<\/p>\n
John Mackey, CEO of Whole Foods, is at it again, <\/p>\n <\/span>I’m glad I Mackey is a libertarian entrepreneur with a firm belief in Only gradually and bit by bit did I cease being a In a telling, and I believe completely honest, statement, “Would I prefer Whole Foods to be very successful and people still ate Admirable as these sentiments are, and as much as he has The yin\/yang symbol is simpler to use, so I’ll stick with The same holds for our individuality. <\/span>We are individuals. <\/span>No question of that in my mind. <\/span>We are also social beings who are Another way to grasp this point is to think of each of us as So a reasonably unbiased thinker, or one like me who started Paradigm Prisons<\/b><\/p>\n Paradigms are models of reality we use to explore Most of us use the paradigms that orient us pretty I think the only real check on this tendency, and The libertarian paradigm grows from Western On the other hand libertarians also are likely to So long as he refuses to distance himself from his But there is a more interesting blindness we Theoretically Induced Blindness: Children. <\/span><\/b><\/p>\n It is not accidental that the paragon of libertarian There are no children in Rand’s novels. <\/span>All are adults, all are self-contained, By treating every adult as essentially impermeable Willful Blindness: Nature<\/b><\/p>\n I believe this ultra-individualism, this exaltation Western individualism assumes we live in a world of Almost 100% of the warming deniers I have read about That Mackey’s response is as irrational as I am Finding Balance<\/b><\/p>\n Paumgarten goes into considerable depth as to who Mackey is But apparently it has not enlarged his compassion. <\/span>And compassion is the means by which we A culture that is ‘yin’ in the sense I am using the term
\nusing his version of libertarianism to deny global warming. <\/span>It is a false crisis that responding to
\nwould impoverish and enslave us.
\n<\/span>Even a writer who has long defended him before now has finally had it with the
\nguy<\/a>. I was going to unload on Mackey again, but before doing so did additional reading
\nabout the guy. <\/span>Especially a very
\ninteresting piece by Nick Paumgarten<\/a> in the January 4 New Yorker. <\/span><\/p>\n
\n<\/p>\n
\ndid. <\/span>While my support of the
\nboycott remains (I have not shopped there since his comments on health reform)
\nMackey is far more interesting (and sympathetic) than simply being a ruthless
\nbusinessman. <\/span>He is also an
\nidealist. An interesting one. <\/span>And
\nso what was going to be a short post has turned rather philosophical.<\/p>\n
\neach individual’s responsibility for his or her own life. <\/span>That hits close to home because I
\nwas a libertarian for a long time myself. (I also ran my own business for many
\nyears – but that’s another story). <\/span><\/p>\n
\nlibertarian, and I still have a great deal of admiration for the creative
\nentrepreneurial spirit as well as respect for individual autonomy that
\nlibertarianism at its best honors.
\n<\/span>Mackey sees the crucial role in improving society that business people
\ncan play, and that many on the left have a hard time grasping. <\/span>Within the limits of today’ economy, he
\nhas done much to mainstream organic and sustainable food and healthy eating,
\nand he did so not simply to make money. <\/span><\/p>\n
\nMackey says<\/a><\/p>\n
\nterrible food and were getting heart disease and cancer and diabetes when they
\ndidn’t have to? I fundamentally don’t believe you have to get those diseases.
\nOr Whole Foods has gone bankrupt, but yet the world’s health is far better and
\neverybody’s eating a healthier diet? I’d rather have the second one.
\nAbsolutely.”<\/span><\/p>\n
\naccomplished to promote his vision, I think Mackey still suffers from an
\nideologically enhanced myopia blinding him to very important dimensions of
\nreality. <\/span>If I had to summarize my
\ncore problem with Mackey’s views, I’d point to a yin\/yang symbol. <\/span>Or perhaps to our own Wheel of the
\nYear, which is a more complex image of the same point. <\/span>Mackey’s views of human beings are
\ncompletely yang. <\/span>Completely
\nMidsummer. <\/span><\/p>\n
\nit. <\/span>When I teach political theory
\none way I explore the nature of our individuality is by analogy to a
\nphoton. <\/span>Ask one set of
\nexperimental questions and you get responses indicating the photon is a
\nparticle. <\/span>Let’s call it the “yang”
\naspect of the photon. <\/span>But with
\nanother set of questions you get results indicating it is a wave, the “Yin”
\naspect. <\/span>They are not reducible to
\none or the other. <\/span>From a human
\nperspective both are equally fundamental even if we ourselves cannot see how
\nthat can be true logically.<\/p>\n
\nimmersed 100% of the time in relationships which make us what we are. <\/span>Also no question in my mind. <\/span>Neither Mackey nor any of us would have
\nthe same ideas or attitudes had we grown up in a traditional Hopi or Chinese
\nfamily or in a traditional Muslim or Jain culture. <\/span>But our actual individuality-in-society encompasses both, is
\nreducible to neither, and achieves its unity, to the degree it does, within our
\nconsciousness.<\/p>\n
\na dynamic gestalt constantly in interaction with everything that surrounds
\nus. <\/span>Our environment gives us
\nsomething to push against,but it also supports us. <\/span>We and it co-evolve. <\/span><\/p>\n
\nout biased as an individualist but is open to con-conforming data, quickly
\ncomes to the conclusion that a purely individualistic approach to understanding
\nhuman beings is simply wrong. <\/span><\/p>\n
\nparts of the world we have not yet encountered. <\/span>They tell us what questions to ask and what counts as
\nevidence and roughly what to expect to find. <\/span>They tell us what is reasonable and what is
\nunreasonable. <\/span>We all use them,
\nexplicitly or tacitly.
\n<\/span>Scientific and philosophical and religious paradigms share these
\nqualities in common. <\/span>So do
\npolitical ideologies.<\/p>\n
\nloosely. <\/span>This can lead to sloppy
\nthinking, but it has an upside as well.
\n<\/span>We are open to at least noticing evidence that does not fit the paradigm
\nwe mostly take for granted. <\/span>By
\ncontrast, when someone studies a paradigm and uses it rigorously to examine the
\nworld, he or she can make genuine contributions to knowledge and deepen their
\nown understanding, but at a cost.
\n<\/span>He or she is far more at its mercy, and far less likely to take
\nseriously or even notice what is absent in their paradigm but in front of their
\nnoses. <\/span>The history of science is
\nfilled with such stories, as is the history of our lives.<\/p>\n
\ncertainly not a fail safe one because nothing in life is fail safe, is to try
\nand remember that the world is a far more mysterious place than we can
\nunderstand. <\/span>If we take that to
\nheart we use our paradigms as potentially fallible road maps not Truth. <\/span>Ideologues and those who have benefited
\nenormously from following a paradigm will have a hard time doing this. <\/span>Mackey’s libertarianism is an example.<\/p>\n
\nindividualism, refines it, and adds free market economics to it. <\/span>Libertarians are able to see stuff that
\nothers might not notice, like the creative role of entrepreneurs. <\/span>Outside libertarian ranks entrepreneurs
\nare often simply thought of as business people after a buck. <\/span>Mackey’s interview shows another side.<\/p>\n
\nmiss what their paradigm ignores. <\/span><\/p>\n
\nlibertarian theoretical paradigm Mackey will never find a way to question
\nit. <\/span>With its core reliance on
\nWestern individualism, the truth of total individual responsibility unless
\nsomeone intervenes violently seems obvious to libertarians. <\/span>They are literally blind to some things
\nand unwilling to look at others except to find the hidden flaws because their
\nparadigm tells them such and such must be the case. <\/span>Two examples from my scholarly own work that only took on
\nsignificance after I started being able to think outside it are the fact that
\ndemocracies never war on other democracies and that there has been no tendency
\nfor freedom to turn into despotism as European “welfare states” have expanded
\ntheir activities. <\/span><\/p>\n
\nencounter in libertarianism’s major thinkers, that is then passed on to those
\ninfluenced by them, like Mackey.<\/p>\n
\nindividualism is Ayn Rand. Mackey is not uncritical of Rand. <\/span>He disagrees with her exaltation of
\nselfishness, saying what she really meant is enlightened self-interest. <\/span>Mackey’s “self-interest” is wiser than
\nthat of many of Rand’s followers.
\n<\/span>But it is still severely limited.
\n<\/span>Why? <\/span>Here is a clue.<\/p>\n
\nwho are as they are because of some inexplicable cause buried deeply in their
\nvery being. <\/span>They are as
\nimpermeable as balls on a pool table – except for sex, and even that (if I
\nremember Rand’s sex scenes accurately) is not a matter of relationship so much
\nas filling a need by using another for mutually achieved pleasure along with
\nadmiration of the partner’s character.
\n<\/span>Her first novel, We The Living<\/i>,
\nstill had fairly complex and conflicted characters. <\/span>By the time of <\/span>The Fountainhead<\/i> and <\/span><\/span>Atlas
\nShrugged<\/i> this appreciation for human
\ncomplexity had disappeared into a good guys vs bad guys image of life where
\nmost people served as filler.<\/span><\/p>\n
\nforces of nature, and ignoring the existence of children, Rand and her
\nfollowers cut themselves off from appreciating a large dimension of reality,
\nfor their environment obviously has an extraordinary impact on children. (I
\nfind it significant that Mackey himself is childless.) <\/span>This ultra-individualism leads to his
\nprescription for improving health in America: Eat better. <\/span>It’s your issue. <\/span>Your responsibility. <\/span>Because his sentiment is partly true
\nits error of radical incompleteness is hard for those holding it to see.<\/p>\n
\nof the yang alone, is also why the global warming issue elicits such an
\nirrational response from libertarians like Mackey. <\/span>It suggests we are intrinsically limited by relationships
\nnot of our choosing. <\/span>Because they
\naccept the basic secular modern image of a world whose meaning depends on human
\ncreativity and effort, anything that fundamentally limits us is a threat, a
\ntrap, <\/span>and a tragedy.<\/p>\n
\nobjects, resources valuable to the degree they can meet our needs. <\/span>Creative people discover how to use
\nthem better. <\/span>We ourselves are
\nseparate from nature. <\/span>Libertarian
\nwriters spend a great deal of time determining how we are separate from nature,
\nso we can use it for our purposes.
\n<\/span>The global warming argument undermines this Faustian view of how to
\nrelate to nature. <\/span>It also
\nundermines the libertarian view that the market with minimal government can
\nsolve any problem because there is no obvious purely market solution to the
\nproblem, if it is a problem. <\/span>For
\nthree reasons: (1) we are separate from and superior to nature, (2) nature’s
\nvalue is in its service to us, and (3) the market can solve all problems,
\nglobal warming CANNOT be a problem, and scientists or anyone else who say
\notherwise must be wrong. <\/span>The
\nresult is willful irrational blindness.
\n<\/span><\/p>\n
\nare on the libertarian wing or conspiracy wing of the political right. <\/span>That a argument about the world that is
\nessentially a scientific issue has such strong correlates is pretty good
\nevidence that for most the science does not matter. <\/span>Global warming is no more an intrinsically left or right
\nquestion than are arguments about the effects of volcanic eruptions. <\/span><\/p>\n
\nsuggesting is demonstrated by his saying, right after he pooh poohs the global
\nwarming claim, “Historically, prosperity tends
\nto correlate to warmer temperatures.” A revealing rationalization as well as a
\nfalse one. <\/span>He grants it might be
\nhappening after all, but that’s OK.
\n<\/span>That is quite different from saying it is not happening. <\/span>As to warmth and prosperity, ask the
\nSwedes and Canadians.<\/span><\/p>\n
\nand what makes him tick. <\/span>All in
\nall, I liked him. <\/span>But it also
\nprovides a wonderful example of how New Age practices, in which Mackey has
\nextensive experience, do not necessarily lead to spiritual insight, though they
\ncan lead to psychological healing.
\n<\/span>In my view, the New Age is fundamentally about Me. <\/span>The New Age conception of well-being tends
\nto be extremely individualistic, and to the degree it is, Mackey appears to be
\na long-time enthusiastic practitioner.
\n<\/span>I think this is all good as far as it goes, but it does not go as far as
\nsome seem to think.<\/p>\n
\nwho tend towards the yang can most easily access the yin side of our being, the side of who we are that is contained in and
\nexpresses itself through the quality of our relationships. <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n
\nhere can lack compassion as well. <\/span>I am reminded of the Chinese bystander who pushed a
\nsuicidal Chinese off a bridg<\/a>e, explaining “I pushed him off because
\njumpers like Chen are very selfish. Their action violates a lot of public
\ninterest.” <\/span> <\/span><\/p>\n