Love and marriage, love and marriage
They go together like a horse and carriage
This I tell you, brother
You can't have one without the other.
Lyrics by Sammy Cahn, sang by Frank Sinatra.
It is a bit like Fish & Chips, the popular English fast food, a binomial. And yet it is a sure bet you have never heard that before of Philosophy and Democracy. You may not even have thought that philosophy and democracy were linked, except that both were invented by the ancient Greeks.
And you were right, in a way; philosophy and democracy are opposites of each other, even though closely connected. And, unlike what you see in the modern world, you cannot have one without the other.
In democracy: one man rises up and says 'Follow me, and I will be your leader, and I will take all the right decisions and do all the right things for you.' And the masses reply, 'No thank you, we do not need you to lead us; we want to decide for ourselves what to do.'
But philosophy is the exact opposite. The masses rise up and agree between themselves and decide, not what to do this time, but what they think is true or what is right. But then a lone man, just one man, stands up and says - he does not say listen to me because I know better, that is not philosophy - but he says, 'Just follow my thinking for one moment.' And that one man takes the crowd, step by step, into a line of logical reasoning, so they too can see the truth for themselves.
So opposites of each other but they balance each other out, and therefore must co-exist. The first is about what to do, the second is about what is true. You cannot have the hoi polloi (Greek for 'the many') decide complex issues of what is right or true, that is a matter of lengthy deep and profound, perhaps scientific thought, not a matter of discussion subject to points of view, where the ignorant can have an equal say and even influence the conclusion. But neither should you have a master, no matter how wise and learned, impose his will on the many as to what to do, no matter how ignorant they may be. Truth is the same for everyone whether they agree or not, regardless of all other considerations, it is unchangeable like the laws of physics, and philosophy is a method for discovering absolute truth, a new discipline as rigorous as modern science. In fact Greek philosophy formed the basis for subsequent science.
This is important to stress: the philosopher will never claim to speak from a position of authority or because he is 'qualified' on the subject. Socrates, Plato, Aristotle never claimed to be. The philosopher relies on logic and reason to demonstrate truth, which should then become self-evident, like shining a light on things that were there already, even though previously unseen in the darkness. He shines a light where there was ignorance. Socrates compared his philosophical method to midwifery, helping his listener to give birth to the truth himself (with the help of questions,) not telling him - indeed, he never claimed to know, but only to search. The truth was the listener's own baby.
In democracy the masses may claim to be wise and knowing while totally wrong. Therefore, democracy must only decide the affairs of daily life, the more mundane stuff of running a state for the common good, whereas philosophy concerns itself with what is true for all time.
Thus the Greeks recognised that what human beings want may not necessarily be based on absolute truth but on more earthy considerations. The masses might not even want what is best for themselves, in full knowledge of what that is, such as a perfectly healthy lifestyle, longevity, the pursuit of knowledge and art, or the perfect athletic body, and nobody should impose such things on them.
Once again, we see that philosophy could only have been invented in parallel with democracy, it needed the freedom of democracy for philosophers to speak without fear of punishment, and the climate for that was unique in ancient Greece because both philosophers and the general masses shared a common, genetically inherited preference for reason and logic as opposed to dogma from above. So the masses would have been receptive to reasoning and new ideas, if based on logic, rather than opposing them with ignorance and brutal force. There was no need for force because, in a state where democracy and philosophy co-existed, your free speech as an ordinary citizen counted as much as that of the great and the good, and the ancient Greeks would listen to you in equal measure without asking who you were or what your qualifications or your position in society, just as long as what you said stood up to reason and logic. Only in a climate of democracy could you have that, hence philosophy flourished in democratic Athens. Today, as soon as you try to open your mouth, the first thing you are asked is who you are and what is your area of professional expertise. Without the ancient Greeks, our modern age could never have given birth to either philosophy or democracy. And this is another way philosophy and democracy were related, in that philosophy was democratic, open to anyone, and democracy embraced philosophy, instead of opposing it. The perfect married couple.
This is also why democracy was the invention of geniuses. Because it gave illiterate peasants the same power as the great and the good. Who would have thought of that? It was the very opposite of what had been practised for thousands of years by everyone previously. Surely those who know better should decide what is to be done? But not in democracy. Only geniuses could think so counter-intuitively and still be right. Democracy was based on the freedom of the individual to live his own life productively as he chose, within the law, allowing the state to function without conflict, which conflict would have been inevitable, if oppressive measures were imposed on citizens by force, to the detriment of the state itself. It follows also that conflict was seen as undesirable, a waste of effort, when most other rulers of the time saw it as the natural order of things, and force as a way of controlling the masses.
But what if the masses strayed into issues they knew nothing about? The answer to that was, not force, but philosophy. To repeat, democracy and philosophy were opposites of each other, but you needed both.
Even on practical decisions, as to what should be done, democracy can be misapplied, if divorced from philosophical thinking. By way of illustration, a family cannot decide where to go on holiday by taking a 'democratic' vote - they do not all have the same responsibilities or the same knowledge for the good of everyone. If a family care about each other, they will decide through the philosophical process of Syzitisis, (See philosophy) where everyone's feelings are taken into account, but some, inevitably know what is best for the less experienced, and for the family purse.
And the same principle applies elsewhere. Crowds can be carried away and think they know best in questions other than functional issues. And this is where the lone voice has to stand up, to hold them back, to interrogate them, to set their thinking straight - but, to repeat, not by persuasion, not by rhetoric or passion, nor by authority - that would not be philosophy - but only through logic and reason. Crowds sometimes will demand to be left alone to do any stupid thing they like, and so they should, if they agree collectively, just as long as philosophers are there to make them aware of what they are doing, and of better choices. If democracy was unchecked, the masses might, and still do today, make all kinds of wrong decisions, mobs can even kill innocent people, so any group also needs philosophers to make them aware of their errors of judgement. But the final choice on practical decisions must lie with the masses where, one hopes, the majority will see sense, just as issues of right-or-wrong must lie with philosophy. On the other hand, if philosophy was left unchecked, it might impose on the masses an inappropriate burden, which may be beneficial in theory but makes life unbearable for ordinary citizens in the short term. If either democracy or philosophy were allowed to override the other on the wrong question, the result would always be unsatisfactory.
A perfect example of such a conflict was after the Second World War when the British government placed advertisements in the West Indies for much needed immigrants to come and work in Britain, giving the impression they would be warmly welcome. So some wonderful, young black people, smartly dressed and with high hopes, arrived in numbers, eager to help. But the British government had failed to consult the masses, the British public, an island people mostly hostile to all foreigners, some racists especially so towards black people. And so those immigrants were subjected to horrendous abuse and discrimination, not to mention a very difficult life for themselves and their descendants in Britain for generations. So, philosophically, the British government had been right to invite those people, but this invitation was in direct conflict with the democratic will of the masses who should have been consulted and their will upheld, or at least better informed with the opportunity to change, well ahead of the decision. Instead, much unnecessary suffering resulted.
It follows also that, where democracy and philosophy coexist, you cannot keep on fighting for what you believe, no matter how passionately, if your beliefs are soundly contradicted; you have to submit, either to the will of the people as to what to do, or to those who have shown your beliefs to be philosophically unsound, depending on what the question is.
SHOULD MEN HAVE THE VOTE?
Not in philosophy. As we set out above, democracy was never intended as a means of arriving at the truth. The Greeks invented democracy as the best means of governing a state, not for finding truth.
It is pointless, as often seen on television, to take a vote 'just to see what people think.' Equally pointless is to stop random individuals in the street and ask them for an opinion, sometimes on the most complex of issues. Really? That is fatal. It is neither philosophical nor democratic. It is commonly done and can be of ephemeral interest, but it is quite dangerous, by leading people to believe that, if the majority think so, it must be right, and so a false belief is propagated. We have come to live in a world of 'fake news' and 'soundbites,' and still nobody even mentions false beliefs. In a world where popular media, let alone social media, dominate the way people think and influence what most people believe, it is tempting to go for a quick answer to every question, but this will never resolve any kind of issue satisfactorily.
DEMOCRACY GONE ALL WRONG
Back to our song then, you cannot have one without the other. You will see this error today when Western armies invade countries with the most brutal dictatorships to liberate them, and then impose genuinely free elections, democracy, as they see it, on those countries, not always with success. Civil wars or dysfunction may follow because there is no common agreement amongst the population on the broader issues as to what is right and true. Those societies lack the discipline of philosophy, in other words they lack individuals who can reason with the masses from a non-political, non-religious, non-adversarial, non-partisan, disinterested standpoint, as to what is universally right and true. What such failed societies have instead is either religious dogma, or political leaders, often with guns, not open to logic and reason either, but bent on power. Even in Western so-called democracies, most problems arise when decisions as to what to do become a matter of political dogma, or, conversely, when right-and-wrong is put to a vote.
E.M.Forster came up with the intentionally humorous title Two Cheers for Democracy for a book of essays, suggesting a number of faults. Democracy is not good at electing a government, it is poor at doing that. As practised today, democracy is better at getting rid of unwanted governments. Conversely, democracy is not the overthrow of authority by force, as in revolutions, another form of dictatorship. As intended by the Greeks, democracy meant the citizens making decisions constructively, not destroying. Democracy is the demand that all authority lies with the general citizens, and if they have delegated authority, that it be fully and directly accountable to the ordinary citizens for everything it does, everything it says. The short termism of democracy as practised in the modern era will always push politicians to do anything that wins elections at the cost of what is right long-term. Politicians in modern democracies have powers to override both philosophical truth and the will of the masses on occasion. Hence, true democracy is not the casting of a vote every few years. In ancient Athens, a true democracy, the citizens took the decisions directly.
I was heckled once with, "Did women have the vote in ancient Athens?" Met with the only possible reply, "Democracy was invented, not discovered." The heckler had supposed that 'the vote' was just there, like the air we breathe, freely available to all but subject to withholding it wrongly. However, 'the vote' did not pre-exist, in order for it to be withheld from women. This was the first time ever ordinary citizens made decisions on a daily basis directly on every issue, instead of voting for this or that political party. Men had always gathered together in public places for all sorts of purposes, and now this was used to exercise direct decision making for the city. Even so, in today's language (post women's-lib,) every single woman, mother, wife, sister or daughter in ancient Athens had a direct representative in government, like their own personal Member of Parliament, their own men, something no other women have today. Women then lived within families, and it was unlikely their own men would make decisions to cause their own families to suffer. Greek civilisation, and therefore our civilisation, might have looked very different, if both men and women in ancient Athens had left their homes and spent every day deciding what was mostly functional issues - remember, questions of truth were not a matter for democracy (see above) - would we still have everything else that ancient Greece produced? Men were left to do the former, to run the sewers, so to speak, whereas women dealt with the more important stuff of family life in a society where the rearing of children as good men, women and good citizens was considered very important. Typical Greek, in that 'the vote' was not seen as a symbol of emancipation and equality, not a symbol at all, but as the reality it was, just a tool, like horse-carts, sandals or oil-jars. Plato, an Athenian, wrote that women could govern as effectively as men and had the same reasoning powers. He also said, a society that does not educate women is like a man who only trains one arm. So it was not a matter of prejudice or discrimination that only men voted. It goes without saying that today all women should be able to vote in equal measure; today democracy is practised through elected representatives, rather than directly, and women should have equal rights in all.
cf. A personal note from
the editor.
A SUBSTITUTE FOR DEMOCRACY?
It follows from the above that democracy is not suitable for the nations of today where the population is made up of disparate peoples with opposing goals or fundamental beliefs, different 'philosophies' in common parlance. Democracy was designed for a state where the population was fairly uniform, and the state simply governed the essential services in society, from the drains to roads and public buildings, without consideration of personal or religious beliefs, without disguising political aims as a matter of philosophical truth.
You may recall that the Arab Spring from 2010 onwards did not result in peaceful democracy in those countries. In Egypt there were two equally popular but opposing revolutions, almost simultaneously. Syria split up into several warring segments. Why did that happen? Because attempts at democracy did not have philosophy to counter-balance it. There was only religious dogma, the exact opposite of logic and reason which demands free thinking and free speech. Their attempts at democracy had been divorced from such freedoms, with occasional or even phoney elections, nothing like the Athenian democracy of a free people.
How can you have the freedoms necessary for democracy in countries where, inside private homes, husbands allow no freedom to their wives, women allow themselves no freedom of dress when finally given the choice, mothers force religious dogma on their sons or freely choose to travel away in order to marry husbands who give them no freedom, or where men reject free thinking for themselves in favour of religious dogma? Such homes can not produce free thinkers open to reason and to the democratic will of the majority. Pre-election campaigning, as enforced on such countries by foreign armies at gunpoint, does not count as free thinking nor freedom of speech. It is extraordinary that the ancient Greeks understood the relationship between democracy and free thought (as in philosophy) two and a half thousand years ago but many still do not understand this today.
You may think you know what freedom means but, if you live in a Western democracy, your idea came directly from the Greeks. Previously, it had meant not being a slave or under foreign occupation. Freedom of thought and freedom of speech had not been invented yet and would have sounded very strange concepts to most peoples of the world at the time. What, just anyone can stand up and tell us what to think? It was philosophy, the pursuit of truth, combined with democracy, which empowered the common citizen, which defined your idea of freedom for the individual.
So what will happen to such countries with such disparate populations, a mixture of Christians, Muslims, Sunni or Shia, or of different ethnic groups with conflicting cultures? Is it even possible to have a stable society without democracy and philosophy? Maybe in future, out of the Arab, and later the Chinese turmoils to come, a new system of government will emerge which may deliver relative social and economic stability without the freedoms we take for granted in the West, with occasional or even phoney elections, but it will never be as good as the Athenian democracy of a free people. Even Western democracies are at risk from the concept of multi-cultural societies where, eventually, there may be loss of common ground and force may become necessary to re-impose state rule, something very undemocratic.
But the greatest danger to the survival of modern Western democracy or any new system in the East is not economic but population growth. No economic or political system can deliver health and prosperity to an ever-growing population on a finite planet already impoverished environmentally. Resources are running out. This is where philosophy can play its role, if it can achieve the biggest U-turn in popular democratic thinking, so that we restrict ourselves the freedoms related to producing babies, including demands for never-ending economic growth, sexual abandon and limitless reproduction. Democracy will never achieve that, and it would condemn us to just reusing plastic bottles as the solution.
Perfect example of why you cannot have one without the other - democracy and philosophy must always coexist
© John K Smyrniotis
London 2019
