Critique of Hope E-Book

Ortrun Schulz

• Herausgeber: Books on Demand
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 64

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2018

Beschreibung

Hope is a basic affection of the mind. This philosophical analysis will clarify the concept by dealing with its involvement in knowledge, ethics and metaphysics. Being a belief, oscillating between knowledge and ignorance, hope is prone to illusion and disappointment. Man can be guided and manipulated by hope. Therefore its role within ideology and enlightenment will be investigated. We will reflect on whether hope may be a blessing or an evil and on how intellectual freedom is possible.

Leseprobe

DR. ORTRUN SCHULZ, born 1960 in Hannover, Germany. Master of Arts in Philosophy and English Linguistics 1986, PhD in Philosophy 1993. From 1992 until 2005 editor of Schopenhauer-Jahrbuch. Private research and various publications.

Hope is a basic affection of the mind. This philosophical analysis will clarify the concept by dealing with its involvement in knowledge, ethics and metaphysics. Being a belief, oscillating between knowledge and ignorance, hope is prone to illusion and disappointment. Man can be guided and manipulated by hope. Therefore its role within ideology and enlightenment will be investigated. We will reflect on whether and when hope may be a blessing or an evil, and on how intellectual freedom is possible.

That thou mayest be able to spend thy life smoothly

Let not everpressing desire torment and vex thee,

Or fear or hope for things of little worth.

(Horace (65 B.C. - 8 B.C.), Epistulae, I, 18, 97)1

The cover contains a section of the painting “Hope” by the English painter George Frederic Watts and assistants, second version of 1886, [public domain], via Wikimedia Commons2

Contents

Introduction

Traditional Views

The Passion of Hope

2.1. Bribed Reason and Folly of the Heart

2.2. Fuel for the Mind and Motive of Action

The Goals of Hope

3.1. Worldly Happiness

3.2. Eternal Life

Intellectual Honesty

4.1. Enlightenment

4.2. Criticism of Ideology

Intellectual Freedom

Bibliography

Index

Notes

Introduction

Recently, the American TV series “Dr. Phil Show” broadcasted the case of a dating scam where an elderly wealthy gentleman, Dennis, sent $ 250,000 via Western Union over a period of several months between 2016 and 2017 to a supposedly pretty American woman named Kimberly Escobar, who was allegedly stranded without funds, first in South Africa, then in Turkey and finally in Amsterdam. There was a rude awakening for him when it turned out that the photo of another person had been stolen and the whole profile was a fake. The betrayed man had become not only the victim of a “catfish”, but at the same time a victim of his own hope.

An elderly divorced woman, with the help of money she borrowed from friends and relatives, even sent nearly one and a half million dollars between 2013 and 2015 to a scammer posing as Chris Olsen, a stunningly handsome Italian-American widower, who she believed was on a business trip in South Africa.

Many of these dating scammers are Nigerians who assume a false identity online or even by phone and invent touching stories of distress.

The methods of the telephone mafia of some call centers are based on the same principle. People are being called and told that they have, for example, won 39,000 and would need to advance bank charges to complete the transaction. If the gullible falls for it, he receives another call and learns that the number had accidentally been twisted and he actually won 93,000 and therefore would have to settle a larger sum in advance. Although this scam is already well known, many still fall for it.

In many cases, the victims of hope are unaware of the exploitation. In 1992 I met a retired old lady in Australia who was traveling the country and staying in youth hostel dormitories. On the one hand she did that to save money, as she did her trade trips at her own expense, on the other hand to meet more potential buyers as she sold diet products of a company. The driving force behind her action was the prospect of taking part in the draw for above-average sales performance for a one-week trip to Singapore.

Own image

The amazingly honest program of this company said that there were “only 2 types of people. 1. Non dreamers – people who have accepted to remain average! 2. Dreamers [...].” It seems that there is no self-misunderstanding, because the misled understand themselves as dreamers. But they misjudge the likelihood of gaining success and overestimate their abilities. They are indoctrinated by the marketing strategy of such a “mission statement” to hold dreams for a value, and they consider it more likely subjectively than it is objectively that their dream be fulfilled. Behind this is the deliberate disregard of ethical guidelines for communication on the part of those responsible. It is deliberate manipulation of others for their own sake. This is illustrated in the well-known image of the so-called “carrot on a stick motivation”, where a donkey runs behind the carrot, which his driver holds on a stick from behind in front of the donkey’s mouth. The reward is always just out of reach, so that the alleged promise in reality is none, and is also referred to as a “lie” in game theory.

Drawing by Rita and Ortrun Schulz

The motive here is mere hope, which is not fulfilled and still acts as an engine of exploitation. This motivational strategy is by no means identical to the “carrot and whip” method, in which reward and punishment actually materialize. Hope has an interactive-ethical component. Because creating and nourishing false or unrealistic hopes in other people violates the rules of ethical communication. To be truthful and to keep promises are actions that involve the purpose of not disappointing others. Those affected may then hope that the other will keep his word to them, which constitutes a substantial basis of trust in the community. To raise false expectations and to support others’ unjustified or poorly justified hopes is often based on self-interest in order to manipulate them according to one’s own interests. Their possible subsequent disappointment is endorsed, thus is contributing to their psychic injury. He who lightheartedly fosters hopes that do not come true, hurts the other. Not to deceive others falls into the field of ethics of communication. Intellectual honesty with oneself, on the other hand, belongs to an ethics of belief.

Hope can be more or less well-grounded, but this is difficult to judge, since an essential concomitant of hope is ignorance, even “blindness”, as expressed in the symbolic oil painting “Hope” by the English painter George Frederic Watts.

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:George_Frederic_Watts,_1885,_Hope.jpg3

There are several versions of the painting, and this is the first one from 1885. A girl with a blindfold sits on a globe and plays on a lyre with only one string left. It shows impressively how weak the reasons are to believe.

Hope is life’s promise of happiness. Thinking clings almost like a reflex to what is uplifting, pleasant and agreeable. The analysis of the human condition reveals the struggle for goals along the way of the fundamental aim for self-preservation. There are needs and wants, and possible ways to meet them or not. These relations usually involve problems which are mentally represented as various states between security and doubt, hope and despair. Taken in the context of our existence, talking about hope involves questions of truth and error, desire and probability, expectation and faith.

1. Traditional Views

Being at the core of human existence, the concept of hope has been dealt with since antiquity. In ancient Greece the term of “hope” (elpis) corresponds roughly to “expectation”. It refers to an unspecific future dimension.

Skeptical or even negative connotations concerning expectation are expressed by Pindar (522 or 518 B.C. - 446 B.C.) and