Dr. Seuss and Philosophy Read online

  And once we begin to get smarter on smarts

  We can move ourselves on to the ethical arts.

  There’s so much one can think o’er the good and the bad

  And so many dear thinkers and thoughts that they’ve had.

  We’ll do our best to give you a view

  A snapshot or glimpse o’er a theory or two.

  We’ve got Greeks once again, and our German friend Kant

  As well as a Scotsman, that’s more than you’ll want.

  We’ll do all the theory, apply it as well

  To issues like nature and business pell mell.

  We’ll give you a history as well as some praxis

  And then we’ll move on to grind other axes.

  It’s off to the realm of political thought

  Where it isn’t just personal questions of “ought.”

  Now we will wonder about our relations

  How people should be and what of their nations.

  Contracts and property, how to divide it

  Diversity, needs, all the ways to contrive it

  And once we’ve wound through these odd wiggled roads

  we will find that our story has not all been told

  there are questions that still have yet to be asked

  but this book isn’t big enough for such a huge task.

  Clearly one book can’t hold all the big thoughts

  So we haven’t discussed all the whys, whats, and oughts.

  This book offers a glimpse

  It’s merely one look

  If you seek understanding you’ll need more than one book.[1]

  [1] Thanks to Kim Newman for her suggestions on the rhyme.

  CHAPTER ONE

  Oh, the Places You’ll Go! The Examined, Happy Life

  Benjamin Rider

  You have brains in your head.

  You have feet in your shoes.

  You can steer yourself

  any direction you choose.

  You’re on your own. And you know what you know.

  And YOU are the guy who’ll decide where to go. (Places)

  On the journey of life, we face many choices: What career should I pursue? Where should I live? What should I do with my money and time? What kind of person should I be, anyway, and what should I stand for? As we make these choices, large and small, we chart the courses of our lives, creating our unique selves and making an impact on the world and the people around us. And whether we think about it consciously or not, we want these choices to turn out well. We want to live good lives and be happy. Of course, people have different ideas about what it means to live a good life. One person might think her life is good when she has lots of money; another when he has a large family; another when she contributes to making the world a better place. Nevertheless, each of us seeks the paths that will bring us happiness and success while navigating the inevitable Bang-ups and Hang-ups, Lurches and Slumps, that get in our way. There is a reason that Dr. Seuss’s Oh, the Places You’ll Go! is popular as a graduation present. In this book, Dr. Seuss’s protagonist faces the challenges, opportunities, and unexpected joys that life offers and responds to them with courage and imagination.

  So what is the best way to make all these difficult choices well? How do you make your way successfully through the maze of life? How should you deal with the Hang-ups and Slumps, the lonely games and the confusing wiggled roads, the Hakken-Kraks and other real and imagined monsters you’ll encounter along the way? Dr. Seuss assures his reader that he’ll succeed (“98 and ¾ percent guaranteed”!) but what does it mean to succeed, anyway? What is a good and worthwhile life? And how do we achieve it?

  Questioning Life’s Big Questions

  For ancient Greek and Roman philosophers questions about the good life were fundamental not only to philosophical inquiry but also to human life in general. The first philosopher to ask these questions prominently was Socrates (469–399 BCE), who referred to them as “the most important matters” in life.1 Socrates assumed (and subsequent ancient philosophers agreed) that all humans desire good and happy lives.2 Although we’re often shortsighted or confused about what that means—sometimes, perversely, we even do things we know will make us miserable—nevertheless, deep down, we do want to be happy and flourish. Indeed, many ancient philosophers went further and argued that, ultimately, the desire for happiness underlies every choice we make, even the most stupid and impetuous ones. Suppose a teenager gets drunk and is arrested driving home from a party. Socrates would say that, as stupid and thoughtless as his actions might seem, his choices must have made sense, at least in terms of what seemed right to him at the time.3 Perhaps he wanted to be accepted by his friends, or he didn’t want to have to call his parents and get in trouble. To be sure, he wasn’t thinking clearly or well. All the same, he did what he thought was best. So even if he never stops to think about the “most important matters” in life—happiness, virtue, what it means to be human, or in general, as Socrates puts it, the “condition of his soul”4—nevertheless his actions and choices reflect his unexamined values, assumptions, and beliefs. He makes his decisions based on what, deep down, he believes is good and worthwhile, and if his beliefs are shoddy, so will be his life.

  Dr. Seuss’s books often feature characters whose unexamined and false beliefs prevent them from being happy or satisfied with their lives. For example, “The Sneetches” tells the story of two kinds of Sneetches who share the beaches—Star-Belly Sneetches and Plain-Belly Sneetches. The difference between the two is not significant: “Those stars weren’t big. They were really so small / you might think such a thing wouldn’t matter at all” (Sneetches). Yet Star-Belly Sneetches look down upon Plain-Belly ones, exclude them from their games, and leave them out in the cold during their frankfurter roasts and marshmallow toasts. The Sneetches on the beaches are miserable and divided, all because of their silly belief that little belly stars make some Sneetches better than others. Then, a “Fix-It-Up Chappie” arrives with a wondrous machine that—for a price—can add stars to unstarred Sneetch bellies. The Plain-Bellies eagerly line up, thinking that once they have stars, they’ll be able to participate fully in Sneetch society. However, when the original Star-Belly Sneetches see what has happened, they want to maintain their distinctive status, so they pay the Fix-It-Up Chappie to take their stars off. And as every child knows, the situation soon spirals out of control. Sneetches run in and out of the machines, putting on stars, taking them off, all the while paying more and more to the Fix-It-Up Chappie, until they have nothing left and no one can even remember who had a star or not in the first place. Only after Sylvester McMonkey McBean drives off laughing, taking a huge pile of Sneetch cash, do the Sneetches learn their lesson: “They decided that Sneetches are Sneetches / and no kind of Sneetch is the best on the beaches” (Sneetches). They finally realize that the beliefs that had divided them were false and meaningless. Until that point, no one ever thought to question them.

  According to Socrates, we have many of these false and happiness-

  destroying beliefs, but the problem is that most of the time, like the Sneetches, we don’t even think to examine or question them. We just accept the prevalent worldview uncritically, often for no better reason than that it’s what “everybody” thinks. As we grow up, we absorb and internalize from our parents and culture a whole slew of beliefs and prejudices about how the world works, what life is about, and what is important. However, most of these unexamined opinions are confused, contradictory, hopelessly simplistic, or just plain wrong.5 So we blunder mindlessly through life, treating each other badly for no good reason, limiting our horizons, and wasting effort on things that don’t matter and may even make us positively miserable, all the while wondering why our lives feel so meaningless and unsatisfying.

  Socrates confronted this problem head on. Like Dr. Seuss, he dared to ask the questions that most people ignored, to challenge conventional wisdom, and to force people to think about what they were doing with their lives and
why. Dr. Seuss’s stories are fanciful, but they often pose for children and their parents problems and questions that many of us as adults have learned to ignore or forget, to our detriment. When we read “The Sneetches,” we wonder, am I acting like them? Do I judge and exclude others because of superficial and meaningless things like belly stars? The same with Socrates, as he is depicted in Plato’s dialogues: His questions force people to think about and defend their beliefs and assumptions, and if—as often happens—they can’t answer his questions or respond adequately to his criticisms, he exposes their ignorance and complacency and takes them to task for not paying more attention to how they are living their lives. In Plato’s Apology, while defending himself in a trial for his life, Socrates tells the jury, provocatively: “I say it is the greatest good for a human being to discuss virtue every day and those other things about which you hear me conversing and testing myself and others, for the unexamined life is not worth living for a human being.”6 According to Socrates, to fail to examine and discuss your deepest beliefs and values is to fail as a human being! Because of his conviction about the importance of living a thoughtful, examined life, Socrates made it his mission to put people’s lives to the test. As one character in Plato’s dialogues explains:

  Whoever comes into close contact with Socrates and associates with him in conversation must necessarily . . . keep on being led about by the man’s arguments until he submits to answering questions about himself concerning both his present manner of life and the life he has lived hitherto. And when he does submit to this questioning, you don’t realize that Socrates won’t let him go before he has well and truly tested every last detail.7

  A Socratic cross-examination is often a painful experience. It is not easy having your beliefs and values called into question, your whole “manner of life” lain bare and scrutinized. But once you have submitted to Socrates’ test—whether talking to the man himself or, today, by reading Plato’s dialogues—it’s hard not to be changed by the experience.

  Things That Scare You Right Out of Your Pants:

  Socrates and Seuss on Courage

  You will come to a place where the streets are not marked.

  Some windows are lighted. But mostly they’re darked.

  A place you could sprain both your elbow and chin!

  Do you dare to stay out? Do you dare to go in?

  How much can you lose? How much can you win? (Places)

  One major theme of Oh, the Places You’ll Go! is the importance of having courage when facing life’s challenges. In his adventures, the young protagonist of the story faces many dangerous and uncertain situations—unmarked streets; darked windows; confusing, wiggled roads; foul weather; prowling monsters. If he failed to face these problems courageously, to “dare to go in,” he would have missed out on most of his opportunities and adventures. He’s able to succeed and “move mountains” in large part because he dares to go on, take chances, and face his fears.

  So what is courage, and how do you get it? Socrates’ main discussion of courage occurs in Plato’s Laches, where Socrates talks to two Athenian generals, Laches and Nicias. Although the dialogue itself is probably fictional, the characters in it were real people: Both generals were well-known Athenian military and political leaders during the long, bloody Peloponnesian War against Sparta in the latter half of the fifth century BCE. As generals, their primary duties included training and rallying soldiers to face death in battle. So if anyone should be able to define or explain courage, it would be them. Socrates begins by asking Laches to explain courage to him. Laches answers confidently: “Good heavens, Socrates, there is no difficulty about that: if a man is willing to remain at his post and to defend himself against the enemy without running away, then you may rest assured that he is a man of courage.”8

  What Laches has in mind here is the kind of courage typically required of Greek hoplites (armored foot soldiers) facing an enemy charge. At the time, hoplites typically fought in a tight formation called a phalanx. By fighting close together, they could interlock their shields to form a solid wall of protection, with the spears of men behind projecting over the top. Such a formation made a frontal assault by the enemy difficult—but only if each man held his ground and protected his fellow soldiers! The tight formation could fall apart disastrously if any soldier lost his nerve and ran away. A soldier who did not “remain at his post” and protect his comrades therefore put everyone in his unit in greater danger.

  This kind of “remaining at your post” courage is exemplified nicely by the noble elephant Horton in Horton Hatches the Egg. In the story, Mayzie (the lazy bird) is bored. She doesn’t want to sit on her nest hatching her egg anymore, so she convinces the kindhearted Horton to give her a break, and he agrees to sit on the egg for her. However, she immediately flies off on vacation to Palm Beach, leaving poor Horton alone on the nest, sitting on her egg (for months, apparently). But Horton refuses to give up, enduring thunder, rain, ice, and even mockery from the other animals as he remains at his post and keeps his word. Eventually, Horton is even threatened by hunters, who aim rifles straight at his heart! But “did he run? / He did not! / HORTON STAYED ON THAT NEST! / He held his head high / And threw out his chest / And he looked at the hunters / As much as to say: / ‘Shoot if you must / But I won’t run away! / I meant what I said / And I said what I meant. . . . /

  An elephant’s faithful / One hundred per cent!’” (Hatches). The hunters are amused and decide to take Horton back home as a circus exhibit rather than shooting him. Horton’s courage and faithfulness make the story’s happy ending possible: If he had run away, he would not only have abandoned the egg and his duty but also put himself in greater danger.

  Remaining at your post, therefore, is sometimes very courageous indeed. But as Socrates points out, Laches’ definition covers only one type of courageous action. What about when military units perform other tactical maneuvers, such as a feigned retreat to draw the enemy in for a counterattack? What about the tactics of cavalry units, which swoop in for quick strikes and withdraw before they can be hemmed in?9 What about the courage shown by an army that has to retreat to fight another day? This is when a soldier most needs courage to protect his friends, when the army is demoralized and the enemy is bearing down on them.

  Socrates also wonders, quite rightly, about all the ways courage can be shown in situations other than battle. What about the bravery people show in the face of dangers at sea, or illness, or poverty? Horton, after all, shows courage not only when he stares down the hunters’ guns but also when he confronts bad weather, the skepticism and mockery of the other animals, and the indignity of being caged up and shipped around the country in the circus. Also, Socrates asks, what about people who courageously stand up against injustice and evil? In short, the problem with Laches’ first definition is that it is too narrow—it applies well to one set of circumstances but fails to account for many other instances of courage.

  Laches sees the force of Socrates’ arguments, and so he next tries a new, broader definition. Courage, he now says, is “a sort of endurance of the soul.”10 A courageous person is one who has the strength of mind to endure fear and threats, in any circumstance.

  Once again, Socrates finds problems with Laches’ answer. This time, his definition is too broad, because there are many cases where “endurance of the soul” is not genuine courage. For example, suppose that, on a dare, a person “endures” danger and lies down on the yellow line in the middle of a busy street. Or suppose a racist “endures” criticism and holds stubbornly to his hateful beliefs. Both of these people display “endurance of the soul,” but neither shows genuine courage. If courage is a virtuous and good quality to have, Socrates argues, an action should count as courageous only if it is noble and good.11 Endurance motivated by foolishness and stupidity isn’t courage but recklessness or stubbornness.

  King Derwin in Bartholomew and the Oobleck offers a good illustration of the danger posed by the foolish, stubborn endurance of the
soul. King Derwin rules the Kingdom of Didd, but despite his power and the happiness of his kingdom, he’s bored with the four things that naturally come from the sky—rain, sunshine, fog, and snow. He wants something different and exciting. So he summons his royal magicians and orders them to cast a spell to make something new fall from the sky, “oobleck.” The king’s page, Bartholomew Cubbins, presciently warns him, “Your Majesty, I . . . think that you will be very sorry. . . . They’ll do something crazy!” (Oobleck). But the king won’t listen, stubbornly persisting in his desire to be “the mightiest man who ever lived” and have “something fall from the skies that no other kingdom has ever had before” (Oobleck). The results are predictably disastrous—the kingdom is inundated by the sticky, green oobleck, which covers everything and makes life impossible. But even at the lowest point of the disaster, King Derwin continues to resist Bartholomew’s suggestions. He finally shows genuine courage only when, at the end of the story, he admits his mistake and says he is sorry.