UNIT 08
THE Accidental factor
24-08-2024
In Unit 08 we demonstrate that Hitchens makes use of accidental facts in his perception formation. The intuitive oriented Hitchens habitually uses the accidental aspects of events in his presentations contra the law bound aspects of events with which Dawkins, Dennett and Harris are concerned.
THEORETICAL ORIENTATION
We demonstrated in Unit 07 that Hitchens’ intuition is indeed concerned with actual facts, and that such facts do count, but only “if they open new possibilities.” (CW. 6, par. 612) The theme pursued in this footprint is a continuation of this aspect. The accidental factor relates to actual facts as opposed to the so-called facts.
Jung writes in Psychological Types: “Objective events both conform to law and are accidental.” (ibid. par. 616) Events refers to occurrences. Jung augments by saying “… an event conforms to law when it presents an aspect accessible to reason, and when it presents an aspect for which we can find no law we call it accidental.” (ibid. par. 616) Events thus present two different kinds of aspects, namely those which are law bound and those which are accidental or contingent. We can also refer to these two aspects as the rational and irrational parts of events.
When events conform to law, they present aspects accessible to reason. Rational minds like Dawkins, Dennett and Harris posit objects or aspects “that are confined within rational bounds.” (ibid. par. 775) We called attention in the previous unit to the rigorous and precise formulation of their presentations. We demonstrated how they rationalise issues by restricting questions to isolated facts. We described their mental orientation with words like “exactitude”, “clarification”, “derived” and “rational basis”, all of these taken from Jung’s discoveries and terminology.
Whilst these gentlemen’s rational approach to problems is not yet our prime focus, these few remarks suffice to confirm Jung’s observation that the intellectual rational mind is directed towards the rational aspects of events. The thinking function is concerned with those aspects which possess general validity. (ibid. par. 692) This rational function “does not consider the actual object as a whole, but only that part of it which has been singled out for rational observation.” (ibid par. 775) It only takes into account what is merely posited. (ibid par. 775)
Events also present aspects which are accidental or contingent. The accidental aspects of events lack lawfulness. Accidental aspects comprise all the unpositable aspects of events which consequently lack general validity. Intuition is concerned with the “perception of accidentals.” (ibid. par. 776) Intuition thus orients towards the accidental factor. Put differently, the perception of the intuitive “is directed simply and solely to events as they happen.” (ibid. par. 616) Jung says that intuition finds “fulfilment in the absolute perception of the flux of events.” (ibid. par. 776) Intuition is a function that lacks “all rational direction.” (ibid. par. 776) Intuition is by its “very nature irrational.” (ibid. par. 616) For this reason Jung calls intuition “an irrational function.” (ibid. par. 776)
DEMONSTRATION OF THE ACCIDENTAL FACTOR
Please study the selection of relevant self-representations
We encourage you to first study the relevant section as a whole to form an overall picture before proceeding to examine a specific extract. Explore for yourself in the following extracts Hitchens’ intuitive use of accidental facts before reading our commentary. We invite you to first hunt for the accidental facts in the following references.
DEMONSTRATIONS
01
The Four Horsemen
Extract
Book: pp. 42-3 [From the last par. on p. 42: “But if the charge of offensiveness…” to the end of the second par on p. 43: “…we wouldn’t know right from wrong.”]
Hour 1 of 2
URL: 00:01:47 to 00:02:53 timer
Hitchens:
“I mean, I’m not just in disagreement when someone like Tariq Ramadan, accepted at the high tables of Oxford University as a spokesman, says the most he’ll demand when it comes to the stoning of women is a moratorium on it.”
Book: pp. 42-3
Hour 1 of 2
URL: 00:01:58 timer
Analytic commentary
Hitchens’ statement: “… Tariq Ramadan, accepted at the high tables of Oxford University as a spokesman” is based on an empirically factual event. From a whole range of facts pertaining to the said event, Hitchens’ draws out this one fact only: Tariq Ramadan accepted at the high tables of Oxford University as a spokesman. He could have mentioned another individual or aspects of another event. This illustrates intuition’s orientation towards the accidental factor. Hitchens’ irrational intuition is oriented towards an aspect which does not reflect a posited or positable fact. No intellectual can posit anything from the accidental. Hitchens’ intuitive perception “is directed simply and solely to events as they happen” (ibid. par. 616).
02
The Four Horsemen
Extract
Book: pp. 44-5 [From the second par. on p. 44: “…Well, it’s interesting that you say that…” to the end of the first par on p. 45: “…to see churches desecrated.”]
Hour 1 of 2
URL: 00:04:21 to 00:04:56 timer
Hitchens:
“Yes, for example, Serrano’s Piss Christ, or the elephant dung on the Virgin. And indeed, I think it’s quite important that we share with Sophocles and other pre-monotheists a revulsion to desecration or to profanity”.
Book: p. 45
Hour 1 of 2
URL: 00:04:36 timer
Analytic commentary
Hitchens’ references to Serrano’s Piss Christ and the elephant dung on the Virgin reflect accidental facts.
03
The Four Horsemen
Extract
Book: pp. 52-3 [From the third par. on p. 52: “I don’t think many of them…” to the end of the first par. on p. 53: “…by keeping two sets of books.”]
Hour 1 of 2
URL: 00:14:55 to 00:15:42 timer
Hitchens:
“A lot of talk that makes religious people not hard to beat, but hard to argue with, is precisely that they’ll say they’re in a permanent crisis of faith. There is, indeed, a prayer: ‘Lord, I believe. Help thou my unbelief.’ Graham Greene says the great thing about being Catholic was that it was a challenge to his unbelief.”
Book: p. 53
Hour 1 of 2
URL: 00:15:18 timer
Analytic commentary
Again, both Hitchens’ stated facts in the above extract reflect the accidental factor which is not positable.
04
The Four Horsemen
Extract
Book: pp. 55-6 [From the second par. on p. 55: “There was a review…” to the end of the first par. on p. 56: “The more you prove it’s true.”]
Hour 1 of 2
URL: 00:18:05 to 00:19:28 timer
Hitchens:
“Well, a friend of mine – Canon Fenton of Oxford, actually – said that if the Church validated the Holy Shroud of Turin, he personally would leave the ranks … I didn’t expect Mother Teresa to come out an atheist. But reading her letters … She writes that she can’t bring herself to believe any of this. She tells all her confessors, all her superiors, that she can’t hear a voice, can’t feel a presence, even in the Mass, even in the sacraments … They write back to her, saying ‘That’s good, that’s great, you’re suffering, it gives you a share in the Crucifixion, it makes you part of Calvary’.”
Book: pp. 55-6
Hour 1 of 2
URL: 00:18:26 timer
Analytic commentary
This example illustrates factual accidental aspects of three events, each with reference to an individual, namely: Canon Fenton, Jerry Falwell and Mother Theresa. Note that none of the stated facts are positable.
05
The Four Horsemen
Extract
Book: pp. 66-7 [From the first par. on p. 66: “Yes. Because I’ll take things…” to the end of the first par. on p. 67: “Shame on them for believing this.”]
Hour 1 of 2
URL: 00:33:09 to 00:34:31 timer
Hitchens:
“I wanted to introduce the name ‘H.L. Mencken’ at this point, now a very and justly celebrated American writer. Not particularly to my taste – much too much of a Nietzschean and what really was once meant by ‘social Darwinist’ at one stage. But why did he win the tremendous respect of so many people in this country in the 1920s and ‘30s? Because he said that the people who believe what the Methodists tell them, and what William Jennings Bryan tells them, are fools. They’re not being fooled; they are fools.”
Book: pp. 66-7
Hour 1 of 2
URL: 00:33:55 timer
Analytic commentary
In this example we again see Hitchens’ intuitive use of accidental facts – in this instance, several stated facts pertaining to H.L Mencken.
ADDITIONAL COMMENTARY
At first glance it may seem as if Hitchens uses many more facts in his presentations than his three friends do. But these are irrational accidental facts, not rational positable facts. Hitchens’ intuitive presentations lack the complete conceptual roundedness found in those of his three rational friends. These examples of Hitchens’ intuitive use of event-related accidental facts are in keeping with Jung’s judgement that “…when [an event] presents an aspect for which we can find no law we call it accidental.”
It is actually impressive to note the wide array of aspects pertaining to accidental facts touched upon by Hitchens in the course of this debate. It may come as a surprise to you that by far the highest number of footnote references published in The Four Horsemen reflect accidental facts mentioned by Hitchens – the tally of his references outnumber those of his three friends put together.
In this unit we have elaborated further on accidental facts pertaining to factual events which are unpositable, and therefore irrational. The reason Jung defines intuition as an irrational function of perception is due to the fact that intuitive perception “is directed simply and solely to events as they happen.” As such its orientation is to the accidental aspect of such events. This is in contrast to an orientation to rational aspects of events and isolated facts which conform to law and can be posited.
From the intellectual perspective of Dawkins, Dennett and Harris, accidental facts, in themselves, are useless. They cannot serve as anchors for the individual with a thinking mind-set.