Here, my friends, we have a chart illustrating the rot infecting the soul of the modern West. Or, at least, that fraction of the West represented by the English-language books written between 1800 and 1990 and contained in Google’s massive database.
The blue line indicates the (decreasing) frequency with which the word “virtues” appears in books. The red line shows the (rapidly increasing) frequency of usage of the word “values.”
But don’t those words mean the same thing, an innocent bystander asks?
No, say I.
Virtues are fine, solid things: prudence, justice, temperance, fortitude; faith, hope, and love. These are “firm attitudes, stable dispositions, habitual perfections of intellect and will that govern our actions, order our passions, and guide our conduct according to reason and faith,” as our favorite tome besides the Bible explains. “…The virtuous man is he who freely practices the good.”
Note the ruthless objectivity of that last phrase — “the good.” It is outside of the man himself. He did not determine it; he only discovered it (by God’s grace). The virtuous man is not he who does what he thinks best. Nor does he merely obey the admonition to “follow his bliss.” (Though, I must digress to add, the acquisition of the virtues results in true bliss, far beyond the fleeting happiness of indulging one’s every whim. Obeying God’s law is painful to most of us because we’re not virtuous. For virtuous people — i.e. saints — obeying God’s law is natural and joyful.)
Values, on the other hand, are flimsy and subjective. Even the dictionary admits it: a value is something of “relative worth, utility, or importance.” It is not something that is worthy, useful, and important; it is something that someone considers worthy, useful, and important. It’s possible, of course, that your values are the same as the virtues — that you value the virtues above all else. But a 30-second examination of conscience will probably reveal that that’s not the case.
Back to the chart. The real problem underlying it is the influence of relativism. No longer is everyone accountable to the same publicly acknowledged virtues; rather, everyone is supposed to discover his own values, to do what’s best for him or what feels right. Hence the public outrage when the Church claims that her morals are universal — that Catholics are not the only ones who should wait until marriage to have sex, for example. To the world, that claim is downright offensive. How dare you impose your values on me? I have the right to come up with my own values! The primary assumption that everyone has his own truth is so deeply ingrained that many young people cannot even grasp the possibility of an alternative view, according to the famous college professor Allan Bloom:
There is one thing a professor can be absolutely certain of: almost every student entering the university believes, or says he believes, that truth is relative. If this belief is put to the test, one can count on the students’ reaction: they will be uncomprehending. That anyone should regard the proposition as not self-evident astonishes them, as though he were calling into question 2:2=4. These are things you don’t think about.
Fortunately, the situation may not be quite so dire. I think most relativists are not entirely relativistic. Nearly all of them, in my limited experience, still believe that a few things (murder, rape, etc.) are always and everywhere wrong, and that there is in fact such a thing as absolute truth (in the sciences if nowhere else). We’ll leave the latter issue — the (un)certainty of science — for another day.
On morals, however, the last defense of relativists-who-are-not-really-relativists is the language of rights. As long as you don’t infringe on someone else’s rights (their right not to be murdered, their right not to be raped), you can do whatever you think best. Your values are acceptable as long as they don’t violate or claim superiority over anyone else’s.
This position is much harder to argue with. The pseudo-relativist’s objection to Catholic morality (allegedly) is not that it prescribes and proscribes the wrong things but that it claims to be universal. (The common form of this: “If you don’t like abortion, just don’t get one! But you can’t tell me what to do!”) You can have a great argument with relativists about the content of Catholic morality, as long as you get them to admit that they do, in fact, believe that something controversial is universally right or wrong (same-sex relations, abortion, contraception, whatever). More difficult to argue is the universality of the Church’s teachings. The claim “You can do what you think is right as long as you don’t hurt anyone else” has the effect of silencing debate.
If anyone has found a way to revive the conversation when someone plays that card, I’d love to hear about it. In the meantime, watch your language. Forget about values. Start extolling the virtues.
29 thoughts on “The decline of civilization, in one simple chart”
This is interesting, but I don’t know if this indicates such a dire change or not because the English language has changed. A case in point, look and see how the definition of weird has changed over the years. At first it meant “fate”, and then William Shakespeare uses it in Macbeth and then the word takes on a whole new meaning.
I would be curious to see how much the usage of particular virtuous words have declined. I think it’s a safe bet that temperance has declined drastically, along with prudence. Also words like “love” and “justice” surely have increased in usage, especially since the 1960’s. 🙂
Such a chart is misleading if it does not distinguish between the use of the word “values” as moral ideals from the word’s many other meanings. I would wager that a good number of the books including “values” are books on mathematics, physics, or some other science, in which case “values” means the same thing as “quantities”. It is also worth pointing out that “values” can be either a plural noun or a singular verb, as in “He greatly values the rocking chair left to him by his mother.”
Our actions and words have consequences…..contraception for one has leaked into the water system……because water systems normally have not been filtering out estrogens…..so our male fish are growing eggs….what is all this estrogen doing to our human males……chew on this question and tell me that what I do is my own business…as long as it does not hurt anyone….
Ask any doctor and he will verify that families that argue and curse and speak badly to and about their members are sicker…have higher blood pressure, more sick days, more divorce as a rule…
Abortion is a perfect example. Go the the prolife websites and read about the after-effects of abortion. The long-lasting cry from hell: Don’t tell me what to do with my body!
Patricia in St. Louis, MO
So interesting, and I am so glad someone is talking about this! I did a post called “Values vs. Virtue — and what kind of man your daughter will bring home!”. The decline of the term and understanding of virtue is a crisis for sure. Virtues are part of natural law and are universal. Values? Not so much.
Anyway, here is the post for anyone who is interested:
http://littlecatholicbubble.blogspot.com/2011/01/values-vs-virtue-and-what-kind-of-man.html
Blessings and keep talking!
@Howard, that is a good point. We can still see a steady decline in the use of “virtues”, though, regardless of what the use of “values” is.
Great article. A great book that really helps you appreciate virtue is Robert Sokolowski’s “The God of Faith and Reason”. Fr. Sokolowski is one of the great minds of our age.
O Blessed Virgin Mary, pray for us that we may continuously draw nearer to Christ, your son, by invoking your sweet name with devotion.
Though they were mistaken about the nature of humanity’s destiny/end, at least the Modern Age still retained a belief in an end of some kind (viz., unending “progress” away from ancient “superstition” à la Star Trek). Post-modernity has rejected purposes/ends themselves. This is because ends (telos in Greek) are a principle of nature/form, and Post-modernity has rejected truth itself.
According to Aristotle, St. Thomas Aquinas, and traditional Christian Theology all morality, all virtue, is derived teleologically, meaning an act is good or bad insofar as it serves a thing achieving the end which it is designed to seek. Man is meant for happiness, the ultimate definition of which is union with God. Any act which does not serve this end is vice.
For Post-modernity, since there are no forms/natures, there are no ends, and no morality. The only thing that matters, then, is what oneself deems is good for them at the present. No objective reality, no objective standard of virtue. Of course, this position is irrational, but nevermind that.
Stop by my blog, PopSophia.
There are several options to revive a conversation when someone says “You can do what you think is right as long as you don’t hurt anyone else”. Their effectiveness is dependent on the type of person you are talking to. Also, you can adapt it according to your personality. For example, I am sarcastic many times, so I may present it that way. But if sarcasm is not your thing (and it can be unhealthy and un-Christian), adapt.
Option 1: If they claim there is not an objective moral truth, ask them why you should have to adhere to their statement. If there is no right and wrong, why should I not hurt anyone else? Any reason they give can be be refuted with “Well, that’s your opinion, but what if mine differs?” For example, if they say it is for the common good, then you can reply that you think genocide is for the common good because it gets rid of ‘unwanteds’. If they speak about majority rule, ask them to provide a reason why you should adhere to popular opinion.
Option 2 (related to option 1): Point out the hypocrisy. They are trying to force you to adhere to their standard of morality, which is what they accuse the Church of doing. Every law has a moral dimension. “The law says I should not steal from someone? How dare they impose their morality on me!”, “I should stop at every red light because it promotes order and prevents people from getting hurt? Stop oppressing me!”, and so on.
Option 3: Get them to think about whether people are actually being hurt. Most, if not all, moral actions have unintended consequences. Since we are connected and affected by what others do, many “harmless” activities can be shown to have harmful side effects.
Option 4: Call them a “ninny-ninny poo-poo head”. Sure, it is not a valid argument, but it may revive the conversation.
Especially loved the last graf. Great post, Anna!
Great post. Another book relating to the subject is “History and Theology of Grace: The Catholic Teaching on Divine Grace” by John Hardon S.J.
I think this is a great post, and have made a similar argument. Dr. Kreeft discusses the difference between VALUE AND VIRTUE in his book: “Back to Virtue.” Even if you remove the graph that you used, and the Google data, this theory still stands up.
Walk into a philosophy department at any state college and listen to what they are talking about: VALUES. My values are different from your values, this culture values that, etc… Sure there are semantic differences, but the core idea of what a virtue is roots itself in an “ultimate truth.”
Thanks for writing this!
@ Dennis: But what if they really are a ninny-ninny poo-poo head? ‘Cause you know they’re out there.
Seriously, I like this article (and graph) quite a lot. I’m always preaching to friends and students that words mean things, and that the simple way we express ourselves gives great insight into the way we think, and by extension the way we worship and believe. In answer to some of the above commenters, I think the shift in definition itself (not simple a decline in use) is telling. “Virtue” is an ancient, ancient word whose definition hasn’t changed much in the last couple millenia. It has known meaning, but modernity (and authors specifically) shies away from it because they we don’t want to make a commitment. We don’t want to pin ourselves down to a definition of what’s good, what’s true, what’s beautiful.
“Values” on the other hand, is a relatively new word that can mean a lot of things to a lot of people. Much safer, much more comfy! My values are not your values, and that can be ok! Yay! Fuzziness! The connotation of commodities and “economic value” that it carries make it less suitable of a word to be basing ethical or moral discussions on. Morality is not a commodity (which can mutate over time) but a solid truth.
Also, apparently,I am unable to proofread myself. At at at all.
How about ” Values come from Man,Virtues come from God “
Sure, when someone plays that card ask them what ‘hurt’ means?– it can mean an abudance to many; especially when you apply the ‘hurt’ word in the abortion law- if a woman may be emotionally ‘hurt’ by having a baby, such as not expecting it, the law endorses her to have an abortion… um, okay- that’s pretty severe hurtin’)
According to some Atheists, I hurt them if they see the 10 Commandments somewhere, or they see it as the government forcing a religion down their throats (a form of “hurt” let’s say).
Simply by Christian women existing with her beliefs, they may hurt a Muslim’s man’s integrety.
What about people who are hurting themselves even though they don’t think they are? (Is there a reason over 90% of pornographic actors were sexually abused as children?- They don’t think they’re abnormal, or ‘hurt’, at all but are they hurting themselves by treating their body in a way that may cause physical pain, but please men?)…. So yes, what is ‘hurt’?…
I see words as symbols that point to a bigger truth, the example C.K. Chester used was ‘chair’. You can read this word (symbol) and know what a chair is without me having to prove it. I didn’t say what the chair looked like even though there are a thousand types, and I don’t need a picture to show you, or a chair to point to, for you to know that the fact is, a “chair” does exist.
That being said, what is “good”?… Well, if words are signs that point to a bigger truth, what is that truth of what good is?…When you look up the eyptomology of the word, you see that “good” comes from “God”–Note, Jesus specified that only God is truly Good…Really, atheists have no reason or point to use or even recognize words like “good” or “bad” because the only way things are, is if God exists.
When I wasn’t a churchgoer I remained indifferent to God- things like ‘good and bad’ had absolutely no meaning to me, but you would never know because everything, to include the way I would speak to people, would be about appeasing myself.
Sometimes Atheists will say that it’s about genetics, such as the Atheist champion of the moment– Richard Dawkins… That selfless act of love- he’ll tell you that the mother pushing her children out of harms way only to die was an act of selfishness to preserve one’s genes, or (in the case of there being no relation to the two people involved) humanity as a whole.
After some thought there’s really no basis to this whatsoever; Who is the person that is going to kill someone in their way or upsetting them, but then take a moment to think of what this would do to humanity as a whole from a genetic standpoint and change their mind based off of that?…. Human emotion is removed from the argument, which is also why aestethics is such a huge part of Christianity.
Funny, I figured it was a Liberals at fault but I’d be wrong:
(Values voter) A term used to refer to religious and social conservatives whose voting is heavily motivated by a desire to restrict abortion access, deny human rights to homosexuals including the right to marry, etc.
Value vs. Virtue, you nailed it.
Thanks for the comments, all!
Paul and Howard- Yes, those are valid points. I majored in English so these nerdy linguistic things interest me. But as Kyle said, the decline of “virtues” alone tells us something is afoot. “Virtues” and “values” are not always interchangeable, but until Nietzsche came along, they were never interchangeable. (Anyone well-versed in philosophy want to confirm this for me? I could be wrong, but I believe the virtues/values switch is attributable to Nietzsche and Kant.) Allan Bloom talks more about this in “The Closing of the American Mind,” the book I quoted in my post.
Patricia- Yeah, it’s funny how the fields of biology, sociology, and psychology all confirm that Catholic morality (opposite-sex lifelong marriage, having kids, praying often, giving to charity, etc) is better for the individual and better for society. That’s a topic for another post.
Leila- Thanks, I will check out your post!
Joe, Bob, and Joseph K- Thanks for the book recommendations. I’ve read Alasair MacIntyre’s book “God, Philosophy, and Universities” on the general topic, but didn’t know enough about all the philosophers he mentioned to understand. Same with Bloom’s book, really. Kreeft is GREAT so I will really need to pick that one up.
If only I had found time to read the full works of Plato, Aristotle, Augustine, Aquinas, Kant, Descartes, Pascal, Nietzsche, and the rest while in college… So thank goodness for the writers who make these things more accessible!
Julie- Thanks, lovely! I want to hear all about Germany soon 🙂
Thomas- Yeah, you nailed it. The rejection of the very concept of “telos” explains a lot of post-modern aimlessness and despair, I think. In the modern era, it was possible to reject God while still having an “end” (art, poetry, societal reform, whatever) to live for. But for post-moderns, the dream has faded, and life is pointless.
Dennis- Thanks, those are good! I especially like the last option. I should have specified this in the original post, though: I think the practical answer of relativists to “If there is no right and wrong, why should I not hurt anyone else?” is simply the social contract. There’s no reason that I should refrain from hurting someone else — except that I don’t want them to hurt me. So we’ll agree not to hurt each other (even though hurting others is not inherently wrong) as a compromise, which allows everyone to pursue his own kind of happiness. (This is arguably the philosophy underlying American society today, even though it certainly wasn’t the view of the American Founders.) Thus the relativist still has a reason to obey the law — he obeys it for the sake of peace, order, and the preservation of his rights.
On option 3- Definitely good with certain things. But most people will claim that especially on sexual issues (contraception, sex before marriage, same-sex relations), no one’s getting hurt as long as everything is consensual. Then you point out the women hurt by abortion, and they say “But they only feel bad because Christians have inflicted a guilt complex on them.” You point out that women who sleep with multiple men are more likely to be depressed, and they’ll give a similar answer.
Jennifer- Exactly! I took a really interesting class last spring called “The New Religious Humanists” and the professor always talked about the devaluation of language (words as basic as “good” or “love” no longer convey much meaning to many people) and the necessity of restoring it. “Virtues” can be just another abstraction, but the term’s unfamiliarity today might help us to reflect on it more and tie it to concrete things like the lives of the saints.
Ben- Yes, “hurt” is a terribly slippery concept. See my reply to Thomas above for more on that. Walker Percy has some very interesting essays on language and semiotics, by the way, as you sound interested in the topic. Regarding the atheist’s explanation of human behavior, I don’t think they attribute it to reflection but to genetic determinism. The mom didn’t stop to think “Yes, I’d better preserve my genes”; she acted automatically as her genes had predisposed her to do. The position is still a silly one, as far as I can see: Here we are arguing amongst ourselves about what it means to be a human being, with some people saying we’re hardly different than (say) chimpanzees. (IE we’re governed by our genes and instincts, not by any higher faculty or inspiration.) But do we find chimpanzees arguing about what it means to be a chimpanzee? No. Plainly humans are different.
Rover- Well, it wasn’t political liberals or conservatives who brought us to this point. It was philosophers, then more mainstream writers and teachers, thus to the broader society. That even conservatives (who believe in absolute truth and an objective moral code) use the term “values” just shows how ingrained the linguistic habit has become. I wrote the post in hopes of bringing us back toward using “virtues” and such objective language.
There is only one TRUTH, one Way, one Life
Read the poem I wrote for my dear Country, it hurts me to see it going the way the Roman Empire went into its decline.
WHO WILL CRY FOR YOU, AMERICA ?
I, will cry you a river
And much much more
My dear dear America,
Once so beautiful !
You sold your soul
To a bunch of mercenaries
Which entered your sheep-fold
As wolves and goats
You sold your skin
To the highest bidder
You resemble a harlot
The new BABYLON
Eating and drinking
With the rich of this world
Prostituting yourself
For money and power
And became a den
Of thieves and murderers
You forgot all about
The One Who blessed
You so abundantly
Biting the Hand of the Blesser
Embarrassed to mention His Name !
Did He not teach you
To be wise as a serpent
And harmless as a dove
Why then do you behave
As a silly goose ??
He invited you to His dinner Table
He so diligently prepared
But, you made light of it
And went your worldly, haughty ways
One to his farm,
Another to his business.
But as the Father of Fathers
He waits for your return
The return of His prodigal daughter
WAKE UP, AMERICA !!!
Humble your pride
And follow the Way, the Life and the Truth !!!
Or, I SHALL cry you a river
A river of bloody tears
And much much more !!!
Rita B. 02/17/2003
The problem with the “JPII and BXVI Generations” is that they think everything can be explained by a chart.
Charles- I was being facetious with the title… I never catch other people’s irony and sarcasm either, though, so it’s OK 😉
My main point with this post is that moral relativism, which has become so pervasive that even non-relativists use its vocabulary (“values” instead of “virtues”), is a problem both for individuals and for society. And (as I was trying to imply with my closing plea for advice), I know the problem will be hard to solve because the communication gap is so great. So I recognize, to some extent, the complexity of how the present state of things developed and the complexity of addressing it in universal terms.
I read this quickly. The premise is valid, I think, because as it is said in the Gospel, “It is what comes out of people’s mouths that is what matters.” (Matt. 15, 18 ss) If a western country(ies) can reverse the trend toward decline, it will be a first in global history. Will the US win the prize? Personally, I doubt it.
I will start by admitting that I did not read the first 21 comments. Apologies if I am repetitive.
The virtues-values dichotomy is as you describe it, Anna. “Values” are morally relativistic, and thee rise of the term in this manner is largely traceable to Nietzsche (a man whose influence on modern society is as inexplicable as it is pervasive).
The moral relativism that pervades “values” discussions, hemmed in only by the don’t-kill-people limitation you advert to, is essentially utilitarianism, the bastard child of Epicurus suckled by Bentham. Benthamite utilitarianism is demolished—just absolutely disassembled, by John Finnis in the work Natural Law and Natural Rights. Read it, but be prepared to devote way more time and mental energy than you thought you would need. (The super-cliffs-notes version is that utilitarianism provides no basis for identifying or choosing between non-commensurate goods, so its methodology of balancing these is incoherent.)
Finnis’s work is one of jurisprudence, but this is a debate that has been waged largely in jurisprudential circles over the last several hundred years. Orthodox Catholics have always had the better side of the argument, but we continue to be undermined by heresies that pretend to make people’s lives easier. G. Robert Blakey, ND Law School prof., has a
helpfulcomprehensive outline.Paul- I’m inclined to be fairly pessimistic about reversing the trend, too, but we should remember that Christianity spread in ancient Rome… a decadent, morally corrupt society.
Titus- Yes, I thought it was Nietzsche! I haven’t read him myself so I didn’t want to say so in the post. I hadn’t thought of Bentham, as I’ve hardly read him myself; I was actually thinking more of Locke and Hobbes, whose influence we might thank for what remains of the social order. An explanation from my comment above: I think the practical answer of relativists to “If there is no right and wrong, why should I not hurt anyone else?” is simply the social contract. There’s no reason that I should refrain from hurting someone else — except that I don’t want them to hurt me. So we’ll agree not to hurt each other (even though hurting others is not inherently wrong) as a compromise, which allows everyone to pursue his own kind of happiness.
And thanks for the book recommendation… and the outline haha. Worse than my dad’s handwriting, and that’s saying something.
That’s an easy answer, but it is also an unsustainable one. Once we agree, even in common parlance, to reduce right and wrong to matters of convenience, the battle is over: there is no depravity to which we can object on anything other than purely emotional grounds. The social-contract theories are “values” theories at heart. You mentioned Locke and Hobbes. We Americans tend to think of Locke and Hobbes as positive influences on the history of ideas, because they directly influenced the Framers: we are wrong. Locke and Hobbes are responsible for accelerating the disintegration of the social moral consensus rooted in an objective understanding of right and wrong. Certainly, Locke and Hobbes said “some things are wrong and God says so,” but those statements are after thoughts, qualifiers to what is at heart a godless philosophy.
No, as Catholics Locke and Hobbes are not our friends (and neither would have admitted to being our friend anyways: Catholicism was the one form of Christianity that Locke held should not be afforded religious freedom by the state). Locke and Hobbes are not the children of Aristotle and St. Thomas: they are the parents of Nietzsche and Mill.
I can’t think of a single work that lays out this criticism of Locke and Hobbes well. I’m sure that Jacques Maritain writes on it somewhere; his works are worth investing in regardless. (Three Reformers is especially useful given the way we tend to fawn over Descartes and Rousseau, but I don’t think it touches Locke or Hobbes.) You might look at Charles Rice, 50 Questions on the Natural Law or Heinrich Rommen, The Natural Law. I (somewhat embarrassingly) haven’t read either of these works, but Maritain’s An Introduction to Philosophy and Alasdair MacIntyre’s After Virtue surely touch on the topics, as would, in an indirect way at least, any good introduction to St. Thomas (I believe Ralph McInerny wrote several). (And to be less cheeky than in the original comment, here’s a more legible version of Prof. Blakey’s outline [pdf].)
Hm, that’s pretty strong language on Locke and Hobbes. There was an interesting debate over Locke’s legacy between a writer on First Things and one on Public Discourse– go to this piece from late in the exchange for links to the earlier pieces: http://www.thepublicdiscourse.com/2011/07/3583
An interesting explanation I’ve seen about Locke: living after vicious Catholic/Protestant conflicts, he was looking for a political philosophy and structure that could replace the lost common culture — a way to preserve peace in the absence of consensus. And even if it was unintentional, he thus undermined the possibility of regaining (or at least of reviving the desire for) that consensus.
I’ll have to check out Maritain and McInerny — he’s a favorite of my dad and would likely help fill the gaping hole (philosophy) in my education. I’ve been meaning to read “After Virtue” for the last five years or so. So many books, so little time!
Gregg’s second article really takes the cake. Forster’s commentary on the empirical importance of Locke in American thought is of course entirely true. But his piece and the first Gregg article, arguing over the efficacy of social-contract theories as tools in political discourse, largely miss the most important point. The real problems with Locke lie in what Gregg discusses at the bottom of the linked article, the fact that Locke “has an inadequate grasp of the workings of intentionality, practical reason, and the will, and therefore of human freedom and human flourishing [and] . . . [a flawed] metaphysics of the person.” Locke isn’t entirely to blame for his own bad metaphysics: he inherited a lot from Luther and Descartes (and Descartes was at least trying to be a faithful Catholic, he just made a mess of the job). But the metaphysical and epistemological foundations of Locke’s theories are terribly rotten, and the rot they contain has been responsible for much of the deleterious effect to which the original post refers.
Any chance you can publish a more readable version of the graph, or at least supply your readers with the source. I am doing a Masters Degree in Philosophy which involves the difference between virtues and values, so I am very interested. Thanks, Martin
Martin- I was unable to post a more legible version of the graph, but here’s the tool I used to create it: http://ngrams.googlelabs.com/
Should be pretty self-explanatory. It’s really fun to play around with. Good luck with your master’s degree!
Titus- Yes, I thought you’d like Gregg. You should be the one writing about this. I’d forgotten Descartes’s name (embarrassing, I know) when I was thinking about this post, but I knew he shared the blame somehow, haha.
Thanks for giving me access to the origin of the graph Anna. Keep up your good work,
Martin Fitzgerald