So, why do I blog? I think the idea was born when I was reading
protestantische Ethik und der ‘Geist’ des Kapitalismus" [EN]
Weber provides a lot of credible links between the philosophy of certain
protestant churches – mostly those of Calvinist descent, and popular
nowadays mostly in the Anglo-Saxon parts of the world (as far as I
know). His theory seems highly accurate given the historic spread of
capitalism, and the amazing prevalence of protestant cultures in the
early centers of capitalist development – the Netherlands, the UK,
Switzerland. I think it even serves to explain some of the cultural
differences that nowadays exist between the United States (which are,
arguably, heavily influenced by the ethics of the Christian sects
prevalent there, most of which are ultimately descendants of Calvinism).
One basic reason he thinks that Calvinism and its related sects
furthered economic success lies in the fundamental tenet of
[EN][DE],
which is very much different from what Catholicism or even Lutheran
Protestantism teach.
According to Weber, a prime concern for
Calvinists of the time was to determine their state of grace – which
must have been of vast importance, given the much stronger focus on the
afterlife that prevailed in those days. Orthodox Calivinist doctrine
denies that is possible to determine a person’s state of grace from any
external indications – only God knows who will be saved.
To
deal with the doubt and anxiety created by this issue, practical
Calvinism advised believers to never doubt that they are saved,
since any such doubts are signs of lacking faith. To help establish and
maintain this self-certainty, the believers were to tirelessly practice
their vocational work. In Weber’s own words:
Es
war zum mindesten, soweit die Frage des eigenen Gnadenstandes
auftauchte, unmöglich, bei Calvins von der orthodoxen Doktrin wenigstens
im Prinzip nie förmlich aufgegebenen Verweisung auf das Selbstzeugnis
des beharrenden Glaubens, den die Gnade im Menschen wirkt,
stehenzubleiben. Vor allem die Praxis der Seelsorge, welche auf Schritt
und Tritt mit den durch die Lehre geschaffenen Qualen zu tun hatte,
konnte es nicht. Sie fand sich mit diesen Schwierigkeiten in
verschiedener Art ab. Soweit dabei nicht die Gnadenwahl uminterpretiert,
gemildert und im Grunde aufgegeben wurde, treten namentlich zwei
miteinander verknüpfte Typen seelsorgerischer Ratschläge als
charakteristisch hervor. Es wird einerseits schlechthin zu Pflicht
gemacht, sich für erwählt zu halten, und jeden Zweifel als Anfechtung
des Teufels abzuweisen, da ja mangelnde Selbstgewißheit Folge
unzulänglichen Glaubens, also unzulänglicher Wirkung der Gnade sei. Die
Mahnung des Apostels zum "Festmache" der eigenen Berufung wird
also hier als Pflicht, im täglichen Kampf sich die subjektive Gewißheit
der eigenen Erwähltheit und Rechtfertigung zu erringen, gedeutet. An
Stelle der demütigen Sünder, denen Luther, wenn sie in reuigem Glauben
sich Gott anvertrauen, die Gnade verheißt, werden so jene selbstgewissen
"Heiligen" gezüchtet, die wir in den stahlharten puritanischen
Kaufleuten jenes heroischen Zeitalters des Kapitalismus und in einzelnen
Exemplaren bis in die Gegenwart wiederfinden. Und andererseits wurde, um
jene Selbstgewißheit zu erlangen, als hervorragendstes Mittel rastlose
Berufsarbeit eingeschärft. Sie und sie allein verscheuche den religiösen
Zweifel und gebe die Sicherheit des Gnadenstandes.
In a time where the competing ethics of Catholicism called for a much
more traditionalist approach, denouncing the "undue" accumulation of
capital as sinful and preaching against greed, the protestant ethics’
lack of such restriction combined with its emphasis on ascetic work,
afforded a clear advantage in a developing capitalist system – the
conflict between the capitalist ‘spirit’ and the traditionalist ‘spirit’
that determined much of the Middle ages’ economic activity is best
highlighted in Weber’s example of the reaction of workers with different
backgrounds, whose wages were dependent on their production output. When
the owner, in an attempt to boost productivity, raised the amount of
money paid for each item produced, this led to different responses -
most workers actually reduced their productivity, content that
they could reach their income goals with less work now, while only a
subgroup with pietistic background reacted to the increased incentive
with increased production. This, I think, adequately reflects the
differences between a European and an American work ethic – and is
probably really rooted in the different religious influences, of
Catholicism and Lutheranism in Europe and the more extremist
Protestantism in the US.
So, how does all this relate to my blog? When showing some
characteristics of the capitalist ‘spirit’, Weber mentions
[EN]
various approaches to self-betterment. Among these, franklin recommends
the keeping of a tabulated diary that details one’s progress in each of
thirteen virtues
[EN]. At the time, I was feeling somewhat stagnant – I had been
working with questionable success in software development for some
years, and felt that it neither was a satisfactory occupation for the
rest of my life nor that I was as exceptionally good at it as I had
assumed I was (the latter is still undecided – I think I’m missing some
Calvinist self-certainty here). I wasn’t learning all that much, except
reading up on a lot of philosophy and noticing more and more how little
I actually knew every day. While I did not necessarily agree with
Franklin’s choice of virtues, at the time I found the idea of a diary
interesting, since I was going through a some pretty radical changes of
my world view during my introduction to the world of philosophy – from
the mildly socialist world view that an education in an Austrian public
school will produce via a short infatuation with
interest in Karl
Popper[DE],
or even the downright weird philosophy of
trilogy [EN], and my first exposures to Libertarianism and related
anarcho-capitalist ideas. I noticed that it would be quite interesting
to document these changes for later reference, to compare how I saw
certain things differently in earlier days, and document my progress
towards whatever goals I had set for myself (which tended to be quietly
forgotten when I didn’t feel like reaching them anymore). In short, I
believed that keeping a diary would help me improve the degree of
rationality in my life. At the same time, I was reading Popper’s Logic
of Scientific Discovery and the heavy focus it placed on
intersubjectivity’s role in the progress of science – and I felt that to
point out and correct errors and inconsistencies in my thinking,
presenting the entries to an audience for review would be a great idea.
At the time I started my diary, I had given the available blogging
software some short tries, but neither really fit my requirements – all
required databases or at least script language interpreters to function,
and I considered this inadequate. However, about a week before this
place opened, I stumbled onto Perry Metzger’s blog
and found out about
[EN], which feels perfectly unixoid and is a god damn shell
script – how great is that?
One thing that is obvious from the content of previous posts is that
the focus of the blog has not yet really been on the kind of
philosophical exchange I intended it to be – but I think that might
change – there are quite a few ideas of mine that I think should be
written down and posted for review, and fortified by my interpretation
of Popper, even advancing a wrong theory that is refuted later
is a contribution to the progress of science – an enormous consolation
to anyone dabbling in any kind of scientific or near-scientific
endeavour and plagued by the constant fear of being wrong and
embarassed (Soul Striptease #1: That’s a major problem for me – I hate
being wrong. It makes me angry. And I think my desire for a ‘track
record’ of being right is a major barrier to learning new and
interesting stuff, or discussing things I’m not an expert in.)
Given the statistics of this post, another advantage of blogging
compared to a paper diary pops up: I always had to stop writing diary
entries at about five pages since my hands would hurt – and it seems I’m
used to banging out a megabyte of text a day in vi without major
problems, so I can blog my thoughts without having to stop when it’s
most interesting.
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