GUIDE TO THE PHILOSOPHY 1938 - 1947.pdf - Rare Books at ...

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not, that it to say, in so fiur as he is reasonable, allow the
operations of his reason to be Massed by his wishes or dictated
by his hopes. A person who rationalizes uses his
reason to arrive only at those conclusions which he con-
sciously or unconsciously desires. Paying attention to those
facts which support the desired conclusion, he ignores
all others. If supporting facts are wanting, he imagines
them. It is rationalising when the smoker persuades him-
self that tobacco ash is good for the carpet, the fisherman
that fish being cold-blooded creatures do not mind their
throats bring torn out by a hook, and the British patriot
that between 1914 and 1918 it was right to kill Germans
because of the violation of Belgium. Thus, while the
conclusions of reasoning are determined by circumstances
external to and independent of the reason that investi-
gates them, those of rationalizing are determined by personal
hopes and fears. It is on these lines that, I think,
most people would be disposed to distinguish between
reasoning and rationalizing.
Now this distinction cannot, if the conclusions ofpsycho analysis are correct, be upheld. For the distinction between
reasoning and rationalizing is, it might be said, itself a
product of rationalizing, the offspring of our desire to think
that our reasons are or can be free. If reason is called into
action by instinct, it must needs arrive at those conclusions
which instinct demands. If reason is the handmaid
of desire, reason must dance to the tune which desire
pipes for her. Reason, in fact, is never free, but is suborned
from the first. The views which we hold are not the result
of an impartial survey of the evidence, but are the reflections
of the fundamental desires and tendencies of our
natures. Our beliefs are based upon instinct, but we
have also, as F. H. Bradley '(1846-1924) pointed out, an
instinct to use our reasons to discover arguments in sup-
port of our beliefs. But these reasons, if psycho-analysis is
correct, have no objective validity; they do not point to
and correctly report some factor in the nature of things;
they reflect instinctive needs of human nature for whose