Martha Nussbaum - The Fragility of Goodness

Summary

In a thought-provoking discussion with Bill Moyers, philosopher Martha Nussbaum delves into the recurring themes of ancient Greek tragedies and their relevance to modern life. Nussbaum explains the fragility of human goodness, citing classic dilemmas of moral conflict faced by figures such as Agamemnon and Antigone. These stories highlight the complexities and tragedies that arise when individuals strive to live virtuously amidst conflicting duties. Nussbaum argues that contemporary society can learn from the ancient Greeks' focus on livable lives, emphasizing the importance of trust, moral struggle, and the interconnectedness of personal and political spheres.

Highlights

• Nussbaum discusses the moral dilemmas depicted in Greek tragedies, making them relatable to modern life. 🔍
• She highlights Agamemnon's tragic decision, illustrating irreconcilable commitments. ⚔️
• Antigone’s conflict with family loyalty versus state loyalty remains poignant today. 🔄
• The importance of trust within moral and personal lives is emphasized through Euripides' characters. 🏅
• Nussbaum believes understanding these ancient conflicts can improve modern ethical and political discourse. 🌐

Key Takeaways

• Martha Nussbaum explores the timeless relevance of Greek tragedies, emphasizing the fragility and complexity of human goodness. 🎭
• Ancient stories of moral conflict, like those of Agamemnon and Antigone, highlight modern dilemmas in living a virtuous life. ⚖️
• Trust and moral struggle are central to personal and political spheres, as depicted in Greek literature. 🏛️
• Nussbaum argues that moral conflict is inherent to caring deeply about multiple commitments. 💔
• Literature and stories provide valuable insights into ethics and the human condition, according to Nussbaum. 📚

Overview

Martha Nussbaum sits down with Bill Moyers to explore the critical lessons drawn from ancient Greek literature. She believes that the profound moral dilemmas faced by Greek characters such as Agamemnon and Antigone offer timeless wisdom about the challenges of living a virtuous life today. These stories underscore the inevitability of moral conflict when we care deeply about our multiple commitments.

In the interview, Nussbaum argues that trust and the willingness to be vulnerable are essential elements of the ethical life. She uses the tragedy of Hecuba to illustrate how profound betrayal challenges our moral foundations. According to Nussbaum, the ancient Greeks teach us to acknowledge life's complexities honestly and to engage with them fully, despite the potential for tragedy.

The conversation also touches on the vital role of literature in illuminating ethical truths. By engaging with complex narratives, Nussbaum suggests we can enrich our understanding of morality and enhance public discourse. The interview concludes with Nussbaum's belief that engaging deeply with our commitments—while accepting the resultant vulnerabilities—leads to a richer, more humane life.

Chapters

• 00:00 - 01:00: Introduction and Context The chapter opens with a thought-provoking scenario presented by Bill Moyers, inviting readers to envision themselves in a moral and existential dilemma. The first scenario challenges the reader to choose between giving their brother a proper funeral to save his soul, risking their own life in the process as the state threatens burial alive as punishment. This poses a conflict between familial duty and societal law. A second, unspecified scenario is introduced, likely involving another moral or ethical decision, hinted by the mention of saving an entire fleet from shipwreck. These scenarios set the stage for exploring themes of morality, duty, and the consequences of personal choices in the broader societal context.
• 01:00 - 01:30: Moral Dilemmas and Greek Tragedy This chapter explores the concept of moral dilemmas through the lens of Greek tragedy and examines their relevance in modern life. It begins by reflecting on the ancient tragedy of sacrificing one's own daughter as an example of extreme moral conflict. The chapter then raises the question of whether such dilemmas still exist in contemporary life. Martha Nussbaum is introduced as a guest who will discuss the challenges of living a morally good life within this context.
• 01:30 - 03:00: Martha Nussbaum's Perspective Martha Nussbaum, a highly regarded philosopher, is the subject of this chapter. Her youthful appearance could easily be mistaken for one of her graduate students. However, her intellectual contributions, particularly through her recent book, have sparked widespread discussion and debate among scholars. The significance of her work was underscored by a recent gathering at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville, where academics convened to discuss and debate her ideas. Nussbaum's perspective and work continue to play a significant role in shaping contemporary philosophical discourse.
• 03:00 - 05:00: Goodness and Moral Conflicts This chapter explores the fragile nature of human goodness and delves into the complexities of moral conflicts, drawing insights from ancient Greek philosophy. Professor Nussbaum, a scholar in classics and philosophy, highlights Aristotle's perspective on virtue and moral character. The discussion prompts a reevaluation of core human values such as love, friendship, and family life. The chapter presents a philosophical discourse on how virtue is developed and maintained in the face of moral challenges.
• 05:00 - 10:00: Family vs. State: The Antigone Conflict The chapter explores the tension between familial obligations and state laws, focusing on the conflict in Sophocles' Antigone. It introduces the viewpoints of characters like Antigone and Creon, and references ancient Greek philosophers like Aristotle. The discussion includes insights from Martha Nussbaum, emphasizing the relevance of ancient Greek tragedy and philosophy to contemporary issues in modern America, particularly the nature of virtue and its development.
• 10:00 - 19:00: The Fragility of the Ethical Life The chapter explores the enduring relevance of ancient Greek works, emphasizing their courageous and eloquent approach to life's big, unchanged problems.
• 19:00 - 24:00: Love and Trust in Human Experience The chapter delves into moral philosophy, focusing on the theme of moral conflict. It presents the dilemma faced by Agamemnon, a king who is committed to leading his army effectively while adhering to divine commands. The expedition to Troy is halted due to a divine sacrifice demand, highlighting the tension between duty and morality. This example illustrates the complexities of love and trust, particularly within the context of leadership and obedience to higher powers.
• 24:00 - 27:00: Philosophy and Literature The chapter titled "Philosophy and Literature" explores an intense moral and ethical dilemma faced by a character who must choose between two profound commitments. The narrative discusses a scenario where the character is torn between disobedience and the horrendous act of sacrificing his own daughter to fulfill an expedition. The discussion highlights the emotional conflict and sense of inevitable wrongdoing faced by the individual, emphasizing the weight of choosing between duties and personal morals. The play mentioned evokes a sense of poignancy and highlights the heavy consequences of either decision.
• 27:00 - 29:00: The Impact of Greek Tragedies The chapter 'The Impact of Greek Tragedies' explores the theme of conflicting loyalties and moral dilemmas as illustrated in Greek tragedies. The narrative highlights how deeply caring about multiple commitments can place individuals in situations where they must choose between conflicting duties. This is exemplified through the imagery of a household tarnished by the sacrificial blood of maidens near an altar, symbolizing the tragic consequences inherent in such moral conflicts.
• 29:00 - 33:00: The Complexity of Human Goodness This chapter explores the concept of human goodness and the inherent complexity within it. The narrative suggests that no matter what actions are taken, they may be perceived as wrong or even terrible at times. It highlights the notion that people, like the taxi driver mentioned, do not see themselves as making deliberate horrific choices. Instead, life presents itself in subtler, everyday choices that contribute to the complexity of human morality. Overall, the chapter delves into the nuanced understanding of morality and everyday decision-making.
• 33:00 - 37:00: Retreating from Humanity This chapter discusses the struggle of juggling multiple important responsibilities, such as maintaining a career and caring for children. It illustrates how life events can force individuals to prioritize one commitment over another, often leading to neglect of important duties. The chapter highlights the challenge of balancing significant life roles and the inevitable sacrifices made when such balance becomes unattainable.
• 37:00 - 39:00: Conclusion The chapter discusses the everyday conflicts faced by individuals, particularly mothers who must balance career and child-rearing responsibilities. An example given is having to choose between attending a work meeting and a child's school play, highlighting the difficulty of prioritizing equally important aspects of life. This leads to a broader discussion on the societal expectation to rank these priorities, often causing neglect in one area no matter the choice made.

Martha Nussbaum - The Fragility of Goodness Transcription

• 00:00 - 00:30 good evening I'm bill moyers imagine yourself faced with this choice if you don't give your brother a proper funeral you do miss Seoul to unrest forever but if you save your brother's soul the state will bury you alive as punishment or imagine being told that the only way to save your entire fleet from shipwreck
• 00:30 - 01:00 is to sacrifice your own daughter wrenching predicaments like those were the stuff of read tragedy over 2,000 years ago surely you say we don't face dilemmas so difficult in real life today or do we tonight my guest tells us about the tragedy of trying to lead a good life join me for a conversation with Martha Nussbaum this program is made possible by a grant
• 01:00 - 01:30 from the John D and Catherine T MacArthur Foundation a world of ideas with bill moyers she could pass for one of her graduate students but Martha Nussbaum is one of the country's most provocative philosophers her new book has become such a catalyst for debate that scholars gathered recently at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville to argue over her
• 01:30 - 02:00 thesis that human goodness is a fragile thing professor Nussbaum does not dodge this hard issue of how we're to reconsider the meaning of love and friendship and family life Nussbaum a professor of classics and philosophy at Brown University sees a message for us and the ideas of ancient Greece I think it has to be said that Aristotle starts off not only believing that people if they're virtuous enough already then they don't
• 02:00 - 02:30 need to be coerced but he also believes that that their basic child lis nature is directed towards virtue that they will if they are given decent support and decent love they will become virtuous I spoke with Martha Nussbaum in New York about virtue and tragedy and why she believes we need to hear what ancient Athens has to say to modern America you write about these ancient Greeks Aristotle Hecuba Antigone Creon
• 02:30 - 03:00 as if they were next-door neighbors I think I've lived with them for a long time and I guess I think that the big problems that those great works put in front of us haven't changed all that much and that the Greek works face them head-on with a courage and an eloquence that I don't always find in modern works
• 03:00 - 03:30 on moral philosophy great problems what kind of problems take the problem of moral conflict now here you have a nice coulis Agamemnon a king who's trying to do his best to lead his army and he's following the commands of the gods leading his army off to Troy and suddenly he finds that his expedition has become D can't move forward and he's told that the reason is that the gods are demanding a sacrifice he's got a sacrifice he got to kill his
• 03:30 - 04:00 own daughter in order to complete that expedition so here we have two deep and entirely legitimate commitments that he has in his life coming into a absolutely terrible conflict in which there's not not anything he can do that will be without wrongdoing and at that point he says thinking about this and the play says with tears in his eyes heavy doom is disobedience but heavy - if I shall rend my own child the pride
• 04:00 - 04:30 of my house polluting my father's hands with streams of slaughtered maidens blood close by the altar which of these is without evils now I think this this idea that often when we care about more than one thing and care deeply the very course of life will will bring you around to a situation where you can't honor both of the commitments and looks
• 04:30 - 05:00 like anything you do will be wrong in some way will be perhaps even terrible in some way that this is true you think it's true for the taxi driver out there on the street right now he doesn't see himself as a key making those willful horrific choices he the life doesn't present itself to him that way oh but I think it does on a smaller basis that is these things happen every day so long as
• 05:00 - 05:30 you care deeply about more than one thing I mean just take a person who works who has a career who also has children and who has to juggle every day those two responsibilities well nothing will guarantee that in some event that you can't provide fermer rising you're just going to have to neglect one of those commitments and and neglect something that's really really important because the the very course of life has produced a terrible
• 05:30 - 06:00 conflict I face this every day myself personally yeah well personally as a mother who has to juggle career and child raising I find so often you know just in a very mundane level you've got a meeting and your child's acting in a school play you can't do both things and it's not simply that you can't do both but whatever you do you're going to be neglecting something it's really important but we were taught to rank
• 06:00 - 06:30 obligations to you know the old term choose priorities and and not to make of every conflict of competing goods great moral drama there's nothing geological it seems to me about saying I am going to care deeply about my work and my writing I'm also going to care deeply about my family my child you know it's only somebody who's trying to evade the recognition of what's actually happening who's going to say oh look I'll rank my obligations and I'll decide oh well in
• 06:30 - 07:00 this situation it's the work that takes priority so the other one just drops out and it's not only not a duty it's contrary to duty I mean that isn't what real people do and I think it's also not what good people do good people look I mean that is suppose you had a person who in that situation would really say oh well given that work comes in here I'm not going to care about my daughter you know I don't care if I go off to that school player what have you I think that's a callous person a person who
• 07:00 - 07:30 doesn't feel what it is to love something and I think if you really feel what it is to to love someone or some commitment and be bound to that then when a conflict arises you will feel deep pain and you will feel what Agamemnon felt even at a smaller level you will feel which of these is without evils I think Agamemnon pretty clearly has to sacrifice his daughter still he has not got the right to think just because he's made the right choice everything's
• 07:30 - 08:00 all is well in fact in the play he does say may all be for the best and the chorus says that he's mad one of my favorites is is Antigone in the conflict between her loyalty to her family I must bury my dead brother even though he's been a traitor to the state and Creon's loyalty to the state to the welfare and protection of the whole society sadly they all end up dead
• 08:00 - 08:30 no one no one comes to peace with that conflict and yet Creon by the end of the play has seen something that he didn't see before because all through the play he defines enemies as anyone who opposes the good of the city even if it happens to be a member of his own family the claim of the family just doesn't exist for him but then by the end of the play the fact that his son has died and that
• 08:30 - 09:00 that does mean something to him that has come forward and he now says that his deliberation has been very bad I saw Antigone with a clarity that I had never imagined possible when I watched Lyndon Johnson pursuing the war in Vietnam which he thought absolutely right to do for the sake of the state refused to stop his two sons in law from going knowing that their death there
• 09:00 - 09:30 could be a personal blow indescribable I saw the torture of the conflicting loyalties there the sad thing is that he didn't didn't learn enough from that perhaps he didn't see quickly enough what that what that meant for families in America generally do you think Creon saw ready to do something about what he saw it was the seeing of it was the realization the recognition enough well
• 09:30 - 10:00 up till then he thinks of the state somehow as though it doesn't consist of and he keeps talking about the the city but he forgets that what what does the city consist of it consists of families who love their children and who are torn apart by Civil War and who who have relatives on the opposing side and he won't see the state in complex enough turns by the end of the play I think he's on the verge of doing that he's ready to do that but it's too late you've just said something that I that I
• 10:00 - 10:30 think is very important that that what these moral conflicts reveal is the truth of reality of personality behind the abstractions if you think of the state without thinking of the family you're thinking of something abstract that enables you to do what you would never do as a ruler if you thought of the human beings behind those abstractions yeah and I think in general do the Greeks were on the right track when they thought that what we're aiming at in political life is to produce a good life that is very complex that has
• 10:30 - 11:00 many different elements but we have to look at each one of them let's take an example you have written that these ancient Greeks were preoccupied with the notion of a of a livable life now what do you take that phrase to mean a livable life well I think it means first of all that they are preoccupied with the idea of a life that has many different parts that is a life that is rich and full that involves many
• 11:00 - 11:30 different activities now it also turns out that these activities are not entirely under people's control at all times that a lot of them like the ability to to love and care for a family the ability to get an education the ability to think well even the ability to be a moral person and to choose well all of these require support from the surrounding society and so they they have the the image often of the person
• 11:30 - 12:00 as as like a plant I mean something that is fairly sturdy that has a definite structure but there is always in need of support from the surrounding society and the political leader in that images is like the gardener who has to 10:10 the plant now I think if you see human life that way and you think of the the role of politics as providing conditions of support for all the richly diverse elements in a full human life that that
• 12:00 - 12:30 does have very definite consequences for the way you're going to think what is long excited me about about the ancient Greeks from the first time I read Edith Hamilton to professor Osmond at the University of Texas is that they were carrying on a vital discussion about the kind of culture they wanted the kind of public society they were after a public culture and society that stood for something that the debate that was going on in those times among the philosophers
• 12:30 - 13:00 was exhilarating you did you find that I think that it's extraordinary the way the whole society was involved in this debate and if you even think about the the performance of the tragedies the tragedies were not performed like going to a Broadway show where you you go into this darkened auditorium and you see somebody up there in the stage and you think well what is this got to do with me but the tragedies were a civic festival where all citizens came in there and they looked across the theater at their fellow citizens and they they
• 13:00 - 13:30 saw this as a scene for feeling and thinking about the life of the city politics was really a conversation between the artists the politicians the statesmen and the people the people in being in the audience the congregation so to speak I think this is an attitude towards literature that to some extent we've lost and that it's very important to recover because I really do think that these these poetic works with their richness of exploration of emotional
• 13:30 - 14:00 experience of the various ways in which human life is vulnerable to disaster that in their very shape they're doing something in ethics that we need to look at what do you think about the level of our public discourse today I think it's very impoverished I think it's it's lost a lot that I think it had in the time of Lincoln for example when when Walt Whitman can say can speak of Lincoln as the large sweet soul that is
• 14:00 - 14:30 gone you know how many people today could you reasonably say that of I think we've lost the idea that politicians are part of the humanities and we think of them as part of a natural science tradition and we don't expect them to have the contact with with literature with history with the the richness of descriptive language that the humanities have always stood for and I think that's
• 14:30 - 15:00 a great loss but you're not arguing are you that politicians should speak as novelists as poets well I think in effect I am see Whitman preferred the poet's language because it was concrete and it was human and it was suffused with feeling and I think that's the language that we need in the political life the common perception of philosophy is of a thinker of abstract thoughts but stories and myths are very important to you as a philosopher are they not
• 15:00 - 15:30 they're very important because I think that the language of philosophy has to come back from the abstract heights on which it so often lives to the richness of everyday discourse and everyday humanity and it has to listen to the ways that people talk about themselves talk about what matters to them in human life and one very good way to do this is to listen to literature the stories to
• 15:30 - 16:00 stories is there out of all of this vast array of stories is there one that you find most gripping that you think speaks most to us today one that I I wake up at night thinking about Euripides Hecuba that to me is a story that says so much about what it is to be a human being in the middle of a world of unreliable things and people do you know the story well
• 16:00 - 16:30 from a long time ago but she was the queen of Troy who whose country was destroyed by war and her whole life was changed he fell from here to here she lost her husband she's lost most of her children she's lost her political power she's been made a slave but up to that point she remains absolutely firm morally and she even says she believes that human good character is something extremely stable in adversity and can't
• 16:30 - 17:00 be shaken but then her one deepest hope is pulled away from her she left her youngest child with her best friend who was supposed to watch over him and watch his money too and then bring him back when the war was over and when she gets to the shore of Thrace she sees a naked body that's been washed up on the beach and she looks at it more closely and then she notices that it's the body of
• 17:00 - 17:30 her child and she realizes right away that what this friend has done is to murder the child for his money and to do it in a callous and heedless way without even taking thought for burying the child just has tossed it out into the waves and all of a sudden the roots of her moral life are are undone she looks around and she said everything is untrustworthy everything that I see is
• 17:30 - 18:00 untrustworthy because her tomorrow life had been based on the ability to to trust things and people that were not under her own control and if this deepest and best friendship proves untrustworthy then it seems to her that nothing can be trusted and she to turn to a life of solitary revenge against the friend and we see her end the play by putting out the eyes of this
• 18:00 - 18:30 former best friend and turning herself into what the the chorus says is in effect a dog I mean they predict that she will literally turn into a dog but we know that the story of metamorphosis from the human to something less than human has really taken place before our very eyes no I think it's pretty clear that this comes about not because she's a bad person but in a sense because
• 18:30 - 19:00 she's a good person because she has had deep friendships on which she staked her moral life and so what this play says that's so disturbing is that they the condition of being good is that it should always be possible for you to be morally destroying by something that you couldn't prevent to be a good human being is to have a kind of openness to
• 19:00 - 19:30 the world an ability to trust uncertain things beyond your own control that can lead you to be shattered in very extreme circumstances in circumstances that for which you are you are not yourself to blame and I think that says something very important about the condition of the ethical life that that it is based on a trust in the uncertain a
• 19:30 - 20:00 willingness to be exposed it's based on being so we're more more like a plant than like a jewel something rather rather fragile but who's very particular beauty is inseparable from that fragility but the other side of it is it not expressed by Viktor Frankl who
• 20:00 - 20:30 survived the death camps who says I'm not responsible for my circumstances I'm only responsible for my attitude toward those circumstances that I may live in the degradation of the camp's I may be put upon by the beasts who are human but I will not let them turn me into a beast well I think if you can maintain that separation that's a very fortunate thing and actually here at the tragedians do see that character itself if the
• 20:30 - 21:00 circumstances are crushing enough and severe enough can be itself polluted as you rip ADIZ puts it by something that you yourself don't control because however much he tried to live well in a world of uncertain things she had to be able to trust something and when by a rare chance to be sure but but it certainly can happen this very best friend the one who was in a sense the
• 21:00 - 21:30 basis of her connectedness to the world proved untrustworthy then it was not her fault that she couldn't sustain the moral life is this what you meant when you wrote once that tragedy is trying to live well tragedy happens only when you when you are trying to live well because for a for a heedless person who doesn't have deep commitments to others Agamemnon's conflict isn't a tragedy somebody who's a bad person would could
• 21:30 - 22:00 go in and slaughter that child with equanimity or could desert all the men let them die but it's when you are trying to live well and you deeply care about the things you're trying to do that the world enters in in a particularly painful way and it's in that struggle with recalcitrant circumstances that a lot of the value of the moral life comes in you're not trying to suggest to your students who are watching that the
• 22:00 - 22:30 lesson is not to try to live well if you do that you should certainly avoid the pain of choice and a frustration and of denial no the lesson certainly is not to try to maximize conflict or to romanticize struggle and suffering but it's rather to see that if that you should care about things in a way that makes it a possibility that tragedy will happen to you if you never trust any people or if you don't trust the
• 22:30 - 23:00 political setting which is certainly something I see very often in my students then it doesn't hurt you when things go badly but you want to tell them to live their lives with such a seriousness of commitment that they're not adjusting their desires to the way the world actually goes but they're they're trying to wrest from the world a good life the good life that they desire and sometimes that does lead them into tragedy
• 23:00 - 23:30 I ask you about the lesson the moral and you said what the tragedies show us in one sense there is no lesson in no moral is there it's simply the revelation of life as seen through the artist the philosopher the sufferer the pilgrim it's the revelation there's no effort to instruct but you know sometimes just to to see the complexity that's there and see it honestly without flinching and without we describing it in the terms of
• 23:30 - 24:00 some excessively simple theory that is itself a progress and I think it's a progress for for public life as well as private life because it's only when we've done that step that we can then ask ourselves how can our institution make it less likely that those conflicts will happen to people as Gabriel says in green pastures everything that's tied down is coming loose goodness the good life the life one attempts to lead by
• 24:00 - 24:30 one's moral bearings is always going to be a fragile thing is it not I think so long as it's understood well and richly it will be a fragile thing is I think that the stories that we sometimes tell ourselves that the the free will is free no matter what conditions people are living in that these people in misery are really ok because they have free will those are evasive stories and really pernicious stories because they prevent us from looking with the best
• 24:30 - 25:00 kind of compassion at the lives of other people it did occur to me once that maybe the unintended moral of Hecuba was that by transposing herself into a dog which the Greeks considered what the lowest form of life by becoming a dog she relieved herself of all emotions of all necessity to lead or to make moral choices that it was and that went to a
• 25:00 - 25:30 certain contentment that comes from being a dumb beast this can happen when you say to yourself it's too much to bear being human where that means accepting promises from other people trusting that other people will be good to you when that is too much to bear it is always possible to retreat into the thought I'll live for my own comfort for my own revenge for my own anger and I just won't be a member of society anymore which which really means I won't
• 25:30 - 26:00 be a human being anymore you see that you see you see people doing that today where they feel that the society has let them down they can't ask anything of it they can't put their hopes on anything outside themselves you you see them actually retreating to a life in which they think only of their own satisfaction only if their their own maybe the satisfaction even of their revenge
• 26:00 - 26:30 against society but the life that no longer trusts another human being and no longer forms ties to the political community is the Greeks wanted to say not a human life any longer or a human society or a human society from New York this has been a conversation with Martha Nussbaum I'm Bill Moyers
• 26:30 - 27:00 this program was made possible by a
• 27:00 - 27:30 grant from the John D and Catherine T
• 27:30 - 28:00 MacArthur Foundation