Can nature be improved?

Modern man is confident that nature can be improved by working on it, as in the technical arts. And yet he neglects the possibility that he himself might be improved by working on himself, as in the moral arts. When it comes to questions of technology, modern man has forsaken the idea that nature is inherently good. He's all too eager to improve it. But when it comes to questions of morality, modern man insists unhesitatingly that all natural urges are good. What earlier ages saw as attempts to improve upon human nature by training (Greek askesis), our age sees as merely irrational and inconvenient forms of repression.

Ancient thinkers once imagined a life devoted to the pursuit of virtue and wisdom was superior to a life driven by urges. But now this view is out of date. Go ahead and fulfill the urge, I tell myself. A tiny voice in the back of my mind objects. "You never read the ancients. How can you be so sure they're wrong?" But the tiny voice never lasts long. I reassure myself that ideas of true and false, right and wrong, are outdated. What matters today is ideas respected by the powerful. To consider the possibility that the powerful might be wrong demands a degree of intellectual courage I lack.

"Fulfill that urge!" screams every stream of bits from the pulpits of Hollywood and Madison Avenue. In today's ruling dogma, life is a feast where every desire must be fulfilled.

The ancient idea that the happiest and most fulfilling life is a life of intellectual flourishing, in which every moment is devoted to improving the mind, is outdated. What's the point of building up the intellect? No one cares about intellect. People are superficial. Forget intellectual improvement. Go for the money. Consume what Madison Avenue tells you to consume. You don't want to look like a fool. You want to keep up with the latest fashions. Your mind is going to perish with you anyway. What's the point of cultivating and improving it?

Socrates' interlocutors made similar objections. And ultimately there's no entirely satisfactory answer to them. If you want to devote your life to pleasure and neglect the cultivation or your intellect, there really isn't much Socrates or I or anyone else can say to change your mind. If you do decide that intellect is worth cultivating, however, we have some tricks to help you.

First, when seductive urges try to steal time and resources you might have used to improve your mind, and squander them instead stimulating the senses, put them in their place. Show them intellect is in charge and urges have no sway.

Second, remind yourself that wisdom achieved late in life can be passed on to others. Insofar as you succeed in perfecting your mind, you will become a role model for others. In this sense, the improvements you make to your intellect don't perish when you do.

The voice of sensory desires tries to undermine your intellectual confidence. It tries make you cynical. It downplays your prospects of intellectual improvement, so it can steal time and resources to stimulate the senses, time that might have been used to improve the mind.

What deters you from the path to becoming a genius or a saint is the glittering objects that lie on either side. Television programs made to entertain and amuse you distract you from books intended to educate and improve you.

Propel yourself unceasingly toward intellectual and moral excellence. Don't allow yourself to be distracted by the entertainments on board. Turn off the television. Burn the pulp fiction that no longer challenges you and was never intended to. Choose a book you'll feel afterward it was an achievement to have read.