Freedom In History

[Didymos Thomas]

From what source(s) do you draw the conclusion that the Greeks "would not understand the philosophy of history"? I imagine your source is not Herodotus.

But that is a quibble.

By what standard can you judge a race of man to be a success or failure? You mention impact upon history: but such an evaluation necessarily discriminates against those "races" who have not been so well documented or studied in the west as, for example, are the Germans. To judge whole races of men based on a collection of history books is to invite error and confusion - it necessitates an inherent bias in favor of those "races" most studied by the books' authors'.

And I cannot imagine why historical note somehow denotes "success and triumph". Sodom and Gomorrah have earned a solid place in the mind of man, but their "race" would wrongly be called a "success and triumph".

To say that "success and triumph transcend time" is to say the thing which is not. Time will transcend all apparent success and triumph, reducing all of these gains to dust. What recorder of our species will outlive the dust?

[Pythagorean]

Thomas, you are speaking from a specifice tradition. The modern liberal one. I don't share that tradition, I am not affiliated with the Democrats and political correct speech. There's where the difference lies. That's why you disagree. There is no room for substantive debate with you. If I were to try to debate you no doubt you would attempt to silence me. Been there, done that.

[Didymos Thomas]

Originally Posted by Pythagorean

Thomas, you are speaking from a specifice tradition.

No - I am asking what sources lead you to believe that the ancient Greeks could not appreciate the philosophy of history as you define the subject. I am asking how you can compare civilizations about which you know varying degrees, about which varying degrees of western scholarship has been done. And I am also asking how it is possible for historical datum to transcend time given the fact that time transcends man's ability to keep such records.

I am asking specific questions. I am not (yet) speaking from a specific tradition.

Originally Posted by Pythagorean

The modern liberal one.

Affectionately referring to Old Testament stories is modern liberal? Bill Maher is not going to like that news.

Originally Posted by Pythagorean

I don't share that tradition, I am not affiliated with the Democrats and political correct speech.

Cool. I'm not a Democrat, either, nor do I advocate the censorship of speech (except in public safety matters like yelling fire in a crowded auditorium). I bet we have a lot in common.

Originally Posted by Pythagorean

There's where the difference lies. That's why you disagree. There is no room for substantive debate with you.

Our differences lie in, our disagreements are caused by, and substantive debate is made impossible because we are both not members of the Democratic party and because neither of us advocate the censorship of speech? I guess I'll have to take your word for it.

Originally Posted by Pythagorean

If I were to try to debate you no doubt you would attempt to silence me.

I'm no mobster and you're no star witness. No cause for concern, friend.

[Pythagorean]

Originally Posted by Didymos Thomas

From what source(s) do you draw the conclusion that the Greeks "would not understand the philosophy of history"? I imagine your source is not Herodotus.

But that is a quibble.

Well, in this post you say it is a quibble, meaning, not important enough to discuss I take it. But however, in your next post you come out and ask the question as if it were not a quibble. So is this a random thing or what?

By what standard can you judge a race of man to be a success or failure?

The famous ones are successes and the majority of the rest are failures. However, I originally say this in a specific context which is being ignored here.

You mention impact upon history: but such an evaluation necessarily discriminates against those "races" who have not been so well documented or studied in the west as, for example, are the Germans.

There is no discrimination -on my part, at least. I am going under the assumption that the great civilizations such as the Roman and the Ancient Greek have been singled out for a reason. You are making something that is rather simple and obvious seem complex or that I have some type of discriminatory agenda and that is wrong. It also changes the subject matter of the thread.

To judge whole races of men based on a collection of history books is to invite error and confusion - it necessitates an inherent bias in favor of those "races" most studied by the books' authors'.

I don't think further study will resolve the problem that you are experiencing with my posts. Are you suggesting we "judge whole races of men" without using history books? Again, you are making something that is a banal set of ordinary facts into something that is problematic.

And I cannot imagine why historical note somehow denotes "success and triumph". Sodom and Gomorrah have earned a solid place in the mind of man, but their "race" would wrongly be called a "success and triumph".

I think it is the ancient Isrealites who are the noteworthy bunch when it comes to the old testament. I have not denied the Jews greatness and I have not attempted to bestow greatness on Sodom and her sister. However, greatness does not imply moral uprightness either. It is your opinion that Sodom and Ghomorah are more infamous than famous. I could easily imagine an antagonist who could reasonably argue the opposite of what you say is moral.

To say that "success and triumph transcend time" is to say the thing which is not. Time will transcend all apparent success and triumph, reducing all of these gains to dust. What recorder of our species will outlive the dust?

Great deeds and great men are eternal objects and object lessons, in my opinion. That's why historians write about them - they know how to find the important ones.

[Fido]

So; do you see in this something other than the anti rationalism for which Nietzsche is often remarked upon???

At least Freud was correct in saying while the irrational holds sway in our lives that the rational voice will be heard...

I would say we are hardly rational, but our non rational goals we reach by way of reason, so we are clearly able to be rational for great periods of time... But until we know what is good for us, truly good, moral and virtuous we are wrong to suggest reason, because reason toward a bad end is no virtue... First determine upon the goal..

[Pythagorean]

Originally Posted by Fido

So; do you see in this something other than the anti rationalism for which Nietzsche is often remarked upon???


At least Freud was correct in saying while the irrational holds sway in our lives that the rational voice will be heard...



I would say we are hardly rational, but our non rational goals we reach by way of reason, so we are clearly able to be rational for great periods of time... But until we know what is good for us, truly good, moral and virtuous we are wrong to suggest reason, because reason toward a bad end is no virtue... First determine upon the goal..

Let me attempt to describe what I think Nietzsche is saying regarding reason and morality.

I believe he is saying that man is an animal. Let me repeat, man is an animal. Man is not some form of Euclidian object who is somehow mysteriously connected to some supernatural force on high. (Also, Jesus Christ was, according to Nietzsche's thinking, not the supernatural son of god.) So man is fundamentally irrational.



So all of the goals or ends that men seek are goals and ends whose purpose is for the benefit or for the use of the irrational animal man. Things like sex and eating, appetite and human will, reveal to the 'reasonable' observer what man is: i.e. an irrational animal. An animal who is not supported (or who is barely supported) by any type of cosmic deity.


Nature has no ulterior motive. Nature is blind force and there is no escaping it. Nature does not conceal some kind of rational purpose within it.



God, reason, and morality are, therefore, qualities or objects or things that serve the irrational purpose because they serve an animal i.e. man. Reason and morality are not supernatural bridges.

Man can develop his reason to the highest degree possible and he can develop a morality which is extremely "good". But these things will not lead to a supernatural heaven. Nietzsche believes that man is fooling himself with his morality and his reason. Man is thus blinding himself to his true nature. Reason is only for the benefit of the animal man, morality is only a regulatory custom handed down from mythological origins (such as the belief that the man Jesus Christ was a god).

--

[Fido]

How does one go about proving man is irrational with reason??? If you use reason you must be reasonable...Apart from what Nietzsche had to say on the subject, clearly we are both, motivated by desires, achieving our desires by reason... As far as Jesus being human... Well sure, but Jesus is not the problem... We simply have no choice given our information and our ignorance, but to conceive of ourselves spiritually... This we do, and this we as humans may always have done... We do as much with rocks, or atoms...It is not the thing we conceive, but the spirit of the thing...We have life, soul, or as the Greeks said: animus...Other spiritual conceptions support this life, like justice, or freedom, or rights, and they are like ourselves, moral forms...

Now; I agree that no heaven awaits us; but that again is not the problem... Heaven is a problem, because it springs from this metaphysical conception of mankind... That is not what I am saying... I am saying we conceive of ourselves and all things spiritually... Only some things have being and meaning, and some only have meaning...So if we say reason is a virtue, which no one has ever proved, then the opposite must be true of emotion, that it is a vice... I would say that we can only seldom reason what is good, but know it as emotion, which is to say, Illogically...Here is where I tell you Nietzsche was all wrong...He was still associating animal with bad, and brutal...He could not escape his own morality...He had his time with prostitutes; and do you think he did not judge himself at time, and rebel against that judgement???If we cannot reason out our emotions, and if we canot justify all that we feel; that does not mean they are bad or good...Nietzsche was very good at denying what was humane about people... Where was Mrs. Overman, or little baby overman??? Is love unnatural???Is it rational???His overman was more reasonable than real...As much as he ran down Socrates, he suffered from the same blindness... Both were cut off from natural realtionships, and neither could judge their own society... But morality has nothing to do with knowledge, or mythology... We learn morality before we learn consciously, when we learn to love our mothers... Community is morality... Nature, nation, naive, nascent all come frrom natal, our common mother, our true social unity...No one makes morality, and the reason behind it cannot be systematized and taught...If you get it, you got it before you got anything else, and if you did not get it you will always be an odd duck like N, or like Socrates, or Caesar, or like Napoleon, or like any number of philosophers, or psycho killers, que est'ce que....If it is possible, then on faith we must accept that much of society has its own logic, and not because it was reasoned out before hand, but has simply worked out for the best -sort of logic... Nietzsche never seems more foolish than when trying to judge natural behavior as though it was art, and bad art at that... He had more knowledge than understanding, and not enough knowledge...

[Pythagorean]

Originally Posted by Fido

How does one go about proving man is irrational with reason??? If you use reason you must be reasonable...

The problem seems to lie in giving to reason a distorted and inexcusable amount of respect. It is the hierarchy or the forced ordering of the natural drives that occur within us that is the important matter. Reason must be something like the ordering and the satisfaction of these inner drives. Upon what basis do you explain your deification of reason? It is all too abstract and wispy, this power that you endow reason with. This is voodoo.

And one does not prove that man is irrational. One only sees, then thinks (whatever thinking may really be) and then one acts. Enough! Reason is not some light from a hidden god, reason is the workings which originate withing an organic being, a rather nasty and selfish being at that, i.e. man. And so reason itself, considering its origins, is equally filthy farty, disgusting and natural. You are inverting the natural perspective and putting airy and vaporous ideas before man, you are putting the cart before the horse. Because considering all of the claims of different peoples, it was man who came first and his gods came later on. In fact man continued even as his gods kept changing throughout history and region.

Apart from what Nietzsche had to say on the subject, clearly we are both, motivated by desires, achieving our desires by reason... As far as Jesus being human... Well sure, but Jesus is not the problem... We simply have no choice given our information and our ignorance, but to conceive of ourselves spiritually...

I don't believe the business man, for example would share your view. The more we see ourselves spiritually the greater our ignorance. It is not god who conquers nature and makes life tolerable for us, it is the work of science based not upon spiritual considerations but upon hard evidence.

This we do, and this we as humans may always have done... We do as much with rocks, or atoms...It is not the thing we conceive, but the spirit of the thing...

The problem of the nature of reality is important. I don't see god in the rocks I see natural forces that took so long and pressed so hard, I see a giant potentially crushing me like an ant, I see dark blind force.

In the book "Beyond Good and Evil" Nietzsche addresses the exact questions that you raise regarding the real nature of things. It is titled "On the Prejudices of Philosophers".

We have life, soul, or as the Greeks said: animus...Other spiritual conceptions support this life, like justice, or freedom, or rights, and they are like ourselves, moral forms...

I will say this, that it is practically impossible to teach a liberal the truth about morality. But try to think of other places and perhaps even other times than the ones you currently inhabit. How could there be some supra-human force called justice to a five year old girl who lives in the sewer in Brazil, for example (and who will not live to be very old either)?

And once you combine the liberal ideology with material comfort you have certainly prepared a whole people for slavery. For it will be in the name of justice and morality that they (the Americans) give up those same liberties. Aristocratic societies saw things differently. And one could study the ante-bellum American South to find such a different example.

Now; I agree that no heaven awaits us; but that again is not the problem... Heaven is a problem, because it springs from this metaphysical conception of mankind... That is not what I am saying... I am saying we conceive of ourselves and all things spiritually...

Nietzsche never says that there is no afterlife or even that there is no god in the generic sense.

Only some things have being and meaning, and some only have meaning...So if we say reason is a virtue, which no one has ever proved, then the opposite must be true of emotion, that it is a vice... I would say that we can only seldom reason what is good, but know it as emotion, which is to say, Illogically...Here is where I tell you Nietzsche was all wrong...He was still associating animal with bad, and brutal...He could not escape his own morality...He had his time with prostitutes; and do you think he did not judge himself at time, and rebel against that judgement???If we cannot reason out our emotions, and if we canot justify all that we feel; that does not mean they are bad or good...Nietzsche was very good at denying what was humane about people... Where was Mrs. Overman, or little baby overman??? Is love unnatural???Is it rational???His overman was more reasonable than real...As much as he ran down Socrates, he suffered from the same blindness... Both were cut off from natural realtionships, and neither could judge their own society... But morality has nothing to do with knowledge, or mythology... We learn morality before we learn consciously, when we learn to love our mothers... Community is morality... Nature, nation, naive, nascent all come frrom natal, our common mother, our true social unity...No one makes morality, and the reason behind it cannot be systematized and taught...If you get it, you got it before you got anything else, and if you did not get it you will always be an odd duck like N, or like Socrates, or Caesar, or like Napoleon, or like any number of philosophers, or psycho killers, que est'ce que....If it is possible, then on faith we must accept that much of society has its own logic, and not because it was reasoned out before hand, but has simply worked out for the best -sort of logic... Nietzsche never seems more foolish than when trying to judge natural behavior as though it was art, and bad art at that... He had more knowledge than understanding, and not enough knowledge...

Nietzsche's ideas are in his books. Before you rush to judgements about him, I suggest that you pick up one of his books or read one of his essays. He was a highly consistent writer.

You could start at the Nietzsche Channel and begin reading some of the shorter essays in English:
The Nietzsche Channel: Nietzsche's Works: English