Just For Fun
….. but once you come to the intelligence,
Farewell nature! Farewell life!
Intelligence is assumed to be what it is
“for no particular reason,
for the fun of the thing.”
As if it did not also correspond to vital needs!
Its original business is to resolve problems
similar to those resolved by instinct,
though indeed by a very different method
which insures progress
and which cannot be applied unless it be,
in theory, completely independent of nature.
But this independence is limited in fact:
it ceases at the exact moment when
intelligence would defeat its own object
by injuring some vital interest.
intelligence is then inevitably kept under observation
by instinct, or rather by life,
the common origin of instinct
and intelligence.
— excerpt The Two Sources of Morality and Religion
By Henri Bergson pg. 163
I remember as a kid from time to time I and my friends while having adventures would do something “just for fun.” It was as if a feat of daring were conceived out of thin air, attempted just for the adrenaline rush of the attempt. Climbing up a fissure at a rock quarry comes to mind. The focus of our attention had nothing to do with anything in our previous experience. And the activity had no purpose other than rush of excitement.
Reading the words quoted from Bergson I had to acknowledge that he is right as to the primacy which we give to reason as the hallmark of what it means to be human. No other mammal uses language, which gives human reason enormous powers of intelligence through the manipulation of symbols. Bergson suggests that we flatter ourselves to think that reason is “just for fun” a serendipitous feature which we certainly take credit for.
Bergson asserts that reason like all other capabilities of an organism is aimed at survival, the continuation of the species. If instinct has been superseded by reason, reason is also a dangerous faculty, secondary to instinct which is life’s primary adaptive interface with its environment.
It is possible for intelligence to defeat life’s vital interest. The record of human history is a sorry account of man’s inability to recognize his limits and thus suffer a disastrous consequence. Hunter-gatherers organize themselves into farming villages, into cities, and cities become empires which disintegrate into fire and blood.
Bergson mentions the independence of reason, which has never been more true than today, — with the ubiquity of information in a globalized world.
There is something comforting in the thought that life and instinct keeps watch over reason, which is not a primary defining feature, separating humanity from the rest of Nature.
Who has not wanted to do something “just for fun” something so outrageous as to be unforgettable? And that is, …. just our problem.
Are we not well served by asking what does life require of us? What is instinct trying to tell us about the survival of all life?
3 thoughts on “Just For Fun”
I understand (or at least I believe I understand) the underlying intent of Bergson’s words. In some respects I agree that we have shut the door to our intuitive selves, replacing it with a pseudo-intellectual, self perceived rationality. I also see that many folks have allowed a baser nature to emerge that is tied to our ancestral reactions to an environment that no longer exists, yet we act as if it does. Trump supporters do not embrace the rational or the intellectual side of the mind, but instead allow the ancient emotions of xenophobia and paranoia to run rampant. This reaction is just as relevant with regard to an instinctual nature as is the argument made by Bergson. My sense is that humanity’s path forward must be a combination of our intellect and our intuitive nature, much like Gregory Bateson suggests in his treaties about the ecology of the mind.
Clearly fear, and an allegiance to a great leader/father figure who allays the fear that things are falling apart is nothing but primal. As a rational as this is, the intelligence provides rationalization, plausible stories for the supporters, to share among themselves and to defend against counter arguments. Bergson observes that the reason/intelligence serves the survival of the species just as does instinct.
Both reason and instinct are tools and as with any tool these highly adaptive characteristics of the mind can be used in a positive manner or for destructive and self-serving purposes. Each time we use these tools, we must ask ourselves if we are using them for the betterment of all or the aggrandizement of the one. Every single one of us does both, but it comes down to a matter of degree and the mindful understanding over how reason and instinct are used and why.