When you're refuting a position, it's 
important to make sure that the position 
that you're refuting is one that you 
correctly understand and that you 
accurately represent. 
Sometimes, when people attempt to refute 
a position that they don't accurately 
represent, we say that that's refuting a 
straw man. 
And now, in the following clip, I'd like 
to consider an example of the straw man. 
[MUSIC] Have you noticed, it's no longer 
good enough to try and live in a such a 
way that pleases you and doesn't outrage 
others. 
No, as if this was too easy a goal and we 
needed a refinement on the human 
condition to make a sufficient challenge 
of it. We are now supposed to live in the 
moment. 
It's not enough to work towards being 
happy later, you have to be happy now. 
Right now. 
No, now, not then, not soon. Now. 
Well, that's unfair of me. 
I realize most of the living in the 
moment here are not saying that's the 
only way of being happy that counts. 
Although, asterisk, some of them 
definitely are saying exactly that. 
They're recommending this as a way to 
become happy. 
Are they mad? Apart from the obvious 
paradox that any time I'm checking to see 
if I'm living in the moment or not I 
cease to live in the moment or rather the 
moment I'm living and becomes a moment of 
checking, the range of pleasures 
available to people living in the moment 
is both small and, well, best deal, 
unless you're in the middle of something 
delicious, intoxicating, carnal, or 
whatever the posh word for sneezing is, 
you're stuck. 
And out of those, the only one that 
requires no [UNKNOWN] the moment planning 
or forethought whatsoever is sneezing. 
A nice, though a good sneeze is, 
after three, they get annoying. 
And what's more, I don't think it's as 
easy as all that to tell whether you're 
enjoying a moment in that moment. 
I remember watching the film Mulholland 
Drive and believing that I was enjoying 
myself as I anticipated the dramatic 
ending that would cleverly resolve and 
make sense of this intriguing mystery, 
but there wasn't one, it just sort of 
stopped. And once I realize that, I have 
no choice but to retrospectively 
downgrade what I had thought had been my 
enjoyment in the moment. 
My enjoyment was predicated on a 
demanding to something, it was an I.O.U. 
to be redeemed at the point of 
pleasurable revelation, by which I don't 
mean the lesbian sex scene. 
And as there was none, the I.O.U. 
was never redeemed, therefore, I hadn't 
enjoyed myself. 
Where this is really starkly obvious, of 
course, is sport. 
Of the three big matches Andy Murray 
played this year, the one I enjoyed most 
at the time by a country mild was his 
last Olympic game, where he went into the 
lead early and stayed there until he won. 
The one I think I enjoyed most now is the 
U.S. 
Open where it was touch and go for hours, 
and then he won. 
Much more exciting, which is why I value 
it now and hated it at the time. 
Because at the time, I had no way of 
knowing that the moment I was reluctantly 
suffering through wasn't a moment on a 
long and exhausting journey towards 
defeat, 
like the Wimbledon final, which neither 
in the moment me, nor looking back me, 
enjoyed at all. 
At the time, when watching any sporting 
contest in which I'm partisan, 
I don't have the faintest idea if I'm 
enjoying myself. 
My dominant emotion is, I really hope my 
team wins, so it will turn out later I'm 
enjoying myself now. 
That's the problem with living in the 
moment, we're too intelligent a species 
to be able to avoid living in some sort 
of narrative and that involves not 
knowing how we feel in the moment until 
we have context for it. 
Too short term a focus, and we've nothing 
to enjoy but sneezing. 
Too long term a context and it's all a 
plan to enjoy something we never get to, 
and anyway, we'll all be dead within a 
100 years. 
We have no choice but to find some sort 
of medium term over which to give a shit 
or nothing is anything. 
And once you've gone to that, then all 
the delayed gratifications are variations 
on a theme and the theme is chores now, 
for jam tomorrow. 
Whether it's I want to build a cathedral 
or I fancy a sandwich, you're stuck in 
the middle with me. 
[MUSIC] In the clip that we just saw, 
David Mitchell gives two arguments 
against those who would say that people 
should live in the moment. 
The first argument seems to go something 
like this. 
Premise one, living in the moment 
involves a very restricted range of 
pleasures, merely the bestial pleasures 
of eating, drinking, fornication, and 
sneezing. 
Premise two, a good life involves many 
pleasures outside that restrictive range, 
the pleasures of watching sports, of 
watching good movies. 
So conclusion, a good life does not 
involve living in the moment, those who'd 
advocate living in the moment are wrong 
to do so, that's not a good life. 
Now, let me point out two things about 
this argument, 
two problems in this argument. 
The first problem, in case it's not 
obvious to all of you already, is that 
this argument is not valid. 
The conclusion simply does not follow 
from the premises. 
Here is why. 
Suppose that living in the moment does 
involve a very restricted range of 
pleasures, 
suppose that Mitchell is right about 
that, 
and let's suppose he's also right that a 
good life involves many pleasures outside 
that restricted range. 
Well, both of those premises could be 
true, 
even if a good life does involve living 
in the moment, 
because a good life might involve 
pleasures inside that restricted range, 
as well as pleasures outside that 
restricted range. 
So, simply from the fact, if it is a 
fact, that living in the moment involves 
a very restricted range of pleasures, and 
that a good life involves a wide range of 
pleasures, simply from those two facts, 
it doesn't yet follow that a good life 
doesn't involve living in the moment. A 
good life might very well involve living 
in the moment, as well as a bunch of 
other pleasures. 
So this argument is not valid. 
That's the first problem I wanted to 
point out with this argument, 
but there's another problem with this 
argument and this is why the argument can 
be fairly accused of attacking a straw 
man. 
Which is that, in premise one, Mitchell 
says that living in the moment involves a 
very restricted range of pleasures and 
that is precisely what the proponents of 
living in the moment would deny. 
They would deny that living in the moment 
requires only the bestial pleasures that 
Mitchell described. 
Living in the moment, according to its 
advocates, is something that involves 
taking pleasure in whatever it is that 
you're doing at that moment, 
whether it's working, talking to friends, 
whether it's taking a walk. 
Anything that you're doing in that moment 
is something that could be an object of 
pleasure if you adapt the right attitude 
towards it. 
And so, learn to adopt the right attitude 
toward whatever it is that you're doing 
in that moment, and then you'll not just 
enjoy the pleasures of anticipation, 
you'll also enjoy the pleasures of 
immediate experience in that moment. 
So, in premise one, Mitchell is attacking 
a straw man. 
He's attacking a position that no one in 
fact or virtually no one in fact 
propounds. 
No one thinks, that a good life involves 
only the restricted range of bestial 
pleasures that Mitchell describes. 
Those people who advocate living in the 
moment do so, because they think that we 
can enjoy a broader range of pleasures in 
experiences that we have at a particular 
moment, 
a broader range than simply the bestial 
range that Mitchell described. 
So, according to the living in the 
momentiers, premise one is false. 
And because Mitchell supposes that 
premise one is true, he's attacking a 
straw man. 
He's attacking a position that no one 
actually propounds. 
So that's why his first argument is 
guilty of the straw man. 
Now, let's consider his second argument. 
The second argument that Mitchell gives 
is an argument not to the effect that 
living in the moment is somehow bad or 
not part of the good life, rather, it's 
an argument that living in the moment is 
actually impossible. 
Here is how his argument seems to go. 
Living in the moment is something that's 
ascertainable only after that moment has 
past. 
For instance, when watching a movie 
whether or not you are presently, while 
watching the movie, enjoying what's 
happening is something that you'll only 
be able to ascertain after the movies 
over. 
When watching a sporting event, whether 
or not you're actually enjoying this very 
moment of watching the sporting event is 
something that you'll only be able to 
ascertain after the sporting event is 
over or at least after it's progressed to 
the point that you realize whether you're 
whether your favorite player is going to 
win. 
Now, from that premise, Mitchell 
concludes that living in the moment is 
therefore impossible. 
You can't succeed in living in the 
moment, because the moment that you're 
living in is not won, the enjoyment of 
which you can ascertain until after that 
moment has passed. 
But again, this argument is only valid if 
living in the moment involves not simply 
taking pleasure in the moment, but 
ascertaining in the moment that you're 
taking pleasure in that very moment, 
only then, is living in the moment shown 
to be impossible by means of this 
argument. 
If living in the moment doesn't need to 
involve ascertaining at that moment that 
you're taking pleasure at that moment. 
If living in the moment only involves 
taking pleasure in that moment, whether 
or not you ascertain that you are doing 
so, 
then this argument is simply invalid. 
Since Mitchell presents the argument as 
if it's valid, that shows that once 
again, he's attacking a straw man. 
He's attacking the position that a good 
life involves living in the moment, 
understood not simply as taking pleasure 
in the particular moment that you're 
living in, 
but also is ascertaining in that very 
moment that you're taking pleasure in 
that very moment. 
Right? The position that this argument is 
designed to attack is that position, but 
is that a position that anybody holds? 
Does anybody think that a good life 
involves not just taking pleasure in the 
moment that you're living in, but also 
ascertaining in that very moment that 
you're taking pleasure in that very 
moment? I certainly don't know anyone who 
holds that view. 
The people who propound living in the 
moment think that it's important to take 
pleasure in the moments that you're 
living in, but they don't think it's 
important to ascertain in those very same 
moments that you're taking pleasure in 
those very moments. 
And since they don't think that, this 
argument doesn't show that living in the 
moment as they describe it, is 
impossible. 
It doesn't show that it's impossible to 
take pleasure in the moments that you're 
living in. 
All it shows is that it's impossible to 
take pleasure in those moments while 
simultaneously ascertaining that you're 
taking pleasure in those moments, 
but who would have ever thought 
otherwise? So once again, Mitchell's 
second argument is attacking a straw man, 
is attacking the position that no one 
actually propounds. 
The living in the momentiers have a more 
plausible position than the one that 
Mitchell is attacking here. 
The second argument that Mitchell gives 
is an argument not to the effect that 
living in the moment is somehow bad or 
not part of the good life, 
rather it's an argument that living in 
the moment is actually impossible. 
Here is how his argument seems to go. 
Living in the moment is something that's 
ascertainable only after that moment has 
passed. 
For instance, when watching a movie, 
whether or not you are presently, while 
watching the movie enjoying what's 
happening is something that you'll only 
be able to ascertain after the movie's 
over. 
When watching a sporting event, whether 
or not you're actually enjoying this very 
moment of watching a sporting event is 
something that you'll only be able to 
ascertain after the sporting event is 
over or at least after it's progressed to 
the point that you realize whether you're 
whether your favorite player is going to 
win. 
Now, from that premise, Mitchell 
concludes that living in the moment is 
therefore impossible. 
You can't succeed in living in the 
moment, because the moment that you are 
living in is not one, the enjoyment of 
which you can ascertain until after that 
moment has passed. 
But again, 
this argument is only valid if living in 
the moment involves not simply taking 
pleasure in the moment, but ascertaining 
in the moment that you're taking pleasure 
in that very moment. 
Only then, is living in the moment shown 
to be impossible by means of this 
argument. 
If living in the moment doesn't mean to 
involve ascertaining at that moment that 
you're taking pleasure at that moment. 
If living in the moment only involves 
taking pleasure in that moment, whether 
or not you ascertain that you're doing 
so, then this argument is simply invalid. 
Since Mitchell presents the argument as 
if it's valid that shows that once again 
he's attacking the straw man. 
He's attacking the position that a good 
life involves living in the moment 
understood not simply as taking pleasure 
in the particular moment that you're 
living in, but also as ascertaining in 
that very moment that you're taking 
pleasure in that very moment. Right? The 
position that this argument is designed 
to attack is that position, 
but is that a position that anybody 
holds? Does anybody think that a good 
life involves not just taking pleasure in 
the moment that you're living in, but 
also ascertaining in that very moment 
that you're taking pleasure in that very 
moment? 
I certainly don't know anyone who holds 
that view. 
The people who propound living in the 
momen Think that it's important to take 
pleasure in the moments that you're 
living in, 
but they don't think it's important to 
ascertain in those very same moments that 
you're taking pleasure in those very 
moments. 
And since they don't think that, this 
argument doesn't show that living in the 
moment as they describe it, is 
impossible. 
It doesn't show that it's impossible to 
take pleasure in the moments that you're 
living in. 
All it shows, is that it's impossible to 
take pleasure in those moments while 
simultaneously ascertaining that you're 
taking pleasure during those moments, but 
who would have ever though otherwise? 
So once again, Mitchell's second argument 
is attacking a straw man. 
It's attacking the position that no one 
actually propounds. 
The living in the momentiers have more, 
the living in the momentiers have a more 
plausible position than the one Mitchell 
is attacking here.