The More Good, the Better vs. The Wheel of Samsara

It may seem that there is significant tension between what in Buddhist circles causes dukkha (the suffering that consists of existential dread) and the principle I rely on (borrowed from Everett Hall) for determining what makes both individual lives and societies well off: The More Good, the Better. After all, getting things is a condition for constant craving, and craving and clinging is thought to be the cause of suffering.

In my book I wrote the following regarding that apparent conflict:

 

It is generally agreed that it is worse to have unsatisfied wants than to have no wants at all (assuming one remains alive, sentient and autonomous). There may thus be (perhaps Vedantist- or Buddhist-tinged) concerns that truly good societies will not only contain the fewest individuals with unsatisfied desires, but the fewest individuals with any desires at all, and consequently, the fewest possible satisfactions or successes. Given such a perspective, CHOICE, with its focus on more, may seem to bestow its blessings on the most horrendous ‘wheel’ of craving—getting—craving that one can imagine. I think, however, that genuine autonomy is inconsistent with the complete absence of striving and getting. I therefore think we should handle this concern by construing desires and satisfactions broadly enough to consider “going beyond wanting” something that itself could be a successful choice. While it may seem that we are perversely attempting to call the absence of desire something that may be sought, it cannot be denied that a sort of bliss is often promised to those who succeed in attempts at asceticism. If the value of sadhana is considered somehow exempt from rebukes stemming from the praiseworthiness of giving up desires, it seems acceptable to count the seeking for this promised state of bliss a value and the finding of it a success. An autonomous person can’t “just be.”

The readers of this blog, who I presume are more interested in democratic theory than the psychology of religious experience may not realize that I once wrote a book (nearly 20 years ago) on mysticism and various religious practices:

 

So, these matters have some urgency for me. But I have come to the conviction that none of that actually matters so much. It’s not that I am no longer interested in those things--particularly Eastern religious views and practices--or that I no longer think that the tenets they preach have real importance for everyone’s life and wellbeing. That is not the case at all. But I have come to believe that, if we are to have any democracy at all, just as the principles underlying it must be exalted over any such legitimate concerns as climate change, abortion or prenate rights, what's owed to labor or capital, taxation policy, etc., its axioms of equal rights and procedural fairness must take precedence over every religious tenet too–from “the golden rule” and “turn the other cheek” to “the four noble truths” and "not this, not that." Taking any one of these religious doctrines to trump democracy means that the views of one’s peers on what is most important will sometimes be rightly demoted. We will have come to think that our own take on some value is to be given the highest importance regardless of what anybody else may believe. And that is an authoritarian take on the way public policies should be made. 

No doubt this will be an extremely difficult conclusion for most people to reach. Certainly it has not been easy for me (see my discussion of Thanatos in my democracy book for a particularly dramatic example). But just as the great Oregonian progressive W. S. U’ren was at some point forced to demote his abiding love for a Georgist take on land value taxes in order to become a democratic reformer, all true democrats must always attenuate their own particular ends to a level below those of the people at large, always treating each person equally. For if they fail in that, they will cease to be any kind of authentic democrat at all. 

So let those “enlightened ones” among us take what positions they will on suffering, emptiness, aggregates, selfhood, being, Brahman, Jesus, cravings and all the rest. If their views do not coincide with the general will, while they must given an appropriate volume of voice in public matters, they need not get their way–regardless of how crucial their faith may seem to them, or even how crucial it actually is to all of us. The more good, the better must be taken to prevail even over all of the religious credos. Indeed, it must take precedence even over the commands of any deity–no matter how great or good.