Kierkegaard on the Internet: Anonymity vs. Commitment in the

Kierkegaard

on the

Internet:

Anonymity

vs.

Commitment

in the

Present

Age

By

HUBERT

L.

DREYFUS

Abstract

To

understand

why

Kierkegaard would have hated

the

Internet

we

need

to

under-

stand what

he

meant

by the

Public

and why he was so

opposed

to the

Press.

The

focus

of

his

concern

was

what

Habermas

calls

the

Public Sphere which,

in the

middle

of the

nineteenth

century, thanks

to the

recent democratization

and

expansion

of the

press,

had

become

a

serious problem

for

many intellectuals.

But

while thinkers like

Mill

and

Tocqueville thought

the

problem

was

"the tyranny

of the

masses,"

Kierkegaard

thought

that

the

Public Sphere,

as

implemented

in the

Press, promoted

risk-free

ano-

nymity

and

idle curiosity, both

of

which undermined responsibility

and

commitment.

This,

in

turn, leveled

all

qualitative distinctions

and led to

nihilism,

he

held. Kierke-

gaard might well have denounced

the

Internet

for the

same reasons. Kierkegaard's

likely

objections

are

spelled

out by

considering

how the Net

promotes Kierkegaard's

two

nihilistic spheres

of

existence,

the

aesthetic

and the

ethical,

while

repelling

the re-

ligious

sphere.

In the

aesthetic sphere,

the

aesthete avoids commitments

and

lives

in

the

categories

of the

interesting

and the

boring

and

wants

to see as

many interesting

sights

(sites)

as

possible. People

in the

ethical sphere could

use the

Internet

to

make

and

keep track

of

commitments

but

would

be

brought

to the

"despair

of

possibility"

by

the

ease

of

making

and

unmaking commitments

on the

Net. Only

in the

religious

sphere

is

nihilism overcome

by

making

a

risky, unconditional commitment.

The In-

ternet,

however, which

offers

a

risk-free simulated world, would tend

to

undermine

rather than support

any

such ultimate concern.

/. How the

Press

and the

Public Undermine

Responsibility

and

Commitment

In

the

section

of A

Literary Review

entitled

"The

Present

Age,"

1

Kierkegaard

warns

that

his age is

characterized

by a

disinterested

re-

flection and

curiosity that levels

all

differences

of

status

and

value.

1

Translated separately

by

Alexander

Dru as The

Present

Age,

New

York: Harper

and

Row

1962. References

to

this edition

are

given

in

parentheses

in the

text.

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Kierkegaard

on the

Internet

97

He

blames this leveling

on

what

he

calls

the

Public.

He

says that

"[i]n

order that everything should

be

reduced

to the

same level,

it is

first

of

all

necessary

to

produce

a

phantom,

its

spirit

a

monstrous abstrac-

tion...

and

that phantom

is the

Public"

(p.

59).

But the

real

villain

be-

hind

the

Public, Kierkegaard claims,

is the

Press.

He

feared that

"Europe

will

come

to a

standstill

at the

Press

and

remain

at a

stand-

still

as a

reminder that

the

human race

has

invented something which

eventually

overpowered

it,"

2

and he

adds:

"Even

if my

life

had no

other significance, well,

I am

satisfied with having discovered

the ab-

solutely demoralizing existence

of the

daily

press."

3

But

why

blame leveling

on the

Public rather than

on

democracy,

technology,

consumerism,

or

loss

of

respect

for

tradition,

to

name

a

few

candidates?

And why

this monomaniacal

demonizing

of the

Press? Commentators have noted

the

problem.

For

example,

Hakon

Strangerup remarks that "the Danish daily press

was on an

extremely

modest scale

in

[Kierkegaard's]

lifetime,"

4

and

asks: "How, then,

is

SK's preoccupation with these

trifling

papers

to be

explained?"

5

He

answers

that Kierkegaard's strident opposition

to the

Press

had po-

litical,

psychological

and

sociological motivations.

First,

the

Press

was the

mouthpiece

for

liberalism

and

this "filled

the

deeply conservative

SK

with

horror."

6

But

this

is not

convincing

for,

in The

Review

at

least, Kierkegaard does

not

attack

the

Press

for

being liberal,

or for any

political stand.

I

will

argue

in a

moment that

Kierkegaard

would have hated

the

newspapers

and TV

talk shows

on

the

right just

as

much

as

those

on the

left.

Then

there

was,

of

course,

the

Corsair

affair.

Strangerup tell

us

that

"[f]rom

then

on the

tone

of

SK's polemic with

the

Press changes

from

irony

to

hatred

of the

Press

as

such."

7

But the

Corsair

affair

occurred

after

the

publication

of

the

Review

and so

cannot account

for the

vehemence with which

Kierkegaard blames

the

Press

for all the

evils

of the

present

age.

In

any

case

I

think

the

evidence

is

clear that

he

thinks that personal

at-

tacks

are

only

one

unfortunate side

effect

of

what

is

essentially dan-

gerous about

the

Press

as

such. Indeed, Kierkegaard quite sensibly

2

Pap.

IX A 378 / JP II

2157,

p.

483,1848.

3

Pap.

X 2 A

17,1847

/ JP II

2163.

4

Hakon Stangerup "His Polemic

with

the

Press"

in

Kierkegaard

as a

Person,

ed. by

Niels

and

Marie

Thulstrup,

Copenhagen:

C.A.

Reitzels Forlag 1983,

p.

119.

5

Ibid.

6

Ibid.,

p.

120.

7

Ibid.,

p.

122.

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98

Hubert

L.

Dreyfus

holds that such degrading gossip

is

only

a

"minor

affair."

8

Finally,

Strangerup

tells

us

that Kierkegaard

had

"contempt

for

[journalists']

low

social

status,"

9

but I

think

it

will

soon

be

clear that

he

would

have

hated

the

snobbish

and

self-righteous William Buckley

as

much

as

the

lower class

felon,

Gordon Liddy. None

of

Strangerup's

three

reasons,

nor all of

them combined, explains

why

Kierkegaard says

in

his

journals that

"[a]ctually

it is the

Press, more specifically

the

daily

newspaper...which

make[s] Christianity

impossible."

10

Clearly,

be-

sides

his

political, psychological,

and

sociological reservations con-

cerning

the

daily press, Kierkegaard

saw the

Press

as a

unique cul-

tural/religious

threat.

It is no

accident that,

writing

in

1846, Kierkegaard chose

to

attack

the

Public

and the

Press.

To

understand

why he did so, we

have

to be-

gin

a

century earlier.

In The

Structural

Transformation

of the

Public

Sphere

11

Jürgen Habermas locates

the

beginning

of

what

he

calls

the

Public

Sphere

in the

middle

of the

eighteenth century.

He

explains

that,

at

that time,

the

Press

and

coffee

houses became

the

locus

of a

new

form

of

political discussion. This

new

sphere

of

discourse

is

radi-

cally

different

from

the

ancient

polis

or

republic;

the

modern Public

Sphere understands itself

as

being outside political power. This extra-

political status

is not

just

defined

negatively,

as a

lack

of

political

power,

but

seen positively. Just because public opinion

is not an

exer-

cise

of

political power,

it is

protected

from

any

partisan spirit.

En-

lightenment

intellectuals

saw the

Public Sphere

as a

space

in

which

the

rational, disinterested reflection that should guide government

and

human

life

could

be

institutionalized

and

refined. Such disen-

gaged

discussion came

to be

seen

as an

essential feature

of a free so-

ciety.

As the

Press extended

the

Public debate

to a

wider

and

wider

readership

of

ordinary citizens, Burke exulted that,

"In a free

country,

every

man

thinks

he has a

concern

in all

public

matters."

12

Over

the

next century, thanks

to the

expansion

of the

daily

press,

the

Public Sphere became increasingly democratized until this

de-

mocratization

had a

surprising result

which,

according

to

Habermas,

"altered [the] social preconditions

of

'public

opinion'

around

the

8

Ibid.,

p.

123.

9

Ibid.,

p.

124.

10

Pap.

X, 2 A 17

/

JP II

2163, cited

by

Stangerup.

11

Jürgen Habermas

The

Structural

Transformation

of the

Public

Sphere,

Cambridge,

MA:

The

MIT

Press

1989.

12

Ibid.,

p. 94.

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Kierkegaard

on the

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99

middle

of the

[nineteenth]

century."

13

"[As]

the

Public

was ex-

panded...

by the

proliferation

of the

Press...the

reign

of

public opin-

ion

appeared

as the

reign

of the

many

and

mediocre."

14

Many

people,

including J.S. Mill

and

Alexis

de

Tocqueville, feared

"the

tyranny

of

public

opinion,"

15

and

Mill

felt

called upon

to

protect

"noncon-

formists

from

the

grip

of the

Public

itself."

16

According

to

Habermas,

Tocqueville insisted that "education

and

powerful citizens were sup-

posed

to

form

an

elite

public whose critical debate determined public

opinion."

17

But

leveling

to the

lowest common denominator

was not

primarily

what

Kierkegaard feared.

The

section

of the

Review

on

"the present

age"

is

concerned

not

primarily with "the merging

of the

individual

with

the

group,"

nor

with

the

conformism

of the

masses which Kier-

kegaard called "the crowd,"

nor

with what Alastair Hannay calls "the

eliminating

of

grades

of

authority within

and

between

groups."

18

Al-

though

Kierkegaard

is

concerned with

all

these phenomena, accord-

ing

to him

they

are not

dangerous

in

themselves since they

can and

do

occur

in a

positive, passionate revolutionary

age

such

as the age of

the

French Revolution.

If an

elitist disgust with

the

crowd were

the

basis

of

Kierkegaard's attack

on the

Public

and the

Press,

his

polemic

would

ironically itself

be a

case

of

conforming

to the

intellectual wor-

ries

of his

time.

In

fact,

however, "The Present Age" shows just

how

original Kier-

kegaard was. While Tocqueville

and

Mill claimed that

the

masses

needed

elite

philosophical leadership and, while

Habermas

agrees

with

them that what happens around 1850 with

the

democratization

of

the

Public Sphere

by the

daily

press

is an

unfortunate decline into

conformism

from

which

the

Public Sphere must

be

saved, Kierke-

gaard sees

the

Public Sphere

as a new and

dangerous cultural phe-

nomenon

in

which

the

leveling produced

by the

Press

brings

out

something that

was

deeply wrong with

the

Enlightenment idea

of de-

tached reflection

from

the

start. Thus, while Habermas

is

concerned

to

recapture

the

moral

and

political virtues

of the

Public Sphere,

Kierkegaard brilliantly sees that there

is no way to

salvage

the

Public

13

Ibid.,

p.

130.

14

Ibid.,

pp.

131,133.

15

Ibid.,

p.

138.

16

Ibid.,

p.

134.

17

Ibid.,

p.

137.

18

Alastair Hannay

Kierkegaard,

London:

Routledge,

2nd ed.

1991 [1982],

p.

293.

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100

Hubert

L.

Dreyfus

Sphere since, unlike concrete groups

and

crowds,

it was

from

the

start

the

source

of

leveling.

This leveling

was

produced

in

several ways. First,

the new

massive

distribution

of

desituated information

was

making every

sort

of

infor-

mation immediately available

to

anyone, thereby producing

a

desitu-

ated, detached

spectator.

The new

power

of the

Press

to

disseminate

information

to

everyone

in a

nation

led its

readers

to

transcend their

local, personal involvement

and

overcome their reticence about what

did

not

directly concern them.

As

Burke

had

noted with joy,

the

Press

encouraged everyone

to

develop

an

opinion about everything. This

is

seen

by

Habermas

as a

triumph

of

democratization

but

Kierkegaard

saw

that

the

Public Sphere

was

destined

to

become

a

realm

of

idle

talk

in

which spectators merely pass

the

word along.

This demoralization reaches

its

lowest form

in the

yellow journal-

ism

of

scandal

sheets

like

the

Corsair. Since

the

members

of the

Pub-

lic

being outside political power take

no

stand,

the

Public Sphere,

through

the

Press, removes

all

seriousness

from

human action

so

that,

at

the

limit,

the

Press becomes

a

voyeuristic form

of

irresponsible

amusement

that enjoys

the

undermining

of

"outstanding

individuals."

If

we

imagine

the

Press

growing

weaker

and

weaker because

no

events

or

ideas catch

hold

of the

age,

the

more

easily

will

the

process

of

leveling

become

a

harmful

pleasure.

More

and

more

individuals,

owing

to

their bloodless indolence,

will

aspire

to be

nothing

at

all - in

order

to

become

the

Public: that abstract

whole

formed

in the

must

ludicrous

way,

by all

participants becoming

a

third-party

[an

onlooker]....This

gallery

is on the

look-out

for

distraction

and

soon abandons

itself

to the

idea that everything

that

any

one

does

is

done

in

order

to

give

it

[the Public] something

to

gossip

about,

(pp.

64,65)

But

this demoralizing

effect

was not

Kierkegaard's main concern.

For

Kierkegaard

the

deeper

danger

is

just what Habermas applauds

about

the

Public Sphere,

viz.,

as

Kierkegaard puts

it,

"[A]

public...

destroys everything

that

is

relative,

concrete

and

particular

in

life"

(p.

62).

The

Public

Sphere

thus promotes ubiquitous commentators

who

deliberately detach themselves

from

the

local practices

out of

which

specific issues grow

and in

terms

of

which these issues must

be

resolved through some sort

of

committed action. What seems

a

virtue

to

detached Enlightenment reason, therefore, looks like

a

disastrous

drawback

to

Kierkegaard.

The

Public Sphere

is a

world

in

which eve-

ryone

has an

opinion

on, and

comments

on, all

public matters with-

out

needing

any

first-hand experience

and

without having

or

wanting

any

responsibility.

Even

the

most conscientious commentators

are not

required

to

have

first-hand

experience

or

take

a

concrete

stand.

Rather,

they

justify

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Kierkegaard

on the

Internet

101

their

views

by

citing principles, and,

as

Kierkegaard

notes

with disap-

proval,

their

"ability,

virtuosity

and

good sense consists

in

trying

to

reach

a

judgment

and a

decision without ever going

so far as

action"

(p.

33). Moreover, since

the

conclusions such abstract reasoning

reaches

are not

grounded

in the

local practices,

its

solutions

are

equally abstract. Such

proposals

would presumably

not

enlist

the

com-

mitment

of the

people

involved

and

therefore

not

work even

if

acted

upon. Kierkegaard concludes that

"what...the

speakers

at a

meeting

understand perfectly presented

to

them

as a

thought

or an

observa-

tion, they cannot understand

at all in the

form

of

action"

(p.

39).

More basically still, that

the

Public Sphere lies outside political

power

so

that anyone

can

hold

an

opinion

on

anything without hav-

ing

to act on it,

opens

up the

possibility

of

endless reflection.

If

there

is

no

possibility

of

decision

and

action,

one can

look

at all

things

from

all

sides

and

always

find

some

new

perspective

from

which

to

put

everything into question again. Kierkegaard saw, when everything

is

up for

endless critical commentary, action

finally

becomes impossi-

ble.

"[A]t

any

moment reflection

is

capable

of

explaining everything

quite

differently

and

allowing

one

some

way of

escape..."

(p.

42).

He

is

therefore clear that "reflection

by

transforming

the

capacity

for ac-

tion

into

a

means

of

escape

from

action,

is

both corrupt

and

danger-

ous... "(p. 68). Therefore

the

motto Kierkegaard suggested

for the

Press was:

"Here

men are

demoralized

in the

shortest possible time

on

the

largest possible scale,

at the

cheapest possible

price."

19

This

demoralization clearly transcends liberal politics, yellow journalism,

and

the

uncouth manners

of

reporters.

The

real problem

is

that

the

Press speaks

for the

Public

but no one

stands behind

the

views

the

Public holds. Thus Kierkegaard wrote

in

his

Journal:

"[H]ere...are

the two

most

dreadful

calamities which

re-

ally

are the

principle powers

of

impersonality

- the

Press

and

anonym-

ity."

20

As

Kierkegaard puts

it

even

more

clearly

in the

Review:

"A

pub-

lic

is

neither

a

nation,

nor a

generation,

nor a

community,

nor a

society,

nor

these particular men,

for all

these

are

only what they

are

through

the

concrete;

no

single

person

who

belongs

to the

Public makes

a

real

commitment."

(p.

63,

my

italics).

As we

shall see, this

is the

sense

in

which

the

Public

and the

Press make Christianity impossible.

Kierkegaard

succinctly

sums

up his

view

of the

relation

of the

Press,

the

Public Sphere,

and the

leveling going

on in his

time.

The

19

Pap.

X 5 A

138,1853

/ JP II

2171.

20

Pap.

VIII1

A

540,1848

/ JP II

2152.

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102

Hubert

L.

Dreyfus

desituated

and

anonymous press

and the

lack

of

passion

or

commit-

ment

in our

reflective

age

combine

to

produce

the

Public,

the

agent

of

the

nihilistic leveling characteristic

of his

time

and

ours. "The Press

is

an

abstraction (since

a

newspaper

is not a

concrete part

of a

nation

and

only

in an

abstract sense

an

individual) which

in

conjunction

with

the

passionless

and

reflective character

of the age

produces that

abstract phantom:

a

public which

in its

turn

is

really

the

leveling

power"

(p.

64). Kierkegaard would surely have seen

in the

Internet,

with

its web

sites

full

of

anonymous information

from

all

over

the

world

and its

interest groups which anyone

in the

world

can

join

and

where

one can

discuss

any

topic endlessly without consequences,

the

hi-tech synthesis

of the

worst features

of the

newspaper

and the

cof-

fee

house.

On

their

web

page anyone

can put any

alleged information

into circulation. Kierkegaard could have been speaking

of the In-

ternet when

he

said

of the

Press,

"[i]t

is

frightful

that someone

who is

no

one...can

set any

error

into circulation with

no

thought

of

respon-

sibility

and

with

the aid of

this

dreadful

disproportioned means

of

communication."

21

And in

interest groups anyone

can

have

an

opin-

ion

on

anything.

In

both

cases,

all are

only

too

eager

to

respond

to

the

equally deracinated opinions

of

other anonymous amateurs

who

post their views

from

nowhere. Such commentators

do not

take

a

stand

on the

issues they speak about. Indeed,

the

very ubiquity

of the

Net

generally makes

any

such local stand seem irrelevant.

What

is

striking about such interest groups

is

that

no

experience

or

skill

is

required

to

enter

the

conversation. Indeed,

a

serious danger

of

the

Public Sphere,

as

illustrated

on the

Internet,

is

that

it

undermines

expertise. Learning

a

skill requires interpreting

the

situation

as

being

of

a

sort that requires

a

certain action, taking that action,

and

learn-

ing

from

the

results.

As

Kierkegaard understood,

there

is no way to

gain

wisdom

but by

making risky commitments

and

thereby experi-

encing

both failure

and

success. Studies

of

skill acquisition have

shown that, unless

the

outcome matters

and

unless

the

person

devel-

oping

the

skill

is

willing

to

accept

the

pain that comes

from

failure

and

the

elation that comes with success,

the

learner

will

be

stuck

at

the

level

of

competence

and

never achieve mastery. Thus

the

heroes

of

the

Public Sphere

who

appear

on

serious radio

and TV

programs,

such

as the

United

States'

MacNeil/Lehrer

News Hour, with views

on

every

issue justified

by

appealing

to

abstract principles,

but who do

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Kierkegaard

on the

Internet

103

not

have

to act on the

principles they

espouse

and

therefore lack

the

passionate perspective that alone

can

lead

to

risk

of

serious

error,

do

not

acquire wisdom.

Kierkegaard

even

saw

that

the

ultimate activity

the

Internet

would

encourage would

be

speculation

on how big it is, how

much bigger

it

will

get,

and

what,

if

anything,

all

this means

for our

culture. This sort

of

discussion

is, of

course,

in

danger

of

becoming part

of the

very

cloud

of

anonymous speculation Kierkegaard

abhorred.

Ever

sensi-

tive

to his own

position

as a

speaker, Kierkegaard concluded

his

analysis

of the

dangers

of the

present

age and his

dark predictions

of

what

was

ahead

for

Europe with

the

ironic remark that:

"In our

times, when

so

little

is

done,

an

extraordinary number

of

prophecies,

apocalypses, glances

at and

studies

of the

future

appear,

and

there

is

nothing

to do but to

join

in and be one

with

the

rest"

(p.

85).

The

only alternative Kierkegaard

saw to

this paralyzing reflection

was

to

plunge into some kind

of

activity

- any

activity

- as

long

as

one

threw oneself into

it

with passionate involvement.

In the

Review

he

exhorts

his

contemporaries

to

make such

a

leap:

There

is no

more action

or

decision

in our day

than

there

is

perilous

delight

in

swim-

ming

in

shallow

waters.

But

just

as a

grown-up,

struggling

delightedly

in the

waves,

calls

to

those

younger

than

himself:

"Come

on,

jump

in

quickly,"

the

decision

in

exist-

ence...calls

out...Come

on,

leap

cheerfully,

even

if it

means

a

light-hearted leap,

so

long

as it is

decisive.

If you are

capable

of

being

a

man, then danger

and the

harsh

judgment

of

existence

on

your thoughtlessness

will

help

you

become one. (pp. 36-37)

//. The

Aesthetic

Sphere:

The

Enjoyment

of

Endless Possibilities

Such

a

light-hearted leap into

the

deeper water

is

typified

by the

net-

surfer

for

whom information gathering

has

become

a way of

life.

Such

a

surfer

is

curious about everything

and

ready

to

spend

every

free

moment visiting

the

latest

hot

spots

on the

Web.

He or she en-

joys

the

sheer range

of

possibilities. Something interesting

is

only

a

click

away.

Commitment

to a

life

of

curiosity where information

is a

boundless source

of

enjoyment puts

one in the

reflective version

of

what Kierkegaard calls

the

aesthetic

sphere

of

existence

- his

anticipa-

tion

of

postmodernity.

For

such

a

person just visiting

as

many sites

as

possible

and

keeping

up on the

cool ones

is an end in

itself.

The

only

meaningful

distinction

is

between those sites that

are

interesting

and

those that

are

boring.

Life

consists

in

fighting

off

boredom

by

being

a

spectator

at

everything interesting

in the

universe

and in

communi-

cating

with

everyone else

so

inclined. Such

a

life

produces

a

self that

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104

Hubert

L.

Dreyfus

has no

defining

content

or

continuity

but is

open

to all

possibilities

and

to

constantly taking

on new

roles.

But we

have still

to

explain what makes this

use of the Web

attrac-

tive.

Why is

there

a

thrill

in

being able

to

find

out

about everything

no

matter

how

trivial? What motivates

a

passionate commitment

to

curiosity? Kierkegaard thought that

in the

last analysis people were

addicted

to the

Press,

and we can now add the

Web, because

the

anonymous

spectator

takes

no

risks.

The

person

in the

aesthetic

sphere

keeps open

all

possibilities

and has no

fixed

identity that

could

be

threatened

by

disappointment, humiliation

or

loss.

Surfing

the Web is

ideally suited

to

such

a

life.

On the

Internet

commitments

are at

best virtual commitments. Sherry

Turkic

has de-

scribed

how the Net is

changing

the

background practices that deter-

mine what kinds

of

selves

we can be. In

Life

on the

Screen,

she de-

tails

"the

ability

of the

Internet

to

change popular understandings

of

identity."

On the

Internet,

"we

are

encouraged

to

think

of

ourselves

as

fluid,

emergent, decentralized, multiplicious,

flexible, and

ever

in

process,"

she

tells

us.

22

Thus "the Internet

has

become

a

significant

social laboratory

for

experimenting

with

the

constructions

and

recon-

structions

of

self that characterize postmodern

life."

23

Chat rooms

lend themselves

to the

possibility

of

playing

at

being many selves,

none

of

whom

is

recognized

as who one

truly

is, and

this possibility

is

not

just theoretical

but

actually introduces

new

social practices.

Turkle tells

us

that: "The rethinking

of

human...identity

is not

taking

place just among philosophers

but on the

ground, through

a

philoso-

phy

in

everyday

life

that

is in

some measure both proved

and

carried

by

the

computer

presence."

24

She

realizes that

the Net

encourages

what

she

calls "experimentation" because what

one

does

on the Net

has

no

consequences.

She

therefore thinks that

the Net not

only gives

people

access

to all

sorts

of

information;

it

frees

people

to

develop

new

and

exciting selves.

The

person

in the

aesthetic sphere

of

existence would surely agree,

but

according

to

Kierkegaard:

"As a

result

of

knowing

and

being

everything

possible,

one is in

contradiction with oneself"

(p.

68).

When

he is

speaking

from

the

point

of

view

of the

next higher sphere

22

Sherry

Tbrkle

Life

on the

Screen:

Identity

in the Age of the

Internet,

New

York:

Si-

mon

and

Schuster 1995,

pp.

263-264.

23

Ibid.,

p.

180.

24

Ibid.,

p.

26.

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Kierkegaard

on the

Internet

105

of

existence, Kierkegaard tells

us

that

the

self

requires

not

"the vari-

able

and

brilliant"

but

"firmness

and

constancy...and

steadiness."

25

We

would therefore

expect

the

aesthetic

sphere

to

reveal

that

it

was

ultimately unlivable, and, indeed, Kierkegaard held that

if one

threw oneself into

the

aesthetic sphere with total commitment

it was

bound

to

break down under

the

sheer glut

of

information

and

possi-

bilities. With

no way of

telling

the

relevant

from

the

irrelevant

and

the

significance

from

the

insignificant everything

becomes

equally

in-

teresting

and

equally boring. Writing

from

the

perspective

of

some-

one

experiencing

the

melancholy that signals

the

breakdown

of the

aesthetic sphere

he

laments:

"My

reflection

on

life

altogether lacks

meaning.

I

take

it

some evil spirit

has put a

pair

of

spectacles

on my

nose,

one

glass

of

which magnifies

to an

enormous

degree,

while

the

other

reduces

to the

same

degree."

26

This inability

to

distinguish

the

trivial

from

the

important eventu-

ally

stops being thrilling

and

leads

to the

very boredom

the

aesthete

and

net

surfer have dedicated their lives

to

avoiding. Thus, Kierke-

gaard concludes:

"[E]very

aesthetic view

of

life

is

despair,

and

every-

one who

lives aesthetically

is in

despair whether

he

knows

it or

not.

But if one

does

know

it...a

higher form

of

existence

is an

inescapable

requirement."

27

///.

The

Ethical

Sphere:

Making Concrete Commitments

That higher

form

of

existence Kierkegaard calls

the

ethical

sphere.

In

it

one has a

stable identity

and is

committed

to

involved action.

In-

formation

is not

denigrated

but is

sought

and

used

for

serious pur-

poses.

As

long

as

information gathering

is not an end in

itself,

what-

ever reliable information

there

is on the Web can be a

valuable

resource.

It can

serve serious commitments. Such commitments

re-

quire

that

people

have

life

plans

and

take

up

serious

tasks. They

then

have goals that determine what needs

to be

done

and

what informa-

tion

is

relevant

for

doing

it. Can the Net

support this

life

of

commit-

ted

action?

If

the

Internet could reveal

and

support

the

making

and

maintain-

ing

of

commitments

for

action,

it

would support,

not

undermine,

the

25

EOF,

p.

391.

26

Ibid.,

p. 46.

27

Ibid.,

p.

502.

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106

Hubert

L.

Dreyfus

ethical commitments Kierkegaard maintains human beings need.

Happily,

we are now

entering

a

second stage

of

information technol-

ogy

where

it is

becoming clear

how the

ethical sphere

can be

imple-

mented

by

using computers

to

keep track

of

commitments

in

order

to

further

the

coordination

of

action.

So far as the

Internet develops

means

of

communication that enable people

to

keep track

of

their

commitments

and to see how

their speech acts open

new

domains

of

action,

the

Internet

supports

the

ethical

sphere.

But

Kierkegaard would probably hold that, when

the use of the In-

ternet

for the

coordination

of

commitments

is

successfully instanti-

ated

in a

communications system,

the

very ease

of

making commit-

ments

would

further

the

inevitable breakdown

of the

ethical sphere.

Each commitment

we

make

has an

enormous number

of

conse-

quences,

and we are

solicited

to

take active responsibility

for all the

consequences that

we

recognize.

So the

more sensitive

we are to

commitments,

the

more conflicting solicitations

we

will encounter.

And the

more

we

decide

a

conflict

by

making

one or

another com-

mitment,

the

more

our

commitments

will

proliferate into conflicts

again.

Thus

the

more developed

a

system

for

keeping track

of

com-

mitments

is, the

more possible commitments

it

will

keep track

of, and

its

very ability

to

keep track

of all

commitments, which should have

supported action,

will

lead instead

to

paralysis

or

arbitrary choice.

To

avoid arbitrary choice,

one

might, like Judge William, Kierke-

gaard's pseudonymous author

of the

description

of the

ethical

sphere

in

Either/Or,

turn

to

one's

talents

and

one's

job

description

to

limit

one's commitments. Judge William says that

his

range

of

possible

relevant actions

is

constrained

by his

abilities

and

social

roles

as

judge

and

husband.

But

Judge William admits, indeed

he is

proud

of

the

fact,

that

as an

autonomous agent

he is

free

to

give whatever

meaning

he

chooses

to his

talents

and his

roles

so his

freedom

is not

constrained

by his

given station

and its

duties.

But, Kierkegaard argues,

if

everything

is up for

choice, including

the

standards

on the

basis

of

which

one

chooses, there

is no

reason

for

choosing

one set of

standards rather than another. Moreover,

choosing

the

guidelines

for

one's

life

never makes

any

serious

differ-

ence, since

one can

always choose

to

rescind one's previous choice.

The

ethical net-enthusiast

will

presumably answer that

all the

learner

has

to do is to

choose

a

perspective

-

something that matters

- and

care about

the

outcome.

But

Kierkegaard would respond that

the

very

ease

of

making

choices

on the

Internet would ultimately lead

to

the

inevitable breakdown

of

serious choice

and so of the

ethical

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Kierkegaard

on the

Internet

107

sphere.

Commitments that

are freely

chosen

can and

should

be re-

vised

from

minute

to

minute

as new

information comes along.

But

where

there

is no

risk

and

every commitment

can be

revoked without

consequences, choice becomes arbitrary

and

meaningless.

The

ethical

person

responds

to

this breakdown

by

trying

to

choose

which commitments

are the

most

important

ones.

This

choice

is

based

on a

more

fundamental choice

of

what

is

worthy

and not

worthy,

what good

and

what evil.

As

Judge William puts

it:

"The good

is

by

virtue

of my

willing

it, and

otherwise

it has no

existence.

This

is the

expression

of freedom....This is in no way to

belittle

the