TOWARDS A RATIONAL THEORY OF TRADITION

IN THE title of this talk the emphasis should be put on the word 'towards': I do not intend to put forward anything like a full theory. I want to explain to you and to illustrate the kind of question which a theory of tradition would have to answer, and to give in outline some ideas which may be useful for constructing it. By way of introduction I intend to say how I came to be interested in the subject, and why I think it is important; and I also intend to refer to some possible attitudes towards it.

I am a rationalist of sorts. I am not quite certain whether or not my rationalism will be acceptable to you, but that will be seen later. I am very interested in scientific method. Having studied for some time the methods of the natural sciences, I felt that it might be interesting to study also the methods of the social sciences. It was then that I first met with the problem of tradition. The anti-rationalists in the field of politics, social theory, and so on, usually suggest that this problem cannot be tackled by any kind of rational theory. Their attitude is to accept tradition as something just given. You have to take it; you cannot rationalize it; it plays an important role in society, and you can only understand its significance and accept it. The most important name associated with this anti-rationalist view is that of Edmund Burke. He fought, as you know, against the ideas of the French Revolution, and his most effective weapon was his analysis of the importance of that irrational power which we call 'tradition'. I mention Burke because I think he has never been properly answered by rationalists. Instead rationalists tended to ignore his criticism and to persevere in their anti-traditionalist attitude without taking up the challenge. Undoubtedly there is a traditional hostility between rationalism and traditionalism. Rationalists are inclined to adopt the attitude: 'I am not interested in tradition. I want to judge everything on its own merits; I want to find out its merits and demerits, and I want to do this quite in-

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Transcript of lecture given at the Third Annual Conference of the Rationalist Press Association on 26th July 1984 at Magdalen College, Oxford; first published in The Rationalist Annual, 1949.

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dependently of any tradition. I want to judge it with my own brain, and not with the brains of other people who lived long ago.'

That the matter is not quite so simple as this attitude assumes emerges from the fact that the rationalist who says such things is himself very much bound by a rationalist tradition which traditionally says them. This shows the weakness of certain traditional attitudes towards the problem of tradition.

Our Chairman ¹ has told us today that we need not bother about the antirationalist reaction; that it is very weak, if not negligible. But I feel that there does exist an anti-rationalist reaction of a serious kind and among very clever men, and that it is connected with this particular problem. Quite a number of outstanding thinkers have developed the problem of tradition into a big stick with which to beat rationalism. I may instance Michael Oakeshott, a Cambridge historian, a really original thinker, who recently in the Cambridge Journal launched an attack on rationalism. I largely disagree with his strictures; but I have to admit that the attack is a powerful one. When he launched it there

was not much in the rationalist literature which could be considered an adequate answer to his arguments. Some answers may exist, but I very much doubt their adequacy. This is one of the reasons why I feel that this subject is important.

Another thing which induced me to take up this question was simply my own experience--my own change of social environment. I came to England from Vienna, and I found that the atmosphere here in England was very different from that in which I had been brought up. We heard this morning from Dr J. A. C. Brown ² some interesting remarks about the great importance of what he calls the 'atmosphere' of a factory. I am sure that he would agree that this atmosphere has something to do with tradition. I moved from a Continental tradition or atmosphere to an English one, and later for a time to that of New Zealand. These changes have, no doubt, stimulated me to think about these matters and try to look further into them.

Certain types of tradition of great importance are local, and cannot easily be transplanted. These traditions are precious things, and it is very difficult to restore them once they are lost. I have in mind the scientific tradition, in which I am particularly interested. I have seen that it is very difficult to transplant it from the few places where it has really taken root. Two thousand years ago this tradition was destroyed in Greece, and it did not take root again for a very long time. Similarly, recent attempts to transplant it from England overseas have not been too successful.

Nothing is more striking than the lack of a research tradition in some of the countries overseas. One has a real struggle if one wants it to take root where it is missing. I may perhaps mention that at the time when I left New Zealand the Chancellor of the University undertook a thorough inquiry into the question of research. As a result of it he made an excellent critical speech in which he denounced the

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1 The Chairman of the meeting was Professor A. E. Heath.

2 The allusion is to the lecture 'Rational and Irrational Behaviour in Industrial Groups', summarized in The Literary Guide, October 1948.

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University for its neglect of research. But few will think that this speech means that a scientific research tradition will now be established, for this is a very hard thing to bring about. One can convince people of the need for such a tradition, but that does not mean that the tradition will take root and flourish.

I could, of course, take examples from fields other than science. To remind you that it is not only the scientific field in which tradition is important-although it is the field about which I shall mainly speak--I need only mention music. When I was in New Zealand I got hold of a set of American records of Mozart 'Requiem'. When I had played these records I knew what the lack of musical tradition meant. They had been made under the directorship of a musician who was obviously untouched by the tradition which has come down from Mozart. The result was devastating. I shall not dwell on this matter; I mention it only to make it clear that when I select for my main illustration the question of the scientific or rational tradition I do not mean to convey the impression that it is either the most important or the only one.

It should be clearly understood that there are only two main attitudes possible towards tradition. One is to accept a tradition uncritically, often without even being aware of it. In many cases we cannot escape this; for we often just do not realize that we are faced with a tradition. If I wear my watch on my left wrist, I need not be conscious that I am

accepting a tradition. Every day we do hundreds of things under the influence of traditions of which we are unaware.

But if we do not know that we are acting under the influence of a tradition, then we cannot help accepting the tradition uncritically.

The other possibility is a critical attitude, which may result either in acceptance or in rejection, or perhaps in a compromise. Yet we have to know of and to understand a tradition before we can criticize it, before we can say: 'We reject this tradition on rational grounds.' Now I do not think that we could ever free ourselves entirely from the bonds of tradition. The so-called freeing is really only a change from one tradition to another. But we can free ourselves from the taboos of a tradition; and we can do that not only by rejecting it, but also by critically accepting it. We free ourselves from the taboo if we think about it, and if we ask ourselves whether we should accept it or reject it. In order to do that we have first to have the tradition clearly before us, and we have to understand in a general way what may be the function and significance of a tradition. That is why it is so important for rationalists to deal with this problem, for rationalists are those people who are ready to challenge and to criticize everything, including, I hope, their own tradition. They are ready to put question-marks to anything, at least in their minds. They will not submit blindly to any tradition.

I should say that in our invaluable rationalist tradition (which rationalists so often accept too uncritically) there are quite a few points which we ought to challenge. A part of the rationalist tradition is, for example, the meta-

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physical idea of determinism. People who do not agree with determinism are usually viewed with suspicion by rationalists who are afraid that if we accept indeterminism, we may be committed to accepting the doctrine of Free Will, and may thus become involved in theological arguments about the Soul and Divine Grace. I usually avoid talking about free will, because I am not clear enough about what it means, and I even suspect that our intuition of a free will may mislead us. Nevertheless, I think that determinism is a theory which is untenable on many grounds, and that we have no reason whatever to accept it. Indeed, I think that it is important for us to get rid of the determinist element in the rationalist tradition. It is not only untenable, but it creates endless trouble for us. It is, for this reason, important to realize that indeterminism--that is, the denial of determinism--does not necessarily involve us in any doctrine about our 'will' or about 'responsibility'.

Another element in the rationalist tradition which we should question is the idea of observationalism--the idea that we know about the world because we look around, open our eyes and ears, and take down what we see, hear, and so on; and that this is what constitutes the material of our knowledge. This is an extremely deep-rooted prejudice and is, I think, an idea which impedes the understanding of scientific method. I shall return to this point later. So much by way of introduction.

Now I come to a brief outline of the task of a theory of tradition. A theory of tradition must be a sociological theory, because tradition is obviously a social phenomenon. I mention this because I wish briefly to discuss with you the task of the theoretical social sciences. This has often been misunderstood. In order to explain what is, I think, the central task of social science, I should like to begin by describing a theory which is held by very many rationalists-a theory which I think implies exrationalists-actly the opposite of the true rationalists-aim of the socirationalists-al sciences. I shrationalists-all crationalists-all this theory the 'conspiracy theory of society'. This theory, which is more primitive than most forms of theism, is akin to Homer's theory of society. Homer conceived the power of the gods in such a way that whatever happened on the plain before Troy was only a reflection of the various conspiracies on Olympus. The conspiracy theory of society is just a version

of this theism, of a belief in gods whose whims and wills rule everything. It comes from abandoning God and then asking: 'Who is in his place?' His place is then filled by various powerful men and groups--sinister pressure groups, who are to be blamed for having planned the great depression and all the evils from which we suffer.

The conspiracy theory of society is very widespread, and has very little truth in it. Only when conspiracy theoreticians come into power does it become something like a theory which accounts for things which actually happen (a case of what I have called the 'Oedipus Effect'). For example, when Hitler came into power, believing in the conspiracy myth of the Learned Elders of Zion, he tried to outdo their conspiracy with his own counterconspiracy. But the interesting thing is that such a conspiracy never--or 'hardly ever'--turns out in the way that is intended.

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This remark can be taken as a clue to what is the true task of a social theory. Hitler, I said, made a conspiracy that failed. Why did it fail? Not just because other people conspired against Hitler. It failed, simply, because it is one of the striking things about social life that nothing ever comes off exactly as intended. Things always turn out a little bit differently. We hardly ever produce in social life precisely the effect that we wish to produce, and we usually get things that we do not want into the bargain. Of course, we act with certain aims in mind; but apart from the

question of these aims (which we may or may not really achieve) there are always certain unwanted consequences of our actions; and usually these unwanted consequences cannot be eliminated.

I will give you a very simple example. Let us say that a man in a small village must sell his house. Not long before there was a man who bought a house in that village because he needed one urgently. Now there is a seller. He will find that, under normal conditions, he will not get nearly as much for his house as the buyer had to pay when he wanted to buy a similar one. That is to say, the very fact that somebody wants to sell his house lowers the market price. And this is generally so. Whoever wants to sell something always depresses the market value of what he wants to sell; whoever wants to buy something raises the market value of what he wants to buy. This is true, of course, only for small free markets. I do not say that the economic system of free markets cannot be replaced by another one. But in a market economy this is what happens. You will agree with me that there is no need to prove that the man who wants to sell something has usually no intention of lowering the market price, and that the man who wants to buy something has no intention of raising it. We have here a typical instance of unwanted consequences.

The situation described is typical of the social situation. In all social situations we have individuals who do things;

who want things; who have certain aims. In so far as they act in the way in which they want to act, and realize the aims which they intend to realize, no problem arises for the social sciences (except the problem whether their wants and aims can perhaps be socially explained, for example by certain traditions). The characteristic problems of the social sciences arise only out of our wish to know the unintended consequences, and more especially the unwanted consequences which may arise if we do certain things. We wish to foresee not only the direct consequences but also these unwanted indirect consequences. Why should we wish to foresee them? Either because of our scientific curiosity, or because we want to be prepared for them; we may wish, if possible, to meet them and prevent them from becoming too important. (This means, again, action, and with it the creation of further unwanted consequences.)

I think that the people who approach the social sciences with a ready-made conspiracy theory thereby deny

themselves the possibility of ever understanding what the task of the social sciences is, for they assume that we can explain practically everything in society by asking who wanted it, whereas

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the real task of the social sciences ³ is to explain those things which nobody wants--such as, for example, a war, or a depression. ( Lenin's revolution, and especially Hitler's revolution and Hitler's war are, I think, exceptions. These were indeed conspiracies. But they were consequences of the fact that conspiracy theoreticians came into power--who, most significantly, failed to consummate their conspiracies.)

It is the task of social theory to explain how the unintended consequences of our intentions and actions arise, and what kind of consequences arise if people do this that or the other in a certain social situation. And it is, especially, the task of the social sciences to analyse in this way the existence and the functioning of institutions (such as police forces or insurance companies or schools or governments) and of social collectives (such as states or nations or classes or other social groups). The conspiracy theorist will believe that institutions can be understood completely as the result of conscious design; and as to collectives, he usually ascribes to them a kind of group-personality, treating them as conspiring agents, just as if they were individual men. As opposed to this view, the social theorist should recognize that the persistence of institutions and collectives creates a problem to be solved in terms of an analysis of individual social actions and their unintended (and often unwanted) social consequences, as well as their intended ones. The task of a theory of tradition must be viewed in a similar light. It is only very rarely that people consciously wish to create a tradition; and even in these cases they are not likely to succeed. On the other hand, people who never dreamt of creating a tradition may nevertheless do so, without having any such intention.

Thus we arrive at one of the problems of the theory of tradition: how do traditions arise--and, more important, how do they persist--as the (possibly unintended) consequences of people's actions?

A second and more important problem is this: what is the function of tradition in social life? Has it any function which is rationally understandable, in the way in which we can give an account of the function of schools, or of the police force, or of a grocer's shop, the Stock Exchange, or other such social institutions? Can we analyse the functions of traditions? That is perhaps the main task of a theory of tradition. My way of approaching this task will be to analyse a particular tradition--the rational or scientific tradition--as an example, and I intend later to make use of this analysis for various purposes.

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3 In the discussion which followed the lecture, I was criticized for rejecting the conspiracy theory, and it was asserted that Karl Marx had revealed the tremendous importance of the capitalist conspiracy for the

understanding of society. In my reply I said that I should have mentioned my indebtedness to Marx, who was

understanding of society. In my reply I said that I should have mentioned my indebtedness to Marx, who was