jwilzewske: philosophy of religion

Showing posts with label philosophy of religion. Show all posts

Saturday, October 11, 2008

Econometrics and the Separation of Music and State

B elieving with you that [Music] is a matter which lies solely between man and his God, ... and that the legislative powers of government reach action only and not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should make no law respecting an establishment of [Music], or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, thus building a wall of separation between [Music] and State.”
— Thomas Jefferson, letter, 01-JAN-1802.

The case of independence between music and state is often considered as being an ideal towards which all societies should aim. Social scientists of music have long anticipated the gradual separation of music from state as one of the predictions of the well-known secularization theory. But independence appears to be far from being the norm in the world today, however. In the U.S. it is not clear how the First Amendment should apply to the separation of Music and State.

It is common for states to fund the provision of some musical goods and to exert influence on musical practices, such that a surprisingly small proportion of countries in the world have fully achieved independence of Music from State. Alarmingly, lawless cooptation of music by political parties—in political contests in which the state itself does not participate—is also increasingly common. “Get Off My Lawn” McCain and “Barracuda” Palin, for example, have belligerently refused to cease and desist from playing certain music for promotional purposes at rallies and campaign events without consent and without paying any fees or royalties, thereby flouting the property rights, financial interests, and wishes of the composers and copyright holders of that music (for example, Ann & Nancy Wilson (Heart), Chuck Berry, John Hall, Jackson Browne, John Mellencamp, Tom Scholz, ABBA, and their respective publishers/record companies). Illegal behavior like this by elected officials is beyond appalling.

Some form of state influence or control over the provision of musical goods is typical in traditional societies. By contrast, state ‘control’ of the music is relatively uncommon in modern times. In the ancient world, musical institutions were typically subordinated and controlled by the state or by clerical authorities. In some societies, the ruler was also the musical leader, as was the case for gamelan music in Indonesian states. The ruler’s control of music has also been the norm among tribal societies throughout the world.

The Arts and State are arguably the two most important social institutions created by humankind. Not surprisingly, therefore, the history of their relationship has been stormy, ranging from cooperation to conflict. It would be desirable to develop a quantitative econometric model that accounts the relationship from an economic perspective. Such a model would answer the question as to what role does Music play in supporting the ability of the sovereign to extract resources from the people through taxation? The idea that Music, through its motivations (or ‘doctrine’ inducing citizens’ beliefs and actions) can facilitate this function of the State is an inchoate one, underlying both ancient and modern civilizations but never stated outright.

A proper model might posit two avenues by which an alliance with Music benefits the State. The first is the [Marxian] notion that musical goods pacify the populace, allowing the state to extract more resources before citizens reach the threshold of revolt. The second is the fact that citizens pay taxes more willingly (i.e., tax evasion declines) when the State is seen as musico-motivationally more legitimate.

This second avenue that potentially makes state control of music—i.e., the establishment of a State-funded Music or, conversely, the indirect repression of certain music—desirable. The reason is that an independent Music serves the pacifying function without the need for distortionary tax financing. If this were Music’s only function vis-à-vis the State, an independent Music would be optimal. However, an independent Music will not provide the sovereign’s ideal level of legitimacy. As a result, it may pay the sovereign to seize control of Music, even at the cost of having to finance it out of taxes, in order to maximize the State’s net gain.

A crucial factor in this decision is the nature of musical doctrine—that is, how favorable or unfavorable is musical teaching toward the State? The more favorable is the music’s doctrine, the more likely it is that the State will benefit by taking control of music. In contrast, when Music is regarded by the State as antagonistic to its power over the populace, the State may act to suppress Music.

A useful consequence of the model would be to better define the nature of musical doctrine. This poses a significant challenge, since Music and music organizations are complex, and distinct institutions, the former being a collection of “texts” and “teachings” aimed at illuminating the mysteries of the universe and humankind’s place in it, and the latter being the organizational structure supposedly established to inculcate and spread those teachings. Music doctrine therefore must be comprised of a constellation of rules and ideas that reflect an amalgam of practical considerations and genuine “revelations,” and any attempt to explain them as originating from a single decision maker or as the product of a single econometric ‘objective function’ is unrealistic.

One possible model is a direct adaptation of one developed by Brennan and Buchanan (2006), and extended by Wintrobe (2000), in which a self-interested sovereign maximizes the surplus of taxes over spending on a public good. To keep the model simple, we only consider spending on a “musical good,” either by the State (in the case of a State-run Music), or the musical community (in the case of an independent Music). The basic conclusions of the model would not be affected if the state also provided a public good.

In the model, the representative citizen has a utility function given by:

U = x + v(q), (1)

where x is composite consumption, and q is the quantity of a musical good, where v' > 0, v˝ < 0. The musical good consists of those services typically provided by Music. The citizen is endowed with wealth of E, an amount T of which the government confiscates in taxes. The citizen therefore has after-tax wealth of, E–T, which he or she can spend on x and, in the case of an independent Music, on musical goods.

Tax collection is costly to the government because of resistance by citizens to having their property confiscated. We capture this by assuming that a fraction δ of each tax dollar collected must be spent on enforcement. This cost will tend to be lower, however, as the government is seen as being more legitimate. As noted, musical spending can potentially provide this legitimacy, for example by proclaiming that the sovereign is divinely inspired (or is himself a classical music prodigy or rock-star). We thus write δ = δ(λq), where λ is a parameter that reflects the extent to which musical goods convey legitimacy, δ' < 0.

W e do not restrict λ a priori in magnitude or sign; λ > 0 means that Music legitimizes the State, λ = 0 means that music is neutral regarding the state, and λ < 0 means that Music de-legitimizes the State (e.g., incites resistance). Thus, we assume that for q > 0, δ —> 0 as λ —> +∞ and δ —> 1 as λ —> -∞. We also assume that δ(0) ≡ δ₀, where 0 < δ₀ < 1. The objective for the State is to maximize tax revenues net of enforcement costs and, in the case of a State-run Music, the cost of the music good.

Over the range where λ < λ₂, the State suppresses Music (that is, takes over Music and sets q = 0). Here, the de-legitimizing effects of Music are so detrimental to the state (or political parties) that the State (or political parties) finds it advantageous to eliminate Music altogether (or to curtail music spending, or to refuse to seek consents or pay royalties, or to embroil music rights-holders in ruinously expensive litigation).

It cannot be disputed that throughout history that there have been cases where Music has manifested motives other than beneficence toward its public. So a proper econometric model of Music and the State ought also to examine the implications of allowing independent Music to act in a self-interested manner; specifically, to maximize profit to the detriment of the public and the State.

Let π be the profits earned by a hypothetical ‘non-beneficent’ Music, where π > 0. That is, R - c(q*) = π or R = c(q*) + π. Solving for T yields the citizen’s tax payment:

T = E + v(q*) – c(q*) – π - U , (2)

and the corresponding return to the State:

V₂(q*, π) = [E + v(q*) – c(q*) – π – U] (1 – δ(λq*)). (3)

Higher values of π reflect a stronger Music in the sense that a stronger Music can extract a larger share of the citizen’s total ability to pay. (So π is bounded above by E – v(q*) – c(q*) - U, the point at which T = 0.)

Consider how an econometric model can show the relationship between independent and State-run Music. As π gets larger, the less desirable independent music is from the State’s perspective. Figure 1 summarizes the various regions where each of the three regimes dominates, depending on the political content of music doctrine (λ) and the degree of music power (π). As the diagram reveals, an independent Music occupies a region where doctrine is neither too overtly favorable nor too detrimental to the state, and where the Music’s power is limited.

In an economic downturn such as the one that’s presently upon us, the private economy makes a truly independent Music less and less viable. Circumstances like these foster a larger role for governments and public-sector econometrics, augment Music’s vulnerability to political ideology, and make stewardship of Music as a pluralistic public good more vital than ever.

T homas Mann often spoke in the face of would-be synthesizers. They were prophets who foretold that there would eventually be a gathering of the separate forces, a centering and synthesis among the world’s legal systems and the religions. People like Mann instead contended that the world has many centers. There is no single organon, encyclopedia, summa, canon, legal code, or synthesis available to and accepted by all the people or all the peoples. Ours turned out to be a century when science propounded the indeterminacy principle and chaos theory. Indeterminacy rules religion and law when they interact... No single symbol system unites the arts or makes them intelligible to all... This decentered and decentering scene demands attention.”
— Stephen Feldman, Law & Religion, p. 26.

Sunday, December 16, 2007

Francis Pott Beyond the Angle of Repose: Feeling Unreal, amidst Clouds of Unknowing

A nd therefore lift up thy head with a blind stirring of love; For if it begin here, it shall last without end.”
— Psalm 90.

T he] first performance of The Cloud was attended by some who had been caught up in the tragic events of ‘07/07’ [terrorist bombing in London]. While it is mistaken to view the music as a reaction to that event, which its completion predated, such happenings offer melancholy confirmation of an enduring darkness at the heart of man, and of his capacity for acts of atrocity alongside selfless heroism. For as long as mankind continues to crucify its messengers of peace, it will fail to see the means of salvation which may always have lain in its own hands. Notwithstanding those who would decry bailing out humanity’s sinking ship through the exercise of artistic expression, the contemporary individual spared terror and suffering at first hand can neither turn away nor remain immune to words written by a surviving Polish Second War poet, Jerzy Ficowski, which resonate still as our world attempts today and tomorrow to rise above the mortal tide of its own suffering:

‘ I did not manage to save
  A single life
  I did not know how to stop
  A single bullet…
  I run
  To help where no one called
  To rescue after the event
  I want to be on time
  Even if I am too late.’

[Tr. by Keith Bosley, Krystyna Wandycz]”
  — Francis Pott, Cloud of Unknowing, Program Notes.

D edicated ‘to Margaret Hassan and all innocent lives lost in Iraq or beyond’, Pott’s monumental, eloquent take on senseless violence and shameful hypocrisy offers a shield to the spirit against those who would destroy it. Unmissable.”
— Andrew Stewart, ClassicFM Magazine, SEP-2007.

O ne sometimes writes, hyperbolically, of a performance moving one to tears. But at the end of Francis Pott’s ‘The Cloud of Unknowing’, genuine tears were shed. …A heartfelt plea for reconciliation and tolerance is very much the theme of Pott’s oratorio. But the work is far from being simplistic peace propaganda. The [50-year-old] composer draws his texts from the psalms, war poets, Blake and other visionary writers, and a mystical mediaeval tract. These are arranged in such a way that mankind's instinctive tendency to lash out at enemies or perceived enemies is continually, and often ironically, contrasted with individual man’s capacity for heroism and self-sacrifice, as epitomised by the Crucifixion.”
— Richard Morrison, The Times, MAY-2005.

I listened yesterday to Andrew Imbrie’s ‘Angle of Repose’, his famous choral work based on Wallace Stegner’s Pulitzer Prize-winning religious novel of the same name. And then, oddly enough, my iPod’s random shuffle served up Francis Pott’s ‘Cloud of Unknowing’.

In physics, the ‘angle of repose’ is a phrase denoting the angle or slant at which objects on an inclined plane cease to slide downward and instead come to rest and are stable at rest—the point at which the gravitational force urging them downward is offset by friction and mutual cohesion. The emphasis Imbrie places on the ‘angle’ concept in his religious choral work implies that the doxastic ‘angle of repose’ is not hospitable to growth of belief but is instead a concept of loss or curtailment or restriction. According to Imbrie, faith becomes less significant and less conventional as we move to that angle of stillness where the aporias of the human condition and immanent evil in the world stand in contrast to the notion of a beneficent God.

Some related philosophy-of-religion questions arise:

Can faith flourish if (through a person’s choices or through a chain of events not of the person’s choosing— ) it reaches a cognitive angle of repose? Can faith (or, for that matter, knowledge) grow if it’s tenuously positioned precisely at the angle of repose? Is there beauty and value in a windswept dwarf tree that clings to a cliff—or must we always prefer a farmer’s exclusionary concept of beauty-as-prolific-production, or an investor’s—one who values only perpetually greater and greater returns, alpha without end?
Conversely, is faith genuine if the minimum angle at which movement occurs is artificially increased by pouring a cement of church dogma on the surface of belief? What authenticity can faith have if you stay always in the flatland, far away from slopes and cliffs, and never venture into steep regions where the pitch of the epistemological terrain exceeds the angle of repose?

In medieval times, the text known as ‘The Cloud of Unknowing’ was meant to serve as a guide to the contemplation of God’s goodness—in a world obviously filled with suffering and evil. By contrast to the historical meditative purpose of ‘Cloud’, Francis Pott uses the text in his commission for the Vasari Singers to provide a withering critique of humanity’s heart of darkness. Pott’s ‘Cloud’ is an unrelenting 88-minute essay on a world riddled by dominionist, fundamentalist ideologies—Christian, Islamist, free-market capitalist.

Vasari Ensemble, photo by Canetty-Clarke

The libretto culminates in a brutal, ironic juxtaposition of ‘The Lord is on our side’ and Psalm 137:9——‘Blessed are they that taketh their children and dasheth the little ones against the stones’——while the tenor soloist futilely again and again tolls ‘The dead are all on the same side’, a line by the French WWI poet, René Arcos. We are way beyond any tenable religious angle of repose here. This is free-fall.

Particularly menacing in [Potts’ ‘Cloud of Unknowing’] fantastical design is ‘Is this He that was transfigured?’, an amorphous musical space that might have been filled by Arvo Pärt just as readily, or perhaps even Herbert Howells. In fact, it is the calculated exploitation of that most indispensable of musical building blocks – absolute silence – that fixes these choral and solo events together so utterly convincingly. The choir is never more stirring than in ‘In one little time may heaven be won and lost’, a chilling yet strangely conciliatory entreaty that trickles forward from an unending musical breath.”
— Mark Tanner, International Record Review, NOV-2007.

The original mystical/esoteric Christian text, ‘Cloud of Unknowing’, was written in the 1390s by an unknown English author, possibly Adam Easton, Cardinal of Norwich. Since God cannot be known by reasoning, the author tells the reader to dispense with any rational discourse entirely and to be submissive in a cloud of forgetting. The reader—a 24 year-old woman novitiate—is told to forget, forget, forget. Empty your mind. Blind, diffuse agape love is all that matters.

W hat we have, then, in ‘The Cloud’ is a continuing polite bowing to the authority of traditional Augustinian sub-faculties of the mind—later to be rejected altogether by Descartes—but at the same time an entirely new sense of freedom of choice in stripping back to one key faculty of divine apprehension, in this case the [uninformed, anti-intellectual] will.”
— Sarah Coakley, p. 81.

There are parallels in the ‘unknowing’ quietistic memes of Zen and Zen Buddhism, of course. But those are not so adamantly opposed to or dismissive of discourse and reason as the ‘Cloud of Unknowing’. For the medieval author of ‘Cloud’, a mystical, pious, contemplative state of mind is the card that trumps all others. ‘Cloud’ exalts a pseudo-Dionysian annihilation of the self as the highest goal to which any human can aspire. It privileges solitary, anchoritic, quietistic, monkish ways—and disparages discourse. We are to give up our impious individual identities and assimilate ourselves into the Borg.

A one-syllable workd such as ‘love’ is best. Choose one that is meaningful to you, then fix it in your mind so that it will remain there, come what may. This word will be your defense in conflict and in peace. Use it to beat upon the cloud of darkness above you and consign all distractions to the cloud of forgetting beneath you.”
— William Johnston, p. 56.

Have a look at Johnston’s translation. The 1390s Cloud is a zombie-like, self-mutilating cataphatism. We are told to renounce our social responsibilities for pious meditation—for neoplatonic, anti-intellectual self-absorption. (Or maybe it’s not cataphatic but instead apophatic—it doesn’t bind any specific Christian image of God; it’s imageless.) Cloud recommends that a pious will must rule the intellect. It maintains that bona fide spirituality involves the power of love only, and never the mind, never knowledge.

Francis Pott’s composition takes this medieval text and collides it with bible verses and canonical liturgical elements. The result is this stark and cautionary assessment of the role of religion in today’s world.

W e want to believe that the culture we live in is stable and dependable, that the moral confusion and depravity we see around us are merely aberrations of settled and established moralities, deviations from the rule of social convention [but recent events and trends have made such belief untenable, except by ignoring/denying those recent facts and events and trends].”
— James Davison Hunter, p. 221.

Some people have difficulty thinking critically or are uncomfortable because reasoning troubles the heart. Reasoning reveals problems which may not be solvable but which nonetheless require human effort and attention to reduce them. So why not instead cleave to regimes that maintain that the process of thinking isn’t necessary? Why not instead cleave to ancient teachings that argue that thinking is forbidden by God and the prophets—teachings that ascribe unpleasant or demoralizing feelings to wrong thinking?

B efore the mountains came into being, or earth and world were created, Thou art, O God, from everlasting to everlasting.
Thou causest men to die and sayest: ‘Return, children of men.’
For a thousand years are in Thy sight as yesterday when it is past, and like a watch in the night.
Thou sweepest men to destruction. They are a dream. They are like grass which suddenly withers.
It blooms in the morning but is transformed at night. It is cut down and withers.”
— Psalm 90:2-6.

The adherent’s distress is reduced in proportion to the dumbing-down, the self-mutilation, the loss of identity. But what you don’t use you lose: the ability to think critically, the ability to remember the issues that pertain to the conflicts, the ability to remember who you are—these quickly atrophy. Eventually, the adherents no longer remember that they used to be able to think for themselves. According to van der Hart and colleagues, Wenninger and Ehlers, and others, such people tend to have more dissociative parts of their personality. They frequently have an ‘amnesia for their amnesia’, not recognizing that they have any impairment. They deny that any conflicts or trauma ever existed.

T o have a renewal of character is to have a renewal of a creedal order that constrains, limits, binds, obligates, and compels.... [Instead,] we want character but without effort or conviction.... We want virtue but without particular moral justifications that invariably offend.... We want decency without the authority to insist upon it.”
— James Davison Hunter.

Victims of trauma bring to the treatment setting an extreme level of emotional intensity and level of distress that touch, surpass and transform the empathic sensitivity of clinicians who listen to their stories. Clinicians providing care to the victims are overcome by the empathic strain. And that strain jeopardizes the effectiveness of subsequent care by blunting the clinicians’ understanding of patients’ internal psychological dynamics. This music is beautiful and cathartic for us care-givers. But it is also stressful in its own right and, therefore, to be taken in moderation. Read the package insert carefully. Use only as-directed.

I n the two months immediately after the events people’s characteristics of gratitude, kindness, hope, leadership, love, spirituality—strengths connected
through a virtue-based view—were all significantly elevated... ”
— C. Peterson & M. Seligman, Character strengths before and after September 11. Psych Sci 2003; 14: 381-4. (Survey of 4,817 residents of NYC in 2002)
.

[Francis Pott’s other sacred choral works, including ‘My Song is Love Unknown’, ‘Christus’, and ‘The Souls of the Righteous’, are less apocalyptic/iconoclastic than ‘Clouds’ or his oratorio ‘A Song on the End of the World’. He was previously Lecturer in Music at St Hilda’s College, Oxford, from 1992 to 2001, and since then has been Head of Music and Composition at London College of Music & Media, in Ealing, West London. In 1997, Pott won First Prize in the S. S. Prokofiev International Composing Competition in Moscow. ]

I n a final coup, Pott rudely interrupts the serenity with an anguished reminder of Christ’s cry from the cross, this time sung, harrowingly, by the soloist. But then a state of calm is reached at last as the choir sings an extended final Amen. The work ends with one last, enigmatic and hushed organ chord, which lasts for some 28 seconds and which, in the composer’s words, ‘enfolds all in its own seemingly eternal cloud of unknowing.’ I listened, enthralled, to this major addition to the choral repertoire. I can’t commend Signum highly enough for having the vision and the commercial courage to issue this recording.”
— John Quinn, MusicWeb International, OCT-2007.

I n character it is a work of pessimism and deep foreboding. The opening sections in particular pose a huge challenge for the choir, who are required to sing very quietly with every syllable stretched out to its fullest extent, often well beyond the point where the words become indistinguishable and we are indeed faced with a cloud of unknowing. But these clouds disperse to be replaced by visions of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, intersecting with the mysticism of William Blake—potentially a powerfully heady mix, but one which I found to be perversely lacking in either menace or horror. An extended setting of Psalm 23, which the composer describes as a retreat from the noise of battle, marks a transition phase and the breakpoint between the two CDs. From here on the work settles into a quiet melancholy, a mood which sits very comfortably with Pott’s style, and a composition of significant stature emerges. Words become clear and telling, and in an atmosphere of gentle supplication the agony and the anguish of a conflict torn world are revealed.”
— Serena Fenwick, Musical Pointers, SEP-2007.