Responsibilitarianism

                    All Ethics presupposes that actors ought to own up the responsibility 

of their actions. The term Responsibilitarianism may sound as a tautology. Unfortunately due to various philosophies & anti-philosophies that have emerged in the course of the on-going enlightenment project, have deviated from the project & have tried to render the project as impossible & in some cases even unwarranted. Rebellions against the very notion of Reason in human sciences on one hand & emergence of reductionist determinism out of the exact sciences on the other have tried to undercut the notion of ‘voluntary agent becoming more & more rational’, by either denying agent-hood or by denying the very possibility of becoming rational. These currents in thought are accompanied by all pervasive welfare State bestowing rights after rights without bothering about the duty-side of any right. Such rights which are not supported from Duty-side tend to become hollow & add to the discontent rather than alleviating it. Re=emergence of religions & communalisms have further harmed the possibility of rational conduct. Aggressive religions are more explicit in making the harm. But non-aggressive ones spread escapism as they preach dissolution of the ego & render agent-hood as illusory.

 We are undergoing a crisis of Responsibility Deficit which tends to cascade with Authoritarianism. With all this, putting Responsibility at the center of Ethics & political philosophy does not at all sound tautological but the very need of the juncture in history.

The Idea of Human-Good

Any political philosophy worth the name can not escape from giving a paradigm-judgment regarding Human-Nature & Human-Good. Responsibilitarianism does not shy away from its universal-rational commitment & does not accept any sort of cultural relativism, as if the individual’s self-responsible choice were a matter of personal taste. It recognizes neither the ‘total pleasure maximization’ nor its ‘equal distribution’ as Human-Good.

Humans have no automatic instinctive capacity to make proper decisions to survive & thrive. They have to think, make conscious decisions, opt for some within available alternatives & own up the consequences. It is Human actions that can be ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ as decisions are reached via conscious deliberation. Humans perceive themselves as agents or doers of their action. Their self-appraisals render the sense of responsibility to them.

Each human individual is unique & fortuitous & has to endeavor to improve her lot again & again at each situation she falls into. Responsibilitarianism recognizes faculty of  reason & quest of rationality but also accepts fallibility, imperfection & susceptibility to temptations on the part of humans. Responsibilitarianism envisions Human-Good in every individual rising as much she can towards Autonomy, Responsibility & Maturity. It proposes to encourage the abiders of responsibility & to discourage the evaders of individual responsibility as well as the invaders of individual rights.

Why coercive power is needed at all

Responsibilitarianism cherishes rule of law & despises the arbitrary whims of the rulers. It recognizes no discriminatory privileges or servitudes & seeks proper law that is universally applicable to all, i.e. Isonomy (& not any quantity distributive equality). General principle is that every authority must be redeemed by accomplishment of the responsibility implied in it & that every responsibility must be enabled by the authority required for it. Deficit of responsibility & surplus of authority generates the demand for coercive power.

The supply of coercive power, on the other hand, comes basically from the relation between the victor & the vanquished that is established at the culmination of wars. Warfare, albeit irrupting intermittently, is kept seething in the form of envy & hatred amongst parochial ‘collective identities’ needed by the minds that do not have true self-esteem.

We will keep aside the ‘supply side’ of coercive power & concentrate upon how Responsibilitarianism seeks to minimize the demand of coercive power generated by the ‘Responsibility Deficit’.

Responsibility towards oneself

Responsibilitarianism countenances three basic categories of Responsibilities & corresponding Authorities (or Rights). Each human individual owes a responsibility towards herself & an authority over herself. It is the responsibility to accept one’s lot, (wasting least energy in grudging & blaming) & to improve upon it. This means using one’s opportunities & capabilities in such a way as to enhance them & not to diminish them, while dealing with threats in such a way as not to multiply them. This is only a prudent rationality. (Moral rationality comes in the remaining two categories.)

The corresponding authority is the personal freedom to employ one’s mind, body & legitimate ‘property’ towards one’s own ends. One’s ends could be altruistic as well but they ought not to be imposed by others.

 The responsibility towards self is optional, in the sense that others (or the State) can not properly compel you, to take care of yourself, if you do not do so on your own. There are so many ‘Self-Harming Vices’ in humans. These include avoidance, indolence, addictions, aversions, obsessions, idiosyncrasies, dogmas & even sheer stupidity, only to name a few. Acting under their spell is to do injustice to oneself. No doubt there exists a lot of injustice from (& to) others to be fought socially & constructively. However, by carrying a ‘victim complex’ OR a ‘guilt complex’ only adds to the self harming vices.

 To counter these vices, of course there are self-enhancing virtues of which humans are endowed with, nurtured into & can imbibe them by practicing volitionally. Self-Enhancers not only do justice to their selves but in turn become capable of doing justice (or something more than justice) to others as well.

Conditional responsibility towards particular others

The second basic category of responsibilities & authorities comprises of the conditional ones towards particular others with whom one engages in voluntary contracts (tacit or express).

 These contracts ought to be truly voluntary, i.e. not made by forces of ‘aggressions’ (non-aggression will be coming under third category.). These contracts ought not to be undefined or ambiguous. One ought not to have accepted responsibilities of which one is not truly capable of shouldering. One ought not cheat or falter away in the midst of carrying through the contract. Even in case of unintended failures, it should be clear as to who is to bear their brunt. Contracts should not be one-sided i.e. authorities & responsibilities should be finite & mutually redeeming.

Some faulty contracts are bound to be there & some breaches of the good ones are also bound to occur. Disputes are bound to arise. Arrangements of resolving disputes & giving verdicts of compliances & compensations must be made. However if some party to a dispute simply refuses to honor verdict then the dispute may enter in the area of crime. It is dealt with in the third category.

Unconditional responsibility towards all others

In this category, every human individual owes an unconditional responsibility towards every other human individual. Seeing the finite & little capacity of single individual, it is clear that this responsibility can not be one of positively supplying something but that of refraining from something.

Here we come to the ‘no aggression’ principle. Not to aggress upon others (except in utter self-defense or minimally invasive prevention) is the most revered principle of Responsibilitarianism. The word freedom is used in many senses. We can talk of ‘inner freedom’ whence one can overcome one’s unruly passions. We can talk of ‘freedom to do things’ in the sense of acquiring a capacity or strength or facility to do things. Such other nuances of the word freedom are also important for Human-Good. Political philosophy, however, must focus upon the freedom from others’ wills being imposed on the individual, by force. All ‘softer’ versions of threat, if investigated by asking the question, “What if I defy?” & take it to its logical conclusion; we discover again & again that the ultimate kernel is physical threat. Power, in the final analysis is violent. Extortion is the basic form of all misappropriations, all injustice.

Thus every human individual has a universal responsibility of not aggressing upon other & has universal authority of not being aggressed by others. The moral right to self-defense (not a right to retribution) is most vulnerable because the individual is always in ultimate minority. Any two individuals allying/coalescing for extorting their common singular victim are enough, let alone ‘all’ (about 6.5 billion). A lynch hunting mob is worst possible threat to individual’s right.

 Second, when anyone acts in self defense, there is always a chance of over-retaliation, i.e. a reverse aggression. Therefore we all need some agency that can protect us from aggression. That is the main moral basis of State. From Responsibilitarian point of view, State-coercion is justified only insofar as it is needed to prevent citizen to citizen coercion.

The Vicious circle

Although we have distinguished the three pairs of responsibilities & authorities, in personal, civil & political arenas, these by no means can remain unaffected by each other. Looking from the ‘demand side’ of coercive power the Responsibility-Deficit occurs in all the three categories as there are evaders & invaders. The vicious circle can be traced right from the responsibility deficit in Self-Responsibility. As individuals fall short in the responsibility to themselves (due to self-harming vices & lack of self-enhancing virtues), their capability of shouldering responsibility to others, diminishes. This leads to failures in responsibilities not only towards themselves but also towards others.

At the same time ‘the others’ do have their authorities as bestowed on them by laws & contracts. Thus the responsibility deficit enters the second sphere. This increases unresolved disputes, breaches of contracts & dishonored verdicts. This process inevitably leads to a situation in which somebody’s rights are encroached. Any authority either has to be redeemed by fulfillment of the corresponding responsibility, so that such authority will retain its ‘voluntary’ basis; OR the authority will have to be coercively imposed on somebody or the other. To the extent authorities become sustainable by coercion, the ‘power’ is required.  The non-violent character of ‘voluntary’ contracts is lost. Crimes breakout & they have to be repressed. Demand for State power increases.

The state power, instead of stopping crimes & implementing verdicts, starts imposing ‘redistribution’ of goods to the self-irresponsible, as well as those who are irresponsible to others, By way of offering bail-outs. The State thereby falsely redeems their responsibilities by bestowing undeserved remittances & grants. For this the State starts extorting the responsible because, qua state, it does not produce any good.

This path of appeasement may earn more popularity but in fact aggravates the problem of responsibility deficit as it rewards the irresponsible & punishes the responsible. Thus the State supposedly the lone protector from all extorters becomes the greatest extorter & the vicious circle continues towards totalitarianism.

Philosophical Blunders of Egalitarianism

What legitimizes the State for neglecting its proper function & usurping proper functions of civil society? The answer lies in the idea of justice of egalitarians who treat the ‘distribution pattern’ as just or unjust without bothering to see whether the incumbents on various point on the distribution ‘curve’ deserve the position or not!

Egalitarians simply assume that all misery is necessarily caused by injustice done by others & all wellbeing is necessarily caused by doing injustice to others. The truth of the matter can be expressed in following equations a) misery = misfortune + self-harming + mutual antagonism + injustice by others & b) Wellbeing = good fortune + self enhancing + mutual complementarity + injustice to others. 

Egalitarians deem any good fortune as if it were snatched away by the fortunate from the unfortunate. Fortuity is neither just nor unjust for it is not a human action at all. (It must be always remembered that fortuity is pertaining to all aspects of life & varies so much from aspect to aspect, in case of same individual, that it is impossible to fix general ranks or to classify individuals as plus/minus on its ‘axis’. Furthermore instead of ranking individuals on the fortuity axis, more often groups are ranked & internal differentiation within groups as well as overlaps amongst groups are overlooked.  )

 If the good fortunes are not ‘deserved as such’ by the fortunate, it does not imply that they are, therefore, deserved by ‘others’ either. The unfortunate deserve compassion but not a right of ‘justice’ to forcefully snatch away the fortunes from the fortunate.

 Politicians, bureaucrats, all the middlemen of ‘redistribution’ who indulge in ‘rent seeking’ for themselves &/or indulge in wastage of the resources to be ‘redistributed’

Indeed, on humanitarian grounds, the fortunate should be generous, compassionate & forgiving to the unfortunate. Responsibilitarianism of course upholds the supererogatory virtues without forgetting that they must flow voluntarily. Responsibilitarianism opposes convicting the fortunate for the crime of being fortunate & extorting them indiscriminately.

This is as far as fortuity goes. But blaming self-enhancers for the self-earned misery of the self-harmers, (or blaming those who achieve mutual complementarity for the self earned misery of those who indulge in mutual antagonism) is a perversion of justice. This idea of equality is nothing but, “Envy draped in a robe of compassion & usurping the chair of justice.”

Paternalism & Demagoguery

Indeed human individuals can fall prey to misjudgments & temptations but they can & do learn from their mistakes & also get expert advice. The State whose proper function is judicial & if necessary, that of enforcement, if called for by citizens qua aggrieved parties, starts deciding on its own as to what is good for its ‘subjects’ & force them to well behave. State invents victimless crimes & bans (which it can not actually implement  but diverts the ‘crime’ in the domain of underworld) them. Such parental stance is called paternalism.

Demagoguery is the misuse of the majority principle of democracy. The majority principle is for attaining maximum possible consent to the election of personnel for holding offices or such other decisions where principles of civil rights are not flouted. Any true democracy ought to be a liberal state & not totalitarianism. If majority principle is interpreted as that a majority has a right to forgo democracy itself, then it is not properly democratic. The rights of liberty must be above the popular opinion at a point in time. This is often called as constitutionalism.

Demagogues are the politicians who try to win over masses by offering them ‘free gifts’. Outright impossible promises are at least better in one sense. These are not to be implemented in any case. But there are promises that can be implemented by taxing others &/or flouting ‘fiscal discipline’. Unjust & ‘positive’ rights (i.e. rights of getting supplies or quotas or share in power) are instituted. Irregularities are ‘regularized’. Demagogues create ‘favor/loyalty’ relations with voters & vote banks. Democracy becomes a method of sharing maximum spoils with maximum people where demagogues make politics an office of profit. In the name of democratizing the market, democracy is marketized.

Collectivism:

Treating any set of individuals as a bearer of a common subject-hood is resorting to collectivism. Only single individual is a proper bearer of subject-hood. It is an individual who switches over to ‘mob mentality’ by misusing the anonymity of being one of a crowd. Mob is set of individuals bearing ‘mob-mentality’.

 Class, caste, gender, language, region, race, nationality or whatever variable that is used to define a set can be misused for resorting to collectivism. It obscures the differentiation & power relations within the set. This suits the vested interest of the powerful individuals within the set.

 Even a proper organization consciously formed by individuals & operating as a singular legal entity does not bear a common subject-hood. Finally it is the individuals that are held responsible, as per their roles, for whatever happens within or ‘to’ that organization. The organization proper (role specific) & the set of individuals engaged in that organization (irrespective of the roles) construed as a ‘collective’, are two different things. Bosses of a firm appeal to their subordinates, “We are one family”, in order to suppress discontent within the organization (as if family were less oppressive than a firm).

 Collective identity lures individuals to believe that whatever happens to any ‘member’ of the collective has happened to ‘them’. They unnecessarily take pride, shame or resentment coming in equal share & multiply the ‘case’ into the ‘case of all’. Within a collective there emerges an evil complementarity between evaders of self-responsibility with the paternalistic invaders of others’ responsibility.

 Collective always needs some external threat or enemy. Collectives project their ‘favorite’ enemy upon each other & convert the false claim of enmity into a self fulfilling prophecy. Collectivism is a tool for political manipulators on one hand & a psychological security cover for the evaders & the mediocre on the other. Advocates of collectivism often give a big cry that One’s individuality itself is socially constructed (hence not real in itself) & deny any self-making of individuality. Even if this claim is, for the sake of argument, held true, it can be answered that ‘the collectivist individuality’ that tries to refuse individuality is also a socially constructed fiction.

Collectivists often make a charge that the individualists treat individuals as atomistic & social organization as a heap of potatoes. Truth is exactly the opposite. Individualists seek to formulate the social ‘molecules’ in terms of actual bonds of ‘role-ions’. It is the collectivists who put a set of individuals into ‘bags’ of collective entities, all (supposedly) equal within the bag, like potatoes.

Collectivists seem to revere solidarity & sense of belonging. No individualist has recommended loneliness. Individualists want to build authentic mutuality & togetherness from within the minds of individuals & not an imposed allegiance or ownership by others. If one does not overcome the fear of loneliness one can not taste the bliss of solitude & it the bliss of solitude that one can hope for authentic togetherness.

Whatever may be the process of social decision making, it can not be other than some structure of connections between severally occurring decisions, in singular minds. Collective mind is a figure of speech at the best & monster of tyranny at the worst.

Responsibilitarianism is a continuing ideological battle, again & again re-awakening the sprit of Enlightenment. Dare to think! Throw away the self-earned-tutelage (Svayam-Arjit-Aashritataa).        

                       

Why not Pantheism rather than Atheism?

Spontaneous Optimism is Faith. Compelled Faith is degrading to humans and blasphemous to God.

No Optimist can supply sufficient evidence to support his position that, on the whole, future of Mankind is bright. (Counter-evidence is more conspicuous.) But all meaningful endeavors are meaningful under this presupposition. Statement of optimism could be, total Existence (matter-energy, consciousnesses, imaginations, contemplations are all included in ‘Existence’.) has an inherent net propensity of perpetually (may be with a few setbacks) moving towards the ‘Better’. (Does this lead to Ultimate perfection or the process would continue asymptotically? My position is in favor of asymptote.)  

Obviously, the ideas of ‘Good’ are certainly not concurrent. But I think they are somewhat convergent. As if it were, vector of the direction of Good for each of us will have some deviation from each other but not more than 90⁰ and certainly not diametrically opposite. (This may also be a part of my optimism.) Peace, Harmony, Justice, Health, Authentic Communication, Joy of Art, Complementarity with non-human Nature are a few items which will occur in almost everyone’s list. May be more convergence with richer lists will also be one implication of the propensity.

No doubt some individuals can sustain their optimism without involving the notion of God. Atheism is a valid philosophical choice. However Atheism is not the only valid choice. You don’t have to prove ‘objective existence’ of your dialogue-partner who enriches your mental and overall life. Ardent Atheists are completely missing the point when they make issue of God into a problem in validity of knowledge. 

God is not a proposed fact at all. He is the complementary pole of a particular set of attitudes towards life. Of course there are multiple notions of God and multiple attitudes invoked by them. Some of such attitudes are deplorable but some are commendable too. Critique of attitudes lies in the value-realm and has nothing to do with objectively provable existence of any entity. As Gabriel Marcel has suggested it is sufficient for God to exist only in ‘second person’ in inner dialogue. Atheists are sealing the dialogue with all Theists indiscriminately and unnecessarily confining themselves in ideological isolation which is detrimental to the laudable causes which some Atheists are pursuing.

Let us focus upon what makes Theism problematic, especially so for liberal perspective. We must identify those features of Theism which ought to be negated for Human Good. Amongst the Vices associated with Theism Divisiveness, Antagonism and Authoritarianism are strong ones and inaction, fatalism and escapism are the softer ones. It must be made clear as to which components in the notion of God are responsible for generating these vices. Before directly expounding Pan-Theism let us focus on the roots of vices associated with Non-Pan-Theisms. Let us call Non-Pan-Theisms as ‘Divisive-Theisms’ for reasons we will see immediately.

Divisive-Theisms divide Existence into Theos and Non-Theos, Divine and Mundane, Sacred and Profane, Chosen ones and Non-Chosen ones and of course, the Fidel and the Infidel. God has to be one! But his messengers are many. Each messenger’s version of God, God’s commands, as well as Name of God varies. There are significant mismatches between these. But one thing is common in Divisive-Theisms is that they demand unconditional allegiance by the followers. Still worse, the message also contains Laws for running society/ Government in ‘this world.’ In case of almost all Divisive-Theisms the commands of God also contain sanctions of Rewards and Punishments, in this world/this birth as well as threats and allurements about other worlds and/Or other births. God in Divisive-Theisms no more remains innocent dialogue partner of Gabriel Marcel but becomes sovereign dictator. Humans are basically sinners deserving to be tamed by God and his representatives. What comes to human lot are fear and guilt, to be ‘overcome’ by wars and tortures/ordeals! No wonder why many a Humanists become Atheists.

But still, the larger optimism which I mentioned earlier is captured by Divisive-Theisms because the God is unconditionally beneficent at least in the long run. God has rule-making power and also he can break his rules if he wishes to bestow his Grace upon the worshiper he finds more lovable. He has an unlimited forgiving nature and can respond to Prayers favorably unless it is the case of infidelity.

The Divisive-Theisms suffer from many logical flaws but a few of them are really devastating to their arguments. Omnipotence is a self-contradiction. Whatever you may be in a position to do you can not do otherwise simultaneously. God will need infinite number of universes to actualize his omnipotence! But ‘we’ are trapped in only one of them which need not be the best of them. Then comes the ultimate dilemma that how Omni-beneficence, Omnipotence and actual Suffering of creatures can all go together?

 Whether I believe in his existence or not, I would give up claim of omnipotence rather than the claim of beneficence. If God is good but not omnipotent he still remains worship-worthy. But if he is omnipotent and still makes his subjects suffer then he doesn’t remain worship-worthy. For me, His worship-worthiness is more important than his less than ‘Omni’-potence or non existence altogether. This is because 95% of my co-travelers on planet earth are dependant on his beneficence and not omnipotence. For worshipers it is the beneficence that keeps their optimism alive. The agents of God emphasize Omnipotence so that they can keep worshipers on ‘the right path.’

By mentioning 95%, I do not at all want to indicate that what majority thinks is right. Question is not right or wrong but the overwhelming fact that many of them are trapped in some or the other Divisive-Theism and you can not merely declare the trap as imagined, and then intellectually prove it and they will be liberated. Due to Atheists’ adherence to making the issue an issue of fact (true or false) is counter-productive. Theists’ emotional reaction to this is evasive or invasive but not communicative. An insurmountable schism has been built. This schism has insulated the dialogue between theists and atheists. The insulation ought to be removed in theological idiom as it is stuck on that side. Scientific idiom goes skew. The dialogue neither brings about convergence nor cordiality. Skew debates are repetitive as they do not find a common plane to cut each other.

Turning back to the ultimate dilemma that how Omni-beneficence, Omnipotence and actual Suffering of creatures can all go together? I repeat that forgoing worship-worthiness is out of question. Even the Divisive-Theisms covertly give up Omnipotence. The very fact that we can sin against his will is sufficient to prove that He is not omnipotent. Whether our sins are limited to those committed in ‘this’ life or accumulated through many earlier birth-lives is a secondary matter. Even if his subjects have earned their suffering, how could he let them do so?

Furthermore omnipotence is cascaded with Perfection which is more of a contradiction. Most of the Theisms also believe that God is an already perfect entity and hence they allow no room for him to become more and more near-perfect. Finally they have to answer that his functioning is beyond our cognitive ability or the evil and suffering that appears to us is a complete illusion, going to the extent that world is a hallucination suffered by God! In such case where is the basis for the optimism with which we started the discussion? Optimism about improvement of this world is replaced by optimism to permanently escape from this world and permanently joining the blissful abode.  

Now let us see how Pantheism is different and more amenable to reason and more accommodative than Divisive-Theisms. According to Pantheism there is nothing outside God. God doesn’t have an ‘outside’. As substance of all substances, he is pervading everything and as an emergent property of all emergent properties (divinity), He is encompassing everything. All dimensions like space time, substance, attribute, composite/component, concept and items subsumed under etc. are inside God. Of course the empirical events occurring in the dimensions are included as well.

Nothing is profane. Sacredness may not be equally distributed. There can be higher and lower degrees of sacredness but no room for the profane inside God. In Atheism the very category sacred/profane is discarded so nothing is sacred. But note that ‘everything is sacred’ is a positive note which is needed by worshipers. The main difference is that in pantheism there is unconditional inclusion of everybody inside God, irrespective of what he/she believes in or does not believe in. Nobody is worth eliminating on theological grounds. There is no devil and none is his agent. A pantheist crusade is inconceivable.

How evil does get accommodated in the Pantheist version of God? God has not achieved perfection. He has to evolve along with evolving matter-energy into life, pre-programmed creatures to self-programmable creatures, savage human to civilized human, unjust civilization to just civilization and so on. All his modicums (we are the most crucial of them at least for his project-Earth) are always at different stages of his evolution. By same token, all humans have not yet sufficiently learnt the art of doing thing in a good way and hence they have to do it in evil way. As long as evil has a function in life and it is not successfully replaced by good, evil will exist. 

But evil has no positive self-existence. It is a lack of good rather than something opposite of it. If and as we learn how to solve our problems without resorting to evil, God’s self perfection process is manifested through us. It is us, who can add into the Glory of God and Grace of God. Glory to the extent we materially progress and Grace to the extent we morally and spiritually upgrade ourselves. God is neither going to punish nor going to reward for simple reason that he does not want to fool himself. Keeping people manageable by threats and allurements is our society’s way of dealing. He can not be satisfied with inauthentic allegiance. He will deem his project successful only, if and when, it really is. Not a false show of it. His dream is that humans become good out of their own intrinsic value-judgment. Managers of societies can cheat worshipers in the name of God but nobody can cheat God. He is witnessing everything that goes on in our minds. We can trick ourselves but not Him. 

 He is undergoing our sufferings and enjoying our happiness as he is our Soul. But he inspires and suggests too. Whenever we find that we excel unbelievably, face agony courageously, help others without any consideration of return, we can be sure that it is manifestation of his Becoming.  In Pantheist version God ceases to be a goal to be achieved, Master to be pleased, Immortal Joy to get merged into. Pursuit is not for Advaita (Non-Dichotomy) for it is already there. It is upliftment that is to be achieved. If we do our part God will respond by unfolding new wonders. Saying by a human that I want to reach to God, it is as stupid as a cell in our body wanting to reach a body. It is already well-placed in it. isn’t it?  

Atheism does not divide people as Divisive-Theisms do. But Atheism lacks any transcendent appeal for uniting. Pantheism unites all of us to help each other in learning, pertaining to the stage one has reached. Earth may not be his only project. As he became matter-energy to be other than consciousness, he is evolving the other way round. He has got infinite patience. What he certainly does not want to do is imposition. We are free to contribute in his project but he will not reject us if we don’t. He is an appeal. He is the Hope. In our moments of intrinsic joy it is he who smiles. In our honest and sincere endeavor, it is Him who buttresses. Each one of us is His unique modicum of His universal essence. His essence is not full and final. It is Becoming.

The main point is that Pantheists can communicate with Divisive-Theists in theological idiom and bring about a change of heart. Atheists have made themselves irrelevant by taking the issue into an Epistemological diversion where the issue does not belong to.

Who are the main thinkers of Pantheism? On which points, do they converge and diverge? What are the technical terms? How the Issue of fortuity is handled? What in us continues after death and why? Are a few of many questions that need to be answered but this was an attempt to show that there can be a third way.             

Deflating the Enigma Associated with ENTROPY

(Fundas Master Vidyadhar Tilak has clarified my physics concepts which has helped this article)

       Entropy is introduced as a variable in Thermodynamics. Then its nature is declared by a value-loaded term ‘Disorder’. Then Second Law of thermodynamic is paraphrased as “Even when you manage to decrease entropy in your enclosure under consideration (enclosure is unnecessarily called ‘system’) it is only at the ‘cost’ of increasing entropy in the universe.” There is further news that Entropy involves Randomness. If Randomness is going to increase, human grip on causality will be loosened, one thinks. Pessimist philosophers rejoice the scientific news as a proof for their position. Engineers impressionistically remember that after drawing Pressure-Volume diagram there was a custom of also drawing a Temperature-Entropy diagram and if you follow the custom your Thermodynamics Papers are cleared and then you can permanently pass out from the little embarrassment that you have not understood it. You have never bothered to ask as to what are dimensions of Entropy in terms of length, mass and time. Entropy is not perceptible as temperature, pressure, volume etc are. There is no Entropy Meter instrument in our labs. It remains something far from ‘clear’ and much less ‘intuitive’.  

In all walks of life everyone accepts that

(Available form of) Energy expended = (Application form of) Energy reaped + Losses. 

This applies to materials too. You know that area of cloth gone in your garment is less than area of the cloth that you purchased, without maligning the bona fides of the tailor, because it is technically inevitable. Of course we know that energy and matter are (even if inter-convertible) never generated and never destroyed, they are conserved. All equations are based on this axiom.

Then what we mean by losses? It is none other than conversion into a form that we don’t value. When a sculpture is carved, the chips can be used as rubble for filling up say plinth. Value of chips is much lower than the value of the sculpture. But value of the Rock which was converted into Sculpture + Rubble was much less valuable than even rubble. So economically there is outright gain. No one ever despairs the fact that whole of the rock could not be converted into sculpture. Rubble is a loss as compared to sculpture. It is not wastage. Had sculpture been broken while finishing it, such event would count as wastage. Chipping out material is an integral part of carving, as constructive as retaining the material which constitutes the sculpture.

Suppose if I tell you, “The pigment that you put in water for coloring the water, gets dispersed into water. As it disperses it loses its coloring power which it would have had if it were not dispersed.”  How can I prove (or refute) my statement? Because we simply can not have it concentrated and disperse it too! We can not know its coloring power had it not been dispersed. But wait! We can color different volumes of water up to exactly same shade and see how much pigment it takes and see if the relation is linear or otherwise. Before going into Entropy with full throttle, let me simply mention that it has a lot to do with dispersal.  

‘Losses’ is very important variable not for physical but for economic considerations. Get maximum output in minimum input, is one of the dictums of engineering. Always remember that ‘input’ and ‘output’ are anthropocentric terms depending upon, what you are ready to forgo(cost) for what you want to get(price). In nature, without any cost-sensitive animal, there is neither any input nor any output. Cheetahs are cost sensitive. They mutely calculate how much to tire for a game and how much energy they would get by eating the game and probability of success in the game. Although Thermodynamics is more notorious for its losses, no process is loss-free.

To see the relation between losses and re-distribution, let us conduct a simple experiment.

There are devices called capacitors. It is two conducting plates divided by an insulating layer. If we push in electrons on one side it attracts holes (positive charge) on other. So it can store static electricity. As it goes on storing charge it develops an opposing voltage (electrons will try to repel each other, won’t they?). If you try to push beyond its capacity it explodes. Q = CV charge is capacitance into voltage built up.

Suppose we have one charged capacitor and one uncharged capacitor. We connect them together in parallel.

First let us find out energy available

The energy stored in the charged capacitor is
½(capacitance)(voltage²) = ½CV².
Now instead of using conservation of energy let us use conservation of charge because electrons can not escape out.

The initial voltage = charge/capacitance, V = Q/C.

charge conserved = Q

capacitance doubled = 2C

 voltage = charge/capacitance = Q/2C = ½V

The stored energy ½(capacitance)(voltage²) = ½(2C) (½V)² = ¼ CV².

Now the question is where the half of energy is gone? Answer is that we assumed no resistance in the circuit. This is never the case. When charge is transferred there is bound to be a flow of current (decreasing as equilibrium is reached) energy I²R is consumed in transfer.

This is an extreme example but makes clear as to what are the losses involved in re-distribution.  

The main point is that any re-distribution of energy does consume some energy even in electrical form which is the most efficient form. Heat is the worst form of energy and we will soon see why it is so.

Temperature is much analogous to ‘head’ in Hydraulics, ‘voltage’ in electricity, ‘force’ in mechanical systems at a gross level. Similarly, friction in mechanical processes is analogous to resistance in electrical circuit. Let us repeat the experiment above in conduction of heat. There are two identical cubes, made of very good heat conducting materials, insulated from the surroundings. One is initially heated up to 80⁰C. Another is heated up to 40⁰C and are joined fast with full surface pressing on each other. After letting some time while away, would we expect them to settle at 60⁰C? We would certainly not and rightly so as per observation as well as contemplation, for we have just seen that there is loss in re-distribution. Don’t jump to conclusion that Entropy can be simply countenanced as ‘resistance in heat transfer’.  This is because entropy does cause losses but all losses are not caused by it. Also its dimensions would have been same as that of ‘energy’. M (L/T)² because losses are in terms of energy, this however is not correct. It is a pure number like radians.

Now let us observe the curious thing that we call temperature and what it means at macro level and at micro level. In case of Thermodynamics the terms macro and micro have a particular meaning. Any thing or enclosure under consideration (unnecessarily called system which contributes to the enigma.) is at some temperature. One cube was at 80⁰C another at 40⁰C. There was certainly a potential difference and heat does move from higher to lower, but there was one more difference hidden in the thermodynamic entity

Temperature represents potential energy at macro (solid piece/enclosure) level but what constitutes Temperature at micro (molecules) level, is Kinetic energy viz. vibrations or collisions of molecules  

In case of capacitors in first example it was not an issue at all as to whether the charge and voltage were equally distributed within a single capacitor or not.

The macro entity (i.e. enclosure) contains in its turn, the holders and carriers of heat within itself and the energy in the enclosure is not equally distributed amongst the holder/carriers viz. molecules. It is precisely this difference that makes Thermodynamics less intelligible than other branches of physics (save nuclear physics).

How can we agree that molecules are vibrating or colliding with different amplitudes and velocities? Let us take example of evaporation of water at temperature much less than its boiling point. If all molecules of water at say 30⁰ C were vibrating with equal kinetic energies corresponding to the level of 30⁰ C, no molecule could have escaped the liquid state and merrily entered gaseous state. 

So there has to be a huge variation in the kinetic energies of the molecules. There is a further bad news that these energy levels are discrete rather than continuous. There is still worse news that distribution of number of molecules amongst the energy levels available at given macro temperatures is probabilistic. Which molecule will happen to be at a particular energy-level at a given point in time is not knowable. However, pattern and total energy (thank God) are knowable. All these breaking news were given by Boltzman who went on calculating Entropy at micro level.

But we are not going to get disheartened. Analogy is far better than mathematics when it comes to intelligibility and if possible perceptibility. Let us go for an altogether different ‘input’ and ‘output’. Suppose we are in a material packaging business. Batches of small uniform items are to be sent in containers requiring minimum volume. Customer is very kind to us in allowing whatever way the items are stacked. Had items been spheres they would have spontaneously conglomerated in minimal volume by sufficient percussions given to the containers. But unfortunately the items are cubes! If we stack very meticulously we can form big cubes of stack from small cubes, thus requiring lowest volume. Labor cost is too high to do this and customer’s workers are ready to pick up cubes from any configuration in which they come. So we can pour cubes in containers and let them form a heap wherein they are randomly oriented. Each container must carry fixed weight of cubes without any condition of array. We are least bothered about which corner of which cube will be touching (prick into) which surface of which cube! (They are tough.) So the volume required by each of our batch will be different. We will chose worst possible dis-array of maximum volume for designing our containers. Therefore almost all of our containers will be underutilized. However container cost is too low than the labor cost involved in meticulous array. Volume was our input and number of cubes delivered was our output. We are making losses in the input but still doing good business.

As we accepted dilution of our cubes similarly a Thermodynamic enclosure has to accept dilution of energy because of differential internal distribution. If more volume is allowed to the nasty molecules they have more opportunity for more differential internal distribution.  Now we have an explanation (and a scientific one) for the results of the Joined Conductors. When they were allowed to redistribute their internal energies, displayed lesser gross temperature than one would expect under the condition of conservation of energy.

By dilution of energy, the energy per se is not depleting but perhaps (as we shall see soon) its convertibility to mechanical work may reduce. It does reduce drastically which is one of the reasons why thermodynamic engines are in-efficient.

Before going into Entropy which is more differential internal distribution we must take into account another independent & important cause of the under-efficiency of thermodynamic engines.

If we take a thermodynamic enclosure for giving heat and taking out work (essence of the concept ‘engine’) we face a problem which we never face in case of electric motor or mechanical converter, say gear box. When we supply electricity to an electric motor no mass is put in or thrown out. No copper, no iron, no insulator, goes in or comes out of the motor. But the gross occupier of Thermodynamic enclosure which is called the working substance, has to be replaced en-mass in each cycle. For example the weakened steam that is thrown out of a steam engine contains lot of heat which is an outright loss. But this loss is very simple to understand than the dreaded Entropy.

Now we will consider what Boltzman did. Suppose there is a pair of dice, six surfaces marked by 1 to 6 dots. Drawing a 2 is only one possibility {1,1}. Drawing a 12 is also only one possibility {6,6}. But drawing a 7 can happen in six ways {1,6}, {2,5}, {3,4}, {4.3},{5.2},{6,1}. So there is a pattern of distribution derivable from number of dice and number of sides they have.

Like our heap of cubes the underutilization can be theoretically calculated by number of energy-levels available and number of molecules available. Boltzman  derived a dimensionless number (like radians in case of angle which is length upon length) and a Boltzman-Constant which made it into temperature. Co-efficient of differential internal distribution is Entropy and multiplied by temperature (varying instant to instant so calculus is involved) gives dimension of energy. We will skip the derivation for it will only further discourage us.

Let us assume that Boltzman was right mathematically. But Boltzman made a huge terminological goof by calling it co-efficient of Disorder(!) instead of Co-efficient of differential internal distribution. Suppose N molecules are colliding in volume V at temperature T. Then somehow we manage to double the volume. By using Boltzman equation we predict a temperature significantly less than T/2 and empirically verify it then where is the disorder? Why it is the case that at initial volume the molecules were behaving more orderly and in double volume they have qualitatively changed into more nasty molecules? The double volume could have been the initial volume. Accepted that work-extractability of a gas goes down more rapidly than linear proportion with volume. There are non-linearities in many functions in physics. If our macro-level calculations are coming right why we should be uneasy simply because a derivation did involve probability calculations?

Dis-order is a misnomer. Philosophers and ideologues are lurking around to latch on misnomers. In natural languages, disorder is read in context of health/wellbeing etc. Boltzman was after all a scientist. What the hell good philosophers were doing while Entropy ballooned scandalously?

Randomness is not always a liability. It has been the greatest asset in evolution. Had there been no random mutations in the genes where is the question as to, which will be eliminated and which will be retained (don’t call it Selected). Many possibilities are produced by Randomness. Some are good, some are bad and many are redundant. Is it not good to have some good possibilities than having no possibilities at all? Creativity in humans is possible due to possibilities in making new combinations. Constructive labor creates Order, out of what would look like disorder, after the product is made. If figurative use is allowed, (most of it is already figurative) evolution and human progress are Negentropic processes taking place in the same universe!

In physicists’ own derivation they call the hot conductor as system (enclosure) and its cooler partner as ‘environment’! Furthermore everything except what you take into consideration is pitched against it as Universe! How you are going to calculate the entropy of the Universe? Are you not overstepping the limited scope of science by bringing in the infinite? They also envisage a heat death of the universe when all temperatures will become equal. All stars including our Sun will be extinguished.  Who knows the process by which stars might be getting generated. Whatever that existed before big bang must be infinitely negentropic! Let us not indulge in speculative metaphysics any further.

Concentration of internal thermal energy is better than its dilution for its work-extractability is all that Entropy means. Is this always disadvantageous to humans?

Let us take Light as an example. Laser-Rays are made parallel and synchronized. This not only increases their burning power but also renders very precise and accurate human control over them. We know how easier and safe eye-operations are made possible owing to the advent of Laser technique. On the other end there lies diffused Light. What a huge and probabilistic calculation would be required to measure diffused-ness of light! Does that make diffused light useless? The reality is completely opposite. It is the diffused light that enables us to view in areas where direct and hot sunlight is not available. In fact what we generally mean by light is diffused light. Otherwise their would have been dazzling objects such that we would require sunglasses to look at them on the one hand and light up our torches in the darkest shadow. Indirect lighting is more comforting while designing interiors of houses. Output in case of light is not ‘work-done’ but soothing visibility. Output increases with ‘entropy’ of light!

Drip irrigation and spray irrigation is highly productive than flow irrigation in agriculture. Water is a scarce resource and plants are in fact harmed if subjected to too much irrigation. Even land gets saline due to over-irrigation. Probability of locating molecules correctly is high in case of flow irrigation than spray irrigation. ‘Entropy’ of water is more in spray than in flow. Water productivity increases with water ‘Entropy.’  People enjoying themselves in a garden or in a funfair are highly ‘Entropic’ than soldiers in a Parade.

When the unscientific concept of ‘Entropy as a bane’ ballooned, academicians started seeing Entropy everywhere. There came a thing called information entropy. They calculated probability of how many times an alphabet occurs in English. They defined the reciprocals of such alphabet probability as ‘information-content’! Why? Because a lesser likely news is more of a news! If lesser likely alphabet goes uncorrupted through your noisy channel you decreased the Entropy of information. I have never come across more of a misuse of the category ‘Form-Content’ than this.

As dE = dU + dW that is energy is equal to internal energy plus work done, they found an analogy in economics, Income = Expenditure + Savings and went on calculating economic Entropy.

The paradox viz. Temperature is potential energy at enclosure-level and Kinetic Energy at molecular level is particular to Heat. Unless you find such paradox you can not go on applying Entropy indiscriminately everywhere.

The Moral of the story is, “With dilution of insight ‘Entropy in usage of terms’ certainly increases.”       

ONCATEGORIES

(We can design Concepts but Categories are such that we have to Accept)

    [I am presenting my contributions to theory, philosophical or otherwise, under 

        the  label ‘my contributions’. I would like to get these articles appreciated as 

        well as  critically reviewed by lay-persons & experts too. If convinced I am 

        ready to modify my positions acknowledging the critics.]

        Perplexities, which can not be blamed upon ignorance, which persist in spite of knowledge, constitute the proper subject-matter of philosophy. Philosophy studies the nature of such perplexities & possible human attitudes that can be taken towards them. A coherent configuration of such attitudes forms a view of life. Various views of life compete with each other in the arena of philosophy, on the issues of better or worse coherence, on the correct & wrong reading of the nature of perplexities & whether a perplexity is genuinely philosophical or not.

Common people in any case do have views of life, but in a rather amorphous, unstable, scattered way. Competing views in the ‘philosophical arena’ offer more crystalline, stable & articulated options. No view emerges as a permanent winner & in the final analysis philosophical choice remains personal, though hopefully, with well clarified criteria & internal consistency.

Human consensus increases, if the participants of debate over any contended issue have taken steps towards their individual integrity. Primary ethic of genuine debate is, “If I allow myself a type of move in my justification, I ought to allow the same to my opponent”. Debate ensues because there are differences. Differences however can not generate a constructive debate unless those who differ in some respect, also at the same time, agree in some other respect. It is the ‘commonly agreed upon’ that constitutes the basis on which differences can be hopefully resolved.

In any negotiations it is the particular situation in which the negotiators find themselves that provides the common ground. Philosophical debates can not be left to any particular situation. Commonly held positions in philosophy must be such that anyone can not (honestly) deny & is convinced not due to any external pressure or interest but due to his/her inner source of ‘axiomatic intuitions’ which emerge in any human individual.

How can I dare to claim that there are ‘axiomatic intuitions’ available to any human individual in a way identical to any other human individual?

Establishing ‘categories’ or ‘dimensionalities’ by self-answering questions

Are there any basic categories or dimensionalities that human beings simply can not avoid or deny? If we are in a position to answer this question affirmatively, we can hope to get hold of a least common denominator, so to speak.

Do we have something opposite of the perplexities (that can not be univocally answered)? Let us start from the other end of the spectrum. There are in a sense ‘self-answering questions’. These are the questions that are raised about the very dimensionalities from which they emerge. They can not be properly ‘raised’ because they presuppose their answers. In a sense they are un-ask-able!  A list is given below. “What is difference?” For example uses grammatically an interrogative pronoun “what”. There are differences between “this” & “that” & therefore there can exist an interrogative pronoun “what”.

Existence of “what” presupposes existence of ‘difference’. Difference therefore can not be defined in some other terms than difference itself. Usually a definition having the same definiens (defining terms) as its definendum (term to be defined) is flawed one. In other words, ‘difference is difference’ is a blatant tautology. Yet it has to be accepted in order to say anything meaningful at all. Because there are differences, we have to ask “what is ‘this’ (rather than ‘that’)?” We can answer ‘what’ in some terms because there are similarities! Thus ‘difference & similarity’ becomes a necessary philosophical category or philosophical dimensionality.

 ‘Space’ (which is in its own way three dimensional but spatially alone!) is but one of them. A list of such self-answering & hence un-ask-able questions is given below

1)    What is difference? What is Similarity? Why items belong to types/classes? Why an item belonging to a sub-type automatically belongs to super-type too?

2)    Due to what, there is causation? What for there is purposefulness? What was the original cause? What is the final purpose?

3)    Where is space? How much big it is? How much smallest it can be? When to call it point & when to call it an occupier of a little space? Why space is retractable (at least in principle)?

4)    When did the time start? Why time goes on of its own & at a constant rate? When is it going to end? Why time is irreversible? How much small an interval that can be taken as a moment?

5)    From which substance, all substances are made up of? It is the set of attributes by which we can identify any item. Why we have to believe that there are substances which ‘have’ various attributes.

6)    Why are inconsistencies disturbing? Why logical self-contradictions are failures of logic? Why are mere tautologies redundant?

7)    Who is conscious of the consciousness? What is it, that can never become an object of consciousness while itself remaining a consciousness?

8)    ‘Who’ thinks ‘I exist’?

9)    Why I am not alone & why there are others? Why I owe anything to others & why others owe anything to me? Why I am responsible for my actions?

10)    Why promises are to be kept? & conventions to be followed? Why there should be any ‘should rules’? Why one should abide by them?

11)    Why happiness is sought & suffering is avoided? Why does everybody strive for achieving whatever?

12)    Why living is necessarily having value contrasts in terms of, like-dislike, well-being-ill-being, Pro-Anti, Eu-Mal, good-bad, & so on?

13)    Do we ‘deserve’ our fortunes & misfortunes?

14)    Why we simply can not consider the choices made by us as ‘fully caused’ without inserting ‘us’ as decisive causes?

15)    Why I am ‘the unique one’ whom I happen to be?

16)    As particularity increases the number of generalizations conjunctively describing it also increases. As uniqueness will require infinite generalizations it will be un-describable. How we still believe that there is uniqueness, without trying to catch it in as many generalizations as possible?

17)    Why I have to suppose that others have a consciousness similar to mine although I can not have a direct access to it or incumbency of it?

18)    Why naming can be arbitrary? Why grammar can not be arbitrary? How can signs represent, some things that are other than themselves? Even though they are not present (or even can not be present ostentatiously).

19)    Why wholes have some properties, which can not be attributed to their parts? Are there any parts, which are not wholes, in there own turn? (i.e. do not have further parts)

20)    What makes some features of an item essential to it & some other features as just accompanying ones? Are essences autonomous or depending upon the ‘relevance’ of such item to us?

21)    How can we get fully convinced of some (non-tautological) truths without judging a single case as verification or refutation? How is it that from such truths we can deduce some other truths which are verifiable or falsifiable?

22)    Why there are no algorithms for creative plunges?

23)    If individual consciousness ceases when body is destroyed, how we can say that there is a persistent structure of Human-Consciousness, irrespective of whatever contents the various individual-consciousnesses may have?

This list is not exhaustive. It is an attempt to demonstrate that there is a peculiar type of questions which presuppose an answer in the question itself & still they are not tautologies or contradictions. Such questions can not be ‘answered’ in external terms. However they themselves are the answers of a very pertinent question, viz. “why philosophy is required at all?

By constructing such type of questions we can grasp the categories/dimensionalities. Questions referring to self-same category are for establishing that category.

Furthermore if we try to construct questions going across the categories we generate outright nonsense. ‘When is Time?’ is un-ask-able question because it is self-answering. On the contrary a question ‘Where is Time?’ is outrageous! Appling ‘where’ to time is a category mistake. It is like saying, “I heard a blue sound.” “It occupied a heavier volume.” & so on.  ‘Cause of all causes’ is at least an arbitrary ending of an infinite regress on some line.

But ‘unconscious volition’ is a logical-contradiction whereas ‘unconscious urge’ is not. Similarly “where is consciousness?” is a profound category mistake. It presumes consciousness to be an occupier of Space as a ‘thing’ which is a legitimate occupier of space. This mistake has lead to supposing ‘soul’ as a substance (Dravya).  As we go on grasping categories, we can also identify category mistakes in which some philosophers might be indulging in.

An exercise similar to the one that we are engaging now was called ‘transcendental deduction’ by Kant. However the term transcendental is easily susceptible to be meant as ‘supra-realmic’ (PaarLoukik). Therefore I opted for ‘categorial contemplation’ as a safe term.

It is via unanswerable questions that we reach undeniable truths of Human Existence

A concept can subsume whatever is denoted by it. We can choose to use a concept or not to use it or reformulate it. Categories have to be used whether we want it or not. Categories subsume aspects of existence that are neither avoidable nor inter-reducible. However they are not unrelated to each other simply because they are dimensionalities of same existence.  

Fair Prices OR Fair Process of Exchange?

  

        [I am presenting my contributions to theory, philosophical or otherwise, under 

        the  label ‘my contributions’. I would like to get these articles appreciated as 

        well as  critically reviewed by lay-persons & experts too. If convinced I am 

        ready to modify my positions acknowledging the critics.]

One extreme position about this is, any exchange is fair as long as it is truly a voluntary one; regardless of the proportions of the values exchanged. Another extreme position is that an exchange can not be fair if the things that are exchanged are not exactly equivalent i.e. of exactly same ‘exchange value’.

The condition of being voluntary is necessary but does not seem to be sufficient one. It is necessary because forced exchange is already an injustice irrespective of the degree of non-equivalence in the exchanged goods. It does not seem reasonable however that no heed ought to be paid to the values and the difference between the values.

Before formulating reasonable conditions of fair exchange we must also observe that, the condition that is posed by the other extreme position namely that of exact equivalence seems to be an unnecessary one. Divisions of Labor and Exchange (in some form or the other) are phenomena that are essential to human civilization as such. We have always been exchanging things and progressing through exchange. It would have been impossible if everyone had waited until she finds an exactly equivalent offer.

So what are the conditions under which we can say that an exchange is fair? I am suggesting the following answer that the conditions that can be reasonably expected by the parties that are entering into actual transaction and anyone having the ‘sense of fairness’ would also feel convinced that transaction could be called a ‘fair’ one.

1)    Both partners enter into it voluntarily i.e. without being threatened by a threat that is other than, “what if the offers in the transaction are withdrawn.” i.e. “what if transaction does not materialize.”

2)    Both partners feel that it is better to take in return than to make their demanded things all by themselves singularly or in other words exchange is better than self-reliance.

3)    As an explicated paraphrase of point no.2, both partners should feel that the algebraic sum of negative utilities incurred in producing the thing to be given and positive utilizes gained from the thing that they are going to get in return, is positive (benefit>cost) to both sides.

4)    Both partners should feel that they are entering into the transaction with the best offer within the available offers at the time of the transaction and that multiple possibilities are actually available to make such comparison.

5)    Both partners should feel that whatever that was promised by the other vide her offer, would actually be delivered as promised.

The point is that it is not a necessary condition that the exchanged goods have to be of exactly or even nearly of same value, for a transaction to be fair. If I am getting benefited sufficiently I have no reason to be spiteful about the case that the other got more benefited. What we actually need is a mutual super-valence and not equivalence.

It should also be noted that even if we insist upon equivalence that does not at all ensure Equality. Suppose by some political system only such exchanges are allowed which are exactly, or at least nearly, equivalent and therefore will be equivalent within itself. But we do not know as to how many and how big transactions are made by each citizen.

The pairs who enter into more transactions and bigger transactions will become much richer than the pairs making less number of transactions and smaller ones. If we want to make the citizens equal we (here this is the royal ‘we’ namely the State) will have to distort the equivalences of the transactions in such a way that benefits incurred by each citizen are equal. We simply can not have Equality and Equivalence at the same time.

Thus the Equivalence is neither useful in bringing about Equality nor necessary for transactions to be Fair. If the authenticity of consent is doubtful or any of the five conditions are not fulfilled then the exchange might be exploitative.

However there are some egalitarians who believe that only equal (equivalent) exchanges would ensure equality.

Now the question arises as to how are we going to determine the degrees of contributions, before we judge whether they turn out to be ‘over’ or ‘under’ with respect to the receipts of value? Is there any method of merit-rating by third-party and dispassionate observer who has, at her service, a standard conversion table, agreed by all concerned?

We can intuitively make some statements for example, the Music-composer’s contribution is more than that of a mere performer who, of course very skillfully plays or sings the notation given by the composer. Even the negative utilities borne while working can be so judged. One can confidently say that a heavy vehicle driver’s job is more strenuous when she drives on two lanes high-way without any road divider, as compared to the driver on a six-lane highway with a wide, tall and sturdy road divider.

First, such ‘uncontroversial’ statements can not be made, about all jobs. Second, such statements are ordinal and not cardinal, that is to say that when we say ‘certainly more strenuous’ we can not say ‘exactly, say 3.7 times strenuous’. It can not be conceived that a consensus algorithm of merit rating can ever exist. For one thing is sure that labor required in evaluating labor should not be more than the labor to be evaluated because all contributors will lose their entire wage in paying for the evaluators’ wages and further, who is going to evaluate the evaluator’s wages?!

There is another problem too. Let us assume that we have somehow worked out relative merit rating of all the employees within a firm and also somehow determined  how much share in value-added should go to labor. The question remains as to whether the value appropriated at the firm (which is empirically available) was entirely generated in the firm or partly or fully generated in an ‘exploited firm’ or had been partly or fully sucked out by some ‘exploiter-firm’? This bring us to the question of whether the output-prices got by the firm and input-prices it had to pay to other firms, were ‘Fair’ or otherwise? So let us turn to the curiosum called ‘Fair Prices’.

Can We Objectively Derive a Configuration of Non-Exploitative Prices? 

            

The Statist socialism assumes that ‘Just distribution’ can be calculated objectively and then it remains an issue of political will to implement it. Why State would have such political will is rather mysterious. However assuming that such ‘will’ can exist and also can retain the power to execute itself, we must ask, whether it is at all possible, without referring to the subjective preferences of economic actors, to arrive at justice-rendering prices by using objective data which is available, pertaining to technical ratios of various inputs and outputs, in physical terms?  

In an attempt to derive price on the basis of production cost, along with the set of quantities of various inputs, we have to use set of prices/unit (rates) of each input. Now the question is, should all these datum-prices of inputs should be deemed as ‘fair’ or not? If we claim that they are ‘fair’ we have to prove that separately. This gets us back to square one. If we do not claim so then the computed cost itself could not be assumed as fair.

Now let us turn our attention to the list of quantities of inputs. The question is that whether these quantities were those which actually got expended in a particular case or these quantities are those which should be reasonably required and hence allowable? Due to ignorance or laxity (or indifference if she was getting it for free) the producer could have wastefully consumed the inputs. It would then be unfair to the customer if she gets taxed on account of the unnecessary overages allowed by the producer. Thus the question again becomes a normative one. What is the ‘fair’ efficiency at which the producer ought to perform? Suppose we agree (amongst whom?) upon standard technical ratios of physical inputs. Still the problem remains far from being solved.

Whatever standard technical ratios are assumed for all the physical inputs (miles per gallon, bytes/millisecond, plants/liter, etc), their conversion depends on the ‘factor-inputs’ namely labor and capital. We now have to normatively agree upon a ‘fair’ capital cost and a ‘fair’ labor cost. Let us analyze labor cost in detail as it is more relevant to the main theme i.e. Exploitation.

Per unit labor-cost of a product is a function of four variables.

1. How much units of ‘employment-time’ is required for producing one unit  

    of the product?

2. What is the wage rate/unit-time?

3. What is the work intensity at which the worker is made to work in terms  

    of ‘exertion’/ unit time (of employment)?

4. Productivity of the process used by the worker in terms of physical unit  

    output/workload required. For example surface area to be painted/ per   

    standard-exertion-time units, is the productivity of the process of painting.

For this we have to have a huge standard-table which converts drudgery and other negative utilities involved in every work element into allowable deployment time to perform each element which gives, in ‘weighted’ time units for the ‘fair’-exertion Say spray painting will be more productive than painting by a brush. Now the formula for per unit labor cost is

                                            Employment-Time x Wage-Rate

       Labor cost per unit =   -----------------------------------------

                                            Work-Intensity x Process-Productivity

The interesting part is that the same labor-cost/unit can be achieved by many combinations of the four variables. For example a combination of high Wage-Rate and high Process-Productivity with low Employment-Time and low Work-Intensity is most favorable to the worker in the employment.

To the contrary, low productivity, high work-intensity and low wage-rate will be the most adverse condition for the worker. Thus even if we agree upon a fair-labor-cost/unit, the degree of exploitation of labor (or reverse exploitation in some cases) remains fully open, in other words, indeterminate.

Further, even if we somehow ensure that all firms are getting ‘fair-prices’ and eliminate the issue of firm to firm exploitation from the argument, the question arises as to how much the workers in the firm can claim their share in the process-productivity of the firm. In fact one cause of higher process-productivity is the capital-intensity of the firm.

If all the credit of higher value-added is attributed to the capital intensity, then in fact workers in the firm lose their contributory claim over the value added. But even this can not be made into a general rule because many a process-improving innovations do not require augmentation in capital intensity. The credit of innovation can not be claimed by all workers in the firm or even perhaps none of them as it might have come from an outside consultant as well.

Let us assume, for the sake of argument that we somehow politically achieve the goal of labor to labor equality so that wage rates and work-intensities are identical for all products. Process-productivities, however, are in heterogeneous physical units. How to compare them with each other? For the same pair of output/input we can compare process productivities before and after an innovation. But how can we quantitatively compare input/output ratios of heterogeneous pairs? Kilometers/liter, megabytes/second, irrigation water/acre, electrical transmission/kg of copper, Pesticides required/unit crop (before and after ‘GE seeds’) and so on.

Comparing physically heterogeneous ratios has to be in terms of utility to humans and that is precisely the curious thing called ‘price’. Although the price-tag is attached to commodities the price is not, really speaking an attribute of commodities but of people. Price represents a set of proportions, of other goods that buyers are ready to forgo against the thing they buy. So we are again back to square-one.

The other significant factor namely capital is no less complicated. Rates of interest or profit are in terms of money/capital duration. The capital that is recycled fast can go through many turnovers in one year. Long term capital has different rate of its recovery. A very doubtful and controversial component of capital-cost is depreciation. Normatively allowed (by tax authorities) rates of depreciation and rates of actual wearing out of capital goods are too much divergent.

In case of capital there are speculative investors or steady investors. From all this, computing capital-cost/unit of a commodity, is really challenging. Again the question remains as to whether the capital was diligently utilized or otherwise. Even in a doctrinaire socialist calculation, where capital is taken as non-contributive, the question of effective utilization of resources can not be disregarded all together. At rate of profit as zero all degrees of utilization get multiplied by zero. Thus the question of diligent utilization gets eliminated from calculation but remains very much affecting in practice.

There is a dilemma involved in the very idea of computing ‘fair’ prices based on cost of production. If stipulated prices are proportional to cost incurred, what incentive is left to producers to minimize cost? How the so inflated prices will remain affordable to the customers? On the other hand, if we stipulate incentives for cost saving, what are we doing something radically different than market?

Let us now ponder over the possibility of need-based conception of ‘fair’ prices. This involves political decisions or policies, which sets a preference order of various needs as per the idea of ‘good of all’. Obvious choice, in context of Equality would be that, the basic needs should get highest weightage. If higher weightage corresponds to higher price then the goods that satiate basic needs will become highly priced. This is obviously harmful to the lower income strata. This means that higher weightage should imply lower prices. If prices of basic-need-goods are kept as low as possible, this will de-motivate the producers of the basic-need-goods. This will cause lowering of the production of basic-need-goods. If prices remain low but goods are actually not available, it harms the lower strata more intensely. (This typically happened in Soviet Union.) Therefore State can not go on protecting the consumers’ interests at the cost of producers’ interests. It is an act of balancing the interests of both parties that is required.

Price affects the income of some party in one way but it, at the same time, can not but affect the expenditure of the other party in exactly reverse way. Every income is composed of some expenditure by some others and by same logic; any expenditure goes into the income of some others.

There have been very tedious efforts made by economists to solve this problem. Suppose N numbers of commodities are being produced, each requires other commodities as inputs in some quantities. (the non required ones can be assigned their quantities as zero) A huge matrix is constructed by assigning all physical ratios. To find out N unknown variables you require N simultaneous equations. But we have at least N+2 unknowns including labor-cost and capital cost. As we saw earlier that one variable of labor cost contains four more unknown factors. Similarly capital too will have its internal unknowns. Thus as there are far too many variables than the number of simultaneous equations that can be conceivably constructed, let alone being actually constructed, Problem of Deriving Fair-Prices is unsolvable.  

[note: The impossibility of deriving predetermined fair-prices is a daunting problem faced by egalitarianism. But it must be noted that if anyone is professing any sort of artificial Meritocracy will also face the same problem. Thus it is not possible to impose either equality or Meritocracy from above.] 

We failed in our effort of constructing price determining tool because we avoided the very domain in which prices actually get determined, namely the Subjectivities of the Economic Actors.

But then another question arises. If the subjectivities are brought in, will it not be succumbing to relativism and hence lose hope of coming to some objective criteria of fairness?

No. We can and we shall spell out objective criteria by defining the sorts of ‘inter-subjectivities’ involved by shifting our focus from fairness of the outcomes to fairness of the Process.