda la vida, aunque sea en el más allá. Es comprensible.

Otra fuente de divinidad es la mirada del Otro. Si los dioses son los padres, los dioses son también los Otros, y una cosa no quita la otra, más bien la sobredetermina.

Y sin embargo algunos de los autores más autorizados que nos llevan a pensar de esta manera no se han autorizado a sí mismos a ver allí el origen de Dios en el hombre, o en los hombres y en las mujeres. Aun desarrollando una teoría que explica cómo Dios surge de la mirada del otro—de la interiorización de la mirada del otro—no consiguen decirlo explícitamente en sus tratados y teorías.

Es el caso de George Herbert Mead, y su noción del 'otro generalizado' que es elemento constitutivo necesario de la subjetividad humana. Eso lo identifica muy claramente: pero no llega a decirnos que es también la raíz de la divinidad—ni, por lo mismo, llega a formular claramente la imbricación necesaria (en este sentido) de la divinidad y del orden humano, ya en la estructura misma de la mente.

Escribe Mead (Mind, Self, and Society, 90):
The very universality and impersonality of thought and reason is from the behavioristic standpoint the result of the given individual taking the attitudes of others toward himself, and of his finally crystallizing all these particular attitudes into a single attitude or standpoint which may be called that of the "generalized other."
En ningún momento asocia Mead el origen de la idea de Dios a este "generalized other"—y se entenderá por qué digo que hay una especie de punto ciego a la hora de contemplar la divinidad desde esta perspectiva, pues me parece que esta objetividad interaccional, resultante del perspectivismo intersubjetivo—el "punto de vista desde ninguna parte", como decía otro filósofo—está obviamente emparentado con la noción de Dios como el detentador de la verdad. También con Dios como la figuración personificada de los valores de la sociedad en cuestión, que es (como los animales para el pitecántropo, o como los padres para su niño) otra raíz suficiente por sí, y más que suficiente en conjunción con las otras, para generar el concepto de Dios. Aprendemos a desligar lo que es el punto de vista social, intersubjetivo, de lo que sería nuestro punto de vista interesado—y de ahí surgen dos entes fantasmales, uno de ellos imagen reflejada del otro como en el interior de una bola de cristal, la bola de cristal del sujeto. Me refiero a Dios, allá en el cielo, the eye in the sky, que lo ve todo en su visión panorámica ("hasta los más ocultos pensamientos", decía mi catecismo católico en la escuela) y a la conciencia, dentro mismo de los más ocultos pensamientos. Dios como proyección a escala cósmica de la conciencia, de lo que opinarían los otros de mí si supiesen cómo soy. Y la conciencia como "el semidiós que tenemos en el pecho"—así llamaba Adam Smith a su espectador imparcial, su propia versión del "otro generalizado" que era la expresión preferida por Mead.

Tampoco Smith relaciona a Dios, ni a la conciencia cristiana, con este constructo que él desarrolla para elaborar su teoría de los sentimientos morales. La idea central de su libro The Theory of Moral Sentiments es que los sentimientos morales surgen de la valoración y juicio que hacemos de los otros, en un primer momento, y de la interiorización de ese juicio que hacemos sobre los demás, aplicándonoslo a nosotros mismos, en un segundo momento. Por el camino encuentra Smith la fórmula para analizar a Dios, pero no se da cuenta, o prefiere no darse cuenta.

Dios, lo hemos dicho, tiene muchos nombres y muchos rostros, aparte del amable o iracundo anciano de la nube, y por ello mismo es precipitado el precipitarse a decir que no existe, o que ha muerto, o que goza de mala salud. Será según y cómo, según qué o qué dios, que haberlos haylos y muchos. Si le preguntan a algunos, Alá goza de salud excelente, y hay naciones enteras de cabeciñas que jamás podrían sacárselo de entre las cejas. Por supuesto, una cosa es que exista la idea de Dios, y otra que exista Dios en sí; como idea existe en sus versiones más extravagantes, y eso apenas puede discutirse. Es una existencia de por sí bastante real, puesto que surte efectos hasta para el no creyente—y para el creyente es por supuesto totalmente real, qué les voy a decir.when alone

Pero en sus versiones más etéreas, el Dios de Aristóteles, el de Spinoza, el de Einstein, o el de Hawking, también tiene este Gran Arquitecto efectos y existencia no menos evidentes, aunque no haya hecho un proyecto de obra en su vida y todo sea producto de la selección natural. Quiero decir que la naturaleza sigue leyes y ajustes finos y procesos que son los que son, y no otros—y a esa necesidad, y a esa regularidad, algunos eligen llamarla Dios, en el sentido de que nos precede, da lugar a nosotros, y no hay quien se la salte. No le recen por cierto, que hace oídos más sordos que el altivo Jehová... aunque por otra parte, quien necesita rezar, y reza, luego se siente aliviado, pues el rezo tiene mucho de autocomunicación, y la comunicación virtual con un corresponsal ausente también es apreciada por los seres sociables y comunicativos. Por algunos.

En su ceguera y su ignorancia, hasta los perseguidores de ateos en la época de las guerras de religión tenían su punto de razón. Cuando decían que "ningún hombre puede ser ateo"—si bien para muchos iba la transubstanciación incluida en el lote, parte de lo que querían decir es que el hombre es un ser social, que ha de participar de la misma verdad que los demás, o que ha de hallar la verdad junto con los demás. (Como corro el riesgo de blanquearlos demasiado, o tratarlos demasiado bien, ahí dejaré su defensa). Si, según veíamos en la explicación de Mead, la idea misma de la racionalidad deriva de esta intersubjetividad inherente, o interiorizada, fácilmente se echa de ver que una negación de Dios, en el sentido de la resultante de esta intersubjetividad interiorizada, sería una negación de la razón, o de la comunicación, una especie de reducción al absurdo de la misma conciencia humana, que es conciencia de ser visto por los demás como por el ojo del cielo, ese superyó, o supertú.

Cuando más solos estamos se siente a Dios, a esa mirada virtual que tenemos interiorizada, por el mero hecho de pensar en esa soledad. Es un dios correlativo con la experiencia de vernos liberados de una situación social específica, de la identidad que los demás nos imponen con su presencia (el 'looking-glass self' lo llamaba Charles Cooley) y cuando gozamos, por tanto, de una versión depurada de nosotros mismos que a la vez incorpora a todos los demás que nos han hecho, y nos libera de ellos, o nos sitúa en el equilibrio perfecto de toda nuestra existencia social. En soledad, más que en ninguna compañía, estamos ante el Otro Generalizado, un testigo virtual que proyectamos en cierto modo al mundo que nos mira sin mirada. Una mirada que ve sin ver, puesto que la llevamos incorporada de hecho en nuestra misma constitución interna. Estamos hechos de los demás, y de nuestra relación con ellos, y de las miradas y juicios con que nos han dado forma. Es por eso por lo que, incluso en la soledad más absoluta, no estamos nunca solos del todo, y (en palabras de Nabokov, "Signs and Symbols") incluso las montañas lejanas de solidez insoportable parecen expresar, en términos de granito y de crujidos de abetos, la verdad última de nuestro ser.

"L'enfer, c'est les autres", decía Sartre, en Huis Clos— y Sartre era muy consciente también de la manera en que nuestra identidad se ve condicionada por la mirada ajena...  Es en una escena muy lacaniana, de El Ser y la Nada, me parece recordar, cuando estamos espiando un panorama humano a través del ojo de la cerradura, refugiados en nuestra invisibilidad; gozamos ahí de una posición divina de perspectiva dominante o topsight. Pero nos caemos con todo el equipo cuando somos descubiertos por un tercero mirando por el ojo de la cerradura; caemos desde el cielo al infierno de los otros. Como se ve, cielo e infierno van en el mismo paquete,  le diable et le bon Dieu. Y es en la tierra, y en el trato con los otros, donde los inventamos, a la vez que nos inventamos como conciencia, todo el teatro interaccional se genera dialécticamente: yo y mi conciencia, Dios y la suya (que no sé si la tiene), los otros y sus respectivas, el cielo y el infierno, y los animales que no sabemos si son Otros o si no lo son—por eso quizá son inquietantes sus miradas, pero es que toda mirada es inquietante. Y toda mirada ajena, incluso la de nuestro espejo, crea interioridad, o la potencia; nos descubrimos en la mirada de los demás, ya sea la que venga de fuera o la que llevamos dentro de nosotros.





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lunes, 25 de abril de 2016

La construcción afectiva de la realidad social (The Affective Construction of Social Reality)


La noción de una construcción afectiva de la realidad social mediante los sentimientos de aprobación y de desaprobación puede remontarse a la Teoría de los Sentimientos Morales de Adam Smith (1759). Relacionamos aquí el sistema moral de Smith con sus aportaciones a la auto-organización y al construccionismo social en su teoría económica. Analizamos asimismo la dimensión interaccional que se halla en la noción del 'espectador imparcial' de Smith, y vemos en ella un importante precedente de las teorías construccionistas del interaccionismo simbólico, y de las teorías dramatúrgicas de la identidad personal.


La construcción afectiva de la realidad social




English Abstract:

The Affective Construction of Social Reality 

The affective construction of social reality through feelings of approbation and disapprobation is a notion which can be traced back to Adam Smith's Theory of Moral Sentiments (1759). This paper relates Smith's system of morals to his insights on self-organization and social constructionism in his economic theory. The interactional dimension in Smith's notion of the 'impartial spectator' is also analyzed, and seen as an important precedent of the constructionist theories of the symbolic interactionists and of dramatistic theories of the self.

Note: Downloadable document is in Spanish.
 
Number of Pages in PDF File: 25
Keywords: Adam Smith, Morals, Ethics, Philosophy, Affections, Sentiments, Social constructionism, Sociology, Social psychology, Dramatism, Self,




This paper has been accepted by a number of journals in several research networks: Anthropology, Cognitive Science, Economics, and Philosophy.
 

eJournal Classifications (Date posted: March 21, 2016)
AARN Subject Matter eJournals
    
        
CSN Subject Matter eJournals
    
        
            
ERN Subject Matter eJournals
    
        
ERN Subject Matter eJournals
    
ERN Subject Matter eJournals
    
PRN Subject Matter eJournals
    
        
PRN Subject Matter eJournals
    
        
PRN Subject Matter eJournals
    
        
PRN Subject Matter eJournals
    
        

_________

_____."La construcción afectiva de la realidad social." Lecture at the HERAF seminar, "Afectividad." Universidad de Zaragoza, Facultad de Filosofía y Letras, 18 March 2016.*

_____. "La construcción afectiva de la realidad social (The Affective Construction of Social Reality)." SSRN  21 March 2016.*

         http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2752402

         http://ssrn.com/abstract=2752402

         2016

         Psychological Anthropology eJournal 21 March 2016.*

         http://www.ssrn.com/link/Psychological-Anthropology.html

         2016

         Cognition and Culture 21 March 2016.*

         http://www.ssrn.com/link/Cognition-Culture.html

         2016

         Behavioral & Experimental Economics eJournal 21 March 2016.*

         http://www.ssrn.com/link/behavioral-experimental-economics.html

         2016

         History of Economics eJournal 21 March 2016.*

         http://www.ssrn.com/link/history-of-economics.html

         2016

         Philosophy & Methodology of Economics eJournal 21 March 2016.*

         http://www.ssrn.com/link/Philosophy-Methodology-Economics.html

         2016

         History of Western Philosophy eJournal 21 March 2016.*

         http://www.ssrn.com/link/History-of-Western-Philosophy.html

         2016

         Philosophy of Action eJournal 21 March 2016.*

         http://www.ssrn.com/link/Philosophy-Action.html

         2016

         Philosophy of Mind eJournal 21 March 2016.*

         http://www.ssrn.com/link/Philosophy-Mind.html

         2016

         Social & Political Philosophy eJournal 21 March 2016.*

         http://www.ssrn.com/link/Social-Political-Philosophy.html

         2016

_____. "La construcción afectiva de la realidad social." In García Landa, Vanity Fea 25 April 2016.*

         http://vanityfea.blogspot.com.es/2016/04/la-construccion-afectiva-de-la-realidad.html

         2016

_____. "La construcción afectiva de la realidad social." Academia 12 April 2017.*

         https://www.academia.edu/32391218/

         2017

_____. "La construcción afectiva de la realidad social." ResearchGate 13 April 2017.*

         https://www.researchgate.net/publication/316086914

         2017

_____. "La construcción afectiva de la realidad social." Net Sight de José Angel García Landa 15 Dec. 2024.*

         https://personal.unizar.es/garciala/publicaciones/SmithCONSTRUCCION.pdf

         2024

_____. "La construcción afectiva de la realidad social." Humanities Commons 25 March 2025.*

https://doi.org/10.17613/zj0nb-91s60

         https://works.hcommons.org/records/zj0nb-91s60

2026








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martes, 15 de marzo de 2016

La teatralidad del yo en Adam Smith

David Marshall, en su capítulo "The Theater of Sympathy", de The Figure of Theater (Columbia UP, 1986), resalta el carácter dramatístico de la teoría del sujeto de Adam Smith.

The Figure of Theater examina, cito, el papel de la teatralidad en las obras de cuatro escritores que tratan del teatro que existe fuera del teatro: lo que el autor llama "el drama de caracteres que pone al yo en el papel de un rol o personaje, y las relaciones teatrales que se forman entre las personas que se encuentran unos a otros en la vida cotidiana como actores y espectadores". Más que centrarse en esta perspectiva,  o en la influencia de obras teatrales específicas, David Marshall sigue la pista al modo en que aparece el teatro en una variedad sorprendente de textos, como representación figurada de cuestiones que ligan los ámbitos tan diversos de la edición de libros, la escritura de ficción, la filosofía moral, la epistemología y la estética. (De la solapa).

Notas sobre "The Theater of Sympathy", con algunas analogías y excursos añadidos:

"In this chapter I will argue that Smith's examination of sympathy in The Theory of Moral Sentiments is designed to address the theatrical character of the way people face each other in the world—and that this theatrical situation, which is implicit in writers such as Hutcheson and Hume, becomes not only explicit but finally problematic for Smith. In this sense Smith can be seen to share Shaftesbury's and Defoe's concern with the inherent theatricality of presenting a character before the eyes of the world and acting as a beholder to people who perform acts of solitude" (169).

Es peculiar del enfoque de Smith, en su tratamiento de la simpatía, cómo remite a la imaginación, y no a la experiencia inmediata, la cuestión la identificación con la otra persona. Y sobre todo cómo presenta a las personas que simpatizan ajustando su experiencia una a la otra, en una circulación de reflexiones imaginativas.  "As nature teaches the spectators to assume the circumstances of the person principally concerned, so she teaches this last in some measure to assume those of the spectators. As they are continually placing themselves in his situation, and thence conceiving emotions similar to what he feels; so he is constantly placing himself in theirs" (22). A esto comenta Marshall:mirrorlooking

"The mirror of sympathy in which the spectator represents to himself the feelings of the other person and places himself in the position and person of the other is itself mirrored in the experience of the person who knows he is being viewed. As the sufferer tries to look at his spectators with sympathy (which Smith defines simply as 'our fellow-feeling with any passion whatever' [10]), he finds himself in the same epistemological void. Unable to know what they feel when they face him, he must represent to himself in his imagination what they feel as they represent to themselves in their imaginations what he feels" (172).

El resultado es el valor social de la simpatía—nos fuerza a moderar nuestras pasiones por atención,  casi cortesía, a los espectadores. Podríamos decir que nos vuelve espectadores de nosotros mismos, de hecho; y esta cuestión está muy relacionada con la teoría de la conciencia de Smith como el "espectador imparcial" interiorizado.

Aprobamos o desaprobamos las acciones de los demás, de las cuales somos espectadores, según nuestra capacidad de simpatizar con la persona que contemplamos. Pero es que también simpatizamos con la persona que sufre la acción, y esto conduce a un equilibrio de actitudes o un sentimiento complejo. También resulta de esto que la mostración pública de nuestras emociones contribuye a moderarlas, pues interiorizamos la visión que de ellas tienen los otros—y por eso consuela más la presencia de desconocidos que la de conocidos, en momentos de sufrimiento.

"Imagining ourselves as a spectacle, we look at ourselves in exactly the same way that we look at others: we attempt to sympathize with ourselves, to enter into our own feelings and persons (...). In Smith's view, one does not simply imagine oneself seen by others; one imagines oneself imagined by others who either can or cannot enter into one's feelings (as they imagine them)." (174)

Se crea así una teatralidad interiorizada, en la que atendemos a nuestro propio "espectador imparcial" incorporado; "According to Smith's system, we govern our actions and judgments—indeed, we know ourselves—by internalizing the regard of a spectator" (175)—y de ahí derivamos nuestro propio juicio sobre nuestros sentimientos y acciones.

Smith nos representa adoptando imaginativamente el papel del otro, y luego nuestro propio papel representando dos personajes: "here he pictures us trying to play ourselves by representing ourselves as two different characters" (175)—el espectador y el agente o actor.

"In his final exposition, he makes it clear that we are both actors and spectators of our characters. We are actors not just because we appear before spectators played by ourselves, but also because we personate ourselves in different parts, persons, and characters. The self is theatricalized in its relation to others and in its self-conscious relation to itself; but it also enters the theater because 'the person whom I properly call myself' must be an actor who can dramatize or represent to himself the spectacle of self-division in which the self personates two different persons who try to play each other's part, change positions, and identify with each other" (176).

Esta estructuración teatral del yo no deja de recordarnos a las teorías dramatísticas de Goffman (ver Somos Teatreros). Con la diferencia de que Adam Smith le precedió en doscientos años—y con la diferencia también de que, al menos según Jonas Barish (The Antitheatrical Prejudice, U of California P, 1981) Smith no llevó a sus conclusiones la teoría dramatística del yo, debido en parte a que estaba prisionero de prejuicios sociales y atento ante todo a los buenos modos de las clases dominantes. Earl Wassermann por su parte estudió la relación entre las teorías dramáticas del XVIII y las teorías de la simpatía. Algo más al respecto podemos ver en este artículo sobre Diderot, que también enfatizó (como Hume, como Smith) el papel de la simpatía, y le dedicó mucha atención en su teoría dramática: Garrick, Shakespeare, y la paradoja del comediante.

Volviendo a Cambpell y Smith. La teoría del espectador de Smith nos remite más allá de Shaftesbury, a la descripción de la conciencia que hace Joseph Butler, hablando de "the witness of conscience". Larga tradición cristiana tiene esta imagen del espectador que nos ve, delegado de Dios en nosotros. Yendo todavía más atrás, un pasaje de la República de Platón (Marshall n. 21) observa también cómo la presencia de espectadores lleva a reprimir las emociones, algo que recuerda a la concepción de Smith (pero donde falta, claro, su tesis de la interiorización del intercambio dialógico de roles y el ajuste mutuo de perspectivas).

En el terreno del drama y la filosofía moral, Marshall también dedica un capítulo a Shaftesbury, quien en su Soliloquy, or Advice to an Author anima a duplicarse, a ser crítico de sí, con un "inspector or auditor established within us". "Conócete a ti mismo" significa para él "Divide yourself, or be two". La imagen del espejo aparece tanto en Shaftesbury como en Smith, —y nos remitirá al looking-glass self de Charles Horton Cooley a la teoría de los roles de George Herbert Mead y el interaccionismo simbólico. Recordemos que para Cooley el "yo espejo" se define asi: "yo soy quien creo que tú crees que soy"—lo cual puede sugerir una falta de sustancia excesiva, y plantea el problema de disgregar al yo en múltiples roles interactuando con diversas personas. Aunque nos conduce de modo interesante a la teoría interaccional de los roles y a un yo relacional.

Smith, con su énfasis un tanto estoico en la propiedad y en la contención, también enfatiza el ajuste externo: llega casi a decir que la virtud consiste en ajustarse totalmente a las expectativas de los demás, en identificarnos con nuestro propio espectador imparcial interno, al que describe en términos laudatorios y reverenciales, como nuestra parte divina. A mí me recuerda esta duplicación de roles también a la creación de una figura autorial en literatura, lo que Booth llama el autor implícito, como autoridad moral abstraída, y construida, y más público e ideal que el "autor de carne" u hombre falible que se esconde tras este constructo literario.

Rebatiendo a Mandeville, Smith enfatiza cómo la simpatía no se basa en el egoísmo analógico. No nos imaginamos que somos la otra persona, más bien creamos una construcción imaginativa desplazada, lo que Fauconnier y Turner llamarían una fusión conceptual; "Sympathy, according to Smith's formulation, involves a loss of self, a transfer and metamorphosis" (Marshall 179). Marshall también trae a colación la teoría dramática de Diderot, pero es para decir que "It is as if Smith were endorsing the two theories of acting that Diderot opposes in his Paradoxe sur le comédien: both the position that an actor should merge himself with his role and the position that the actor must be a cool observer who can stand at a distance from his own performance" (179). Todos somos actores de esas dos escuelas, al parecer. Hay una cierta paradoja del comediante en Smith cuando habla de la fusión imaginativa que se da entre las dos situaciones, la nuestra propia y la de la persona que vemos padecer. Marshall observa que "such a combination of identification and difference provided the standard eighteenth-century explanation for the pleasure audiences take in watching tragedies" (180), pero Smith enfatiza especialmente la tensión entre participar del espectáculo, proyectarse en el otro, por una parte, y, por otra, mantener la distancia que por simpatía queremos trascender.

Su análisis del remordimiento plantea vívidamente esta división de roles y de simpatías. Por ejemplo, el criminal no simpatiza consigo mismo, sino con su víctima, al sentir remordimiento. (En realidad con ambos, supongo, un círculo vicioso amenaza...). Tememos a los espectadores potenciales o imaginados de nuestras faltas, y así se autorregula la moral social. "The internalization of the regard of others suggests the degree to which Smith believes that the need for sympathy will socialize people and regulate their behavior to make it conform to moral values" (183).

(Dryden decía algo parecido sobre el efecto de la tragedia: el espectador de la tragedia, si hablamos de la emoción puramente trágica, ha de simpatizar con el criminal, y no con la víctima. Lo cual nos lleva en el caso del remordimiento del criminal a la paradoja que acabamos de mencionar, si bien Marshall no entra en esta cuestión).

Smith señala, a pesar de su énfasis en la simpatía, la dificultad de simpatizar totalmente. "Smith's description of us resembles his portrait of the murderer: we cannot bear the thought of unsympathetic spectators yet this is precisely the prospect we must confront" (183).

Señala Marshall en la admiración de Smith por el estoicismo una aversión a la teatralización ostentosa de los sentimientos:

"The moral of The Theory of Moral Sentiments is that one should not display one's sentiments unless one is sure of eliciting sympathy; indeed, it would be best not to display oneself at all, given the small likelihood of attaining fellow-feeling" (184)

Esto es más que congruente con lo que contábamos en Un amor de Adam Smith. Marshall también observa la casi total ausencia de mujeres en la Teoría de Smith; un libro éste que está escrito en una época sentimental, y trata sobre los sentimientos, pero va contra el sentimentalismo.

Muy prominente es el lugar de la conciencia, o del "espectador imparcial, el testigo interno de nuestro pecho" en Smith, un espectador virtual o imaginario. Pero para Marshall, pesa más lo que llamábamos el espectador real:

"The Theory of Moral Sentiments represents a society where everyone and everything seems motivated by the gaze of spectators. These spectators are not the imaginary, impartial judges who personify our conscience. Smith portrays a society that is directed by a more pervasive and more powerful point of view: the eyes of the public." (185)

Pero la visión de los otros es imperfecta. No lo saben todo de nosotros. También tienen, por otra parte, sus intereses egoístas. Por eso necesitamos un equilibrio que construimos en forma del espectador interiorizado. Una figura que por cierto tampoco exhibimos mucho en público, aunque represente a ese público. Dios representa el papel del testigo imparcial externo y universalizado, y con la autoridad máxima, que a la vez nos somete a su observación, y nos libera de los puntos de vista limitados de los demás, trascendiéndolos objetivamente—al menos en nuestra mente. Necesitamos esa perspectiva dominante última, ese topsight total y apocalíptico, que justifique que todo en el mundo está sujeto a observación; que no hay nada fuera de la escena y que todo acto es social, il n'y a pas de hors-scène.

No soportamos estar ante un público que no simpatiza con nosotros—y de ahí derivan construcciones complejas e indirectas de lo que sociólogos interaccionalistas posteriores llamarán nuestra faz (face), nuestra identidad social, nuestro autoconcepto.... Y asimismo nuestro deseo de prestigio, nuestra admiración por los grandes de la tierra, nuestro deseo de distinción, nuestro lucimiento de símbolos de status social, económico o elegante, el consumo ostentoso de Veblen, etc.

Marshall llama la atención sobre la consciencia dramatística de la sociología y la ética de Smith. El teatro es una referencia constante—la vida como teatro, de hecho. "In Smith's view, our state is the theater, and an intense concern with theatricality governs both our acts and our reactions" (187); toda la vida social nos hace sentir como si estuviésemos en un teatro, rodeados por un público. Y más los ricos y poderosos, que por eso parecen volverse, retroalimentativamente, los objetos de atención y los epítomes de la existencia humana—en las tragedias, por ejemplo.

El otro modelo, más valioso, al que señala Smith, es el del sabio filósofo (él mismo) que lleva una vida discreta y es ignorado por la muchedumbre, siendo un modelo sólo para los espectadores más inteligentes. "The philosopher, like the Stoic, refuses to force himself upon the notice of every wandering eye; he does not display the sentiments he asks others to share on the public stage. Yet this does not mean he is exempt from a role in the theater of sympathy" (188).

El yo mismo es teatral y espectatorial en Smith; la sociedad teatral la llevamos interiorizada: "Thus the theatrical structure of sympathy is both acted out between people and internalized; the self as Smith represents it has a dramatic character, as it does for Shaftesbury." (190).

Es la misma necesidad de aprobación la que lleva a moderar o esconder las emociones, cuando la aprobación no es alcanzable o tememos el rechazo; "The theater of sympathy in The Theory of Moral Sentiments is based on the simultaneous necessity of spectators and fear of spectators; the ultimate threat in the world that Smith represents is the prospect of spectators who would deny sympathy." (191)

La simpatía del espectador, observa Marshall, ofrece un peligro: si se proyecta hacia la escena de los demás, nos convierte ya no en espectadores, sino en participantes—espectadores arrastrados a escena, atrapados en el espectáculo. Y qué duda hay de que lo somos, y tanto más si abrimos la boca para manifestarnos sobre algo, abandonando la perspectiva olímpica del mero espectador.











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