A few thoughts on intellectual history, abstraction and values

Terms like “pragmatism” as it applies to philosophy and the history of ideas – most isms really – are intrinsically vague and useful only to the (necessarily limited) extent that they help to bring out persistent or more fleeting strands or commonalities in thinking within or across populations.

Even the views of individuals are often difficult to fathom and characterize accurately. That these views generally change over time, from book to book, from article to article, from diary entry to diary entry, makes the task even harder.

Nor is any one thinker’s work privileged over another’s. Judgments on the intrinsic merits of individual works or of the merits of particular thinkers are very difficult to make in an objective manner.

But individual thinkers can be readily assessed according to the compatibility of their views with the findings of contemporary and subsequent scientific and scholarly investigation. Certain thinkers can also be shown to have been more influential than other thinkers. Unfortunately there is very little correlation between these two vectors. Sometimes it seems that an inverse correlation between compatibility with science and personal influence applies.

In my view, there is no grand narrative and no abiding canon. We find ourselves with respect to the history of ideas – just as we do with respect to any and every aspect of this relentlessly evolving world – in the midst of complexities which can only be satisfactorily “simulated” or modeled by the reality that is generating them. The best we can do is make marginal notes.

One of Louis Rougier’s early books was called En marge de Curie, de Carnot et d’Einstein: études de philosophie scientifique. Marginal notes, you could say, by a marginal figure.

Rougier’s works are not on anybody’s essential reading list today. He made some bad career moves and got pushed aside, but he was a rising star in the 1920s and a very influential figure in the 1930s. You want to pigeonhole him? Not possible, I’m afraid.

Rougier was aware early on of the thought of William James (whom he read in translation). It was James’s version of pragmatism that he singled out for attack as a young man, but which arguably was not all that far from his own developing views. As Rougier himself often pointed out, intellectual history can be seen as a dense network of ironies and contingencies.
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There is another angle to this. It relates to the nature of language. I see natural language as something that evolved for specific reasons and which is well suited to certain uses (e.g. storytelling and facilitating and coordinating social interactions of various kinds) and not so well suited to other uses. In particular, I am wary of the dangers of using abstract concepts in a relatively unconstrained way as often happens in theology and philosophy.

Common concrete nouns involve abstraction. There is no instance of a dog that is not also a particular animal of a particular breed or mix of breeds; or of a table that is not of a particular type and size and shape and color etc.. Such words, however, are clearly both semantically constrained and useful. Common abstract nouns are also useful as a sort of linguistic shorthand.

The trouble is that we have a natural tendency to hypostatize concepts and this has led, variously, to myth, ideology, philosophical puzzles and the elaboration of metaphysical systems.

Mythic elements in our thinking are unavoidable. Likewise ideology to an extent. Our brains just naturally generate value-laden narratives. Beyond this we are, as language users, committed to certain rudimentary metaphysical assumptions associated with grammatical structures that can lead to philosophical puzzles or pseudo-problems. But the deliberate construction of free standing or self-contained metaphysical systems is something else again.

Arguably myths, ideologies and metaphysical systems (unless the latter are closely tied to science) lack any real connection to non-human reality. Many metaphysical systems fail even to connect to human reality in any significant way.

Within science, abstractions are necessarily constrained. They play their assigned roles within, and take their meaning from, theories. The abstractions are constrained by the theories, and the theories are constrained by the rules and protocols of the discipline in question and ultimately by empirical evidence.

The formal sciences take us further from natural language than empirical science generally does. Abstractions in mathematics and logic take their meaning from, and so are constrained by, the rules of the systems involved. They are, as it were, contained within the system. What Rudolf Carnap referred to as “external” questions about these concepts are misguided and ultimately meaningless.

I would not want to commit too strongly, however, to a distinction between the formal and the empirical. Many developments point to a blurring of the distinction. For example, pure mathematical structures have long been known to play important roles in modeling physical reality. And, of course, the rapid development of computers and artificial intelligence is changing the nature of mathematics, arguably moving it closer to empirical or applied science. Algorithmic information theory is a case in point, focused as it is both on practical problems and on deep questions concerning the fundamental nature and limitations of computation and mathematical thinking (i.e. on metamathematics).
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Moral, social, political and aesthetic values and convictions can be described but ultimately cannot be derived or justified scientifically. Moreover, discursive reason cannot be applied in any really comprehensive or extensive way to normative questions without creating drastic distortions and oversimplifications. Discursive reason operates on one level; values on another.

Whenever I read a philosophical text on normative questions which is framed in terms of arguments mounted in standard philosophical style I rarely get beyond a couple of paragraphs before a move is made which appears unmotivated or to which I object for one reason or another. Historical approaches make more sense to me, especially when they are (or aspire to be) purely descriptive.


[This piece is an extract (slightly modified) from an essay of mine which was published at The Electric Agora.]

Culture and language: some personal reflections

Much is written about shared narratives and their role in creating a common culture. But what is a culture?

The idea of a common culture – whether that culture is defined in regional, national or supranational terms – is an idealization and necessarily vague and imprecise. This fact needs to be recognized. But it does not entail that clear and definitive claims about culture cannot be made. One way of making claims more precise is to focus on specific cultural elements. My background in comparative literature and linguistics leads me to focus on language.

Language can be seen from a broadly literary perspective on the one hand or from a scientific perspective on the other. The former perspective motivates my views to a large extent and provides a partial conceptual framework (based on certain intellectual and literary-historical traditions). But linguistics extends and strengthens the conceptual framework and provides a bridge to cognitive and evolutionary science.

Language is central because, without language, distinctively human forms of social practice would not have arisen. Take early ritual burials, often seen as markers of emerging human consciousness. Clearly, some kind of shared narrative is at work here; a shared notion of an afterlife for which the deceased is being prepared. Such a sophisticated narrative could not have existed before our ancestors developed a capacity for language.

There is a huge gulf between the linguistic or semiotic capacities of humans and other animals. All known human languages (apart from pidgins) share an equivalent degree of structural and grammatical complexity. Presumably language did not come into existence all at once and fully-formed, but evidence for hypothetical, intermediate forms is unavailable and we can only speculate regarding the communicational powers of pre-modern humans and other hominins.

There is an important distinction between a (natural) language and the more general and abstract concept of human language which parallels the distinction between a culture and human culture in general. All actual linguistic phenomena occur within a specific linguistic context, of course. But languages share common elements and/or structural features with other languages, so the idea of a language is not a simple one and is not without its problems.

In what sense does a language exist as distinct from particular instances of language use? Spoken words and written texts are generally assignable to this language or that, but precise boundaries are impossible to draw. Grammars and dictionaries try to do this but they can never reflect the constantly shifting contours of actual linguistic practice which always depend on the knowledge and behavior of individual speakers. In the final analysis, then, what we have is a set of unique and (to a greater or lesser extent) overlapping idiolects. We find it convenient, however, to group sets of idiolects into what we call dialects or languages. (Noam Chomsky and many other linguists have explicitly endorsed this idea.)

If a language is difficult (or impossible) to define, the notion of “a culture”, being more general, is even more problematic. But something similar to an idiolect-based approach can help us out. Each of us can be seen to represent a unique cultural mix. What we call “a culture” is represented by a set of (potentially communicating) individuals whose cultural knowledge and practices are similar in certain respects.

Though only limited precision is possible when talking about particular cultures, it helps if the primacy of the individual (in the sense explained above) is borne in mind. Consequently, a bit of personal history may help to flesh things out.

I went to a high school which had a strong classical focus. Latin was considered an important subject. We read Book IV of Virgil’s Aeneid, the letters of the Younger Pliny (not recommended) and extracts from Julius Caesar’s Commentarii de Bello Gallico (an account of his military campaigns in Gaul).

The older boys had studied classical Greek as well as Latin, but Greek was phased out. We were aware that Latin also was being marginalized in the broader educational culture. Fewer and fewer students were taking up Latin and, of those who did, fewer and fewer were taking it through to their final high school years.

Language lies at the heart of culture and knowing Latin gave us a sense of being part of a long tradition of Western cultural life. Being exposed to the actual words of cultural forebears who lived in a world untouched by Christian philosophy and yet which did not seem completely alien challenged us in subtle ways. This is an aspect of classical learning which is not always appreciated. Classical values (despite attempts by later thinkers to Christianize them) are opposed in quite fundamental ways to the moral spirit of the New Testament and, by extension, to the underlying values of the many social and political movements that were founded upon and driven by secularized versions of Biblical ethics and eschatology.

Elements of classical culture permeated ordinary life in ways that are difficult to conceive today. The details, taken individually, seem trivial: Latin words and phrases were used in English more than they are now; likewise classical references in English idioms were once more common (like “crossing the Rubicon”). And historical figures were routinely alluded to. I don’t know if “Great Caesar’s ghost!” was ever actually a common exclamation, but it certainly was a successful 20th-century popular culture meme. Significantly, in the 1990s television series, Lois and Clark: The New Adventures of Superman, the Perry White character says, “Great shades of Elvis!” instead of “Great Caesar’s ghost!”.

One of the things that characterized European cultures in previous centuries was a fairly widespread knowledge of Greek and Roman myths and legends. You can’t read much literature in English or other modern European languages or appreciate the visual arts without at least a cursory knowledge of these stories.

Strangely, even in the 20th century, the names and images of Greek and Roman (and Scandinavian) gods and heroes were very popular and effective marketing tools for selling consumer products. Or even football teams (e.g. Ajax Amsterdam).

As a love goddess, Venus was always popular. Some years ago, a local firm, Venus Packaging, got rid of their old, sexist logo which incorporated a shapely silhouette with the tagline: “That’s packaging!” On a more sober note, STDs used to be called venereal diseases.

Fables (going back to Aesop and beyond) and fairy tales were generally better adapted for children than Greek myths and were woven deep into the fabric of life. I recall getting off a train at London’s North Wembley station (which was near where I then lived). I was in the back carriage and had a long way to walk down the platform to the exit gate. As I passed through, an elderly white woman was telling the story of “The Tortoise and the Hare” to the young, black ticket collector (an immigrant from the Caribbean). Obviously, she had made an allusion to the fable (she being the tortoise), which he had not understood. It was a poignant scene, especially given the race-based social and political frictions which were beginning to manifest themselves in parts of London and other English cities.

A sense of regret for the loss of shared stories and traditions has nothing to do with racism. It applies within all ethnic or racial groups and across them. But it also reflects a particular view of culture which my literary education happened to reinforce.

“The term culture,” wrote T.S. Eliot in his Notes Towards the Definition of Culture, “includes all the characteristic activities and interests of a people; Derby Day, Henley Regatta, Cowes, the twelfth of August, a cup final, the dog races, the pin table, the dart board, Wensleydale cheese, boiled cabbage cut into sections, beetroot in vinegar, 19th-century Gothic churches and the music of Elgar. The reader can make his own list …”

As I see it, without a rich, common culture, not only does a society become less interesting, it becomes less resilient. It fractures. And this is precisely what we are seeing in the United States and many Western countries today.

No doubt there are many causes of and explanations for the social and political problems we are currently witnessing, but the marginalization of shared, traditional stories is undeniably a significant factor. Given the nature of our brains – given that they are narrative-consuming and narrative-generating engines and that our sense of self and meaning and purpose are narrative-dependent – the loss of one set of stories will make space for another. How one characterizes and interprets the current changes will depend on one’s ideology which in turn depends on the stories which one has internalized over a lifetime.

A part of me (my non-scientific, emotional side) sees a toxic mix of manufactured slogans coupled with ad hoc narratives rushing to fill the vacuum left by the loss of traditional and organic modes of thought and practice.

This judgment is tempered, however, by an awareness of the essential transience of languages and cultures, and a belief that what is truly valuable in what has been lost, culturally speaking, will – for as long as humans continue to exist and thrive – always manage to find new forms of expression.

[This is a revised version of an essay first published at The Electric Agora.]

On the scope and limits of science

Attempts to express a comprehensive personal view of the world are doomed to failure. Each of us has a view of the world; some such views are more developed and plausible than others. But language (even supplemented with other modes of expression) is simply not equipped to articulate the complex and shifting set of values and beliefs which creates and lies behind the way a particular individual sees and interprets the world.

What we can do is to express our views on and reactions to particular topics and particular things. What we can’t do is to tie it all together and articulate the whole, even in general terms.

There are a number of ways of looking at this. You could see it in terms of underlying logical coherence, for example. If a view of things had such coherence, it could be articulated accurately and concisely, at least in general terms. (1) But, given the fact that conscious reasoning constitutes only a minuscule portion of cognitive activity, there is no reason to expect – and every reason not to expect – that a person’s outlook on the world, with all its implicit value assessments, etc., would have anything like the degree of underlying logical coherence which would be necessary for its satisfactory articulation in linguistic terms.

Another way of looking at this is in terms of frameworks. A particular context is always required to provide a foundation for any statement or claim, and there is no general or generic context to which we can appeal. The broader the context, the less we can usefully (or even meaningfully) say. The danger here is that one gets lost in virtually meaningless abstractions and generalizations.

The most powerful forms of self-expression via written language are literary, and good writing in a literary sense is marked by specificity and concreteness and attention to the details of lived experience. Generalized claims and abstractions play only a minor role.

The impulse to express a comprehensive view has traditionally manifested itself in religious and philosophical contexts. But, as ways of understanding the world, modern scientific disciplines (including historical disciplines) have largely replaced religion and traditional metaphysics. You want to know about some specific thing? Go to the experts. Unfortunately, there are no experts to go to if you want answers to substantive questions about values or about the significance of human life, for example.

Individually we need to be committed to a set of values and beliefs in order to live. There is a huge range of possible belief and value systems, but an individual’s social and cultural environment narrows the possibilities somewhat. Beyond embracing the best available cultural elements (as one sees them) and applying principles of practical wisdom and commonsense, there is not a lot more one can do, other than ensuring that – as far as possible – one’s beliefs are compatible with scientific and scholarly knowledge.

It has become clear over time that scientific, empirical, formal and analytical methods represent the only reliable ways we have of building an objective or value-neutral communal knowledge base. Unlike our culturally-driven (and so values-driven) individual perspectives, this knowledge base is not only able to be articulated, it only exists to the extent that it has been articulated. It is necessarily public knowledge. (I use the word knowledge, but all claims are subject to challenge within the context of the disciplinary processes involved.)

Even here, however, the knowledge in question does not constitute a single thing or a unified structure, and so cannot be expressed concisely or in a unified way.

The term “edifice” is sometimes used to describe our communal knowledge base, but this metaphor is very misleading. In fact, it seems to me that one of the most significant things about human knowledge which the history of science and rigorous scholarship clearly demonstrates is its diverse and distributed nature. It is something of an irony therefore that champions of a scientific view of the world so often fall into the trap of seeing knowledge in unified terms.

Otto Neurath, who represented what might be called the radical wing of the logical positivist movement, was for many years the most prominent promoter of the notion of the Unity of Science. He clashed repeatedly with moderate figures in the movement such as Louis Rougier who strenuously rejected the notion, seeing in Neurath’s campaign an attempt to promote a creed, a new orthodoxy. Neurath’s view was an updated version of well-known 19th-century attempts to create a scientific socialism, and it was quite as censorious and illiberal as traditional religious orthodoxies, if not more so.

The attempt to promote a scientific creed continues to this day, of course, driven by a combination of arrogance and ignorance of intellectual history. But there is a difference between having a basically scientific view of the world and making science into some kind of creed or orthodoxy.

Things have changed in the arts and in non-scientific intellectual circles in recent decades, but not so long ago many of the greatest writers and artists and non-scientific thinkers had a very positive view of science, or at least accepted the general findings of mainstream science and rigorous scholarship. This is sometimes forgotten, partly because many of these writers and thinkers are currently out of fashion but partly also because the scientific or science-accepting side of many currently fashionable thinkers (Nietzsche comes to mind) is being downplayed.

As I see it, the fruits of science and scholarship belong to us all even though, as individuals, our actual knowledge is necessarily limited. Strangely enough, practicing scientists and scholars – because of the extreme degree of specialization which is required today – are no more likely to have a satisfactory general understanding than the interested observer, and the amateur will often have more time and energy than the specialist to devote to wide reading and to considering the implications of what is known.

I still have a very high regard for leading thinkers in scientific fields, especially fields (like physics and biology) which deal with fundamental questions of the natural world which have a bearing on how one sees or conceptualizes human life. But the more one reads their popular books or blogs or listens to interviews or to panel discussions, the more obvious it becomes that the special insights of scientific specialists rarely go beyond the scope of their areas of expertise.

For most purposes, of course, specialist expertise is not required, and useful or interesting conclusions can be drawn from very basic kinds of knowledge. Such arguments and elaborations may (and should, in my opinion) still be rooted in a view of the world which respects the findings of mainstream science and other rigorous forms of intellectual inquiry, but any argument involving matters of human significance (and so human values) necessarily goes beyond science and our empirical knowledge base more generally.

Some such elaborations have been developed with a view to expressing in a systematic way a particular view of the world. These (if my thesis is correct) cannot succeed. I have in mind, in particular, the sort of metaphysical systematizing which was in vogue in Europe, especially during 19th century.

Under the influence of thinkers such as Bertrand Russell and Gottlob Frege, more analytic and narrowly focused approaches gradually came to prominence and largely replaced traditional metaphysics. This analytical strand of philosophical thinking was very different in nature to almost all philosophical thinking before it in that it sought to bring academic philosophy more into line with scientific, formal and rigorous empirical disciplines; in other words to separate once and for all philosophy as an intellectual discipline from more traditional notions which saw philosophy as (at least potentially) providing guidance for living. Both Frege and Russell saw themselves as men of science (in the old European sense of the term). Russell was particularly scornful of the idea that academic philosophy should deal in any way with what was (and still is) popularly known as a “philosophy of life.”

In his intellectual autobiography Russell described the sense of freedom and liberation that accompanied his rejection of the idealist metaphysics which dominated the intellectual world in which he grew up for a more empirically-based view of things. The case I am making here is very much in line with a Russellian view. (2)

A great strength of Bertrand Russell as a thinker is that he was always aware of the way our personal values play into our thinking. Much of his published work is journalistic and opinionated. Arguably his views on education and some social questions were quite misguided. His views on power and politics still stand up, I think. But my point is that he drew a clear distinction between his serious philosophical work (from which he sought entirely to exclude his personal values) and the rest.

My focus here, however, is not science or the nature of philosophy, but rather on the relationship between science (broadly interpreted) and human values. Any attempt to articulate a value-driven point of view takes us beyond a purely scientific or rigorously scholarly space, albeit not entirely beyond the reach of scientific and scholarly expertise.

Even in the realm of rhetoric and persuasion, where personal values hold sway, the compatibility of any given position with mainstream science and rigorous scholarship remains an important litmus test. If a position or point of view fails the test, it can be excluded from consideration. But – fortunately or unfortunately – the bar is fairly low here, and the test in question lets through a vast array of mutually incompatible points of view.

The perspective I am putting forward is based in part on a particular interpretation of recent Western intellectual history. Certain thinkers have influenced me more than others, and any elaboration or defense of these ideas would necessarily involve the historical aspect: arguments about particular thinkers and about the relative merits of different ways of identifying and framing the main questions. (3)

Nonetheless, let me try to sum up my key points in purely non-historical terms. As individuals we slowly develop (or allow the ambient culture to develop for us) a general perspective or view of the world. Such a perspective cannot be fully articulated or satisfactorily summarized. It could be seen to express itself (via words and actions) in countless choices. These choices are practical and action-oriented rather than theoretical. They are responses to particular situations. Whereas individual perspectives can never be articulated holistically, values-based points of view on particular issues (which are driven in large part by an individual’s general perspective) can be articulated. They may be falsifiable, but are not amenable to positive scientific or academic validation.


NOTES

1. There may be a parallel here with the way complexity is conceptualized in algorithmic information theory, i.e. in terms of the compressibility of strings or other kinds of data structure. Data can usually be compressed (to a greater or lesser extent), but arbitrary random data cannot.

2. I am also drawing on Karl Popper’s general views on knowledge and falsifiability. Many of Russell’s and Popper’s specific views have been called into question, of course, and/or developed in various directions. Russell (at least) welcomed this. He saw himself as having made his significant contributions relatively early in his life and looked to others (initially to Ludwig Wittgenstein, and later to the logical empiricists) to move things forward. It is often asserted that the logical positivist movement 1) failed and 2) deserved to fail because the core insights of its main representatives were profoundly misguided. I question both of these judgments. Some of the ideas which drove the logical positivists were misguided. I mentioned Neurath’s ideologically-driven approach, for example. But the basic principles and perspectives on the scope and nature of human knowledge expressed in the writings of more moderate figures within the movement (like Moritz Schlick, Hans Reichenbach and Louis Rougier) are sound, and I am optimistic that they will survive – at least in modified forms which reflect ongoing changes in the scientific and intellectual landscape.

3. Also, it is obvious that the general perspective on knowledge which I have been discussing (and defending) has social implications. Historically speaking, it has, by and large, been associated with anti-totalitarian social philosophies, and this is no accident. I would want to claim (though I am not attempting to make the case here) that such a perspective is naturally compatible with traditional liberal values and – if not strictly incompatible with – at least not supportive of extremist politics, either of the left or the right.

[This essay was first published under the title Self-Expression, Knowledge and Valueat The Electric Agora.]

Isaiah Berlin and passionate thinking

In my latest essay at The Electric Agora, entitled Passionate Thinking [you will find this and more material in my new (May 2016) Google+ Collection, Social and Political Reflections], I deal with the question of social and political values, briefly sketching out my own (changing) attitudes and alluding to the views of Isaiah Berlin.

Interestingly, Berlin started out as an analytic philosopher but was never really at home in that tradition of thought. He tends either to be ignored or scorned by most people I know, and it's entirely possible that he was somewhat overrated during his lifetime.

In a very amusing piece which I link to from my essay, Christopher Hitchens notes that he responded to claims that he was overrated by saying: "And long may it continue."

Good-humoured, witty, self-deprecating, very knowledgeable in certain areas and almost alarmingly articulate, Berlin was certainly a class act.

I think he was more than this, and his characteristic forthrightness was, if not a form of courage then at least the mark of a genuinely passionate thinker.

He was asked about the meaning of life not long before his death. His reply:

"As for the meaning of life, I do not believe that it has any: I do not at all ask what it is, for I suspect it has none, and this is a source of great comfort to me — we make of it what we can, and that is all there is about it. Those who seek for some deep, cosmic, all-embracing, teleologically arguable libretto or god are, believe me, pathetically deluded."

Such forthrightness is refreshing (though I personally don't see where the "comfort" is coming from).

The problem with much discourse in the humanities today is not only that is it not forthright or compelling, but that it is profoundly uncritical and conformist: ideologically driven but not ideologically engaged. Closed off, in other words, to other possibilities.

From my piece at The Electric Agora:

"[A]s there is no privileged cosmic libretto, so there is no privileged social or political one. Berlin's kaleidoscopic vision reflected this conviction also.

He was a complex man and [...] thinker. [...] Always opposed to fanaticism and revolutionary violence, he was fascinated by certain 19th-century radical thinkers (e.g. Herzen, Sorel). He was also a Zionist of sorts, but he distanced himself both from the secular zealots and their Orthodox counterparts. His vision was clearer than theirs, and his loyalty was ultimately to a broader constituency.

Loyalty is at the heart of things, both in personal and political life. The crucial question is: loyality to whom, or to what?

To certain values, first of all, I would say, values which one typically sees as being embodied in certain individuals or groups. What I have realized is the tenuousness of the link between values (which persist) and the individuals and groups with which these values are – often quite arbitrarily – identified.

I'm not saying that social ideals can exist in the abstract, apart from actual individuals and actual groups. But any such identification should never be more than provisional. There is a world of difference between taking sides in an ideologically open manner, which involves keeping one's critical senses alive, and taking sides in a merely political or social way so that the party or the nation or a particular ideology or ideologue becomes the cause."

Too many stories

It's a confronting thought, but it seems irrefutable.

There are all sorts of stories we might tell ourselves about ourselves (or about our country, or political grouping), some plausible (in accordance with the facts), some implausible, some delusional. Discard the delusional, set aside the implausible. Fine.

The trouble is, many plausible (and mutually incompatible) narratives remain and there is no way of choosing between them. There is no true version, no 'God's eye view' (unless of course there is a more or less conventional God out there).

So there are no clear answers to questions about whether I am mean or frugal, or whether you are brave or reckless, or whether, morally, anyone is precisely anything.

But it goes further than this. It is not merely a matter of assigning - or not assigning - labels. It goes to the heart of a life's significance and involves the interpretation of complex histories.

To what extent is my life story or my country's history one of inspiring achievements or missed opportunities or a muddle of self-deception; to what extent successful or unsuccessful? It's all in the eye of the beholder.

Two things set limits to this kind of subjectivity: social facts; and the hypothetical logic of values. (Someone with such and such a value system would be inclined to praise or condemn specific behaviours.)

But, in the end - on this analysis, at least - subjectivism holds sway in the realm of values and the vindication we all seek at a fundamental level will never be achieved.