3. M. N. Roy
M. N. Roy (1887-1954) is one of the greatest, if not the greatest, Indian philosopher of twentieth century. Unlike some other Indian thinkers of twentieth century, Roy has made a clear distinction between philosophy and religion in his thought. This alone, I think, entitles him to be recognized as the foremost Indian philosopher of twentieth century. According to Roy, no philosophical advancement is possible unless we get rid of orthodox religious ideas and theological dogmas. On the other hand, Roy has envisaged a very close relationship between philosophy and science.
Secondly, Roy has given a central place to intellectual or philosophical revolution in his philosophy. According to Roy, a philosophical revolution must precede a social revolution.
Besides, Roy has, in the tradition of eighteenth century French materialist Holbach, revised and restated materialism in the light of twentieth century scientific developments. If we wish to place Roy's philosophy in the context of ancient Indian philosophy, we may place Roy in the tradition of the ancient Indian materialism, Lokayata or Charvaka. However, compared to the ancient doctrines of Lokayata, Roy's "physical realism" is a highly developed philosophy. Roy not only takes into account the then contemporary discoveries of physics in reformulating "materialism" as "physical realism", but also gives an important place to ethics in his philosophy. Moreover, Roy's philosophy has an important social and political component, which is based on his criticism of communism and "formal" parliamentary democracy. Roy called this "new philosophy of revolution", which he developed in the later part of his life, "new humanism" or "radicalism". The essence of the philosophy of new humanism is contained in Roy's "Theses on the principles of Radical Democracy" or the "Twenty-two Theses of Radical Humanism". Roy further elaborated this philosophy in his New Humanism - A Manifesto, first published in 1947.
Biography
M.N.Roy was not inclined to write his autobiography. However, after much persuasion he started writing his Memoirs in the last part of his life. Sadly, he was not able to complete it. This incomplete autobiography covers only a period of seven years from 1915 to 1922.
This brief life-sketch of M. N. Roy is based mainly on V.B. Karnik's M.N. Roy, Sibnarayan Ray's introduction to Selected Works of M.N. Roy (vol. 1) and V.M. Tarkunde's Radical Humanism. I have also derived some help from Essence of Royism, compiled by G.D. Parikh, and M.N. Roy Philosopher Revolutionary, edited by Sibnarayan Ray. Besides, I have also drawn heavily from my own book M.N. Roy's New Humanism and Materialism for writing this chapter.
M.N. Roy, whose original name was Narendra Nath Bhattacharya, was born on 21 March 1887, at Arbalia, a village in 24 Parganas district in Bengal. His father, Dinabandhu Bhattacharya, was head pandit of a local school. His mother's name was Basanta Kumari. From school going age, Roy lived in Kodalia, another village in 24 Parganas.
Militant Nationalist Phase: In Search of Arms
Roy began his political career as a militant nationalist at the age of 14, when he was a school student. He joined an underground organization called Anushilan Samiti, and when it was banned, he helped in organizing Jugantar Group under the leadership of Jatin Mukherji. In course of his underground work, he was involved in many political dacoities and conspiracy cases. In 1915, after the beginning of the First World War, Roy left India for Java in search of arms for organizing an armed insurrection for overthrow of British rule in India. However, the plan failed and Roy went a second time to Java for the same purpose. Thereafter, he moved from country to country, with faked passports and different names, in his attempt to secure German arms. Finally, after wandering through Malay, Indonesia, Indo-China, Philippines, Japan, Korea and China, in June 1916, he landed at San Francisco in United States of America.
Roy's attempts to secure arms ended in a failure. In fact, Roy concluded that Germans were not serious about giving arms to the Indian revolutionaries. Besides, police repression had shattered the underground organization, which Roy had left behind. He had also come to know about the death of his leader, Jatin Mukherji, in an encounter with police.
Towards Communism
The news of Roy's arrival at San Francisco was somehow published in a local daily, forcing Roy to flee to Pao Alto, the seat of Stanford University. It was here that Roy, until then known as Narendra Nath Bhattacharya or Naren, changed his name to Manbendra Nath Roy. This change of name on the campus of Stanford University was like a new birth for Roy. As stated by him in his Memoirs, it enabled him to turn his back on a futile past and look forward to a new life of adventures and achievements.
Roy's host at Pao Alto introduced him to Evelyn Trent, a graduate student at Stanford University. Evelyn Trent, who later married Roy, became his political collaborator. She accompanied him to Mexico and Russia and was of great help to him in his political and literary work. The collaboration continued until they separated in 1929.
At New York, where he went from Pao Alto, Roy met Lala Lajpat Rai, the well-known nationalist leader of India. He developed friendships with several American radicals, and frequented the New York Public Library. Roy also went to public meetings with Lajpat Rai. Questions asked by the working class audience in these meetings made Roy wonder whether exploitation and poverty would cease in India with the attainment of independence. Roy began a systematic study of socialism, originally with the intention of combating it, but he soon discovered that he had himself become a socialist! In the beginning, nurtured as he was on Bankimchandra, Vivekanand and orthodox Hindu philosophy, Roy accepted socialism "except its materialist philosophy".
Later in Mexico in 1919, Roy met Michael Borodin, an emissary of the Communist International. Roy and Borodin quickly became friends, and it was because of long discussions with Borodin that Roy accepted the materialist philosophy and became a full-fledged communist. Roy was also instrumental in converting the Socialist Party of Mexico into the Communist Party of Mexico.
In 1920, Roy was invited to Moscow to attend the second conference of the Communist International. Roy had several meetings with Lenin before the Conference. He differed with Lenin on the role of the local bourgeoisie in nationalist movements. On Lenin's recommendation, the supplementary thesis on the subject prepared by Roy was adopted along with Lenin's thesis by the second conference of the Communist International. The following years witnessed Roy's rapid rise in the international communist hierarchy. By the end of 1926, Roy was elected member of all the four official policy making bodies of the Comintern - the presidium, the political secretariat, the executive committee and the world congress.
In 1927, Roy was sent to China as a representative of the Communist International. However, Roy's mission in China ended in a failure. On his return to Moscow from China, Roy found himself in official disfavor. In September 1929 he was expelled from the Communist International for "contributing to the Brandler press and supporting the Brandler organizations, …". Roy felt that he was expelled from the Comintern mainly because of his "claim to the right of independent thinking."
Return to India: Prison Years
Roy returned to India in December 1930. He was arrested in July 1931 and tried for his role in the Kanpur Communist Conspiracy Case. He was sentenced to six years imprisonment.
When Roy returned to India, he was still a full-fledged communist, though he had broken from the Comintern. The forced confinement in jail gave him more time than before for systematic study and reflection. His friends in Germany, especially his future wife, Ellen Gottschalk, kept providing him books, which he wanted. His letters to her from jail, published subsequently as Letters from Jail (1943), contains pointers to his reading and thinking during those years.
Roy's had planned to use his prison years for writing a systematic study of 'the philosophical consequences of modern science', which would be in a way a re-examination and re-formulation of Marxism to which he had been committed since 1919. The reflections, which Roy wrote down in jail, grew over a period of five years into nine thick volumes (approximately over 3000 lined foolscap-size pages). The 'Prison Manuscripts' have not so far been published in their totality, and are currently preserved in the Nehru Memorial Museum and Library Archives in New Delhi. However, selected portions from the manuscript were published as separate books in the 1930s and the 1940s Materialism (1940), Science and Superstition (1940), Heresies of the 20th Century (1939), Fascism (1938), The Historical Role of Islam (1939), Ideal Of Indian Womanhood (1941), Science and Philosophy (1947) and India's Message (1950) are among the books that were made from these handwritten notebooks.
These writings show that Roy was not satisfied with a primarily economic explanation of historical processes. He studied and tried to assess the role of cultural and ideational factors in traditional and contemporary India, in the rise and expansion of Islam, and in the phenomenon of fascism. He was particularly severe on the obscurantist professions and practices of neo-Hindu nationalism. Roy tried to reformulate materialism in the light of latest developments in the physical and biological sciences. He was convinced that without the growth and development of a materialist and rationalist outlook in India, neither a renaissance nor a democratic revolution would be possible. In a way, seeds of the philosophy of new humanism, which was later developed fully by Roy, were already evident in his jail writings.
Towards New Humanism
Immediately after his release from jail on 20 November 1936, Roy joined Indian National Congress along with his followers. He organized his followers into a body called League of Radical Congressmen. However, in December 1940, Roy and his followers left Congress owing to differences with the Congress leadership on the role of India in the Second World War. Thereafter, Roy formed the Radical Democratic Party of his own. This signaled the beginning of the last phase of Roy's life in which he developed his philosophy of new humanism.
After Roy's release from jail in 1936, Ellen Gottschalk joined Roy in Bombay in March 1937. They were married in the same month. Subsequently, Ellen Roy played an important role in Roy's life, and cooperated in all his endeavors.
In 1944, Roy published two basic documents, namely, People's Plan for Economic Development of India and Draft Constitution of Free India. According to V.M. Tarkunde, who played a role in drafting 'People's Plan', these "documents contained Roy's original contributions to the solution of country's economic and political problems". The Indian state, according to the draft constitution, was to be organized on the basis of countrywide network of people's committees having wide powers such as initiating legislations, expressing opinion on pending bills, recall of representatives and referendum on important national issues. According to Sibnarayan Ray, another prominent associate of Roy, "the Plan and the Constitution anticipated several of the principles which were to be formulated and developed as Radical Humanism in 1949 and the subsequent years".
Beyond Communism: 22 Theses on Radical Humanism
Roy prepared a draft of Basic principles of Radical Democracy before the All India Conference of Radical Democratic Party held in Bombay in December 1946. The draft, in which basic ideas were put in the form of theses, was circulated among a small number of selected friends and associates of Roy including Laxman Shastri Joshi, Philip Spratt, V.M. Tarkunde, Sibnarayan Ray, G.D. Parikh, G.R. Dalvi and Ellen Roy. The "22 Theses" or "Principles of Radical Democracy", which emerged as a result of intense discussions between Roy and his circle of friends, were adopted at the Bombay Conference of the Radical Democratic Party. Roy's speeches at the conference in connection with the 22 Theses were published later under the title Beyond Communism.
In 1947, Roy published New Humanism - A Manifesto, which offered an elaboration of the 22 Theses. The draft of the manifesto was prepared by Roy, but, as Roy himself says, in the preface of New Humanism, he derived help from valuable suggestions of Philip Spratt, Sikander Choudhary and V.M.Tarkunde in improving his draft. The ideas expressed in the manifesto were, according to Roy, "developed over a period of number of years by a group of critical Marxists and former Communists."
Further discussions on the 22 Theses and the manifesto led Roy to the conclusion that party-politics was inconsistent with his ideal of organized democracy. This resulted in the dissolution of the Radical Democratic Party in December 1948 and launching of a movement called the Radical Humanist Movement. At the Calcutta Conference, itself where the party was dissolved, theses 19 and 20 were amended to delete all references to party. The last three paragraphs of the manifesto were also modified accordingly. Thus, the revised versions of the 22 Theses and the manifesto constitute the essence of Roy's New Humanism.
Indian Renaissance Institute
In 1946, Roy established Indian Renaissance Institute at Dehradun. Roy was the founder-director of the Institute. In a statement prepared in 1952, Roy described the Institute as "a cultural-educational organization founded with the object of re-educating the educators and young intellectuals of India in spirit and with the ideas of Radical (or Integral) Humanism."
Since 1937, Roy was editing a new weekly named Independent India. In 1949, Independent India weekly changed to The Radical Humanist weekly. The name of another quarterly journal The Marxian Way, which Roy had been publishing since 1945 in collaboration with Sudhindranath Datta, was changed to The Humanist Way in the same year.
Reason, Romanticism and Revolution
In 1948, Roy started working on his last major intellectual project. Roy's magnum opus Reason, Romanticism and Revolution is a monumental work (638 pages). The fully written, revised and typed press copy of the book was ready in April 1952. It attempted to combine a historical survey of western thought with an elaboration of his own system of ideas. As Roy says in the preface of the book: "On the basis of a humanist interpretation of cultural history, this work endeavors to outline a comprehensive philosophy which links up social and political practice with a scientific metaphysics of rationality and ethics."
International Humanist and Ethical Union
While working on Reason, Romanticism and Revolution, Roy had established contacts with several humanist groups in Europe and America, which had views similar to his own. The idea gradually evolved of these groups coming together and constituting an international association with commonly shared aims and principles. The inaugural congress of the International Humanist and Ethical Union (IHEU) was planned to be organized in Amsterdam in 1952, and Roys were expected to play an influential role in the congress and in the development of the IHEU.
However, before going abroad, Roy needed some rest. He along with Ellen Roy went up for a few days from Dehradun to the hill station of Mussoorie. On June 11 1952, Roy met a serious accident. He fell fifty feet down while walking along a hill track. He was moved to Dehradun for treatment. On 25 August, he had an attack of cerebral thrombosis resulting in a partial paralysis of the right side. The accident prevented the Roys from attending the inaugural congress of the IHEU, which was held in August 1952 at Amsterdam. The congress, however, elected M.N. Roy, in absentia, as one of its vice-presidents and made the Indian Radical Humanist Movement one of the founder-members of the IHEU. On 15 August 1953, Roy had the second attack of cerebral thrombosis, which paralyzed the left side of his body. Roy's last article dictated to Ellen Roy for the Radical Humanist was about the nature and organization of the Radical Humanist Movement. This article was published in the Radical Humanist on 24 January 1954. On 25 January 1954, ten minutes before midnight, M.N. Roy died of a heart attack. He was nearly 67 at that time.
Publications
Roy was a prolific writer. He wrote many books, edited, and contributed to several journals. The Oxford University Press has published four volumes of Selected Works of M.N. Roy, edited by Sibnarayan Ray. We have already mentioned some of his works related to the final humanist phase of his life. Of these Materialism, Science and Philosophy, New Humanism and Reason, Romanticism and Revolution are of special interest to us.
Roy's Conception of Philosophy
Roy has discussed the nature of philosophy and its relationship with religion and science in his books Materialism and Science and Philosophy.
"Philosophy", says Roy, quoting Pythagoras, in his book Materialism, is "contemplation, study and knowledge of the nature". Its function is "to know things as they are, and to find the common origin of the diverse phenomena of nature, in nature itself".
"Philosophy", according to Roy, "begins when man's spiritual needs are no longer satisfied by primitive natural religion which imagines and worships a variety of gods as personification of the diverse phenomena of nature. The grown-up man discredits the nursery-tales, with which he was impressed in his spiritual childhood ... Intellectual growth impels and emboldens him to seek in nature itself the causes of all natural phenomena; to find in nature a unity behind its diversity."
In his book Science and Philosophy, Roy defines philosophy as "the theory of life". The function of philosophy, in words of Roy, "is to solve the riddle of the Universe".
Elaborating on his definition of philosophy, Roy says:
Philosophy is the theory of life, because it was born of the efforts of man to explain nature and to understand his own being in relation to its surroundings; to solve the actual problems of life in the light of past experiences, so that the solution will give him an encouraging glimpse into the future.
Philosophy and Metaphysics
Roy has made a distinction between philosophy and metaphysics. According to him, metaphysics, too, begins with the desire to discover unity behind the diversity.
But it leaves the ground of Philosophy in quest of a noumenon above and beyond nature, something which is distinct from phenomena. Thus it abandons the inquiry into what really exists with the object of acquiring knowledge about it, and plunges into the wilderness of speculation. It takes up the absurd task of knowing the intangible as the condition for the knowledge of the tangible.
It is obvious that Roy was opposed to speculative philosophy, which set for itself the impossible task of prying into the transcendental being "above and behind" the physical universe - of acquiring the knowledge of the reality behind the appearance. In words of Roy:
Speculative philosophy is the attempt to explain the concrete realities of existence in the light of a hypothetical absolute. It is the way not to truth, but to dream; not to knowledge but to illusion. Instead of trying to understand the world, the only reality given to man, speculative philosophy ends in denying of the existence of the only reality and declaring it to be a figment of man's imagination. An inquiry which denies the very existence of the object to be enquired, is bound to end in idle dreams and hopeless confusion.
Philosophy and Religion
Roy is opposed not only to speculative philosophy but also to the identification of philosophy with theology and religion. As he says in Science and Philosophy:
For the average educated man, the term philosophy has a very vague meaning, but sweeping application; it stands not only for speculative thought, but also for poetic fancy. In India, particularly, this vague, all-embracing sense is generally prevalent. Philosophy is not distinguished from religion and theology. Indeed, what is believed to be the distinctive feature of Indian philosophy is that it has not broken away from the medieval tradition, as modern western philosophy did in the seventeenth century.
According to Roy, "Faith in the supernatural does not permit the search for the causes of natural phenomena in nature itself. Therefore, rejection of orthodox religious ideas and theological dogmas is the condition for philosophy." (emphasis mine)
"With the assumption that the phenomena of nature are determined by the will of some supernatural being or beings," says Roy, "philosophy must make room for faith." What is supernatural, points out Roy, must be always beyond the understanding of man, who is himself a product of nature, and is, therefore, limited by the laws of nature. In this way, according to Roy, "as soon as the cause of the phenomenal world is thus placed beyond the realm of human knowledge, the world itself becomes incomprehensible."
Roy is of the view that, "religion is bound to be liquidated by science, because scientific knowledge enables mankind to answer questions, confronted by which in its childhood, it was compelled to assume super-natural forces or agencies."
Therefore, according to Roy, in order to perform its function, "philosophy must break away from religion" and start from the reality of the physical universe.
Philosophy and Science
On the one hand, Roy regards rejection of orthodox religious ideas and theological dogmas as the essential condition of philosophy, and on the other, he envisages a very intimate relationship between philosophy and science. In fact, according to Roy, the philosophical significance of modern scientific theory is to "render the old division of labor between science and philosophy untenable." Science is, says Roy, "stepping over the old boundary line. Digging deeper and deeper into the secrets of nature, science has come up against problems the solution of which was previously left to philosophy. Scientific inquiry has pushed into what is traditionally regarded as the 'metaphysical' realm."
The problems of philosophy - cosmological, ontological and epistemological - can all be progressively solved, according to Roy, in the light of scientific knowledge. The function of philosophy is, points out Roy, to explain existence as a whole. An explanation of existence requires knowledge of existence, knowledge about the different phases of existence is gathered by the various branches of science. Therefore, in words of Roy:
The function of philosophy is to coordinate the entire body of scientific knowledge into a comprehensive theory of nature and life.
Even in his Scientific Politics, which is more in the nature of a popular lecture than a philosophical treatise, Roy says, "having thus yielded position to science, philosophy can now exist only as the science of sciences - a systematic coordination, a synthesis of all positive knowledge, continuously readjusting itself to progressive enlargement of the store of human knowledge." Such a philosophy, according to Roy, has "nothing in common with what is traditionally known, particularly in this country, as philosophy. A mystic metaphysical conception of the world is no longer to be accorded the distinction of philosophy."
In Reason, Romanticism and Revolution, too, Roy repeats his conception of philosophy as a logical coordination of all the branches of positive knowledge in a system of thought to explain the world rationally and to serve as a reliable guide for life.
Thus, Roy has given a secular and modern definition of philosophy. We have noted in the preface that in twentieth century the academic Indian philosophy, as taught and studied in Indian universities, has been dominated by Hindu religion, particularly advaita vedanta, in one way or another. This has been largely owing to the pervasive influence of S. Radhakrishnan. At least in twenty-first century, Indian "philosophy" must make a clean break from religion, and stop projecting "religion" as "philosophy". Otherwise, the future of "Indian philosophy" will remain bleak. Roy needs to be commended for making a clear distinction between philosophy and religion.
Roy's Materialism or Physical Realism
M.N. Roy was a strong supporter of materialist philosophy. In his book Materialism, Roy says:
Strictly speaking, philosophy is materialism, and materialism is the only possible philosophy. For, it represents the knowledge of nature as it really exists - knowledge acquired through the contemplation, observation and investigation of the phenomena of nature itself.
According to Roy, materialism is not the monstrosity it is generally supposed to be. It is not the cult of "eat, drink and be merry", as it has been depicted by its ignorant or malicious adversaries. It simply maintains that "the origin of everything that really exits is matter, that there does not exist anything but matter, all other appearances being transformation of matter, and these transformations are governed necessarily by laws inherent in nature."
Thus, broadly speaking, Roy's philosophy is in the tradition of materialism. However, there are some important differences between Roy's materialism and traditional materialism. In fact, Roy's "materialism" is a restatement of traditional materialism in the light of then contemporary scientific knowledge.
As Roy says:
The substratum of the Universe is not matter as traditionally conceived: but it is physical as against mental or spiritual. It is a measurable entity. Therefore, to obviate prejudiced criticism, the philosophy hitherto called materialism may be renamed Physical Realism. (emphasis mine)
Restatement of Traditional Materialism
According to Roy, "materialism must be dissociated from certain notions which have been rendered untenable by the latest discoveries of science."
Roy's revision and restatement of materialism embraces both the basic tenets of materialism. He has revised the concept of matter as well as that of physical determinism.
Change in the Concept of Matter
According to Roy, the discoveries of quantum physics have "made the classical notion of matter untenable". Nevertheless, Roy insists that though the substratum of the universe is "not matter as traditionally conceived" it is "physical as against mental or spiritual. It is a measurable entity".
The so-called "crisis" of materialism, according to Roy, involved the conception of matter, and not its existence. The "crisis" simply exposed the inadequacy of the old atomist theory. The substance of the "crisis" was, in words of Roy, "that it appeared to reduce matter from mass to energy and radiation". However, emphasizes Roy, there cannot be any doubt about the fact that "atomic physics deals with material realities which exist objectively, outside the mind of the physicist." (emphasis mine)
Thus, in Roy's physical realism "matter" is not made up of hard and massy stone-like atoms as in traditional "mechanical materialism". The whole concept of "matter" has been revised in the light of new physics. In fact, Roy was even ready to discard the term "matter" provided a more appropriate new term could be coined. In Science and Philosophy, Roy describes "matter" as the "sole-existence". According to Roy, it is not very important what name is attached to the "substratum of existence" - matter, energy, action, vibratory motion or field. But he insists that it is a physical reality. What Roy means by calling it physical is that it exists objectively and that it is measurable. As we have seen, Roy has even renamed his revised version of materialism as "physical realism".
Revision of Physical Determinism in light of Heisenberg's Principle
Roy disagrees with the view of some thinkers that Heisenberg's Principle of Uncertainty necessitates the rejection of the doctrine of determinism. According to Roy, only a modification in the traditional conception of causality is required. Causality, in Roy's view, is not an a priori form of thought or an axiomatic law; it is physical relation inherent in the constitution of the universe.
Roy, in fact, tries to temper rigidly mechanical view of determinism by interpreting it in terms of probability. He admits plurality of possibilities and the element of contingency in the world, and tries to show that determinism and probability are not mutually exclusive. However, Roy insists that statistical methods presuppose determinism. The universe is a law-governed system, and the existence of law presupposes causality. He is emphatic that the element of uncertainty in the sub-atomic world is not to be equated with indeterminacy. Rejection of the idea that there are invariant relations in nature, maintains Roy, will blast the very foundation of science.
"Soft" Determinism
Roy also tries to reconcile freedom of will with determinism. According to him, human beings possess free will and can choose out of various alternatives in front of them. Roy, however, is not unique among materialists in recognizing free will. Epicures, among ancient Greek materialists, and Hobbes, among modern materialists, tried to accommodate free will in their philosophies. According to Roy, the vast world of biological evolution lies between the world of human beings and the world of inanimate matter, and, therefore, the world of human beings has its own specific laws, though these laws can be referred back to the general laws of the world of dead matter. Nevertheless, human will, says Roy, cannot be directly related to the laws of physical universe. Thus, Roy is not, to use the terminology of William James, a "hard" determinist like Holbach, but a "soft" determinist like Hobbes.
Objective Reality of Ideas and the Autonomy of the Mental World
Though Roy traces the origin of mental activities to the physical background of the living world, yet he also grants them an objective existence of their own. "Mind and matter", according to Roy, "can be reduced to a common denominator; as such, they are two objective realities." In Roy's view, once formed, ideas exist by themselves, governed by their own laws. Thus, Roy grants much more objectivity and autonomy to the mental world than has been traditionally granted by materialists. Roy's materialism is not an "extreme" materialism like that of the eighteenth century French materialist, Julien de la Mettrie, who regarded man to be a self-moving machine. According to Roy, on the other hand, "Man is not a living machine, but a thinking animal".
Emphasis on Ethics
Roy has given a very important place to ethics in his philosophy. According to Roy, "the greatest defect of classical materialism was that its cosmology did not seem to have any connection with ethics". Roy strongly asserts that if it is not shown that materialist philosophy can accommodate ethics, then, human spirit, thirsting for freedom, will spurn materialism. In Roy' view materialist ethics is not only possible but materialist morality is the noblest form of morality. Roy links morality with human being's innate rationality. Man is moral, according to Roy, because he is rational. In Roy's ethics freedom, which he links with the struggle of existence is the highest value. Search for truth is a corollary to the quest for freedom.
However, Roy is not unique among materialists in emphasizing the importance of ethics in his philosophy. Contrary to popular impression, ancient materialist Epicures and modern materialist Holbach, for example, accorded an important place to ethics in their philosophies. However, the details of Roy's ethics are somewhat different from these philosophies.
Roy's Physical Realism and Marxian Materialism
Roy, before he formulated and expounded his own philosophy of New Humanism, was an orthodox Marxist. In fact, Roy's revision of materialism was carried out in the context of Marxism. Thus, Roy's revision of materialism in general is also applicable to Marxian materialism to the extent Marxian materialism resembles traditional materialism.
Roy's Physical Realism is, however, different from Marxian materialism in particular in three important ways. Firstly, Roy considers the Hegelian heritage a weak spot of Marxism. The simplicity and scientific soundness of materialism are marred, in Roy's view, by making its validity conditional upon dialectic. According to Roy, materialism pure, and simple, can stand on its own legs, and, therefore, he tries to de link dialectics from materialism. The validity of materialism, maintains Roy, is in no way conditional on dialectics, as there is no logical connection between the two.
Secondly, Roy rejects historical materialism and advocates a humanist interpretation of history in which he gives an important place to human will as a determining factor in history, and he recognizes the autonomy of the mental world. According to Roy, human will cannot be directly related to the laws of physical universe. Ideas, too, have an objective existence, and are governed by their own laws. The economic interpretation of history, in Roy's view is deduced from a wrong interpretation of materialism.
Thirdly, Roy's materialism is sharply different from Marxian materialism in so far it recognizes the importance of ethics and gives a prominent place to it. According to Roy, Marxian materialism wrongly disowns the humanist tradition and thereby divorces materialism from ethics. The contention that "from the scientific point of view this appeal to morality and justice does not help us an inch farther" was based, according to Roy, upon a false notion of science.
"New Humanism" is the name given by Roy to the "new philosophy of revolution" which he developed in the later part of his life. As pointed out earlier, the philosophy has been summarized by Roy in the "Twenty-Two Theses" and elaborated in his New Humanism - A Manifesto.
New Humanism, as presented in the Twenty- Two Theses, has both a critical and a constructive aspect. The critical aspect consists of describing the inadequacies of communism (including the economic interpretation of history), and of formal parliamentary democracy. The constructive aspect, on the other hand, consists of giving highest value to the freedom of individuals, presenting a humanist interpretation of history, and outlining a picture of radical or organized democracy along with the way for achieving the ideal of radical democracy.
Apart from Roy's effort to trace the quest for freedom and search for truth to the biological struggle for existence, the basic idea of the first three theses of Roy is: individualism. According to Roy, the central idea of the Twenty-Two Theses is that "political philosophy must start from the basic idea that the individual is prior to society, and freedom can be enjoyed only by individuals".
Quest for freedom and search for truth, according to Roy, constitute the basic urge of human progress. The purpose of all-rational human endeavor, individual as well as collective, is attainment of freedom in ever increasing measure. The amount of freedom available to the individuals is the measure of social progress. Roy refers quest for freedom back to human being's struggle for existence, and he regards search for truth as a corollary to this quest. Reason, according to Roy, is a biological property, and it is not opposed to human will. Morality, which emanates from the rational desire for harmonious and mutually beneficial social relations, is rooted in the innate rationality of man.
In his humanist interpretation of history, presented in theses four, five and six, Roy gives an important place to human will as a determining factor, and emphasizes the role of ideas in the process of social evolution. Formation of ideas is, according to Roy, a physiological process but once formed, ideas exist by themselves and are governed by their own laws. The dynamics of ideas runs parallel to the process of social evolution and both of them influence each other. Cultural patterns and ethical values are not mere super structures of established economic relations. They have a history and logic of their own.
Roy's criticism of communism, contained in theses seven to eleven is based mainly on the experience of the former Soviet Union, particularly the "discrepancy between the ideal and the reality of the socialist order". According to Roy, freedom does not necessarily follow from the capture of political power in the name of the oppressed and the exploited classes and abolition of private property in the means of production. For creating a new world of freedom, says Roy, revolution must go beyond an economic reorganization of society. A political system and an economic experiment which subordinate the man of flesh and blood to an imaginary collective ego, be it the nation or class, cannot possibly be, in Roy's view, the suitable means for the attainment of the goal of freedom.
The Marxian doctrine of state, according to which the state is an instrument of exploitation of one class by another, is clearly rejected by Roy. According to Roy, the state is "the political organization of society" and "its withering away under communism is a utopia which has been exploded by experience".
Similarly, Roy rejects the communist doctrine of the dictatorship of the proletariat. "Dictatorship of any form, however plausible may be the pretext for it, is," asserts Roy, "excluded by the Radical-Humanist perspective of social revolution".
Roy has discussed the shortcomings of formal parliamentary democracy in his twelfth and thirteenth theses. These flaws, according to Roy, are outcome of the delegation of power. Atomized individual citizens are, in Roy's view, powerless for all practical purposes, and for most of the time. They have no means to exercise their sovereignty and to wield a standing control of the state machinery.
"To make democracy effective," says Roy, "power must always remain vested in the people and there must be ways and means for the people to wield sovereign power effectively, not periodically, but from day to day." Thus, Roy's ideal of radical democracy, as outlined in theses fourteen to twenty-two consists of a highly decentralized democracy based on a network of people's committee's through which citizens wield a standing democratic control over the state.
Roy has not ignored the economic aspect of his ideal of radical democracy. According to Roy, progressive satisfaction of the material necessities is the pre-condition for the individual members of society unfolding their intellectual and other finer human potentialities. According to him, "an economic reorganization, such as will guarantee a progressively rising standard of living, is the foundation of the Radical Democratic State. Economic liberation of the masses is an essential condition for their advancing towards the goal of freedom."
The ideal of radical democracy will be attained, according to Roy, through the collective efforts of mentally free men united and determined for creating a world of freedom. They will function as the guides, friends and philosophers of the people rather than as their would-be rulers. Consistent with the goal of freedom, their political practice will be rational and, therefore, ethical. According to Roy:
The function of a revolutionary and a social philosophy is to lay emphasis on the basic fact of history that man is maker of his world… The brain is a means of production, and produces the most revolutionary commodity. Revolutions presuppose iconoclastic ideas. An increasingly large number of men conscious of their creative power, motivated by the indomitable will to remake the world, moved by the adventure of ideas, and fired with the ideal of a free society of free men, can create the condition under which democracy will be possible.
Roy categorically asserts that a social renaissance can come only through determined and widespread endeavor to educate the people as regards the principles of freedom and rational co-operative living. Social revolution, according to Roy, requires a rapidly increasing number of men of the new renaissance, and a rapidly expanding system of people's committees and an organic combination of both. The program of revolution will similarly be based on the principles of freedom, reason and social harmony.
As pointed out by Roy himself in his preface to the second edition of the New Humanism: A Manifesto, though new humanism has been presented in the twenty-two theses and the Manifesto as a political philosophy, it is meant to be a complete system. Because of being based on the ever-expanding totality of scientific knowledge, new humanism, according to Roy, cannot be a closed system. "It will not be", says Roy, "a dogmatic system claiming finality and infallibility." Roy also declares, "the work and progress of the Radical Humanist Movement will no longer be judged in terms of mass following, but by the spread of the spirit of freedom, rationality and secular morality amongst the people, and in the increase of their influence in the state."
According to Roy:
To consolidate the intellectual basis of the movement, Radicals will continue to submit their philosophies to constant research, examine it in the light of modern scientific knowledge and experience, and extend its application to all the social sciences. They will, at the same time, propagate the essentials of the philosophy amongst the people as a whole by showing its relevance to their pressing needs. They will make the people conscious of the urge for freedom, encourage their self-reliance and awaken in them the sense of individual dignity, inculcate the values of rationalism and secular morality, and spread the spirit of cosmopolitan Humanism. By showing the people the way to solve their daily problems by popular initiative, the Radicals will combat ignorance, fatalism, blind faith and the sense of individual helplessness which are the basis of authoritarianism. They will put all the social traditions and institutions to the test of the humanist outlook. (emphasis mine)
Philosophical Revolution or Renaissance
It is obvious from the foregoing that Roy was a great supporter of philosophical revolution or renaissance, and he has given a central place to it in his radical humanism. Roy was an admirer of European renaissance and drew inspiration from it. For him, "the renaissance was the revolt of man against God and his agents on this earth". According to Roy, the renaissance "heralded the modern civilization and the philosophy of freedom". He strongly believed that India, too, needed a renaissance on rationalist and humanist lines. According to him, this was a necessary condition for democracy to function in a proper manner. As Roy says in his Reason, Romanticism and Revolution:
In the first place, there must be a conscious and integrated effort to stimulate amongst people the urge for freedom, the desire to rely upon themselves, the spirit of free thinking and the will never to submit to any external authority by exchanging their freedom for the security of the slave. A new Renaissance based on rationalism and cosmopolitan Humanism is essential for democracy to be realized. (emphasis mine)
As mentioned earlier, according to Roy, a philosophical revolution must precede a social revolution. He was opposed to blind faith and superstitions of all kinds and supported rationalism. As a physical realist, he rejected all allegedly supernatural entities like god and soul. Similarly, he was opposed to fatalism and the doctrine of karma. He unequivocally rejected the religious mode of thinking and advocated a scientific outlook and a secular morality. As noted earlier, he was in favor of de linking philosophy with religion and associating it closely with science. He believed that science would ultimately liquidate religion. Thus, though Roy primarily used the label of "humanist", he was also a rationalist and an atheist. He considered the promotion of rationalism and atheism as part of his humanist movement.
As he says in Beyond Communism:
A philosophical revolution must precede any radical social transformation…The belief in god and fate is the strongest link in the chain of the slavery of the Indian people…The Radical Democratic Movement will be the school to teach the Indian people to revolt against fate and the God or gods who preside over it.
As mentioned earlier, according to Roy, "A revolutionary is one who has got the idea that the world can be remade, made better than it is to-day, that it was not created by a supernatural power, and therefore, could be remade by human efforts."
Further, according to Roy, "the idea of improving upon the creation of God can never occur to God-fearing. We can conceive of the idea only when we know that all gods are our own creation, and we can depose whomsoever we have enthroned."
Roy's critical approach towards religion comes out very clearly in the preface of his book, India's Message, where he asserts that "a criticism of religious thought, subjection of traditional beliefs and the time-honored dogmas of religion to a searching analysis is a condition for the belated Renaissance of India. The spirit of inquiry should overwhelm the respect for tradition."
According to Roy, "a critical examination of what is cherished as India's cultural heritage will enable the Indian people to cast off the chilly grip of a dead past. It will embolden them to face the ugly realities of a living present and look forward to a better, brighter and pleasanter future."
Thus, Roy was opposed to an uncritical and vain glorification of India's so-called "spiritual" heritage. However, he did not stand for a wholesale rejection of ancient Indian thought either. He favored a rational and critical approach towards ancient traditions and thoughts. Roy believed that the object of European renaissance was to rescue the positive contributions of ancient European civilization, which were lying buried in the Middle Ages owing to the dominance of the Church. Roy had something similar in his mind about India. According to him, one of the tasks of the Renaissance movement should be to rescue the positive outcome and abiding contributions of ancient thought - contributions which just like the contributions of Greek sages are lying in ruins under the decayed structure of the Brahmanical Society - the tradition of which is erroneously celebrated as the Indian civilization.