Examined Life

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The unexamined life
is not worth living. -Plato
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EXAMINED LIFE
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[Man] "The unexamined life is not
worth living," Plato says in
Line 38A of the Apology.
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How do you examine yourself?
What happens when you
interrogate yourself?
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What happens when you begin
to call into question...
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your tacit assumptions
and unarticulated presuppositions,
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and begin then to become
a different kind of person?
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See, I put it this way.
That for me,
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I mean, philosophy
is fundamentally about...
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our finite situation.
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We can define that in terms of
we're beings toward death,
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and we're featherless, two-legged,
linguistically conscious creatures
born between urine and feces...
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whose body will one day
be the culinary delight
of terrestrial worms.
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That's us.
We're beings toward death.
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At the same time, we have desire
while we are organisms
in space and time,
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and so it's desire
in the face of death.
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And then of course,
you've got dogmatism,
various attempts to hold on to certainty,

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various forms of idolatry,
and you've got dialogue
in the face of dogmatism.
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And then of course,
structurally and institutionally
you have domination...
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and you have democracy.
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You have attempts of people
tying to render accountable...
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elites, kings, queens, suzerians,
corporate elites, politicians,
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trying to make these elites
accountable to eveyday people.
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So philosophy itself becomes...
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a critical disposition...
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of wrestling with desire
in the face of death,
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wrestling with dialogue

in the face of- of dogmatism,
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and wrestling with democracytrying to keep alive very fragile
democratic experiments29
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in the face of structures
of domination;
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patriarchy, white supremacy,
imperial power,
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um- uh, state power.
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All those concentrated forms
of power...
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that are not accountable to people
who are affected by them.
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The first step towards
philosophy is incredulity. -Diderot
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[Woman]
So, can you hear me well?
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[Astra Taylor]

And you can speak to me, soGood. Vey good.

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Wonderful. Okay.
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So I was trying to figure out
what you were getting me
into here,
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and how we're implicated
in this walk.
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I was going to interview you
and ask you what you thought
you were doing.
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I'm specifically thinking about
the challenge of making a film
about philosophy,
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which, um, obviously
has a spoken element,
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but is typically written.
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And book form allows you
to explore something so in-depth,
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you know, 300, 400, 500 pages

exploring a single concept,
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whereas in a feature-length film
you have 80 minutes...
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in the form of speech
that's been recorded.
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And in the case of this film,
each person has 10 minutes.
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Yes, that is scandalous.
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I can understand that the others
would have 10 minutes,
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but to- to bring me down
to 10 minutes...
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is an outragethere's no doubt about it.
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The thing is, we don't know
where this film is going to land,
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whom it's going to shake up,
wake up,

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or freak out, or bore.
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But even boredom,
as an offshoot of melancholy,
would interest me...
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as a response
to these dazzling utterances
that we're producing.
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But I- I would say that,
even if philosophy59
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And don't forget that Heidegger
ditched philosophy for thinking,
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'cause he thought philosophy
as such...
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was still too institutional,
academic,
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too bound up in knowledge
and results,
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too cognitively inflected.

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So he asked the question,
"What is called thinking?"
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And he had a lot to say about walks,
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about going on paths
that lead nowhere.
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One of his important texts
is called Holzwege,
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which means a path
that leads nowhere.
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In Greek, the word for path
is methodos.
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So we're on the path.
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[Astra Taylor]
One thing I want to ask you
about is meaning.
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Is philosophy a search for meaning?
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[Ronell]

I'm very suspicious historically...

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and intellectually
of the promise of meaning,
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because meaning...
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has often had very fascistoid,
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non-progressivist edges,
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if not a core of that sort of thing.
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Excuse me. Um80
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So that vey often,
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also the emergency supplies
of meaning...
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that are brought
to a given incident or structure...
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or theme in one's life
are cover-ups,

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are a way of dressing
the wound of non-meaning.
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I think it's very hard
to keep things...
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in the tensional structure
of the openness,
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whether it's ecstatic or not,
of non-meaning.
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That's very, very difficult,
which is why there is then...
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the quick grasp for
a transcendental signifier,
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for God, for nation, for patriotism.
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It's been very devastating,
this, um92
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this craving for meaning,
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though it's something with which

we are in constant negotiation.

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Everyone wants something
like meaning.
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But when you see these dogs play,
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[Growling]
why reduce it to meaning...
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rather than just see
the arbitrary eruption...
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of something
that can't be grasped or explicated,
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but it's just there...
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in this kind of absolute
contingency of being.
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To leave things open...
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and radically inappropriable
and something103
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and admitting
we haven't really understood...
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is much less satisfying,
more frustrating,
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and more necessary,
I think, you know.
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And that's why
I think a lot of people...
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have been fed and fueled
by promises...
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of immediate gratification
in thought...
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and food and junk, and so on110
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junk thought, junk food,
and so on.
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So the- the112
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There's a politics of refusing
that gratification.

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And I know that's crazy-making,
but I think that's where
we have to pull the brakes.
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[Astra Taylor]
Some people might be troubled,
or might wonder,
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how do you behave ethically
if there's no ultimate meaning?
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Precisely where there
isn't guaranteed...
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or palpable meaning,
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you have to do a lot of work
and you have to be mega-ethical,
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'cause it's much easier
to live life and know...
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that well, that you shouldn't do,
and this you should do,
because someone said so.
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If we're not anxious,
if we're okay with things,

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we're not trying to explore
or figure anything out.
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So anxiety is the mood,
par excellence,
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of- of125
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of ethicity, I think, you know.
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Now, I'm not prescribing
anxiety disorder for anyone.
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However, could you imagine Mr. Bush,
who doesn't give a shit...
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when he sends everyone
to the gas chamber...
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or the, um, electric chair?
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He expresses no anxiety.
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And they're very proud of this.
They don't lose a wink of sleep.

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They express no anxiety.
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This is something
that Derrida has taught.
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If you feel that you've acquitted
yourself honorably,
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then you're not so ethical.
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If you have a good conscience,
then you're kind of worthless.
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Like, if you think"Oh, I gave this homeless person
five bucks.
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I'm great"then you're irresponsible.
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The responsible being
is one who thinks...
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they've never been
responsible enough.
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They've never taken care enough
of the Other.
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The Other is so in excess...
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of anything you can understand
or grasp or reduce.
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This in itself creates
an ethical relatedness145
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a relation without relation,
'cause you don't know146
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You can't presume to know
or grasp the Other.
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The minute you think you know
the Other, you're ready to kill them.
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You think,
"Oh, they're doing this or this.
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They're the axis of evil.
Let's drop some bombs."
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But if you don't know,

you don't understand this alterity,

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it's so Other that you can't violate it
with your sense of understanding,
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then, um,
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you have to let it live,
in a sense.
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This is the center of one of
the world's richest countries...
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and one of the most
expensive places there,
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and that raises an ethical issue.
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I mean, there are people who have
the money to buy at these stores...
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and who don't seem to see any kind
of moral problem doing that.
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But what I want to ask is,
well, shouldn't they see some
sort of moral problem about that?

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Isn't there a question about
what we should be spending
our money on?
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So we're outside Bergdorf Goodman,
where they've got a display
of Dolce & Gabbana shoes.
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And it's kind of amusing to me
because about 30 years ago,
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I wrote an article called
"Famine, Affluence, and Morality"...
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in which I imagined...
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that you're walking
past a shallow pond,
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and as you walk past it
you notice there's a small child
who's fallen into the pond...
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and seems to be in danger
of drowning,
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and you look around to see
where the parents are,

and there's nobody in sight.

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You realize that unless you wade
into this pond and pull the child out,
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the child is likely to drown.
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There's no danger to you
because you know the pond
is just a shallow one,
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but you are wearing
a nice pair of shoes...
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and they're probably
gonna get ruined if you wade
into that shallow pond.
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So, of course, when I ask
people this, they always say,
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"Well, of course, forget about
the shoes. You've just got to
save the child. That's clear."
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And then I stop and say,
"Okay, you know,
I agree with you about that.
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"But for the price
of a pair of shoes,
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"if you were to give that
to Oxfam or UNICEF
or one of those organizations,
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"they could probably save
the life of a child, maybe more
than one child in a poor county,
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"where children are dying because
they can't get basic medical care...
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to treat very basic diseases like diarrhea
or whatever else it might be."
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And that's really one of the reasons
why I think it's interesting...
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to be here on 5th Avenue
talking about ethics,
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because ethics is about
the basic choices that we ought
to make in our lives,
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and one of those choices
is how do we spend our money.

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[Singer]
I started thinking about
these issues back in the 1970s...
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when, for one thing,
there was the crisis in Bangladesh...
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where there were millions of people
who were in danger of starving...
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because of the repression
of the Bangladeshis
by the Pakistani Army at the time.
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And that made me think
about our obligations to help people
who are in danger of starvation.
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Also around the same time,
I happened to meet someone
who was a vegetarian,
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who, uh, got me asking myself about,
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am I justified in continuing to eat meat?
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What is it that gives us the right,

or that justifies us,

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in treating animals
the way they get treated...
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before they end up on our lunch
or dinner or whatever it might be?
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And I read a little bit about
factory farming,
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intensive farms,
and the way they confine animals,
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which was something
that was really just getting
going at that stage.
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And I thought that
you can't really justify this,
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that we've just taken
for granted the idea...
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that somehow humans
have the right to use animals
whichever way they want to.
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And that isn't defensible.

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The boundary of species
is not something that really
is so morally significant...
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that it entitles us
to take another sentient being...
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who can suffer or feel pain,
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and do as we wish
with that sentient being...
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just because we happen to like
the taste of its flesh.
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So these two issues really got
me thinking about Applied Ethics,
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which at this time in the beginning
of the 1970s wasn't really a field.
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It wasn't really something
that philosophers thought
was properly philosophy.
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But I think it was a good time

to start thinking about these issues...

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because of the student movement,
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the radical movement
of the '60s and early '70s...
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which had created a bit more interest
in these issues and raised the question,
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can we make our academic studies
more relevant to the important
questions ofthe day?
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When you do apply ethics,
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you often find that thinking things
through leads you to challenge
common-sense morality.
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And of course, this is
consistent with a very ancient
philosophical tradition.
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It's exactly what happened
with Socrates...
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when he started asking people about,

"What is justice?"
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And they thought
they knew what justice is,
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and then they started
thinking about it,
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and they realized
they didn't understand it.
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And of course,
Socrates ended up havingbeing forced to drink the hemlock...
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because he was accused
of corrupting the morals
of the youth.
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Now, fortunately that doesn't happen
to philosophers today.
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But it could well be said
that from a conservative point of view,
229
00:17:41,605 --> 00:17:44,096
Applied Ethics does corrupt morals230
00:17:44,174 --> 00:17:48,770
"Corrupt" is the wrong word.

But it certainly challenges morals...

231
00:17:48,845 --> 00:17:52,008
and might lead us to think
differently about some things...
232
00:17:52,082 --> 00:17:55,279
that we have held very dear
for a long time.
233
00:17:57,621 --> 00:18:00,351
A lot of people think that
you can only have ethical standards...
234
00:18:00,424 --> 00:18:02,654
if in some way you're religious,
235
00:18:02,726 --> 00:18:06,127
you believe that there's a god
who handed down some commandments...
236
00:18:06,196 --> 00:18:10,292
or inspired some scriptures
which tell you what to do.
237
00:18:10,367 --> 00:18:12,801
I don't believe in any of that.
238
00:18:12,869 --> 00:18:16,134
I think ethics
has to come from ourselves,
239
00:18:16,206 --> 00:18:18,766
but that doesn't mean
that it's totally subjective,
240

00:18:18,842 --> 00:18:23,370

that doesn't mean that
you can think whatever you like
about what's right or wrong.
241
00:18:25,048 --> 00:18:27,949
When you start to look
at issues ethically,
242
00:18:28,018 --> 00:18:30,816
you have to do more than just think
about your own interests.
243
00:18:30,887 --> 00:18:35,221
You have to ask yourself,
how do I take into account
the interests of others?
244
00:18:35,292 --> 00:18:40,992
What would I choose
if I were to be in their position
rather than in my position?
245
00:18:58,448 --> 00:19:01,212
One of the most obvious things
that emerges...
246
00:19:01,284 --> 00:19:04,481
when you put yourself
in the position of others...
247
00:19:04,554 --> 00:19:09,514
is the priority of reducing
or preventing suffering,
248
00:19:09,593 --> 00:19:12,926
because ethics is not just about...

249
00:19:12,996 --> 00:19:16,193
what I actually do
and the impact of that,
250
00:19:16,266 --> 00:19:22,227
but it's also about what I omit to do,
what I decide not to do.
251
00:19:22,305 --> 00:19:26,935
And that's why, questions aboutgiven that we all have
a limited amount of money252
00:19:27,010 --> 00:19:29,638
questions about what you spend
your money on...
253
00:19:29,713 --> 00:19:32,580
are also questions about
what you don't spend your money on,
254
00:19:32,649 --> 00:19:35,948
or what you don't use
your money to achieve.
255
00:19:38,421 --> 00:19:40,821
They just say,
"Oh, well, I'm not harming anyone...
256
00:19:40,891 --> 00:19:45,851
if I go and spend
a thousand dollars on a new suit."
257
00:19:45,929 --> 00:19:50,662
But, uh, in fact,
given the opportunities
that we have to help...

258
00:19:50,734 --> 00:19:52,668
and given the way the world is,
259
00:19:52,736 --> 00:19:56,297
I think that quite often
you're actually...
260
00:19:56,373 --> 00:19:59,137
are failing to benefit someone,
which you could be doing.
261
00:19:59,209 --> 00:20:04,943
I think we have moral obligations
to help just as we have
moral obligations not to harm.
262
00:20:42,619 --> 00:20:46,578
[Singer]
Over the thousands of years of history
and development of philosophy,
263
00:20:46,656 --> 00:20:50,217
a lot of philosophers have asked,
"Does life have a meaning?
What is it?"
264
00:20:50,293 --> 00:20:53,956
And that's a question for which
I think we can give an answer.
265
00:20:54,030 --> 00:20:57,329
And I think the answer is,
we make our lives most meaningful...
266
00:20:57,400 --> 00:21:02,702
when we connect ourselves

with some really important causes

or issues.
267
00:21:02,772 --> 00:21:05,639
And we contribute to that,
so that we feel that...
268
00:21:05,709 --> 00:21:10,578
because we lived,
something has gone a little better
than it would have otherwise.
269
00:21:10,647 --> 00:21:15,141
We've contributed,
in however small a way,
to making the world a better place.
270
00:21:15,218 --> 00:21:20,246
And I think it's hard to find anything
more meaningful than doing that,
271
00:21:20,323 --> 00:21:25,625
than reducing the amount
of unnecessary pain and suffering
that there's been on this world,
272
00:21:25,695 --> 00:21:30,394
or making the world a little bit
better for all of the beings
who are sharing it with us.
273
00:22:20,517 --> 00:22:23,418
[Appiah]
I started thinking about
the difference between...
274
00:22:23,486 --> 00:22:26,853
the context in which

we evolved as a species...
275
00:22:26,923 --> 00:22:30,882
and the present, you know,
in this age of globalization.
276
00:22:30,961 --> 00:22:35,091
And one way to think about that
is to notice that...
277
00:22:35,165 --> 00:22:39,568
if you live a modern life,
if you're traveling
through an airport,
278
00:22:39,636 --> 00:22:41,934
you're gonna be passing
lots and lots of people,
279
00:22:42,005 --> 00:22:46,032
and within a few minutes
you'll have passed more people...
280
00:22:46,109 --> 00:22:48,373
than most of our remote
human ancestors...
281
00:22:48,445 --> 00:22:51,278
would ever have seen
in their entire lives.
282
00:22:55,518 --> 00:23:00,649
As an American, you exist
in this kind of virtual relationship
with 300 million people.
283
00:23:00,724 --> 00:23:05,127

If you're lucky enough to be Chinese,

your virtual relationships
are with, you know,
284
00:23:05,195 --> 00:23:08,323
soon, one and a half billion people
or something like that.
285
00:23:08,398 --> 00:23:12,095
So I think that'sthat's a way of dramatizing,
286
00:23:12,168 --> 00:23:14,261
I think, the challenge
that we face.
287
00:23:14,337 --> 00:23:18,273
We're- We're good at small,
face-to-face stuff.
288
00:23:18,341 --> 00:23:20,275
That's what we were made for.
289
00:23:20,343 --> 00:23:23,938
We know how to be responsible
for children and parents...
290
00:23:24,014 --> 00:23:26,710
and cousins and friends.
291
00:23:26,783 --> 00:23:30,048
But we now have to be responsible
for fellow citizens,
292
00:23:30,120 --> 00:23:33,647
both of our country
and fellow citizens of the world.

293
00:23:33,723 --> 00:23:36,521
And the question is,
can we figure that out?
294
00:23:48,371 --> 00:23:51,499
which means citizen of the cosmos,
of the world.
295
00:23:51,574 --> 00:23:55,032
And we need a notion
of global citizenship.
296
00:23:58,314 --> 00:24:01,806
The cosmopolitan says,
we have to begin by recognizing
that we're responsible...
297
00:24:01,885 --> 00:24:04,649
collectively, for each other,
as citizens are.
298
00:24:04,721 --> 00:24:06,518
But second,
299
00:24:06,589 --> 00:24:11,026
cosmopolitans think that it's
okay for people toto be different.
300
00:24:11,094 --> 00:24:13,289
That they care about everybody,
301
00:24:13,363 --> 00:24:17,459
but not in a way that means
they want everybody to be
the same, or like them.

302
00:24:17,534 --> 00:24:22,437
Whereas, there's a certain kind
of philosophical universalism,
303
00:24:22,505 --> 00:24:26,464
which is often associated
with evangelizing religions, where,
304
00:24:26,543 --> 00:24:29,979
"Yeah, we love everybody,
but we want them to become like us...
305
00:24:30,046 --> 00:24:32,310
in order to love them properly."
306
00:24:32,382 --> 00:24:37,342
There's a great German proverb
which says307
00:24:40,723 --> 00:24:44,853
"If you don't want to be my brother,
I'll bash your skull in."
308
00:24:44,928 --> 00:24:47,954
And that's- that's the opposite
of cosmopolitanism.
309
00:24:48,031 --> 00:24:51,728
It's the universalist who says,
"Yeah, I want you to be my brother,
but on my terms."
310
00:24:55,605 --> 00:25:00,542
Now, if you think that everybody's
entitled to be different, right,

311
00:25:00,610 --> 00:25:04,341
it can produce a kind of cultural
relativism, in which you say,
312
00:25:04,414 --> 00:25:06,507
"Whatever they want to do,
that's fine.
313
00:25:06,583 --> 00:25:10,644
"There's no place for me standing
outside to make any moral judgments,
314
00:25:10,720 --> 00:25:12,915
any ethical judgments,
about what they're up to."
315
00:25:14,691 --> 00:25:18,491
So that's kind of one position
that I want to distinguish myself from.
316
00:25:18,561 --> 00:25:20,791
I think that it's very important...
317
00:25:20,864 --> 00:25:26,166
that in the global conversation
of human beings
that cosmopolitans recommend,
318
00:25:26,236 --> 00:25:28,295
one of the things we're doing...
319
00:25:28,371 --> 00:25:30,464
is exchanging ideas about
what's right and wrong,
320
00:25:30,540 --> 00:25:33,407

and that it's perfectly

appropriate to do so.
321
00:25:44,587 --> 00:25:48,216
I have this privilege of having
grown up in a couple of places.
322
00:25:48,291 --> 00:25:50,384
My mother came from England.
My father came from Ghana.
323
00:25:50,460 --> 00:25:52,428
And they would never,
either of them,
324
00:25:52,495 --> 00:25:56,556
tell us exactly how they met
or exactly what it was
that drew them to each other,
325
00:25:56,633 --> 00:26:01,866
though my father always said
that my mother had
a splendidly un-English behind.
326
00:26:01,938 --> 00:26:03,667
That it was327
00:26:03,740 --> 00:26:07,107
She actually had a more African behind
and he found that attractive.
So I don't know.
328
00:26:07,177 --> 00:26:11,546
It happens that in the shanty
where I grew up, kinshipthat is, the family-

329
00:26:11,614 --> 00:26:14,777
is organized in a very different way
from the way that
it's organized in England.
330
00:26:14,851 --> 00:26:17,479
We're what anthropologists
call matrilineal.
331
00:26:17,554 --> 00:26:21,513
That means that the most
important adult male
in a child's life...
332
00:26:21,591 --> 00:26:26,756
isn't, um, his mother's husband,
that is, his father.
333
00:26:26,829 --> 00:26:29,798
It's his mother's brother,
his maternal uncle.
334
00:26:29,866 --> 00:26:32,096
There's a word for that; wofa.
335
00:26:32,168 --> 00:26:37,231
So I have, uh- uh,
these eight people in the world,
336
00:26:37,307 --> 00:26:39,867
two- two young women...
337
00:26:39,943 --> 00:26:42,571
and six young men
who are my nephews and nieces.
338

00:26:42,645 --> 00:26:46,137

I'm their wofa.
And by our tradition, I'm339
00:26:46,216 --> 00:26:48,650
Since my sisters don't have
any other brothers,
340
00:26:48,718 --> 00:26:51,346
I'm the guy who's responsible
for their education.
341
00:26:51,421 --> 00:26:54,584
If anything bad happens to them,
I'm supposed to look after them
and so on.
342
00:26:54,657 --> 00:26:59,356
Um, now of course, in England,
if you have a father, that's his job.
343
00:27:02,165 --> 00:27:04,861
There's a certain kind
of universalist who will say,
344
00:27:04,934 --> 00:27:06,993
"One of these has to be correct."
345
00:27:07,070 --> 00:27:09,436
But the cosmopolitan says
these are two ways of doing it,
346
00:27:09,505 --> 00:27:12,406
and as long as they do the thing
they're supposed to do,
347
00:27:12,475 --> 00:27:15,672

it seems to me absurd to suggest

that one has to be better
than the other,
348
00:27:15,745 --> 00:27:19,340
or that one should be universalized
for any reason.
349
00:27:28,725 --> 00:27:33,719
One thing that people talk about
all the time these days is conflicts
of values across cultures,
350
00:27:33,796 --> 00:27:36,959
and often people think they're
kind of inevitably irreconcilable...
351
00:27:37,033 --> 00:27:39,866
and that they're the root of
all the difficulties in the world.
352
00:27:39,936 --> 00:27:41,870
And I- The first way, I think,
353
00:27:41,938 --> 00:27:47,240
you need to work to disentangle
all the problems of that way of thinking...
354
00:27:47,310 --> 00:27:52,873
is to recognize the huge diversity
of values by which people are guided.
355
00:27:56,552 --> 00:27:59,783
We're different.
The cosmopolitan thinks
we're entitled to be different,
356

00:27:59,856 --> 00:28:02,416

and that it's permissible that
there should be differences
in certain ways.
357
00:28:02,492 --> 00:28:07,555
But the cosmopolitan also assumes
the fact that there are all
these different kinds of values...
358
00:28:07,630 --> 00:28:09,598
and the fact that
we can recognize so many of them...
359
00:28:09,666 --> 00:28:13,067
is a recollection of the fact
that we're all human beings,
360
00:28:13,136 --> 00:28:17,630
that we share what
you might call a moral nature.
361
00:28:26,582 --> 00:28:30,916
[Appiah] Our responsibilities
aren't just to a hundred people
whom we can interact with and see.
362
00:28:30,987 --> 00:28:32,750
And that's, I think,
the great challenge.
363
00:28:32,822 --> 00:28:36,087
Cosmopolitanism, for me,
is meant to be an answer
to that challenge.
364
00:28:36,159 --> 00:28:38,627
It's meant to say...

365
00:28:38,695 --> 00:28:41,596
you can't retreat to the hundred.
366
00:28:41,664 --> 00:28:46,101
You can't simply be partial
to some tiny group...
367
00:28:46,169 --> 00:28:48,660
and simply live out
your moral life in that.
368
00:28:48,738 --> 00:28:51,366
That's notThat's not morally permissible.
369
00:28:51,441 --> 00:28:55,741
But you can't abandon
your local group either,
370
00:28:55,812 --> 00:28:59,441
because that would
take you too far away, I think,
from your humanity.
371
00:28:59,515 --> 00:29:03,110
So what we have to do
is to learn how to do both.
372
00:29:54,771 --> 00:29:58,571
[Nussbaum]
Aristotle had the ingredients
of a theory of justice...
373
00:29:58,641 --> 00:30:00,905
that I think is very powerful.

374
00:30:00,977 --> 00:30:04,504
And that is that it's the job of
a good political arrangement...
375
00:30:04,580 --> 00:30:07,515
to provide each
and every person...
376
00:30:07,583 --> 00:30:10,814
with what they need
to become capable...
377
00:30:10,887 --> 00:30:14,015
of living rich
and clourishing human lives.
378
00:30:16,426 --> 00:30:18,485
Now, of course,
he didn't include all the people,
379
00:30:18,561 --> 00:30:22,622
but he at least had that idea
of supporting human capability...
380
00:30:22,698 --> 00:30:25,360
that's the foundation
of my own approach.
381
00:30:25,435 --> 00:30:29,030
Now then, in the 17th
and 18th centuries,
382
00:30:29,105 --> 00:30:32,802
a very powerful new approach
came on the scene,
383

00:30:32,875 --> 00:30:35,309

and that was
the social contract approach384
00:30:35,378 --> 00:30:38,643
Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau, Kant.
385
00:30:38,714 --> 00:30:42,150
The social contract approach
was inspired...
386
00:30:42,218 --> 00:30:46,177
by the background culture
of feudalism,
387
00:30:46,255 --> 00:30:50,282
where all opportunities
were distributed unequally...
388
00:30:50,359 --> 00:30:52,793
to people according to their class,
389
00:30:52,862 --> 00:30:56,093
their inherited wealth,
and their status.
390
00:30:56,165 --> 00:31:01,000
And so what these theorists said is
try to imagine human beings...
391
00:31:01,070 --> 00:31:04,233
stripped of all those
inherited advantages,
392
00:31:04,307 --> 00:31:07,333
placed in what they called
the "state of nature,"

393
00:31:07,410 --> 00:31:12,211
where they had only their natural body
and their physical advantages,
394
00:31:12,281 --> 00:31:15,910
and try to imagine
what kind of arrangements
the would actually make.
395
00:31:23,159 --> 00:31:26,219
The social contract tradition is,
of course,
396
00:31:26,295 --> 00:31:29,162
an academic,
philosophical tradition,
397
00:31:29,232 --> 00:31:33,726
but it also has tremendous influence
on popular culture...
398
00:31:33,803 --> 00:31:36,601
and our general public life.
399
00:31:36,672 --> 00:31:39,937
Because weEvery day we hear things like,
400
00:31:40,009 --> 00:31:43,570
"Oh, those people
don't pay their own way."
401
00:31:43,646 --> 00:31:46,615
Or, supporting
some new group of people,

402
00:31:46,682 --> 00:31:50,209
"Well, they'll be a drag
on our economy."
403
00:31:50,286 --> 00:31:55,223
So the idea that the good member
of society is a producer...
404
00:31:55,291 --> 00:32:01,127
who contributes advantage
to everyone, that is verya very live idea.
405
00:32:01,197 --> 00:32:06,464
And it lies behind
the decline of welfare programs
in this county.
406
00:32:06,536 --> 00:32:11,098
I think it lies behind many Americans'
skepticism about Europe,
407
00:32:11,173 --> 00:32:13,266
about European social democracy.
408
00:32:13,342 --> 00:32:16,368
You hear terms like
the "Nanny State,"
409
00:32:16,445 --> 00:32:19,710
as though there were something wrong
with the idea of maternal care...
410
00:32:19,782 --> 00:32:23,513
as a conception of what society
actually does.

411
00:32:23,586 --> 00:32:28,683
Um, we also see it in another way
in images of who the real man is.
412
00:32:28,758 --> 00:32:33,218
The real man is sort of like these
people in the state of nature.
413
00:32:33,296 --> 00:32:35,321
He doesn't deeply need anyone.
414
00:32:35,398 --> 00:32:40,335
He isn't bound to anyone
by ties of love and compassion.
415
00:32:40,403 --> 00:32:43,463
He's the loner who can go
his own way...
416
00:32:43,539 --> 00:32:45,700
and then out of advantage,
417
00:32:45,775 --> 00:32:50,405
he'll choose to have certain kinds
of social arrangements.
418
00:32:59,322 --> 00:33:04,726
The theorists of the social contract
made certain assumptions
that aren't always true.
419
00:33:04,794 --> 00:33:07,160
They assumed that the parties
to this contract...
420
00:33:07,229 --> 00:33:11,962

really are roughly equal

in physical and mental power.
421
00:33:12,034 --> 00:33:14,127
Now, that was fine...
422
00:33:14,203 --> 00:33:19,402
when you're thinking about adult men
with no disabilities,
423
00:33:19,475 --> 00:33:22,740
but as some of them already
began to notice,
424
00:33:22,812 --> 00:33:25,280
it doesn't do so well
when you think about women,
425
00:33:25,348 --> 00:33:30,217
because women's oppression
has always been partly occasioned...
426
00:33:30,286 --> 00:33:32,982
by their physical weakness,
compared to men.
427
00:33:33,055 --> 00:33:36,286
And so if you leave out
that physical asymmetry,
428
00:33:36,359 --> 00:33:40,420
you may be leaving out a problem
that a theory of justice
will need to fix.
429
00:33:40,496 --> 00:33:44,660
But it certainly does not do well

when we think about justice...

430
00:33:44,734 --> 00:33:49,194
for people with serious physical
and mental disabilities.
431
00:33:49,271 --> 00:33:51,967
And in fact, some of the theorists
who noticed that said,
432
00:33:52,041 --> 00:33:55,875
"Well, this is a problem,
but we'll just have to solve it later.
433
00:33:55,945 --> 00:34:00,575
We'll get the theory first,
then we'll work on this problem
at some other point."
434
00:34:00,650 --> 00:34:05,451
Well, my thought is
that this is not a small problem.
435
00:34:05,521 --> 00:34:09,423
There are a lot of people with serious
physical and mental disabilities.
436
00:34:09,492 --> 00:34:12,256
But not only that,
but it's all of us437
00:34:12,328 --> 00:34:17,231
when we're little children
and as we age.
438
00:34:17,299 --> 00:34:21,702
How do you think about justice

when you're dealing with bodies...

439
00:34:21,771 --> 00:34:26,435
that are very, very unequal
in their ability and their power?
440
00:34:26,509 --> 00:34:28,568
And perhaps even harder,
441
00:34:28,644 --> 00:34:30,612
how do you think about it
when you're dealing with...
442
00:34:30,680 --> 00:34:35,344
mental powers that are very, very
unequal in their potential?
443
00:34:35,418 --> 00:34:39,684
And I think that this is
a really serious political problem.
444
00:34:39,755 --> 00:34:45,250
We have only just began
to understand how to educate
children with disabilities,
445
00:34:45,327 --> 00:34:48,763
how to think about
their political representation,
446
00:34:48,831 --> 00:34:53,131
how to design cities
that are open to them.
447
00:34:53,202 --> 00:34:57,866
I mean, this bridge we walked
across, a person in a wheelchair

can go over that bridge.

448
00:34:57,940 --> 00:35:00,602
But, you know, 50 years ago
that would not have been the case.
449
00:35:00,676 --> 00:35:05,875
There would have been steps,
and that person could not get
to see this beautiful lakeshore.
450
00:35:19,295 --> 00:35:23,425
The capabilities approach,
as I've developed it
as a theory of justice,
451
00:35:23,499 --> 00:35:26,764
begins with the idea
that all human beings...
452
00:35:26,836 --> 00:35:29,737
have an inherent dignity...
453
00:35:29,805 --> 00:35:32,433
and require life circumstances...
454
00:35:32,508 --> 00:35:36,171
that are worthy of that dignity.
455
00:35:38,080 --> 00:35:41,538
The areas of life that seem to me
particularly important...
456
00:35:41,617 --> 00:35:44,916
when we think
about the capabilities are;

457
00:35:44,987 --> 00:35:49,014
of course life
is the very most basic one;
458
00:35:49,091 --> 00:35:52,891
bodily health; bodily integrity;
459
00:35:52,962 --> 00:35:57,524
the development of the senses,
imagination and thought;
460
00:35:57,600 --> 00:36:00,535
the development
of practical reasoning;
461
00:36:00,603 --> 00:36:04,334
the development of affiliations,
both more informal,
462
00:36:04,406 --> 00:36:09,070
in the family and friendship
but also in the political community;
463
00:36:09,145 --> 00:36:12,546
the development
of the ability to play...
464
00:36:12,615 --> 00:36:15,379
and have recreational opportunities;
465
00:36:15,451 --> 00:36:17,442
the ability to have relationships...
466
00:36:17,520 --> 00:36:22,924
with other creatures
and the world of nature;

467
00:36:22,992 --> 00:36:26,587
developing emotional capabilities,
468
00:36:26,662 --> 00:36:29,062
because I think a lot of theories
leave out the fact...
469
00:36:29,131 --> 00:36:33,625
that we don't want to have lives
that are filled with fear,
for example.
470
00:36:38,908 --> 00:36:42,708
In my view, people get together
to form a society...
471
00:36:42,778 --> 00:36:45,440
not because they're afraid...
472
00:36:45,514 --> 00:36:48,449
and they want to strike a deal
for mutual advantage,
473
00:36:48,517 --> 00:36:52,749
but it's much more out of love...
474
00:36:52,822 --> 00:36:58,158
that they want to join with others
in creating a world
that's as good as it can be.
475
00:37:15,811 --> 00:37:18,746
[Astra Taylor]
So, do you have to go to school
to be a philosopher?

476
00:37:18,814 --> 00:37:21,783
[ West ]
Oh, God, no. Thank God
you don"t have to go to school.
477
00:37:21,851 --> 00:37:24,786
No. A philosopher is a lover
of wisdom.
478
00:37:24,854 --> 00:37:27,687
It takes tremendous discipline,
it takes tremendous courage...
479
00:37:27,756 --> 00:37:29,747
to think for yourself,
to examine yourself.
480
00:37:29,825 --> 00:37:33,022
The Socratic imperative of
examining yourself requires courage.
481
00:37:33,095 --> 00:37:36,929
William Butler Yeats used to say
it takes more courage...
482
00:37:36,999 --> 00:37:41,800
to examine the dark corners
of your own soul than it does
for a soldier to fight on the battlefield.
483
00:37:41,871 --> 00:37:44,465
Courage to think critically.
You can't talk484
00:37:44,540 --> 00:37:47,805
Courage is the enabling virtue
for any philosopher,

485
00:37:47,877 --> 00:37:50,141
for any human being,
I think in the end.
486
00:37:50,212 --> 00:37:52,271
Courage to think,
courage to love,
courage to hope.
487
00:37:57,653 --> 00:38:01,919
Plato says philosophy is a meditation
on and a preparation for death.
488
00:38:01,991 --> 00:38:04,186
And by death,
what he means is not an event,
489
00:38:04,260 --> 00:38:08,196
but a death in life
because there's no rebirth,
490
00:38:08,264 --> 00:38:11,665
there's no change,
there's no transformation
without death.
491
00:38:11,734 --> 00:38:15,101
And therefore, the question becomes,
how do you learn how to die?
492
00:38:15,170 --> 00:38:17,968
And of course, Montaigne talks
about that in his famous essay,
493
00:38:18,040 --> 00:38:20,736
"To Philosophize Is to Learn

How to Die."
494
00:38:20,809 --> 00:38:24,472
You can't talk about truth
without talking about learning
how to die.
495
00:38:28,684 --> 00:38:31,551
I believe that Theodor Adorno
was right when he says...
496
00:38:31,620 --> 00:38:35,488
that the condition of truth
is to allow suffering to speak.
497
00:38:35,557 --> 00:38:40,221
That gives it
an existential emphasis, you see.
498
00:38:40,296 --> 00:38:43,026
So we're really talking
about truth as a way of life...
499
00:38:43,098 --> 00:38:45,692
as opposed to simply truth
as a set of propositions...
500
00:38:45,768 --> 00:38:49,135
that correspond to a set
of things in the world.
501
00:38:52,608 --> 00:38:54,838
Human beings are unable...
502
00:38:54,910 --> 00:38:58,869
to ever gain any monopoly
on Truth, capital "T"

503
00:38:58,948 --> 00:39:02,850
We might have access to truth,
small "t," but they're fallible
claims about truth.
504
00:39:02,918 --> 00:39:06,445
We could be wrong.
We have to be open
to revision and so on.
505
00:39:06,522 --> 00:39:09,389
So there is a certain kind of mystery
that goes hand-in-hand with truth.
506
00:39:09,458 --> 00:39:13,895
This is why so many
of the existential thinkers,
be they religious,
507
00:39:13,963 --> 00:39:17,023
like Meister Eckhart
or Paul Tillich,
508
00:39:17,099 --> 00:39:20,933
or be they secular,
like Camus and Sartre,
509
00:39:21,003 --> 00:39:25,702
that they're accenting our finitude
and our inability to fully grasp...
510
00:39:25,774 --> 00:39:28,834
the ultimate nature of reality,
the truth about things.
511
00:39:28,911 --> 00:39:33,712

And therefore,
there, you talk about truth...
512
00:39:33,782 --> 00:39:36,342
being tied to the way to truth,
513
00:39:37,686 --> 00:39:40,587
because once you give up
on the notion...
514
00:39:40,656 --> 00:39:44,592
of fully grasping
the way the world is,
515
00:39:44,660 --> 00:39:49,757
you're gonna talk about what are
the ways in which I can sustain
my quest for truth.
516
00:39:51,367 --> 00:39:54,996
How do you sustain a journey,
a path toward truth,
the way to truth?
517
00:39:55,070 --> 00:39:58,471
So the truth talk goes hand-in-hand
with talk about the way to truth.
518
00:39:58,540 --> 00:40:00,599
And scientists could talk about this
in terms of, you know,
519
00:40:00,676 --> 00:40:04,544
inducing evidence
and drawing reliable conclusions
and so forth and so on.
520

00:40:04,613 --> 00:40:07,173

Religious folk could talk about this
in terms of...
521
00:40:07,249 --> 00:40:10,309
surrendering one's arrogance
and pride...
522
00:40:10,386 --> 00:40:13,617
in the face of divine revelation
and what have you.
523
00:40:13,689 --> 00:40:17,648
But they're always of acknowledging
our finitude and our fallibility.
524
00:40:22,064 --> 00:40:26,125
I want all of the rich,
historical colorations...
525
00:40:26,201 --> 00:40:30,228
to be manifest
in talking about our finitude.
526
00:40:30,305 --> 00:40:33,331
Being born of a woman...
527
00:40:33,409 --> 00:40:38,346
in stank and stenchwhat I call "funk."
528
00:40:38,414 --> 00:40:41,042
Being introduced to the funk
of life in the womb...
529
00:40:41,116 --> 00:40:43,983
and the love-push that gets you out.

530
00:40:44,053 --> 00:40:46,886
Right? And then your body
is not just death531
00:40:46,955 --> 00:40:50,413
The way Vico talks about it.
And here Vico was so much better
than Heidegger.
532
00:40:50,492 --> 00:40:52,687
Vico talks about it
in terms of being a corpse.
533
00:40:52,761 --> 00:40:54,820
See, Heidegger didn't talk
about corpses.
534
00:40:54,897 --> 00:40:58,628
He talks about death.
It's still too abstract.
535
00:40:58,700 --> 00:41:00,964
Absolutely. Read the poetry
of John Donne.
536
00:41:01,036 --> 00:41:04,665
He'll tell you about corpses
that decompose.
537
00:41:04,740 --> 00:41:06,503
Well, see, that's history.
538
00:41:06,575 --> 00:41:10,033
That's the raw funky,
stanky stuff of life.

539
00:41:10,112 --> 00:41:13,206
That's what bluesmen do.
See, that's what jazzmen do.
540
00:41:17,719 --> 00:41:20,517
See, I'm a bluesman
in the life of the mind.
541
00:41:20,589 --> 00:41:24,252
I'm a jazzman
in the world of ideas.
Therefore for me, music is central.
542
00:41:24,326 --> 00:41:26,590
So when you're talking about poetry,
for the most part,
543
00:41:26,662 --> 00:41:30,792
Plato was talking primarily
about, uh, words,
544
00:41:30,866 --> 00:41:35,235
whereas I talk about notes,
I talk about tone,
I talk about timbre,
545
00:41:35,304 --> 00:41:37,795
I talk about rhythms.
546
00:41:37,873 --> 00:41:40,740
You see, for me,
music is fundamental.
547
00:41:40,809 --> 00:41:43,209
Philosophy must go to school
not only with the poets.

548
00:41:43,278 --> 00:41:46,611
Philosophy needs to go to school
with the musicians.
549
00:41:46,682 --> 00:41:51,210
Keep in mind, Plato bans
the flute in the republic
but not the lyre.
550
00:41:52,955 --> 00:41:55,389
Why?
Because the flute appeals...
551
00:41:55,457 --> 00:41:57,982
to all of these various sides
of who we are...
552
00:41:58,060 --> 00:42:01,223
given his tripartite conception
of the soul;
553
00:42:01,296 --> 00:42:04,732
the rational and the spirited
and the appetitive.
554
00:42:04,800 --> 00:42:08,531
And the flute is- appeals
to all three of those,
555
00:42:08,604 --> 00:42:12,370
where he thinks the lyre
on one string, it only appeals to one
and therefore is permissible.
556
00:42:12,441 --> 00:42:15,569
Now of course, the irony is
when Plato was on his deathbed,

what did he do?

557
00:42:15,644 --> 00:42:19,944
Well, he requested the Thracian girl
to play music on the flute.
558
00:42:24,319 --> 00:42:28,221
I'm a Christian, but I'm not a puritan.
I believe in pleasure.
559
00:42:28,290 --> 00:42:33,455
And orgiasmic pleasure has its place.
Intellectual pleasure has its place.
Social pleasure has its place.
560
00:42:33,529 --> 00:42:37,522
Televisual pleasure has its place.
You know, I like certain TV shows.
561
00:42:37,599 --> 00:42:40,261
My God, when it comes to music- Oh!
562
00:42:40,335 --> 00:42:45,136
You know, Beethoven's
32nd Sonata, Opus 111.
563
00:42:45,207 --> 00:42:48,574
Unbelievable aesthetic pleasure.
564
00:42:48,644 --> 00:42:51,738
The same would be true for
Curtis Mayfield or the Beatles
or what have you.
565
00:42:55,117 --> 00:43:00,487
There's a certain pleasure of the life
of the mind that cannot be denied.

566
00:43:00,556 --> 00:43:02,990
It's true that you might be
socially isolated,
567
00:43:03,058 --> 00:43:05,720
because you're in the library,
at home, and so on,
568
00:43:05,794 --> 00:43:08,228
but you're intensely alive.
569
00:43:08,297 --> 00:43:10,458
In fact, you're much more alive
than these folk...
570
00:43:10,532 --> 00:43:13,092
walking these streets
of New York in crowds...
571
00:43:13,168 --> 00:43:18,800
with just no intellectual interrogation
and questioning going at all.
572
00:43:18,874 --> 00:43:23,436
But if you read, you know, John
Ruskin or you read a Mark Twain,
573
00:43:23,512 --> 00:43:26,345
or, my God, Herman Melville,
574
00:43:26,415 --> 00:43:28,383
you almost have to throw the book
against the wall...
575
00:43:28,450 --> 00:43:32,944

because you're almost

so intensely alive
that you need a break.
576
00:43:33,021 --> 00:43:34,989
[Astra Taylor]
You get electrified.
Exactly.
577
00:43:35,057 --> 00:43:38,288
It's time to take a break and
get a little dullness in your life.
578
00:43:38,360 --> 00:43:43,696
Take Moby Dick, throw it against
the wall the way Goethe threw
von Kleist's work against the wall.
579
00:43:43,765 --> 00:43:46,290
It was just too much.
It made Goethe580
00:43:46,368 --> 00:43:49,337
It reminded Goethe of
the darkness that he was escaping...
581
00:43:49,404 --> 00:43:52,271
after he overcame
those suicidal impulses...
582
00:43:52,341 --> 00:43:54,502
with Sorrows of Young Werther
in the 1770s...
583
00:43:54,576 --> 00:43:58,410
that made his move toward
neoclassicism in Weimar.

584
00:43:58,480 --> 00:44:02,246
There are certain things
that make us too alive almost.
585
00:44:02,317 --> 00:44:06,048
It's almost like being too intensely
in love. You can't do anything.
[Chuckles]
586
00:44:06,121 --> 00:44:10,251
It's hard to get back the Kronos.
It's hard to get back the everyday life,
you know what I mean?
587
00:44:10,325 --> 00:44:13,886
That chirotic dimension of being
in love with another person,
588
00:44:13,962 --> 00:44:17,261
everything is so meaningful,
you want to sustain it.
It's true.
589
00:44:17,332 --> 00:44:20,768
You can't just do it, you know.
You gotta go to the bathroom,
have a drink of water. Shit.
590
00:45:21,296 --> 00:45:25,164
For my generation in the mid-'80s
when I was in my 20s...
591
00:45:25,233 --> 00:45:28,532
just starting to do politics
in a serious way,
592
00:45:28,603 --> 00:45:31,595

it seemed like the only way to593

00:45:31,673 --> 00:45:34,437
the only outlet for revolutionay desire
was to go to Central America...
594
00:45:34,509 --> 00:45:39,412
and to somehow participate in,
or at least observe, their revolutions.
595
00:45:39,481 --> 00:45:42,746
I mean, so a lot of people
went to Nicaragua.
596
00:45:42,818 --> 00:45:47,755
I, with my friends, was mostly
interested in El Salvador.
597
00:45:47,823 --> 00:45:50,621
But the, um- the thing I realized
at a certain point...
598
00:45:50,692 --> 00:45:55,629
was that all we could do
is really observe what
their revolutions were.
599
00:45:55,697 --> 00:46:00,896
And the defining moment for me
came in a meeting in El Salvador...
600
00:46:00,969 --> 00:46:03,938
with a group of, uh, students
at the University of El Salvador.
601
00:46:04,005 --> 00:46:07,532
And at a certain point,

a friend there said,

602
00:46:07,609 --> 00:46:10,806
"Look, we're really grateful
for these North American comrades
who come to help us,
603
00:46:10,879 --> 00:46:13,814
"but we really- what would
be really best for us...
604
00:46:13,882 --> 00:46:16,908
"is if you all would go home
and make revolution in the U.S.
605
00:46:16,985 --> 00:46:19,453
That would really be better
than trying to come help us here."
606
00:46:19,521 --> 00:46:23,719
And it was true, of course.
I don't think any of these
North Americans were particularly helpful...
607
00:46:23,792 --> 00:46:25,919
in Nicaragua and El Salvador, et cetera.
608
00:46:25,994 --> 00:46:29,054
Um, and- But I said at that point609
00:46:29,131 --> 00:46:31,122
"You know, Reagan's in the White House.
610
00:46:31,199 --> 00:46:35,101
I have no idea what it would mean
to make revolution in the U.S.
I just don't have any-"

611
00:46:35,170 --> 00:46:37,263
And then he said, "Look, don't
you have mountains in the U.S.?"
612
00:46:37,339 --> 00:46:39,773
And I said, "Yeah. We have mountains."
He says, "It's easy.
613
00:46:39,841 --> 00:46:44,005
"You go to the mountains.
You start an armed cell.
You make revolution."
614
00:46:44,079 --> 00:46:46,172
And I thought, "Oh, shit."
You know.
615
00:46:46,248 --> 00:46:49,183
It just didn't correspond
to my reality.
616
00:46:49,251 --> 00:46:53,381
Like those notions of
constructing the armed cell,
617
00:46:53,455 --> 00:46:57,789
especially constructing the armed cell
in the mountains and then sabotaging things.
618
00:46:57,859 --> 00:47:02,558
It didn't- It didn't make any sense at all,
so we really had no idea how to do it.
619
00:47:02,631 --> 00:47:04,997
Um, not just
we didn't know practically-

620
00:47:05,066 --> 00:47:08,627
like we didn't know which rifles
to take up into the mountains.
621
00:47:08,703 --> 00:47:12,867
It's-The whole idea
of what it involved was lacking,
622
00:47:12,941 --> 00:47:17,173
um, and required
a real conceptual rethinking.
623
00:47:56,451 --> 00:48:00,888
We're stuck conceptually, I think,
between two almost cliche ways
of thinking revolution today.
624
00:48:00,956 --> 00:48:03,891
On the one hand, we have...
625
00:48:03,959 --> 00:48:06,928
the notion of revolution
that involves...
626
00:48:06,995 --> 00:48:10,431
the replacement of a ruling elite...
627
00:48:10,499 --> 00:48:12,694
with another...
628
00:48:12,767 --> 00:48:15,031
better, in many ways, ruling elite.
629
00:48:15,103 --> 00:48:18,869
And that's in fact the form

that many of the modern

revolutions have taken...
630
00:48:18,940 --> 00:48:23,274
and have posed great benefits
for the people, et cetera,
but they have not arrived at democracy.
631
00:48:23,345 --> 00:48:27,748
And so that notion of revolution
is really discredited,
and I think rightly so.
632
00:48:27,816 --> 00:48:31,149
But opposed to that
is another notion of revolution,
633
00:48:31,219 --> 00:48:34,313
which I think is equally
discredited from exactly
the opposite point of view,
634
00:48:34,389 --> 00:48:38,553
which is the notion of revolutionthat, in fact hasn't been instituted635
00:48:38,627 --> 00:48:42,119
that thinks of revolution
as just the removal...
636
00:48:42,197 --> 00:48:45,997
of all of those forms of authority637
00:48:46,067 --> 00:48:48,501
state power, the power of capital638
00:48:48,570 --> 00:48:52,666

that stop people from expressing

their natural abilities to rule themselves.
639
00:48:55,844 --> 00:48:59,644
The question of human nature
has long been a thing
of political philosophy.
640
00:48:59,714 --> 00:49:04,981
In fact, I'm sure everyone had
some stupid evening in college
smoking way too much and talking,
641
00:49:05,053 --> 00:49:09,046
where you end up in a discussion
where, like, you decide you
disagree with your friend...
642
00:49:09,124 --> 00:49:11,149
because she thinks
that human nature's evil,
643
00:49:11,226 --> 00:49:13,456
you think human nature's good,
and you can't get any further.
644
00:49:13,528 --> 00:49:17,862
I mean, this is- I think
that kind of stupidity, I think,
645
00:49:17,933 --> 00:49:21,061
has affected a lot of the history
of political philosophy.
646
00:49:21,136 --> 00:49:24,299
And I think the relevant
fact for politics-

647
00:49:28,743 --> 00:49:31,940
Running aground.
648
00:49:34,082 --> 00:49:36,016
Shipwrecked.
649
00:49:41,423 --> 00:49:44,688
The relevant fact for politics is
really that human nature's changeable.
650
00:49:44,759 --> 00:49:49,992
Human nature isn't good or evil.
Human nature is, uh, constituted.
651
00:49:50,065 --> 00:49:52,590
It's constituted
by how we act, how we652
00:49:52,667 --> 00:49:57,536
The history- Human nature is, in fact,
the histoy of habits and practices...
653
00:49:57,606 --> 00:50:00,370
that are the result
of- of past struggles,
654
00:50:00,442 --> 00:50:03,502
of past hierarchies,
of past victories and defeats.
655
00:50:03,578 --> 00:50:06,069
And so this is, I think, actually656
00:50:06,147 --> 00:50:09,014
The key to rethinking revolution
is to recognize...

657
00:50:09,084 --> 00:50:11,848
that revolution...
658
00:50:11,920 --> 00:50:16,653
is not just about...
a transformation for democracy.
659
00:50:16,725 --> 00:50:19,193
It's reallyRevolution really requires...
660
00:50:19,260 --> 00:50:23,594
a transformation of human nature
so that people are capable of democracy.
661
00:50:27,969 --> 00:50:31,029
Democracy is one of those concepts
that seems to me has been...
662
00:50:31,106 --> 00:50:33,700
almost completely corrupted today.
663
00:50:33,775 --> 00:50:36,005
In some cases,
it's used to mean...
664
00:50:36,077 --> 00:50:39,604
simply periodic elections
with a limited choice of rulers.
665
00:50:39,681 --> 00:50:43,708
In other cases, when one thinks
especially in international affairs,
666
00:50:43,785 --> 00:50:47,380

it often means following the will

of the United States.
667
00:50:47,455 --> 00:50:50,618
But really, democracy means
the rule of all by all.
668
00:50:50,692 --> 00:50:55,288
It means everybody involved
in collective self-rule.
669
00:50:58,500 --> 00:51:00,593
You see those turtles over there?
670
00:51:08,810 --> 00:51:13,042
How do you transform human nature
so that people will be capable
of democracy?
671
00:51:13,114 --> 00:51:16,447
Lenin's solution to this problem
is a properly dialectical one.
672
00:51:16,518 --> 00:51:20,045
He thinks- and this is in large part
what the Soviets enact673
00:51:20,121 --> 00:51:23,249
that there has to be
a negation of democracy.
674
00:51:23,324 --> 00:51:25,519
Call it "dictatorship of the proletariat,"
675
00:51:25,593 --> 00:51:30,326
some sort of hegemonic state
that would then operate the transition,

676
00:51:30,398 --> 00:51:32,389
that would transform human nature,
677
00:51:32,467 --> 00:51:37,234
then to eventually arrive at the time
when people are capable of democracy,
678
00:51:37,305 --> 00:51:40,274
the state's no longer necessary,
et cetera.
679
00:51:41,276 --> 00:51:45,542
It's properly the dialectical nature
of this that seems to me mistaken.
680
00:51:45,613 --> 00:51:50,448
How do people learn democracy?
How does human nature change
to become capable of democracy?
681
00:51:50,518 --> 00:51:52,486
Not by its opposite.
682
00:51:52,554 --> 00:51:57,184
It can only be done in a sort
of positive development by683
00:51:57,258 --> 00:51:59,556
You can only learn democracy by doing it.
684
00:51:59,627 --> 00:52:04,087
And so that that seems to methe conception685
00:52:04,165 --> 00:52:08,397

the only way it seems to me today

to be able to rehabilitate...
686
00:52:09,404 --> 00:52:11,463
the conception of revolution.
687
00:52:13,441 --> 00:52:17,639
Revolution then today
refuses that dialectic
between purgatory and paradise.
688
00:52:17,712 --> 00:52:22,149
It's rather instigating
utopia every day.
689
00:52:26,421 --> 00:52:30,187
There's something quite- that feels
immediately quite inappropriate...
690
00:52:30,258 --> 00:52:34,422
about talking
about revolution on such a691
00:52:34,496 --> 00:52:39,456
what would be sort of like...
aristocratic almost.
692
00:52:39,534 --> 00:52:41,866
I mean not even bourgeois.
Aristocratic location.
693
00:52:41,936 --> 00:52:46,373
You know, rowing
on a beautiful pond in a park...
694
00:52:46,441 --> 00:52:51,469
with the rich of New York all around it,

it seems like kind of an absurdity.

695
00:52:51,546 --> 00:52:55,175
[Astra Taylor]
Well, where would we pick that
would be the revolutionary spot?
696
00:52:55,250 --> 00:52:57,878
But then that
would be cliche already.
697
00:52:57,952 --> 00:53:01,251
Here, the cliche would be
that you'd choose as a visual site...
698
00:53:01,322 --> 00:53:05,816
either- either a scene of poverty...
699
00:53:05,894 --> 00:53:08,226
or a scene of labor and production.
700
00:53:08,296 --> 00:53:09,957
Um,
701
00:53:11,666 --> 00:53:14,032
because then you would show the ones
who would benefit from it,
702
00:53:14,102 --> 00:53:18,869
and even the subjects, you know,
the actors that would- that would conduct it.
703
00:53:18,940 --> 00:53:23,206
But it strikes me in another way
that it might be appropriate to have704

00:53:25,113 --> 00:53:29,413

to work against such
a conception of revolution...
705
00:53:29,484 --> 00:53:31,918
as, um706
00:53:33,388 --> 00:53:35,379
as loss and as deprivation.
707
00:53:36,257 --> 00:53:40,990
It makes little sense to me
to say revolution can't be made
in the United States...
708
00:53:41,062 --> 00:53:43,553
or revolution can't be made in New York
because everyone is too comfortable,
709
00:53:43,631 --> 00:53:46,259
because they have too much
to lose, et cetera.
710
00:53:46,334 --> 00:53:49,565
They too have
an enormous amount to gain.
711
00:53:49,637 --> 00:53:51,798
When we say a better world
is possible,
712
00:53:51,873 --> 00:53:55,900
we don't just mean a better world
for those who are least off today.
713
00:53:55,977 --> 00:53:58,070
We mean a better world for all of us.

714
00:54:23,171 --> 00:54:27,437
[Man]
This is where we should start
feeling at home.
715
00:54:30,111 --> 00:54:33,410
Part of our daily perception
of reality...
716
00:54:33,481 --> 00:54:37,042
is that this disappears
from our world.
717
00:54:37,118 --> 00:54:42,055
When you go to the toilet,
shit disappears. You flush it.
718
00:54:42,123 --> 00:54:46,526
Of course rationally you know
it's there in canalization and so on,
719
00:54:46,594 --> 00:54:49,893
but at a certain level of
your most elementay experience,
720
00:54:49,964 --> 00:54:53,957
it disappears from your world.
721
00:54:56,037 --> 00:54:59,973
But the problem is that trash
doesn't disappear.
722
00:55:02,043 --> 00:55:04,034
I think ecology723

00:55:04,112 --> 00:55:06,774

The way we approach
ecological problematic...
724
00:55:06,848 --> 00:55:11,217
is maybe the crucial field
of ideology today.
725
00:55:11,286 --> 00:55:16,553
And I use ideology in the
traditional sense of illusory
726
00:55:16,624 --> 00:55:20,993
wrong way of thinking
and perceiving reality.
727
00:55:21,062 --> 00:55:24,725
Why? Ideology is not simply dreaming...
728
00:55:24,799 --> 00:55:27,666
about false ideas and so on.
729
00:55:27,735 --> 00:55:33,537
Ideology addresses very real problems,
but it mystifies them.
730
00:55:33,608 --> 00:55:37,203
One of the elementay
ideological mechanisms, I claim,
731
00:55:37,278 --> 00:55:42,079
is what I call
the temptation of meaning.
732
00:55:42,150 --> 00:55:44,618
When something horrible happens,

733
00:55:44,686 --> 00:55:48,122
our spontaneous tendency
is to search for a meaning.
734
00:55:48,189 --> 00:55:52,125
It must mean something.
You know, like AIDS.
It was a trauma.
735
00:55:52,193 --> 00:55:55,390
Then conservatives came
and said it's punishment...
736
00:55:55,463 --> 00:55:58,762
for our sinful ways of life,
and so on and so on.
737
00:55:58,833 --> 00:56:04,669
Even if we interpret a catastrophe
as a punishment,
738
00:56:04,739 --> 00:56:06,468
it makes it easier in a way...
739
00:56:06,541 --> 00:56:10,033
because we know it's not just
some terrifying blind force.
740
00:56:10,111 --> 00:56:11,635
It has a meaning.
741
00:56:11,713 --> 00:56:14,307
It's better when you are
in the middle of a catastrophe.
742
00:56:14,382 --> 00:56:20,116

It's better to feel that God punished you

than to feel that it just happened.
743
00:56:20,188 --> 00:56:24,124
If God punished you,
it's still a universe of meaning.
744
00:56:24,192 --> 00:56:30,062
And I think that that's where
ecology as ideology enters.
745
00:56:50,585 --> 00:56:53,952
It's really the implicit
premise of ecology...
746
00:56:54,022 --> 00:56:56,991
that the existing world...
747
00:56:57,058 --> 00:57:00,152
is the best possible world,
748
00:57:00,228 --> 00:57:03,629
in the sense of
it's a balanced world...
749
00:57:03,698 --> 00:57:07,361
which is disturbed
through human hubris.
750
00:57:07,435 --> 00:57:10,097
So why do I find this problematic?
751
00:57:10,171 --> 00:57:14,073
Because I think
that this notion of nature752

00:57:14,142 --> 00:57:19,239

nature as a harmonious, organic,
753
00:57:19,313 --> 00:57:24,182
balanced, reproducing,
almost living organism,
754
00:57:24,252 --> 00:57:28,780
which is then disturbed, perturbed,
755
00:57:28,856 --> 00:57:32,849
derailed through human hubris,
technological exploitation and so on,
756
00:57:32,927 --> 00:57:37,364
is, I think, a secular version
of the religious story of the Fall.
757
00:57:37,432 --> 00:57:42,665
And the answer should benot that there is no fallthat we are part of nature,
758
00:57:42,737 --> 00:57:45,797
but on the contrary,
that there is no nature.
759
00:57:45,873 --> 00:57:50,469
Nature is not a balanced totality
which then we humans disturb.
760
00:57:50,545 --> 00:57:52,843
Nature is a big series...
761
00:57:52,914 --> 00:57:55,212
of unimaginable catastrophes.

762
00:57:55,283 --> 00:57:59,686
We profit from them.
What's our main source
of energy today? Oil.
763
00:57:59,754 --> 00:58:02,188
What are we aware- What is oil?
764
00:58:02,256 --> 00:58:07,023
Oil reserves beneath the earth
are material remainders...
765
00:58:07,095 --> 00:58:09,620
of an unimaginable catastrophe.
766
00:58:09,697 --> 00:58:13,758
Are we awareBecause we all know
that oil- oil- oil is767
00:58:13,835 --> 00:58:17,635
oil is composed of the
remainders of animal life,
768
00:58:17,705 --> 00:58:19,798
plants and so on and so on.
769
00:58:19,874 --> 00:58:23,935
Can you imagine what kind
of unthinkable catastrophe...
770
00:58:24,011 --> 00:58:25,945
had to occur on Earth?
771
00:58:26,013 --> 00:58:27,947
So that is good to remember.

772
00:58:46,167 --> 00:58:49,034
No. You call this porn? My God.
773
00:58:55,109 --> 00:58:59,978
You can have a half of a hamburger.
There is some cheese sandwich.
774
00:59:00,047 --> 00:59:03,244
Then you can have a muffin
and some juice.
775
00:59:09,757 --> 00:59:13,955
Ecology will slowly turn, maybe,
776
00:59:14,028 --> 00:59:17,930
into a new opium of the masses...
777
00:59:17,999 --> 00:59:21,059
the way, as we all know,
Marx defined religion.
778
00:59:22,003 --> 00:59:27,669
What we expect from religion
is a kind of an unquestionable
highest authority.
779
00:59:27,742 --> 00:59:30,734
It's God's word, so it is.
You don't debate it.
780
00:59:30,811 --> 00:59:32,745
Today, I claim,
781
00:59:32,813 --> 00:59:37,773
ecology is more and more

taking over this role...

782
00:59:37,852 --> 00:59:41,310
of a conservative ideology.
783
00:59:41,389 --> 00:59:45,985
Whenever there is
a new scientific breakthroughbiogenetic development, whatever784
00:59:46,060 --> 00:59:48,392
it is as if the voice...
785
00:59:48,462 --> 00:59:53,092
which warns us not to trespass,
786
00:59:53,167 --> 00:59:55,465
violate a certain invisible limit...
787
00:59:55,536 --> 00:59:57,834
like, "Don't do that.
It would be too much."
788
00:59:57,905 --> 01:00:02,638
That voice is today more
and more the voice of ecology.
789
01:00:02,710 --> 01:00:04,940
Like, "Don't mess with D.N.A.
790
01:00:05,012 --> 01:00:07,139
Don't mess with nature.
Don't do it"791
01:00:07,215 --> 01:00:09,911
this basic conservative...

792
01:00:09,984 --> 01:00:15,047
partly ideological mistrust of change.
793
01:00:15,122 --> 01:00:17,090
This is today ecology.
794
01:00:19,026 --> 01:00:21,961
Another myth
which is popular about ecology795
01:00:22,029 --> 01:00:25,760
namely a spontaneous ideological myth796
01:00:25,833 --> 01:00:30,031
is the idea that we Western people...
797
01:00:30,104 --> 01:00:33,267
in our artificial
technological environment...
798
01:00:33,341 --> 01:00:38,904
are alienated from immediate
natural environments799
01:00:38,980 --> 01:00:40,914
that we should not forget...
800
01:00:40,982 --> 01:00:45,510
that we humans
are part of the living Earth.
801
01:00:45,586 --> 01:00:50,353
We should not forget
that we are not abstract engineers,

802
01:00:50,424 --> 01:00:53,018
theorists who just exploit nature803
01:00:53,094 --> 01:00:58,999
that we are part of nature,
that nature is our unfathomable,
impenetrable background.
804
01:00:59,066 --> 01:01:04,333
I think that that precisely
is the greatest danger.
805
01:01:04,405 --> 01:01:08,808
Why? Think about
a certain obvious paradox.
806
01:01:08,876 --> 01:01:13,040
We all know in what
danger we all are807
01:01:13,114 --> 01:01:17,744
global warming,
possibility of other ecological
catastrophes and so on and so on.
808
01:01:17,818 --> 01:01:21,276
But why don't we do anything about it?
809
01:01:21,355 --> 01:01:24,324
It is, I think, a nice example...
810
01:01:24,392 --> 01:01:29,261
of what in psychoanalysis
we call disavowal.
811
01:01:29,330 --> 01:01:32,299

The logic is that of,

"I know very well,
812
01:01:32,366 --> 01:01:36,234
but I act as if I don't know."
813
01:01:36,304 --> 01:01:38,602
For example, precisely,
814
01:01:38,673 --> 01:01:43,133
in the case of ecology, I know very
well there may be global warming,
815
01:01:43,210 --> 01:01:46,304
everything will explode,
be destroyed.
816
01:01:46,380 --> 01:01:50,749
But after reading a treatise on it,
what do I do?
817
01:01:50,818 --> 01:01:55,619
I step out. I see- not things
that I see now behind me818
01:01:55,690 --> 01:01:57,715
that's a nice sight for me819
01:01:57,792 --> 01:02:01,523
I see nice trees, birds singing and so on.
820
01:02:01,595 --> 01:02:05,656
And even if I know rationally
this is all in danger,
821
01:02:05,733 --> 01:02:10,670

I simply do not believe

that this can be destroyed.
822
01:02:10,738 --> 01:02:16,142
That's the horror of visiting sites
of a catastrophe like Chernobyl.
823
01:02:16,210 --> 01:02:19,441
You- In a way,
we are not evolutionarily824
01:02:19,513 --> 01:02:22,778
We are not wired to even imagine
something like that.
825
01:02:22,850 --> 01:02:24,841
It's in a way unimaginable.
826
01:02:24,919 --> 01:02:27,911
So I think
that what we should do...
827
01:02:27,988 --> 01:02:32,652
to confront properly the threat
of ecological catastrophe...
828
01:02:32,727 --> 01:02:35,457
is not all this New Age stuff...
829
01:02:35,529 --> 01:02:39,363
to break out of this
technological manipulative mold...
830
01:02:39,433 --> 01:02:42,266
and to found our roots in nature,
831

01:02:42,336 --> 01:02:46,534

but, on the contrary, to cut off
even more these roots in nature.
832
01:02:56,150 --> 01:03:00,143
We need more alienation
from our life-world,
833
01:03:00,221 --> 01:03:03,486
from our, as it were,
spontaneous nature.
834
01:03:03,557 --> 01:03:06,549
We should become more artificial.
835
01:03:15,736 --> 01:03:20,366
We should develop, I think,
a much more terrifying
new abstract materialism,
836
01:03:20,441 --> 01:03:24,343
a kind of a mathematical universe
where there is nothing.
837
01:03:24,412 --> 01:03:28,041
There are just formulas,
technical forms and so on.
838
01:03:28,115 --> 01:03:32,950
And the difficult thing
is to find poetry,
839
01:03:33,020 --> 01:03:35,250
spirituality,
in this dimension...
840
01:03:36,991 --> 01:03:40,586

to recreate-if not beautythen aesthetic dimension...

841
01:03:40,661 --> 01:03:43,892
in things like this, in trash itself.
842
01:03:43,964 --> 01:03:46,057
That's the true love of the world.
843
01:03:46,133 --> 01:03:49,500
Because what is love?
Love is not idealization.
844
01:03:50,771 --> 01:03:55,970
Every true lover knows
that if you really love a woman or a man,
845
01:03:57,478 --> 01:04:01,346
that you don't idealize him or her.
846
01:04:01,415 --> 01:04:04,646
Love means that you accept a person...
847
01:04:04,718 --> 01:04:08,654
with all its failures,
stupidities, ugly points.
848
01:04:08,722 --> 01:04:13,216
And nonetheless,
the person's absolute for you.
849
01:04:13,294 --> 01:04:16,752
Everything lifethat makes life worth living.
850
01:04:16,831 --> 01:04:21,325

But you see perfection

in imperfection itself.
851
01:04:21,402 --> 01:04:27,170
And that's how we should learn
to love the world.
852
01:04:27,241 --> 01:04:30,472
True ecologist loves all this.
853
01:05:11,151 --> 01:05:14,052
I thought we should take
this walk together.
854
01:05:14,121 --> 01:05:16,180
And, um855
01:05:17,892 --> 01:05:22,454
One of the things I wanted
to talk about was what it means
for us to take a walk together.
856
01:05:30,538 --> 01:05:35,669
When I first asked you
about this, um, you told me
you take walks, you take strolls.
857
01:05:35,743 --> 01:05:38,837
I do.
And...
858
01:05:38,913 --> 01:05:44,351
can you say something about,
um, what that is for you?
859
01:05:44,418 --> 01:05:48,821
When do you do it

and how do you do it

and what words do you have for it?
860
01:05:48,889 --> 01:05:52,848
Well I think that II always go for a walkMm-hmm.
861
01:05:52,927 --> 01:05:54,918
Probably every day I go for a walk.
Every day.
862
01:05:54,995 --> 01:05:59,398
Um, and I always tell people
that I'm going for walks.
863
01:05:59,466 --> 01:06:01,400
I use that word.
864
01:06:01,468 --> 01:06:04,835
And most of the disabled people
who I know use that term also.
865
01:06:04,905 --> 01:06:09,137
And which environments make it
possible for you to take a walk?
866
01:06:09,209 --> 01:06:13,976
I moved to San Francisco
largely because it's the most
accessible place in the world.
867
01:06:14,048 --> 01:06:16,039
Yes.
And part of what's so amazing
to me about it...
868

01:06:16,116 --> 01:06:20,212

is that the- the physical access869
01:06:20,287 --> 01:06:22,414
the fact that the public transportation
is accessible,
870
01:06:22,489 --> 01:06:24,923
there's curb cuts most places.
871
01:06:24,992 --> 01:06:29,292
Almost most places I'll go,
there's curb cuts.
Buildings are accessible.
872
01:06:29,363 --> 01:06:33,823
And what this does is
that it also leads
to a social acceptability,
873
01:06:33,901 --> 01:06:37,393
that somehow becausebecause there's physical access,
874
01:06:37,471 --> 01:06:40,372
there're simply more disabled people
out and about in the world.
875
01:06:40,441 --> 01:06:44,434
And so people have learned
how to interact with them...
876
01:06:44,511 --> 01:06:47,036
and are used to them
in this certain way.
Yes.
877

01:06:47,114 --> 01:06:51,983

And so the physical access
actually leads to, um,
878
01:06:53,187 --> 01:06:55,553
a social access, an acceptance.
Yeah.
879
01:06:55,623 --> 01:06:58,057
It must be nice not to always
have to be the pioneer.
880
01:06:58,125 --> 01:07:00,992
Yes, definitely. Definitely.
The very first one they meet...
881
01:07:01,061 --> 01:07:03,825
The first disabled person
they've ever seen.
and having to explain.
882
01:07:03,897 --> 01:07:06,127
Yeah.
And yes I do, you know, speak...
883
01:07:06,200 --> 01:07:08,725
and think and talk
and move and enjoy life...
Yes.
884
01:07:08,802 --> 01:07:11,703
and suffer many of the same
heartaches that you do.
885
01:07:11,772 --> 01:07:13,706
Anyway, um,
886

01:07:13,774 --> 01:07:18,643

but what I'm wondering about
is, um, moving in social space, right?
887
01:07:18,712 --> 01:07:21,203
Moving- all the movements
you can do...
888
01:07:21,281 --> 01:07:25,217
and which help you live
and which express you
in various ways.
889
01:07:25,285 --> 01:07:31,053
Um, do you feel free to move
in all the ways you want to move?
890
01:07:31,125 --> 01:07:36,392
I can go into a coffee shop
and actually pick up the cup
with my mouth...
891
01:07:36,463 --> 01:07:38,397
and carry it to my table.
892
01:07:38,465 --> 01:07:42,629
But then thatthat becomes almost more difficult...
893
01:07:42,703 --> 01:07:46,036
because of the894
01:07:46,106 --> 01:07:48,540
just the normalizing standards
of our movements...
Yes.
895

01:07:48,609 --> 01:07:52,010

and the discomfort
that that causes...
896
01:07:52,079 --> 01:07:55,310
when I do things with body parts...
897
01:07:55,382 --> 01:07:59,751
that aren't necessarily
what we assume that they're for.
898
01:07:59,820 --> 01:08:04,280
That seems to be even more, um,
899
01:08:06,160 --> 01:08:08,355
hard for people to deal with.
900
01:08:09,963 --> 01:08:11,988
Is that somebody's shoe?
Someone's shoe.
901
01:08:12,066 --> 01:08:15,900
I wonder
if they can walk without it.
Yeah.
902
01:08:15,969 --> 01:08:20,565
I'm just thinking that nobody
takes a walk without there being
a technique of walking.
903
01:08:20,641 --> 01:08:22,575
Yeah.
Nobody goes for a walk...
904
01:08:22,643 --> 01:08:27,342
without there being something

that supports that walk,

uh, outside of ourselves.
905
01:08:27,414 --> 01:08:33,114
Mm-hmm.
Um, and that maybe
we have a false idea,
906
01:08:33,187 --> 01:08:38,215
um, that the able-bodied person
is somehow radically
self-sufficient.
907
01:08:38,292 --> 01:08:40,283
[Sunaura Taylor]
Yeah.
908
01:08:43,197 --> 01:08:48,533
It wasn't until I was
in my early 20s, about 20 or 21,
909
01:08:48,602 --> 01:08:53,335
that I became aware
of disability...
910
01:08:53,407 --> 01:08:55,341
as a political issue.
911
01:08:55,409 --> 01:08:59,743
Um, and that happened
largely through discovering
the social model of disability...
912
01:08:59,813 --> 01:09:01,906
which is basically913
01:09:01,982 --> 01:09:04,143

In disability studies,
they have a distinction...
914
01:09:04,218 --> 01:09:06,277
between disability
and impairment.
Yeah.
915
01:09:06,353 --> 01:09:11,222
So impairment would be
my- my body, my embodiment
right now.
916
01:09:11,291 --> 01:09:14,488
The fact that I was born
with arthrogyposis,
917
01:09:14,561 --> 01:09:20,022
which affects- what
the medical world has labeled
as arthrogyposis918
01:09:20,100 --> 01:09:25,333
Um, but basically that my joints
are-are-are-are fused.
919
01:09:25,405 --> 01:09:29,535
My muscles are weaker.
I can't move in certain ways.
920
01:09:29,610 --> 01:09:35,207
And this does affect my life
in all sorts of situations.
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
921
01:09:35,282 --> 01:09:38,547
For instance, you know,
there's a plum tree in my backyard.

922
01:09:38,619 --> 01:09:40,883
I can't pick the plums
off the plum tree.
923
01:09:40,954 --> 01:09:42,945
I have to wait for them
to drop or whatever.
924
01:09:43,023 --> 01:09:47,426
Um, but thenAnd so there's thatthere's that embodiment,
925
01:09:47,494 --> 01:09:50,327
um, our own unique embodiments.
926
01:09:50,397 --> 01:09:55,266
And then there's disability
which is basically the927
01:09:55,335 --> 01:10:00,967
the... social repression
of disabled people.
928
01:10:01,041 --> 01:10:04,875
The fact that disabled people
have limited housing options.
929
01:10:04,945 --> 01:10:07,038
We don't have career opportunities.
930
01:10:07,114 --> 01:10:10,345
Um, we're socially isolated.
931
01:10:10,417 --> 01:10:12,351

We're, um932
01:10:12,419 --> 01:10:15,616
You know, in many ways,
there's a cultural aversion
to disabled people.
933
01:10:15,689 --> 01:10:19,887
So would disability
be the social organization
of impairment?
934
01:10:19,960 --> 01:10:22,485
The disabling effects,
basically, of society.
935
01:10:27,334 --> 01:10:30,667
What happened?
Did you come in contact
with disability activists?
936
01:10:30,737 --> 01:10:34,696
Or did you read certain things?
I read a book review actually.
937
01:10:34,775 --> 01:10:37,505
Oh, really?
Yeah, I just read a book review.
938
01:10:37,578 --> 01:10:39,569
And when that happened,
I lived in Brooklyn.
939
01:10:39,646 --> 01:10:44,583
And I would- I would really try
to make myself go out...
940

01:10:44,651 --> 01:10:46,949

and just order a coffee
by myself.
Yes.
941
01:10:47,020 --> 01:10:50,183
And I would sit for hours
beforehand in the park...
942
01:10:50,257 --> 01:10:52,691
just trying to get up the nerve
to do that.
Oh.
943
01:10:52,759 --> 01:10:56,251
In a way, it's a political protest
for me to go in...
944
01:10:56,330 --> 01:10:58,798
and order a coffee
and demand help...
945
01:10:58,866 --> 01:11:02,597
simply because in my opinion,
help is something that we all need.
946
01:11:02,669 --> 01:11:06,901
Yes.
And it's something that isis, you know, looked down upon...
947
01:11:06,974 --> 01:11:11,434
and... not really taken care of
in this society...
948
01:11:11,511 --> 01:11:13,479
when we allwhen we all need help...

Yes.
949
01:11:13,547 --> 01:11:16,948
and we're all interdependent
in all sorts of ways.
Yes.
950
01:11:19,419 --> 01:11:22,286
Should we stop
and get me something warm?
951
01:11:24,658 --> 01:11:26,125
I don't know, honey.
That's pretty fancy.
952
01:11:26,193 --> 01:11:29,060
Let's go find something good.
953
01:11:30,297 --> 01:11:33,027
Yeah, I think that would
probably fall off my shoulders.
954
01:11:34,968 --> 01:11:37,960
Although I guess we can try it on.
955
01:11:38,038 --> 01:11:41,303
Basically, that's the back, yeah.
That would be956
01:11:42,476 --> 01:11:44,467
Yeah.
957
01:11:45,779 --> 01:11:47,770
Okay.
958
01:11:49,716 --> 01:11:51,741

Other arm.
Other arm?
959
01:11:57,991 --> 01:12:00,926
And I like it.
It's stylish.
It's very stylish.
960
01:12:00,994 --> 01:12:04,020
Okay.
It's kind of, you know,
961
01:12:04,097 --> 01:12:06,031
sporty and fancy.
962
01:12:06,099 --> 01:12:09,830
It's gonna be a new show,
Shopping With Judith Butler.
963
01:12:09,903 --> 01:12:11,837
For the Queer Eye.
964
01:12:13,640 --> 01:12:16,108
Maybe I can just get it
while wearing it.
965
01:12:17,244 --> 01:12:19,872
[Clerk]
Hey.
Hi. We put the sweater on.
966
01:12:19,947 --> 01:12:21,881
Yeah, so I'm actually buying
the one that I'm wearing.
We just wanna buy it.
967
01:12:21,949 --> 01:12:24,509

Okay. Um, so it's by weight.

968
01:12:24,584 --> 01:12:26,518
Oh, it's by weight?
Can we guess?
969
01:12:26,586 --> 01:12:29,282
I can probably just do it
for four bucks plus tax.
That sounds good.
970
01:12:29,356 --> 01:12:31,790
Here you go.
971
01:12:34,161 --> 01:12:38,291
Can you give me the- the bills first
and then give me the change?
Sure.
972
01:12:39,366 --> 01:12:41,834
Oh. Oh, I just meant theOh, you just want973
01:12:41,902 --> 01:12:44,530
Yeah, I just can't hold both
at the same time.
There you go.
974
01:12:46,373 --> 01:12:50,241
- There you go.
- Thanks. Thanks so much.
975
01:12:55,515 --> 01:13:00,043
I think gender and disability
converge in a whole lot
of different ways.
976

01:13:00,120 --> 01:13:03,851

Yeah.
But one thing I think
both movements do...
977
01:13:03,924 --> 01:13:08,827
is get us to rethink, um,
what the body can do.
978
01:13:09,563 --> 01:13:14,262
There's an essay by the philosopher
Gilles Deleuze called
"What Can a Body Do?"
979
01:13:15,569 --> 01:13:20,097
Uh, and the question
is supposed to challenge,
um, the traditional ways...
980
01:13:20,173 --> 01:13:22,164
in which we think
about bodies.
Mm-hmm.
981
01:13:22,242 --> 01:13:25,040
We usually ask, you know,
what is a body...
982
01:13:25,112 --> 01:13:27,580
or what is the ideal form
of a body...
983
01:13:27,647 --> 01:13:30,548
or, you know,
what's the difference
between the body and the soul...
984
01:13:30,617 --> 01:13:32,551

and that kind of thing.

Yeah.
985
01:13:32,619 --> 01:13:38,251
Uh, but "what can a body do?"
is, um- is a different question.
986
01:13:38,325 --> 01:13:41,317
It's- It- It isolates
a set of capacities...
987
01:13:41,395 --> 01:13:45,661
and a set of instrumentalities
or actions,
988
01:13:45,732 --> 01:13:49,099
and we are kind
of assemblages of those things.
Mm-hmm.
989
01:13:49,169 --> 01:13:51,103
Um, and I like this idea.
990
01:13:51,171 --> 01:13:53,071
It's- It's not like
there's an essence,
991
01:13:53,140 --> 01:13:56,769
and it's not like
there's an ideal morphology992
01:13:56,843 --> 01:13:58,777
you know, what a body
should look like.
993
01:13:58,845 --> 01:14:00,745
It's exactly not that question.

Yeah. Yeah.
994
01:14:00,814 --> 01:14:04,011
[Laughs] Or what a body
should move like.
Mm-hmm.
995
01:14:04,084 --> 01:14:07,383
Um, and one of the things
that I found...
996
01:14:07,454 --> 01:14:10,184
in thinking about gender
and even violence...
997
01:14:10,257 --> 01:14:14,091
against, uh, sexual minorities
or gender minorities998
01:14:14,161 --> 01:14:19,360
people whose gender presentation
doesn't conform with standard ideals...
999
01:14:19,433 --> 01:14:22,960
of femininity or masculinity1000
01:14:23,036 --> 01:14:26,335
is that very often, um,
1001
01:14:26,406 --> 01:14:29,466
it comes down to, uh,
1002
01:14:29,543 --> 01:14:33,843
you know, how people walk,
how they use their hips,
what they do with their body parts,

1003
01:14:33,914 --> 01:14:36,246
uh, what they use
their mouth for,
[Laughs]
1004
01:14:36,316 --> 01:14:40,082
what they use their anus for
or what they allow
their anus to be used for.
1005
01:14:44,658 --> 01:14:50,062
There's a guy in Maine whoI guess he was around 18 years old.
1006
01:14:50,130 --> 01:14:54,157
And, uh, he walked
with a very, um,
1007
01:14:54,234 --> 01:14:56,168
distinct swish.
1008
01:14:56,236 --> 01:15:00,366
You know, the hips going one way
or another- and very feminine walk.
1009
01:15:01,108 --> 01:15:03,702
But one day
he was walking to school,
1010
01:15:03,777 --> 01:15:06,541
and he was attacked
by three of his classmates,
1011
01:15:06,613 --> 01:15:10,777
and he was thrown over a bridge
and he was killed.

1012
01:15:10,851 --> 01:15:14,446
And, um, the question that community
had to deal with1013
01:15:14,521 --> 01:15:18,184
and, indeed, the entire media
that covered this event1014
01:15:18,258 --> 01:15:21,591
was, you know, how could it be
that somebody's gait,
1015
01:15:21,661 --> 01:15:23,822
that somebody's style of walking...
1016
01:15:23,897 --> 01:15:27,697
could engender the desire
to kill that person?
1017
01:15:30,737 --> 01:15:34,195
And that, you knowthat makes me think
about the walk in a different way.
1018
01:15:34,274 --> 01:15:37,038
I mean, a walk
can be a dangerous thing.
1019
01:15:40,814 --> 01:15:43,078
I'm just remembering
when I was little- when I did walk1020
01:15:43,150 --> 01:15:46,278
I would be told
that I walked Iike a monkey.
Ah.

1021
01:15:46,353 --> 01:15:50,414
And I think that for a lot of,
you know, disabled people,
1022
01:15:50,490 --> 01:15:53,220
the violence and the1023
01:15:53,293 --> 01:15:58,128
the- the sort ofthe hatred exists a lot...
1024
01:15:58,198 --> 01:16:04,137
in- in- in this, um,
1025
01:16:04,204 --> 01:16:06,195
reminding of people...
1026
01:16:06,273 --> 01:16:10,642
that our bodies are... going to age...
1027
01:16:10,710 --> 01:16:15,010
and are, um, going to die.
1028
01:16:15,081 --> 01:16:16,742
And1029
01:16:18,084 --> 01:16:22,487
You know, in some ways,
I wonder also just, you knowjust thinking about the monkey comment...
1030
01:16:22,556 --> 01:16:26,925
if it is also a level of, um1031
01:16:26,993 --> 01:16:29,120

and this is just a thought

off the top of my head right now1032
01:16:29,196 --> 01:16:31,187
but just, um,
1033
01:16:32,799 --> 01:16:36,200
the- the sort of...
1034
01:16:39,573 --> 01:16:43,373
where- where our boundaries lie
as a human...
1035
01:16:43,443 --> 01:16:46,276
and what becomes non-human, you know.
1036
01:16:46,346 --> 01:16:49,838
It makes me wonder
whether the person
was anti-evolutionary.
1037
01:16:49,916 --> 01:16:51,884
Yeah.
Maybe they were a creationist.
1038
01:16:51,952 --> 01:16:55,513
It's like, "Well, why shouldn't
we have some resemblance
to the monkey?" I mean1039
01:16:55,589 --> 01:16:57,614
Well, the monkey's actually
always been my favorite animal too.
1040
01:16:57,691 --> 01:16:59,625
So actually quite a lot
of the time I was flattered.

1041
01:16:59,693 --> 01:17:01,627
Exactly.
Yeah.
1042
01:17:01,695 --> 01:17:03,629
But that- that1043
01:17:03,697 --> 01:17:07,064
When- When- When
in those in-between moments...
1044
01:17:07,133 --> 01:17:10,330
of, you know- in between male
and-and female...
1045
01:17:10,403 --> 01:17:16,308
or in between, um- uh,
death and-and health1046
01:17:16,376 --> 01:17:20,073
when- when do you still
count as a human?
1047
01:17:21,881 --> 01:17:23,872
My sense is that
what's at stake here...
1048
01:17:23,950 --> 01:17:29,411
is really rethinking the human
as a site of interdependency.
Mm-hmm.
1049
01:17:29,489 --> 01:17:33,186
And I think, you know,
when you walk
into the coffee shop. Right?

1050
01:17:33,260 --> 01:17:35,524
If I can go back
to that moment for a moment.
1051
01:17:35,595 --> 01:17:37,790
And you- you ask for the coffee,
1052
01:17:37,864 --> 01:17:41,857
or you, indeed,
even ask for some assistance
with the coffee,
1053
01:17:41,935 --> 01:17:45,701
um, you're basically
posing the question1054
01:17:45,772 --> 01:17:50,709
Do we or do we not live in a world
in which we assist each other?
[Laughs] Yeah.
1055
01:17:50,777 --> 01:17:56,716
Do we or do we not help
each other with- with basic needs?
1056
01:17:56,783 --> 01:18:01,618
And are basic needs there
to be decided on
as a social issue...
1057
01:18:01,688 --> 01:18:06,284
and not just my personal,
individual issue...
1058
01:18:06,359 --> 01:18:08,657
or your personal, individual issue?

1059
01:18:08,728 --> 01:18:10,787
So, I mean, there's a challenge
to individualism...
1060
01:18:10,864 --> 01:18:15,392
that happens at the moment
in which you ask for some assistance
with the coffee cup.
1061
01:18:15,468 --> 01:18:17,959
Yeah. Yeah.
And hopefully,
people will take it up...
1062
01:18:18,038 --> 01:18:20,404
and say, "Yes, I too
live in that world...
Yeah.
1063
01:18:20,473 --> 01:18:23,806
in which I understand
that we need each other
in order to address our basic needs."
1064
01:18:23,877 --> 01:18:25,811
Mm-hmm.
You know.
1065
01:18:25,879 --> 01:18:29,872
And- And I wanna organize
a social, political world
on the basis of that recognition.
1066
01:19:12,826 --> 01:19:17,160
[West]
Romanticism thoroughly saturated
the discourse of modern thinkers.

1067
01:19:17,230 --> 01:19:20,063
Can you totalize?
Can you make things whole?
[Astra Taylor] Right.
1068
01:19:20,133 --> 01:19:23,125
Can you create harmony?
And if you can't, disappointment.
1069
01:19:25,271 --> 01:19:28,365
Disappointment's
always at the center.
Failure's always at the center.
1070
01:19:28,441 --> 01:19:33,435
But where'd the Romanticism come from?
Why begin with Romanticism?
See, I don't begin with Romanticism.
1071
01:19:36,282 --> 01:19:39,718
You remember what Beethoven
said on his deathbed, you know.
1072
01:19:39,786 --> 01:19:41,720
He said,
"I've learned to look at the world...
1073
01:19:41,788 --> 01:19:45,554
in all of its darkness and evil
and still love it."
1074
01:19:45,625 --> 01:19:50,426
And that's not Romantic Beethoven.
This is the Beethoven of the String
Quartet 131,"
1075

01:19:50,497 --> 01:19:54,866

the greatest string quartet ever writtennot just in classical music.
1076
01:19:54,934 --> 01:19:59,166
But of course it's a European form,
so Beethoven is the grand master.
1077
01:19:59,239 --> 01:20:01,639
But the string quartetyou go back to those movements,
1078
01:20:01,708 --> 01:20:05,906
it's no Romantic wholeness
to be shattered,
as in the early Beethoven.
1079
01:20:05,979 --> 01:20:08,504
He's given up on that, you see.
1080
01:20:08,581 --> 01:20:13,041
This is where Chekhov begins.
This is where the blues starts.
This is where jazz starts.
1081
01:20:13,119 --> 01:20:16,054
You think Charlie Parker's upset
'cause he can't sustain a harmony?
1082
01:20:16,122 --> 01:20:21,082
He didn't care about the harmony.
He was trying to completely ride
on the dissonance, ride on the blue notes.
1083
01:20:21,161 --> 01:20:24,688
Of course he's got harmony
in terms of its interventions
here and there.

1084
01:20:24,764 --> 01:20:27,289
But why start with this
obsession with wholeness?
1085
01:20:27,367 --> 01:20:31,326
And if you can't have it,
then you're disappointed
and wanna have a drink...
1086
01:20:31,404 --> 01:20:35,431
and melancholia
and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
1087
01:20:35,508 --> 01:20:39,239
No. You see, the bluesmy kind of blues1088
01:20:39,312 --> 01:20:44,648
begins with catastrophe,
begins with the Angel of History
in Benjamin's Theses.
1089
01:20:44,717 --> 01:20:48,710
You see. It begins with the pillage,
the wreckage1090
01:20:48,788 --> 01:20:50,949
one pile on another.
1091
01:20:51,024 --> 01:20:56,758
That's the starting point.
The blues is personal catastrophe
lyrically expressed.
1092
01:20:57,797 --> 01:20:59,924
And black people in America

and in the modern world1093

01:20:59,999 --> 01:21:02,160
given these vicious legacies
of white supremacy1094
01:21:02,235 --> 01:21:06,365
it is how do you generate...
1095
01:21:06,439 --> 01:21:09,966
an elegance
of earned self-togetherness...
1096
01:21:10,043 --> 01:21:12,170
so that you have
a stick-to-it-ness...
1097
01:21:12,245 --> 01:21:14,736
in the face of the catastrophic
and the calamitous...
1098
01:21:14,814 --> 01:21:17,305
and the horrendous
and the scandalous and the monstrous.
1099
01:21:22,956 --> 01:21:26,585
See, part of the problem, though,
is that, see, when you have
a Romantic project,
1100
01:21:26,659 --> 01:21:32,325
you're so obsessed with time as loss
and time as a taker.
1101
01:21:32,398 --> 01:21:36,334
Whereas, as a Chekhovian Christian,
I wanna stress, as well,

1102
01:21:36,402 --> 01:21:39,997
time as a gift and time as a giver.
1103
01:21:40,073 --> 01:21:44,601
So that, yes, it's failure,
but how good is a failure?
You done some wonderful things.
1104
01:21:44,677 --> 01:21:49,114
Now, Beckett could say, you know,
"Try again, fail again, fail better."
1105
01:21:49,182 --> 01:21:53,812
But why call it failure?
I mean, why not say
you have a sense of gratitude...
1106
01:21:53,887 --> 01:21:57,084
that you're able to do
as much as you did?
1107
01:21:57,156 --> 01:21:59,624
You're able to love as much
and think as much...
1108
01:21:59,692 --> 01:22:02,024
and play as much.
1109
01:22:02,095 --> 01:22:04,529
Why think you needed
the whole thing?
1110
01:22:04,597 --> 01:22:07,691
You see what I mean?
This is even disturbing about America.

1111
01:22:07,767 --> 01:22:10,292
And, of course, America
is a Romantic project.
1112
01:22:10,370 --> 01:22:15,398
It's paradisal, "City on a Hill"
and all this other mess
and lies and so on.
1113
01:22:15,475 --> 01:22:18,967
I say no, no. America is
a very fragile democratic experiment,
1114
01:22:19,045 --> 01:22:21,639
predicated on the dispossession
of the lands of indigenous peoples...
1115
01:22:21,714 --> 01:22:24,945
and the enslavement of African peoples
and the subjugation of women...
1116
01:22:25,018 --> 01:22:27,179
and the marginalization
of gays and lesbians.
1117
01:22:27,253 --> 01:22:29,813
And it has great potential.
1118
01:22:29,889 --> 01:22:33,416
But this notion that somehow,
you know, we had it all...
1119
01:22:33,493 --> 01:22:35,518
or ever will have it all,
it's got to go.
1120

01:22:35,595 --> 01:22:37,529

You got to push it to the side.
1121
01:22:37,597 --> 01:22:41,658
And once you push
all that to the side, then it tends
to evacuate the language of disappointment...
1122
01:22:41,734 --> 01:22:43,725
and the language of failure.
1123
01:22:43,803 --> 01:22:46,328
And you sayOkay, well, how much have we done?
1124
01:22:46,406 --> 01:22:48,340
How have we been able to do it?
1125
01:22:48,408 --> 01:22:50,706
Can we do more?
Well, in certain situations,
you can't do more.
1126
01:22:50,777 --> 01:22:54,372
It's like trying to break-dance at 75.
You can't do it anymore.
1127
01:22:54,447 --> 01:22:57,507
You were a master at 16. It's over.
1128
01:22:57,584 --> 01:23:01,350
You can't make love at 80
the way you did at 20.
So what?
1129
01:23:01,421 --> 01:23:03,753
Time is real.

1130
01:23:08,728 --> 01:23:12,824
So the one question that keeps
coming up- or a phrase1131
01:23:12,899 --> 01:23:14,833
is this idea
of the meaningful life.
1132
01:23:14,901 --> 01:23:17,597
Do you think it is
philosophy's duty
to speak on this?
1133
01:23:17,670 --> 01:23:20,264
A meaningful life?
How to live
a meaningful life.
1134
01:23:21,874 --> 01:23:25,435
Is that even a relevantIs that even an appropriate question
for a philosopher?
1135
01:23:25,511 --> 01:23:28,776
No, I think it is.
No, I think the problem with meaning
is vey important.
1136
01:23:28,848 --> 01:23:31,180
Nihilism is a serious challenge.
1137
01:23:31,250 --> 01:23:33,810
Meaninglessness
is a serious challenge.
1138
01:23:33,886 --> 01:23:38,619

Even making sense of meaninglessness

is itself a kind of discipline
and achievement.
1139
01:23:41,728 --> 01:23:43,958
The problem is, of course,
you never reach it, you know.
1140
01:23:44,030 --> 01:23:47,796
It's not a static,
stationary telos or end or aim.
1141
01:23:47,867 --> 01:23:51,530
It's a process that one never reaches.
It's Sisyphean.
1142
01:23:51,604 --> 01:23:56,337
You're going up the hill
looking for better meanings...
1143
01:23:56,409 --> 01:24:00,072
or grander, more enabling meanings.
1144
01:24:00,146 --> 01:24:02,239
But you never reach it.
1145
01:24:02,315 --> 01:24:04,545
Uh, you know, in that sense,
1146
01:24:04,617 --> 01:24:07,609
you die without being able
to "have" the whole,
1147
01:24:07,687 --> 01:24:10,053
in the language
of the Romantic discourse.

1148
01:24:14,727 --> 01:24:17,457
Let me just jump out here
on the corner.
1149
01:24:17,530 --> 01:24:19,828
Okay, you'll. Thank you so much.
[Man] Thank you very much.
1150
01:24:19,899 --> 01:24:21,924
Take good care now.
You too.