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K. E. Løgstrup and the virtue of travelling
An attempt to illuminate an ethical conflict in
transportation issues by applying the sensation metaphysics
of K. E. Løgstrup
By Assistant Professor Cand.Theol. Svein Sando [1]
Introduction
Transport of people and merchandise is connected with many
negative features of the manmade environment (accidents,
noise, local pollution, barriers, considerable consume of
space, etc.) as well as of the natural environment (great
consumer of energy, global pollution, collisions with
animals and so forth.). On the other hand transportation is
both necessary in order to fulfil basic tasks of a modern
society and attractive to individuals in their social and
recreational activity. Hence, there is a conflict between a
consideration for the environment (both manmade and
natural) and the requests of individuals and society to
have goods and peoples carried as fast and cheaply as
possible.
To illuminate this conflict concerning and suggesting
alternative actions, I will use writings by the late Danish
philosopher and theologian Knud Ejler Løgstrup
(1905-81). By doing so, we are able to present one of the
more recent attempts from a Christian point of view to
revaluate the created nature. Through the often-cited
article by Lynn White in Science 155/1967: «The
Historical Roots of Our Ecological Crisis»,
Christianity is blamed for the ecological crisis. The main
problem with the Judaeo/Christian tradition is the passage
in Genesis 1:28 where Adam and Eve are instructed to
“fill the earth and subdue it”. Of all the
contemporary Christian attempts to rethink the status of
the nature, Løgstrup’s Christian fundament is
partly concealed. He tries in his writings to reach people
with other starting points than only Christian ones.
Løgstrup’s view about nature and modern man
Løgstrup has not written an explicit ethics for the
environment or technology. He has however many passages in
his writings that can easily be evolved to an ethic for a
technological age. The material in Løgstrup’s
writings that we will use in this essay is mainly from his
four volumes of metaphysic published partly after his sudden
death in 1981. Metaphysic III «Ophav og omgivelse.
Betragtninger over historie og natur» [Source and
surrounding. Considerations about history and nature]
published in 1984 is important for establishing an
Løgstrupian environmental ethics. Part of this book is
translated to English and published in “Metaphysics.
Volume II” (Løgstrup 1995). All inline
references will refer to this translation unless otherwise
mentioned.
1The title of his book, “Source and
surrounding”, contain an important pair of notions in
order to understand his view of the nature (universe). That
the universe is our surrounding is something that modern
western man is perfectly aware of and exploits to all what
it is worth. Løgstrup reminds us that the universe
is still our source as well. From a biological viewpoint,
this is obvious. We need the nature for both energy and
metabolism. To describe this, Løgstrup uses the
expression that “we are emplaced [2] (Danish: «indfældt»)
in the cycle of nature” (43). He distinguishes,
however, between human being as a living being
(«levevæsen») and human being with
respect to his consciousness or understanding. As conscious
beings “we have broken out of this systematic
unity.” (43)
Animals as well as human beings are emplaced in nature
(43). There is however one fundamental difference between
human beings and animals. While the animals are more or
less controlled by instincts, man’s instincts are
considerably reduced (43). This reduction is compensated
with consciousness and understanding that is an obligatory
ability to survive in the natural world. Understanding is
used to cover basic needs.
Løgstrup thinks that the reduction of instinct
(«instinktsredutkion») can be considered as
withdrawal («tilbagetrækning») (33-43).
This happens at the mental level in a manner that one may
feel oneself to be outside the nature and the physical
universe. The universe is just a surrounding.
Løgstrup calls this the marginal existence
(“randtilværelsen”) with respect to
intelligence, where we are at “the edge of nature, on
the margin of the universe” (5). This is
“modernity’s most formidable illusion”
(17).
Historically Løgstrup thinks this can be traced back
to the medieval controversy about the universals. The
nominalistic position claims that “the universals are
the subject’s own control of reality” (4). (I
would add that the Christian flirtation with Gnosticism in
the late antiquity is another and older source for a
subordination of the matter under the spirit or
intelligence.) This is followed up by Descartes “res
cogitans”, where the consciousness gains specific
value at the sacrifice of the external world (“res
extensa”). Kant’s transcendental philosophy
aims in the same direction. The secondary qualities
(colour, sound, taste etc) loose their importance with
Galilee (78) and Descartes.
Løgstrup pays much attention to the notion of
sensation (“sansning”). The importance of
sensation is ignored in our culture, he claims. Even his
disciples admit that his analysis of the sensation is both
difficult to grasp and controversial (Andersen, 38). We
will however, not draw heavily on this more controversial
part of “his” sensation. Løgstrup is a
phenomenologist and we must understand his theory of
sensation in this view. He denies that sensation is
perception. In stead, he claims “sensation is lack of
distance “(“afstandsløs”) (6).
When we look at a flying bird, the sensation brings us out
to the bird out there, not the other way around. The lack
of distance in the sensation is in opposition to the
distance making understanding. When we in our sensation of
the bird say that the bird is out there, at distance to us,
that is because of the interpretation by the understanding.
Pure sensation can however never be experienced. At once,
the understanding interprets what is sensed and thus the
distance making understanding gets the final trick in
sensation as it is experienced. What brings us to the edge
of the nature are thus not the sensation but the distance
making understanding.
The withdrawal in the marginal existence where
understanding has replaced the instincts, is ambiguous
because it both offers a fantastic opportunity and a great
risk:
The opportunity consists of the fact that human beings have
latitude to make tools for themselves. The risk consists of
the fact that we can destroy our surroundings. The more
effective our tools become as technology, the greater the
risk. (43)
The basic material needs demand that we make tools and
strategies to survive, e.g. use our understanding upon the
nature. The needs are not satisfied by themselves. The
satisfaction of the basic needs thus tends to be
aggressive. Nature must be conquered to deliver the basic
supplies for a human life (44f).
In the western modernity, the basic needs are more than
satisfied, but this seems to be no reason to cease further
development of tools. Løgstrup thinks that the
development of tools has emancipated itself and seeks a
justification in itself.
The development moves from tool to [technique, and from
technique to] [3]
technology, understood as technical research, as the art of
engineering, which is a science alongside other sciences.
Along the way, there is a reversal of the relationship
between need and tool. Once need inspired intelligence to
discover tools, now it is the tools that create the need.
Technique and technology discover needs no one had ever
dreamed of having but which we now demand to be satisfied
as though it were the most obvious thing in the world.
This is altogether in its order. It has brought us
possibilities for the development of our lives in grand
style. But the more this development proceeds, the more
acceleration it gets and the more important it becomes that
restraint keep up with it. If this does not happen, we all
know what it ends with. If we do not acquire a technology
that is suitable to nature and society, we are destroyed.
(50)
A new important notion is presented here: restraint
(“tilbageholdenhed”). Understanding and
restraint are exclusive to man compared to animals.
Restraint is a sort of break that moderates the
understanding in its conquest of the nature. The contents
of restraint may seem a bit out of date in our time:
“shame and shyness, respect and recognition,
bashfulness and modesty and more” (44). The ability
to be ashamed seems to be the most important part of
restraint. The greatest evilness is thus the lack of this,
namely shamelessness or impudence:
Shamelessness, on the other hand, is totally inhuman,
because the individual in it will not shrink form anything
at all. (46) … Any demonstration of power in which
there is shamelessness will not tolerate that anything at
all should exist that is independent of us and which
preserves us. One lives at its expense, even at the cost of
eroding the ground from under one’s feet and that of
future generations.” (47)
The ethical problem in an age of technology is when
“the restraint does not keep up with technological
power” (47). For an inter-human relation, Kant has
formulated a rule to prohibit actions that hold another
human only as a mean to our ends. In breaking this rule,
Løgstrup would say that we acted shamelessly. In an
analogous way, Løgstrup will allow us to use the
nature as a mean, but not only as a mean. We have to use
the nature as a mean in order to survive. Nevertheless,
there is a limit for this conquest of the nature. This
limit is broken if we regard the nature only as
surroundings, and not also as our source.
Is the only thing that curbs our exploitation of nature and
its living beings the fact that we risk undermining our
existence? Is there only intelligence and no shame in
drawing this line? Can we, in our relationship with nature,
only be guilty of stupidity, never shamelessness? (48)
No, is the answer he gives. There are limits not to be
trespassed. One of them is trespassed when we destroy
nature “for no purpose”. It is shamelessness
when we treat the nature in a way that it does not matter
whether it exists or not:
If a disparity between a means and end reigns - the means
wonderful, the end cheap - we exterminate nature. (48)
A common (and “shallow” to use Arne
Næss’ notion from his ‘deep
ecology’ writings) reason for environmental work is
to “prevent erosion of the natural foundations of
existence” (48). The shallow argumentation is (often
tacitly) based on the conception that nature exists to the
best for man only. The reason for such ideas is, according
to Løgstrup, that in the Western culture,
“only need counts, not sensation” (49).
Most of what is said so far can be illustrated in the
figure below. It has four main notions: sensation,
understanding, need and restraint. Løgstrup writes
that the sensation correlates with understanding with
respect of interplay. Need correlates restraint with
respect of tension. In the point of intersection between
all four elements, in the middle of the figure, we find the
human history and culture, the place where our lives take
place (45).
SENSATION
-
lacks distance
-
no human co-operation
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interplay
<---------------->
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UNDERSTANDING
-
adds distance to sensation
-
demands distance
-
withdrawal from universe, but cannot escape it
completely
|
|
History and culture
|
|
NEED
-
satisfied through action and
-
conquest of nature to keep man living
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must be restricted in order to avoid ecological
crisis
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tension
<---------------->
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RESTRAINT
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shame, shyness, respect, recognition, bashfulness,
modesty
|
common with animals
|
exclusively human
|
Løgstrup’s critique of Western modernity is
that the pair NEED--UNDERSTANDING has become too powerful
because the opposite pair SENSATION--RESTRAINT is barely
noticeable. Ethical and political systems that regard
utility as the highest value are hit by this critique.
Løgstrup does not deny that true needs have to be
satisfied to maintain human life on earth. The problem
arises when this utility-idea becomes the only or dominant
value.
The qualities of restraint are to some extent intact in our
culture. Sensation in Løgstrup’s meaning has
however been neglected for centuries. The secondary
qualities of sensation left the natural philosophy and made
thus way for the technological success we have experienced
the last two centuries. It is however easy to mix the
success in itself and the reasons for this success. The
technological triumph may easily be regarded as a proof of
what reality is really about. It is a short way from
functionality to ontology.
Løgstrup thinks that the secondary quality of
sensation is of great importance for something quite
different from technological success, namely if and in what
way we develop technology and how we use it. The secondary
quality, which the pioneer scientists got rid of, is just
what we need to ensure that the products of physics,
chemistry and biology will not destroy this planet as a
home for human beings. Mathematical formulas make no
ethical claims on us. But such come from the secondary
qualities which convey destruction of the beautiful, cry of
terror concerning a hopeless future, cry of pain from
animals which have to suffer to fulfil some artificial
human “need” and cries from starving children
in a man made world where short sighted economical profit
has replaced the love for the neighbour as supreme norm.
The rationality of sensation and restraint
What can Løgstrup then offer in order to build an
ethics for the contemporary technological society? Is it
not just yet another way of widening the scope of the
Kantian imperatives to imply non-human ethical subjects as
well? Albert Schweitzer, Peter Singer, Kenneth Goodpaster
and Arne Næss are among those who have done just that
already (Ariansen, Chap.8). Løgstrup’s
argument is however rather original. His revaluation of the
sensing act combined with the importance of the human
character restraint is important both in person-to-person
relationships, but absolutely also in the man vs. nature
relationship. In a way, Løgstrup breaks with the
common anthropocentric argument for the ethics, without
ending in an egalitarian biocentrism (Andersen, 77).
When Løgstrup introduces notions like shame and
bashfulness in facing the nature, he tries to give us a
positive reason for acting to the best for the environment.
The source of restraint is the sensation, not the
understanding. We are not to be convinced that nature has
some rights that imply some duties to fulfil. The appeal is
directed to feelings and sentiments, made by the sensation
that creates an attuned consciousness (40). This attuned
consciousness requires a response. Our relation to the
nature requires an ability to respond, e.g.
“respons-ability”.
For Christian ethics, this attuned responsibility is quite
familiar. In the probably most powerful ethical text in the
New Testament, Jesus tells the parable about the Good
Samaritan (Luke 10:25-37). In verse 33, it is told about
the Samaritan, “he took pity on him”. This text
can easily be interpreted in a Løgstrupian fashion:
It is the story told by the secondary qualities about the
terrible condition of this robbed person that moves the
Samaritan to his beneficial actions, more than some human
rights this other person might possess. In fact, the
Samaritan had no obligations to help this robbed man
because they were from different tribes. That is just the
point made by Jesus: Despite the lack of rights and (at
least positive) duties between the robbed and the
Samaritan, the Samaritan showed the true meaning of
“loving your neighbour”. Løgstrup would
say, I think, that the only way an ethical demand could be
conveyed were then through the sensation that attuned the
Samaritan's mind (hearth) so that “he took pity on
him”. Others might say, however, that Jesus is making
loving-kindness a duty by telling this parable.
Løgstrup’s writings are no nostalgic
“back-to-nature-ethics”. Understanding,
cleverness and technology are not to be thrown away for the
benefit of sensation, an attuned hearth and shamefulness.
There is no return to a pre-modern society, neither is it
desirable. We shall and must continue to make tools to
maintain life. This activity, however, must be balanced
with a quite different one, but of equal importance, namely
the alliance between understanding, sensation and restraint
where we become responsible for the universal totality.
Like Hans Jonas (Jonas, 26), Løgstrup wants even
more understanding and cleverness into science, but
primarily to make us able to predict and stop the bad side
effects of technology:
Side-effects is much more important than the aim. Not the
aim, as it conceives in the laboratories changes the world.
That is done by the side-effects of the pursuit of the
aim.” (Løgstrup 1983, 22, own translation)
Application of Løgstrup on issues in transport
We introduced this essay by pointing out a conflict between
the environment and the human need for transport of people
and goods. We will now try to apply Løgstrup’s
model on this conflict. To take the last topic first,
Løgstrup’s model could imply that the
side-effect of transport is a long term destruction or
exploitation of the environment as a whole, and several
local incidents of damage of landscape, etc. as well. The
reason for this is the technological spiral: basic needs ?
tools ? technique ? technology ? artificial needs, because
we have neglected the restraint nurtured through the
sensation.
The case is however not that simple. The side effect point
of view points out that a lot of technological mishap,
particularly long-term side effects, was not intended. The
people behind the development of motorization of road
transport might have had the very best intentions for doing
this, having reverence and respect for both the human and
natural environment. The main problem was not lack of
restraint, but lack of knowledge about the effects of the
technology.
The lack-of-restraint argument can be used only when at
least some of the bad side effects of a technology is
known, and ask why we continue using it. In transport
technology, we know about these side effects today. An
answer might be that we use it because we have no choice.
We need these transports and as long as there are no
sufficient economically sound alternatives that are to the
better for the environment, we have to continue using it,
otherwise, we cannot maintain our living standard, the
unemployment might increase, and so forth.
In one respect, we have no choice - to some extent and on
an individual (or small scale) level. As individuals, we
are a piece of puzzle in a very big system. Living in a
sparsely populated countryside with just a few or no public
transport in the area, you just have to use a car to
maintain a fairly normal life, partly because the nearest
shop have moved miles away to a village or town. Our
standards of living are to some extent not chosen but
imposed. Children are being mocked at because of
not-up-to-day clothing. Then parents have to choose between
concern for own children and concern for a more invisible
large-scale environment. We have obligations and
responsibilities both ways. The Løgstrup model gives
little help in such a conflict. This might imply that
Løgstrup’s model is not very well suited when
dealing with individual cases. We shall see, however, that
we face many cases in our personal choice of means of
transportation that the Løgstrup model really gives
direction for an alternative way of living. Before doing
that, we will turn to the political and global level.
If we as individuals were trapped in a bad system, then the
best thing to do would be to do something with the system.
The technological spiral mentioned above end up with
‘artificial needs’. This begs the question when
applied to transport: How much of the transport work is
necessary? To answer such a question, one have to determine
what is necessary and who defines necessity for whom? Thus,
one cannot determine such questions within the transport
area alone, but have to consider the whole way of living.
Things link together. It seems to be easier to point out
some big goals to strive for in transport issues if we are
to save the environment and at the same time maintain
living human societies:
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The distance between place of production and place of
consumption should be reduced drastically.
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It should be a massive shift from means of transport
using non-renewable energy to those using renewable or
less energy consuming non-renewable energy.
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Use of transport technology using non-renewable energy
should be restricted to those with sufficient important
needs.
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The societies should promote attitudes and develop a
sufficient network of public transport so that
individuals are both able to and in fact choose ways and
volume of transportation that is within the
sustainability of the nature.
Much could be said about these goals, but lack of space
forbids it. In the remaining part of this essay, we will
therefore deal with the fourth goal only, and only address
the attitude-part of it.
Virtues of travelling
A proponent of virtue ethics is John McDowell. He writes
that a virtuous person has «an ability to recognize
requirements which situations impose on one’s
behavior.» (McDowell, 333). In case of the
environment, the Løgstrup model would say that
“to recognize requirements which situations
impose” is the same as a proper response to sensation
and restraint. Løgstrup himself can hardly be called
a virtue ethicist (Andersen, 86). However, his elements of
restraint are virtues or at least virtuous.
The Løgstrup model tells us to evaluate our needs
for travelling and to rethink what kind of means of
transportation we should use, chosen among the available
ones. (The content of what is available is a matter for the
society to decide and bring forth.) The needs and the
choices should be evaluated under an open-minded respect
for the nature as our source. “Is my share in the
increased pollution and my part in reducing the amount of
fossil energy less important than the purpose for my
journey?” This is not a utilitarian calculus, but a
deliberation done by a mind that is attuned by the
sensation of the nature, our source. By acting like this,
we take our share of the responsibility for the future of
our planet. By ignoring this, the next generations have to
reduce its polluting journeys more than we need to day.
Aristotle is often reckoned as the “inventor”
of virtue ethics. Virtues are more than good ideas, even
more than good attitudes. It is good acting by habit
(Aristotle, 28). Thus, training a habit is a way to achieve
a virtue. One way to obtain these virtues of travelling, is
thus to train ourselves to travel by train instead of
aeroplane, for instance. When learning a new habit, some
kinds of rules will be helpful until we get the good grasp
at it (Dreyfus, ch.1). Helpful rules in a virtue of travel
spirit, might be like this:
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"Use your own feet or bike in stead of car whenever
practically possible."
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"Take rail transport or bus whenever possible instead of
car."
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"Do not use your car just for fun."
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"Avoid settling in areas where public transport is
difficult or impossible to obtain in order to reach job,
school, kindergarten, necessary shops etc."
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"Consider transport with train, ship, bus etc when
travelling over long distances in stead of by air or
car."
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"Try to make the best out of the more time-consuming
journeys, and find arguments for yourself why this is the
better way of travelling."
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"Try to consider more time-consuming journeys as a gain
of time for you to fill with whatever is meaningful to
you, and not as an annoying loss of time."
It is not new to talk about virtues and environmental
ethics. Onora O’Neill does that in her book
“Towards justice and virtue” from 1996. Under
the heading “Varieties of social virtue”, she
writes:
“These ‘green virtues’ are not to be
identified with a determinate set of highly specific
policies, projects or activities, but rather with the
rejection of policies or attitudes that express
indifference to natural and man-made environments in ways
that are realistic rather than sentimental for actual
situations.” (O’Neill, 204).
She might find my rules for virtues of travelling a bit too
specific, but they are only meant as one step on the way to
be virtuous with respect of travelling. She might also find
the Løgstrup model both too sentimental and
problematic because of his metaphysical starting points,
which she rejects per se, at least for her own project
(O’Neill, 203 note 15, among others). She
differentiates between realism and the
“sentimental”. I find Løgstrup realistic
in not rejecting the technology as a whole, but rejecting
only the abuse of it. Løgstrup, however, finds the
sensation, and thus the attuned mind, as an important way
to get knowledge about life hostile technologies. However,
if she by “sentimental” means "nostalgic", I am
sure Løgstrup would agree to this rejection. The
metaphysical starting points are however, a real
difference, even if Løgstrup thinks he is writing
for a common audience, not a religious congregation only.
He admits his starting points by putting the subtitle
“metaphysics” on his book. The great question,
however, is if it is possible to develop an ethics for a
technological age without any starting points?
Litterature
Andersen, Svend (1995) Løgstrup. Fredriksberg,
Forlaget ANIS
Ariansen, Per (1992) Miljøfilosofi, en
innføring. Universitetsforlaget, Oslo
Aristotle (1980) The Nicomachean Ethics. Translation by
David Ross (1925). Oxford University Press, Oxford, New
York.1980.
Dreyfus, Hubert & Stuart (1986) Mind over Machine. The
Power of Human Intuition and Expertise in the Era of the
Computer. Basil Blackwell, Oxford
Jonas, Hans (1984) The Imperative of Responsibility. In
search of an ethics for the Technological Age. University
of Chicago Press, Chicago & London. Orig: Das Prinzip
Verantwortung. Frankfurt 1979.
Løgstrup, Knud E. (1976) Skabelse og
tilintetgørelse, Religionsfilosofiske betragtninger.
Metafysik IV. Gyldendal, København
Løgstrup, Knud E. (1983) System og symbol, Essays,
side 246, Gyldendal, København
Løgstrup, Knud E. (1984) Ophav og omgivelse.
Betragtninger over historie og natur. Metafysik III,
Gyldendal, København
Løgstrup, Knud E. (1995) Metaphysics. Volume II.
Marquette University Press, Milwaukee. (Translation by
Russell L. Dees of excerpts from “Ophav og
omgivelse” [1984], “Vidde og
prægnans” [1976], “Kunst og
erkendelse” [1976] and “System og symbol”
[1983])
McDowell, John (1979) "Virtue and reason" in Monist 62, pp
331-50
O’Neill, Onora (1996) Towards justice and virtue. A
constructive account of practical reasoning, Cambridge
University Press, Cambridge
Notes
1) This paper was
written for the course "Towards Justice and Virtue"
15.-19.4.1997 in the Norwegian Ethics Programme. Commented
and considered "satisfactory" by Dr. Onora O'Neill,
principal at Newnham College, Cambridge, UK.
2) Dees’
translation uses this rare word for the Danish
‘indfældt’. Another translation could be
‘inlayed’ or ‘inserted’. The
meaning is that something fits perfectly to its
environment, like a piece in a jigsaw puzzle.
3) The translation is
erroneous here. It has skipped the words that are placed in
the brackets.
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