An interview with <\/span>Abdolkarim Soroush<\/span><\/pre>\nby Sa\u2019id Ra\u2019i for the Iranian Labour News Agency<\/p>\n
January 2004<\/p>\n
Q. Dr Soroush, you have been away from Iran for some time and we have been deprived.\u00a0 The fact of the matter is, when we look at your works over the past one or two years, we see a common denominator.\u00a0 Ethics of the Gods <\/em>is a collection of your articles that was published in 2001.\u00a0 Articles such as \u201cCivil Society, Ethical Society\u201d and \u201cAn Ethical Critique of Power\u201d have appeared by you.\u00a0 There have also been speeches. I have two in mind in particular:\u00a0 \u201cReviving the Mu\u2019tazili Experience\u201d, in which you concentrated on the Mu\u2019tazili school as a rational and ethical school of thought, and \u201cThe Relationship between Ethics and Political Power\u201d.\u00a0 To which I should add that this time around, when you came to Iran thanks to Moulana Jalal-al-Din Rumi and spoke about him, you referred in your speech to the reasons why Rumi revered silence, among which you mentioned the ethical value of silence to him.\u00a0 The common factor in all these works, which comprises a period of about two years, is ethics.\u00a0 Taking this as the preface for my question, do you\u00a0 accept that, over the past two years, Dr Abdolkarim Soroush\u2019s concern has been \u201cethics\u201d?<\/p>\n\u00a0A.\u00a0 You\u2019re right.\u00a0 Yes, I accept that over these two years, too, my concern has been ethics.\u00a0 I say, \u201cover these two years, too\u201d, because ethics has been a subject of interest to me before this as well.\u00a0 Since the revolution, when I came back to Iran, I taught philosophy and ethics at university. The tale of ethics has always been a preoccupation for me and I have never neglected it, whether in the realm of practice or in the realm of theory. I have always tried to direct my students towards reflecting on ethics too.<\/p>\n
\u00a0Q.\u00a0 Where did this lead?<\/p>\n
\u00a0A.\u00a0 It led to the point where the practical dimension of this subject gradually gained prominence in my mind.\u00a0 That is to say, at first, I was teaching the philosophy of ethics more, but, from a certain time, I became more inclined towards the field of ethics.<\/p>\n
\u00a0Q.\u00a0 What was your approach?<\/p>\n
\u00a0A.\u00a0 As you know, the philosophy of ethics is a meta-field;\u00a0 i.e. the philosophy of the field of ethics;\u00a0 whereas the field of ethics is a first order field that pertains directly to action, the external world and human beings\u2019 conduct.\u00a0 In the field of ethics, I have tried to lay particular foundations and, specifically, started from the \u201cself\u201d.\u00a0 That is to say, I taught my students that we have a \u201cself\u201d and an \u201cother\u201d.\u00a0 The field of ethics\u2019 entire concern is to purify the self from the other and, in a sense, to purge the other.<\/p>\n
\u00a0Q.\u00a0 What does this purging the other mean?<\/p>\n
\u00a0A.\u00a0 It means that all the vices are other and are not of the same fabric as we human beings.\u00a0 Even if they penetrate our being, we must drive them out.\u00a0 But the virtues are of the same fabric as us and, when they penetrate our being, they make us more ourselves and make our \u201cself\u201d more stout.\u00a0 This is how people\u2019s behavior is divided into good and bad and values take on a positive or negative aspect.\u00a0 Negative values are those \u201cothers\u201d and positive values are the selves.<\/p>\n
\u00a0Q.\u00a0 What drew your interest to ethics?<\/p>\n
\u00a0A.\u00a0 I have always been preoccupied with the question of why we Iranians and, even more so, we Muslims, despite the long, elaborate and sometimes profound debates that we have had and do have about ethics \u2013 and it is preached from pulpits, taught in classes and given as advice \u2013 why are we so far removed from real ethics?\u00a0 Why \u2013 and I hope I\u2019m not causing any offence \u2013 are we so unethical?\u00a0 Why is it so prevalent among us to lie, to speak ill of others and to insult people?\u00a0 More importantly, why do we consider the precepts of Islamic jurisprudence [henceforth fiqh] to be superior to and more important than ethical precepts?\u00a0 Or how is it that a practicing Muslim never misses the ritual prayers, but is incapable of controlling his tongue and lies, speaks ill of others and insults people without compunction?\u00a0 Add to this the problem of people\u2019s rights.\u00a0 How is it that some people attach such sanctity to the injunctions of fiqh and religion but, when its comes to other people\u2019s rights, they so easily brush them aside and trample them underfoot?<\/p>\n
\u00a0Q.\u00a0 Well, it would appear that the reasons are not to be found only in ethics itself.\u00a0 One must \u2013<\/p>\n
\u00a0A.\u00a0 Yes, precisely.\u00a0 This was how my attention was gradually drawn from theorizing about the philosophy of ethics and the field of ethics to the social, economic and psychological conditions in which ethical virtues seep into people\u2019s beings and behavior, and I turned to look at how things stood in this respect in our own culture in the past.<\/p>\n
\u00a0Q.\u00a0 In your article \u201cCivil Society, Ethical Society\u201d, you mentioned several reasons for this unethical-ness or I should say, ethical crisis.\u00a0 Please elaborate.<\/p>\n
\u00a0A.\u00a0 I realized that there were reasons behind the tale of the decline of ethics in our midst;\u00a0 I\u2019ll mention two of the most important ones.\u00a0 First, in a particular era, the field of fiqh became particularly dominant.\u00a0 Emphasis was placed on the idea that a Muslim was someone whose conduct was in keeping with fiqh.\u00a0 And, on the whole, the stoutness of fiqh led to the emaciation and sickliness of ethics.\u00a0 This occurred not just in the realm of practice, but also in the realm of theory.\u00a0 If you look at Islamic-Iranian culture, you will see that even a fraction of the books written on fiqh were not written on ethics.\u00a0 Even our thinkers channeled their ideas into the framework of fiqh.\u00a0 Far from ideas being developed to an even greater extent in the framework of ethics, thinking in this field did not even manage to keep up with of the sheer scale of thought in fiqh.\u00a0 This emaciation and sickliness was disastrous.<\/p>\n
\u00a0Q.\u00a0 Of course, this reasoning cannot be used to weaken fiqh; a solution needs to be found instead for the sickly state of ethics.\u00a0 Don\u2019t you agree?<\/p>\n
\u00a0A.\u00a0 Yes.\u00a0 This is why I said that ethical critiques must be encouraged.\u00a0 There must be an ethical critique of fiqh too.\u00a0 Look, when we set ethics aside, fiqh also suffered.\u00a0 This is why I thought of ethical critiques;\u00a0 the ethical critique of many things, including religion, fiqh, power and other subjects.\u00a0 Of course, the field of fiqh needs to be criticized from many different angles, one of the most important of which is the ethical.<\/p>\n
\u00a0Q.\u00a0 Do you have a concrete example in mind?<\/p>\n
\u00a0A.\u00a0 For example, the question of human rights, which is so weak in our fiqh, has a serious ethical dimension.\u00a0 We say that this or that thing is a right. If the right is trampled, it is an injustice.\u00a0 And injustice is a vice and considered unethical.\u00a0 What I\u2019m saying is that fiqhi living has endangered ethical living amongst us.<\/p>\n
\u00a0Q.\u00a0 Well, it seems that my tangential question diverted our discussion.\u00a0 You were going to mention two reasons for the sickliness of ethics.\u00a0 One was the dominance of fiqh.\u00a0 What is the other reason?<\/p>\n
\u00a0A.\u00a0 The second reason is that we lived for centuries \u2013 even before the arrival of Islam in Iran \u2013 under tyrannical systems and tyrannical systems have many flaws.\u00a0 One of their worst and most horrific flaws is the backwardness of ethics.\u00a0 Ethics does not thrive under tyrannical systems and it is strangulated. Most people believe that tyranny is bad because it oppresses them.\u00a0 Of course, this is one of the vices of tyrannical systems.\u00a0 But, more importantly, tyranny is bad because it oppresses ethics;\u00a0 that is to say, it demolishes ethics.\u00a0 It leaves ethics totally strangulated.<\/p>\n
\u00a0Q.\u00a0 You seem to hold that the tyrant himself turns into the criterion and model for ethics?<\/p>\n
\u00a0A.\u00a0 In tyrannical systems, there is a pyramid.\u00a0 The people form the base and the rulers are at the top.\u00a0 And, since the system is tyrannical, there is no rule for wresting one\u2019s right other than to move closer to the criterion that you mentioned;\u00a0 that is to say, closer to the rulers or to the top of the pyramid.\u00a0 The closer a person moves to the centers of power, the more powerful he becomes.\u00a0 He can then wrest what is his by right and even go beyond it.<\/p>\n
\u00a0Q.\u00a0 What does this going beyond mean?<\/p>\n
\u00a0A.\u00a0 It means trampling all rights, virtues and values for the sake of moving closer to the top of the pyramid.\u00a0 In this way, the people turn into an individual\u2019s ladders and he imagines that everything is exploitable for the sake of gaining power and moving closer to the power holders.\u00a0 This being the case, ethics will be one of tyranny\u2019s first victims.<\/p>\n
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Unfortunately, we have been faced with both these ills in the course of our history.\u00a0 In a society where a stout fiqh occurs and is combined with a stout tyranny \u2013 that is to say, where political tyranny is based on fiqh and fiqh is exercised in a tyrannical way \u2013 ethics is doubly constricted and its last breaths are squeezed out of it.<\/p>\n
\u00a0Q.\u00a0 At any rate, an unethical or even anti-ethical act has its own particular function.\u00a0 A person wouldn\u2019t lie if lying didn\u2019t help him achieve the desired end.\u00a0\u00a0 Perhaps fiqh can be viewed in this same pragmatic or functional light.\u00a0 In other words, it can be said that, in a particular era, fiqh became so functional that it even imposed its hegemony over political philosophy and ethics and left it in the state that it is today.\u00a0 This is not fiqh\u2019s fault, it\u2019s the fault of an unsuitable bedrock.<\/p>\n
\u00a0A.\u00a0 I don\u2019t deny that fiqh has a function.\u00a0 Despite certain objections, I don\u2019t even deny that fiqh serves a function today.\u00a0 What I have problems with is the stoutness of fiqh and at the cost of the emaciation of ethics at that.\u00a0 Otherwise, I don\u2019t hold that the existence and essence of fiqh is fundamentally harmful.<\/p>\n
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 In our society and the history of our culture, people have been given the impression that fiqh can answer all the questions that arise regarding human conduct.\u00a0 Even today I still find individuals who believe that good and bad, too, can be extracted from fiqh and the principles of jurisprudence.\u00a0 And that any question about what a person ought and ought not to do should only be asked from Islamic jurists [henceforth faqihs], because they are the ones who are qualified to answer these questions.\u00a0 This is a false impression that has always carried credence in our society.\u00a0 I have said repeatedly that it was in the light of these same ills in Islamic society that Al-Ghazzali wrote his Revival of the Religious Sciences<\/em>.\u00a0 In his introduction and the other sections of the book, he points to this problem and notes that fiqh has become so stout as to constrict ethics.\u00a0 Al-Ghazzali is of the opinion that the revival of religion hinges on the revival of religious ethics.\u00a0 This was Al-Ghazzali\u2019s diagnosis at that time.\u00a0 I believe that our problem is the same today.\u00a0 Our religious ethics has become very weak.<\/p>\n\u00a0Q.\u00a0 It does not seem as if ethics is the only factor.<\/p>\n
\u00a0A.\u00a0 Yes, today all the religious fields are weak.\u00a0 In the current conditions, theology, exegesis, the study of primary principles, etc. have also become both weak and congealed. In a particular era of the history of Islamic culture, immediately after the Prophet of Islam\u2019s demise, religious thought was fluid.\u00a0 If you look at this period, you will find many theoretical, fiqhi and theological schools of thought.\u00a0 There was also a very extensive flow and counter flow of ideas; to an astounding extent.\u00a0 The movement of religious thought at that time was exactly like a volcano that has just become active, with molten material of different shapes and sizes shooting out of it at great speed.\u00a0 But the passage of time cooled and congealed this molten material.\u00a0 We are living in the era of congealment.\u00a0 Our theology, exegesis and study of primary principles have become congealed and amount to nothing more than the rehearsing of formulas.\u00a0 This is why our religious thinking has become weak through and through.\u00a0 We see this weakness in fiqh too.\u00a0 What is regrettable is that this very same weak fiqh has constricted and endangered an even weaker ethics and trampled it underfoot.<\/p>\n
\u00a0Q.\u00a0 At any rate, every era has its own exigencies.\u00a0 At that time, the Muslims themselves hadn\u2019t become consolidated, never mind about their thinking.\u00a0 But, today, we have achieved the consolidation of these subjects.\u00a0 Haven\u2019t we?<\/p>\n
A.\u00a0 This is not consolidation, it is congealment.\u00a0 And the fundamental way of making religious thinking active and fluid is to extricate ourselves from this congealment.\u00a0 This, in turn, requires freedom.\u00a0 The precondition for the fluidity of religious thinking, in all its branches, is freedom, without any whys and wherefores.\u00a0 There can be no fluidity based on our present approach and the congealment will continue.\u00a0 Today, if anyone says anything that has a hint of unorthodoxy about it and is slightly against the grain, they attract a host of accusations and suffer the fate that we have seen.<\/p>\n
Q.\u00a0 Of course, no-one rejects freedom for the growth and elevation of thought and culture, but freedom, too, has limits that \u2013<\/p>\n
\u00a0A.\u00a0 I don\u2019t mean dissoluteness by freedom either and I doubt that anyone defends freedom in the sense of dissoluteness.\u00a0 But freedom of opinion is the necessary precondition for the revival of those branches, so that we can restore the original fluidity to our religious thought, so that a range of schools of thought in fiqh, theology and exegesis are allowed to emerge and manifest themselves, and everyone can step into the arena and there can be a lively flow and counter flow of ideas, and thinkers can have an open field in which to think.\u00a0 With the gradual development of ideas, many feeble ideas will fade away and genuine, robust ideas will thrive, and we will witness a new fluidity of thought.\u00a0 The fact that so much is said nowadays about the software movement is fine and fitting, but when thinkers fear for their safety and their reputations and can\u2019t even enjoy the basic minimums of life, how can they be expected to step into the field?<\/p>\n
\u00a0Q.\u00a0 If you have no objection, let us talk about ethical critiques.\u00a0 No doubt when you speak about ethical critiques, you have certain assumptions in mind.\u00a0 Before learning what an ethical critique means, we have to know what your assumptions are:\u00a0 why must we be ethical at all and what does being ethical mean, and basic questions of this kind.<\/p>\n
\u00a0A.\u00a0 The most important principle in the field of ethics is that one must be ethical and live an ethical life.\u00a0 If someone asks me, what\u2019s your reason for saying this, I will say that I have no reason; this is an assumption or a basic principle that has to be taken for granted.<\/p>\n
\u00a0Q.\u00a0 I think that no-one has any problem with the idea that people should be ethical, but \u2013<\/p>\n
\u00a0A.\u00a0 I hope no-one has any problem with it.\u00a0 And, if they do, I can\u2019t solve their problem.\u00a0 This is the first principle.\u00a0 It\u2019s like when someone says that the external world does not exist.\u00a0 I\u2019m certain that no philosophical school of thought can answer them;\u00a0 i.e. prove that the external world exists, because there is no reason for it.\u00a0 So, we have to start from a basis or a principle, and that is that I am sitting opposite you and you are sitting opposite me.\u00a0 I exist and you exist. And we are having a reasonable discussion.\u00a0 Now, if you imagine that you\u2019re dreaming and I, too, imagine that I\u2019m dreaming, we can never prove that we exist and that we are talking.<\/p>\n
\u00a0Q.\u00a0 The assumption in ethics that we have to be ethical and live an ethical life is not disputed.\u00a0 But this is where the problem starts \u2013<\/p>\n
\u00a0A.\u00a0 Yes, as Hafez put it, \u201cLove seemed so simple at first, then came manifold problems\u201d.\u00a0 Very well, we have accepted ethics; but what is this ethics?\u00a0 What does living an ethical life mean?\u00a0 Socrates said, \u201can ill-judged life is not worth living\u201d and this is a fitting thing to say, but what constitutes a well-judged life and what, basically, is judgment, and on what scale do we weigh up our judgments?\u00a0 These are all important questions and it is not easy to answer them.\u00a0 Of course, there is a big and varied range of ethical schools that we can use as our point of departure, and they can determine our stance and approach.\u00a0 But the important thing is the belief that, one way or the other, we have to set off from an ethical position.\u00a0 You have to choose your preferred school of thought.\u00a0 Are you an Aristotelian, a Kantian, a Utilitarian, a deontologist and so on.\u00a0 At any rate, you have to make it clear where you stand.\u00a0 In ethical critiques, too, you have to approach fiqh, power, religion and other matters from your ethical position and criticize them on this basis.\u00a0\u00a0 Of course, criticizing something means shedding light on things, not carping.<\/p>\n
\u00a0Q.\u00a0 If one can say that criticism is a method, then, an ethical critique means the method of applying values or, to phrase it better, then, an ethical critique means adopting a value-judgment approach.\u00a0 Do you accept this definition?<\/p>\n
\u00a0A.\u00a0 A critique is not a method itself; a critique has a method.\u00a0 That is to say, the critique has to be carried out on the basis of a method. And that consists of standing in a certain position and being armed with notions, concepts and judgments and, then, applying these notions, concepts and judgments to the matter that is being criticized, so that a firm verdict can be issued.\u00a0 Of course, a critique is occasionally used in the sense of revealing a system\u2019s internal inconsistencies and, sometimes, totally tearing a system to pieces is also called a critique.\u00a0 All these things are critiques.\u00a0 For example, there was a time when people undertook a critique of Marxism here and thereby highlighted the system\u2019s internal inconsistencies. They were engaged in a philosophical critique.\u00a0 In other words, they would say that some of the elements in this school of thought are at odds with certain philosophical principles.\u00a0 And sometimes they would apply an ethical critique.\u00a0 They would say that Marxism ultimately leads to a strong concentration of state power and that this concentration produces a terrible dictatorship.<\/p>\n
\u00a0Q.\u00a0 I can understand what you\u2019re saying at the theoretical level, but when I want to put it into practice in a concrete case, I run into problems.\u00a0 Can you elaborate in slightly more concrete terms?<\/p>\n
\u00a0A.\u00a0 When I speak about the ethical critique of fiqh or politics, I am precisely seeking to put theories into practice.\u00a0 For example, we ask, does a velayi <\/em>system [rule by a faqih] lead to particular vices or not?\u00a0 This is an ethical critique of the velayi<\/em> political system. If we can show via ethics, sociology and social cause and effect that a velayi<\/em> system, wittingly or unwittingly, produces certain vices or virtues in society, this constitutes an ethical critique of politics in our country.\u00a0 The same can be said of an ethical critique of tyranny.\u00a0 An ethical critique of democracy would also be the same.<\/p>\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Nowadays, some clerics are presenting an ethical critique of democracy.\u00a0 They say that a democracy would produce a kind of freedom and dissoluteness and this dissoluteness would lead to vices and acts of immorality that we consider ethically reprehensible.\u00a0 This is an ethical critique of democracy.\u00a0 Well, if it is correct, it is truly an ethical critique of democracy.<\/p>\n
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Today, some Western thinkers and Habermas\u2019s followers in particular criticize modernity.\u00a0 They say that modernity has not done what it promised to do.\u00a0 This, too, is a critique.\u00a0 You promised to make the world prosper, to give people their due rights, to do away with colonialism, to do away with wars between nations, etc., but you did not fulfill your promises.<\/p>\n
\u00a0Q.\u00a0 Exactly the same criticism can be made of religion.\u00a0 In other words, one can say that religion has promised people many things and been unable to fulfill them.<\/p>\n
\u00a0A.\u00a0 This is the maximalist reading of religion.\u00a0 Personally, I believe that religions promised people very few things.\u00a0 But those who favor a maximalist reading of religion believe that religions have promised people many things in this world and the next.\u00a0 This interpretation of religion can be criticized.\u00a0 One can say, what happened to all those promises?\u00a0 People have believed in religions for several thousand years.\u00a0 Have they received what maximalist religion promised them?\u00a0 This religion is easy to attack.\u00a0 This is what I\u2019m saying.\u00a0 One of the ways of reducing these criticisms is to make fewer promises.\u00a0 This is very important.\u00a0 The fewer the promises made, the more likely that they will be kept and responding to criticism will also become easier.<\/p>\n
\u00a0Q.\u00a0 I still can\u2019t come to terms with it all.\u00a0 The ethical critique of power, which you have just spoken about in detail, seeks to show how the structure of power generates injustice and leads to tyranny, and how this tyranny produces vices.\u00a0 How does it work in the case of religion?\u00a0 If we take religion to mean religious people\u2019s understanding or grasp of religious propositions, then, what does an ethical critique of religion entail?<\/p>\n
\u00a0A.\u00a0 Let us define religion in another way.\u00a0 I don\u2019t object to the way you defined religion, but I think that, in this instance, you\u2019ve defined it very narrowly.\u00a0 Religion has at least two arenas;\u00a0 one is the internal and the other, the external.\u00a0 The internal aspect of religion relates to people\u2019s religious experiences and the fact that people consider themselves to be the servants of God and develop a particular kind of ethics within themselves.\u00a0 This encompasses the arena of faith, belief and religious experience, and makes the individual have particular dispositions and a particular relationship with being.\u00a0 But the external aspect of religiosity is something else.\u00a0 When these same individuals, who have religious experiences and particular dispositions, come together and live in the same community, their external life takes on a particular condition and state, such that their situation will differ from that of people who do not hold the same views.\u00a0 This external aspect, which is the organizational aspect of religion, creates a collective identity for believers and this collective identity hinges on belonging to a specific congregation.\u00a0 This gives rise to a series of new tenets that are in no way present in the internal aspect of religion.\u00a0 On the basis of this explanation, both aspects of religion can be subjected to ethical critiques.<\/p>\n
\u00a0Q.\u00a0 In what sense?\u00a0 You mean to say that, on the internal aspect, we can criticize believers\u2019 religious experiences and, on the external aspect \u2013<\/p>\n
A.\u00a0 I\u2019ll give an example.\u00a0 In contemporary times, the most renowned critics of the internal aspect of religion are atheistic existentialists.\u00a0 They believe that religion in the sense of the relationship between God and his servants is very unethical, because it invites the limited human being to be reduced to zero before an infinite God.\u00a0 It reduces human beings to zero in order to bring an infinite God into people\u2019s beings and lives.\u00a0 They find this unethical and they say that, in order for human beings to remain human, they must be God-less and forsake God.\u00a0 The ethical critique of religion for these thinkers is based on the impossibility of coexistence of an infinite being and a finite being.\u00a0 They say that when an infinite God enters the scene, finite human beings are forced to flee and nothing is left of them.<\/p>\n
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 As to ethical critiques of the external aspect of religion, they are as clear as the midday sun.\u00a0 Marxists criticize organized religion in one way and liberals in another way.\u00a0 Many people are of the opinion that fundamentalism arises from organized religion.\u00a0 The late Shariati, who believed that the clergy belong to organized religion, criticized this aspect of religion.\u00a0 Ethical critiques of the external aspect ultimately seek to show what vices organized or institutionalized religion are imbued with and what vices they generate.<\/p>\n
Q.\u00a0 What are the criteria used in these ethical critiques?\u00a0 That is to say, what device do the ethical critics use?\u00a0\u00a0 Collective wisdom, conventional norms, metaphysical foundations or something else?\u00a0 What is the basis of their value-judgments?<\/p>\n
\u00a0A.\u00a0 We subject a system to an ethical critique based on the ethical criteria that we hold \u2013<\/p>\n
\u00a0Q.\u00a0 It all seems very vague.<\/p>\n
\u00a0A.\u00a0 Look, we believe that the integrity of human beings has to be preserved.\u00a0 Now, if something comes and breaks human beings and crushes them, we do an ethical critique and we say that it produces a vice.\u00a0 We say that tyranny is bad because it robs human beings of their integrity and crushes them.\u00a0 The late Allama Muhammad Iqbal, who criticized slavery, based it on the fact that, in slavery, human beings are crushed.\u00a0 Their sanctity, integrity and dignity are reduced to zero.\u00a0 As you know, Kant believed that human beings are ends not means.\u00a0 This is an ethical principle in Kant\u2019s philosophical system.\u00a0 If you accept this principle, you can, on this basis, criticize any system that posits human beings as means and views them instrumentally, and you can say that the system is unethical.\u00a0 In brief, you have to derive the criterion for your ethical critique from the ethical system to which you subscribe.<\/p>\n
\u00a0Q.\u00a0 In a recent newspaper interview, you described yourself as a nominalist.\u00a0 Is there not a contradiction between nominalist ideas, which consider universals to be names only, and ethics, which basically deals with universals?<\/p>\n
\u00a0A.\u00a0 Let me clarify things a bit.\u00a0 In that interview and in a number of my speeches I\u2019ve said that I consider my views to be closer to nominalism.\u00a0 I was thinking about the tale of realism versus nominalism nearly 20 years ago.\u00a0 At any rate, I decided that I had to opt for a position, because this is a very basic and fundamental matter.\u00a0 I looked at the two sides\u2019 arguments and thought about this issue for years.\u00a0 Ultimately, I inclined towards nominalism or it might be more appropriate if I say: nominalism was more pleasing to me;\u00a0 to which I should add that nominalism also explains the plurality in the world better.\u00a0 This nominalism absolutely does not harm ethics and ethical values.\u00a0 In other words, they stay where they are.<\/p>\n
\u00a0Q.\u00a0 It seems that the two positions are equally acceptable or maybe I should say equally rejectable.\u00a0 They are antinomies, aren\u2019t they?<\/p>\n
\u00a0A.\u00a0 Yes, they are antinomies.\u00a0 We can match any reason we give against realism with a reason against nominalism.\u00a0 This is the way things are with metaphysics.\u00a0 In metaphysical philosophy, establishing what constitutes concrete proof is impossible.\u00a0 This is why one cannot become either a realist or a nominalist on the basis of reasoning.\u00a0 Philosophy is not meant to solve this question at all.\u00a0 This is what Wittgenstein used to say and I think it is very correct: \u201cPhilosophy leaves everything in its place.\u201d\u00a0 In other words, it does not change or displace anything in this world.\u00a0 I believe that this definition is very true of metaphysical philosophy.\u00a0 Whatever metaphysical principle you hold, the external world remains the external world and events remain the same events.<\/p>\n
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 It is the same with ethics.\u00a0 In other words, I can say that, in terms of metaphysics, I\u2019m closer to nominalism.\u00a0 But this doesn\u2019t harm either ethics or politics; it will even untie a few knots in these areas.\u00a0 In fact, philosophy is the same thing as untying knots, in the sense that we do not expect all the knots to be untied, because then philosophers would become unemployed.\u00a0 Even if, one day, all the currently existing knots were untied, philosophers themselves would be the first to create some fresh knots so that future philosophers could untie them.<\/p>\n
\u00a0Q.\u00a0 At any rate, your particular approach to ethics is interesting.\u00a0 You present justice as an aggregate of ethical virtues sitting alongside one another.\u00a0 Then, you consider lying and truth-telling to be the natural names of actions and say that a lie or a truth can themselves be just or unjust.\u00a0 It seems that, in this approach, which is somewhat Aristotelian, nominalist ideas can enter the arena and have a positive or negative impact.<\/p>\n
\u00a0A.\u00a0 Yes, this is my position.\u00a0 I believe that justice is a redundant virtue;\u00a0 that is to say, it is not itself a virtue.\u00a0 Justice itself is not an ethical value; rather, an aggregate of ethical values is justice.\u00a0 Of course, although this position equips us for ethical critiques, it does not by any means blunt criticism as a tool.<\/p>\n
\u00a0Q.\u00a0 On this basis, it would appear that you consider ethics to be something that exceeds or is stouter than religion.\u00a0 Or, at least, you don\u2019t consider religion to be the source of ethics.\u00a0 Hence, the question arises:\u00a0 what is the sources of ethics and where do its foundations lie?<\/p>\n
\u00a0A.\u00a0 It stands to reason that ethics pertains to human conduct and, if there are no human beings, ethics is meaningless.\u00a0 We don\u2019t consider animal behavior ethical because they aren\u2019t human.\u00a0 Animal behavior does not admit of good and bad;\u00a0 the same can be said of angels.\u00a0 But, when it comes to human beings, their behavior is ethical because they have good and bad intentions, and they understand \u201cought\u201d and \u201cought not\u201d.\u00a0 Hence, the foundation of ethics, i.e. the thing that has made ethics possible, is the existence of human beings.\u00a0 If it weren\u2019t for this being, we wouldn\u2019t have ethics either.\u00a0 This is the basis of ethics.\u00a0 As to the question of where \u201cought\u201d and \u201cought not\u201d come from or what do good and bad mean and what is the source of duty, this is itself a prevalent debate in the philosophy of ethics, on which different schools offer different answers, such that each one of them subscribes to a different basis for ethics.<\/p>\n
\u00a0Q.\u00a0 I raised this question because I know that you hold that there are different manners and ethics.\u00a0 Assuming that we say that there are different manners, can we not maintain that a non-civil society, too, has its own particular manners or that a tyrannical system has its own particular manners?\u00a0 On this basis, how can you consider civil society more ethical than non-civil society?<\/p>\n
\u00a0A.\u00a0 Yes, of course, we have different manners and ethics.\u00a0 Every sphere has its own particular manners.\u00a0 But remember: in a civil society, too, we encounter instances of unsuitable, unethical and ill-mannered conduct. I have said that we consider some things, such as tyranny, unethical. Of course, this is because they inherently lead to injustice.\u00a0 We spoke about this at length.\u00a0 This is a basic assumption;\u00a0 in other words, we equate these things with unethical-ness and ill-mannered-ness.\u00a0 This sits alongside that initial basic assumption: \u201cone must live an ethical life\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u00a0Translated by Nilou Mobasser<\/em><\/p>\n<\/center><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
An interview with Abdolkarim Soroush by Sa\u2019id Ra\u2019i for the Iranian Labour News Agency January 2004 Q. Dr Soroush, you have been away from Iran for some time and we have been deprived.\u00a0 The fact of the matter is, when we look at your works over the past one or two years, we see a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/drsoroush.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/drsoroush.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/drsoroush.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/drsoroush.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/drsoroush.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=105"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/drsoroush.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/drsoroush.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=105"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/drsoroush.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=105"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/drsoroush.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=105"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}