Conatus: REVISED EDITION by Tom Wallace - HTML preview

C O N A T U S

the world? There are no true stories, according to Sartre, and we’ve certainly seen philosophy advocate the idea that words and language have a powerful influence on the way we experience and describe our world. So yes, it’s important to remember that our thoughts are partly shaped by the way we form and use symbol! A culture that is absolutely convinced of — for instance — the existence of soul and spirit would make those aspects into a reality of sorts — even if this could never be traced back to some objective fact. But I think that, at most, the idea that stories create the world is only half true.

It is ‘poetic’ truth and narrative that really engage people — cementing our friendships, relationships and communities. This ‘alternative’ narrative is not the absence of meaning or the absence of moral absolutes — but a narrative where the body, our essence and our power (or lack of power) take the upper hand. We are less concerned with literal truth and more concerned with a great story! All these observations indicate, for instance, why politics is so easily ‘weaponised’ by all manner of ideas that have little or nothing to do with policies and manifestos!

Following stories, one might say, rather cynically, is delusional. Alasdair MacIntyre said, ‘we are never more (and sometimes much less) than the co-authors of our own narratives. Only in fantasy can we live as we please’. And essence itself is an abstract idea — there is not any material thing, or even mental thing — that constitutes the essence of something or someone. Yes, perhaps, but stories don’t need

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