The dichotomy of pleasure and pain is slippery. — Cabbage Farmer

One may be pained in one respect and pleased in another by the same state of affairs. — Cabbage Farmer

Good point. Life, taken as a whole, is exactly that. Yet, people have a tendency to make this dichotomy. Optimists fail to see the shadows, pessimists fail to see the light, etc. So, if this dichotomous view is an error then I'm not alone. Why do you think people are prone to this mistake? Methinks it's got something to do with our way of thinking, specifically rationality. Logic, if we're to use it effectively, requires sharply defined categories with no room for the possibilities you point out (situations evoking both pain and pleasure...life in general). I think to be happy a person has to abandon rigid reasoning.

I would say such cases of self-deception are not "willing", but rather inadvertent. — Cabbage Farmer

We'll have to argue on what ''inadvertent'' means but I accept that a person definitely wants to avoid contradictions. That brings us back to the beginning of your post - Life is a contradiction. Can we, in that case, even with the utmost deliberation, avoid contradictions? Again, we see the role of rationality, trying to arrange reality into neat compartments with clear boundaries. I think this enterprise is a fool's errand.

Good point. Life, taken as a whole, is exactly that. Yet, people have a tendency to make this dichotomy. Optimists fail to see the shadows, pessimists fail to see the light, etc. So, if this dichotomous view is an error then I'm not alone. Why do you think people are prone to this mistake? — TheMadFool

I don't think it's a mistake to recognize a significant opposition in experiences of pleasure and pain or in their roles as motives. But it is a mistake to oversimplify. I wouldn't say the opposition of pleasure and pain is a false dichotomy, just a slippery one.

I suppose the reason people are prone to oversimplify is that it's easier than putting in the time and effort to carefully think things through, especially when we see no value in the task or its result.

I have the impression that most people don't spend much time engaged in philosophical conversation about pleasure and pain, or about happiness and truth; and most of the philosophizing we do engage in on these topics is casual, not careful.

Methinks it's got something to do with our way of thinking, specifically rationality. Logic, if we're to use it effectively, requires sharply defined categories with no room for the possibilities you point out (situations evoking both pain and pleasure...life in general). — TheMadFool

I agree that rationality is at issue here, that ways of thinking are at issue here. But I don't think rationality is the source of the problem. I'd rather say the fact that people aren't rational enough, and don't have time or inclination to sort out their thoughts and experiences, leads them to many errors and confusions, including an oversimplified view of pleasure, pain, and their relation to action and happiness, for instance.

I'm not sure that logic requires sharply defined "categories", but it does require clearly defined terms. I'm not sure what to make of your suggestion that "the possibilities" I've pointed out are somehow not accommodated by "logic", for it seems to me that all my discourse here has been in keeping with good logical form. Is there something illogical in my speech that I've missed?

When I was still a boy, around the time I started smoking, I was outraged by the Law of the Exclusive Middle. It didn't take many years for me to see the error in my ways. Logic doesn't inform us about what's in the world. It doesn't show us what exists and what doesn't exist. It doesn't tell us what concepts to use to speak about what exists and what doesn't exist. It's only a set of conventions for speaking and thinking clearly about what is and what isn't the case, and thus a useful guide in concept formation and in conversation.

If you think the facts and the evidence don't line up with our concepts and accounts, don't blame logic. Blame our concepts and accounts. Then try changing the concepts and accounts to fit the facts and align with the evidence. It seems there's always a way to do this -- always many ways to do this -- while conforming to the norms of logic.

When your stories line up with appearances and conform to the norms of logic, your discourse is rational.

I think to be happy a person has to abandon rigid reasoning. — TheMadFool

I suggest there's a difference between rigid reasoning and rigorous reasoning. Rigorous reasoning may be as flexible and fluid as required by any subject matter, given a fluent reasoner with adequate information and time sufficient for the task.

A dog can be happy, at least for a while, without much rigorous reasoning, and so can a human being. Such reasoning as we do engage in must be sufficient for our purposes and circumstances, as you and I have agreed, in keeping with winks and nods from Rorty and Davidson.

It seems to me that on balance, good information and good reasoning tends to increase the range of purposes and circumstances with respect to which we may be fit and satisfied and happy.

The extent to which that's true depends in part on communal norms. In communities in which people are rewarded for irrational speech and action, or for traffic in fictions and half-truths, the link between objectivity, rationality, and happiness may be far weaker in a wide range of contexts. But not in every context, no matter what they say.

We'll have to argue on what ''inadvertent'' means but I accept that a person definitely wants to avoid contradictions. — TheMadFool

By "inadvertent self-deception", I mean to suggest that the self-deceiver has not clearly acknowledged for himself that he is deceiving himself. In this respect he is unlike the liar who knows full well that he speaks falsehood.

I raised this point in rejecting the claim that the self-deceiver "willingly" believes falsehood. For it seems to me that in order to say he willingly believes falsehood, we should require that he believes that he believes falsehood, and my position is that he does not believe this in the relevant sense.

In speaking this way I mean to implicate something like an account of the "subconscious", which presumably conflicts with traditional Cartesian biases about the transparency of the ego to itself, or however that old story is supposed to go.

The self-deceiver will continue to avoid contradiction in his speech, to avoid making contrary claims. We may say there is a contradiction "in him", for instance a conflict between what he says and seems to believe, on the one hand, and the gnawing feeling in his gut that something's not quite right, or the fleeting detours from his story during moments of stress and self-doubt, or other signs in his behavior.

I suppose we learn much about this sort of state from the first-person point of view, when one of us realizes that he's been deceiving himself, or that he had not fully acknowledged some troubling fact until now, or that he has long been denying something "he had always known, down deep" was true... or that he had somehow or other been evading a firm recognition of his own bad faith.

That brings us back to the beginning of your post - Life is a contradiction. Can we, in that case, even with the utmost deliberation, avoid contradictions? Again, we see the role of rationality, trying to arrange reality into neat compartments with clear boundaries. I think this enterprise is a fool's errand. — TheMadFool

What does it mean to say that life is a contradiction? I'm inclined to reject the claim. What "categories" and "compartments" have led you to that strange assertion?

There is no way to guarantee immunity to contradiction or self-contradiction. But we can make more or less of an effort to speak and think clearly and consistently, with emphasis on the discourses in which clear and consistent speech seem most valuable and appropriate.

There are many contexts in which speaking is of no use at all, or is contrary to some purpose. There are many contexts in which poetic, metaphorical, or fictional speech have priority. There are many contexts in which loose talk is more appropriate than careful conversation.

I'm not sure this is one of those contexts.

But it is a mistake to oversimplify. I wouldn't say the opposition of pleasure and pain is a false dichotomy, just a slippery one. — Cabbage Farmer

It's my impression that rational examination of issues lead to simplification - we pare away the irrelevant, the incidental, the superfluous, etc. and focus on the essentials, the heart of an issue. Perhaps you mean that such an approach can lead to artificial situations, the purely hypothetical, which are so removed from reality as to be pointless.

I'd rather say the fact that people aren't rational enough, and don't have time or inclination to sort out their thoughts and experiences, leads them to many errors and confusions, including an oversimplified view of pleasure, pain, and their relation to action and happiness, for instance. — Cabbage Farmer

The only way I can make sense of the above is that life needs to be appreciated for its subtlety and variety. Isn't that why you warn against oversimplification? To me, this is good advice. We need to be recognize the complexity, so to speak, of life if we are to ever understand it. But, this complexity isn't amenable to reason because logic simply can't deal with it. For instance, I'd like clear-cut directives on morality but this, it turns out, is too complex for logic.

If you think the facts and the evidence don't line up with our concepts and accounts, don't blame logic. Blame our concepts and accounts. — Cabbage Farmer

I'm not blaming logic. I think it's a fine tool but I am saying that its application has failed to provide answers on crucial matters e.g. morality.

It seems to me that on balance, good information and good reasoning tends to increase the range of purposes and circumstances with respect to which we may be fit and satisfied and happy. — Cabbage Farmer

Yes indeed. Rationality is all about getting to the truth and one who is aligned to the truth should be happy, so long as his worldview is shaped by the truth.

What does it mean to say that life is a contradiction? I'm inclined to reject the claim. — Cabbage Farmer

Read my other thread: Is life a contradiction?