This essay is by my son, Dan Revich. In this latest installment in a series of articles on fundamental philosophical issues, Dan goes beyond discussing the issue of whether there is a supernatural being, and moves on to the next logical step, formulating a paradigm for how we can find meaning, purpose, and morality in a world without such a being.
What is the Meaning of Life?
The meaning of life is simply life itself. There is no meaning beyond our existence and our life experience. There is no greater meaning to it all that can somehow transcend our world. This is it.
So now what?
The all too unfortunate side of this realization is the potential for nihilism or hedonism. Nihilism is the idea that because there is no greater meaning to it all, we should live with the attitude that life is hopeless and pointless. The nihilist would spend life sitting around, moping, and waiting for the inevitable end.
The opposite of the nihilist is the hedonist. The hedonist believes that since there is no greater meaning to it all, he is free to do as he pleases, when he pleases, without any regard for others, and with the only goal of seeking maximum personal pleasure. The hedonist would spend life committing crimes, doing drugs to excess, and walking over others for his or her own benefit.
There is nothing intrinsically wrong with either of these attitudes. There is nothing universal that would preclude someone from living a life as such and feeling perfectly content. However, most people would probably be more content not living with either of these attitudes. We do live in a real world with real consequences, and living without regards to others will subject a person to the consequences that individuals in our society have created to deter such attitudes (i.e. laws, social isolation, etc.).
These are not the only options available for living a life in a godless world. There is a “light at the end of the tunnel” for the rational person, and it’s not in the form of a supernatural being.
Purpose
The amazing thing about there being no greater meaning to life beyond life itself is that we have the power to create meaning. Everyone has a blank slate to work with to craft a story that will please himself or herself. We craft a meaning by choosing a purpose. We have the power to decide our purpose, or even several purposes that we will work to fulfill. By fulfilling a purpose, and working to do so, we can live our lives in such a way as to become content with our own existence and the world around us. After one purpose has been fulfilled, we can choose a new one. The meaning of life can be to find and fulfill life purposes.
A purpose can really be anything. It can be to do works of art, start a business, help the poor, enforce the law, help the sick, or create scientific developments. It can even be to start a family, travel, or to spend time with friends or a significant other. Whatever makes us content with our lives. Although this paradigm is very simple, it is also very empowering. Life is ours for the taking. We are in control of our own destiny.
One of my purposes is to create a legacy that will live on after my death. Why would this matter if I don’t believe that I will have the ability to experience that legacy? It is for the same reason that someone would send a check to a charity to help a group of people that he will never see or never meet. Or, from a more selfish perspective, why a celebrity would want to be considered famous to a person that he will never encounter. We as humans share the common experience of life, regardless of the time or place we live in. If there is one way we can transcend our own existence, it is through the life of another. Although their life experiences may have ended long ago, historical figures constantly remind future generations of the experience they had by cementing their names in the history books.
The hedonist or the nihilist lives a life without purpose, and will likely never find spiritual fulfillment. The hedonist could say that his purpose is to do whatever he feels like. If he can truly find meaning in fulfilling that purpose, then perhaps that will create content. But there are very few people who would find such a meaning.
The Religious Paradigm
Under most religions, the meaning of life is simply that each individual life amounts to some minor part of a greater plan by some invisible being or beings. Many questions remain unanswered. What is the meaning of the greater plan? What is my meaning within the greater plan? Why would such a greater plan include suffering? What is the meaning of the creator, and where did he come form? These questions create more confusion and despair than the theories pacify.
The purpose of life in most religions is to follow a list of rules (many of which are ridiculous and inconsistent with contemporary life) that an invisible being wants us to follow in order to gain access to a better afterlife. What is the purpose of the afterlife? What is the purpose of each particular rule? What if the purpose I would like to fulfill conflicts with one of the rules?
The religious paradigm is incomplete. It simply makes up a story and calls it a meaning. An existentialist paradigm may not be as fantastic or magical, but it is rational and complete. The meaning of your life is whatever you want it to be.
Morality
An obvious argument against the concept of choosing your own purpose in life is that someone could choose the purpose of hurting or killing other people. What would make this purpose wrong if it made that person content? Would there not be something universally wrong with hurting others?
There is nothing universally wrong with hurting others. But, a world in which people hurt others would be worse than a world in which people did not. Although there is no ultimate arbiter of right and wrong, or universal moral code that we should adhere to, the fact remains that there are several independent beings in the world whose interests will inevitably collide. Morality is simply a set of rules that we create to organize human interactions. There is no hard and fast set of rules, but we as a species have been very successful at crafting rules that provide all individuals with the opportunity to fulfill their purposes.
If there is one thing I learned in law school, it’s that there is a solution in law to almost any possible problem resulting from human interaction. The law is constantly evolving as new problems are solved, and old solutions are replaced with better ones. Of course, laws can be bad. For example, a law permitting the killing of someone for having the wrong religious belief. Why would we say that such a law is immoral? It is because such a law is a bad solution to a problem, and there are better solutions that will create more opportunity for happiness.
Many philosophers have searched for a unifying theory of morality. For example, the utilitarian theory states that morality is simply the solution that provides the greatest good for the greatest number of people. The theory attempts to measure levels of good and compare them. This theory fails when you start trying to measure levels of good. Is the value of a great scientist’s life more important than a bum’s? How about two bums? What of a law that provides a huge benefit to a large group, but a serious detriment to one or two people? The world is simply too complex to determine values for every possible interest and measure those values against the values of others.
Another theory is Kant’s categorical imperative, which basically states that an action taken by an individual in any situation should be such an action that should be Universally taken by any person in such a situation. If I see another person’s house, it should be a Universal maxim that I should not break in and steal that person’s TV. The problem with this theory is that it only works for simple human problems. What if there are several competing good things to do. Should I take a good job in a far away city, or stay home to help my ailing mother? There is no universal maxim to solve this problem. A similar situation arises if there are two bad choices.
We as a society have made rules to guide people to make better choices, and to punish choices that we think are bad. We create morality to try and shape the best possible world, but there is no perfect world.
Of course politics is an inevitable factor in discussing morality. Is the United States moral code the best for regulating human interactions? Or is a more socialist European nation like Sweden’s better? Who should determine what is the best moral code for the people of all nations? There is no easy way to make such determinations. Settling who has the best moral code and what it should be is a great goal of humanity that will involve inevitable conflicts in opinion.
However, there is no room for moral relativism in this theory. That is to say, there are certain moral codes that are vastly inferior and should not be considered acceptable forms of organizing a society simply because they are accepted by the individuals in that society. For example a society that permits ritual human sacrifice would be vastly inferior to one that did not. It may be for the good of humanity for a more powerful society to enforce its superior moral code on the society committing ritual sacrifice in order to provide a better life for the individuals in that society.
In any discussion of morality and atheism, Hitler and Stalin will inevitably be discussed as examples of what happens when atheists are given the power to enforce their moral views. These individuals led their nations based on what they believed were moral principles. Under skewed forms of utilitarianism, both believed that they were acting for the greater good by killing political dissidents, the mentally ill, Jews and other ethnic minorities. These dictators had inferior moral codes by which they organized their societies. It was not their atheism that led to their horrible deeds, but rather their skewed versions of morality. We have realized that these moral codes were absolutely abhorrent, and should never be allowed to exist again.
These examples of immoral atheists should also be compared with the hundreds of immoral actions by dictators and societies acting around religious foundations of morality. The problem with religious morality is that religions set a moral code based on the prevailing views of morality at the time and in the society that the writers of the religion were living. The Jewish moral code is based on the sections of law in the of the old testament, which were written approximately 2600 years ago (read up on the documentary hypothesis for more information on the origins of the old testament). The Christian moral code is based around morality from 2000 years ago. Islam 1500 years ago. Of course religions generally have their own case law, or religious scholarly writings, interpreting the primary sources and allowing some change. However, these writings are bound by rigid books written by ancient people. The books cannot be amended or changed to reflect changes in prevailing views of what is right or wrong.
Contrast with the US constitution. The US constitution provides a moral code from approximately 250 years ago. However, the constitution permits amendments, meaning that the primary source of law can change as morals change. This flexibility permits change and evolution.
Conclusion
Realizing that there is no god and that our existence is simply a great fluke may be a scary experience, but it does not mean that life cannot persist without spiritual enlightenment. There is opportunity to find meaning in life, fulfill a purpose, and act in a moral way. We have the power to shape our world and our own destiny. We must take control of the power while we are here, for it will not last forever.
Manfred Max-Neef is a Chilean economist who has worked for many years to understand development issues third world economies.
Max-Neef developed a taxonomy of human needs along with a corresponding process which communities can use to identify endemic “wealths” and “poverties” according to how fundamental needs are satisfied.
Human Scale Development is defined as “focused and based on the satisfaction of fundamental human needs, on the generation of growing levels of self-reliance, and on the construction of organic articulations of people with nature and technology, of global processes with local activity, of the personal with the social, of planning with autonomy, and of civil society with the state.” (Max-Neef et al, 1987:12)
The main contribution that Max-Neef makes to the understanding of needs is the distinction made between needs and satisfiers. Human needs are seen as few, finite and classifiable (as distinct from the conventional notion that “wants” are infinite and insatiable). Not only this, they are constant through all human cultures and across historical time periods. What changes over time and between cultures is the way these needs are satisfied.
My own needs model, the Three Fundamental Needs Model, was most recently discussed in my blog post The Values Filter.
This article by Ryan Black , Alison Hayman , Sarah Kilpatrick and Peter Wells of Lang Michener LLP covers topics including; File Sharing and Format Shifting, Circumventing Technological Protection Measures, Time Shifting, Exception for User Generated Content, Performers’ Rights, Network Service Providers, Libraries, Fair Dealing, and Ownership of Copyright in Photographs and Portraits.
After failed attempts in 2006 and 2008, the government tabled the Copyright Modernization Act (Bill C-32) in the House of Commons on June 2nd, 2010. It has proven politically difficult in Canada to pass this type of legislation even though it is urgently needed. Time will tell if this third attempt has struck a politically acceptable balance between the rights of users and owners of copyrighted works.
The art of mediation is constantly evolving, adapting to changes in society, and integrating ideas from negotiation theory, legal practice, as well as other disciplines. Transformative Education emerged from the environmental movement into the academic field of Adult Education where it has been accepted into the prevailing adult education models and further developed. The basic precept of transformational learning is that, in order to be truly useful, education should do more than impart knowledge and skills… It should also transform the way in which learners observe and interact with the world around them. Since mediation already involves assisting people to reach agreement on difficult issues, the transformative model has been adapted to the practice of mediation by forward-thinking mediators and mediation educators. For the most part, this should be seen as positive development – but not always.
One of the reasons that I was prompted to develop The Goal Focused Way is that I felt that the prevailing mediation and negotiation model; Interest-Based, Principled Negotiation, was inadequate when one or more parties simply refused to engage with the process. While the interest-based model has mechanisms to deal with this possibility, I felt that these methods presented problems when “walking away”, or one-sided principled bargaining, or subtle (and unsubtle) methods were employed to bring the other party around. Particularly when the stakes are very high, and the parties are very antagonistic and/or unprincipled, the principled negotiating model fails completely. I have in my library a book by William Ury, one of the founders of Principled Negotiation
In some cases the transformational mediation model can make a bad situation worse. One might (and should) ask, “how is it possible that a progressive model, designed from its very outset to build bridges, make peace, and make the world a better place, could possibly make a difficult situation even worse than it already is”? I can think of two examples and there are probably others.
Example 1)
Nearly every experience that human beings have can be transformative in one way or another, but in general terms, transformative education and mediation is going to take longer than less transformative, more instrumental mediation modes. In some cases this is a good thing, in some cases it does not matter, but in cases where clients are paying substantial amounts of money for professional services, spending more time than is necessary to reach a settlement is not acceptable. Lawyers can charge upwards of $400 per hour, mediators can charge as much as $3000 per day, clients are taking time away from their work and businesses. Sometimes the best interests of clients are best served by simply reaching a quick, fair agreement, and moving on.Example 2)
Transformative Mediation is usually presented as being much more effective at reaching sustainable agreements in which the parties feel strongly vested. The process seems inherently fair and balanced. Usually I thing both of these beliefs are well-founded. But just as the Principled Negotiation model can fail miserably when one or more of the parties refuse to play ball, the transformative model can also fail to achieve agreements that are balanced or fair. The easiest way for me to demonstrate this is through a hypothetical example:After 25 years of employment as a mid-level manager at the same company “John” is terminated without cause, and provided with 12 weeks severance pay by his US based employer. The employer believes that this is very fair given that there is an economic downtown and the amount is the maximum payable in the employer’s home state. John believes that the amount is inadequate, retains a lawyer, and the dispute is eventually mediated by a mediator using a transformative model. John’s lawyer quickly brings the employer’s offer up to the statutory minimum, but after considerable time spent in mediation John insists that his counsel accept this amount and refuse to ask for a penny more. John has been “transformed”! He now “sees the light”! Until this mediation he had no idea what a burden he had become to his employer, or how generous his employer had been to him over the years despite his poor performance, or how hard the economic downturn had been on his employer. He feels awful. He is no longer interested in a settlement that would make things any more difficult on his employer. He is simply pleased that he now is walking away with the statutory minimum. He believes it is more than fair! Everyone has been transformed. Everyone is happy. …And Hypothetical John was just screwed.
Does this mean that Transformational Mediation is a “bad idea”? Certainly not. I believe that Transformative Education is the highest possible ideal and that all mediators and negotiators should strive for opportunities to engage clients in a transformational manner whenever it makes sense to do so. Just remember that it is not the only path to sustainability, nor is it always the best path.
The core concept behind The Goal Focused Way is that we need set clear, ambitious, and achievable goals in order to succeed in any endeavour. Goals are set based on interests, and interests are determined based upon our needs. By knowing our interests, the interests of those of the people that we communicate with, and the alternatives available, we are able to work towards the achievement of mutual goals. Good communicators and successful negotiators always try to help other people achieve their goals as the first step in reaching their own goals.
An integral part of The Goal Focused Way is the Three Fundamental Needs model that I developed – based on an updated interpretation of Abraham Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs
We all share the three fundamental needs of Security, Status, and Stimulation. Individuals can vary greatly in the importance that they place on different needs. Also, within each Fundamental Need there can be major differences in the value placed on different components. For example, for some people Status Needs may manifest as a desire for a prestigious job title, while other people may seek to fulfil status needs by being the person that friends, family, and colleagues always seem to callupon first when they need help or advice.
Personal values are mostly accounted for within the Three Fundamental Needs Model, and personal values of others can be very difficult to determine. It is usually much easier to determine the weight that people place on their different fundamental need than it is to “see into someone’s soul”, so I have tended to leave the conversation about personal values to professional who provide counselling and therapy. Personal values are a very important factor in human behaviour, but there is limited utility in working with a factor that is virtually always invisible. Fundamental Needs can also be “hidden” at the outset of communications, but they can usually be gleaned by observing behaviour and through disucssions about interests and goals. Values generally remain invisible. Partly because they are so ingrained in the essence of our own being, we have difficulty imagining that others may not share values that seem innate to all human beings.
…So, if we can’t see them, and we can’t make use of them, what value are values to the negotiation process and/or to interpersonal communications?
People filter all of their needs through what I would term a “Values Filter“. Most of the time, for most the people within a community, the Values Filter is so similar that we can in fact take it for granted. BUT… sometimes, when we are at a communications impass, we might need to consider the possibility that the person(s) that we are negotiating with, may be filtering their needs through a Values Filter that is so different from our own, that they seem to arrive at Interests and Goals that we have trouble understanding.
Good communicators, and successful negotiators, must be aware of the Values Filter. Once we recognize that we are communicating without a foundation of shared values, we can take appropriate remedial action.
02 Jan ‘10
The Goal Focused Action Cycle is a tool designed for goal attainment. It was designed by Allan Revich, and forms an integral part of The Goal Focused Way. The Goal Focused Action Cycle can be applied to negotiating, conflict management, workplace issues, and to personal development.
Ambitious, yet realistically achievable goals are set by reflecting on past events, and upon needs and interests. Once a goal is set, it is important to plan the steps required to achieve it. Planning requires us to generate options, look at alternatives, and needs to occur before acting. Once planning is complete the next step must be taken, and once action is taken, it again becomes necessary to reflect upon the consequences of the action. The cycle continues until the desired goals are reached.
The Goal Focused Action Cycle
30 Dec ‘09
Bullying is a strategy that some people use to realize their goals. It can be very difficult to deal with because for some people it represents a successful strategy. I suspect that the worst bullies don’t care if they are liked. They may not even care if they are respected. As long as they are feared and obeyed, and achieve their personal objectives, they can consider themselves “successful”.
I think that bigger issue is how organizations deal with bullies.
From what I have observed, I think that while bullying can sometimes be an effective strategy for reaching certain individual goals, it is seldom a beneficial strategy towards achieving organizational goals. Progressive organizations are often very good identifying bullying and at providing coaching, mentoring, training and other assistance to individuals identified as being. But problems can occur if the bully fails to respond to progressive measures. And those problems can be worse if the bully feels no need to change. I have seen organizations with “zero tolerance” for bullying, but zero tolerance is matched by “zero zeal” to deal with bullies when the bully is sufficiently powerful and entrenched within the organization.
In the most extreme cases (i.e. The Apprentice) the only effective strategy is likely to be an exit strategy. The impact on the organization will be entirely negative. Good people leave. The workplace becomes dysfunctional. The organization does not meet organizational goals and objectives. But the strategy worth pursuing for individuals within that organization may be to leave it.
29 Dec ‘09
“Right now we are engaged in this huge show, this huge piece of security theatre, We’re engaging in magical thinking in that by defending against what the terrorist happened to do last time, we think we’ll make ourselves secure. It’s like saying the terrorist wore a green shirt, so no more green shirts”
~ Bruce Schneier, Security Consultant
Source: Globe and Mail, Dec. 29, 2009
One might be tempted to inquire about the relationship between airport security and The Goal Focused Way… While The Goal Focused Way was developed primarily as a negotiating tool, it also functions as a critical thinking tool with applications that extend far beyond the field of negotiation practice.
When looking at the utility, impact, and desirability of new security measures put in place as a result of recent terror activity, it is important to look at what the goals of the new measures are. Consultants like Schneier are probably correct in their assessments about the utility of further restrictions on carry-on bags and personal items. Individuals and groups intent on doing harm to innocents as a means to promoting their political agendas have proven themselves to be creative, resilient, and resistant to security measures. There is probably no way to institute measures that will effectively prevent every act of terror every time. Security measures are of vital importance… but economic activity and cultural values are also important. The security measures already in place before the incident on December 25th were probably as good as can ever realistically be achieved and maintained. From a purely utilitarian perspective the new measures put in place this week are completely useless. They function purely as theatre. Theatre provides an illusion of reality, but only fools confuse theatre with reality. So why bother?
There are two possible reasons that security theatre is the main political response to acts of terror. Which reason is dominant depends upon what the goals of the “theatrical producers” are. The first, and ostensibly the only, goal is to increase public safety. But since theatre is highly unlikely to provide any real increase in public safety, if this is the real goal, then I am afraid that the terrorists are winning (i.e./ they are achieving their goals at the expense of ours) because it means that we are being led by fools. Why fools? Why use such a powerfully derogatory term for political leaders and functionaries whose only goal is to keep us safe? …Because it is foolishness to implement expensive and inconvenient measures that will not achieve the stated goals. But… maybe that is not the goal?
There is another reason for security theatre to be implemented. If the goal is not to actually make travel safer, but to make the travelling public feel safer, then security theatre is a reasonable response. This may in fact be the case. If it is true that the real goal is to create an illusion of safety, then our leaders are not fools at all. They are wise and politically astute. Sadly, it means that our leaders are assuming that the majority of the travelling public are fools; but in a democracy we are led by politicians, and politicians get elected by developing the skill of reading the mood and desire of voters. Were I to hazard a guess (and you know that I will), I would guess that we are being led by a blend of fools and cynics. The fools are probably “nicer” since they have our best interests at heart, but it is the cynics that know what the public wants to see, and who encourage the fools to perform their theatrics.
Using The Goal Focused Way to look critically at political events and their consequences allows us to see these events in terms of goals and interests. By reading events in these terms we can develop and use our critical thinking skills in ways that extend well beyond negotiating agreements. In the case of security theatre, it’s possible to see that even in cases where the negotiation is not obviously between parties, there is still a kind of negotiation going on, in which the players are acting, and implementing decisions, based on interests and goals; and that often the interests and goals are not broadcast at the outset.
18 Dec ‘09
In the beginning there was only darkness…
OK, maybe not exactly darkness, but people basically argued over positions, and disputes were resolved through either the exercise of power, or by compromising on their positions. The art and science of negotiation can be divided into three historical phases, beginning with the Classical phase during which positional bargaining was refined.
I would venture that the first great Classical writer on negotiation was the Chinese general, Sun Tzu – author of the still popular (and well worth reading) treatise, “The Art of War“. Sun Tzu applies tactical and strategic thinking to the practice of warfare. His ideas are still worthwhile today, and are still used by military and business leaders today. Unfortunately, Classical negotiation tends to result in win/lose or lose/lose solutions. While the defeat of an enemy and successful subjugation of conquered foes may have some value, on some occasions, in some shooting wars; there are clearly shortcomings to this kind of approach to problem-solving.
The second phase of Negotiation Theory could be termed the “Modern” phase. Modern negotiation theory begins with the Enlightenment and reached its peak in the mid-twentieth century with the publication of “Getting to Yes” by William Ury and Roger Fisher. The modern negotiator understood that positional bargaining tended to result at best in only one party being satisfied with the outcome – and more often than not – nobody being satisfied with the outcome. Even military strategists understood that military victories were brief and transient if the vanquished were left too miserable. Think “Paris 1917″ vs. “The Marshall Plan”. The allied victory in WW I was a key factor leading to the tragedy of WW II, while the Marshall Plan resulted in the miracle of modern Europe. Win/Win negotiating, in which all parties gain something and satisfy their key interests, leads to agreements that last because everyone one has a stake in the outcome.
One of the historical features of the late twentieth century was the dawn of postmodernism in art, architecture, and philosophy. Postmodernism is characterized by eclecticism and relativism. Detractors of postmodernism often point to the idea of “moral relativism” in which there is no longer a fundamental grounding of what constitutes moral and ethical behaviour since everything is determined by context. I’m not going to concern this brief Blog posting with an issue as big, broad, and divisive as moral relativism… But, postmodernism offers important advantages to contemporary negotiators.
Most professional negotiators and mediators have experienced situations where the Classical model works best, even though they usually prefer the Modern model. They have also experienced situations where the parties need to be steered away from positional bargaining, and directed towards a more collaborative mode of communication. And, of course, everyone has at some point or another experienced that “worst case” scenario where nothing works. The Goal Focused Way offers a model that builds upon, takes from, and integrates ideas of, the Classical Model, the Modern Model, AND ideas from fields not generally associated with the field of negotiation. This postmodern approach allows people from all walks of life and from all different backgrounds to use basic knowledge and simple tools to build their own micro-models for each situation. The Goal Focused Way provides the essential foundations and the critical framework to consistently achieve the best possible outcome for every situation. Using the Goal Focused Way will not necessarily result in “winning” every dispute or in reaching every goal – but using it will ensure that achievable goals can be determined and that what is achievable is in fact achieved.
30 Nov ‘09
This idea comes from Solution Focused Brief Therapy. SFBT is a component of The Goal Focused Way. While not all psychotherapy models are adaptable to a professional and personal negotiation model, I think that this part of the SFBT model is.
For psychotherapy purposes this means accepting that a client may not be ready to reach for the “big goal”, but might be ready to take a small step towards a smaller goal. For negotiators, this means understanding that substantive and objective evidence is always influenced by perceptual interests and subjective feelings. The substantive facts and objective evidence will have a big influence on the type of settlement achieved, but the perceptions and feelings of the people involved will often determine the limits of the available settlement options.