On Means and Ends, or: The Importance of Seriousness (Column 13)

With God's help

These days the European Football Championship is taking place in France. Here in the Levant we are lamenting, as every year, the fact that once again we did not manage to take part in this tournament. The point is sharpened when tiny Iceland, whose population is less than 5% of Israel's population (roughly the population of Haifa), knocked out England, an unquestioned football powerhouse, and advanced to the next round (think of a match in which Hapoel Haifa defeats the England national team). Many ask how such a miracle can happen. How can so small a country succeed in reaching achievements that we, the "big ones" (everything is relative), do not reach?
Several reasons may be suggested. First, statistically it is possible that from time to time a small group of people will produce greater talents than are found in a group with far more people. For example, if Israel were to play football against China, to the best of my meager understanding we would probably beat them, despite the gap in size between them and us being incomparably greater than the one between us and Iceland. Another point also arises here: mentality and culture. I do not know China, but I can guess that the love of football and its popularity there do not approach the levels they reach here, and therefore only a few among its billions of inhabitants are even exposed to the game and enter this race. If we want to compare them to us, we should not take all the inhabitants of China but only those who are relevant to this race. I imagine that in such a comparison the numbers would be much closer. Perhaps that is also what is happening between us and Iceland (though here I am doubtful). Others will introduce additional parameters here, such as the players' salaries, how much is invested in their development, and how much people are prepared to demand of them. But here I want to focus on another aspect, connected to all of these: seriousness.

The Importance of Seriousness
Yesterday a friend reminded me of a television program (from 2005) by Emmanuel Rosen, "In Search of the Lost Cup," in which he compares, among other things, an Israeli player who plays in England (Tal Ben Haim) with an Israeli player who plays here in Israel (David Revivo, and others). See here, and here.

The nub of the matter is that Tal Ben Haim in England follows a strict and carefully regimented daily routine, which begins early in the morning with training, eats according to a dietitian's menu, rests, trains again, eats another carefully planned meal, continues with further training sessions, and goes to sleep early in order to wake up early the next day for the next practice. By contrast, the Israeli David Revivo gets up toward noon, sits in cafés and eats as he pleases, gives interviews on television or in the press, arrives (late, but first) at a token and tedious practice session in the afternoon, and goes to sleep very late after a lengthy night out, only to get up again the next day around noon. There is a difference here in seriousness, in professionalism, and in fact a mental difference in the willingness to work hard and to demand hard work.
Oscar Wilde wrote a comic play titled The Importance of Being Earnest, of course with the aim of undermining precisely this importance. Wilde's British play actually expresses an Israeli outlook, whereas in England the prevailing approach is the opposite. There seriousness really does count (and that is what he mocks).

The Teleological Critique of the "Smoch" Approach
My untested intuition is that behind these things stands another very Israeli point, which has been dubbed the "smoch" approach ("it'll work out"). The Israeli assumes that last-minute improvisation and a local flash of brilliance—and talent does not hurt either—can bring him the achievement even without hard work. Sometimes this really does work, and it is my impression that quite a few Israeli achievements in some fields are built more on flashes of brilliance than on too much hard work.
This approach can be criticized in terms of results. The "smoch" approach does not lead to consistent achievements, but at most to fleeting and local ones, if at all. It may be that this outlook is part of what underlies our consistent failures in football and in other areas as well.
The critique I have presented here of the "smoch" approach is a teleological critique, for it assumes that the criterion for success is the end, the goal. This critique holds that the failure of the "smoch" approach lies in the fact that it does not bring us to the goal, that is, to the desired achievement. But here I would like to examine the matter from another, deeper angle.

The Essential Critique of the "Smoch" Approach
Even if the "smoch" approach did bring us the hoped-for achievements, I do not accept the assumption implicit in it, according to which the goal is the achievement. According to this assumption, effort, if it is required, is intended solely in order to reach the achievement. Therefore the criterion for success is reaching the achievement, and failure to reach it is failure.
In an area like security, this sounds reasonable and persuasive. After all, the goal is to stay alive, to win, and to thwart attacks. Therefore there it is reasonable to set the criterion at the achievement, that is, at the bottom line. True, systematic effort is still required in order to reach the achievement, but it has no value in itself. It is only an important means to reaching the desired achievement.
But in other areas, such as sports, culture and art, academic research, and the like, I am not at all sure that this is correct. There, the very engagement and the effort matter no less, and perhaps more, than the achievement. In political meetings people sometimes say that the main achievement is the very holding of the meeting, and there I usually do not buy it. But in sports I certainly do.
According to this conception, if we were to succeed in building a serious mentality of serious training aimed at achievement, that would be a success even if in the end the hoped-for achievement were not in our hands. Conversely, even if we were to attain the hoped-for achievement without effort, we would have missed something very fundamental: the very effort required in order to reach that achievement. In fields like sports, I endorse an essential conception that sees the achievement as a trigger, a challenge whose purpose is to cause us to make the effort and undergo the grueling training, and to agree to enter into the discipline that accompanies them. Here the goal and the criterion are דווקא the effort, and the achievement is a means.

Two Planes of Reference
This does not mean that according to the essential conception the athlete who trains does not aspire to achievement. Of course he does; otherwise it simply would not work. The athlete must place before his eyes the aspiration to achievement so that it will give him motivation to train and improve. But at the same time he must also act with awareness of the essential plane. His action takes place on two parallel planes: he strives with all his might to reach the achievement, but he also sees the effort in itself as a victory. Seemingly one contradicts the other, for if he places at the forefront of consciousness only the effort as such, he will not make it, because it has no purpose. This is a dispiriting and problematic conception. No wonder that it is sometimes adopted in order to console one who has failed (that is, did not reach the achievement). People tell him that the main thing is the effort, and that it is no less important than the achievement. For ordinary people it is very important to act in order to attain something, even if the real value is the effort in itself. But by the same token, if we place the achievement as the exclusive goal, failure lies hidden there too, especially in the Israeli mentality. A person may come to the conclusion that the effort is a non-essential means. Perhaps one can succeed by chance even with the "smoch" approach. In the achievement-based conception, a person naturally enters into calculations of the relation between return and investment, and tells himself that increasing the chance of reaching the achievement is not always worth the great efforts that training demands. That is how "smoch" is born.

From the Importance of Seriousness and the "Smoch" Approach to the Essential Conception
How did we get from the question of seriousness and the "smoch" approach to the question of achievements versus efforts? It is important to understand that if the effort is itself the goal, then there is no room at all for the "smoch" approach. After all, this approach assumes that the goal is the achievement, except that it sees a chance of reaching it even without effort (and that is worth it in comparison to the difficulty and the costs that effort requires). But in the essential approach, which sees the effort in itself as the value, there is simply no meaning at all to arguments of "smoch." They cannot arise, for the entire force of the "smoch" claim is built on our reaching the achievement without effort. The technical critique of "smoch" points to the importance of seriousness. It points out that we may not be lazy. We must be sober and serious, and understand that without effort we probably will not reach the achievement. And yet what stands before our eyes is still the achievement. But the essential critique of the "smoch" approach holds that the "smoch" approach is a failure in the very act of adopting it, even if by chance we do attain the achievement. This is not related at all to the question of the likelihood of success. Seriousness, according to this conception, is not a means to achievements but a goal in itself.

Example: Character Refinement
Rabbi Hayyim Vital, the Ari's disciple, at the beginning of his book Sha'arei Kedushah, is troubled by the question why the Torah does not command us regarding the refinement of character traits. Clearly this is an important value in the Torah's eyes, and yet there is no commandment that instructs us to do it. Several explanations have been offered for this, and I will not enter into them here.[1] What concerns us here is a difficulty that has been troubling me for some time in connection with Rabbi Hayyim Vital's question.[2] After all, the Torah does command us concerning refined character traits. In positive commandment 8, Maimonides counts the commandment to cleave to God's attributes: מה הוא רחום אף אתה היה רחום, מה הוא חנון… ("Just as He is compassionate, so you be compassionate; just as He is gracious…"). Why, then, does Rabbi Hayyim Vital assume that there is no commandment concerning the refinement of character traits? This is difficult with respect to the other later authorities (Acharonim) as well who dealt with resolving this difficulty.
It seems to me that the explanation is that cleaving to God's attributes means behaving as He does. For God's attributes do not describe His inner traits but His conduct in the world. "Compassionate" and "gracious" are not descriptions of emotional or psychological states, but forms of practical conduct. If so, it is reasonable to conclude from this that the commandment that instructs us to cleave to these attributes deals with behavior and not with the character traits of the soul themselves. According to this, Rabbi Hayyim Vital wondered about the refinement of the traits within the soul and not about behavior, and concerning that we truly were not commanded.
The meaning of this is that Rabbi Hayyim Vital assumes that the refinement of character traits is not intended only to bring us to proper behavior. The refinement of character is a value in itself. A person who behaves correctly but whose traits are not refined is a person who has fulfilled the commandment to cleave to God's attributes, but he is not a refined person. Spiritual-psychological refinement is a goal and not a means to proper behavior, and concerning that we have no commandment in the Torah.
This distinction is entirely parallel to the distinction I made above between means and ends. Here too, what is perceived as the goal is actually the means, and what seems at first glance to be the means is actually the goal. The act is the goal, and the state to which the act leads is a means (so that we perform the act).

Morality
The refinement of character is only one particular expression of the correct deontological conception of morality. Some see morality as a collection of practical instructions whose purpose is to create a better world (a world in which people feel better and more comfortable). But a deeper conception of morality sees it as a way of life and a properly ordered inner structure. The goal of morality is not beneficence toward others, and in fact it does not belong to the behavioral plane at all. Good behavior is one thing, and morality is behavior that stems from moral commitment and refined character traits. In the third part of the Fourth Notebook I discussed this at length (especially in chapter 9), and there I explained that the good behavior of a sheep that does not harm its flock-mates does not deserve to be called moral behavior. The sheep does not act that way out of refined character traits and moral commitment, but simply because of the inner structure with which it was born.
To be moral means to be a refined person, not a person who behaves nicely. True, a refined person also behaves properly, but behavior is a criterion for morality, not that morality is a means to behavior. Therefore, as we have seen, the refinement of character is not a means to proper behavior but a goal in itself.
A sharp example of this can be found in my response to the Haaretz supplement. In a series of articles, Gadi Taub explained why incest (sexual relations within the family) is such a grave prohibition in our society. He pointed to the psychological harms they cause. In my response I asked what we would say if psychiatrists were to find a pill that solved all the problems and eliminated all those harms as though they had never been. Would it then be permitted? How can such explanations establish a prohibition on two adults—for example, a brother and sister—living together? Even if there are such harms, do they not have the right to act in a way that harms only themselves? After all, they do this while of sound mind and as adults, so how can this be forbidden to them? My conclusion was that a moral prohibition cannot be based on facts (such as harms caused by the act), and, in Leibowitz's language, it cannot be rationalized (reduced to facts). Grounding a value in facts is what is called in philosophy the "naturalistic fallacy." An act that is morally forbidden is an act that is forbidden because of itself and not because of the harms it causes. Just as an act that is morally worthy is not such because it is done in order to create a better state. If the problem is only the harms or the benefit, then we are not dealing here with morality but with a technical issue. Thus theft is problematic even if the owner is not harmed by it in the slightest. The problem is not consequential but lies in the act itself. The same is true of incest and other moral transgressions, and the same is true conversely of morally worthy acts.

The Categorical Imperative
In chapter 9 of the Fourth Notebook I discussed Kant's categorical imperative. In Kant's approach, the supreme moral imperative is that we should perform our actions in such a way that we would want them to become a universal law. I illustrated the meaning of this principle through a discussion of evading income tax or voting in elections.
Think of a man named Reuven who claims that there is no point in going to vote in elections, for his vote will have no effect whatsoever on the results. The only influence he could have is in a case where the party he supports receives a number of votes that is exactly one less than a full Knesset-seat quota. Only then can his vote change the balance in the Knesset. In every other situation he has no effect at all. What is the likelihood that such a situation will arise? Something on the order of 1/30,000 (the value of a seat is something like 30,000). A truly negligible number—significantly smaller than the risk of my being hurt in an accident on a highway. It is important to understand that this is not a negligible influence but zero influence (more precisely: a tiny influence with a negligible probability). With so small a probability we take no account of it in any other area of our lives (for example, we do not hesitate to drive on a highway, even when doing so is not essential for us). So small a chance of so small an influence is not worth a single second of our time. Reuven's conclusion is that there is no reason in the world to go vote in elections.
Reuven's friends scold him with the claim: "What will happen if everyone acts like you?" Reuven, of course, answers them: "It will be very bad. But why should everyone act like me? And if everyone does act like me, they will do so regardless of my personal decision. What I decide—whether to vote or not to vote—has no effect whatsoever on others. I also will not tell anyone what I did, so that I will have no global influence of any kind. If so, once again there is no point in going to vote in elections."
From experience, this argument never ends. But anyone who thinks a little will see that Reuven is certainly right. In terms of ends and purposes, you will never be able to persuade him. If the purpose of voting is to achieve a goal (to influence the political situation), there is no reason in the world to go vote.
The only argument against Reuven is that he must act in a way that he would want to become a universal law. This is not an argument based on the concern that others may also act like him. Even if no one else acts like him, behavior such that, if it were to become a universal law, it would bring about a worse world is behavior that is flawed in its very essence, even if in practice that situation never occurs. The question Kant poses—what would the situation be if this were a universal law?—is a hypothetical question. The obligation to go vote does not derive from fear that an actually bad state will be created. Voting is an end in itself, not a means to changing the political situation. The state that would result if everyone were to act this way is only a criterion for the morality of the act. Kant's categorical imperative requires us to act morally, where a moral act is a type of act such that, if everyone performs it, the world improves. But the act is not done in order that we reach that state. In other words, morality describes a mode of action and not a state. And with respect to Reuven's argument, voting is an end in itself and not a means to achieving a particular political state.

The Paradox of Achievement
Ironically, you can now see how Kant's categorical imperative produces practical achievements. Think of a world that acts only on achievement-based considerations.[3] In such a world, every person would make Reuven's calculation and would not go vote, or would evade income tax. We have seen that achievement-based considerations do indeed justify this course of action (because such an action on the part of each individual person does not bring about a bad result, and therefore he has no reason not to act this way). What would the state of the world be in such a case? Very bad, since everyone would evade taxes or not go vote. We certainly would not want that to become a universal law.
How can we save the world from reaching such a state? True, if Reuven behaves differently it will change nothing, but if each of us individually acts according to the categorical imperative and goes to vote or does not evade taxes, even though this action by itself makes no difference one way or the other, then the state of the world will be much better. Notice: the categorical imperative is not intended to achieve some particular goal, good or bad. This mode of action is a value in itself (only the definition of the action is such that it brings the world to a better state). And yet it is easy to see that only such action will in practice attain the achievement. To be sure, that is not the purpose of the action (for the action itself is the value). But paradoxically, it is precisely seeing the act in itself as a value that is the only way to attain the achievement. It is precisely the essential conception, which sees the act as a value in itself and not as a means to some state that is the goal—it, and it alone, can bring us to the achievement, that is, to the goal state.[4]

Back to the Question of Achievement in Sports, in Mathematics, and in General
It seems to me that the application to the subject of sports is self-evident. The goal is the effort and the training, not the achievement. And more than that, only seeing the efforts and the training as a goal in itself will also bring us the achievement. Seeing the achievement as the goal and the training as the means sometimes דווקא distances us from the achievement. As we have seen, it is precisely this that gives rise to the "smoch" approach and to failure in achievement.
I have already noted that these things are true also with respect to academic pursuits. Let us take as an example the study of mathematics or the sciences in high school. The meager achievements of Israeli students on the international tests have once again made headlines these days.[5] What follows from my remarks here is that perhaps the way to deal with the problem is to place learning itself as a value, rather than to raise the achievement threshold that we set for our students as a goal. Paradoxically, even one who in these areas sees before his eyes only the achievement (unlike me) probably needs to adopt the conception of learning as a value and not as a means in order to reach the desired achievement. It may be that this is part of the reason why for years we have not succeeded in improving the situation. It may be that the problem cannot be solved by setting a higher achievement bar, but by changing the culture of learning and our attitude toward it.

[1] See on this in chapter 6 of my article On Sevara.

[2] See there, footnote 21.

[3] "Achievement-based" in this context does not mean selfish or self-interested, but a morality based on the attainment of goals. Even acting in order to bring about a better and more pleasant world (a world in which people feel better) is an achievement-based morality (this is what is called teleological, goal-oriented morality). True morality is deontological morality, that is, morality that sees value in the moral act itself. The definition of the moral act is an act that brings the world to a better state, but the motivation for doing it is not in order to bring about that state (but simply in order to act in a proper way).

[4] In chapter 9 of the Fourth Notebook I showed that such a situation is very similar to what in game theory is called the prisoner's dilemma. There too, instead of each prisoner trying to maximize his own situation on the basis of his personal considerations, if they form a coalition and decide to act in a way that is less good for each of them individually, the condition of both improves.

[5] Although I think that we do not correctly analyze the significance of those tests. See, for example, here.