Face it. We all have some perspectives that allow us to account for the phenomena in our lives in ways that differ from those of our neighbors. “We” see the world. “They” see the world. However, we might act in unison even though we start from different assumptions and have those different perspectives. Is it possible that each of us operates under a principle that “if it works, it’s good enough for me”? But the process which allows individuals to accept erroneous explanations of phenomena is very much like putting the conclusion cart before the reasoning horse. It is also a utilitarian process in which the ends justify the means. Countries face that dilemma all the time when they work together on some issues (such as N. Korea’s nuclear weapon development) while they oppose one another on other international issues.
Take explanations of eclipses for an example of “if it works” (I know; you’re asking, “Where’s this going?” Patience. Patience).
In 2017 eclipse fever swept across North America, and millions people went outside to watch a darkening sky. Astronomers would like to think that many—if not all—people know that the moon orbits Earth at an average distance of about 239,000 miles, and that the moon has a diameter less than the distance between New York and San Francisco. Many people probably also know that the sun is farther away than the moon, and that is why it looks about the same size, even though the sun could hold millions of moons in its interior. And many people understand that the moon’s shadow can fall on Earth just as the moon can lie in the shadow of Earth. But for the many people who don’t understand Earth-Sun-moon relationships, there are still explanations of eclipses that work, if only for them. Go back to Aelfric’s time for an example. About a millennium ago in England, someone, maybe Aelfric (955-1025) himself, wrote the following description of an eclipse of the moon:
“Woruldlice uðwitan sædon, {þæt} seo sceadu astihð up oð ðæt heo becymð to þære lyfte ufeweardan, and þonne be yrnð se mona hwiltidum þonne he full byð on ðære sceade ufeweardre, and faggeteð oððe mid ealle asweartað, for þam þe he næfð þære sunnan leoht þa hwile þe he þære sceade ord ofer yrnð oð ðæt þære sunnan leoman hine eft onlihton.”*
Now, just in case your Anglo-Saxon is a bit rusty, suffice it to say that the author explains that the moon falls in the shadow of Earth as the Sun orbits Earth (apparently, going beneath Earth and then above it in a daily pattern). According to the thinking of the time, the shadow on the moon goes away when the Sun continues to swing around our planet to light the moon (sunnan leoman hine eft onlihton). From the assumption of a geocentric Solar System and the perspective of a medieval mind, the explanation “worked.” It worked just fine.
Obviously, medieval science is wrong for our times, but it had an element of modern knowledge, and an element of “truth” is usually hidden in “if it works.” Apparently, the 10-11th-century author knew that the moon reflected, rather than generated its own light and that somehow the shadow of Earth was involved in a lunar eclipse. Significantly, the medieval writer reached the same conclusion that we know as fact today: Earth can cast a shadow on the moon. If we ignore the actual details modern science has provided since the times of Copernicus and Galileo and our visits to the moon, then we can acknowledge that “if it works” can actually “work” to explain natural phenomena. But it can also give us some trouble when we use it to deal with human phenomena.
Let’s apply “if it works” to human affairs because you already know those Earth-Sun-moon relationships. How about an example of “if it works” causing some trouble? When the Supreme Court ruled negatively in the Dred Scott case in 1857 (three months before his “owner” freed him and his family), it seem to echo the thinking processes of the Anglo-Saxon writer. E. S. Corwin explained the Court’s decision this way:
“When the student finds six judges arriving at precisely the same result by three distinct processes of reasoning, he is naturally disposed to surmise that the result may have induced the processes rather than the processes compelling the reasoning.”**
The decision of the Court occurred at a tumultuous time in American politics, and it was apparently influenced not by the Constitution from which reasoning should have begun as much as it was by regional conflicts about slavery and the loyalties of the justices to their respective regions of origin. The context of the Dred Scott case also included the issue of slavery in territories like Kansas and Nebraska and the legitimacy of the Missouri Compromise. The Chief Justice was a Southerner in favor of slavery, and President Buchanan, a Pennsylvanian not wanting to stir any pot of rebellion, supposedly convinced another justice to vote with the majority to avoid furthering tensions between North and South. The end was the justification; so, if the decision worked as Buchanan wanted, then it would reduce tensions in the South.
So, back in 1857 the Court arrived at a process that affirmed a result, very much in the manner of the Medieval mind that wrote about a lunar eclipse. Southern values could be explained at the time by Southerners; northern values, by Northerners. New territories were moons eclipsed by both. In choosing one result over the other, the Dred Scott decision cast a shadow that eclipsed the Constitution and led in part to the darkness of the Civil War. But for the Supreme Court Justices, Southerners, and President Buchanan, the tri-fold reasoning and result, however faulty, worked.
“If it works” is a utilitarian’s methodology. Whenever “if it works” makes little difference in the lives of others, such as in explaining how an eclipse of the moon occurs, there’s no problem. All of us probably walk around in some darkness while we believe we see the light. But putting a conclusion before reasoning in regard to human affairs can be devastating to individuals, as it was to Dred Scott. And we know that the decision stirred other tensions.
Our problem as an intelligent species is that we like to explain, but we often explain on the bases of faulty reasoning or information. Still, if we think “it works,” then we accept the explanation. Thus, today, we see numerous explanations for human interactions that are based on assumptions and perspectives acceptable to one group, but unacceptable to another. Both believe their explanations work.
Maybe we will someday as a species understand how we are influenced by a philosophy of “if it works.” It’s been hundreds of years since Copernicus and Galileo, however, and there are still people around the world who think we live on a flat world around which the sun and moon travel. If we can’t get together on an explanation as simple as the processes that make an eclipse, how are we going to agree on those processes and ways of thinking on which we differ but on which we will sometimes agree because the end appears “to work”?
The Anglo-Saxon quotation above begins with “Woruldlice uðwitan sædon” (“Worldly philosophers said”). All philosophers—all of us—explain the darkness that envelopes our species’ interactions in ways that work for us. And probably all of us reconcile on the grounds of an end that seems, if only temporarily, to work.
*Found in Earle, John. Anglo-Saxon Literature, New York. E. & J. B. Young & Co., 1884. p. 246.
Online at http://www.gutenberg.org/files/17101/17101-h/17101-h.htm#pg150
** Garraty, John A. The American Nation to 1877: A History of the United States. New York. American Heritage Publishing Co., Inc., 1966, p. 389.
Take explanations of eclipses for an example of “if it works” (I know; you’re asking, “Where’s this going?” Patience. Patience).
In 2017 eclipse fever swept across North America, and millions people went outside to watch a darkening sky. Astronomers would like to think that many—if not all—people know that the moon orbits Earth at an average distance of about 239,000 miles, and that the moon has a diameter less than the distance between New York and San Francisco. Many people probably also know that the sun is farther away than the moon, and that is why it looks about the same size, even though the sun could hold millions of moons in its interior. And many people understand that the moon’s shadow can fall on Earth just as the moon can lie in the shadow of Earth. But for the many people who don’t understand Earth-Sun-moon relationships, there are still explanations of eclipses that work, if only for them. Go back to Aelfric’s time for an example. About a millennium ago in England, someone, maybe Aelfric (955-1025) himself, wrote the following description of an eclipse of the moon:
“Woruldlice uðwitan sædon, {þæt} seo sceadu astihð up oð ðæt heo becymð to þære lyfte ufeweardan, and þonne be yrnð se mona hwiltidum þonne he full byð on ðære sceade ufeweardre, and faggeteð oððe mid ealle asweartað, for þam þe he næfð þære sunnan leoht þa hwile þe he þære sceade ord ofer yrnð oð ðæt þære sunnan leoman hine eft onlihton.”*
Now, just in case your Anglo-Saxon is a bit rusty, suffice it to say that the author explains that the moon falls in the shadow of Earth as the Sun orbits Earth (apparently, going beneath Earth and then above it in a daily pattern). According to the thinking of the time, the shadow on the moon goes away when the Sun continues to swing around our planet to light the moon (sunnan leoman hine eft onlihton). From the assumption of a geocentric Solar System and the perspective of a medieval mind, the explanation “worked.” It worked just fine.
Obviously, medieval science is wrong for our times, but it had an element of modern knowledge, and an element of “truth” is usually hidden in “if it works.” Apparently, the 10-11th-century author knew that the moon reflected, rather than generated its own light and that somehow the shadow of Earth was involved in a lunar eclipse. Significantly, the medieval writer reached the same conclusion that we know as fact today: Earth can cast a shadow on the moon. If we ignore the actual details modern science has provided since the times of Copernicus and Galileo and our visits to the moon, then we can acknowledge that “if it works” can actually “work” to explain natural phenomena. But it can also give us some trouble when we use it to deal with human phenomena.
Let’s apply “if it works” to human affairs because you already know those Earth-Sun-moon relationships. How about an example of “if it works” causing some trouble? When the Supreme Court ruled negatively in the Dred Scott case in 1857 (three months before his “owner” freed him and his family), it seem to echo the thinking processes of the Anglo-Saxon writer. E. S. Corwin explained the Court’s decision this way:
“When the student finds six judges arriving at precisely the same result by three distinct processes of reasoning, he is naturally disposed to surmise that the result may have induced the processes rather than the processes compelling the reasoning.”**
The decision of the Court occurred at a tumultuous time in American politics, and it was apparently influenced not by the Constitution from which reasoning should have begun as much as it was by regional conflicts about slavery and the loyalties of the justices to their respective regions of origin. The context of the Dred Scott case also included the issue of slavery in territories like Kansas and Nebraska and the legitimacy of the Missouri Compromise. The Chief Justice was a Southerner in favor of slavery, and President Buchanan, a Pennsylvanian not wanting to stir any pot of rebellion, supposedly convinced another justice to vote with the majority to avoid furthering tensions between North and South. The end was the justification; so, if the decision worked as Buchanan wanted, then it would reduce tensions in the South.
So, back in 1857 the Court arrived at a process that affirmed a result, very much in the manner of the Medieval mind that wrote about a lunar eclipse. Southern values could be explained at the time by Southerners; northern values, by Northerners. New territories were moons eclipsed by both. In choosing one result over the other, the Dred Scott decision cast a shadow that eclipsed the Constitution and led in part to the darkness of the Civil War. But for the Supreme Court Justices, Southerners, and President Buchanan, the tri-fold reasoning and result, however faulty, worked.
“If it works” is a utilitarian’s methodology. Whenever “if it works” makes little difference in the lives of others, such as in explaining how an eclipse of the moon occurs, there’s no problem. All of us probably walk around in some darkness while we believe we see the light. But putting a conclusion before reasoning in regard to human affairs can be devastating to individuals, as it was to Dred Scott. And we know that the decision stirred other tensions.
Our problem as an intelligent species is that we like to explain, but we often explain on the bases of faulty reasoning or information. Still, if we think “it works,” then we accept the explanation. Thus, today, we see numerous explanations for human interactions that are based on assumptions and perspectives acceptable to one group, but unacceptable to another. Both believe their explanations work.
Maybe we will someday as a species understand how we are influenced by a philosophy of “if it works.” It’s been hundreds of years since Copernicus and Galileo, however, and there are still people around the world who think we live on a flat world around which the sun and moon travel. If we can’t get together on an explanation as simple as the processes that make an eclipse, how are we going to agree on those processes and ways of thinking on which we differ but on which we will sometimes agree because the end appears “to work”?
The Anglo-Saxon quotation above begins with “Woruldlice uðwitan sædon” (“Worldly philosophers said”). All philosophers—all of us—explain the darkness that envelopes our species’ interactions in ways that work for us. And probably all of us reconcile on the grounds of an end that seems, if only temporarily, to work.
*Found in Earle, John. Anglo-Saxon Literature, New York. E. & J. B. Young & Co., 1884. p. 246.
Online at http://www.gutenberg.org/files/17101/17101-h/17101-h.htm#pg150
** Garraty, John A. The American Nation to 1877: A History of the United States. New York. American Heritage Publishing Co., Inc., 1966, p. 389.
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