AGENDA
- DeBres overview
- Discussion
- Next time: Galen Strawson, critic
- Relationism--the actual narrative relations add meaning to our lives
- Progressive relationism--the actual narrative relations add meaning to our lives provided that the narrative is progressive
- Recountism--recounting our life stories adds meaning to our lives
- Agency recountism--recounting our life stories adds meaning to our lives when we are autonomous protagonists of our stories and telling the story is therefore empowering
- Parallel
- Seeking meaning OF life...you want the universe to be intelligible
- Seeking meaning IN life ... you want yourself to be intelligible
- By telling our own life stories we make our own lives intelligible to ourselves and others
- So telling our life stories contributes to meaning in life (recountism)
"Fitting Story. Telling a story about one’s life that is (i) true and (ii) adheres
to a set of (salient) narrative conventions, contributes to the meaningful-
ness of one’s life. It does so by making the life more intelligible to oneself
and others, thereby enabling the goods of understanding and community." (p. 562)
- The story must be true--"a wildly inaccurate --one involving major fabrications, distortions, or omissions--can't render the life that it treats intelligible" (p. 562)
- The narrative must adhere to narrative conventions...otherwise, does not increase intelligibility
"Although I have argued here that recounting one’s life story contributes to meaning, I haven’t argued that doing so is necessary for a meaningful life or sufficient for a life of
superlative meaning. In fact, I deny both of those claims. I believe that the bulk
of meaning in life is supplied not by “fitting stories,” but directly by the projects, relationships, activities, and experiences that are the stuff of which those
stories are told. Possession of such goods could render a life meaningful even
if narrative intelligibility were absent and lack of them could render a life substantially meaningless even if narrative intelligibility were present. Relatedly, although I believe that narrative addresses some deep and widespread human concerns, I make no claim here that all humans experience those concerns or that all humans find narrative a useful response to them." (p. 570)
- Imagine Sisyphus continually telling his life story...still a meaningless life
- Imagine Choppy Life continually telling his life story...doesn't add much meaning
DeBres's reply
- Life stories are often only partially true
- We embellish, we forget, we shape our own stories, we deceive ourselves
DeBres's reply
(3) The most meaningful lives break free from narrative conventions
DeBres's reply: even very unique lives can be told within existing narrative conventions
(4) This theory gives bad advice--that we should live in such a way that we have good stories to tell.
DeBres's reply
(5) Clover and Daisy do all the same things, but only Clover tells her life story. Doesn't seem plausible that Clover's life is more meaningful.
DeBres's reply
_________________________
Suppose that telling your life story does contribute meaning to your life. Does the story have to be true or do you just have to believe it's true?
- This American Life, episode 504 (Michael Lewis)
- Emir Kamenika, his story of how he got into college
- He came to the US from war torn Bosnia
- Goes to a rough high school in Atlanta
- Mrs Ames assigns an essay...he can't really speak English...plagiarizes an essay he had translated out of a book he stole from a library in Bosnia
- Mrs Ames writes him a letter of recommendation, he gets into Harvard
- He goes on to become a professor in the business school at University of Chicago
- His life story, which he loves to tell, is about the shameful essay and how Mrs Ames saved his life
- The producer brings Emir and MrsAmes together
- She says his story is false! His trengths would have made him succeed without her and she doesn't even remember the essay.
- Later on he just keeps telling his story about the essay and Mrs Ames saving his life
