Janus Thinking

With regard to philosophy generally, we have a tendency to mix the “what” with the “why” and “how” questions. For example, a Rabbinical college that I chair is known to be unique in the way it forms its students. Nevertheless, no one has ever tried to identify where this uniqueness comes from. While we know that the students interact and learn at a very high intellectual level, not all of them are geniuses; overall they reflect a certain average intelligence of all Rabbinical colleges.

As it is clear that something is done differently at this Rabbinical college, I asked the dean to try to define what this uniqueness is. This is a clear “what” question but the answers I got had a “how” characteristic. The dean told me many stories and brought many examples of “how things are done over here” but all I wanted to know was what happens over there and eventually, why things happen the way they happen. I did not get the answer.

On the other hand, people will readily answer “what,” in their opinion, luxury is. However they have difficulty in expressing why some product or service or behaviour is a luxurious one or where this luxury is embedded. The recent insert in the blog shows that the six facets identified by Dubois and his colleagues are valid; hence, we know what constructs luxury. These are dimensions such as rarity, high quality and expensiveness. However, the question remains how we define these dimensions. We know that luxury is subjective as for different people different products or services are luxury, but is there one common denominator that is similar to all?

People also are quick to say that luxury is something that we don’t need. This is not a very good definition as it does not explain why we need what we do not need. The need for luxury goes into our deepest layers of personality and we do not wish to associate those important needs with our day-to-day needs. Thus, luxury is important for us. The question remains: why is it so?

Relying on luxury to satisfy our needs is shrouded with social pressure. However, let’s experiment. If we are to be put on an isolated island with no restaurants to indulge in and no shopping arcades for spending, how then is luxury going to be expressed? Is the need for luxury going to evaporate or is it going to take a different dimension?

Luxury serves a good purpose. It implies choice and free will, something that is unique to mankind. This freewill is what differs man from beast. Thus, using luxury properly and consciously would improve us as human beings. However, are we really consciously aware of the positive qualities that luxury has and do we use luxury for the right purpose?