Brand Blanshard, "On Philosophical Style"

For years, I sat on a slim essay: On Philosophical Style, by Professor Brand Blanshard. A thin, orange volume, it got in the way of my mouse when I played computer games or kept the comic books on my shelf company. I bought it at Half Price Books, which always has choice items. Lincoln-Douglas debate preparation besides tomes on telekinesis beside professional academic texts.

I was curious about what it takes to create a work of philosophy. I didn't feel up to the task, though, until now. Blanshard himself is an interesting figure. He held, according to Wikipedia, "that the universe consists of an Absolute in the form of a single all-encompassing intelligible system in which each element has a necessary place." I'm thinking a lot at present about matters of aesthetics, and this strikes me as a beautiful vision of what underlies human reason. I believe I preach a practical skepticism against it, however.

On Philosophical Style does not speak of an absolute universe fully comprehensible by reason. That would be too interesting. No, writing style is his focus, and he can be maddeningly parochial as he discusses his tastes. Blanshard is a man of a particular era; he was born in the 19th century and was Emeritus at Yale in the 1950's. He talks with excessive familiarity of writers such as Macaulay and Carlyle. However, his essay can be used to raise serious questions about the experience of reading and thinking about philosophy. His starting point is essential: Why are so many philosophers hard to read? Why do they persuade perfectly intelligent people to avoid them? Blanshard opens with a quotation from Kant's Critique of Pure Reason. See if you can describe in plain language how the human mind is supposed to interact with the world in order to have experience in the first place:

"Because a certain form of sensuous intuition exists in the mind a priori which rests on the receptivity of the representative faculty (sensibility), the understanding, as a spontaneity, is able to determine the internal sense by means of the diversity of given representations, conformably to the synthetical unity of apperception, and thus to cogitate the synthetical unity of the apperception of the manifold of sensuous intuition a priori, as the condition to which must necessarily be submitted all objects of human intuition." (1-2)

I tried reading the Critique of Pure Reason in my undergraduate years and found myself horribly frustrated. I think I know what's being talked about here? I'm not entirely sure, but I imagine the question is how it is we see or hear or experience anything at all. That may not be the case, as Kant speaks for hundreds of pages like this. But if that is the concern, what Kant asserts is that nothing about that process is simple. There's no such thing as you "see" it. How does the mind know how to understand what is being seen? How do we understand the object we see to be the same one we saw before? "Sensuous intuition" must be intimately tied to human reason. It's not just your senses, it isn't just a series of impressions which afflicts you. Which, if I'm right, leads to a rich consideration. Maybe we can say that Kant hints that when you're not thinking, you're thinking. Or maybe not!

Blanshard, for his part, does not try to dissect this monstrous passage. He holds that philosophy is the search for truth, thus a lack of style is somewhat to be expected. In Blanshard's words:

"Philosophizing proper is a purely intellectual enterprise. Its business is to analyze fundamental concepts, such as self, matter, mind, good, truth; to examine fundamental assumptions, such as that all events have causes; and to fit the conclusions together into a coherent view of nature and man's place in it." (6)

Is philosophy "a purely intellectual enterprise," as he claims? Would you sign up for a class in "fundamental concepts" or "fundamental assumptions?" Do people engage philosophy because they want "a coherent view of nature?" If they say yes: why?

Blanshard's blandness is clarifying. Do you get any sense from his words that people were willing to die to do philosophy? Ironically enough, the weakness of his position comes from worshiping the truth a bit too much. I guess I should capitalize that: Truth. I did like the force of these remarks later in the essay, though I see how they can lead one astray:

"Philosophy is not an attempt to excite or entertain; it is not an airing of one's prejudices–the philosopher is supposed to have no prejudices; it is not an attempt to tell a story, or paint a picture, or to get anyone to do anything, or to make anyone like this and dislike that. It is, as James said, "a peculiarly stubborn effort to think clearly," to find out by thinking what is true." (13)

Philosophy: "a peculiarly stubborn effort to think clearly," "t0 find out by thinking what is true." This resonates–it hits with a certain moral force–but it does not adequately delineate the stakes. Since the stakes are not clear, Blanshard retreats into the vagueness of wanting "a coherent view of nature." I don't think anyone has ever wanted that, especially not those who tried to categorize every being or come up with a theory of everything. Plato's Symposium instructs on this count: all the eloquent speeches about the nature of love, Socrates' excepted, may justify some not quite ethical behavior.

It's funny that Blanshard wants to talk about style and philosophy. While he eventually argues that philosophers should be attentive to stylistic concerns, he goes a roundabout way and misses the obvious. The opening of Plato's Apology features Socrates saying that he will speak the plain, unadorned truth. His accusers have made the worst charge of all, declaring him eloquent when he is not. He is expected, like everyone else before the jury, to make a "set oration duly ornamented with words and phrases." Because he will not do this, he risks death.

Already at this inception point of Western philosophy, style as a theme is prominent. And the enormity of the question looms over us now. Is there such a thing as the simple truth? Is it a truth so trivial that anyone who questions it needs to examine their life? A truth so obvious it cannot be denied? Or one that may have the force of nothing less than the voice of god? Socrates wanted to tear his accusers down the way he tore apart those with philosophical pretension. There's nothing simple about what he does, but it seems natural, and a certain clarity comes about. Why, if philosophy is about finding a simple truth, might it depend on a most elaborate rhetoric?

I suspect the answer has to do with a conclusion Blanshard fights to arrive at. Toward the end of his essay, he wonders if style is an expression of character. That, perhaps, the truth can only be reliably communicated by those concerned with it. People can state true propositions and be abominable liars; in fact, no one full of it is terribly distant from the truth. They're trying to avoid it, after all. Thus, style matters immensely for the sake of philosophy. Attention to it reveals how the truth matters.

I spoke before of advancing practical skepticism against claims which are too beautiful. Even though it is boring, the claim that we can, with honesty, sincerity, and good arguments, approach topics like "the soul" and "the good" is a beautiful claim. There's a style, a fashion, accompanying it. The belief is that one can read and take notes and have discussions with friends. Maybe tea and scones will be served. And no one will be regarded as a crank or be furious that they are misunderstood. No risks need to be taken for the sake of knowing better.

I think Blanshard fails to appreciate how exciting a truth which will unravel our own lives is. Style is the voice of the approach. No less than Socrates experienced this excitement, and whether the price he paid was worth it only time will tell.

References

Branshard, Bland. On Philosophical Style. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1967.