The End or the Means?

I have started to read a book called "The Conquest of Happiness" by the famous 20th century British philosopher Bertrand Russell. With the first few pages I have obtained some bits of Information that my readers might find useful. The reading has also left me with some interesting questions I must ask myself.

I seek here to talk about Ends and Means in Informationalism. It is a long standing popular debate within philosophy about the importance of Ends and Means. I am sure you are all familiar with the famous quote by the Italian political theorist Machiavelli who said that, "The ends justify the means". There have been some claims that this was a mistranslation, but the overall idea is still spelled out in his work "The Prince".

The famous German metaphysicist Immanuel Kant believed that individuals should treat other human beings as ends in themselves and not just means to an end. Philosophy has long troubled itself over what ends should be chosen and what the best means are to those ends. In fact, that is the central theme in philosophy. This skepticism about ends and means is what separates it from the modern day business mentality, which knows the ends, and simply debates the means.

I shall discuss a bit about what Bertrand Russell has said, and then give some of my own thoughts on its relationship to Informationalism.

Russell says in the opening of his book that, "The typical unhappy man is one who, having been deprived in youth of some normal satisfaction, has come to value this one kind of satisfaction more than any other, and has therefore given to his life a one-sided direction, together with a quite undo emphasis upon the achievement as opposed to the activities connected with it" (Russell 22). To simplify, it seems that people of living circumstances that are not unusually psychologically agitating at a glance, have been exposed over time in their past to unnatural circumstances which have twisted their mental health.

This does not seem surprising, as the simple construction of modern civilization seems well beyond the state humans have lived in throughout most of their existence. Adaptation to this new environment on a biological level is bound to have its drawbacks; this idea is similar to the idea of "The Shadow" advanced by the psychoanalyst Carl Jung.

Russell speaks primarily about 4 kinds of character stereotypes: The guilty sinner, the narcissist, the megalomaniac, and the hedonist.

The guilty sinner is an individual who has been instilled with an impossible moral code, something comparable to the puritan moral code, which causes him to feel himself a lowly creature never deserving of love. It is no doubt that this morality would lead to a sense of unhappiness and perhaps nihilism.

The narcissist is an individual who wishes to be loved by all, and to be seen as charming. They are wrapped up in love with themselves. This love leads to treating people as means instead of ends, and overall unhappiness with a vanity that can never be satisfied.

The megalomaniac is similar to the narcissist, but his end is power, power for its own sake, and not for the sake of accomplishing something else. This complex simply leads to the desire for more power, an impossible amount of power, which will also ensure the individual is never happy.

Finally the hedonist chooses to indulge in simple pleasures. They escape their own discontent by indulging in quick fix habits such as drugs to forget their own displeasure. However, the displeasure returns as the drug wears off, and so it must be taken again to forget the added displeasure of the burden of this knowledge.

Perhaps some of you have noticed that all 4 of these are recursive systems? It is also not unusual to find individuals who shift between these modes of character.

So Russell seems to suggest that one should practice an activity for its own sake. One should treat the activity as an end in itself. For example, one should play basketball not to win the NBA championship, but because they enjoy playing basketball. We practice martial arts not for the belt, but for the sake of the art and its enjoyment. Russell suggests that this is the only way to ensure happiness.

How does this relate to Informationalism?

We've been discussing means and ends. So how does this concept apply to Informationalism?

Informationalism is a means, and not an end. I have stated that we should acquire and freely distribute Information for its own sake. It is true, perhaps and end could be to ensure the survival of the species. It is also true that I think that Informationalism is the best way to ensure that this end is met. However, this is not necessarily the "end" of Informationalism.

Regardless of whether or not we are Informationalists, we could still be wiped out at any time. As I just stated, Informationalism just ensures we are doing all we can to make sure that this does not happen. It is also, therefore, the only way to ensure that we continue to have any means or ends to explore at all. It thus appears, as I have said before, that the preservation of the species is the ultimate end if there could ever be such a thing.

Informationalism itself, once again, is a means, it is an activity. Acquiring more knowledge about the world is an art that can be practiced, the same as basketball or martial arts. As one practices, one can become more adept at this art. We do it, however, not as an obsession with the ultimate end that we may never reach, but for the activity itself. Informationalism gives the individual the opportunity to grow outside the confines of systems that narcissistically claim to be able to explain everything. To join it is, as always, a choice.

Take yourself all the way back to Socrates: What do you really think that you know?