Let's call the whole thing off.
Why say that Plato lied? That he was engaged in some devious deception? Maybe he was just wrong.
In reality the word "Fascist" refers to something other than a political party ~ instead, it refers to a behavior, and to a belief system underlying how rules should be imposed.
Because the term "Fascist" describes behavior and not political affiliation, it's fair to use it to describe the behavior of Democrats, Socialists, Communists and Shining Path! It can be applied to Royalists and traditional Moslems in non-democratic states.
We've pretty well "hijacked" the term here at FR to the degree that others outside the FR counter-conspiracy are beginning to adopt the term for the same purposes.
We probably need to work a little harder to nail down "teabagger", meaning "a winner", and I think the path to that salubrious eventually was shown with the expression provided by another Freeper yesterday ~ to wit: "Better a TEABAGGER than a TEABAGEE."
Objectivism is the antidote: Aristotelian epistemology is superior to the Platonic construction. Besides, Aristotle was a better drinking companion. And when Socrates offers to buy a round, take a pass: that hemlock is one nasty hangover.
There was not enough substance in this article to drawn any conclusions. Anyone that has studied Plato knows that he supported totalitarianism, even to the point of propagating the “noble lie.” I doubt that anyone today supports Plato or Aristotle’s views on the relationship of the individual to government.
Good stuff. The guy has a unique perspective on how all our current troubles started. Worth the time to study.
There's a great anecdote about Plato and Diogenes that (I believe) is from Plutarch's Lives...
Goes like this: One fine day, Diogenes was at the town square cleaning lentils to make himself a meal. Plato strolls up to Diogenes and says: "Diogenes, if you'd only learn to kowtow to kings, you wouldn't have to eat lentils." To which Diogenes immediately responds: "Plato, if only you'd learn to eat lentils, you wouldn't have to kowtow to kings."
Great stuff!
I wonder if they will still be blaming Bush in 2,400 years?
ping
Somewhere long forgotten I read Plato said a man should not drink wine before 18, drink wine 19 to 40 but do not get drunk, after 40 consume as much as you want.
Recently purchased a copy Atlas Shrugged. Can someone help me get started..I can’t get past Who is John Galt. It is a paperback and the print is very small.
Leo Strauss: May I ask you to let me know sometime what you think of Mr. Popper. He gave a lecture here, on the task of socioal philosophy, that was beneath contempt: it was the most washed-out, lifeless positivism trying to whistle in the dark, linked to a complete inability to think "rationally," although it passed itself off as "rationalism"--it was very bad. I cannot imagine reading, and yet it appears to be a professional duty to become familiar with his produtions. Could you say something to me about that--if you wish, I will keep it to myself.
Dear Mr. Strauss, The opportunity to speak a few deeply felt words about Karl Popper to a kindred soul is too golden to endure a long delay. This Popper has been for years, not exactly a stone against which one stumbles, but a troublesome pebble that I must continually nudge from the path, in that he is constantly pushed upon me by people who insist that his work on the "open society and its enemies" is one of the social science masterpieces of our times. This insistence persuaded me to read the work even though I would otherwise not have touched it. You are quite right to say that it is a vocational duty to make ourselves familiar with the ideas of such a work when they lie in our field; I would hold out against this duty the other vocational duty, not to write and to publish such a work. In that Popper violated this elementary vocational duty and stole several hours of my lifetime, which I devoted in fulfilling my vocational duty, I feel completely justified in saying without reservation that this book is impudent, dilettantish crap. Every single sentence is a scandal, but it is still possible to lift out a few main annoyances.
1. The expressions "closed [society]" and "open society" are taken from Bergson's Deux Sources. Without explaining the difficulties that induced Bergson to create these concepts, Popper takes the terms because they sound good to him[he] comments in passing that in Bergson they had a "religious" meaning, but that he will use the concept of the open society closer to Graham Walas's "great society" or that of Walter Lippmann. Perhaps I am oversensitive about such things, but I do not believe that respectable philosophers such as Bergson develop their concepts for the sole purpose that the coffeehouse scum might have something to botch. There also arises the relevant problem: if Bergson's theory of open society is philosphically and historically tenable (which I in fact believe), then Popper's idea of the open society is ideological rubbish . . .
2. The impertinent disregard for the achievements in his particular problem area, which makes itself evident with respect to Bergson, runs through the whole work. When one reads the deliberations on Plato or Hegel, one has the impression that Popper is quite unfamiliar with the literature on the subject--even though he occasionally cites an author. In some cases, as for example Hegel, I would believe that he has never seen a work like Rosenzweig's Hegel and the State. In other cases, where he cites works without appearing to have perceived their contents, another factor is added:
3. Popper is philosophically so uncultured, so fully a primitive ideological brawler, that he is not able even approximately to reproduce correctly the contents of one page of Plato. Reading is of no use to him; he is too lacking in knowledge to understand what the author says. Through this emerge terrible things, as when he translates Hegel's "Germanic world" as "German world" and draws conclusions form this mistranslation regarding Hegel's German nationalist propaganda.
. . . Briefly and in sum: Popper's book is a scandal without extenuating circumstances; in its intellectual attitude it is the typical product of a failed intellectual; spiritually one would have to use expressions like rascally, impertinent, loutish; in terms of technical competence, as a piece in the history of thought, it is dilettantish, and as a result is worthless.
It would not be suitable to show this letter to the unqualified. Where it concerns its factual contents, I would see it as a violation of the vocational duty you identified, to support this scandal through silence.
If you keep the container properly sealed, Plato will stay good for years. I especially like the red and yellow Plato.