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Conversazioni
to examine responsibility and historical inevitability
Why did the chicken cross the road? According to Karl Marx, "It
was an historical inevitability."
So goes the old joke. However, over the years, many have taken issue with
the Marxist belief that historical events could have developed only in
the precise way they did. If you believe in free will, can you also believe
that there is such a thing as historical inevitability? Scholars will
address this question in upcoming Conversazioni on Culture and Society,
Responsibility and Historical Inevitability, which will take place on
Friday, November 30, and Saturday, December 1, at the School of Management
Auditorium. (See sidebar on page 8.)
Political scientist Isaiah Berlin (1909-1997), in his 1953 lecture Historical
Inevitability, launched countless debates about the roles of individuals
in history. He argued that despite the constraints of circumstance, historical
figures acted freely and are therefore morally accountable. An excerpt
from this essay, in the Conversazioni program, along with a passage from
Leo Tolstoy's War and Peace, and a segment from The Decline of the West,
a 1922 book by German philosopher Oswald Spengler, will provide the backdrop
for a two-day discussion on the pros and cons of a determinist approach
to history.
Can individuals alter the giant sweep of history, or are we merely marionettes?
Claudio Véliz, director of The University Professors program at
BU, says that if Berlin were alive today, he would be alarmed to see the
prevalence of the latter philosophy. "It is a flight from responsibility,"
says Véliz, who uses as an example the murder trial of Richard
Sharpe, a Wenham, Mass., dermatologist accused of killing his wife last
year. "Sharpe said, 'It's not my fault. My father abused me when
I was a little boy.' It's extraordinary. He's basically saying, 'The murder
of my wife is the inevitable occurrence that flows from my father beating
me when I was five years old. I know that I killed her, but I'm not responsible.'"
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David
Fromkin, director of BU's Pardee Center for the Study of the Longer-Range
Future. |
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Véliz says that this attitude comes from a pervasive culture of
irresponsibility. "The heart of its belief is that we are creatures
of history; we think we are free to choose, but in fact, our action has
been determined by an infinity of irrevocably imprinted decisions by fellow
human beings. I think it's rubbish."
One of Berlin's favorite quotes, says Véliz, was Benito Mussolini's
utterance when he learned of the Allies landing in Sicily: "History
has seized us by the throat." Berlin contended that mistakes made
by individuals are often conveniently chalked up to historical inevitability.
David Fromkin, director of BU's Pardee Center for the Study of the Longer-Range
Future, thinks that perhaps some events may be inevitable. "It's
my belief," he says, "that in 1914, if the archduke of the Austro-Hungarian
empire had not been assassinated, there probably would have been a world
war anyway."
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| George
Steiner, Charles Eliot Norton Professor at Harvard. Photo by Vernon Doucette |
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Still, Fromkin says that for the most part, history isn't predestined.
He plans to discuss individual responsibility in his lecture, How Individuals
Shape the Future on Friday, November 30, at 2:30 p.m. "It's a common
belief that everything is determined by impersonal forces and trends,"
he says. "I don't believe that, and I am going to discuss different
ways in which individuals make a difference."
Is there such a thing as fate? If there is, can one resist it? Véliz
says that Berlin used to enjoy another quote, this one from Justice Louis
Brandeis: "The irresistible is often only that which is not resisted."
| Conversazioni: a discussion in the pursuit
of learning The 12-year-old Boston, Melbourne, Oxford Conversazioni on Culture and Society is an annual arrangement between The University Professors program of Boston University, La Trobe University in Melbourne, Australia, and Wadham College, Lincoln College, and Merton College of the University of Oxford to address major topics of our time in a cross-disciplinary manner. BU has hosted the event four times. "It is truly a conversation," says Claudio Véliz, director of The University Professors at BU. "The lecturer reads his or her paper, and then the reactor offers a brief comment and puts one question to the lecturer. Then the topic is open to discussion." This year's lecturers are freelance journalist Bryan Appleyard; David Fromkin, director of BU's Pardee Center for the Study of the Longer-Range Future; Harvard Physics Professor Gerald Holton; George Hupert, president of the Historical Society at the University of Illinois at Chicago; Times Literary Supplement editor Ferdinand Mount; Timothy Potts, director of the Kimbell Art Museum in Fort Worth; biographer Andrew Roberts; George Steiner, Charles Eliot Norton Professor at Harvard; author and publisher Keith Windschuttle; and Newsweek International editor Fareed Zakaria. The reactors are CAS International Relations Professor Andrew Bacevich, director of the Center for International Relations; University Professor Liah Greenfeld; STH Professor David Hempton; University Professor Geoffrey Hill; University Associate Professor Igor Lukes; University Professor Lance Morrow; National Review editor John O'Sullivan; University Professor Bruce Redford; Pulitzer Prize-winning author Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr.; and CAS Physics Professor Lawrence Sulak, chairman of the physics department. The lectures, which are free and open to the public, will begin on both days at 9 a.m. and 2:30 p.m. For a list of lecture times, visit http://www.bu.edu/UNI/events/conv_program.pdf. |
30
November 2001
Boston University
Office of University Relations