American Selfishness

The Kelleter reading from last night emphasized that Franklin believed in a utilitarian form of enlightened philosophy. In his search for usefulness, he even went so far as to reject deism, not because he did not think it was true, but because he did not find it useful in living a moral life. In general, the idea of utilitarianism is a decent idea in that it encourages enlightened thinkers to use their rational thought to better society for the greater good. However, one aspect of Franklin’s utilitarianism stood out to me as being less admirable. Kelleter gives us a passage from Franklin’s autobiography in which he describes how he stopped being a vegetarian one day because he saw some fish that looked really appetizing. At the end of the passage he says, “So convenient a thing it is to be a reasonable Creature, since it enables one to find or make a Reason for everything one has a mind to do.” This kind of self-serving rationality with an aim towards self-advancement at the expense of ideals seems to be an unintentional effect of the Enlightenment. In the introduction to our Enlightenment Reader, Kramnick describes how many enlightened thinkers thought of life as a “race for wealth and honors and preferments.” The playing field was theoretically supposed to be level, but in reality there are a lot of self-serving people, so the focus the Enlightenment places on individuals and their right to pursue wealth and happiness created an environment where selfish rationality could flourish.

It is this rationality for personal gains rather than for societal usefulness or truth, I think, that is one of the problems of the Enlightenment. It is an unintentional side effect and the Enlightenment as a whole was probably a good thing, but this aspect of it was definitely negative. Take, for example, America. Because America was just getting started during the Enlightenment, it was founded on many principles of the Enlightenment, and many people were influenced by Franklin and his writings. The Kelleter article mentions that “a very widespread criticism of Franklin and of the American Enlightenment, if not of American society at large” is that “freedom from external authorities” allows enlightened individuals to do whatever they want to do. Especially in today’s modern times, America is often viewed by people in other countries as a place where everyone is selfish and does whatever they want to do despite the consequences to others. Perhaps this was caused – at least partially – by the Enlightenment, and perhaps not. However, I think that the Enlightenment was a contributing factor in allowing people the freedom to be selfish.