21 January 1999, 906 words
The impulse to primitivism is very strong at all levels in our society. Among the lower echelons - by which I mean the less educated and the less wealthy - it is mainly expressed in a fervent adherence to religion. This is the real reason the Pentecostal movement is the "fastest-growing religion in Trinidad and Tobago", as Pastor Cuffie never tires of pointing out. But you also find this impulse, in a somewhat different form, among many of our intellectuals.
In the December issue of the Trinidad and Tobago Review, there is an article by academic Glen Sankatsing which was delivered at the Allan Harris Conference. It is a profoundly bad essay - a description I am using very precisely, for Sankatsing's paper is both profound and bad. Among the several bad profundities, the worst is Sankatsing's assertion that "On historical and epistemological grounds, social science disciplines should be rejected and banned from all scientific premises." Now I do not know if Sankatsing, like so many intellectuals in the humanities, is scientifically illiterate. But, assuming he isn't, his recommendation means certain exact things. One, that the social science disciplines must reject causality - the assumption that effects have causes. Two, they must also reject empiricism - the gathering of facts to support a hypothesis. And, three, they must reject induction - making general inferences from specific instances.
My question is: if we follow Sankatsing's advice, why should we then believe anything he says? Just because he is brilliant and has a really large moustache? Trouble is, I have a problem trusting a man when half of his face is hidden by hair. This is very unscientific of me, I admit, but by his own lights Sankatsing can hardly argue with my judgement.
In a similar vein, Lloyd Best has continually spoken of the need to rediscover our "obeah". In an Express column (98.03.14) he wrote, "With our penchant for rationality, we have branched off on many paths that are exciting but dangerous...many fertile options have been closed off by a view so linear...it is not even embarrassed by the idea of modernity, progress and development..." I don't know where Best got the idea that we have a penchant for rationality - it is patently obvious that the exact opposite is the case. In fact, Best's anti-rationalism is merely part of a wider malaise. Hugh Skinner, a regular contributor to the Review, pushes a Luddite ideology, arguing that technological regression is inevitable. (His conclusions, not surprisingly, are based on a misunderstanding of evolution theory.) The regular newspapers also bolster anti-rationalism: the Maha Sabha columns, full of historical and scientific misinformation, are published in all three dailies; the "feelings" of Yesenia Adams are front-page news stories; and sensible people apparently write letters to the editor only occasionally.
So the impulse to irrationality is hailed as a virtue at all levels in this place. The Pastor Cuffie position is at least coherent: that God is good and therefore the unreason, insecurity and fanaticism that strengthen faith is a good thing. The non-fundamentalist position, which accepts the concept of a Supreme Being without defining it too clearly, holds a parallel view. And the intellectualist position, which speaks vaguely of indigenous "space", is not too different from either.
All these positions are based on what is called "the naturalistic fallacy." This is the assumption that whatever happens in Nature is morally right. The term was first coined by the philosopher G.E. Moore, who argued that goodness is an objective property of things, actions and people which we perceive by a direct moral intuition. Moore's idea is, of course, nonsense. Intuitions are, almost by definition, quite subjective. The argument also tacitly assumes the existence of a Supreme Moral Being - a premise for which no good logical or empirical arguments can be adduced.
In our society, this fallacy expresses itself mainly in imitativeness, nowadays in calls to return to ethnic ancestral cultures. The assumption is that there is some inherent good in those cultures (apparently, mainly by virtue of their being old) and, as a usually unspoken corollary, an inherent badness in our modern Trinidadian culture. This attitude is most succinctly expressed by artist Leroy Clarke describing Trinidad as a "douendom" - Clarke, of course, is often hailed as one of this country's leading voices.
Once this kind of cerebral superstitiousness remains prevalent among our elites, there is certainly no hope that the general populace will abandon its habits of Play-Whe choices and ethnic rationale. And, unfortunately for us, no society can move forward in the new world on such bases. But, if a change is to come about, it must start with our intellectual leaders, from university academics to social scientists to writers to teachers. I long to see the day when scholarship winners, supposedly our nation's best and brightest, won't all thank God for helping them get Ones.
But I'm not holding my breath. In his Sunday Express column of January 10, Denis Solomon - one of the few truly rational voices we have - argued for less religion in education in order to help our society advance. But Prime Minister Basdeo Panday, later that week, expressed his belief that more religion in education might help reduce crime. Solomon's case was, as usual, well thought out and forcefully argued. Naturally, therefore, Panday's voice will carry the day.
Copyright ©1999 Kevin Baldeosingh