what could have gone wrong between locke and bentham
The show is unravelling a historical narrative. It was inevitable that the utilitarians would be introduced, because the show or island for that matter doesnt care about why, but that it has happened...hence the absolutley ridiculous introduction of a frozen donkey wheel to accomplish revolution (from divine right monarch to representative democracy) on the island. In our world the historians have been introduced.
When it was first revealed that Locke's new name was Jeremy Bentham, I was suprised, but wasn't shocked. In a sense, it seemed natural that Locke could change personas, after all Ben did it a number of times, (with every mask that I am thinking of being of the mastermind mold (Henry Gale, Dean Moriarty, even Ben Linus as Jazprof has suggested on another website fits that mold). It seemed natural that Locke could morph into Bentham, Bentham being a natural successor to Locke's empricism. The show indicated as much when Alpert had the young empiricist choose between among other things the knife and the book of laws. Locke with his bizarre defense of inalienable property rights constituting a limit on government would choose the knife, Bentham, who held the common law in disdain and who advocated political change through an instrumental appoach to law (ie revising the common law into a code based system) would naturally choose the law. When Locke choose the knife, Alpert's response was something along the lines of "your not ready yet", the empiric approach was still in its infancy; later it would later take on the rational characteristics, the legal adoption of the average man that would be its hall marks.
While in some sense it does seem natural that Locke is succeeded by Bentham, their is a large difference between Bentham and Locke. (I won't deal with the issue of whether Bentham is the natural successor of Locke or more properly Hume, which the show doesn't appear to be addressing).
Whereas Locke's relationship to the island is self involved as I tried to suggest in my mind body dichotomy post, utility is a socially maximizing approach. Whereas Locke's approach incorporates fundamental concepts that cannot be violated (life, liberty, property) indicating a kind of natural law underlay to empiricism; utilitarianism (especially per Bentham (and Austin, but less so Mill)) is resolutely a-moral; asking as its fundamental question what brings the most happiness--what causes more pleasure, how do we lessen general pain? While utilitarians offer ingeneous ratonales for why some seemingly purely moral laws exists (the prohibition of lying while seemingly purely moral is given a utilitarian gloss through the rationale that human's as a whole benefit from the prohibition of lying), utiliatrianism could potentially accept an immoral policy if the policy was determined to increase the pleasure of society generally.
What does this have to do with what could go wrong?
Depending on who was determining on what constitutes pain, what constitutes pleasure, the direction that society could take could disagree with Locke's fundamental character. The potential result could produce disagreement with Locke, and result in things going very wrong for Locke.
In fact, if the moving of the island means that the island moves back in time, the utilitarian approach, could produce a world that the oceanic six live in, or the world that we live in.
For example pre crash, Kate was in the process of being brought to justice. Post crash, sovereign Kate Aust(i)n (the namesake of English jurisprude John Austin) is above justice (the accusation of guilt shouted by the man in the street is said in reverse [see Seany B's eggtown recap on youtube]), justice is backwards. Superstar, (OJ) style, justice is avoided...maybe the utilitarians have gained control of world's mind, the island... and maybe this movement has changed the body of the society tied to it.
hey..
I just reread your post (sometimes I'm a very bad/hyperactive reader), and I really like the way that you frame the coming conflict.
I would also like to suggest that the island's, uh, energy, is being tapped by Alpert and the organization that Alpert represents (it is also apparently still being searched for by Big Widmore which means that economic intrests are still in play). The reasons that it is being tapped are unclear, or how the connections between the island and the mainland are unclear.
Possibly Alperts group is influenced by economic interests, influenced by the free market. If the free market isnt the mob, I dont know what is. If the mob's base instincts are allowed to influence the mind, because happiness is the gross sum of happiness for all per the utilitarian formula, this leads to an unprincipled world, devoid of morality, which would allow for injustice depending on your viewpoint.
Also, someone brought up the other day that Bentham was more famous for what he did after he did, and told the story of is auto-icon.
There is another way that Bentham is more, uh, interesting dead than alive.
Do you know what legal positivism is? I dont want to sound like a pedagogue, but I'll just give a brief summary to get to my point.
Legal positivism and natural law are the two big modern jurisprudential schools (legal positivism represented by HLA Hart, Joseph Raz, Hans Kelsen, Jules Coleman...; natural law represented by Ronald Dworkin, John Finnis, Lon Fuller...). Both schools have different sources or holy founders.
What positivism essentially advocates is that law is of human creation, and that their is no necessary connection between law and morals. (Compare this to Finnis's fundamental prerequisites for human flourishing or Kant's categorical imperative.)
Positivism's two big dudes are jeremy bentham and john austin. Both offered empircal counts of law. Bentham's utilitarianism looks at the world, figures out what would constituted maximum utility, and prescribes law on this basis. Austin's account, the command theory, merely offered a descriptive account of the law. Per the command theory law is distributed by a sovereign who is above the law, whom the law cannot account for--law draws its authority from the sovereign being sovereign, because the sovereign can impose punishment on this basis.
Ok, if you are still reading, sorry for all that nonsense, but the interesting thing is that a majority of Bentham's thoughts on law were not discovered until about the middle of the 20th century. Thus positivisms main influence is Austin, although Bentham's account is incredibly more nuanced and more sensitive as a descriptive account. It is Austin that Hart treats as his whipping boy in reformulating postivism in "Concept of Law". Hart commented on and published the posthumous works of Bentham, but the ball had already been set rolling, Concept of Law, the most influential jurisprudential work of the 20th century, had been written as a response to Austin, the "rules of recognition" describing the core features of law in a top down system had already been postulated, leaving Bentham as this kind of strange annomaly as what could have been.
So this is a long winded way of saying that Bentham is more interesting dead that alive. And that maybe the world has been usurped by Austin, which might possibly might explain her reticence in the FF...this world was made for her.
Bentham/Austin
I've long had a theory that Kate is a mole and connected to Widmore--if Widmore is the sovereign--is it his command that has put Kate above the law? And interesting that Locke threw Kate out of New Otherton--asserting that he was not acting as a dictator.
Alpert--given his connection to altered states of mind I would think that his interest in tapping the island's energy might be spiritual rather than economic. I don't know if you read what I posted about the island perhaps representing the base chakra (lower spine), while the storms offshore represent the 6 other chakra realms--but if this is what the island's energy is about then it offers both some kind of way of reaching a higher area of enlightenment, and also is key to physical survival and reproduction. I wonder if that's the split between Richard and Ben in how they approach the island?
Oh--and totally off topic of Lost--but an excellent book that connects up Kant to political/economic context (in one chapter--the book actually covers a lot of political/economic-philosophy connections) is "The Ideology of Aesthetics" by Terry Eagelton.
Changing Jack's beard style :-)
I cant place Jack...
The take that you offer on Jack is definetly one to think about.
I also like how you include Burke. To me he has represented one of those sad commentators, who could recognize the benefits of the other side but in the end offered apolgies for the system he was in fact in.
I think the show might have made a direct relation to the french revolution with Burke sitting on the shore, watching the boat explode, over the ocean.
Historically, this is what he/she did.
Burke/Revolution
)
Spectacle>>Discipline>>Empathy?
Hey RM,
What you said about Austin reminded me of the question Prof was posing on the 4.12 thread--why have the O6 drawn attention to themselves--why not try and hide out and change their names as Michael did?
(This is borrowing Foucault's historical narrative): In a justice system presided over by a sovereign, the law reaches only a few (no system of police)--those few are punished in elaborate public spectacles--and the purpose of the spectacle is to inform others of what their fate could be. But the sacrifice of those few also allows the majority to live relatively untouched by the law. Very similar to what's happening in the FF--the celebrity of the O6--their public spectacle as a way for the island to remain out of the "eye" of the sovereign (Widmore?).
Meanwhile on the island--next step--Bentham, the Panopticon, discipline, the greatest good for the greatest number. What could go wrong? Remember when Locke was in charge of New Otherton and said it wasn't a dictatorship (sovereign) because he didn't hold a gun to Kate's head? He was denying that it was a dictatorship of one person--a ruler. But the critique of utilitarianism is that it's a dictatorship of the many--(Bill of Rights in the U.S. as counter measure to a strict utilitarian democracy). So maybe that's what is happening on the island. If it is, I would think the main conflict would probably be between Sawyer and Juliet on the one side and Locke/Bentham on the other. That's based both on their personalities and their name sakes:Tom Sawyer--the rebel, invdividual freedom vs. social constraint; Edmund Burke--his distrust of the mob (French Revolution)in favor of a democracy by the elite-learned members of the society.
OK--so proposal for how this could all end--we keep seeing various dualities in conflict. Above, primarily the one vs. the many. What if Jack is the eventual succesor to Locke? And what if Jack's name points to a connection of some kind with Jacob? Then in Jack's name we have the linking of the Jewish-Jacob and the Christian-Jesus, the Shephard. (Overcoming one duality?) And both have a version of the Golden Rule (Hillel, Jesus) as does the Eastern tradition. "Do unto others as you would be done by."--Wouldn't that be a way of overcoming the one vs. the many division? Perhaps we are moving from a juridical model to one rooted in empathy? Also (as I think Annie suggested)--this requires Jack to make a sacrifice which will result in his becoming Jacob.