What Thomas Sowell Means by "Visions"

In "A Conflict of Visions," Thomas Sowell identifies (wait for it) conflicting visions as the cause behind different sides of the political aisle. Here's what he means.

As the subtitle states, “A Conflict of Visions” is about explaining the two basic ideologies—specifically, the two assumptions about human nature—that underly the political conflicts particularly in Western societies over the past several centuries. It is safe to assume, however, that these same basic ideological impulses are at work in political conflicts in all places and eras, and that is because, at least for the purposes of this discussion, there are essentially only two ways to perceive human nature.¹ Dr. Sowell summarizes those under the concepts of what he calls the constrained vision and the unconstrained vision.

On the surface, what Sowell means may not seem immediately obvious to some. And even though he goes through great lengths to define his terms, the meaning still might be tough to summarize in a clean, concise definition.

But Dr. Sowell does labor to explain what he means. For instance, he writes:

“A vision, as the term is used here, is not a dream, a hope, a prophecy, or a moral imperative, though any of these things may ultimately derive from some particular vision. Here a vision is a sense of causation. It is more like a hunch or a “gut feeling” than it is like an exercise in logic or factual verification. These things come later, and feed on the raw material provided by the vision.” (Pg. 6, emphasis his)

Next he goes on to provide definitions for each of the two visions. About the constrained vision, he writes:

“The moral limitations of man in general, and his egocentricity in particular… [are] treated as inherent facts of life, the basic constraint in the [constrained] vision.” (Pg. 12)

In other words, human nature is inherently and inviolably limited or constrained by moral corruption. Not only is there no telling what a person can and will do, but there are certain things you can expect with certainty from everyone (namely, moral failure to some degree or another) by nature of what people are.

In defining the unconstrained vision, Dr. Sowell cites William Godwin’s Enquiry Concerning Political Justice. Quoting Godwin he writes:

“Men are capable, no doubt, of preferring an inferior interest of their own to a superior interest of others; but this preference arises from a combination of circumstances and is not the necessary and invariable law of our nature.” (Pg. 16)

In other words, people are essentially morally good, and their default choices will always be for some higher good and not their own selfish interests. Or more to the point, if you let people be what people are in their raw, unconditioned, naturally-human state, they will unselfishly do good even at their own expense. It is only when the influences of societal structures corrupt people that they become corrupt and selfish. Again:

“…this preference [for self-centered interests] arises from a combination of circumstances… [and not] our nature.”

Sowell goes on to clarify:

“Rousseau was… the most famous of those who argued [that] human nature [is] not inherently constrained to its existing limitations, but [is] narrowed and corrupted by social institutions.” (Pg. 22)

What is a dog if you don’t a train a dog? What will it be like without any kind of conditioning whatsoever? What will it do and how will it behave in its natural dog state? Obviously it will be well-behaved, safe, and properly socialized…right?

This is a silly illustration, but it makes the point: in the unconstrained vision, there is nothing inherent in humanity except virtue, goodness, and selflessness, and only the potential for evil under the proper conditions. Since, there is nothing in man that necessarily produces moral corruption, all of a person’s moral failings are someone else’s fault—namely, the corrupting influence of societies, be it the government, the culture at large, or even the family.

Sowell’s “Vision” Defined

So what exactly does Thomas Sowell have in mind when he uses the term “vision”?

For Christians (I am thinking specifically of protestant, evangelical, reformed Christians, which is what I am), what he is getting at is obvious: he is talking about presuppositions.

In other words, as Dr. Sowell himself says, “Facts do not ‘speak for themselves.’ They speak for or against competing theories” (pg. 6). There is no fact or event that you and I see in the world that we do not interpret, and the lens through which we interpret everything is our grid of presuppositions—things that we assume to be true about humanity and the world a priori. There is a difference between proof and persuasion, and proof does not persuade us. This is why the only “proof” we see overwhelmingly is the kind that “proves” what we already believe and that coheres with the commitments we held before encountering the proof. Everything that’s contrary to what we believe is false, or wrong, or a lie, or a conspiracy.

What really makes this difficult is that our assumptions are almost never examined, let alone recognized, and that is because they are—by nature of the case—assumed.

When you and I are arguing, for example, about policy or a particular moral issue, we are almost always only dealing with superficialities—literally, things that are on the surface—and we rarely walk away from that kind of discussion with a changed mind. That is because we have been focusing on the flowers, while the presuppositional soil out of which those flowers grow (i.e., our a priori beliefs about the nature of man and reality) has remained undisturbed. In fact, almost no one ever even realizes that soil is there.

When I look at an apple and say that it’s red, I am assuming certain things about the reliability of my eyes to pick up color. I might know myself to be color blind, or I might know that the apple’s color has been intentionally, artificially changed by light or paint or whatever, but whether or not I’m able to truly see the color red never crosses my mind.

And so it is with our understanding of reality. You and I have particular, fundamental assumptions about the nature of humanity and of reality, and those assumptions inform everything we think about how things are and how we think they should be.

You and I have particular, fundamental assumptions about the nature of humanity and of reality, and those assumptions inform everything we think about how things are and how we think they should be.

If man is inherently and unalterably morally deficient—or, in biblical terms, “fallen” or “evil” or “sinful”—then that puts a certain constraint on what I can expect as I go through life. It also necessitates a certain role of law and of government—namely, that those institutions protect us from each other and punish transgressors.

We are going on, but the point is simply that when Thomas Sowell talks about a “vision,” he is referring to a set of presupposed assumptions about the nature of humanity and the world. Those assumptions are the grid through which we interpret everything; they are what produce our beliefs about what we think we are seeing in the world, and about how we think things “should be.”

In the constrained vision…

In the constrained vision, life in this world is limited by the morally-corrupt nature of every human being—and that includes not only “you” and “them” (which, of course, we’re all more than happy to affirm), but myself as well. That reality places “constraints” or limitations on life and on the “good” that I can expect out of myself and others. In this vision, “evil” is a reality of which we are all guilty to some degree or another; we all offend each other and transgress each other in some form or another, and each of us has the potential to do so catastrophically, or at least far more than most of us have ever have imagined or would like to admit.

In this vision, my biggest problem in life is in the mirror—personal deficiencies and limitations, neglects, failures, shortcomings, missed opportunities, mishandled relationships and situations. Unfortunate things indeed happen to me, and (as can be expected in a reality like ours) people “sin” against me to greater or lesser degrees and with more or less consequence, but I am ultimately responsible for what I do about all of that. Ultimately, the best I can hope for in this world is for a civil system that protects me from others so that at least I can give it my best shot while ensuring that my biggest obstacle remains me alone. And to the degree that I can overcome the great obstacle of Me, to that degree will I be productive and beneficial to others.

In the unconstrained vision…

In the unconstrained vision, there is no moral deficiency inherent in human nature that necessarily constrains us. Human evil is only potential, and when evil does happen and someone actually is guilty, it is a group of people, a “they” who are committing moral evil in order to oppress a virtuous, honest, innocent, well-intentioned, different group of people. According to this vision, all human evil is “out there”—the government, religious institutions, my society, even my family—and it is those institutions and those institutions alone that corrupt people, and that corruption is always two-fold. First, it enlists people into the cause of the oppressors, and second, it corrupts the oppressed so that they are not responsible for any evil they do.

In the unconstrained vision, there are only victims and victimizers. What is needed therefore is not equal protection and opportunity under the law for all, but the eradication of the locust of human evil, namely, the victimizers and the evil, oppressive, corrupting societal structures they’ve created.

1. Obviously the ways in which people might understand human nature are as numerous as people themselves; at least it might appear that way if you start soliciting opinions. However, while it’s outside the scope of our present discussion to deal with this in detail, we would say that all actual understandings of human nature are presupposed and almost never articulated, and that they all distill down essentially to one of the two basic visions that Dr. Sowell outlines here. We’ve made something of a corollary to this argument elsewhere, and have tried to make the case that there are only two ways of presupposing what a person is, namely, a sovereign individual with rights and responsibilities that are inherent to being a person, or a member of a group. We would argue that Dr. Sowell’s constrained vision is consistent with the former presupposition, and that the unconstrained vision is consistent with the latter.