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Complementary Reflection, African Philosophy and General Issues in Philosophy |
AMBIVALENCE OF HUMAN EXISTENTIAL SITUATION AS AN INDEX OF RATIONAL
EXPLANATION
BY
CHRIS O.
AKPAN
Abstract
Man inspite of his
rationality often tend to do things that also negate the interest he at the
same time attempts to conserve. His
entire existence is beset by this phenomenon of ambivalence. Models of explanation like the positivist and
realist models, usually employed to give rational explanation on human social action
have failed to make recourse to this phenomenon. Their logic of explanation is more or less
restrictive and lopsided in the sense that reality, for them, is limited either
to observable phenomena or their underlying structures from which the
observable emanates. In this exclusivist – disjunctive reasoning, they cannot
claim to explain fundamentally. In this
paper, we argue that to give rational explanation about man’s social behaviour demands taking the human ambivalent situation
into consideration. This measure will
give us the leverage to understand that reality though a complex phenomenon
with diverse components could better be appreciated in a complementary
way. We submit that such understanding
could only be provided via “complementary reflection”, an approach which is
non-exclusivist in character.
Introduction
No one in his
right senses would argue that man does not belong to the animal kingdom. Yet unlike other animals, his high level of
rationality, perhaps more than anything else, stands him out. In his day to day
interaction with other members (men) of his society, man with his rationality, does
not cease from pursuing his interest (and perhaps that of his colleagues) which
is screened by the natural tendency of self-preservation: a tendency which
ironically, is shared by other lesser animals with no rationality. These
interests may be political, social, economic, religious, scientific, etc.
In all these
categories, the human existential situation, of course, demands that man cannot
do without seeking and defending the interests accruing from them. Such
interests, it is often taken for granted, are mainly for the enhancement of
man’s place in nature, which he spares little or no energy to conquer. Thus
man’s pursuit of interest in the world he lives is often mistakenly seen as
positive in so far as he achieves his aim.
What appears
to be elusive to our consciousness is that this pursuit of interests is, to put
it metaphorically, a double-edged sword whose one side may be blunt and the
other, sharp. By this, we mean that human interests have double capacity which
more often than not, are conflicting, portraying negativity and positivity at the same time. Professor Asouzu painstakingly
and vividly captures this phenomenon as “the ambivalence of human situation” (Effective,
5ff; Method, 61 ff).
The irony is
that as highly rational animals that we are, we have often either failed to
decode this phenomenon or feigned ignorance of it, or more still, tend to take
it as normal with impunity. Yet the damage or punishment that this phenomenon
has offered us is already enormous! More
ironical is the fact that models of explanation, especially in the social
sciences whose subject matter is human social action, have ever been busy
explaining, describing and distinguishing what constitute rational action as
against irrational action without any recourse to this phenomenon.
This
essay, in view of such problematic, is an attempt to argue that any model of
explanation in so far as it is concerned with man, his action and interaction
in the society that does not take this phenomenon into consideration is
defective. Our submission is that understanding the ambivalence of human
existential situation provides the measures towards any rational explanation,
and that “complementary reflection” provides a better model to understanding
this primordial phenomenon.
An Exposition on the Notion of Ambivalence of Human Existential Situation
Man
is a complex being, easily distinguishable from other animals in his physique,
rationality, sociality, religiosity, creativity, political nature, etc. Yet as part of nature, he cannot completely
divorce himself from the natural tendency shared even by other beings: the
tendency of self – preservation. Self-preservation therefore appears to be
man’s strongest instinct and indeed the fulcrum from which man pursues his
interest. Professor Asouzu who has to be given immense credit as the first African
Philosopher to expound the problems associated with the ambivalence of human
interest captures it this way: “The need to self- preservation is the
primordial human interest around which human beings articulate their human
action either individually or collectively” (Method, 52).
What
the above means is that self-preservation has been man’s preoccupation right
from the time of Adam. And it is through this primeval interest that man can
make meaning about his life. This primeval
interest, however, actually divulges itself into several other existential
interests that adorn man’s whole existence. Thus, human actions, whether
individually carried out or collectively performed are more often than not
influenced by this interest. The implication here is that self-preservation and
its concomitant interests are not tendencies that are bad in themselves. The problem, however, is exposed when we
critically examine the intrigues that characterize such interests and the
intricate aims human beings associate with such pursuits.
Professor
Asouzu in his books, Effective Leadership and the Ambivalence of Human
Interest: the Nigerian Paradox in a Complementary Perspective, and The
Method and Principles of Complementary Reflection in and beyond African
Philosophy has taken time to explain the phenomenon of ambivalence of
human interest with some mind-throbbing concrete examples. Thus there seems to
be no better place to appeal to if we want to understand this phenomenon well.
Asouzu’s
mission statement is that “Human interest is ambivalent because it has a double
capacity and as such can represent something negative and positive at the same
time” (5). What this means is that in the course of pursuing our interest, we
most time would believe that what we are pursuing is something positive; something which may be
beneficial to us, without knowing that on the other side of the coin, what we
will achieve at the same time is negative. This is to say that we are often
being misled by our shallow, parochial and quasi insightful drives towards what
we think is positive only to achieve what in the final analysis would be
negative. This tendency is the root cause of social disorder, crisis, distrust
and lack of our development as humans, state, nation and continent
respectively.
Asouzu
correctly sees the phenomenon of ambivalence of human interest as something that
is paradoxical. He wonders how we could explain a situation where one seeks to
conserve his interest but at the same time undertakes actions that would
virtually lead to his destruction and in the process end up by loosing whatever
interest he was trying to conserve. (15-16). Instances that can explain such paradoxicalities abound especially in
Most
ironical is the fact that many people would detect so many things as being
wrong yet they would not help going ahead to do those things that they have
detected as wrong. On top of that, they may even proffer wonderful solutions to
these problems, yet they will not implement these solutions: the solutions
ending up only on paper!
In
Asouzu’s words, “We are confronted with a situation where people often choose
to do those things they abhor and criticize” (21). To a large extent, some
people especially the elites or what Nigerians call “leaders of thought and
political leaders,” have tended to project these paradoxical and contradictory
ways of perceiving reality into a general law (21). In other words, our so
called leaders have made uncanny efforts to project and accept abnormalities as
being normal and to that extent it does not matter to them if it could be
generally accepted as a paradigm.
So
many “why questions” as raised above on this paradoxical phenomenon need
answers. The all-embracing answer as given by Asouzu is that the ambivalence of
human interest has rather blurred our views, forcing us to “see only the short
term or adhoc benefits of our policies and not their
dangers on the long run” (29). This, of course, is true because human interest
is intricately interwoven. It is not homogeneous. Thus, failure to understand
what we need authentically would always lead us into error of getting at, or
pursuing what we do not authentically need and this will lead us into
self-contradiction. He makes the point that our interests, since they are not
homogeneous, “can easily conceal an aspect of their ambivalent dimension and
this can lead to all sorts of mistakes” (Method, 61). This phenomenon of
concealment, would force our drives towards certain interest which are rather
deceptive in nature.
The
fundamental question then is, how do we get ourselves
liberated from this phenomenon? How do we escape being destroyed by this
tendency? Professor Asouzu makes it clear that we can free ourselves from this ‘tyranny’
“only if we make concerted conscious efforts to be aware of their devastating
effect (62). This means that we are not usually conscious of the dangers
inherent in some of the interest we pursue. If we were, then we would know the
correct avenue of how to go about realizing them. According to him, “if we were
fully aware of the dangers associated with the ambivalence of our interests, we
would certainly not sign our own death warrant; we would vehemently resist
those things that would complicate matters later and put us into trouble” (
Effective, 6).
But
on a more critical note, do we really say that human beings are not sometimes
aware or conscious of the dangers that lie in-wait as consequence when they
take certain actions? For instance, is the suicide bomber entirely unaware of
the fact that taking his life or that of other fellow human beings is wrong? Is
the pipe-line vandal not aware of the danger he is open to in his business of
scooping fuel illegally? Even before he ventures into the business, his mind is
always cut between two possible alternatives - life and death! Yet he would ignore
that inner voice which keeps warning him: ‘that something terrible could happen’.
He would ignore that sub-conscious power which reminds him that the action he
would want to delve into will not augur well nor promote the common good.
It
appears therefore, that Professor Asouzu’s remark that “if we were fully aware
of the dangers associated with the ambivalence of our interests we would not
sign our own death warrant…” (16), is similar to identifying knowledge with
virtue. Inyang
in his “Social Engineering and Ambivalence of Human Interest: The Nigerian Experience”
correctly makes the point that Professor Asouzu’s position may not be far from
Socrates’ teaching that “knowledge is virtue and vice is attributed to
ignorance of that which is good” (88). But he seems to agree totally with
Asouzu’s position that if we were aware of the danger of our actions we would
not do it, for no man who really knows what is wrong would do it.
But
this position is open to the same criticism leveled against Socrates’ identification
of “knowledge with virtue” by Aristotle. Aristotle is said to have pointed out
that Socrates may have forgotten the influence of the irrational part of the
soul and did not take sufficient notice of the fact of moral weakness which
leads man to do what he knows to be wrong (Coppleston
109). We cannot in all honesty say, for instance, that criminals are totally
ignorant people. They are people who most times have deep conviction within
them that what they are doing is utterly wrong and devilish and yet would
choose to do it. This does not seem to mean that they are unaware of the evil
associated with their actions or that if they were aware they would not do it.
The problem appears to lie in their moral weakness which is induced when the
irrational part in them subjugates the rational part. Asouzu even makes the
point that the natural urge of self-preservation which influences human actions
is not a purely rational one, hence we
do at times make recourse to questionable means that we wrongly perceive as
good (Method, 60).
Be
that as it may, what is significant about this phenomenon of human existential
situation is that it is something that is natural. It is only when we fail to
manage it successfully that we tend to act paradoxically. Asouzu has propounded
two basic principles of complementalism on how to
manage this natural phenomenon that beset human life. These, according to him,
are:
i.
The
principle of harmonious complementation, and
ii.
The
principle of progressive transformation.
The first principle states: “Anything
that exists serves a missing link of reality” (Effective 58). By this, it is meant that all realities are
composed of diverse components or segments. The segments, if viewed singly or
in isolation from the others would be meaningless and for that reason they are
missing in relation to the other. For any reality to be meaningful, then, the
components have to be viewed complementarily; that is, the missing components
have to be brought together such that they become aware of each other. Relating
human social actions to this principle, it would mean that both the positive
acts and the negative acts that are part of human existence should be
harmoniously and mutually related such that each act serves the other in a
complementary way. In this way, the negative act when linked up to its other (the
positive act), would be transformed positively. This hitherto negative act
which has now turned positive since it has found its missing component can
become a source of joy for those who perform them. This principle has a touch of Aristotle’s idea
that nature abhors vacuum and would not make anything in vain. Hence everything
has a natural tendency towards its end. In this vein, Asouzu adds the point
that “their transformation (that is, human actions) to the purpose for which
they are meant can be accomplished if one adheres to the second principle of
harmonious transformation” (60).
The
demand of this principle is that we should allow the limitation of being to be
the cause of joy. What this means is that we should accept our limitations and
finality as humans, while making efforts to see these as conditions through
which we can achieve higher level of legitimization. It is only when we gain
this higher level of legitimization that our struggle and interest in the
society could have authentic meaning. In his “Redefining Ethnicity within the Complementary
System of thought in African Philosophy”, he explains “limitation of being” to
mean “ the capacity to view and accept all stakeholders in their relativity and
insufficiency and the help and services rendered to them as part of the joy
intended in one’s own action” (77).
Professor
Asouzu’s idea here is a plea for tolerance and deep understanding of the ‘facticity’ of the human situation as an imperfect one. To
promote a cordial relationship and interaction, we have to integrate what we
think are wrong actions, carried out sometimes unintentionally, with the
positive actions, hoping that the positive actions would transform the negative
acts and this will then lead to the joy of our being.
Ambivalence of Human Existential Situation and the Quest for Rational
Explanation
Having explained the notion of
ambivalence of human existential situation, the task here is to show that this
phenomenon is both a veritable and indispensable index of rational explanation
for human social actions.
The
question that looms large is, what is rational
explanation? In answering this question it will be pertinent we dig briefly
into the concept of rationality. The concept ‘rationality’, ordinarily is a
derivative of the word reason. It entails the procedure of making and adopting
beliefs, opinions, ideas, etc, on the basis of appropriate reason. In this
wise, one must be seen to be capable of making decision and judgment based on
appropriate reason rather than emotion or arbitrary choice before he could be
said to be rational.
Meanwhile,
we should note that the adjective ‘rational’ is used to characterize man (the
agent) and man’s specific beliefs, opinions or knowledge claims or
actions. In both of these cases,
rationality can be contrasted with either non-rationality or irrationality
(Brown 744). A non-living thing, a stone
or wood, for example, is not capable of any rational assessment and as such is
non-rational. A being who is capable of
carrying out rational assessment but who regularly violates the principles of
rational assessment is irrational.
Aristotle
is said to be the first person to have declared that rationality is the
essential feature that distinguishes human beings from every other animals,
thus man by nature according to him, is rational. The influence of Aristotle on the entire
history of philosophy need not be recapped here
but suffice it to remind us that he is the one who formalized and
systematized all forms of human thinking and this culminated in the subject
called logic. From then on most
philosophers have emphasized that rational assessment or explanation requires
rigorous rules of logic for deciding
whether a belief, an opinion or an action should be accepted as rational or
not. The rules of logic, according to
these philosophers, apply to every man irrespective of his cultural background
or world-view. Thus the idea of
rationality had since become central to the tradition of Western philosophy;
and as pointed out by J. B. Thomson, “it became definitive of philosophy
itself” (279).
The
rise of modern science in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries gave
additional impetus to this technical conception of rationality. Thompson notes that:
With the rise of the positive science, philosophy lost
its pretension to provide a rational explanation of the phenomena which
constitute the world. The alleged
autonomy and self-sufficiency of philosophy was destroyed; thenceforth,
philosophy could continue to explore the theme of rationality only in
conjunction with the sciences of nature, of language, of society (279).
What this implies is that logic which
is part of philosophy and the method of science both became the paradigm of
rational explanation. More succinctly, the scientific method, which provides the
rules for gathering evidence and evaluating hypothesis on the basis of such
evidence, and the fixed and universal principles of logic combined, sort of, to
become the paradigm method for any form of knowledge (including the human
sciences) wishing to be regarded as rational.
Thus any form of knowledge, beliefs, traditions and even human actions
that did not conform to this paradigm was irrational. This, of course, was the prevailing attitude
that made the positivists, the falsificationists and
the like to attempt to demarcate science from non-science. This is why, according to Aronowitz,
“’rationality’ itself becomes inextricably linked to domination” (317). Indeed, rationality became ideologized, and to that extent turned into a tool for the
suppression and hegemonization of cultures and
forms of knowledge believed to be under-developed and second-rated
respectively.
Feyerabend
made allusion to this conception of rationality as having originated in
This
logocentric – scientific paradigm has had a firm grip
on many models of explanation towards explaining natural phenomena and in fact,
human social behaviour. But the question is,
to what extent have these models of explanation succeeded in explaining,
especially human actions rationally. To
put it more firmly, what does it means to give rational explanation about man’s
social action? Man may be part of the
natural order of things in the world: A
world which science attempts to explain rationally. This does not mean that everything about man
could as well be subjected to rational study and dispassionate investigation by
deductive or inductive reason and/ or the scientific method as if he were an
inanimate object or a lesser being. Man
with his complex nature characterized by his intention, beliefs, values, aspirations,
and most important his interest and the natural instinct of self-preservation
can render the logocentric – scientific method,
especially as peddled by the positivists, questionable. Michael Lesnoff
argues strongly that the model of natural science “is inapplicable in the
social sciences because the existence of social facts always implies the
existence of mental state – intentions, purposes, beliefs, expectations, and
awareness of rules – which are not observable by empirical methods (188). Any study of man, therefore, has to take into
consideration the human existential situation which, of course, is influenced
by the ambivalent nature of his interest.
Models
of explanation like the positivists model of explanation (confirmationist
and the falsificationist approaches), often couched
in the garb of inductive and deductive logic respectively, and to some extent
the realist model, have failed to take this phenomenon into consideration when
employed to explain human social action. Basically, both the positivist and the
realist models of explanation have been observed to be limited and insufficient
in their approach to explanation of reality.
To be sure, the positivist model hinges on the idea of subsuming whatever
phenomenon to be explained under some kind of general law, which according to the
positivist is made possible by the regularity of events observed in
nature. The model simply conceives of
reality as merely phenomenal or as simply made up of only observable entities. Thus whatever is not observable or that
cannot fit into the scheme of the general law is unscientific and therefore
should be discarded. General Law, it is
argued, is the fulcrum that gives science its impetus of predicting
events. Predictability thus becomes a
fundamental feature that distinguishes what is scientific and rational from
that which is unscientific and irrational.
A critical
look at the positivist model shows that it applies the exclusivist –
disjunctive kind of reasoning. But this
poses a big problem to the positivist because reality is complex and not merely
phenomenal. With this exclusivist
approach, the model cannot claim to give any authentic explanation which could
capture reality in its totality. It is
therefore defective and lopsided in its attempts to explain reality.
On the other
hand, the realist position on explanation is that an authentic causal
explanation of event could only be achieved if we strive to uncover and
understand the underlying structures, the operative mechanisms and their inter-relationship
that give rise to phenomena. William Outhwaite puts it this way:
“Realists by contrast (to the positivists) analyze causality in terms of
the nature of things and their interactions, their causal power (and
liabilities). The
guiding metaphors here are those of structures and mechanisms in reality,
rather than phenomena and events” (22).
In this wise, a rational explanation is attained only if we go beyond
the phenomenal or the observable to the underlying structures or essences which
are believed to be the cause of the phenomena we seek to explain.
This model on
face value may appear to be better than the positivist model in the sense that
it does not seem to limit reality to the observable entities. But like the positivist model, it has serious
limitation which is in its over-emphasis on the essences or underlying
structures as if the phenomenal do not count much. Thus in its approach, the model appears to
divorce the “real” from the “appearances” as if they have no mutual
relationship. In this sense, the realist
model is simply too restrictive and suffers the same fate of being lopsided in
its attempt to explain reality.
The two
models on the whole, do not seem to bother about taking the different strands
and components of reality into consideration in a complementary manner. This problem is what Asouzu’s complementary
approach seeks to overcome. We shall
return to this soon.
Meanwhile, it
is pertinent to also note that in their quest for criteria to determine what
type of action is rational, acceptable and scientific, these models of
explanation have tended to detach the problem of rationality from the
existential conditions of man which is ambivalent. Influenced by the scientific paradigm, these
models claim that explanation could be done on the basis of humanly detached
evidence. Quoting Ernest Gellner, Jacob Aigbodioh captures
this picture of science thus: “the salient features of scientific knowledge is
that its explanatory schemata are impersonal, indifferent to idiosyncrasy and identity,
and articulated in terms which are
socially and morally blind, and which are, indeed, generally unintelligent
without specialized and technical training”
(19).
The
point here is that this ‘scientism’ when applied to human social situation, seems
to detach the issue of what factors are responsible for the actions or the
existence of the social agent from the explanatory schemata. The result of such explanatory models would
always be lopsided and defective. This
is why Feyerabend argues that any
’rational’ procedure or ‘valid’ standard that runs counter to sociological and
psychological tendencies, and that does not belong to any tradition is hopeless
(Rationalism, 14). Ozumba seems to also support
this position when he argues that “the abstract rationalistic aspect of epistemology
(scientific knowledge) should be decoded and made to have bearing on human
concrete existential situation.” (Ozumba 17).
Now
if human existential situation is guided and influenced by that primordial
interest – self preservation, and since this interest in its diverse ways is
not homogenous nor entirely rational, then any
rational explanation about man must take this phenomenon into
consideration. Thus, to give rational
explanation about man as a social animal is not to detach this phenomenon from the logic of explanation – making logic
or scientific paradigm to dwell in a realm that cannot be brought down to bear
on human existential situation.
Apart
from social scientists employing the paradigm of science and logic to attempt to give
rational explanation on human actions, each social participant (to use Michael Root’s
term) does not seem to be bereft of ideas on how to explain his actions
rationally. For example, ask any social
participant why he chooses to break the pipe line or disconnect/reconnect the electric
cables to suit his own fancy, or why he evades payment of tax, or why he ‘sorts’
to pass examinations or gain employment, or any favour,
he will line out what appears to be very cogent and persuasive reasons –
reasons that ‘caused’ him to engage in such actions. His reasons may range from
negligence by government, unemployment, injustice, inequality, marginalization, favoritism to the ‘man no man syndrome’
and the like. The reasons he gives may
appear to explain his actions. To this
extent, he may also be said to give a rational explanation of the causes of his
actions. Rational explanation in this
sense would mean citing an intention that is the cause of the behaviour, and describing the behaviour
with some amount of reasonableness. The
reasons cited usually would include beliefs, desires, interests, etc, and
these, of course, are meant to show that what he did was the reasonable thing
to have done in the circumstances.
But
the question that social scientists usually pose is,
does such ‘lay man’ explanation correctly explain participants’ behaviour? Some
social scientists do come to the conclusion that participants’ account of what
cause their behaviors is insincere and thus certain things are hidden. To that extent, social scientists discount
participants account because they “believe the participant is self-deceived and
is hiding from herself the cause of her behaviour”
(Root 176). This explains why many
social scientists put aside or look beyond participants accounts because the
belief is that such accounts do not explain enough or fundamentally.
This
is what Asouzu seems to tell us when he argues strongly that to explain
ambivalent human acts like violence, graft, corruption, etc., on the basis of
such other acts, as injustice, oppression, nepotism or even colonialism, etc,
would amount to begging the question. He makes it clear that such ‘causal
explanation’ is only touching the symptoms not the root cause of the
disease. This of course, is the kind of
explanation given by the layman. To give an adequate causal explanation
demands that we “take the relative historical conditions of the individual into
account and still be insightful. The
explanation must go beyond known empirical effects but has to consider them” (Method
231). The explanatory task, according to
him, is to explain the most fundamental cause why people engage in acts that
are ambivalent, acts that are awkwardly paradoxical. And the most appropriate
approach of explanation, it seems, is the complementary approach which we
mentioned in the last section of this work.
A
thorough look at Asouzu’s complementary approach to explaining reality shows
that his approach has the capacity to overcome the limitations of the
positivist and realist models of explanation; models that are purely
exclusivist in nature. The complementary
approach is a non-exclusivist model which seeks to establish the basic
relationship that makes an event possible.
It seeks to understand all events, first in their historical and
relative fragmentation and then in their ultimate relationship to the totality.
This
approach, anchored on the methodological principles of “harmonious
complementation” and “progressive transformation”, is a call for every
scientist and social inquirer to learn to view each component of reality as
being meaningful only when understood in relation to other components. In this sense, we will learn to accept all
diverse components in their relativity and insufficiency, but with a conviction
that they can be mutually complemented; that is, if we have to achieve an
authentic understanding of their nature.
Following such an illuminative approach, it would be seen that all
models that are restrictive in their explanation of reality are non complementary. And all non-complementary models are models
that are incapable of explaining the phenomenon of ambivalence that beset human
existence.
The
bottom line of our discourse above is that any model of explanation wishing to
explain the actions of that rational being (man) must go beyond the outward
manifestations of man’s actions or behaviours to the
fundamental causes which is the human primordial interest (self preservation),
which is not entirely rational because of its ambivalence nature. We must however, in doing this, still be
insightful of the outward actions by assimilating them in a complementary
way. This then is what the complementary
approach does better than the other models of explanation.
The Significance of Ambivalence of Human Situation as an Index of
Rational Explanation
Our
attempt here is to show the significance that accrues from understanding or
being conscious of the phenomenon of ambivalence: A phenomenon that underlies
human actions. Understanding this phenomenon is the measure for any rational
explanation.
Given
the fact that man is not entirely rational, for he can act irrationally at
times: and given that it would be pretty difficult to mark and maintain a
precise boundary between rationality and irrationality, for an act can be
rational now and irrational in another sense or another moment (Boudon 4), the best way to explain human action ‘rationally’
is to understand this phenomenon of ambivalence.
Understanding
this phenomenon would mean that we must be at alert always, for one who is
alert will know when the irrational part of him attempts to subjugate the
rational part, especially with regard to taking actions which concerns himself
and which may have immediate or later effect on others.
Let
us explain this with the illustration of those individuals and groups who evade
payment of taxes to the appropriate bodies.
Some individuals will give ‘rational explanation’ that government has
not justified the monies that accrue from taxes, that government has not provided
enough social amenities that is commensurate with the taxes they collect, and
so on. Hence, they conclude, there is no need to pay taxes again. On face value,
the reasons they give as the cause of their refusing to pay taxes make their
argument rational, for after all, if government involves reciprocity between it
and the citizen with respect to observance of rules (Fuller 188), then the
government should justify the taxes paid by providing these amenities, that is,
if the citizens are to continue obeying the rules covering tax payments.
But
on a more critical look many people because of self interest would not
ordinarily want to part with their money for their belief is that government
should take care of them. The question
is, how many people would pay their taxes willingly if government do not remove
from their sources or mount road blocks or go to houses in order to force
people to comply? In
Refusing
to pay taxes, on the other hand, is irrational because it breaches a provision
of the constitution of the country (we can call it a standard of rationality)
which mandates every adult to pay taxes.
Now the individual or group who evades payment of taxes may think that
he has gained something positive by saving his money but on the other side, his
action will present something negative about him as a social animal and to his
community. Suppose his action expressed
in the proposition ‘there is no need to pay taxes again’ is taken as a maxim or
is generalized (that is, becomes a ‘general law’), then the little
effort government has made will pale into nothingness, for the few social
amenities provided through the ‘forced’ collection of taxes would not be
there. The implication is that those who
refuse to pay taxes and the entire citizenry will suffer the effect of such
maxim.
What
the above tries to capture is that trying to promote self interest above the
common good is not entirely rational no matter how ‘rational’ the explanation
as regards the cause of the action would appear to be. It would therefore be absurd for one to term behaviour rational when it produces undesired effects
either immediately or in the long run.
Such behaviour is ambivalent in that it amounts
to pursuing an end that one does not want.
This is why Asuozu makes the point that ”if we act under the assumption of unmitigated self-interest
devoid of considerations for the common good, our action has an inherent moment
of contradiction because in seeking to negate the common good, we indirectly
also negate our own interest” (Method, 237). The best way to escape this
contradiction is for the human mind to come to terms with the phenomenon of
ambivalence which underlies his actions, and then makes effort to pursue what
is fundamentally authentic.
Understanding
the phenomenon of ambivalence would make or enhance our moral consciousness. The issue of morality could not entirely be
divorced from our conception of what rational explanation involves in so far as
we are talking about human actions.
Human beings, according to Pratt, are “typically subject to moral
obligations, and this is a further difference between them and the objects
studied by natural science” (90).
Related to this is the fact that man is a political animal. This, according to Jacgues
Maritain is that “he is a rational animal, because
reason requires development through character, training, education and the
cooperation of other men and because society is thus indispensable to the accomplishment
of human dignity” (Qtd. in Eneh
and Okolo 50 – 51). Being a rational animal means that man naturally can
discern what is good behaviour from what is bad behaviour. Man only
engages in bad behaviour because of interest which he
may see as positive. But this is only as
a result of moral weakness. If man were
to take the concomitant problems associated with his moral weakness seriously
then, he would always attempt to be morally upright. He would know that just as the self need the
society so does the society needs the self.
This would force it on him to know that nefarious acts like
embezzlement, vandalization, disregard for sanctity
of human life, graft, etc, are crimes committed against himself
and these would not augur well for the social order.
In
this way, whenever we talk of giving a rational explanation about human
actions, we should also make allusion to the morality of the said action. This becomes quite important because
explanation in the “human sphere”, according to Pratt, “is not a matter of
finding covering laws” (77). It is simply more than that. Explanation of what causes human actions,
especially the paradoxically puzzling types we have been discussing, entails
providing deep understanding of the action.
In such understanding, we assimilate what is obvious and clear to us
with that which is puzzling and not immediately intelligible (Onigbinde 76). For
example, in explaining the action of a vandal who breaks the pipeline to scoop
fuel, we will seek to explain his action by looking at his reasons which may be
that: (i) he has been marginalized by government (ii)
he has no employment (iii) his land which he would have cultivated has been
spoilt by gas flaring (iv) the only source of income, therefore, is to scoop
and sell fuel if he must survive. These
reasons perhaps, are obvious facts that can be attested. But the puzzling and unintelligible part is the
act of not fearing for his life or that of other members of his society. In this sense his instinct of
self-preservation has tended to subvert his rationality. Thus in explaining
such actions from the complementary stand-point and with reference to the phenomenon
of ambivalent situation, we assimilate in a very complementary manner both the historico – environmental conditions of the individual with
the primordial interest of self-preservation. It is such model of explanation that can lead
us to a comprehensive understanding of the said action.
This
is why it would not be entirely acceptable to discount ‘participants’ account
or reasons as explanation for their actions.
Failure to take the participants reasons for their actions into
consideration in the course of explanation would inturn
means undermining the human beings involved as not being rational at all. In view of this, an understanding of the
ambivalent human situation becomes very significant if we must give a rational
explanation of human actions.
Conclusion
This work has been an attempt to show
the inevitability of ambivalent of human existential situation as a measure of
rational explanation of human actions.
The ambivalence of human situations is anchored on the notion of
self-preservation which man, though rational, shares with other animals that
are not rational, or are of a lesser level of rationality.
We
have argued that models of explanation in science, employed in social theory
have often detached the idea of what is rational from the human existential
situation and to this extent such explanatory models have somewhat been
lopsided and defective.
In
our exposition of the notion of ambivalence of human existential situation, we
have appealed heavily to Professor Asouzu’s book on the subject by reviewing
the basic point of his idea. We have
agreed with him that the best way to give rational explanation of human action
is to understand that human interest is ambivalent for this would lead us to
know not only the observable effects of the actions but the latent or hidden
meanings of such actions. This index of
rational explanation, we should further agree with him, could best be explained
through complementary reflection.
“Complementary
reflection” could be said to be a ‘Calabar School of Philosophical thought’ or
better still a philosophical blue-print incidentally propounded by Professor
Asouzu. This philosophy, which to our
understanding is very encompassing, seeks to build bridges of unity between and
among the opposing strands of reality and competing interests, not unmindful,
however, of the potentialities of each diverse strand or interest respectively. It seeks to interpret and explain realities
from a complementary standpoint rather than from an exclusivist standpoint,
taking cognizance of the possible usefulness of each component of reality – whether positive or negative.
It
is our conviction that with its underlying imperative – the principle of
harmonious complementation and the principle of progressive transformation,
complementary reflection could lead us to reflect critically and deeply on the
limitations and facticity of human existence with a
view to understanding and managing the double capacity of our interest and
other intrigues associated with it. It
is on this conviction that one is tempted to consider complementary reflection as a better model of rational explanation than
some others that are utterly exclusivist in nature.
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