I start with a joke. There are 10 sorts of people in the world. Those who understand binary numbers and those who don’t.
In our culture, we are encouraged to think that we can divide the world up using binary oppositions. We are either x or we are y. In politics we are on the left or on the right; in personality we are extrovert or introvert; for our intellectual training we choose between the sciences or the arts; we are routinely asked, by organisations gathering data on diversity, whether we are male or female, homo- or hetero-, abled or disabled, black or white; in London, you either live north of the river or you don’t really live in London at all, which illustrates a significant problem about the use of dichotomies: they set people in opposition one with another.
I recently came across a remark by Bertrand Russell, who said of the development of his philosophical temperament that he had leapt from the Hegelian view that the world was a bowl of treacle to the atomist view that the world was a bowl of lead shot. In other words, he had abandoned the view that we cannot understand anything until we understand everything, since as Hegel claimed the true is the whole, and instead had adopted the view that the only way to understand anything is to break it down into its component parts and try to understand each of them in turn and then figure out how they connect. Atomists, of whom Russell is a good example, think that the main purpose of philosophy is analysis, that is, the systematic separation of each part or element of a phenomenon, so that it can be studied in isolation; by contract, treaclists, of whom John Dewey might be a good example, think that the main purpose of philosophy is synthesis, that is, the examination of the interconnectedness of phenomena, so that their reciprocal influence upon each other can be understood. I was taught philosophy in the atomist tradition, but during my training I leapt in the opposite direction to Bertrand Russell, and I am now a confirmed treaclist. I try to resist attempts to divide up the world, believing that we understand best when we consider the whole and the fulness of its variety. There are many more than 10 sorts of people in my world.
For the past few years, I have been involved – in a very minor way – with a research project that is being led by my friend Olga Biosca at Glasgow Caledonian University, which investigates the connections between financial well-being and mental and physical health outcomes. Her hypothesis is that financial insecurity – lack of income, lack of access to credit, and lack of access to good financial advice – can accelerate the onset of a variety of serious health conditions, which include an increase in stress and the propensity to episodes of mental illness, and the more rapid onset of a range of physical morbidity conditions. This research is important for several reasons, one of which is that if it becomes clear that providing vulnerable individuals with access to credit and financial advice reduces the likelihood that they will experience serious mental and physical health challenges in the near term, then funding fair credit and financial advice becomes a strategic health priority. Just as public campaigns to promote healthy eating, regular exercise, giving up smoking, and moderation in the consumption of alcohol, are all much cheaper for society in the long-term than providing intensive and expensive care facilities for the obese, and those with heart, lung, and liver disease (and, of course, better for the well-being of the individuals who respond to them), so too it is probable that providing good financial services to those who are currently excluded from the mainstream financial system, will lower society’s long-term health costs as well as helping these individuals to manage their money in the short-term.
The idea that social problems are interconnected, and that public policy therefore needs to address these connections as a whole if it is to be successful, is the theme of an interesting book, written by another of my friends, Jo Wolff. In Disadvantage (2007), he and his co-author provide a framework for thinking about the way in which certain features of our lives interconnect, such that when all is working well for us, we benefit from fertile functionings, which is to say, some of the positive features of our lives might create benefits in other areas of our lives. Success in education can lead to well-paid work, which can fund a healthy and enjoyable lifestyle, and it can also provide us with social confidence and personal satisfaction, which support our well-being. However, it is also the case that certain negative features of our lives might create problems elsewhere, that is we might suffer from corrosive disadvantages. A bout of ill-health might cause us to lose our job, which in turn might lead to us being forced to move to a smaller and less well-maintained house, which might reinforce our propensity to ill-health as well as damaging our self-esteem. The book has some interesting examples, drawn from interviews with a wide range of people, which illustrate the thesis, namely that sometimes benefits are generative and sometimes problems are degenerative.
Both these examples reinforce my conviction that it is difficult to deal with social problems in isolation. We might want to separate out the components of financial well-being or social disadvantage, to examine each of them in turn, but unless all these components are brought together and studied holistically, they can never be fully understood, and never successfully treated. I suspect this is also true when we think about our own individual lives. We can analyse each aspect of our lives separately – work, leisure, family, friends, health, finances, hobbies, ambitions, and dreams – but to understand who we are and how we are doing, we need to understand the connections between all these various elements, and how success or failure in one area ramifies over all the others. If we spend many hours worrying about our work or our finances, it is inevitable that this will spill-over and impact our leisure time, our friendships, and our health. Contrariwise, when a project at work goes well, or when our friendships are strong and supportive, this can improve our mood, our health, and our ambitions.
Further, I suspect that when we consider our personal and social experiences as a whole, the idea of binary divisions no longer makes sense. When people feel more confident about their social and financial security, they tend to be more tolerant of policy proposals from the left; when they are scared and insecure, they tend to flee to the right. We cannot explain changes in the political mood of a country solely in political terms. Likewise, when individuals are comfortable and confident about their social standing and their skills, they are more likely to engage with others; when they doubt their worth and their abilities, then they might prefer to isolate themselves from others. How we relate to others is contextual, and changes in our habitat can allow us to change our habits. The best scientists and the best artists, recognise the value of the other disciplines and perspectives on the world, whereas those who are struggling with their work tend to entrench themselves within their specialisms. And, I am willing to admit that on a warm and sunny day, when all is well with the world, a trip across the Thames to London’s SE and SW postcodes can seem pleasant enough.
Meanwhile, a mile to the north of the river, I am gradually unpacking my belongings in my new home. On a par with the excitement of unpacking my books has been the thrill of using my new oven. After two months with no catering facilities, I am now able to cook simple meals. (My enjoyment of a full kitchen, with well-designed preparation space and access to all my unpacked equipment, is still two or three weeks away). On Saturday, I used the oven’s flat hot-plate to cook steak – with mushrooms, courgette, and tomatoes – accompanied by a glass or two of Galodoro Reserva. It was a simple but delightful meal. Of course, one could try to account for the pleasure by a careful examination of the quality of the meat, the way each of the vegetables were cooked, and the vintage and varietal of the wine. But properly to understand why the meal was delightful, each of these factors needs to be set in the wider context: it was the first meal I had made with my new cooker, in my new home, in the company of a close friend, after a busy week of activity, with some good music to set the mood. It is the combination of all these elements that makes the occasion special. To appreciate the moment, we need to synthesise not analyse. Bertrand Russell is welcome to spend his days eating lead shot, I prefer treacle.
Let me end with another joke. A patrol car stopped a neutrino driving along the highway. “Do you know how fast you were travelling?” the police officer asked. “Only when I’m lost”.