The Philosophy Book

266

INTELLIGENCE

IS A MORAL

CATEGORY

THEODOR ADORNO (1903–1969)

IN CONTEXT

BRANCH

Ethics

APPROACH

Frankfurt School

BEFORE

1st century CE Saint Paul

writes about being a “fool

for Christ.”

500–1450 The idea of the

“holy fool”, who represents an

alternative view of the world,

becomes popular throughout

Medieval Europe.

20th century The global

rise of differing forms of

mass-media communication

raises new ethical questions.

AFTER

1994 Portuguese neuroscientist

Antonio Damasio publishes

Descartes’ Error: Emotion,

Reason, and the Human Brain.

21st century Slavoj Žižek

explores the political, social,

and ethical dimensions of

popular culture.

T

he idea of the holy fool has

a long tradition in the West,

dating all the way back to

Saint Paul’s letter to the Corinthians

in which he asks his followers to be

“fools for Christ’s sake.” Throughout

the Middle Ages this idea was

developed into the popular cultural

figure of the saint or sage who was

foolish or lacked intelligence, but

who was morally good or pure.

In his book Minima Moralia, the

German philosopher Theodor Adorno

calls into question this long tradition.

He is suspicious of attempts to (as

he puts it) “absolve and beatify the

blockhead”, and wants to make the

case that goodness involves our

entire being, both our feeling and

our understanding.

The problem with the idea of

the holy fool, Adorno says, is that

it divides us into different parts,

and in doing so makes us incapable

of acting judiciously at all. In reality,

judgement is measured by the

extent to which we manage to

make feeling and understanding

cohere. Adorno’s view implies that

evil acts are not just failures of

feeling, but also failures of

intelligence and understanding.

Intelligence Emotion

So to act morally I need to

be able to use my intelligence

as well as my emotions.

Both are needed for me

to make judgements about

what is right and wrong.

Intelligence is a

moral category.