The Perfectibility of Human Nature in Eastern and Western Thought

Chapter 2 The Perfectibility of Human Nature in Western Philosophy and Psychology

Chapter 2 The Perfectibility of Human Nature in Western Philosophy and Psychology PERFECTIBILITY IN WESTERN PHILOSOPHY John Passmore begins his classic book on the topic of the perfectibility by distinguishing between “technical perfection” and the perfectibility of a human being.1 Technical perfection occurs when a person is deemed to be excellent or perfect at performing a particular task or role. In this sense we may talk about a perfect secretary, lawyer, or accountant, suggesting that such persons achieve the highest possible standards in their professional work. But this does not imply that they are perfect in their performance of the other tasks and roles of life. Passmore points out that Plato in his Republic allows for technical perfection by allocating to each person that task to perform in which the person’s talents and skills will enable a perfect performance of the task. But that same person might be a failure as a parent; and so, in Plato’s Republic he or she would not be allowed to be a parent. The parent role would be reserved for someone else whose talents enabled him or her to perfectly perform the task of raising children. But Plato distinguishes such technical perfection from the perfection of human nature evidenced by the special class of persons who are rulers of the Republic. These “philosopher-kings,” as he calls them, are not perfect because they rule perfectly; they are perfect because they have seen “the form of the good” and rule in accordance with it. Passmore comments, “in the end, the whole structure of Plato’s republic rests on there being a variety of perfection over and above technical perfection—a perfection which consists in, or arises out of, man’s relationship to the ideal.”2 Passmore goes on to point out that other Western thinkers including Luther, 9 10 The Perfectibility of Human Nature Calvin, and Duns Scotus follow Plato in talking about technical perfection in terms of one’s vocation or calling. But the perfecting of oneself in the performance of the role in life to which one is called is not sufficient by itself to ensure one’s perfection as a human being. A more philosophically complex idea of perfection is Aristotle’s idea of “teleological perfection,” which in the West has often been taken as the test of human perfectibility. Aristotle argues that every form of activity is directed toward reaching its natural end. Sculpting, for example, has as its end the depiction of the human form. The art of medicine has health as its end. But the overall natural end for humans is “happiness” or “well-being.” Humans are perfectible, according to Aristotle, only if they are able to achieve happiness or well-being. Passmore notes that Aquinas took over Aristotle’s analysis of perfection and gave it systematic Christian development. According to Aquinas, everything moves toward a particular condition in which it can rest. That condition is the thing’s perfection. The perfection of human nature, according to Aquinas, comes with the realization of the vision of God. But humans cannot achieve that end by their own efforts, through their own talents and skills. In the view of Aquinas, the vision of God is both our natural end or goal as human beings and a gift to us from God. As humans we cannot achieve our end by the exercise of our own talents no matter how perfectly we might do that—we can achieve our end only by the gift of God’s grace. As humans, then, we may reach technical perfection without achieving our final goal of teleological perfection. Passmore puts it as follows: one “can perform perfectly his religious and moral duties, so far as that involves the skilled use of his abilities, he can make himself expert in ritual and in Christian knowledge, without being vouchsafed the vision of God, and he can attain to that perfection without being technically perfect.”3 The teleological approach of Aristotle and Aquinas assumes that humans, like all other things, have a natural end (“happiness” or “the vision of God”) in which they can realize perfection. But another way of presenting this metaphysical assumption is to think of one’s natural end or goal in terms of having unrealized potentialities. In this way of thinking, “becoming perfect” consists in actualizing one’s inherent potentialities. Kant adopts this approach in his Critique of Judgment. A thing perfects itself, says Kant, “only when it attains an end inherent...