Religion – The Modern Frame

Toward a Theory of History

Change is the defining feature of history. By history, I mean human history; specifically, the history of the human world, which exists over and above–yet never entirely independent from–the physical and biological world.¹ As time unfolds the present is influenced by the past; what is, has been conditioned by what once was; the human world of today is a synthesis of the human world of yesterday. Just as any given moment holds the necessary conditions for what is possible in the future, the necessary conditions of the world we inhabit today existed in the past in some way. Today has developed and emerged from new combinations and novel instantiations of a multiplicity of conditions existing in the past. A given moment may be said to comprise a “whole”, out of which emerges a synthesis constituting a larger, more complex, whole. Thus, there is a directedness to the unfolding of history. Like the expansion of the universe or the arrow of time, it would appear history moves in a single direction.² This phenomenon–in which the totality of circumstances constituted within the human world influences and affects itself over time–I will call historical conditioning.³

Cultural Existentialism: Instances and Instrumentality

While the previous essays¹ laid the foundation and began exploring some of the architecture of what I have called cultural existentialism, at this point the following can be offered as a working definition: Cultural existentialism is the phenomenon that views the individual as entirely free and unencumbered–by history, family, community, tradition, inherited ideas, et al.–and, therefore, free to live and define themselves as they see fit; the sole author of their life.² In this essay, I want to explore some of the more outward forms of cultural existentialism, as well as its relation to what I have called the instrumental stance. In so doing, I hope to shed some light on the question of the more recent origins of this phenomenon. Again, my focus will remain on America.

Cultural Existentialism: The Absurdity of American Individualism

In the previous essay I hoped to make clear the connection between the phenomenon of cultural existentialism with that of its formal counterpart–the philosophy of Existentialism. Again, I believe the connection between them is one of similarity rather than direct causality, and that the primary difference between the two is merely the extent to which they are articulated. Still, the average person is not a philosopher–let alone Sartre–so in many ways the accusation that cultural existentialism is widely embodied but not articulated is unfair. For a more common view of cultural existentialism, I would like to turn to the excellent work of the sociologist Robert Bellah, and some of his colleagues, such as Richard Madsen, William M. Sullivan, Ann Swindler, and Steven M. Tipton.¹ Much of their research, findings, and collaboration on American culture from the early 1980s will help color the outline I have sketched thus far.

The Modern Culture of Achievement

As the concept of a calling became unmoored from its historically religious roots it gradually gave way to the secular concept of success.¹ Over time, success effectively became the end-goal or purpose of everyday life and existence.² This is the framework in which the modern culture of achievement was born. It is not a coincidence that this culture originated, developed, and matured to the greatest extent in America–a country wedded more than any other to the economic system of capitalism. The dream of success became the preoccupation of many and was reinforced in what I have called the “mainline thought” of self-help or success literature as it existed in the early to mid-twentieth century.³ It is within the overlap of the Social and Economic spheres, as well as the particulars of success literature itself that the image of the modern culture of achievement finally comes into view.

Achievement Culture: Some Considerations In Context

Over the course of three previous essays, I sketched some of the origins of what I have called “the modern culture of achievement”.¹ What has been missing up to this point in these explorations is a historical understanding of the context in which these origins emerged. The origins of modern success literature (and its corresponding culture) came about at a time when the quest to succeed existed in an almost exclusively–though not entirely–secular way. As Max Weber observed, the “spirit of capitalism” reached a point where it became self-sufficient, no longer requiring the religious impetus which had sparked it.² It was in the rational and methodical reorganization of life, structured around the idea of a vocation or calling, which laid the groundwork for what I have described in the origin story.³ This is what I had in mind, when, speaking of success literature in Part I, I wrote, “the literature in question developed and emerged within a culture that already existed”. It is within the context of the larger whole of socioeconomic history that a deeper and broader understanding of the origins of achievement culture will emerge.⁴

Education: Instrumentality and Specialization

Education in the West has taken many forms throughout history. Like philosophy, its genesis can be traced to ancient Greece, where the first schools of thought were recorded. The first rival conceptions of education–such as those advanced by the ancient sophists, Isocrates, and Plato¹–are in many ways mirrored in modernity, albeit in very different circumstances. Beginning in Greece we find tension with respect to education, which concerns the debate between theoretical and practical forms of higher learning, i.e., between disinterested truth and application or utility. Of course, there is an academic history of this thought, the aggregate of which has come to be known as the philosophy of education. It is not my intention, however, to explore the history of this thought here. It is rather to contrast the varying forms of higher education as they have existed across history in the West in terms of two specifics: instrumentality and specialization. Most important to this comparison will be the question of telos, that is, what is and what has been the goal or purpose of education? What is its raison d’être?

Beyond the Instrumental and Non-Instrumental: Some Thoughts on The Person

At this point the notion of goods as they relate to the instrumental and non-instrumental can be added to our considerations. I have spoken of two distinct “stances” or approaches to the world as adopted by homo sapiens. One views things¹ in terms of their purported usefulness or utility, of their instrumental value for the sake of some further end or goal. The other views things for their own sake, as ends in themselves, as such. Furthermore, it is the human person–conceived as a unique subject existing beyond or outside the instrumental and non-instrumental²–which adds yet another level of complexity to our understanding of these stances, particularly the instrumental.³

The Instrumental Stance: Analysis and Contrast

The instrumental stance describes the unique approach of homo sapiens to view things as instruments–or means–to achieve some end or goal.¹ Here we will further explore this phenomenon in terms of the role it has played in the rise of civilization, the structure of the rationality it embodies, and its contrast with the non-instrumental.

Introduction to the Instrumental Stance

Investigation of the instrumental stance¹ is necessary to understand the contemporary world. Various terms may be used to describe this phenomenon, such as (yet not limited to) means/end rationalism, instrumental reason or rationality, utilitarianism,² or utility. I will simply refer to it as the instrumental stance, as it describes a specific “stance” or approach to the world.

Three Spheres of Influence

There are many aspects of the world we inhabit which affect us in different ways. Those which yield the most power, and thereby affect us the most, I will refer to as “spheres” or spheres of influence. They describe specific aspects of our world, the investigation of which may help us come to a better understanding of our contemporary situation. Many of the essays published on The Modern Frame will refer to these spheres of influence (e.g., “a growing sphere of economy”).