This too shall pass

The Wheel of Fortune

I've just been looking into the idea, in ancient and medieval culture, of the Wheel of Fortune. One of the interesting things I found out is the famous chorus in Carl Orff's Carmina Burana, which I always found rather Satanic, is actually a Medieval poem about the Wheel of Fortune.

Have a look.

China's search for Happiness

Anyone interested in the politics of wellbeing in Asia might want to read a book I read about this morning. The book is called China and the Search for Happiness, and was written by German sinologist Wolfgang Bauer in 1971.

The New York Review of Books reviewed it when the English translation came out in 1977. They wrote:

One way to pursue a people's sense of happiness is through its utopias, but despite the richness of this theme in traditional, esoteric, and heterodox Chinese sources there was no systematic study of the theme until Hou Wai-lû's compendium of 1959 (in Chinese); and as far as I know, the first Western scholar to broach the subject was the Munich Sinologist Wolfgang Bauer, in his China und die Hoffnung auf Glück in 1971, now finely translated by Michael Shaw as China and the Search for Happiness: Recurring Themes in Four Thousand Years of Chinese Cultural History.

In this enormous work, in essence a compendium of sources with prolonged commentary, Bauer pictures the Chinese visions of escape into happiness from a large number of sources: the key ones are Taoist, especially the second century AD Lieh-tzu, though he also examines the middle periods of China's history, considers the Westernized syntheses of the early twentieth century, and ends with Mao Tse-tung and his critics.

With considerable subtlety and great erudition Bauer traces a number of themes across this great span: the ecstatic shamanic journeys out of the human sphere, the local village structure of much Chinese utopian vision, the side-tracking by the elite of the utopian vision into a vision of extreme social and moral order, the struggle against this as the physical expansion of the state led to a Chinese universe in which islands of wilderness came to replace islands of civilization, giving new urgency to the flight into realms of the imagination. In the Lieh-tzu one can find a lost land of eternal and diseaseless affluence and gentleness, where the people "follow their nature without disputes or quarrels…are neither proud nor afraid…have equal rights…are of great fertility, know only joys and delights…hold each other by their hands, and take turns singing all day long until evening."

Yet the dominant focus for China is a median one, between the eternal gray sleep of "Ku-mang" and the unremitting glare of the lights of "Fu-lo" where sleep is banished:

"In the southernmost corner of the western pole lies a land that extends no one knows how far. It is called the Ku-mang land. There the forces of Yin and Yang do not meet, and therefore the contrast between cold and warm does not exist. Sun and moon do not shine, and thus there is no difference between night and day. The people do not eat; and do not wear garments, but sleep almost all the time. They wake up only once every fifty days. They think that what goes on in dreams is real, and take for appearance what they see when awake."

"The Middle Kingdom lies amidst the Four Oceans, to the north and south of the Yellow River and to the east and west of the Great Mountain (t'ai-shan) in an area far greater than a thousand square miles. Dark and light are clearly separated, and thus day follows night. Among the people, some are clever, others stupid. Nature thrives, the arts and the crafts are highly developed. The prince and the people face each other, morality and righteousness support each other. It is impossible to enumerate all that people do and talk about there. Waking and sleeping alternate. What is done while awake is considered real, what is seen in dreams, appearance."

"In the northernmost corner of the east pole lies a land called Fu-lo. It is always hot there, sun and moon shine [constantly] with a glaring light. The earth does not produce good grain so that the people have to nourish themselves with roots and fruits from the trees. They do not know cooked food. They are hard and cruel by nature. The strong oppress the weak, only the victor is honored, and justice is disregarded. Most of the time, the people run around doing things; they rest little. They are always awake, and never sleep."

Bauer sees the Chinese quest as a sad one, haunted by the knowledge that "the discovery of human freedom almost becomes the discovery of the dissolution of the self." Thus the vision of happiness is muted and, again and again across the centuries, the central vision of escape from care turns out to be accidental and unrecoverable. The schematized descriptions of the Buddhist paradises brought no lasting freshness here, and the very idea of the journey was finally emptied of its excitement.

Bauer's conclusion in his beautifully executed last section, "The Knot That Cannot Be Untied," is sorrowful, and he does not except Mao, whose symbolism of swimming and the sun, his invocations of "the poor and the blank," are seen as part of this melancholy tradition. Though some thinkers seem to break away, for example the late nineteenth-century reformer and philosopher K'ang Yu-wei (with his re-examination of the Great Unity and his renewed vision of the journey), Wu Chih-hui, the early twentieth-century anarchist with his dream of "Great Equality by Machines," or Liu Shih-p'ei with his assault on national boundaries and the specializations of labor, they are all touched by the same poignancy:

Utopia and the ideal are not the same as happiness; they are too easily contaminated by lies. For those who claim to have brought utopia into existence are as far from the truth as those who maintain that it can never become reality. A life without hope for happiness is no life. But the life which is a succession of too many vain hopes is equally unbearable. With only a minor shift in perspective, the history of uncounted expectations which unrolls before the eye as one studies the development of utopias, paradises and conceptions of the ideal among a people such as the Chinese also reveals itself with a terrible clarity as a history of incessant disappointments from whose oppressive sadness the individual, having only one life to live, could hardly hope to recover. Happiness neither lies entirely where anxiety to preserve an unflawed world eternally arrests all movement, nor where the pursuit of a new world takes on an unremitting urgency. Its nature, and the nature of utopia, hold a paradoxical secret.

The consideration of how the politics of wellbeing went wrong under Maoist China is relevant, in fact, to the western politics of wellbeing, because critics of it will occasionally criticise it as a form of Maoist mass engineering and even brain-washing - see this article by psychoanalyst Darian Leader, for example. Leader declares, somewhat hysterically:

CBT-style therapies were last used on a mass scale in China in the cultural revolution. Separated from loved ones - having perhaps witnessed their murder - people were taught to deny the legitimacy of their symptoms: depression was just the outcome of false beliefs.

So...anyone with depression should save up all their money and see a psychoanalyst for years and years, who will assure them that their depression is real, that the world is awful and their parents in particular were awful, and if you're not depressed, you're in denial. Until you accept the orthodox Freudian dogma regarding your psyche, you're in denial. When you finally accept orthodox Freudian dogma, you're cured. Who's really the Maoist here?

Still, it's worth remembering, when one considers state support for self-help programmes, that Stoicism, from where CBT draws its self-help techniques, was always pretty wary of government-imposed programmes for spiritual liberation.

If anyone could have imposed such a programme, it was Marcus Aurelius - the philosopher-emperor, who was finally in a position to bring about Plato's dream of a society governed according to philosophical principles with the aim of the spiritual liberation of its citizens. But Aurelius wisely understood that you cannot force people to be free, and that even freeing yourself from a single mental habit takes a huge amount of work and effort.

Whenever he started getting Utopian aspirations, he told himself:

do not expect Plato's ideal commonwealth; be satisfied if even a trifling endeavour comes off well, and count the result as no mean success. For who can hope to alter men's convictions; and without change of conviction what can there be but grudging subjection and feigned assent?

Learned helplessness in action at Guantanamo Bay

It makes me sick to read about some of the interrogation techniques used at Guantanamo Bay, where the CIA applied Martin Seligman's theory of 'learned helplessness' to try and break the spirit of the inmates (most of whom have still yet to be charged with any crime).

Seligman didn't know his ideas were being applied there. Ironically, his theory of 'learned optimism' is now being imparted to every US soldier through the Pentagon's Comprehensive Soldier Fitness programme, this time with Seligman's active participation. Build us up, break them down. That's the spirit.

Here is a Huffington Post article by Peter Jan Honigsberg, professor of law at the University of San Francisco, and the author of Our Nation Unhinged: The Human Consequences of the War on Terror:

"The first day I was at Guantanamo, they put me in a little cage. There was a toilet hole and I thought this is the bathroom and they will then take me to my cell. Later, they brought me food. 'Why food?' I thought, 'This is a bathroom.' Only the next day did I realize this was my cell where I was to stay." -- Ayub Muhammed

On August 22, 2009, the Witness to Guantanamo Project completed its first round of 16 in-depth filmed interviews of former Guantanamo detainees in five countries: Albania, Bosnia, France, Germany and England. Each in-depth interview was 2+ hours in length. Three men did not want their faces shown. We hope to film hundreds of interviews of former Guantanamo detainees. We are determined to document the systematic human rights abuses and rule of law violations at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

The empirical evidence we gathered during this journey confirmed information found in the recently released CIA Inspector General's Report and memos regarding CIA's strategies and techniques of torturing and otherwise mistreating detainees.

It was very difficult to hear each man's story. The narratives were mesmerizing, powerful, compelling, unnerving and heartbreaking.

The CIA's intention to create a climate of "learned helplessness," that is, of shattering the men's spirits, emerged throughout the interviews. For example, the guards and interrogators did their best to try to break a detainee who was a fourth level black belt karate expert and another detainee who was a former boxer. The US personnel forced a hose down the throat of the karate expert and poured water into the hose. They hung the former boxer by his wrists for five days. On the other hand, a detainee who "went with the flow" and was not a "physical threat," had a relatively easier experience. He had already learned the value of "helplessness."

The complicity of the medical profession was a reoccurring theme. The boxer who was hung by his wrists for five days was let down periodically to be examined by a doctor. Then he was hoisted up again. He passed out on the third day, but they continued to hoist him up for two more days. Two other men described how they were interrogated during surgery. Each man was under a local anesthetic. Any detainee who wanted medical care needed to go through his interrogator. One man refused to ask for dental work because he did not want to ask a favor from his interrogator. Some prisoners who expected to have cavities filled, had their teeth pulled instead.

While brutal treatment was always intense at Bagram and Kandahar air bases, Guantanamo was described by many of the men as a "psychological prison." Some men were held in isolation for nearly the full time that they were at Guantanamo -- over four years in isolation for one man. Initially, prisoners were placed in isolation for five days. But, when the military learned that people could easily tolerate the relatively short periods of isolation, the military increased the length to weeks, months and even years. One man, who was afraid of isolation and willing to say anything that the interrogators wanted to hear, was advised by other inmates that isolation became less frightening with each return visit.

The prisoners responded to the treatment that they received in different ways. Some resisted. One beat up a guard, others spit at guards. Still others threw feces. One prisoner told us that when he was treated unfairly he resisted in order to make himself feel better. There was a community of spirit among some prisoners. If one person was mistreated, others would refuse to eat or strike in support of him. Several detainees used the word "solidarity" to describe their relationship with other prisoners.

Some men endured detainment in Guantanamo by reflecting on their families, their religion, stories in the Koran, and the value of patience. Others accepted their "fate," believing that they could not change it. Still others relied on "hope," expecting that they would ultimately be released because they knew they were innocent.

When we asked people to describe their worst experiences, we were surprised by several of the responses. Two people told us that their worst experience was observing others beaten while they could do nothing about it. Another person's worst experience was the unknowing of what would happen in the future. A Uyghur described his feeling of betrayal by the United States. The Americans had assured him that any information he gave to U.S. officials would not be passed on to the Chinese. When he was later interviewed by Chinese officials in Guantanamo, the Chinese diplomats repeated to him all that he had told the Americans.

The men did not only lose years of their lives while being held in Guantanamo. Their lives going forward are also, for many, similarly lost. Many of the detainees told us that they have been unable to obtain employment. Once a prospective employer hears that the men are former detainees, the opportunity for employment disappears. In addition to not finding work, the Uyghurs in Albania are also facing the prospect of losing their homes. Albania, with a grant from the U.S., has been paying their rents for the past two years. However, the payments are up in October, and it is not clear whether Albania will continue to pay their rents. If not, the Uyghurs may be out on the street or back at the refugee center.

The men agreed to be interviewed for different reasons. The reasons included speaking for history (that is, assisting us in creating an archive) and hoping that others who are still in Guantanamo will soon be released. One man participated because he wanted to "plant a tree for the next generation." He also told me that "the world is one hand with many fingers."
If there is a term that best describes the experience of interviewing these men, it is witnessing their humanity. Guantanamo is about people. Their humanity is what I will remember best.

The View From Above

Check out this wicked illustration by fellow Stoic, Daniel Strain:

The politics of happiness

Vision, the Italian think-tank, announced the launch of their new programme, called 'The Politics and Economics of Happiness: A New Approach to Existing Problems'.

It announces:

Is the western civilization suffering a crisis of its own values and should be a concern of politics and states to respond to such crisis? Can happiness be the analytical and communication key to reconsider the political and economic problems that mainstream politics and economic science appear not to be able to address anymore, and for political debates to engage increasingly disillusioned public opinions and young generations?

Can happiness be the key? What is this, a Italian disco track circa 1981? Happiness is the key! Put your hands up for Milan!

It goes on: 'The sort of radical questions we just mentioned are not new'. Well, then they're not very radical either. Hell, even Babar was discussing the politics of happiness, back in the 1930s, when he had a vision of bringing about a new political order in which all suffering would be banished from the state of Celesteville:

Anyway, the paper goes on:

Could the happiness paradigm better account for better distribution of welfare among different places (different countries, different segments of the population) and different times (different generations) giving a more concrete political sense to the 'sustainability' of progress?

Come again? I don't think that paragraph gives a 'concrete political sense' of anything, other than that Vision is trying to jump on the creaky happiness bandwagon, in order to get some nice EU funding. Now there's the secret of happiness: EU hand-outs. Oui! Encore une fois!

Anyway, in fairness, the paper raises one interesting question, which I don't expect the gathered beard-strokers of the think-tank to answer in a meaningful (or even legible) way, but it's a good question nonetheless:

Is the 'clash of civilization' also a clash between a weakening and still dominating vision of the world [ie Enlightenment values of tolerance, rationality, trust in science and technology, and a belief in progress] and one that may be more traditional, more spiritual and even fundamentalist...and yet, more adequate to our times?

What the politics of wellbeing/happiness/resilience (or whatever) at its best is trying to do, is find a middle way between rampant secular consumer materialism and religious fundamentalism. It's trying to find a way that Enlightenment values can be brought into some kind of synthesis with more 'spiritual' values (actually, these 'spiritual' values aren't exactly older. Liberalism pre-dated Stoicism, Christianity and Islam by several centuries).

I think cognitive behavioural therapy is an important bridge because it combines the Enlightenment's emphasis on scientific evidence and rationality with the insight of ancient spiritual traditions (particularly Buddhism and Stoicism) with regard to learning to control the self and its appetites, and becoming more centred, grounded and responsible people.

It would help, however, if policy makers admitted that the psychological therapies they promote (particularly CBT) do actually derive from older spiritual traditions. At the moment, policy-makers like Lord Layard, who is a utilitarian, insist very loudly on the evidence-based, secular aspect of CBT, without accepting or admitting to its derivation from Stoicism and Buddhism, because they are afraid that, if they do so, western secular governments will not give it their backing.

Terry Pratchett on assisted dying

If you didn't see the lecture on Tuesday evening by Sir Terry Pratchett, the best-selling fantasy novelist, on assisted dying, I strongly recommend it. Pratchett was diaognosed with a rare form of Alzheimer's two years ago, and has since done a lot to increase our awareness of Alzheimer's and our reactions to it. The lecture was watched by over 2 million people in the UK, and came just after a poll that showed four out of five British people support assisted dying for the terminally ill. You can read a transcript here.

Pratchett says we should be able to "shake hands with death", to leave life on our own terms, rather than spending months and years in "death's waiting room", in a twilight state where you are not really there, but also not allowed to pass on. We should be able to choose how we want to die. He said:

I vowed I would live my life as ever to the full and die, before the disease mounted its last attack, in my own home, in a chair on the lawn, with a brandy in my hand to wash down whatever modern version of the "Brompton cocktail" some helpful medic could supply. And with Thomas Tallis on my iPod, I would shake hands with Death...My life. My death. My choice.

The idea of choosing one's death, of dying on one's own terms, with dignity and autonomy (and perhaps some assistance), is very Stoic. Seneca once wrote: 'Just as I choose a ship to sail in, or a house to live, so I choose a death for my passage from life'.

Medieval Christianity, however, erected a whole moral edifice against the Stoic tolerance of suicide and assisted dying - indeed, the word 'suicide' was coined by a 12th century monk in a tract written against Seneca.

The debate between the right to die camp and the sacredness of life camp is still, in some respects, a debate between Stoicism and Medieval Christianity.

Anyway, here is the first section of Pratchett's speech, the rest is also on YouTube: