Ethical Record The Proceedings of the South Place Ethical Society Vol. 117 No. 1 £1.50 January 2012 LUCRETIUS’S – ON THE NATURE OF THINGS Whilst human kind Throughout the lands lay miserably crushed Before all eyes beneath Religion – who Would show her head along the region skies, Glowering on mortals with her hideous face – A Greek* it was who first opposing dared Raise mortal eyes that terror to withstand, Whom not the fame of Gods nor lightning’s stroke Nor threatening thunder of the ominous sky Abashed; but rather chafed to angry zest His dauntless heart to be the first to rend The crossbars at the gates of Nature old. from Book I, translated by William Ellery Leonard * A reference to the Greek materialist and atomist philosopher, Epicurus, on whom Lucretius modelled his own philosophy. This was expounded in his famous book De Rerum Natura, written in 50 B.C.E. See article on page 3. ‘THE POET OF NATURE’: GEORGE SANTAYANA ON LUCRETIUS AS A PHILOSOPHICAL POET Timothy J. Madigan 3 LET’S TAKE FREE SPEECH SERIOUSLY Alan Haworth 11 VIEWPOINT Tom Rubens 17 ESSAY: EXPERIENCING ANOTHER’S MIND? THE CASE OF THE HOGAN TWINS Graham Bell 18 BOOK REVIEW - FAR FROM THE FASHIONABLE CROWD The People’s Concert Society and Music in London’s Suburbs David Morris 21 ETHICAL DOUBTS ABOUT A MARKET IN LIVE DONOR ORGANS Simon Rippon 22 A CRITICAL LOOK AT THE OCCUPY MOVEMENT Fred Whitehead 26 ETHICAL SOCIETY EVENTS 28 SOUTH PLACE ETHICAL SOCIETY Conway Hall Humanist Centre 25 Red Lion Square, London WC1R 4RL. Main phone for all options: 020 7405 1818 Fax (lettings): 020 7061 6746 www.ethicalsoc.org.uk Chairman: Chris Purnell Vice-chairman: Jim Herrick Treasurer: Chris Bratcher Editor: Norman Bacrac Please email texts and viewpoints for the Editor to: [email protected] Staff Chief Executive Officer: Jim Walsh Tel: 020 7061 6745 [email protected] Administrator: Martha Lee Tel: 020 7061 6741 [email protected] Finance Officer: Linda Alia Tel: 020 7061 6740 [email protected] Librarian: Catherine Broad Tel: 020 7061 6747 [email protected] Archivist Carl Harrison Programme Co-ordinator: Ben Partridge Tel: 020 7061 6744 [email protected] Lettings Officer: Carina Dvorak Tel: 020 7061 6750 [email protected] Caretakers: Eva Aubrechtova (i/c) Tel: 020 7061 6743 [email protected] together with: Angelo Edrozo, Alfredo Olivo, Rogerio Retuerna, Cagatay Ulker Maintenance: Zia Hameed Tel: 020 7061 6742 [email protected] CONWAY HALL EVENING CLASSES, JANUARY 2012 From January 2012, historic Holborn venue Conway Hall is running the following evening classes which have been specially developed for a general audience by members of the Humanist Philosophers’ Group: Brendan Larvor, Peter Cave and Prof. Richard Norman: Exploring Humanism: a 6 week basic introduction to what Humanism is and what Humanists believe and do. Aspects of Humanism: an 8 session, 16 hour in-depth course on the history and philosophy behind Humanist beliefs. Applied Ethics: a 5 part look at differing approaches to moral thinking and action throughout history. Death and Dying: 4 sessions exploring the significance of death, from murder and suicide to terminal illness; the meaning of life and immortality. Each course will be running twice and will be tutored by members of the London School of Philosophy. The first sessions will take place from 24 January to 22 March, with the second round running from 1 May until 19 June 2012. Each session will be priced at £10, but there is a discounted rate of £7 per session if two whole courses are booked. To make a booking or for more information about dates, tutors and further details on course content, please email [email protected] or call 020 7061 6744 or look up www.conwayhall.org.uk/courses SOUTH PLACE ETHICAL SOCIETY Reg. Charity No. 251396 Founded in 1793, the Society is a progressive movement whose aims are: the study and dissemination of ethical principles based on humanism and freethought the cultivation of a rational and humane way of life, and the advancement of research and education in relevant fields. We invite to membership those who reject supernatural creeds and are in sympathy with our aims. At Conway Hall the programme includes Sunday lectures, discussions, evening courses and the Conway Hall Sunday Concerts of chamber music. The Society maintains a Humanist Reference Library. The Society’s journal, Ethical Record, is issued monthly. Memorial meetings may be arranged. The annual subscription is now £35 (£25 if a full-time student, unwaged or over 65) 2 Ethical Record, January 2012 ‘THE POET OF NATURE’: GEORGE SANTAYANA ON LUCRETIUS AS A PHILOSOPHICAL POET Timothy J. Madigan Philosophy, St.John Fisher College, Rochester, New York This lecture to the London Ethical Society was given on 18 December 2011 as part of the festival marking the 20th Anniversary of Philosophy Now magazine, of which Timothy Madigan is a US Editor “A naturalistic conception of things is a great work of imagination – greater, I think, than any dramatic or moral mythology: it is a conception fit to inspire great poetry, and in the end, perhaps, it will prove the only conception able to inspire it.” George Santayana (1863–1952), “Lucretius”, in Three Philosophical Poets (TPP:27 1) Quotations are from the 1954 Doubleday edition of Three Philosophical Poets; bibliographic information for all references can be found in the Select Bibliography at the end of this article. Defining Humanism In 1951, Warren Allen Smith, then a graduate student in English at Columbia University, working under the auspices of his professor, the noted scholar Lionel Trilling, attempted to come up with a definition of the meaning of the term ‘Humanism’ by writing to several prominent individuals — including Thomas Mann, Sinclair Lewis, John Dos Passos, Henry Hazlitt and Lewis Mumford — who had been identified in one way or another as ‘humanists’. One of the personages he contacted was the philosopher, poet and novelist George Santayana, who was living in retirement in Rome. Santayana, then nearing the end of his long life, responded in length to Smith’s letter, penning his reply on 9 February 1951. “Dear Mr. Smith,” he wrote: In my old-fashioned terminology, a Humanist means a person saturated by the humanities: Humanism is something cultural: an accomplishment, not a doctrine. This might be something like what you call ‘classical humanism.’ But unfortunately there is also a metaphysical or cosmological humanism or moralism which maintains that the world is governed by human interests and an alleged universal moral sense. This cosmic humanism for realists, who believe that knowledge has a prior and independent object which sense or thought signify, might be some religious orthodoxy, for idealists and phenomenalists an oracular destiny or dialectical evolution dominating the dream of life. This ‘humanism’ is what I call egotism or moralism, and reject altogether. Naturalism, on the contrary, is something to which I am so thoroughly wedded that I like to call it materialism, so as to prevent all confusion with romantic naturalism like Goethe’s, for instance, or that of Bergson. Mine is the hard, non-humanistic naturalism of the Ionian philosophers, of Democritus, Lucretius, and Spinoza. [The Letters of George Santayana, 8:328] Thus, in a letter written shortly before his own demise, Santayana Ethical Record, January 2012 3 expresses his continued interest in, and commitment to, the ‘hard naturalism’ or materialism of Lucretius. Indeed, throughout the many volumes of Santayana’s collected letters one can read of his appreciation for Lucretius’s great work, De Rerum Natura. In a letter to a friend dated 16 January 1887, for instance, Santayana writes: “By the way, do you ever read Lucretius? If you don’t, I should advise you to try him. He fills me with the greatest enthusiasm and delight. The arguments are often childish, but the energy, the flow, the magnificence and solidity are above everything.” (1:46) Santayana Excited by Lucretius’s De Rerum Natura What so excited Santayana about this work? First of all, he himself was often torn between devoting himself to philosophical analysis and writing creative poetry. While a prolific author of works in professional philosophy, his first published book was entitled Sonnets and Other Verses (1894). In many ways, he exemplified the modern dichotomy between science and the humanities. A gifted versifier, he was also trained as a student at Harvard in strict logical argumentation. For much of his long life, Santayana struggled between the desire to follow his creative flights of fancy and the duties of adhering to factual matters in explication. In Lucretius he found a soul mate who seemed to have somehow been able to combine both. In addition, Santayana greatly admired Lucretius’s ability to not only bring poetry and scientific understanding together, but to do so in an extended work, rather than in the short verses and sonnets which he himself was able to produce. Santayana was to write a three volume autobiography, which described in detail what he considered to be the three phases of his life. Volume One dealt with his birth in Madrid, Spain, his coming to America with his mother when he was eight, and his time growing up in Boston and attending Harvard University as a student, where he came to feel himself to be a pilgrim in a land of Puritans (his one and only novel is significantly entitled The Last Puritan). Volume Two describes his time as an instructor of philosophy at Harvard, where he both completed his Ph.D. under William James, and then joined his teacher as a colleague and fellow professor, from 1886–1912.