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Divide and Conquer The Authority of Nature and Why We Disagree about Human Nature
| Content Provider | Semantic Scholar |
|---|---|
| Author | Kronfeldner, Maria E. |
| Copyright Year | 2018 |
| Abstract | The term ‘human nature’ can refer to different things in the world and fulfil different epistemic roles. Human nature can refer to a classificatory nature (classificatory criteria that determine the boundaries of, and membership in, a biological or social group called ‘human’), a descriptive nature (a bundle of properties describing the respective group’s life form), or an explanatory nature (a set of factors explaining that life form). This chapter will first introduce these three kinds of human nature, together with seven reasons why we disagree about human nature. In the main, this chapter focuses on the explanatory concept of human nature, which is related to one of the seven reasons for disagreement, namely, the scientific authority inherent in the term ‘nature’. I will examine why, in a number of historical contexts, it was attractive to refer to ‘nature’ as an explanatory category, and why this usage has led to the continual contestation of the term within the sciences. The claim is that even if the contents of talk about ‘nature’ varied historically, the term’s pragmatic function of demarcation stayed the same. The term ‘nature’ conveys scientific authority over a territory; ‘human nature’ is a concept used to divide causes, as well as experts, and thereby conquer others who threaten to invade one’s epistemic territory. Analysing this demarcation, which has social as well as epistemic aspects, will help us to understand why the explanatory role has been important and why it is unlikely that people will ever agree on either the meaning or the importance of ‘human nature’ as an explanatory category. 10.1 SEVEN REASONS WHY WE DISAGREE ABOUT HUMAN NATURE There are at least seven reasons why we disagree about human nature. The first two are connected to what I call the politics of human nature, and the rest are connected to scientific issues. The last of these reasons is the focus of this chapter. First, human nature is about ‘our’ nature. David Hull (1986: 6) noted that we often describe other species in a careful statistical and non-normative manner, but when it comes to our species, we often fall back into essentialist traps, involving normalcy and normativity. Hull regarded this ‘coincidence [as] highly suspicious’. In the words of Proctor (2003: 220), we do not ask about an entity ‘being “fully cockroach” or “fully chimpanzee”’, but we do regard some humans as more fully human than others, or as realizing more natural goodness. The source of this exceptionalist way of dealing with our nature lies, first and foremost, not in any epistemic functions of the concept, but rather in its normative function for us, which is after all a political function. With respect to this function, the concept is essentially contested in the sense of Gallie (1956): the only essence in that concept is that it is contested. In terms of a slogan: by continuously contesting what it means to be human, we continuously become human.1 Second, the history of the vernacular (or folk) concept of human nature suggests that ‘being human’ is an empty category that simply says, in the words of Marshall Sahlins (2008), ‘L’espèce, c’est moi.’ If ‘human nature’, in a broad descriptive sense, simply refers to ‘what it means to be human’, then this concept has been used—historically and in different cultures—for whatever characterizes the respective in-group. The respective out-groups are consequently dehumanized, that is, regarded as less human.2 Evidence from historical, anthropological, and 1 For human nature as an essentially contested concept, see Kronfeldner (forthcoming). ‘Becoming human’ by contesting the meaning of human nature involves not only ‘making meaning’ (e.g. in the sense of Toren, Ch. 9 this volume) but also ‘making people’ (in the sense of Hacking’s (1995) looping effects). 2 See Kronfeldner (2016), where I discuss the connection between dehumanization and human nature in detail. Dehumanization does not require a concept of human nature in a narrow sense (i.e. contrasted to culture); all it requires is either a graded genealogical association (people as more or less genealogically related) or a differential attribution of properties deemed to be central for ‘what it means to be human’. However, the idea that these properties are part of a human nature is a catalyzer for dehumanization. à 186 |
| File Format | PDF HTM / HTML |
| Alternate Webpage(s) | https://publications.ceu.edu/sites/default/files/publications/kronfeldner2018divide-and-conquerpostprint-fin.pdf |
| Language | English |
| Access Restriction | Open |
| Content Type | Text |
| Resource Type | Article |
