Topics Mind

Question Some twelve step groups advocate taking the right actions to lead to the right thinking, "right" being defined as non-addictive behavior. The phrase is "Fake it until you make it." Is there a philosophical comment on that process, as opposed to the idea of thinking your way into the desired behavior?

Accepted:
June 29, 2010

Comments

Interesting! Philosophers have disagreed about the scope of our freedom and even over whether we (in non-addictive states) have freedom at all. Spinoza, for example, denied that we have libertarian freedom (the freedom to do other than what we are determined to do). The great majority of philosophers have affirmed our morally responsible freedom (or voluntariness), however. Probably the two most famous cases of a "fake it, till you make it" involve Pascal and Descartes. Pascal thought there were good prudential reasons for living a life of religious devotion, a life that included a belief in God. He proposed that nonbelievers could cultivate a belief in God by practicing religious rites and acting as though they believed in God. Descartes undertook a radical skeptical inquiry but decided before doing so that he would act in the world in conformity with the prevailing customs no matter how far his skepticism took him. In a sense, he would "fake" or at least act as though he did not doubt the existence of the town he was in, even though his philosophy led him (at one stage) to doubt the existence of the material world itself.

Although I am not acquainted first hand with the 12 step program, I suggest that it would be backed up by Aristotle who held that virtue is achieved (in part) through the cultivation of habits.