[lit-ideas] Re: Why Philosophy. (Was: On Nip Thievery)
- From: "Lawrence Helm" <lawrencehelm@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: <lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Mon, 9 Jun 2008 18:08:37 -0700
Walter writes, "(No, in a Faculty of Education, be it in Canada, the US, or
some part of the UK, not everyone is from the same planet. Many hail from
"California." That's not necessarily a sublunary, geographical
identification, Lawrence. Of course, what Faculties of Education look like
in Indonesia is one hell of an intriguing question.)"
That strikes me a little like looking at Boeing and pretending it's a
mom-and-pop operation. I learned years ago that we Californians were
different. I was the only one in my boot-camp platoon from Californian and
just about everyone of my fellow Marines told me, "there are only two things
that come from California, Queers and hot rods, and I don't see no wheels on
you." What a misconception that was. Everyone ultimately derives
everything from California. You know how areas like China and the Middle
East hate American culture? Well all that came from California. It starts
in California, moves to the rest of the country and from there it moves out
into the world.
Canadians especially scoff, but they have good reason. In the world
rankings of economies, California rated number 8, and Canada rated number 9
in 1991. http://www.lao.ca.gov/1995/010195_calguide/cgep1.html
By 2005 Canada dropped behind Spain, but California remained number 8:
http://www.ccsce.com/pdf/Numbers_CA_Rank.pdf
Those figures aren't unchallenged, I admit. The CIA rated us tenth in 2005,
placing Russia and India above us. I don't know about that, but even the
CIA has us two ahead of Canada.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_California
When I was getting ready to retire, I considered moving to Arizona but was
warned by several people whom I had assumed were my friends, "never move
away from California, because if you do, you'll never be able to afford to
move back." Well, that veiled threat was enough to whip me back into line,
I can assure you of that.
As to whether California has a unique geographical location, well yes it
does. There are vast empty regions on either side of us. Maybe some of you
live in those regions. Had California been pugnacious like Texas it could
have become and sustained itself as an independent nation, but its goals are
more insidious - wait strike that word . . . "indirect." We want to
influence the world with our culture. We want to make everyone like us.
When we see pictures of teenagers in Tokyo, India or France dancing
worshipfully in front of a California-type music, or sitting reverently in
front of a Hollywood movie, we whisper to each other, "it's working."
Andreas and I only pretend to disagree with each other so no one will notice
that we are slowly taking over the world. Well, that's not completely true,
because after we take over the world we are going to have to see whether the
capital remains in Sacramento or moves to its rightful place in Los Angeles;
so it isn't as though Andreas and I are ever going to be real close. . .
. . . I'm not really writing this, am I Franz? We mustn't let the secret
out . . no one must know . . . where did you put my medication, you Austrian
fiend?
Lawre . . .
-----Original Message-----
From: lit-ideas-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:lit-ideas-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx]
On Behalf Of wokshevs@xxxxxx
Sent: Monday, June 09, 2008 12:55 PM
To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx; John McCreery
Cc: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [lit-ideas] Re: Why Philosophy. (Was: On Nip Thievery)
Please see specific replies below -------------------->
Quoting John McCreery <john.mccreery@xxxxxxxxx>:
> On Sun, Jun 8, 2008 at 5:33 AM, Robert Paul <rpaul@xxxxxxxx> wrote:
> > Philosophy does not flourish on lit-ideas, as it once did on Phil-Lit.
Try
> > having a philosophical discussion (a discussion about some philosophical
> > problem), and before long, someone will intercede with the discussion
> > breaker that Aristotle was full of beans and has nothing to say to the
> > 'modern' mind; or that Aristotle thought (as did Frege, later, with a
> > vengeance) that it was possible for certain concepts to have sharp
> > boundaries, and that recent sociology (or Wittgenstein, or Eleanor
Rosch)
> > have all shown how silly this is.
> >
> > Any attempt (this has been my experience) to examine an issue carefully
> and
> > in detail is soon met with hoots and jeers, barrages of overripe
tomatoes,
> > and charges of super-hyper-masturbatory-latte-drinking intellectualism.
> So,
> > I scarcely bother any longer-for my own peace of mind I scarcely bother.
> > Once, for example, it was possible to discuss specific passages from the
> > Tractatus, with law professors at Northwestern, Eric Dean, and others;
> Hume
> > (and sometimes Popper) with Donal; Kant with Walter and Phil;
contemporary
> > British philosophy with JL (and so on, I want to say, in order to
disguise
> > my failing memory).
> > As far as I can see we have lost the ability and the collegial
politeness
> > to tolerate such discussions.
------------------> To which John McC replies:
> I read these paragraphs, and I feel a great sadness, tinged with not a
> little guilt, since I have from time to time been the source of one of
those
> discussion breakers.
--------------> Well, it's certainly a matter of degree, but I've never
chided
anybody for morally worthy hurling of tomatoes or morally worthy practices
of
masturbation. (Tomatoes do help to clear the sinuses, after all.)
I am not at all averse to having my philosophical views challenged or even
purportedly trashed, so long as I have some sense of the warrant or evidence
grounding the challenge or trashing. My view of philosophy as a and, the
sole,
transcendental form of inquiry available to us
does tend to put me at the receiving end of hoots, howls and shots to the
mid-rift. But much of my teaching and work takes place in a Faculty of
Education, so I have been well habituated to and innured against the slings
and
arrows of outrageous criticism of the value and point of
philosophical/transcendental analysis.
Life is, comparatively, much easier, whenever I walk down to the
philosophy department where everyone basically is from the same planet,
despite
widely ranging areas of interest and competence. (No, in a Faculty of
Education,
be it in Canada, the US, or some part of the UK, not everyone is from the
same
planet. Many hail from "California." That's not necessarily a sublunary,
geographical identification, Lawrence. Of course, what Faculties of
Education
look like in Indonesia is one hell of an intriguing question.)
> My own struggles with philosophy brought me to
> anthropology, the sociology of knowledge, the history of science and other
> disciplines in which, having decided in advance that ideas have no
> particular merit in and of themselves, the problem is to understand why,
> then, do people cling to them, argue for and against them, even fight wars
> over them.
--------------> Oy! And you live to tell this tale??! You must have been the
victim of the likes of Berger and Luckmann, Thomas Kuhn, Peter Winch (who I
personally believe was a genius, if I may be so arrogant as to say, but who
still got it almost all wrong), Latour & Woolgar - maybe even, dare we
utter
his name ? ....... Nietzsche? Surely not Richard Rorty, may the saints
preserve
us.
> The arc of my understanding has, however, led me back to
> philosophy, to closer examination of the ideas themselves and the
arguments
> advanced for and against them.
------------> Praise be the Lord! (I utter this metaphorically, of course.)
> For the great sin of those fields that
> attracted my attention after what was, after all, only a cursory,
> undergraduate introduction to philosophy, is to attempt to explain away,
not
> the great ideas themselves, but mere abbreviations, if not distortions, of
> them.
------------> You mean there's something beyond undergrad philosophy that is
still credibly "philosophy."?
>The anthropologist in me insists that before I do that I should listen
> more carefully to what philosophers have to say, if I am ever in regard to
> philosophy, to achieve the goal spelled out by Clifford Geertz in his
essay
> on "The Concept of Culture and the Concept of Man." I refer to that point,
> in the opening paragraph, where, chiding Levi-Strauss, he suggests that
our
> aim is not to substitute simple models for complex realities but to build
> complex models that illuminate those realities while retaining the clarity
> that simple models appear to offer. Now I chide myself for blundering in
> with challenges instead of reserving judgment and listening more
carefully.
----------> I never thought of L-S as providing simple models of anything.
But
I've never read anything by Geertz so I'm unclear as to the context of the
remarks.
Walter O.
MUN
>
> John
>
> --
> John McCreery
> The Word Works, Ltd., Yokohama, JAPAN
> Tel. +81-45-314-9324
> http://www.wordworks.jp/
>
Other related posts:
