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The Ethics Of Ambiguity Accessories
The Ethics Of Ambiguity Reviews
The Ethics of Ambiguity is a first rate philosophical study, and important contribution to ethics, that demonstrates the radical freedom proclaimed by existentialists to carry with it ethical responsibilities. The insight that the essence of human being is freedom, or that we are just what we make of ourselves and there are no absolutes does not lead to nihilism, but rather to the recognition that we are answerable to the others with whom we must collaborate in the construction of human existence.
The core of the book is in the second chapter, where Beauvoir outlines a progressively more adequate series of responses to the awareness of freedom. The child can remain ignorant of the ways in which her choices reflect back upon her, and begin imperceptibly to define who she is and determine a destiny; but in adolescence we all grasp, in varying degrees, that if who we are has been shaped by the free and somewhat arbitrary choices of our parents and guardians, who we will become is up to us. It's easy, at that point, to deny or reject our freedom and fall into complacency or routine, but to do so is to be not fully human, a "sub-man" who rejects responsibility and lives just to live and according to habit. Such are easily manipulated by trends and marketing and political slogans of whatever content.
The first stage along the way of accepting freedom, according to Beauvoir, more pernicious perhaps but still an advance on the "sub-man," is what she calls the "serious man": the one who subordinates freedom to a cause - a war, an ideal, a gang, a program or a religion - whatever it is, and embraces that cause as if it were the one and only thing worth choosing, as if choice itself were not what matters and as if any and all freedoms that stand in the way of the cause are to be suppressed.
Beauvoir outlines a series of "ways of being" - the adventurer, the passionate person, the lover, the artist and intellectual - each of which can be understood as overcoming the deficiencies of the prior, in living up to the demands of freedom. Ultimately, she argues, to be free involves dedicating oneself to the cause of freedom, realizing some good that allows others also to discover that good. Teaching could fit this pattern, but so could revolutionary activity; she argues that in some situations that may be what is called for, and in such situations the ambiguous nature of free activity would be evident: that in order to achieve freedom I must struggle against the choices and activities of those who suppress freedom.
Beauvoir's argument in this book is provocative and compelling, and leaves one with much to reflect on. While some of the works once considered pivotal for the existentialist "movement" may appear to be directly bound to a particular time and place (e.g. the cafes and lounges of postwar Paris), Simone de Beauvoir's excellent little treatise on existentialist ethics has lost none of its relevance or urgency. Highly recommended!
I first read this book forty years ago for an undergraduate class in social philosophy. I've re-read it five or six times since, and benefitted from each re-reading. Though it was not DeBeauvoir's intention to write an introduction to existentialism, this is the best one available.
What is the meaning of life? It has none save that which we give it, an inescapable process which the author terms "disclosure of being in the world." This view is strongly relativistic, to be sure, providing no basis for preferring a painfully abscessed molar to good sex.
Unlike the early Sartre, moreover, DeBeauvoir recognizes that we disclose being in the world -- learn what it means to be -- in very specific ways, in socially determined contexts. The meanings we discern are bounded by the social worlds of which we are the ongoing creations and which we help to create.
DeBeauvoir's answer to what-is-the-meaning-of-life kinds of questions is not spiritually uplifting, but it's an answer, given without equivocation or hollow appeals to faith. As such, I think it's the right answer. She makes a compelling case.
Can we organize our lives around "disclosure of being in the world?" I don't think so. Its much too abstract, fraught with anomie, positing a sort of Durkheimian nightmare. Still, at least we know where we stand: right in the middle of a universe that anticipates by two or three decades post-modern rejection of any sort of natural and durable foundation.
In ethics you find two sorts of reasoning:
1) One that wants to 'delimit' ethics;
allow them to do what they want.
2) One that wants to add further limits to your moral
plane.
Ethics has been argued from a social point of view:
that anthropologically speaking some restrictions
like those on incest and child abuse are universal.
The mid-ground seems to be in marriage laws
and sexual conduct: with the south sea islands on
one side and Boston Ladies of society on the other?
Historically it appears that break down in the values
of family and moral conduct go hand in hand with
decline in the culture. The fall of the Soviet Union
and Communism seems to be tied not with the ideals
of that cultural set, but the adherence to a moral conduct
where the ends justify the means.
Innocents with political and religious ideals died in Siberian camps.
There is no "Ambiguity" in clear wrongs to innocents
to promote a political set of ideas or a leader
like Stalin. Philosophically one can't say
that feminism should be tied to an existentialist doctrine
or that the natural world's lack of ethics means that
we are left to chose our own logical solution
to the decision problems. Harming others in your own selfish self interest isn't in the area of "ambiguity".
Social responsibility is a force that alters history
and is self-organizing: giving up ethical constraints
for your own ends will be the fall.
These are my own sharp words to answer Simone de Beauvior's words.
Existence.. it's meaning is never fixed, it must constantly be won. This book examines Existence and it's meaning in a humans life. French Philosopher Simone De Beauvoir talks of Nihilism, Surrealism, Existentialism, Objectivity, and a persons ethics and values in life. Beauvoir also tries to resolve some problems Sartre had with trying to work out Existentialist Ethics. Also discusses recognizing your own freedom and taking charge of your life.
Despite being shorter than most Philosophy books this is by no means an easy read. Its a challenging book but it will force you to think. It is brilliant. This is Philosophy at its finest.
"There is no more obnoxious way to punish a man than to force him to perform acts which make no sense to him, as when one empties and fills the same ditch indefinitely, when one makes soldiers who are being punished march up and down, when one forces a schoolboy to copy lines."
What will the modern man do when slapped in the face with the absurdity of his own existence? Become an adventurer, passionate, serious, intellectual? Where will his values come from when there are no values -- how will he create them out of nothing? Is it easier to adopt a game full of illusions created by someone else? de Beauvoir forces the reader to come face to face with the absolute absurdity of the human condition, and then, proceeds to develop a dialectic of ambiguity that will enable the reader not to master the chaos, but to create with it. This book will probably alter many well-rooted philosophical perceptions -- so, reader beware! I could have done without the dramatic image of how the Nazi's conditioned themselves to become insensitive to human suffering (de Beauvoir used as an extreme example), but oh well... This book is a keeper, and very quotable! Highly recommended, especially for those diving into the Realm of Existentialism! --Katharena Eiermann, 2006
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