![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
On Not Knowing What One Wants
Nov. 15th, 2012 04:25 amWhen I tell people the topic of my dissertation, I frequently get responses such as, "Oh, I have no idea what my mental states are!" And I have to say, I'm baffled.
Usually, but not always, these people are extraverts. This leads me to suspect that perhaps this results from unstable or profuse identifications (in the Harry Frankfurt sense, wherein one 'identifies' oneself and one's standing volitions with those of others). Flakiness arises from the instability of such profuse or changing identifications, perhaps.
Then the questions as to what one ought to {do, love, want} will seem more relevant than they will seem to someone with fewer identifications yielding competing information about those things.
Of course, a person can have conflicting desires without being influenced by chaotic identifications. It's understandable to have desires pulling in two different directions. But sometimes there seems genuinely to be no fact of the matter; as when choosing ice cream: outside of a couple of broad parameters, there seems to be no preexisting preference there. In the no-fact-of-the-matter cases, what seems to be called for is not introspection, but some sort of commitment; or, if commitment sounds too detached, creation. I am hesitant to recommend this; but people do sometimes get stuck in an endless introspection loop, so that one begins to suspect that isn't the answer; whatever it is the person is looking for is not to be found antecedently existing. What's required is, rather, a leap.
This is to affirm the appeal of Moran's recommendations (from Authority and Estrangement to cases in which the introspection process (to the extent that naming one's desires is a process) fails to produce results of any kind. My overwhelming inclination is to say to these people, "You're looking in the wrong place." Though I do rather wonder why the process failed.
For the least self-estranging results, it would be best for the executive decision to be made in accord with one's identifications; though if conflict between those exists, another endless loop might be triggered. Additionally, if, in the case of no antecedent preference, in which a decision must be made based upon one's identifications, a subject might have a strong motivation to avoid any identifications. This would lead back to the endless unproductive introspection loop as well.
Usually, but not always, these people are extraverts. This leads me to suspect that perhaps this results from unstable or profuse identifications (in the Harry Frankfurt sense, wherein one 'identifies' oneself and one's standing volitions with those of others). Flakiness arises from the instability of such profuse or changing identifications, perhaps.
Then the questions as to what one ought to {do, love, want} will seem more relevant than they will seem to someone with fewer identifications yielding competing information about those things.
Of course, a person can have conflicting desires without being influenced by chaotic identifications. It's understandable to have desires pulling in two different directions. But sometimes there seems genuinely to be no fact of the matter; as when choosing ice cream: outside of a couple of broad parameters, there seems to be no preexisting preference there. In the no-fact-of-the-matter cases, what seems to be called for is not introspection, but some sort of commitment; or, if commitment sounds too detached, creation. I am hesitant to recommend this; but people do sometimes get stuck in an endless introspection loop, so that one begins to suspect that isn't the answer; whatever it is the person is looking for is not to be found antecedently existing. What's required is, rather, a leap.
This is to affirm the appeal of Moran's recommendations (from Authority and Estrangement to cases in which the introspection process (to the extent that naming one's desires is a process) fails to produce results of any kind. My overwhelming inclination is to say to these people, "You're looking in the wrong place." Though I do rather wonder why the process failed.
For the least self-estranging results, it would be best for the executive decision to be made in accord with one's identifications; though if conflict between those exists, another endless loop might be triggered. Additionally, if, in the case of no antecedent preference, in which a decision must be made based upon one's identifications, a subject might have a strong motivation to avoid any identifications. This would lead back to the endless unproductive introspection loop as well.
