Mortimer mention in WSJ Books page

"Gertrude Stein once described Ezra Pound as a "village explainer," which, she said, was fine if you were a village, "and if not, not." Arthur Goldwag, seeing the global village crowded with abstractions, wants to do some explaining of his own. The result is "-Isms and -Ologies," a lexicon of more than 450 enduring truths, cast-off notions, newly minted ideas and historical chimeras, from Abolitionism to Zoroastrianism. . .

". . .Mr. Goldwag manages to keep his erudition lively and his scope wide indeed. Perhaps only the late Mortimer Adler at his top-loftiest could have sallied forth so bravely against the cognitive monsters of collective experience. The subtitle of "-Isms and -Ologies" offers a broad, Adler-like claim: "All the movements, ideologies, and doctrines that have shaped our world."

-Mark Brawner

William F. Buckley RIP

William F. Buckley Jr. Is Dead at 82 Douglas Martin, NY Times February 27, 2008

- Buckley's 2001 obit of Mortimer in National Review [Edit: fixed the link. -MB]

- Adler's appearances on Firing Line:

http://www.thegreatideas.org/adler.html

http://hoohila.stanford.edu/firingline/programList.php

-Mark Brawner

Teaching Plato in Palestine: Can Philosophy Save the Middle East?

Carlos Fraenkel, Dissent, Spring 2007


--Terrence Berres

Socrates in the 21st Century

Is the endlessly examined life still worth a look?

Carlin Romano, Critic at large, in The Chronicle Review, February 15, 2008

(via Arts & Letters Daily)

--Terrence Berres

The calculus of virtue

Based on the ideas I previously presented that 1) basing justice on the definitions of subjective quantities leads, at best, to unproductive debate and more commonly, to coercion and that 2) there is a class of goods which, by their nature, cannot be obtained by stealth, deception or coercion (virtues) and that this class of goods can be identified objectively, I submit the following as a tentative definition for justice:

Justice is that art which seeks to maximize the ability or opportunity of all concerned parties to seek virtue.

I'll give an example:

Suppose person A robs person B. Possible responses could be: do nothing; punish A arbitrarily (current American jurisprudence); force A to restore the goods to B; punish A arbitrarily and restore goods to B; allow B to exact revenge.... Which of these responses would maximize the ability of all parties to seek virtue? Nothing would leave B without the goods and likely angry and likely to do something unvirtuous. It would also enable A to continue to obtain goods in such a manner. Arbitrary punishment of A, perhaps incarceration, would certainly prevent unvirtuous behavior for a time, but likely not result in any increased capacity in A. It also does not begin to address B's feelings. Likely, the final answer would involve A restoring goods to B and perhaps some amount of punishment. The important point in this essay is not a particular answer, but the calculus of ability to seek virtue.

Notice that this approach to justice avoids the whole revenge thing and what A or B "deserves" and whose "rights" were or were not violated and whether those rights were natural or derived. It also avoids pejorative labels like "criminal" and avoids static judgements like "evil", "guilty" or "innocent".

Another example: Free transactions in the market. Economics theory only specifies THAT people set a value in the market, it does not delve into why. Justice based on virtue helps us understand. Producing needed products by labor and free agreements is a virtue. If the price is too low, then the seller can't continue seeking virtue in this manner - he would go out of business. If the price is too high, then the buyer has her resources consumed disproportionately and is thus impeded in her search for virtue that needed products would enable.

I would love to hear responses as to whether the calculus of virtue is clear or if you find it too muddy to apply.

I would also be happy to apply the calculus of virtue to any specific examples anyone would care to conjure up just to show the lines along which I am recommending people think about justice.

The Ring of Gaiges

This post has been copied from the Great Ideas Forum

In Book V of the Republic a definition of justice was proposed based on the legend of the Ring of Gaiges. Gaiges found a ring that would make him invisible so that he could obtain information and goods by stealth without fear of punishment or reprisal. Justice is proposed as the compromise between our desire to BE Gaiges and obtain all goods for free and our desire to NOT be his victim. This definition is debated a little in the Republic and then discarded without being formally refuted.

Frankly, that definition of Justice strikes me as perverse and hideous. It was hard to put my finger on what made it so awful to me. Then it hit me: Not all goods could be obtained by Gaiges using his magic ring.

There is a class of goods which cannot be obtained by stealth, theft or coercion: things like bodily strength, wisdom, friendship, love, self-discipline, honesty. Most of these kinds of goods are unlimited in the sense that my intelligence does not detract from yours. My honesty does not subtract from the available honesty to be had. For lack of a better word, I will call these goods virtues.

Just for clarification, note that one can steal money to get into a university, or perhaps to obtain a diploma, but knowledge must be obtained the old fashion way - by ones own effort. Knowlege is the virtue. A diploma or school attendance are not necessarily virtuous. Thus, there is a class of goods which, by their very nature, can only be obtained through what we would call "just" means. Note that we dont' need to agree on a definition of "good", "right", "happiness" or "fairness" to recognize there is something unique about the class of goods I am calling "virtue".

Next post, I will propose a definition of justice based upon the unique properties of this class of goods.

How do you find the definition of justice based on the Ring of Gaiges ?

What would you include in a list of goods that cannot be obtained by stealth, deception or coercion?

Looking at your list, do you sense that there is indeed something unique about these goods. Can you put your finger on what it is?

Is there any correlation between your list of virtues and what makes your life rich and meaningful?

The problem with Justice

This post has been copied over from the Great Ideas Forum.

I was interested in the general topic of Justice but not willing to only speak when spoken to or limit my posts to less than 250 words so I thought I would outline what I see as the problems with discussions on Justice, Dr. Adlers essay in the Syntopicon included and then propose a way to cut the Gordian knot.

Dr. Adler points out that discussions about Justice have been very similar for thousands of years. That is sign #1 that these discussions are generally unproductive. Dr. Adler correctly points out that we generally have natural justice and might makes right on one side and then social justice and inalienable rights etc on the other side. There is no great way to reconcile these two - a system of justice entirely created socially would be arbitrary and artificial. A system of justice entirely natural would simply be "justice is the will of the sovereign". These tensions permeate all modern jurisprudence.

The problem with both positions is that justice is defined in terms of subjective quantities that generate endless unproductive debate. Aristotle suggested that Justice should be defined in terms of happiness. Guess who got to define what "happiness" is? For every definition of happiness, I can show you a whole bunch of people who claim that they wouldn't be very happy living that way. Others define justice in terms of "fairness", "good", or "right". No wonder these discussions have gone on for over two millenia. Just as for "happiness", for every definition of "fairness", "good" or "right", I can show you a whole bunch of people who will claim that the definition is unfair, not good and wrong. Then what happens is people get reactionary about their opinions and start making up terms like "true happiness" so that anyone who disagrees with them gets their position labelled "false happiness". Doctrinarians, such as Dr. Adler, strive to argue that their really is only one universal definition of these things and then argue about whose definition is really universal. Everyone has their own universal definition of all of these subjective ideas.

I have an idea to cut through this Gordian knot of unproductive debates over subjective quantities. It begins with a refutation of the definition of justice proposed in book V of the Republic based on the legend of the Ring of Gaiges. Continued in next post.

Does anyone care to comment on the general proposition that arguments over definition of subjective quantities are or are not productive?

Can you see how attempts to establish universal definitions of subjective quantities has enabled coercion - physical or intellectual - in the past?

Do you have an emotional reaction to my suggestion that thinkers have defended their positions by making up pejorative terms for the opposition?

Adler On: Angels

The Reality of Angels:
(1) Why Try to Prove the Existence of Angels?
(2) The Reason God Created Angels
(3) The Great Chain of Being
(4) The Best of All Possible Worlds
The Angels and Us, Chapter 4

The Possibility of Angels:
(1) The Crux of the Matter
(2) Who Says That Angels are Impossible?
(3) Reasons for Affirming Their Possibility
The Angels and Us (1982), Chapter 7

Philosophical Exploration of that Possibility:
(1) Angelology and Mathematics
(2) The Mutability of Angels
(3) The Differentiation of Angels
(4) Angelic Occupation of Space and Movement Through It
(5) Angels as Knowers
(6) Angels as Lovers
(7) The Community and Communication of Angels
The Angels and Us (1982), Chapter 8

If Men Were Angels:
(1) Angelistic Politics
(2) Angelistic Psychology
(3) Angelistic Linguistics
(4) Angelistic Ethics
The Angels and Us (1982), Chapter 11

Man on the Boundary Line:
(1) Straddling the Line or Reaching Over It?
(2) The Weakness of the Human Mind
(3) The Middle Ground
(4) The Resurrection of the Body
The Angels and Us (1982), Chapter 12

Defined, Adler's Philosophical Dictionary (1995)

--Terrence Berres

Apostle translations of Aristotle

Online order form to get Hippocrates Apostle translations of Aristotle from the source, Upstart Crow Books / Peripatetic Press, Des Moines, IA.

I just got a snazzy black hardcover of Nicomachean Ethics. Shrink-wrapped, as new.

-Mark Brawner

Morality Studies

Paul Bloom reviews Experiments in Ethics by Kwame Anthony Appiah, The New York Times, February 3, 2008

--Terrence Berres

Adler On: Anarchy

The Necessity of Government, The Common Sense of Politics (1971,1996), Chapter 6

The Anti-Political Philosophers, The Common Sense of Politics (1971,1996), Chapter 8

Defined, Adler's Philosophical Dictionary (1995)

--Terrence Berres

Adler On: Analytic and Synthetic Judgments

Defined, Adler's Philosophical Dictionary (1995)

--Terrence Berres

Adler On: Analogical Speech

Its Distinction from Univocal and Equivocal Speech, Adler's Philosophical Dictionary (1995)

--Terrence Berres

The Magnificent Contrarian

Harold Bloom speaks out!

Adler On: Abstract and Concrete

Can all universal objects of thought be instantiated by perceived or perceivable particulars? Some Questions About Language (1976), Chapter VII, Question 3

Defined, Adler's Philosophical Dictionary (1995)

--Terrence Berres

Adler On: Absolute and Relative

Milder Forms of Skepticism, Six Great Ideas (1981), Chapter 6

The Realm of Doubt, Six Great Ideas (1981), Chapter 7

The Restriction of Pluralism, Truth in Religion (1990, Chapter 1

The Logic of Truth, Truth in Religion (1990, Chapter 2

Defined, Adler's Philosophical Dictionary (1995)

--Terrence Berres

In Search of the Constitution

IN SEARCH OF THE CONSTITUTION has found its way online, which, as far as I can tell, is the first Adler video to do so. You'll remember from Center materials that this is the one in which We Hold These Truths: Understanding the Ideas and Ideals of the Constitution is discussed thusly:

Bill Moyers and Mortimer Adler with students of St. John's College, Annapolis, MD

Students at St. John's College in Annapolis, MD, challenge Adler, the noted philosopher, author, and educator, on his views about fundamental ideas in the Constitution and their relevance today. Adler discusses Americans' lack of familiarity with the Constitution, the checks and balances provided by the Supreme Court, "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" and the welfare state, foreign policy, and legislating morality.
(60 minutes)

-Mark Brawner

My Time in the Indexing Trade

Enid Stubin on working at the Sydney Wolfe Cohen index, at More Intelligent Life, December 19, 2007.

Sounds a bit like Index House, where the Syntopicon was compiled.

--Terrence Berres

(via Arts & Letters Daily)

The New New Philosophy

Kwame Anthony Appiah in The New York Times, December 9, 2007

...Philosophers don’t observe; we don’t experiment; we don’t measure; and we don’t count. We reflect. We love nothing more than our “thought experiments,” but the key word there is thought. As the president of one of philosophy’s more illustrious professional associations, the Aristotelian Society, said a few years ago, “If anything can be pursued in an armchair, philosophy can.”

But now a restive contingent of our tribe is convinced that it can shed light on traditional philosophical problems by going out and gathering information about what people actually think and say about our thought experiments. ...

(via Arts & Letters Daily)

--Terrence Berres

Kant Attack Ad

Video, and comments.

--Terrence Berres

(via The Daily Dish)

Early Holiday Gift Idea

Amazon has again this season reduced the price of World of Shakespeare: The Complete Plays and Sonnets of William Shakespeare (38 Volume Library) (Hardcover) by more than $200. Instead of the usual price of $299.00, it is on sale for $89.70. That works out to be cheaper then buying the equivalent paperback copies.

-Mark Brawner

The Philosophical Lexicon

8th ed. 1987, edited by Daniel Dennett

Some sample entries.

heidegger, n. A ponderous device for boring through thick layers of substance. "It's buried so deep we'll have to use a heidegger."
...
marcuse, v. To criticize vehemently from a Marxist perspective. "Je marcuse!" - J. P. Sartre.
...
rawl, n. A fishing line, baited with a few apparently innocent intuitions about fairness, but capable of bringing in such big fish as Pareto optimality and God knows what else. "But some who use a rawl are only fitching." Hence rawl, v. "When he rawled that slender line in, I could hardly believe my eyes."

--Terrence Berres

Middlebrow Translations of Highbow Philosophy
The Film Fandom of the 1930s Great Books Intellectuals

(Preview of a chapter from Scenes of Instruction: The Beginnings of the U.S. Study of Film By Dana Polan (University of California Press - April 2007))

...in which Adler, Scott Buchanan, St. John's College, etc, are discussed.

-Mark Brawner

Who Is John Galt? And Does Anyone Care Anymore?

Brian Murray, at On the Square, marking tomorrow's fiftieth anniversary of the publication of Atlas Shrugged

What made [Ayn] Rand’s works controversial, then and now, was their unashamed elitism and atheism—their contempt for the values and attitudes held by most human beings who must make their way through the real world with the usual sets of weaknesses and strengths.

--Terrence Berres

Contrary view on The Paideia Proposal

I just stumbled across a four-page extract/preview of an article in something called The Curriculum Studies Reader (Routledge 2004) titled The False Promise of the Paideia: A Critical Review of The Paideia Proposal.

-Mark Brawner

Ayn Rand videos

I thought I'd chime in regarding the recent attention to Ayn Rand in the journal. There are two wonderfully entertaining* video interviews out there, if you're interested.

One with Mike Wallace in 1959:
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3

and one with Phil Donahue in 1979:
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Part 5

Enjoy,
Mark Brawner

*(and, it hardly needs saying, occasionally exasperating, infuriating, etc, depending on your point of view)

A Chaucer-Milton-Burger

The Great Books: A Chaucer-Milton-Burger, by Geoffrey Wagner, Modern Age, Summer 1957 [5 pp. pdf]

--Terrence Berres

On Canons

Edward T. Oakes, S.J. at On the Square posts on canons "Literary, Philosophical, Theological" and on "Error in the Philosophical Canon". His remarks on the latter include the following.

...they ignored the careful methodological distinctions Thomas [Aquinas] made between what could be known about God by reason as opposed to what faith alone could know; and this overreaching led to a peculiar form of modern gnosticism, as Mortimer Adler noticed so acutely in his Aquinas Lecture at Marquette University in 1938, called St. Thomas and the Gentiles:

"Modern gnosticism results from the efforts of thinkers to answer purely theological questions by merely natural means. The theodicy of Spinoza, the knowledge of the Absolute in Hegel, the discussion of the order of the universe in time and space by Whitehead, are examples of philosophy exceeding its domain. Though lacking faith, these philosophers do not seem able to regain the position of natural reason in Greek antiquity. Christianity has somehow been too much for them. When we learn that Hegel’s formative influences were theology and the classics, we can see the root of all his confusions. In a paradoxical sense, then, all modern philosophers are Christian, even when they are skeptical, as Hume, or agnostic, as Kant. Christianity has made problems for them which they cannot solve without faith, but which they will not refrain from discussing in rational terms."

Marquette University Press keeps the entire St. Thomas Aquinas Lecture Series in print. Dr. Adler's was the second. The fourteenth is St. Thomas and the World State by Robert M. Hutchins (1949).

--Terrence Berres

The Cambridge Study Center of Lakeland, FL has three essays from Mortimer on their articles page.

Invitation to the Pain of Learning

Schooling Is Not Education

Teaching, Learning, and Their Counterfeits

-Mark Brawner

How Richard Rorty Found Religion

"Rorty broke from his parent’s conscientious Leninism (they denounced Stalin’s Russia) after he matriculated as a precocious fifteen-year-old at the University of Chicago and immediately fell under the tutelage of Mortimer Adler and Robert Hutchins. They taught him that the only way to refute both a Nazi and a Stalinist was to defend democracy as 'something eternal, absolute, and good.'”
---

It had somehow escaped my notice until now that the late Rorty had studied with Mortimer.

-Mark Brawner