“Tranquility can best be reached through indifference to pleasure and pain”

Commentary on The Heart's Reasons: Intuition as an Authority in Practical Reasoning, by Ronni Sadovsky

By Konstantine Aprilakis, The State University of New York at Stony Brook

“Tranquility can best be reached through indifference to pleasure and pain.”

“Steel your sensibilities, so that life shall hurt you as little as possible.”

“Follow where reason leads.”

These are just a few of the assorted maxims of Zeno of Citium, that best characterize the Stoic school of philosophy which he founded over two millennia ago. Stoicism teaches that exercising a high degree of self-discipline and emotional detachment allows one the best opportunity to achieve the highest levels of clarity and rationality of thought. Otherwise interpreted, stoics demonstrate indifference to pleasure or pain in an attempt to connect with the most human aspect of their nature—their higher rationale.

Given this imposed dichotomy upon reason and emotion, the following question is begged: why have the two been polarized in human history? The simplest and most likely answer is that reason sometimes clearly comes into conflict with our desires, giving us the impression that reason is separate from emotion.

In her paper, Sadovsky has attempted to do two things: demonstrate that this culturally inherited notion, that reason and feeling are at opposite poles of the human psyche, is false and illuminate what specifically does relate the two.

Sadovsky proposes that intuition plays the role of an authority in regards to reasoning. In so doing, she references Joseph Raz's explication of authority, which rests upon two properties known as preemption and dependence. Her presentation and analysis are quite astute although I fear her familiarity with Raz's work influences her view of human faculties. In an attempt to understand both, she provides a myriad of illustrative examples which convey the notion of legitimate authority as Raz sees it.

One example that helps illustrate the relation between intuition and rationale is our visceral versus our rational reaction to a used car-dealer as he attempts to sell us a car. Of the possible reasons for not purchasing the car in question, we may rely upon a sentiment such as "there's something fishy about him" or "he lied about the car's gas mileage."1 The former refers not to something specific about the dealer himself but to our own feeling in interacting with him. The feeling of "fishiness" is no doubt due to something specific about the dealer or his actions but we are either unconscious of what that something is or unable to express it if we are somewhat conscious of it. So intuition, as presented here, is just a form of indolence; instead of examining what that something is, you stop short. However, I would offer that the more informed you are, in other words, the more empirical evidence you can garner, the more likely you are to make the correct decision, like not buying the car. Thus, you should rely on sentiments that resemble "he lied about the car's gas mileage" as you make a decision.

Sadovsky’s conclusion of intuition as an authority seems unlikely. In other words, I doubt Raz had this in mind when he formulated his notion of authority. I ask, is intuition the sole authority? Can I not employ reason as an authority as you would when a calculator commits an obvious error and we reason that it's no longer a dependable tool?

It appears to me as though we follow our intuition either when we're simply being lazy, or when we are so confident in our ability to intuit that we trust it without further consideration. Intuition appears to be a mechanism we employ to conserve processing energy for the future and possibly more important decisions.

I’ve always made it a habit to assume the rationality of my fellow man, even as he makes a “mistake.” So, the question I pose to Sadovsky is: in making the alleged mistake of polarizing reason and feeling, what good bit of rationale do you presume was used by those responsible for this false dichotomy, whomever they may be?

Given the difficulty we find in trying to force intuition into the role of an authority, or any other role for that matter, I offer that the two are probably meant to exist as they have for centuries—as forces at odds with each other. As such, it seems as though humans are meant to choose between which will take the upper hand until they find a way, not to reconcile the means by which we characterize them, but the means by which they interact.□

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