[MD] I'm an Asshole

[Matt Kundert]

Oddly enough, I once gave a defense of using "asshole" 
as opposed to "irrationalist," cousin of relativism, as a 
more effective rhetorical strategy.

Of course, none of this means anything in this context 
because, though Marsha doesn't believe me when I say 
I'm on her side, I still think I'm on her side--but now 
more because it just seems to piss her off.  Talking the 
way I do, being authentic to myself, and my perspective, 
being me: these things seem to piss Marsha off and 
make her think I'm attempting to disembowel her 
hard-fought for sense of respect.  Hell, as much as she 
may want, she's not even alone in this: almost everyone 
here thinks I'm a poseur because of the academic lilt to 
my textual voice.  But that's just me.  Philosophologist, 
for Pirsig, stands for "inauthentic philosopher," but what 
happens to the poor schlub who's just authentically 
being inauthentic?  Is he just cursed, then?

That might be projection, but it's easier than the 
herniated disk I suffered trying to figure out how Marsha 
gets from what I say to her own responses.

Matt

-----

Are You Irrational or an Asshole

A little anecdote: I have this beat up copy of Bernard 
Williams’ Ethics and the Limits of Philosophy.
I get most 
of my books used and, living in a university town, most 
of
them were formerly in the possession of students, 
students who like to
mark the hell out of them. Most 
people have no idea what they’re
marking, and many 
of the marks are a bunch of underlining and circling
in 
ballpoint pen which makes it hard to read the book. 
Annoying to be
sure, but for a quarter of the price, it 
ends up being worth it (so I
keep telling myself). The 
second chapter of Williams’ book is entitled
“The 
Archimedean Point.” In this chapter, Williams asks 
what kind of
rock hard, root bottom, 
this-has-to-be-the-way-it-is could be used
against 
ethical skeptics and amoralists. In the beginning of the

chapter Williams poses his quandary: “Unless the ethical 
life, or (more
narrowly) morality, can be justified by 
philosophy, we shall be open to
relativism, amoralism, 
and disorder. As they often put it: when an
amoralist 
calls ethical considerations in doubt, and suggests that

there is no reason to follow the requirements of morality, 
what can we say to him?”[1]
Williams quite rightly sees 
he’s in a tough spot because this
amoralist, like Callicles 
in dialogue with Plato, “has a glistening
contempt for 
philosophy itself, and it is only by condescension or to

amuse himself that he stays to listen to its arguments at 
all.”[2]
The likely response to such a contempt is, “the 
question is not whether
he will be convinced, but whether 
he ought to be convinced.”[3]

“But is it?”[4] Williams sees that to say that the amoralist 
ought to be convinced is saying that “the justification of 
the ethical life could be a force.”[5]
The question, then, is 
“Why are they supposed to be listening? What
will the 
professor’s justification do, when they break down the 
door,
smash his spectacles, take him away?”[6] That is a 
good question. So, Williams asks what is meant by “ought.”
Is
it meant only that it would be a good thing if he 
were convinced? It
would no doubt be a good thing 
for us, but that is hardly the point. Is
it meant to be 
a good thing for him? Is he being imprudent, for

instance, acting against his own best interests? Or is 
he being
irrational in a more abstract sense, 
contradicting himself or going
against the rules of 
logic? And if he is, why must he worry about that?[7]As
it happens, Williams doesn’t have the last bit, “why 
must he worry
about that,” italicized. But it’s something I 
would want to italicize,
and apparently I’m not the only 
one who thinks it important because the
previous owner 
had underlined that bit of the sentence. Why must he

worry about that? Why must the amoralist worry about 
contradicting
himself or going against the rules of logic, 
why must he worry about
being irrational, in this 
abstract sense? The punch line to this
anecdote is that 
Williams goes on to quote from Robert Nozick’s book, 
Philosophical Explanations,
a bit about how the “immoral 
man” might respond to his being told that
he’s inconsistent: 
“To tell you the truth, if I had to make the choice,
I would 
give up being consistent.”[8]
At the end of this block 
quote, ending in this choice, my previous
owner has 
written “—because he’s an asshole”. Why would someone 
give up
being consistent? Because he’s an asshole.

No doubt a flip
remark, but what if we took it seriously? 
Going back to Williams’
question, “Why must he worry 
about that?,” you can say you’d only worry
about that if 
you didn’t want to be an asshole. But who are
these 
assholes? Is being an asshole different from being 
irrational? My
previous owner, that silent, invisible 
interlocutor, didn’t write down
that Nozick’s immoral 
man was being irrational, but that he was being
an 
asshole. What’s the difference then? To capture the 
unintended force
of my playful, I’m-imagining-exasperated 
student, someone who’s a
little tired of all the abstract 
contrariness that seems to exude from
the very pores of 
philosophy, I think the difference is that being
“irrational” 
means being contrary to the rules of logic, while being an

“asshole” means being contrary to the rules of conversation.

This
difference captures the difference between a Rortyan, 
pragmatist
reading of ethics and morality and an objectivist, 
foundationalist
reading. When Williams says that “a limited 
benevolent or altruistic
sentiment may move almost anyone 
to think that he should act in a
certain way on a given 
occasion, but that fact does not present him with the ethical”[9]

(another line underlined by my former owner), that “the 
ethical
involves more, a whole network of considerations, 
and the ethical
skeptic could have a life that ignored such 
considerations altogether,”[10]
the pragmatist is wont to 
reply that this “limited benevolent or
altruistic sentiment” 
would probably keep a person from kicking down
your door 
and breaking your glasses, and that this, then, is all we

need. When the objectivist opposes the ethical to sentiment, 
morality
to prudence, the pragmatist tries to blur these 
differences and say
that they are not a difference in kind, 
but only in degree.[11]

For
the pragmatist, being called irrational is an abstract 
scare tactic
that has as much force as the Golden Rule: 
people would like to live by
it, but they consistently 
ignore it everyday of their lives. However,
being called 
an asshole is a less abstract scare tactic, one that has

more force because it is more specific and particular 
than the Golden
Rule. When confronted with a 
contradiction in our thinking, oftentimes
we are liable to 
shrug it off, the thought being that we could untangle
it 
if we had more time. That is, in fact, what Rorty 
suggests can be
cone with most contradictions, given 
time and ingenuity. But when
you're called an asshole, 
you're presented with something much more
presently 
forceful, something that must be attended to now. 
Rather than
being presented with the emptied out 
rational, you are presented with
the embodied ethical. 
Some people don't care if they are assholes, and
so 
would remain unaffected, just as Williams suggests, 
that the only
people that feel the force of the ethical 
are those that already embody
it. But in the actual, 
workaday conversations we have with people, who

wants to talk to an asshole? Should we feel bad if 
nobody then talks to
them?
 		 	   		  
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