Ideas to work out

1. The metaphor of a rocking boat instead of a golden mean. In other words, the best life is a constant movement between (but not reaching) extremes. The point is partly that there must be motion between various states - the love of honor, for example, must enter into greater and lesser prominence; it going into lesser visibility is important for other states, awarenesses, or values to come to the fore (such as love of privacy, or anonymity). The rocking boat metaphor shares the golden mean theory's avoidance of extremes (in the rocking boat metaphor, reaching an extreme would be equivalent to falling overboard), but it also indicates that there is something attractive or worthy about extremes (the most distilled form of a certain type of experience), and that is why there has to be movement towards and then away from them. Approaching one type of "distilled experience" will, moreover, create nostalgia for another one. So it is not possible to draw a static picture of the best man, or best life, because the whole point is the need for change and alteration; interestingly, however, the rocking boat is still headed in a particular direction - which implies that a continuously shifting state is compatible with an overall purpose or aim.
2. It seems to me that social conservatism has not succeeded - actually, has failed - to make morality seem beautiful. Maybe there is an alternative to the emphasis on morality. Maybe what traditionalists have failed to address is the way that morals can lead people to live in a way that is out of touch with themselves. The reason could be that morality can only discuss people in terms of structures (husband and wife, citizen and country, etc) and it can't grasp the individual who inhabits the structures. From its outside perspective, the structures appear in the aspect of walls - rather e.g. than carriers/homes. So discussion of them focuses on what is binding about them, not what is nutritive or . (In fact, it's possible that social conservatism is animated by a kind of power trip involved in pointing out human obligations.) The alternative to the discourse of morality would be one that focuses on what is special about inhabiting such structures, instead of what is binding. If that can only be done by examples, then it is the job of sociology or literature. But this also implies that what is special about the experience might be lost. In other words, a person's attention to his own experience within particular structures should be relevant to his continued commitment to them.
3. Strauss: seems to stress the necessity of conjoining philosophy with political power. But it is one thing to talk about philosophy having freedom (e.g.Isaiah Berlin) and another to talk about it having power. If philosophy is done best in a state of 1) indifference to practical life and 2) skepticism, (perhaps: 3) humility), then it seems like political power would be an eternal temptation to philosophy to become corrupted into something else. It could become, for example, concerned with ideas that promote survival, not truth; or with being persuasive to those who are to submit to its government; or with being glorious and risking perhaps its self-awareness.
Part of the reason why Strauss' ideal seems to link philosophy with power must be that Strauss understands power relationships symbolically, rather than practically. An aristocracy symbolizes appreciation of wisdom, whereas democracy symbolizes relativism (in practice this isn't necessarily true, since a democracy may have very vehement beliefs). Further, in an aristocracy, the philosophers are situated above the common people as a higher class - and that is metaphorical for how Strauss understands the process of philosophy, i.e. that it rises (via dialectic) out of, and is grounded in, common sense.

Greek Riots

Fundamentally, I still don't understand the reason behind the Greek riots. I have a suspicion that much of it is an issue of people not wanting to criticize "the enemies of their enemy." The mass of Greek students, who had already begun demonstrations by December 4th (protesting reforms in the state universities, such as the limit on the number of years one can be a student) didn't want to undermine their cause by condemning anarchists who, much more violently, damaged, looted, and petrol-bombed the stores of hundreds of middle class Greek businessmen. The parents of the students didn't want to condemn their children when they occupied university campuses and attacked police stations and government buildings (with Seville oranges, stones, etc) and demonstrated throughout Greece. Somehow the fact that each of these groups professes outrage at the death of the 15 yr old Alexi Grigoropoulos' (who conveniently was both a student and an anarchist) by an irresponsible policeman has given each of them confidence that what unites them with each other is ultimately irreproachably good.

Still, I think it would be wrong to regard Grigoropoulos' death as being an actual cause of the uprising. For one thing, it simply doesn't seem shocking enough that, in a row with the police in an anarchist-dominated neighborhood, in which the boy was at least likely carrying a petrol-bomb, a policeman would have fired his gun, albeit in an irresponsible way. It also doesn't explain why people have insisted on calling this a murder both before and after evidence came out indicating that the bullet ricocheted onto Grigoropoulos from a surface above him -- and so was not strictly speaking a murder.

The interesting question for me is, how did this upheaval reach the proportion it did (reaching eighteen cities in Greece, and inspiring sympathy demonstrations from Moscow to Madrid). Indignation towards the recent corruption scandals of the Karamanlis (conservative party) government may have been a factor, but doesn't explain why the events were carried out above all by identifiable interest groups -- the students, the anarchists, and the union workers. Some argue the root cause is the breakdown of the family in Greece, and that so many teenagers have grown up with parents who are divorced in addition to facing economic malaise.

I think it would be better to explain it, not in terms of family associations and values, but rather in terms of the social units that have replaced the family as the key element of self-identification -- associations between peers or between members of a profession or class. This phenomenon, likely the result of Greece's dedication to socialist principles, is quite evident in the Greek high-school and university students who, faced with one paternal, centralizing power, are completely undivided (in two respects: one, the power they are reacting to, and two, the cultures they represent). Thus, they have been urged, via mass-delivered SMSs and email forwards, to show up in large numbers to the demonstrations and riots of these last two weeks. The group-identification has, in a sense, become an ideology of its own.

One could point out that part of it is a pointed reaction against certain government reforms to the education system, and more generally the fact that the average graduate student has an expected 700 euro per month income. But it doesn't look like the youth that are demonstrating have a particular agenda that they wish to put forward. This makes it hard to take seriously. My personal perspective is that this anti-government attitude is a fashion and not exactly political -- because it cannot realize any goals if the fashion's very existence depends on the continuance of a paternal state it must react to.

One solution, then, is for the government to aggressively decentralize; to let responsibility (especially for education) take place at a more local level. Thus, authority will become more divided, and a variety in educational cultures can evolve. More importantly, initiatives that call for greater community responsibility might be the antidote to a prevailing concept of heroism that is inseparable from rebellion.

Apologies Abound

I'm unhappy with the way I've expressed myself in a lot of the previous posts. I think some of the ideas were good, but the language was overly dogmatic, and worse, "scientific" sounding, which I think just isn't the right way to do political philosophy. I apologize for sentences like "Rogers Smith's theory of the founding is problematic" ('problematic' sounds like I'm discussing math), or for putting things in lists when they don't deserve to be in them (e.g. my last post), or for making absolutist claims. I won't write like that again. I also apologize for the prolonged absence of...anything.

But there's a way I want to write political philosophy, and I think I can: a way that's incisive, insightful, honest, analytic, human and also perhaps distinctly feminine. More later...

Communitarianism

Some of the principles underlying my communitarianism include:

1. Politics as being more than just power dynamics; politics as the method by which a particular community reaches decisions concerning itself.
2. Politics understood as encompassing both formal and informal political structures.
3. In this sense, politics as being universally present, and becoming more informal as the community becomes more and more partial (i.e. more obviously part of a larger community).

Many claim that the end of political philosophy should not be to promote "the good life," but merely to guarantee freedom, or material security. However, once it becomes clear that politics encompasses more than just the government (i.e. the family is a political context; the classroom is a political context; even the playground is a political context), then it becomes more obvious how much human life would be deprived of if the issue of "a good life" were to be removed from politics/political philosophy. It would mean both that this topic would cease to be a part of public discussion, and that, for man to be a "political animal" would merely signify that he was interested in his neighbor's freedom/material security, not the substance of his lifestyle.

From my perspective, then, the real question for political philosophy is: what is the optimal growth context for a person/people? What community -- or structure of communities -- constitutes the optimal growth context?

Growth contexts can tentatively be understood in terms of contexts which promote 1. individuals believing in and striving for particular ideals, and 2. individuals as political (i.e. having a notion of "community" and concerning themselves with its well-being).

And in that sense, the ends of political philosophy and of education are not necessarily entirely discrete.

Moreover, in contrast with a claim I made in my last post, my concern in political philosophy is not 1) the elite, nor 2) the masses, nor 3) the least advantaged. My concern is that, with respect to human wisdom and values, the various enclaves of community life are providing a forum for human growth.

A word to Christian conservatives:

It is not as simple as to say "the goal is to alleviate spiritual poverty, not material poverty." Rawls and other liberals are not wrong to concern themselves with material wants. But material concerns are primarily relevant because of the ways they may hinder or advance community health/value (e.g. how can a family in which two parents work 16 hours a day be one in which children are receiving the nurturing they require?). In other words, instead of being abandoned, they should be incorporated into such a framework.

A word to Rawlsians and (contemporary) liberal political philosophers:

There is nothing per se inconsistent about Rawlsian political philosophy (well --except for the fact that the veil of ignorance is rooted in the Descartian tradition, and therefore to believe in it is to believe in innocence and tradition at the same time), but it is certainly anti-communitarian. In other words, it claims that people have obligations towards one other, not because of their relationships with each other, but simply because of a hypothetical choice they would have made in an original (solitary) position. However, his political philosophy is nevertheless crafted for "a community"; it would not make sense to say that the prosperity of the richest "anywhere" should serve the least advantaged "anywhere else". Or at least, one must assume that it is crafted for a community, because otherwise it would have no practical value. Given that it is crafted for a community, then, it seems irresponsible for it not to have a theory of a) what defines a community, and b) what the purpose of a community is. The fact that his political philosophy (and really, ANY political philosphy -- including utilitarianism) cannot make sense unless it is in reference to a community (e.g. of persons, actors, countries) implies that a meaningful political philosophy must begin with a proper appreciation for the value of a community -- and thus have a theory for what a community should be.

Political Man

A good number of political philosophies can be roughly categorized according to the following three aims:

1) freedom -- sometimes discussed in the form of "the absence of tyranny"; arguably the central concern of the American founders; at the individual level, it is often embodied in the consent principle, i.e. no action or exchange between two people mutually consented to should be interceded with; or alternatively, the Marxist/anti-exploitation principle: no action or exchange (even consensual) which permits one person to profit off another's labor should be allowed
2) happiness -- e.g. utilitarianism
3) human excellence -- can be religious or non-religious, moral or amoral (e.g. the Third Reich is an amoral non-religious regime that tried to promote a particular idea of human excellence)

By way of further assertion, most political philosophies generally concern themselves with promoting either

1) the elite (Nietzsche/Ayn Rand), or the work of the elite (Plato - knowledge, produced by philosopher kings via dialectic w/ each other, Bacon - technology, produced by scientists)
2) the masses - most democratic theory? but also Lockean utilitarianism ("happiness of the greatest number"), and often religious political philosophy
3) the least advantaged (Rawls)

often, in one of the three previously listed respects.

[Note: I can probably be pinned in terms of (3) and (2) respectively.]

Of course, the problem with most political philosophies that have an idea of human excellence, even disregarding what that idea happens to be, is that, when they reach the level of comprehensive enforcement, they end up degrading man by turning him into a child of the state, i.e. a peon in someone else's dream.

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Or, to put the problem otherwise, if human growth has something to do with learning to be a "political animal", by which I mean, concerned with the good of the community and also of other members within that community, then it seems that man must lose that sense of responsibility (for others and himself) when he is not functioning as an institutional being. The problem is: how do you create an institutional setting in which one person's sense of responsibility for other people is not advanced at the expense of their sense of responsibility for themselves?

Many conservatives/libertarians pretend to have found a solution to this problem by saying that not the state but private/"free" associations (Tocqueville, etc.) should be the forum in which man develops his/her identity as an institutional being; what they don't realize is that this is not an apolitical solution, but merely a solution in which politics takes place at a more local level (in other words, a person is free to abandon a private association in the same sense that he is free to abandon his country, and in this sense private associations are not meaningfully different from governments).

To summarize further:
1. There is no "apolitical solution" to promoting human growth. The only difference is between formal and informal politics.
2. The real question for political structures is how to advance man's sense of himself as a political animal without mitigating the development of another man's sense of himself as a political animal -- interested and responsible for the good of the community and its members [also: there is not a single distinct community man is part of; instead, he exists within various concentric circles in which the strength of the community is greatest within the unit closest to him (the family), extending outwards (friends, neighbors, countrymen, etc.), and defined by the degree to which they share things in common (history, mores, language, principles, identity)].

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* Why Rogers Smith's lack of a sense of telos is problematic. (see my last post)

The problem with Rogers Smith is that he (deliberately?) does not consider the evidence for an American sense of telos, at the founding. He notes that American identity was from the beginning complex and not simply formulaic, or straightforwardly egalitarian/concerned with human rights. But why doesn't he look for a vector -- an indication of intended direction? The problem with this is not just the cynicism implied by it but more importantly, the lack of a perception of identity over time. Someone who does not look for a "vector" does not perceive the community or the individual he is examining to be a forward-looking entity, i.e. to be an entity attentive to its future growth.

Lions, Tigers, and Straussians

A quick review of Professor Steven B Smith's book, Reading Leo Strauss:

Smith's basic portrait of Strauss:

1. One of Strauss's greatest contributions to political science was to resurrect the quarrel between the ancients and the moderns, in particular by blaming modernity for historicism (tendency to treat ancient texts and thinkers as mere products of their time), positivism (tendency towards "value-neutral" political and social sciences), and relativism (tendency to regard values as socially contingent), and advocating a return to the classical tradition in order to have some starting point for answering the problems of today.
2. Strauss, rather than being a precursor to neo-conservatism, was a believer in "Platonic liberalism". In order to understand this one must understand that a)his notion of esoteric writing was not that authors appealed to elite audiences but that they wrote in such a way as to both eschew persecution and (at least in Plato's case) avoid for all time the use of their works as "authoritative texts", as well as to relay different messages to different readers, b)the allegory of the cave is intended not only to indicate that politics can corrupt philosophy but that intellectuals can be dangerous when in power (they require a detachment from the city in order to discern truth), c)he wished to buttress liberalism through a return to a notion of rights and justice, without which he believed liberalism to be on shaky grounds, and d)he advocated for liberal democracy in opposition to mass democracy (the first is an "aristocracy of the many," i.e. in which every person can philosophize, the second is polity in which group identities supersede independent ones).
3. In spite of believing that the West was predicated on the tension between Jerusalem (awe of God and submission to his command) and Athens (reason and philosophy), Strauss was in truth a Spinozan Jew, i.e. a mostly secular one. He believed the Jews were chosen in the sense that they represented "the human problem" insofar as it is a "social or political problem", and called Judaism a "heroic delusion" because he thought that moral man was "the potential believer."

Some side points:
SBS seems to devote a small chapter at the end of his book to speculating on what Strauss would have thought of the current Bush administration, and whether it is at all justified to refer to the likes of Paul Wolfowitz and Donald Rumsfeld as "Straussians." His argument is that this link is nonexistent, and that Strauss would have been critical both of the political idealism and lack of moderation exhibited by the current administration. It is a little ironic that the current discussion of "Straussianism among right-wing elites" is simultaneously what has justified interest and relevance in Smith's book, and been the topic which SBS appears to consider the most peripheral and least interesting (although of course he must address it, for both the book's sake and for Strauss's).
One senses that Professor Smith is also, in part, seeking to make Strauss palatable to liberal academia (his other audience) by arguing that Strauss was after all a "Platonic liberal." However, there seems to be ample reason to refer to Strauss as a conservative as well, given a)his belief in teleology, b)his preoccupation with virtue, and c)his willingness to conceive of elites and hierarchies (even if SBS slightly tempers readings of elitism in Strauss).

Some thoughts on Strauss:
*I like the Athens v. Jerusalem paradigm for conceptualizing the West, although at the same time a part of me thinks it is a frustrating rhetorical ploy to say that the two exist in a necessary tension with one another (frustrating because for those of us who believe in one side, namely Athens, and not the other, it is like saying that our believing in that particular side is simply part of the way in which the greater dialectic functions). I wonder if Strauss would also associate Athens with individualism and Jerusalem with group-identity (in which case maybe Socrates v. Jerusalem is a more apt way to capture the tension). If this were the case, I would be a much stronger fan of the Jerusalem component of the equation.
*I was slightly perturbed by the idea that the ultimate place and, it is suggested, even "the aim" of the philosophers constitutes one of "detachment" from the city. While it seems true that philosopher kings would be blinded by their desire for glory and power, I wonder why Strauss wouldn't prefer the role of "adviser to statesman" for them (in the style of Aristotle or Machiavelli), which both shields them from the corruption of ambition and puts them in touch with politics. To say that pristine truth is best accessed in a position of detachment seems to me to be in the same vein of thought as that which treats traditions as "prejudices" rather than institutionalized forms of knowledge--i.e. not a vein of thought I would imagine Strauss falling into.
*I wonder if Strauss would say that a loss of belief in teleology is also evident at the level of the American self-conception. One thesis that is, for example, being increasingly taught to college students is Roger Smith's "multiple traditions thesis" of American identity, which argues that America was from the very beginning an entity of contradictions, in that the Declaration of Independence championed the idea of universal and hereditary human rights, on the one hand, while on the other hand America functioned according to a system of ascriptive hierarchies. While all these things are no doubt true, I think the peril of Roger Smith's thesis is that it does not discern an "essential" American identity, i.e. a telos to which it strove. Lincoln's address at the Cooper Institute, in contrast, argues persuasively that the founders for all their faults tried to put the nation on "the right track" towards the realization of certain ideals (including the eventual extinction of slavery). One might argue in opposition to R. Smith that the nation is founded not only on a proposition, but in this sense, on an aspiration, and thus does possess an essential identity.

Freedom Free-Riders

I visited a Demos lecture today, in large part to see what the Demos people are up to, and heard John Schwarz, from the University of Arizona, speak on “Freedom Reclaimed”. His basic spiel: progressives should reclaim the concept of “freedom” and use it to talk about the need for greater material equality, rather than letting conservative economists manipulate freedom-lovers into thinking they therefore like free-markets.

His argument came down to these two points: 1) freedom has traditionally (i.e. since Jefferson, Madison, and the Decl. of Indep.) meant that a person is entitled to the fruits of his own labor and 2) the average worker’s productivity has increased over the last two-three decades, while his/her wages have remained stagnant, therefore the average worker has not received the benefits of his/her labor. Moreover, since the rich have gotten richer in the same period of time, the latter are obviously profiting off the former’s increased productivity.

Which I think is a challenging argument. (Of course, it assumes that we have apt ways of measuring increased productivity, which some would dispute.)

One quick response: while the latter point may be true, I’m not sure that the concept of freedom at play here is really a traditional American one. I would say that the traditional American concept of freedom is that you are entitled to the fruits of your labor, but that you deserve whatever return on it you and Joe Schmoe mutually agree to. In fact, I think it is more in the Marxist lexicon to talk about freedom as entailing a return on one’s labor proportionate to the labor input, with anything less amounting to worker exploitation.

Also, it’s kind of relevant that the founders would have balked at the idea of a welfare state, and almost made it constitutionally impossible to demand more than 10% in income taxes before they decided it was unlikely to ever happen.

More generally: I am somewhat iffy on projects that involve “re-defining” popular concepts. On the one hand, it seems like a pretty good tactic for making your particular cause popular. On the other hand, it is a little Pavlovian and isn’t exactly a method of persuasion that enriches the mind of the person being persuaded.

Yale's Grand Strategists

Some quick thoughts on Yale Redpath Event:


John Gaddis: the most provocative speaker of the three (esp. in terms of original insights); my only criticisms would be that a) he comes across a little too much as an “academic” in his interpretation of historical events (e.g. arguing that one of the primary motivations behind the Marshall plan was to expose the contradictions in communist theory, which presumed that capitalist powers were always at odds with each other (why couldn’t he just say “expanding American influence so as to limit Soviet influence” which would be the more political and less intellectual reading of what was going on)…or arguing that Gorbachev’s weakness stemmed from his failure to envision a new grand strategy, rather than pointing to the fact that Russia was on the brink of economic collapse, etc.) and b) his analysis of the symbolism of the Cold War, namely that it shows how far we have evolved such that nuclear arms can exist and no real confrontation occur, seems like a recklessly optimistic reading (not just because it ignores proxy wars but also because mutual destruction may have been the consequence if Russia hadn’t fallen apart)…anyway, having said that, he made a worthwhile point that stronger awareness of human rights evolved because of it. And I also hadn’t realized before that part of the point behind the nuclear détente between world powers was to take the steam out of domestic movements, and that was cool. (Plus I’m happy I finally got to see what he looks like in person, after having listened to podcasts of him…)

Paul Kennedy: I think most people felt a little disappointed by this lecture; frankly, it was a little uninspired and introductory textbook-ish. It wasn’t clear why he thought the UN was an interesting subject (aside from the Secretary General having asked him to take it up) and he didn’t really say anything new about it. One would think that, having raised the topics of a) people’s concerns regarding the threat to national sovereignty, and b) UN reforms currently on the table, he would make some argument as to why this was worth the sacrifice and how the institution itself should be improved. On the whole, it seemed like his forced attention to this topic in the last decade had robbed him of his enthusiasm for glory and controversy, on both a global and a personal level.

Charles Hill: I didn’t think his lecture was as “partisan” as certain members of the audience accused it of being. And I thought it was cool that he announced we were “losing the war of ideas” although I couldn’t figure out if he meant only that we were less effective at producing propaganda or if he also thought that was because the ideas we were promoting were somehow not as compelling as they could be. It would have been nice to know how he thought we could start winning the war of ideas, because it seemed like the “solution” he finally came to was simply to say that the problem was not that big after all (i.e. people immigrate to America because they like us), rather than to propose an actual solution.

Unfortunately, I was working on only four hours of sleep, so I didn’t stay for the panel discussion, which might have given more insight into what their classrooms are like. But I’m excited about the program in general, and I think more of this sort of thing (i.e. programs that span more than one class/semester) is really what liberal education needs, as opposed to the hodge-podge-of-unrelated-classes that many students end up with nowadays.

Four Accusations Against Philosophy

Or alternatively, four shameful motivations behind the philosophical life (all of which I am guilty of):

1. Eroding the division between public and private in order to eliminate all vulnerabilities.

With secrecy comes the possibility of being discovered--and with that, of shame. It is better to have no secrets; one can either reveal them or give them up (whether the secret is a habit or a belief). Of course, there can be an initial anxiety that accompanies the "unclothing of the self". But thereafter one can decide which of these beliefs/actions he/she is comfortable enough with, even in the face of disagreement, that one will persevere in them.

A friend once told me, "The more you make yourself vulnerable, the more invulnerable you become."

2. Seeking a happiness that is internally-derived as a way of losing a sense of dependency on things external to oneself: in effect, the striving to become a "stone" or "corpse". Best symbolized by Socrates--who tried to persuade himself and everyone else out of their appetites.

SOCRATES: Tell me: are you saying that if a person is to be the kind of person he should be, he shouldn't restrain his appetites but let them become as large as possible and then should procure their fulfillment from some source or other, and that this is excellence?
CALLICLES: Yes, that's what I'm saying.
SOCRATES: So then those who have no need of anything are wrongly said to be happy?
CALLICLES: Yes, for in that case stones and corpses would be happiest. (Gorgias, 492e)

3. Seeking something higher than the self in order to make one's own mortality acceptable. I.e. the real meaning behind the statement that "Philosophy is preparation for death."

Moral imperatives (including "thou shalt serve truth") are a great solution to the horror of mortality because they, almost by definition, are valuable not because we choose them, but rather the opposite: we choose them for their value. In deferring to something that is higher and outside of us, we can come to terms with our own impermanence.

But I would include more than just the fear of death in the fear of mortality; I would also include the fear of failure and of defeat.

4. Removing danger from love by seeking to love things that are inanimate. (Diotima.)

Loving a human being risks the possibility that the latter might 1. refuse us, 2. accept but abuse us, or 3. suffer harm or disappear. Wedding oneself to ideals can, in this way, be an escape from human relationships, even though those ideals often concern themselves with human relationships.

"The other idiosyncracy of the philosophers is no less dangerous; it consists in confusing the last and the first. They place that which comes at the end--unfortunately! for it ought not to come at all!--namely, the 'highest concepts,' which means the most general, the emptiest concepts, the last smoke of evaporating reality, in the beginning, as the beginning." (Nietzsche, Twilight Idols, 1:4)

Underlying all this love of order, of truth, and of moral maxims is a deep fear of life--a fear of loving or caring for things that ephemeral or unreliable, and of what can happen if one allows one's own fragility to express itself. As a result, one makes a hero out of Socrates, who gave up 1) pleasure, 2) love of humans for love of forms, and 3) pride (or at least claimed to, because he still struggled with this one).

Socrates v. Nietzsche

"When these honorable idolators of concepts worship something, they kill it and stuff it; they threaten the life of everything they worship. Death, change, old age, as well as procreation and growth, are to their minds objections--even refutations." (Twilight Idols, 1:1)

Nietzsche saw all of this and tried to affirm life by affirming its risks and its inconstancies. All that he saw the philosophers, in fear, abjuring (e.g. death, change, ephemerality), he made the centerpiece of his value system (except that he would never use the word "system"). It is not merely incidental that he:

1) tried to restore an appreciation for tragedy, and with that, Dionysian ecstasy (in which a person might be torn limb from limb in the abandon of the moment);

2) devised the thought experiment of Eternal Recurrence (i.e. meaning is determined by what you would will to recur again and again; it's basically a reversal of the idea that your life is meaningful if you are prepared to die with no regret, in favor of the idea that life is meaningful only if death is tragic).

[Note: Eve Tushnet has an essay on Nietzsche titled "Deeply I love only life: Nietzsche's Rejection of Eros" in which she argues that Nietzsche must reject eros in order to be able to affirm life, because eros might stand in judgment of life and of the self. While I don't think that Nietzsche's philosophical views culminate in a fully-fledged argument for eros, his reaction against the tendency of clerics and scientists to abhor both the ephemeral and the subjective, in fact prepares the groundwork for an affirmation of eros in the same way that it prepares the groundwork for an affirmation of life. I think ET is right, however, to point out that objectivity/morality becomes necessary to eros inasmuch as 1) promise-making is an integral part of eros, and 2) one expresses one's love for the beloved by making oneself "calculable."]

A Partial Vindication of Philosophy

1. It is possible that the perfect erotic union occurs only between two people who are completely assertive about who they are (and only people who have genuinely examined themselves are capable of genuine self-exposure).

2. Learning to articulate one's every thought and intuition (which is the method by which one makes the private public) can make a person more interested in other people, and less hostile to them, precisely because one does not feel oneself to be "at the mercy" of their every opinion and influence.

3. There must be some benefit to "seeing the world rightly". In other words, if we are relating to something we have made up (the subjectivist), then we are in fact merely relating to ourselves.

Harvard's New President: Boon or Blow to Feminists?

I have ambiguous feelings about Harvard's (still unconfirmed, but widely presumed) choice for a new President, following Larry Summers, Drew Gilpin Faust. I guess my doubts on this matter are not very different from anyone else's; namely, that this is likely a politically correct move that does not have the University's best interest in mind, and might in addition be a blow rather than a boon to feminist ends.

Of course, there is no evidence that Ms. Faust is an incapable candidate. However, with the amount of experience she has under her belt (only having managed an institute with 0.5% the budget of Harvard-at-large and a comparatively tiny fraction of its employee base), she is an obvious gamble. More importantly, the combination of the facts that a) Larry Summers was chased out in large part because of his insensitivity to political correctness (particularly as concerns female scientists), b) Ms. Faust happens to be the only reasonable female candidate up for consideration, and c) she heads the research institute that evolved out of Radcliffe and which focuses primarily on issues of women, gender and society, lends itself to the impression that this is above all a PC/PR move.

This might be a little disconcerting to members of the Harvard community, but also brings up broader concerns regarding the ends and methods of feminist progress. As a feminist myself, I don't believe that gender equality can be successfully established unless we draw a definite distinction between recognition and charity. I think it is or will be a failure of feminism if women become content with charity. Accepting versions of "affirmative action," would, in this sense, appear to be a symptom of that tendency.

On Rights And Privileges

In one of my earliest posts on this blog, I raised the topic of the controversial differentiation between rights and privileges. At the time I was unclear as to whether what the Right tended to term "privileges" actually qualified as such, or whether a stronger term was warranted.

I have decided that, in the case of issues such as poverty alleviation, it would be incorrect to say either that the poor "had a right" to such assistance, or that they would be "privileged" to receive it. It would not be correct to call it a right because rights are those things which, when we violate, we violate the dignity of those to whom they belong. It isn't true that the dignity of the poor is violated by the refusal of the rich to help them. On the other hand, it would not be correct to call it a privilege because privileges are those things which, when not granted, do not in any way reflect upon the moral character of those who might have granted them. It isn't true that the rich man who refuses to help the less fortunate or less capable is as good of a man (in that respect at least) as the rich man who does do so.

The only term that I can locate as of now to indicate the correct relationship between these entities is to say that the assistance of the poor is, not the right or the privilege of the poor, but the duty of the rich.

In addition, it is clear that each side has a vested interest (inasmuch as their own material welfare is concerned) in portraying this matter in terms of rights or privileges. This is, on the part of the poor, because it is impossible to demand anything unless that thing is a right--at least, not without sounding spoilt. This is, obviously, on the part of the rich, because it is impossible to deny anything to someone else unless that thing were a privilege--that is, not without sounding greedy.

Socrates UnPlatonized

I thought I should inform fellow lovers of Socrates that I've been revisiting Xenophon (whom I haven't read in at least four years) and have identified many similarities between Xenophon's account of the trial and Plato's Apology; more importantly, there seem to be real similarities between the personality that Xenophon depicts as Socrates and the one that Plato did (which implies that Socrates--as we know/understand him--could not merely have been Plato's invention!). Here are my favorite two parts of the Xenophon account:

*when asked why he wasn't preparing a speech prior to his trial, Socrates responded by saying, "Why should I? Haven't I been preparing myself my entire life?" (I'm paraphrasing of course)

*when someone, after the trial, went up to Socrates and said that it was terrible that he should be put to death unjustly, Socrates responded saying, "Why, would you prefer that I be put to death justly?"

Anyway, I especially liked those because they are exactly what I would have expected the Socrates I know via Plato to have said. Some other interesting similarities: he was indeed prosecuted on two charges, 1) that he corrupted the young, and 2) that he did not believe in the gods of the city; he argued against both charges; he interrogated Meletus at some point in his trial; he mentioned the oracle of Delphi that had isolated him from all other men as a model to all men; he refused to ask for a less harsh sentence (because he thought it would be equivalent to an apology for his life); he was self-reportedly unafraid of death (in Plato, he says he cannot be afraid of death since he does not know what it is like; in Xenophon, he says he is lucky to die then because he can thus circumvent all the drawbacks of old age, primarily of being a burden to other people); and finally, he refused to escape when given the chance by his friends, and drank the hemlock.

One thing that should be taken into account is that Xenophon was not actually at the event, but found these things out through hearsay, which counts against his narrative in the same way that Plato's tendency to fictionalize counts against his. But the fact that all of these things appear in common in their two accounts is reassuring that Socrates is after all more truth than legend.

No Vote For Hillary

I just came upon an article that discusses the Hillary Clinton team's research into Barack Obama's apparent "Muslim heritage." This is so low on her part. In addition to it being obvious that Obama is not a Muslim, it is also not at all the case that it should matter (unless he belonged to a particular strand of Muslim faith that promoted intolerance towards non-Muslims, women, gays and so on, which he manifestly does not).

This is just one more place in which Hillary's preoccupation with votes rather than values becomes plain. I'm not even sure I know what her personal values are, since they so often seem to run with the tide. While I like the notion of female candidates, I am personally going to wait until I find one I am proud of before I offer my support.

What's left for me is John McCain and Barack Obama. The first I like because of his toughness and his "been there" wisdom, the second because of his innocence and good will. Ultimately, McCain is more inspiring to me, although I do have some qualms about some policy choices of his (e.g. abortion, the middle east--excluding the Iraq question, etc.). But I do like his resistance to the whims of popular opinion, and if I were to guess, I would say that his personal experiences with mortality, danger, and service are probably what account for his ability to rise above that (i.e. by making him care about things that are greater and more lasting, namely, ideals).

But that's just considering them outside of the parties they bring along with them, which adds a whole new dimension to the problem.

[Note: in retrospect, I think I may have too easily dismissed the relevance of religion. It might be that if Obama were Muslim, which he is not, then a predominantly Christian nation may want to take that into account, in that it would imply a different cultural framework than their own. However, the intent behind the Hillary team allegation was so obviously exploitative of anti-Muslim prejudices that it is still shameful on their part to have brought it up.]

*Meeting History* with Ted Sorensen and William Safire

So I actually went to a really cool event yesterday hosting former Presidential speechwriters Ted Sorensen and William Safire (for JFK and Nixon, respectively). The setting was quite cozy--we were all in the Marble Collegiate Church (29th and 5th in Manhattan), and Sorensen and Safire were seated on stage and answering questions from the audience one by one. (The downside was that they only took questions that had been prepared by members of Generation Engage. Argghh) Anyway, in spite of a) belonging to different parties, and b) having worked for opposing candidates, the two seemed to be fairly good friends, and their mutual pugnacity was enjoyable rather than discomforting (Sorensen joked at one point that his family was so used to referring to Safire as "Sweet Old Bill" that they had eventually resorted to just using the initials).

On the whole, I think the event was a success. Safire opened by talking about the key words that Presidents over the last three decades have used to describe the Union; when asked, he joked that the two words we were unlikely to encounter in the forthcoming State of the Union Address were "compromise" and "constitution". It was also interesting to witness the affection with which each of them--particularly Sorensen--described different lines their respective Presidents had once used (e.g. JFK's "We must remember that civility is not a sign of weakness"). Sorensen bewailed the decline of rhetoric since JFK (admittedly, a little boastful on his part), and talked about the way that speeches today had become a committee product and thus lost their charisma.

But while the upcoming State of the Union Address gave power and relevance to their statements (it was, after all, the subject of the event), it ultimately detracted from the presentation. This is partly the fault of the questions, which basically required them to go down the laundry list of what they thought the President would say about war, health care, education, service, immigration, taxes, and so on and so forth. This wasn't uninteresting, but it wasn't what these two personalities would have been most interesting to hear about.

I guess what most struck me about this event was the obvious intimacy and chumminess two former speechwriters could share based on their common vocation. Safire mentioned annual events in which former national speechwriters got together and would talk about their experiences and make toasts, regardless of partisan affiliations (I actually asked him more about this in person). I wonder if the reason why they felt like they had so much in common was because they had all been denied the spotlight for thoughts and ideas that were actually their own.

The truth is that I'm very conflicted in my feelings about speechwriters. I can agree--with Sorensen and others--that political rhetoric has declined over the last three decades, and that it is a shame. However, I can't get over my feeling that there's something deceptive about having other people write your speeches for you in the first place. Maybe that in itself is evidence of a decline in rhetoric--I'm quite sure, for example, that Lincoln did not hire speechwriters for himself. Of course, the practice is so institutionalized now that it sounds radical to propose jettisoning it. On the other hand, the public has always placed importance on Presidential speeches because of its belief that it can access the President's character through them. For example, there's something just very disillusioning about learning that the statement "Ask not what your country can do for you--ask what you can do for your country" belongs not to Kennedy, but to Sorensen.

Anyway, I'm glad I went, although I wish I could have spoken longer to them in person. They just kind of shuffled out when they were done and ironically did not even wait to hear the Address (!). But being in the same room as them felt like we were in contact with actual history in a cool way.

So props to Generation Engage for putting that on. Although they could have made sure to plant better questions. Oh, and the badges were in such poor taste...I mean, who is actually going to wear a badge that says "ENGAGED" on it?

Some Questions About Iraq

Basically Iraq is, I think for all of us, an all or nothing thing. Either we should pull out now and not let any more of our own troops die, or we should try our very best to make it work. Anything that is half-hearted or in between is not going to make much of a difference and furthermore will lead to more soldiers of ours dying. So the first question I have is: is 20,000 troops going to be enough to make it work? That's even less than the AEI's estimate of how many troops we would need (the American Enterprise Institute being the thinktank whose advice Bush heeded against almost everyone else), which was 35,000. According to the Economist, the counter-insurgency manual's own estimate of how many more troops we will need is something like 400,000. Which would probably require a draft of some sort--all eerily reminiscent of Vietnam.

The other concern I have is, what happens if Iraq devolves into civil war? One likely result is that it would pull in its surrounding neighbors. But the real question I have, leading aside for the moment the question of moral obligations to civilians in the region, is what would this mean for the West, and particularly the United States? Would it lead to more instability and more radicalism in the Middle East, and thereby promote further terrorist action against us? Or does the fact that the Sunni-Shia divide would rise to greater prominence mean that anti-Western sentiment would fade into the background?