The Philosophy of Film #1

Ethics


Thought I'd start up a new thread. Not sure how it's going to go, so please bear with me. I know some of these longer posts can be a bit of a slog, but I'll try to keep it interesting.

The philosophy of film and cinema can be approached from a number of angles. The famous French philosopher Gilles Deleuze wrote a two volume work on it and, of course, there are all kinds of books, courses and thoughts on the matter. I cannot even pretend to be an initiate, let alone an expert, but I can claim to be interested in the effect film can have and passionate about the reasons for that (among other things), so here goes. Be gentle with the comments.

There is a huge controversy in moral philosophy and ethics over whether our moral values are, or can be, objectively true. Most philosophers tend to think not, I disagree (though I am not a philosopher). This might seem an unlikely debate film can shed some light on, but I strongly believe it can.

It is certainly true that (as the philosopher Donald Davidson puts it) in our weaker moments we all tend to be moral objectivists. When, in everyday talk, I state that 'the current state of world poverty is unjust', it's plain that I believe that statement to be true. True, objectively, that is, not just true for me. In fact, this is a good example to employ, as most people (I believe and hope) would agree. Though they certainly disagree over what obligations this gives rise to, for us as individuals and as citizens of individual countries.

Some respond that our moral values are not objectively 'out there' in the 'fabric of the world' or some other such talk, which suggests that ethics eventually must always come down to subjective opinion. J.L. Mackie's book Ethics: Inventing Right and Wrong is an excellent illustration of this.
The title of Mackie's book is inherently misleading. It is completely implausible to say that you can just invent a language, or a means of talking, that just suits you and that makes no sense to other people. This is key. You just would not be able to make yourself understood. Imagine that some person sees a creature in her dreams she hears called 'Landasti'. Her talk of 'Landasti' in everyday communication will result in puzzled looks and raised eyebrows. Where is the evidence for her belief in creatures called 'Landasti'? The answer in short is nowhere. She might be able to make herself understood by describing the creature in detail and a picture may well form in the minds of her hearers, but if she persisted in her talk of the existence of 'Landasti' in the world, she would most likely be considered delusional. She would fare no better than if she began speaking about an emotion called ‘Borabora’ which she offered no other explanation for other than the name. Of course, her Borabora might, on reflection and conversation with others, turn out to be something else which does make sense to her listeners, but that is another matter.

And yet, with ethics, there is clear evidence for the existence of basic shared truths and common moral ground. Okay, you cannot 'see' ethics and morals (in one sense at least) somewhere out there in 'the fabric of the world' in the way you can see 'leaf', 'chair', 'train', 'tree' (and so on), but the same process is surely involved. It is this. The existence of such things is confirmed by a fundamentally intersubjective process relying on three varieties of knowledge. Knowledge of my mind, knowledge of other minds and knowledge of a shared outside world. Knowledge is not, when looked at in this light, subjective and it doesn't need to be. This translates into a triangle of speaker, hearer and shared outside world. The infant learns 'leaf' in the presence of leaves (which she is seeing 'in the world') and with the correct prompt from the parent of the word 'leaf' (who are assuming, yes assuming, that the infant is noticing the correct phenomena). We are generally prompted to say the sentence 'that's a leaf' by the presence of leaves. Sounds obvious, I know, but it's fundamental. That will be confirmed by conversation with others who will (we can be sure) be noticing the same thing.

It's the same with ethics and moral judgements. At least, I think it must be. Imagine two people see a man kicking a dog. They may well say (if they enjoy stating the obvious) that 'there's a man kicking a dog' because there is some appropriate event occurring in the world involving humans, dogs and kicking. They are also very likely (though, regrettably, not 100% certain) to find that objectionable. If they speak with one another about the event they are both noticing they may well come to understand that they are feeling similar things, just like the infant with the leaf. Ethics were not invented. They couldn't have been. Ethical language just wouldn't make sense to people who do not think or feel or believe or act ethically. This does not mean that ethical language cannot be manipulated and distorted. It can, and history proves it.

This, finally, is where film comes in. I think that film and cinema stand hugely in favour of the objectivity of values and ethics. In fact, I think this explains why film is, in the first place, so successful (or why good films are so successful). It speaks to us.

The film functions by communicating with you on a level that makes you sympathise with its characters when they are heroes and deplore other characters when they are villains. No one wants Blofeld to win, everyone wants Bond to win. No one wants Bridget Jones to go for Hugh Grant's character. No one wants Spiderman to die. At least, generally speaking. We cheer for the heroes and boo the villains. It is amazing that such a cinematic commonplace can have such significance which, I suspect, we don't generally think about. And if you started having a conversation with your cinematic neighbour about why you don't want Spiderman to die and Venom to win, it would quickly become clear why you both thought this. And it would be based on some level of common moral understanding. It must be. A common, shared, outside world is causing us to think and to behave in appropriate ways.

Now, this is not to cast aspersions on one other fascinating aspect of moral philosophy, disagreement and diversion. If you look around the world, we clearly don't all think the same. We disagree. And yet, films from cultures all around the world can have the same oppositions of hero and villain, of good and evil and of the morally powerful and the morally bankrupt. This is very very interesting and, I suspect, very very important.

Moral disagreement is a fact of life. Film confirms that too, and yet I still don't see how that impinges on moral objectivity. Take an obvious, but still telling, example, Million Dollar Baby. Some like it because it argues on behalf of euthanasia in some circumstances and events whilst others detest it because it seems to suggest that the life of a quadriplegic is one that is not worth living. And if the film was saying that (I'm not sure it is, straightforwardly, at least) I think it would be morally objectionable. Clearly the quadriplegic life is worth living as there are many quadriplegics living happy and very full lives the world over. No one could countenance the idea that all quadriplegics should have their lives terminated. Such a suggestion would be morally reprehensible. Does anyone disagree? Surely not.

Yet, isn't there a case too, to suggest that some quadriplegics (just as some other individuals capable of making the free, rational choice, though I accept that 'free' and 'rational' are contentious here) ought to be allowed to pass if that was their deepest wish. It is, of course, very tragic that they essentially lose the ability to make that choice for themselves. The means of suicide available to most of us are denied them. This is, then, an issue about freedom and free choice.

Whereas in most other areas of life we like to say that all individuals ought to be left free to do whatever they want providing they don't harm others, in more contentious ones we want to deny this thought. When we're being pig-headed we like to deny the reality of this observation and we end up looking hopelessly inconsistent. And still, the objectivity of values is not touched. Freedom is still the basic value, we just don't like to admit it and for a number of reasons.

There will come a day, surprising as it might seem now, when this issue will be resolved. Most of us will think the same and we will do so for the reasons I have been outlining above. Doesn't science (the most 'objective' of all fields) work like this too? Someone puts forward a hypothesis, it's argued over and then some proof or evidence eventually wins the day. The same goes for ethics. Just as, unlike in the 15th Century, we don't generally believe that witches exist (note, some people do still believe that witches exist and this is significant), nor do we believe that burning people at the stake is a good way to behave. In other words I take it as basic that most people believe the statements 'witches don't exist' and 'it's wrong to burn people at the stake' to both be objectively right, correct and true. Ironically, I suspect fewer people would object to the second than to the first and that is pretty damn significant too.

Think, for example, about the current debate(s) around global warming. Has science established the objective truth? Some scientists think they have, others deny those scientists are right (and just who are we to rely on and why? We’re not scientists). We might actually even have more common ground over morals than science, though, if true, that would be incredibly surprising. We disagree, but this does not touch objectivity or ‘the fabric of the universe’ (so to speak). It is quite plausible that we might one day attain a degree at least of moral agreement, though this might be found in unexpected places. Freedom, to be sure, will be key. Humanity agreeing over such things (or the majority of human beings agreeing over them) is a warming thought indeed. But this will come down, like in science, to the testing of thoughts, ideas and hypotheses.

Now, take Ikiru. I love that film (in fact it's my favourite film) partly because I believe we have a clear and unavoidable duty to help to assist those less fortunate than ourselves so that they can be lifted into a position of equality. Takashi Shimura's Kenji Watanabe speaks to me on a number of levels because of that. It's also a film that speaks to most of us about another cherished human value, redemption. We like to believe people can change and that they can make a difference. Watanabe does both. Whilst an ethic of duties takes priority over an ethic of rights in a number of cultures across the world (it is particularly prominent in African philosophy and culture) it doesn't in ours in the West, which is, regrettably, the hegemonic one. I hope this changes and it is our job (those of us who believe this) to put the case to human beings and let them judge the hypothesis that this is an objectively valid means of speaking about ethics and human values. There is a lot more I could go into here in relation to what I have been saying above but I'll leave it there, for now at least, as this is an issue beyond film and the cinema. Or, is that actually fair? Doesn't Ikiru suggest that film can have a great power to inspire, and to change, minds? And what could be the effect of that?

Can film have the power to change the world?

I leave you to make your own minds up...

Thanks for listening : )