Jennifer Church - Why Its OK to Be of Two Minds

Most of us experience the world through competing perspectives. A job or a religion seems important and fulfilling when looked at in one way, but from a different angle it seems tedious or ridiculous. A friend is obtuse from one point of view, wise from another. Continuing to hold both views at once can be unsettling, highlighting conflicts between our own judgments and values and undermining our ability to live purposefully and effectively.

Yet, as Jennifer Church argues in this book, inner conflict can be a good thing, and not just as a temporary road bump on the road to resolution. This book describes several desirable types of double consciousness or being of two minds and explains why and how they should be maintained. Church looks critically at some common ideas about identity, including a popular belief about narratives that suggests our lives should make sense as a story. She also examines how empathy can helpfully cause us to be of two minds, and how various forms of irony and laughter enable us to benefit from holding onto opposing views. Finally, Church shows the merit of acknowledging reality while sometimes being guided by fantasy.

Why Its OK to Be of Two Minds is for anyone whos held two opposing views simultaneously, which is to say its for everyone.

Key Features

• Argues against a long-standing philosophical idea: that it is important to resolve inner conflicts that result from competing systems of beliefs.
• Examines the role of empathy and friendship in maintaining a valuable form of double consciousness.
• Considers how irony and laughter allow us to dedicate ourselves to our particular projects while acknowledging their ultimate insignificance.
• Shows how fantasies that conflict with our beliefs can make a positive contribution to the way we live our lives.

Jennifer Church is a Professor of Philosophy at Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, New York. Her research addresses various topics in the philosophy of mind. She is the author of Possibilities of Perception (Oxford UP, 2013) and numerous articles on mental divisions and mental health.

Philosophers often build cogent arguments for unpopular positions. Recent examples include cases against marriage and pregnancy, for treating animals as our equals, and dismissing some popular art as aesthetically inferior. What philosophers have done less often is to offer compelling arguments for widespread and established human behavior, like getting married, having children, eating animals, and going to the movies. But if one role for philosophy is to help us reflect on our lives and build sound justifications for our beliefs and actions, it seems odd that philosophers would neglect arguments for the lifestyles most people including many philosophers actually lead. Unfortunately, philosophers inattention to normalcy has meant that the ways of life that define our modern societies have gone largely without defense, even as whole literatures have emerged to condemn them.

Why Its OK: The Ethics and Aesthetics of How We Live seeks to remedy that. Its a series of books that provides accessible, sound, and often new and creative arguments for widespread ethical and aesthetic values. Made up of short volumes that assume no previous knowledge of philosophy from the reader, the series recognizes that philosophy is just as important for understanding what we already believe as it is for criticizing the status quo. The series isnt meant to make us complacent about what we value; rather, it helps and challenges us to think more deeply about the values that give our daily lives meaning.

Why Its OK to Want to Be Rich

Jason Brennan

Why Its OK to Be of Two Minds

Jennifer Church

Why Its OK to Ignore Politics

Christopher Freiman

Why Its OK to Make Bad Choices

William Glod

Selected Forthcoming Titles:

Why Its OK to Get Married

Christie J. Hartley

Why Its OK to Love Bad Movies

Matthew Strohl

Why Its OK to Eat Meat

Dan C. Shahar

Why Its OK to Mind Your Own Business

Justin Tosi and Brandon Warmke

Why Its OK to Be Fat

Rekha Nath

Why Its OK to Be a Moral Failure

Robert Talisse

Why Its OK to Have Bad Grammar and Spelling

Jessica Flanigan

For further information about this series, please visit: www.routledge.com/Why-Its-OK/book-series/WIOK

JENNIFER CHURCH

First published 2021
by Routledge
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The right of Jennifer Church to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

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ISBN: 978-0-367-89863-2 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-0-367-89862-5 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-1-003-02154-4 (ebk)

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We live in a time where most people belong to more than one culture, where most people undergo significant changes in outlook as they age, where most of us try to empathize with people from very different backgrounds than our own, and where most of us experience a significant disparity between the world we move in and the worlds we imagine. All of these dichotomies mean that we frequently find ourselves in states of double consciousness that give rise to various sorts of inner conflict. Inner conflict, like outer conflict, creates discomfort that we tend to avoid by steering clear of whatever prompts the conflict, by discounting one or the other side of the conflict, or by seeking a harmonious resolution. However, these strategies are often unsuccessful or damaging. We are left with a lingering desire for inner coherence yet we doubt its feasibility. We attempt, by various means, to overcome the tension created by states of double consciousness but we do so without confidence in the task and without surprise at our failures.

Philosophy usually argues for coherent outlooks and whole selves. Wholeheartedness is valued because it makes us feel better and because a confident, undistracted actor is more likely to succeed. Also, we assume that the world itself is coherent, so true beliefs about that world must themselves be coherent. Rejecting the ideal of wholeness seems to threaten the very idea of an objective world and the very possibility of a responsible self. These are not things that should be abandoned lightly. Thus, it is important to show how double consciousness can be embraced without losing our appreciation of individual selves inhabiting a common world. Double consciousness can be a creative, enlivening part of our lives. Explaining that is the task of this book.