The Dark Side of Enlightenment
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Libertarianism, Culture, and Personal Predispositions
Undergraduate Journal of Psychology 22 Libertarianism, Culture, and Personal Predispositions Ida Hepsø, Scarlet Hernandez, Shir Offsey, & Katherine White Kennesaw State University Abstract The United States has exhibited two potentially connected trends – increasing individualism and increasing interest in libertarian ideology. Previous research on libertarian ideology found higher levels of individualism among libertarians, and cross-cultural research has tied greater individualism to making dispositional attributions and lower altruistic tendencies. Given this, we expected to observe positive correlations between the following variables in the present research: individualism and endorsement of libertarianism, individualism and dispositional attributions, and endorsement of libertarianism and dispositional attributions. We also expected to observe negative correlations between libertarianism and altruism, dispositional attributions and altruism, and individualism and altruism. Survey results from 252 participants confirmed a positive correlation between individualism and libertarianism, a marginally significant positive correlation between libertarianism and dispositional attributions, and a negative correlation between individualism and altruism. These results confirm the connection between libertarianism and individualism observed in previous research and present several intriguing questions for future research on libertarian ideology. Key Words: Libertarianism, individualism, altruism, attributions individualistic, made apparent -
Diogenes Laertius, Vitae Philosophorum, Book Five
Binghamton University The Open Repository @ Binghamton (The ORB) The Society for Ancient Greek Philosophy Newsletter 12-1986 The Lives of the Peripatetics: Diogenes Laertius, Vitae Philosophorum, Book Five Michael Sollenberger Mount St. Mary's University, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://orb.binghamton.edu/sagp Part of the Ancient History, Greek and Roman through Late Antiquity Commons, Ancient Philosophy Commons, and the History of Philosophy Commons Recommended Citation Sollenberger, Michael, "The Lives of the Peripatetics: Diogenes Laertius, Vitae Philosophorum, Book Five" (1986). The Society for Ancient Greek Philosophy Newsletter. 129. https://orb.binghamton.edu/sagp/129 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by The Open Repository @ Binghamton (The ORB). It has been accepted for inclusion in The Society for Ancient Greek Philosophy Newsletter by an authorized administrator of The Open Repository @ Binghamton (The ORB). For more information, please contact [email protected]. f\îc|*zx,e| lîâ& The Lives of the Peripatetics: Diogenes Laertius, Vitae Philosoohorum Book Five The biographies of six early Peripatetic philosophers are con tained in the fifth book of Diogenes Laertius* Vitae philosoohorum: the lives of the first four heads of the sect - Aristotle, Theophras tus, Strato, and Lyco - and those of two outstanding members of the school - Demetrius of Phalerum and Heraclides of Pontus, For the history of two rival schools, the Academy and the Stoa, we are for tunate in having not only Diogenes' versions in 3ooks Four and Seven, but also the Index Academicorum and the Index Stoicorum preserved among the papyri from Herculaneum, But for the Peripatos there-is no such second source. -
Self-Reliance by Ralph Waldo Emerson in His Essay
Self-Reliance by Ralph Waldo Emerson In his essay “Self-Reliance,” Emerson begins with a definition of genius, a quality which he says he recently encountered in a poem written by an eminent painter. Genius is to “believe your own thought, to believe that what is true for you in your private heart is true for all men.” Moses, Plato, and Milton had this quality of disregarding tradition and speaking their own thoughts, but most people dismiss these thoughts, only to recognize them later in works of acknowledged genius. At some point, every individual realizes that “imitation is suicide.” One’s own powers of perception and creativity are the most important gifts, and one can only be happy by putting one’s heart into the work at hand. Great individuals have always accepted their position in the age in which they lived and trusted their own ability to make the best of it. Children, and even animals, also have this enviable power of certitude in their undivided minds. Society requires conformity from its citizens, but to be a self-reliant individual is to be a nonconformist. “Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind.” Concepts such as good and evil, with which many people are accustomed to label their thoughts, are meaningless so long as people are true to themselves. Most people are swayed by irrelevant matters, such as how their conduct appears to others. The appearance of virtue is often a penance, which people perform because they think it makes them fit to live in the world, not because it expresses their true natures. -
THE PHILOSOPHES Voltaire Montesquieu Rousseau
THE PHILOSOPHES Voltaire Montesquieu Rousseau Tuesday, January 21, 2014 Philosophes - public intellectuals dedicated to solving the problems of the World http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxG_d94F3Dg http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Xd_zkMEgkI Tuesday, January 21, 2014 Philosophes - public intellectuals dedicated to solving the problems of the World - wrote for a broad, educated public audience http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxG_d94F3Dg http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Xd_zkMEgkI Tuesday, January 21, 2014 Philosophes - public intellectuals dedicated to solving the problems of the World - wrote for a broad, educated public audience - fought to eradicate bigotry, religious fanaticism, superstition http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxG_d94F3Dg http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Xd_zkMEgkI Tuesday, January 21, 2014 Philosophes - public intellectuals dedicated to solving the problems of the World - wrote for a broad, educated public audience - fought to eradicate bigotry, religious fanaticism, superstition - promoted “Natural Rights” - intellectual freedom, freedom of the press and religion, human progress http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxG_d94F3Dg http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Xd_zkMEgkI Tuesday, January 21, 2014 Philosophes - public intellectuals dedicated to solving the problems of the World - wrote for a broad, educated public audience - fought to eradicate bigotry, religious fanaticism, superstition - promoted “Natural Rights” - intellectual freedom, freedom of the press and religion, human progress - spread their ideas through books, essays, letters pamphlets http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxG_d94F3Dg http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Xd_zkMEgkI Tuesday, January 21, 2014 PHILOSOPHES Tuesday, January 21, 2014 PHILOSOPHES - Paris was headquarters Tuesday, January 21, 2014 PHILOSOPHES - Paris was headquarters Tuesday, January 21, 2014 PHILOSOPHES - Paris was headquarters - they met in salons and coffee houses to share ideas Tuesday, January 21, 2014 PHILOSOPHES - Paris was headquarters - they met in salons and coffee houses to share ideas -Mme. -
Sovereignty of the Living Individual: Emerson and James on Politics and Religion
religions Article Sovereignty of the Living Individual: Emerson and James on Politics and Religion Stephen S. Bush Department of Religious Studies, Brown University, 59 George Street, Providence, RI 02912, USA; [email protected] Received: 20 July 2017; Accepted: 20 August 2017; Published: 25 August 2017 Abstract: William James and Ralph Waldo Emerson are both committed individualists. However, in what do their individualisms consist and to what degree do they resemble each other? This essay demonstrates that James’s individualism is strikingly similar to Emerson’s. By taking James’s own understanding of Emerson’s philosophy as a touchstone, I argue that both see individualism to consist principally in self-reliance, receptivity, and vocation. Putting these two figures’ understandings of individualism in comparison illuminates under-appreciated aspects of each figure, for example, the political implications of their individualism, the way that their religious individuality is politically engaged, and the importance of exemplarity to the politics and ethics of both of them. Keywords: Ralph Waldo Emerson; William James; transcendentalism; individualism; religious experience 1. Emersonian Individuality, According to James William James had Ralph Waldo Emerson in his bones.1 He consumed the words of the Concord sage, practically from birth. Emerson was a family friend who visited the infant James to bless him. James’s father read Emerson’s essays out loud to him and the rest of the family, and James himself worked carefully through Emerson’s corpus in the 1870’s and then again around 1903, when he gave a speech on Emerson (Carpenter 1939, p. 41; James 1982, p. 241). -
Some Worries About the Coherence of Left-Libertarianism Mathias Risse
John F. Kennedy School of Government Harvard University Faculty Research Working Papers Series Can There be “Libertarianism without Inequality”? Some Worries About the Coherence of Left-Libertarianism Mathias Risse Nov 2003 RWP03-044 The views expressed in the KSG Faculty Research Working Paper Series are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect those of the John F. Kennedy School of Government or Harvard University. All works posted here are owned and copyrighted by the author(s). Papers may be downloaded for personal use only. Can There be “Libertarianism without Inequality”? Some Worries About the Coherence of Left-Libertarianism1 Mathias Risse John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University October 25, 2003 1. Left-libertarianism is not a new star on the sky of political philosophy, but it was through the recent publication of Peter Vallentyne and Hillel Steiner’s anthologies that it became clearly visible as a contemporary movement with distinct historical roots. “Left- libertarian theories of justice,” says Vallentyne, “hold that agents are full self-owners and that natural resources are owned in some egalitarian manner. Unlike most versions of egalitarianism, left-libertarianism endorses full self-ownership, and thus places specific limits on what others may do to one’s person without one’s permission. Unlike right- libertarianism, it holds that natural resources may be privately appropriated only with the permission of, or with a significant payment to, the members of society. Like right- libertarianism, left-libertarianism holds that the basic rights of individuals are ownership rights. Left-libertarianism is promising because it coherently underwrites both some demands of material equality and some limits on the permissible means of promoting this equality” (Vallentyne and Steiner (2000a), p 1; emphasis added). -
Cities Within the City: Doityourself Urbanism and the Right to the City
bs_bs_banner Volume 37.3 May 2013 941–56 International Journal of Urban and Regional Research DOI:10.1111/1468-2427.12053 Cities within the City: Do-It-Yourself Urbanism and the Right to the City KURT IVESON Abstract In many cities around the world we are presently witnessing the growth of, and interest in, a range of micro-spatial urban practices that are reshaping urban spaces. These practices include actions such as: guerrilla and community gardening; housing and retail cooperatives; flash mobbing and other shock tactics; social economies and bartering schemes; ‘empty spaces’ movements to occupy abandoned buildings for a range of purposes; subcultural practices like graffiti/street art, skateboarding and parkour; and more. This article asks: to what extent do such practices constitute a new form of urban politics that might give birth to a more just and democratic city? In answering this question, the article considers these so-called ‘do-it-yourself urbanisms’ from the perspective of the ‘right to the city’. After critically assessing that concept, the article argues that in order for do-it-yourself urbanist practices to generate a wider politics of the city through the appropriation of urban space, they also need to assert new forms of authority in the city based on the equality of urban inhabitants. This claim is illustrated through an analysis of the do-it-yourself practices of Sydney-based activist collective BUGA UP and the New York and Madrid Street Advertising Takeovers. Introduction In many cities around the world we are presently witnessing the growth of, and interest in, a range of micro-spatial urban practices that are reshaping urban spaces. -
Sade and Sensibility.Cwk
1. (c) 2011 by Sean M. Quinlan. Draft. Please do not quote, cite, summarize, or otherwise reproduce without permission of the author. SHOCKED SENSIBILITY: WILL, NERVES AND ALTERED STATES IN SADE’S L’HISTOIRE DE JULIETTE by Sean M. Quinlan, University of Idaho From the opening pages of the Marquis de Sade’s L’His- toire de Juliette, a book which Maurice Blanchot has called the most scandalous ever written,1 readers are presented with repeated references to the relation between sensibility, the nerves and the human will. Sade’s characters are constantly asserting that they can unlock the secrets of physical and mental bliss by controlling their nervous sensibility and then pushing it into a transcendent realm of experience. In this place anything was possible. But before opening this door, libertines must first grasp the real key: ‘the shock imparted by criminal impressions to the nervous system’.2 By means of this ‘indispensable shock’, libertines could 1 Maurice Blanchot, Lautréamont et Sade (Paris: Union générale d'édi- tions, 1967). 2 Donatien-Alphonse-François de Sade, Juliette, trans. Austryn Wainhouse (New York: Grove, 1968), p. 111. 2. send ‘voluptuous vibrations’ through their nervous systems and thus ignite their ‘lubricious mood’.3 One character, named Noirceuil, testifies: ‘How my senses are brought alive, how my organs bestir themselves! ... ’tis a new life surging in me, a new soul animates me; my mind is blended in pleas- ures, identifies with it’.4 Yet this nervous shock delivered more than carnal de- light. Rather, when -
De Sade's Theatrical Passions
06.puchner 4/19/05 2:28 PM Page 111 Martin Puchner Sade’s Theatrical Passions The Theater of the Revolution The Marquis de Sade entered theater history in 1964 when the Royal Shakespeare Company, under the direction of Peter Brook, presented a play by the unknown author Peter Weiss entitled, The Persecution and Assassination of Jean-Paul Marat as Performed by the Inmates of the Asylum of Charenton Under the Direction of the Marquis de Sade.1 Marat/Sade, as the play is usually called, became an extraordinary success story.2 By com- bining narrators with techniques developed in a multi-year workshop entitled “Theater of Cruelty,” Marat/Sade managed to link the two modernist visionaries of the theater whom everybody had considered to be irreconcilable opposites: Bertolt Brecht and Antonin Artaud. Marat/Sade not only fabricated a new revolutionary theater from the vestiges of modernism, it also coincided with a philosophical and cul- tural revision of the French revolution that had begun with Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer’s The Dialectics of Enlightenment (1944/69) and found a preliminary culmination in Michel Foucault’s History of Madness (1972). At the same time, the revival of Sade was fu- eled by the first complete publication of his work in French (1967) and by Roland Barthes’ landmark study, Sade Fourier Loyola (1971).3 Marat/Sade had thus hit a theatrical and intellectual nerve. Sade, however, belongs to theater history as more than just a char- acter in a play.Little is known about the historical Sade’s life-long pas- sion for the theater, about his work as a theater builder and manager, an actor and director. -
The Political Life of Edmund Burke
INTRODUCTION 1 Empire and Revolution Th is is a book about the vicissitudes of empire and revolution as confronted by one of the leading political intellects of the eighteenth century. Th e confrontation was complicated in a number of distinct ways. In the fi rst place the term “revolution” had a range of meanings. At its simplest it could denominate a change in the system of government. Yet it could also cover resistance to an established political order lead- ing to the creation of a new regime. Finally it could refer to the subversion of govern- ment along with the various liberties it was supposed to protect. Over the course of his life, Edmund Burke defended revolution in the fi rst two senses although he ardently set himself against the third. But while he supported the rights of legitimate rebellion, he also consistently upheld the authority of empire. However, the picture here was again a complex one. Burke cherished the rights of British imperial sover- eignty, yet he vehemently opposed the standing policies of the Empire. Underlying this apparent ambivalence was a commitment to the rights of conquest accompanied by a repudiation of the “spirit of conquest.” Th is referred to the attitude of usur- pation that Burke believed had characterised European governments in the gothic past. Although governments of the kind had their origins in expropriation, they had gradually accommodated the “spirit of liberty.” Nonetheless, modern liberty for Burke was a precarious achievement. It was capable of relapsing into the spirit of domination, not least in its interactions with the extra- European world. -
The Philosophes (The Enlightenment
GS/World History, Jan 7 •Entry Task: On a piece of paper, please make a chart like the one on the board. Then read, “Coffeehouse Culture” •Announcements: • We are going to briefly look at your song lyrics (with your permission) after each description. If you’d rather perform, let me know • Parent/Guardian Survey PHI LOSOPHE ENLI GHTENMENT PHI LOSOPHER Madame Goffrin’s SALON – a gathering, focused on conversation “ Dare to know! Have courage to use your own reason!” I mmanuel K ant (1784 ) WHO’ S WHO of t he E nl i ght enment PRECURSORS T homas H obbes: L eviathan PRECURSORS (F ranci s B acon), N ewt on and L ocke NEWTON R at i onal V i ew of the Universe L OCK E R el i gi ous T ol erat i on L OCK E R at i onal V i ew of G over nment NATURAL RI GHTS Life L i ber t y P r oper t y THE PHI LOSOPHES FRA N CE PRUSSI A USA Vol t ai r e K ant Jef f er son D i der ot SCOTL A N D F r ankl i n M ont esqui eu Pai ne R ousseau Smi t h WOM EN’ S RI GHTS •From England •Wrote “The Vindication of the Rights of Woman” in 1792 VOLTAI RE F rench P hi l osophe, A ut hor, & P l aywri ght NOTABLE WORKS • L etters on England • Philosophical D ictionary • E l ement s of N ewt on’ s Philosophy V oltaire writing hi s book on N ewton’s phi l osophy W ho i s the woma n? CHÂTELET F rench M athemati ci an, P hysi ci st, and A uthor “a great man whose onl y f aul t was being a woman.” -- V ol t ai re A DV OCATE of R el i gi ous T ol erat i on CRITIC of Christianity (“ Reveal ed” Rel i gi on) N atural Religion DI DEROT F rench A uthor and Editor T he E ncyclopédi e was a col l abor at i ve ef f or t t o compi l e and di st r i but e a wi de var i et y of knowl edge f r om an “ enl i ght ened” per spect i ve. -
Montesquieu on the History and Geography of Political Liberty
Montesquieu on the History and Geography of Political Liberty Author: Rebecca Clark Persistent link: http://hdl.handle.net/2345/bc-ir:103616 This work is posted on eScholarship@BC, Boston College University Libraries. Boston College Electronic Thesis or Dissertation, 2012 Copyright is held by the author, with all rights reserved, unless otherwise noted. Boston College Graduate School of Arts & Sciences Department of Political Science MONTESQUIEU ON THE HISTORY AND GEOGRAPHY OF POLITICAL LIBERTY A dissertation by REBECCA RUDMAN CLARK submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy December 2012 © Copyright by REBECCA RUDMAN CLARK 2012 Abstract Montesquieu on the History and Geography of Political Liberty Rebecca R. Clark Dissertation Advisor: Christopher Kelly Montesquieu famously presents climate and terrain as enabling servitude in hot, fertile climes and on the exposed steppes of central Asia. He also traces England’s exemplary constitution, with its balanced constitution, independent judiciary, and gentle criminal practices, to the unique conditions of early medieval northern Europe. The English “found” their government “in the forests” of Germany. There, the marginal, variegated terrain favored the dispersion of political power, and a pastoral way of life until well into the Middle Ages. In pursuing a primitive honor unrelated to political liberty as such, the barbaric Franks accidentally established the rudiments of the most “well-tempered” government. His turn to these causes accidental to human purposes in Parts 3-6 begins with his analysis of the problem of unintended consequences in the history of political reform in Parts 1-2. While the idea of balancing political powers in order to prevent any one individual or group from dominating the rest has ancient roots, he shows that it has taken many centuries to understand just what needs to be balanced, and to learn to balance against one threat without inviting another.