Sir Roger Scruton and Dr. Jordan Peterson on transcendence

I just re-listened to a conversation between Sir Roger and Dr. Peterson: Sir Roger Scruton/Dr. Jordan B. Peterson: Apprehending the Transcendent. Here are a few somewhat random thoughts — blending what they say with my own ideas.

The idea of the transcendent (i.e., the way I think they’re using the term) is that there’s a truth beyond what we can perceive by thinking. That’s why we tend to associate “transcendent” with music and landscapes and art and ritual. (Poetry for some, but not for me. I don’t get poetry.) When we appreciate art, we feel that we’re a part of something real, but we can’t reduce it to words.

That’s one of the unfortunate realities of the modern world. We tend to prefer debunking explanations that reduce things to the lowest possible components. E.g., that everything can be explained as a power struggle, or that life is merely mechanical, or that morality can be derived from science, etc. Sir Roger asks why there is such a will to explain beautiful things that we love (such as love itself) in simple, ugly terms (e.g., power or dominance).

Dr. Peterson said the claim that everything comes down to power is itself a justification for the use of power.

A thing in itself is always more than our apprehension of it. That’s a good thing, practically speaking. We take useful mental shortcuts so we can get along with life without trying to understand the nature of the lion that’s threatening to eat us. But those mental shortcuts often leave us with the false impression that we know more than we do. Things are far more real than what we can possibly perceive.

Dr. Peterson said the transcendent could be thought of as the conjunction between the factual and the meaningful. Sir Roger tacked on the idea that teaching the humanities invites people to open themselves to a truth that’s beyond what is known.

The conversation strayed beyond the transcendent into commentary on culture, which Sir Roger usefully summarized as the residue of all the things people have felt worthy of preservation.

One problem with our culture is the dominance of zero sum thinking. Dr. Peterson explained this as a justification for resentment, and Sir Roger built on that idea. People have a feeling of loss — that there is more to life, but they don’t know how to get at it. They feel it’s been stolen from them by all the people who are rich and at ease in the world.

Another problem is our inability to put theory and ideology aside and to simply celebrate the normal. Sir Roger said we have an almost hysterical relationship to human choice. We believe that we have created everything (e.g., “gender is a social construct”) so we believe we can change everything.

We have to ask ourselves whether we’re entities that participate in a higher transcendent plane (or, to make it sound less spooky, in a reality that transcends what we think we know), or do we simply create everything ourselves?

There was also some interesting commentary on dance. Dr. Peterson said that the punk rockers who get carried away in the mosh pit are experiencing a transcendence that they would deny ideologically, but Sir Roger was having no part of seeing any beauty in punk rock or mosh pits, and turned the conversation to the old school way of dancing — which he called dancing with — against the new dancing — which he sees as dancing against. In a Scottish Reel, for example, you’re dancing with the community. In a waltz, you’re dancing with your partner. Modern dancing, by contrast, is very narcissistic and individual.

Sir Roger said that traditional teaching is a teaching of love. “Here’s something I love, and I want you to love it too.” But modern teaching is a teaching of hate. E.g., here’s how we can disassemble everything meaningful in your life and explain it in crass, ugly terms.

One section that strayed a little from the topic of transcendence was when Dr. Peterson mentioned a theory about female political involvement. I found very interesting. He said we know what male political principles look like, because that’s most of what we’ve seen. But we’re only recently starting to get a look at what female political principles might look like.

He took it back to the idea (similar to themes I discuss in Eggs are Expensive, Sperm is Cheap) that women have a lot at stake in relations with men, and one of the things they want to know is whether or not the man is a predator.

He didn’t unpack that very much, so I’ll do it for him. When a woman gets pregnant, she becomes very vulnerable. She is going to need someone — or a group of someones — to protect her and help her with the child for several years.

She also knows that men want to mate with her, and one thing she has to consider is whether they are merely predators — just trying to get what they want — or whether they are going to be around and supportive. Dr. Peterson said that mindset helps to explain some of the changes women seem to want to make regarding the presumption of innocence and the burden of proof. I.e., first we assume that you’re a predatory male (“all men are rapists”), and you have to prove that you’re not.

Getting back to culture and the transcendent, the moderator asked how we can coax people back into a view of relations to others rather than gratification of the self. Sir Roger said we need to teach that relationships of dependence (which are often seen these days as negative things) can be very positive on both sides. Dr. Peterson said we need to create a positive vision about love for beauty and truth, and to tell people that participation in the great tradition is more enjoyable and meaningful than passing nihilistic pleasure.

Finally, they both agreed that we should cut funding for schools, to which I say Amen.

It was an interesting conversation, and if you have 90 minutes to spare, you should give it a listen.