[lit-ideas] Re: Patrick and the Snakes: the logic of falsification [errata]
- From: Donal McEvoy <donalmcevoyuk@xxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" <lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sat, 23 Mar 2013 11:57:23 +0000 (GMT)
________________________________
From: Omar Kusturica <omarkusto@xxxxxxxxx>
>I strongly suggest that you read Kaufmann's essay on Popper's treatment of
>Hegel. Besides an almost certainly better informed reading of Hegel, we get a
>useful reminder there that there was much more to the German culture of the
>period than Kant and Hegel, and many other possible influences that might have
>encouraged the emergence of Nazism.>
Thank you for this, Omar. Kaufmann's paper was first made known to me [afair]
almost thirty years ago by a student at Queen's University, Belfast. I read it
then and have read it since. My conclusion [afair] was that Kaufmann, though he
makes many worthwhile points, does not really get to the fundamentals of
Popper's attack but equivocates on the actual meaning of Hegel's doctrines -
which Popper locates unequivocally within a framework of what P calls 'moral
positivism'.
Btw, when I was still at school I wrote to Popper having come acrossThe Open
Society in my school's library [it had 'Marx' in the title and Marx was one of
the thinkers we studied in 'Politics']: and my letter criticised Popper's
treatment of Marx among other things. He replied, and a gist of his reply was
that my specific criticism might be answered and he might have written more to
me by way of an answer but the answer relies on the "over-optimistic"
assumption that all two volumes of The Open Society had been read and digested.
At the time this seemed somewhat unsatisfactory, even evasive: but I think I
understand now what Popper meant and what he meant also applies, I later
thought, to the kind of paper Kaufmann has written.
But will take another look.
Best,
Donal
Snowy Shropshire
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