Good point, it’s easier to tear down than to build up, which is another reason why we should focus less on the establishment (Keynesianism + 2-3 party representative democracy), which has been sufficiently critiqued left, right and center, and more on alternatives and their potential benefits/drawbacks. The other reason being - if you spend all your time/energy criticizing the establishment, you never get anything done. We’re all responsible for the present sociopolitical and economic condition. You get the government you deserve.
Sauwelios
I was using the present Anglo-American meaning. There’s nothing wrong with so doing, even if they’ve amalgamated many largely unrelated concepts together, as I’m not attempting to adopt the dichotomy as my own, I’m attempting to identify and go beyond it… and there’s nothing wrong with what you’re attempting to do either, going back to its genesis in France. However, I’m not sure that’s what you did, the 18th century French usage may have more in common with the 20th century Anglo-American usage than you know.
That’s what simplification is, boiling everything down to one thing, like refining sugar from molasses. I’m saying the left/right is more like molasses, and the ingredients may have more in common with one another than you realize.
Indeed I don’t, I said many of the debates that occur here and elsewhere on these forums, even in epistemology, metaphysics and ethics, may be an extension of the broader left/right paradigm. I and others have attempted to transcend the left/right paradigm in my “New forms of government” thread.
The Philosophes and freemasons were arguably responsible for the ideology of the French revolution. Their mantra was - liberty, equality, fraternity, among others. Admittedly liberty is more similar to equality, authority implies some degree of inequality. However, perhaps liberty and equality have something to do with progressivism, secularism and science. Inequality and authority at that time meant the inequality and authority of the Catholic Church, which was opposed to the philosophical and scientific methods, in part, along with secular progressivism.
Religion, as defined in the west is inherently unequal and authoritarian, as you rely solely on God and its representatives for your conception of things, where as in philosophy and science, man becomes his own deity, sort of speak, free to exercise his consciousness and conscience as he sees fit. Philosophy and science entail more liberty and equality than Catholicism, and they also entail progress, as Catholicism was and is - largely intellectually static. Therefore, since the Philosophes and Freemasons were advocates of philosophy and science, and science philosophy and science are inherently less hierarchical than Catholicism, one could rightfully associate the left with the ideals of liberty, equality, and with other ideals being championed at the time - secular progressivism, science and philosophy.
What about dualism versus monism/materialism, is dualism not a more hierarchical metaphysics than monism/materialism, mind over body/matter. What about theism - creator over creation, church and state over the populace, man over woman/children, master over slave. Do the doctrines of dualism not have implications for free will that monism, particularly materialistic monism, does not? Is theism as conceived by the Catholic Church not inherently hierarchical? Does utilitarianism not place more emphasis on the body/matter than deontology, in addition to equality, but not necessarily liberty? Is deontology not more compatible with divine command ethics than utilitarianism, which the Catholic Church was championing contra illuminism? In summary, were the ideals of illuminism, the left, not the antithesis to everything the right, the establishment of the time stood for?
What I’m calling for is a transcendence of this paradigm, not a synthesis or a never ending back and forth like we have now. Can the West overcome itself?
Obe
The many words of philosophers are lost on the rabble. They can only hear a few buzzwords and catchphrases, without comprehending their broader entailments and implications. Perhaps this is due more to being overstressed, overworked and undereducated, rather than their inherent stupidity.
George
Again, it’s relative. People and animals are relatively equal and unequal, both in terms of value, and in terms of ability. Some lions are stronger than others, but none of them are stronger than an elephant and all of them are stronger than a mouse. Lion X’s cubs have more value to lion X than to lion Y.
Now that we’ve gotten left/right out of the way, give me an alternative.
The answer to your question was already in what raised it: even as forcing equality means bridging the natural gulf between people, forcing stratification means making it unnaturally wide.
Bar idealists, everyone’s ideology is simply whatever works to make them more powerful.
I agree with this, but I disagree that this makes them ideologically any less “Leftist”.
Indeed the whole left/right paradigm is symptomatic of the crisis in which the west is stuck. A political dichotomy revolves around a resource, it represents two competing interpretations (valuings) of that resource. But the terms of the dichotomy also enable/dictate the very nature of the resource that is being discussed. i.e. recognized.
Left/Right have us stuck thinking about “freedom” as a resource. Whether it be economic liberty (right) or societal/civil liberty (right), the emphasis is on Freedom, which is a slave-value. As soon as freedom is in question, it is no longer really there to be enjoyed. I think it has to do with the death of God - knowing he was bound in sin, man permitted himself the few very real freedoms he had left to him. In the case of aristocratic Romans, they were bound by duty, but short of that (often enough in name of that) they could permit themselves everything.
We are all bound by “common sense” - which permits us virtually nothing, as it explains nothing, offers nothing, just sets a limit by averaging out all tendencies.
The only way for the West to redeem itself is by growing a pair of testicles and abandon common sense. Was it common sense that inspired Columbus to set sail? What is lacking is a whole set of real values, resources that aren’t “common” at all - the various forms of exceptional power.
To be fair, it’s also the supremacy of western power that has led us to this impasse - how can we ever hope to be as powerful as a Columbus?
This is why I said in my ridiculous hubris that people need me (or “me” - what I represent) - I am “crazy”. I lack common sense. I value ambition, pride, lust, even recklessness - as these are natural exponents of vigor. I am able to select people based on their vigor without feeling guilty. It’s the only way to assemble power. One grows up to either be powerful or not, and Eyesinthedark is powerful, so is Sauwelios - but there is no banner underneath which the vigorous can assemble.
For a time in my life I sought out people of special physical vigor, but I have returned to view vigorous intellect as the greatest value, without which physical vigor is powerless in a world where passive intellect sets standards for virtue.
The vigorous intellect spawns philosophy that is poetry - philosophy behind which strong men will gather, for which they are eager to sacrifice themselves. And that is the real requirement - an order of rank with a philosophy on top. Philosophy can only be at the top if it conquers, slaughters all the other philosophies. It can’t do this analytically, although the analytical skills must be perfect in order to sustain the poetic will.
What the west needs to be doing is stop thinking that it suffices if a thought is “correct”. That is only one of the requirements for being “right” - it matters not that a thought is correct if it does not drive men to action. “Truth is a woman” only if that truth compels men to conquer it, to master it, “own” it, inflict themselves on it, reproduce themselves by its code.
Why live at all? By my standards, a good life is living for something that one would also die for. Clearly, “personal health and happiness” does not fit this category. So that is the first question the lover of truth of must ask - what am I willing to die for?
If “Family” or “Fatherland” is the only thing you can come up with, you are not a thinker.
There’s certainly something in this. However, I will again point out that liberalism in itself has nothing to do with the “Left/Right” distinction. In fact, I don’t see why people don’t just use the terms “Democratic” and “Republican” or their British counterparts instead of “Left” and “Right”, respectively, if that’s what they really mean. Ironically, though, the word “republican” is used as the obverse of “liberal” in what’s possibly the best definition of liberalism I know:
“A different way approach [sic] is to look at Strauss’s juxtaposition of (classical vs modern) as (republicanism vs. liberalism). By liberalism, I mean classical liberal, i.e. enlightenment liberal. Classical liberalism is the view that individuals are prior to society. By republicanism, I do not mean anything related to the republican party. Republicanism means that individuals are willing to sacrifice their private interests to the public good, i.e. civic virtue. Republicanism means, in extremely superficial terms, that civil society is prior to the individual.” (Source: http://www.amazon.com/review/R3ESMKK0XP6T2S/ref=cm_cr_pr_viewpnt#R3ESMKK0XP6T2S)
Now in his first 1971 lecture on Nietzsche’s Beyond Good and Evil, Strauss said:
"The conservatives stood for throne and order [note that this is a transcript of an audio tape; Strauss probably said “altar” instead of “order”], and the liberals stood for democracy, or something similar to democracy, and religion as a strictly private affair. But liberalism was already outflanked by the extreme revolutionaries, socialists, communists, anarchists, and atheists. There was a position we may call political atheism.
“Now Nietzsche opposed both the moderate and the extreme left, but he saw that conservatism had no future, that its fighting was a real garbage, and its conservatism was being eroded evermore. The consequence of this was that Nietzsche pointed to something which we may call the revolutionary right, an atheism of the right.”
Does the fact that “the extreme revolutionaries, socialists, communists, anarchists, and atheists” were further to the “left” than “the liberals” mean that they were more liberal? Or the fact that what Nietzsche pointed to was further to the “right” than “the conservatives” mean that it was more conservative? To be sure, there is a way in which what Nietzsche pointed to is more conservative than “the conservatives”:
“By saying Yes to everything that was and is Nietzsche may seem to reveal himself as radically antirevolutionary or conservative beyond the wildest wishes of all other conservatives, who all say No to some of the things that were or are.” (Source: Strauss, Studies in Platonic Political Philosophy, "Note on the Plan of Nietzsche’s Beyond Good and Evil.)
But, as I already wrote six years ago with regard to the Strauss lecture quote:
"Conservatism meant both aristocratic and Christian conservatism. There existed a self-contradiction at the heart of conservatism, indeed, at the heart of the aristocracy. For the Christian values were the moral values ‘good and evil’; whereas the aristocratic values were the ‘ethical’ values ‘good and bad’ [“ethical” is a reference to Peter Berkowitz’s book, Nietzsche: The Ethics of an Immoralist]. ‘Good and bad’ are ‘noble’ values, sprung from what Nietzsche called ‘master morality’; whereas ‘good and evil’ are ‘base’ values, sprung from what he called ‘slave morality’. So why did the aristocracy champion both noble and base values? Because it had in the past divined a means to power in slave morality.
“On at least one occasion, Nietzsche says that the development of something from a means into an end signifies decadence [see, e.g., BGE 62]. Perhaps it signifies an impoverishment of the nobility that it got its natural, noble values so tangled up with the base values of slave morality. In any case, this self-contradiction at the heart of conservatism weakened it. By pointing to an atheism of the right, Nietzsche sought to create the possibility of a restoration of noble values. For ‘atheism’ to him meant disbelief in the Christian god, that is, in the moral god. He did emphatically not deny the possibility of a god, or gods, beyond good and evil.”
Yes. This is why I said, in my thread on your forum, that “I wasn’t sure about the final paragraph.” In its explicit form, which I subsequently posted in that thread, that paragraph reads, in full:
“1) the Homeric Age as the age of the theistic deification (religious celebration) of nature (originally aimed at the Rationals (knowledge), but eventually degenerating to being aimed at the Idealists (identity));
2) the Platonic Age as the age of the theistic demonisation (religious conquest) of nature (originally aimed at the Idealists (identity), but eventually degenerating to being aimed at the Guardians (security));
3) the Machiavellian Age as the age of the non-theistic demonisation (scientific conquest) of nature (originally aimed at the Guardians (security), but eventually degenerating to being aimed at the Artisans (stimulation));
4) the Nietzschean Age as the age of the non-theistic deification (scientific celebration) of nature (originally aimed at the Artisans (stimulation), but eventually degenerating to being aimed at the Rationals (knowledge)).”
In the meantime I’ve formulated the reason why I wasn’t sure about it in a private email to one of my contacts:
“[T]he pattern seems to always have been that the philosopher [—a Rational—] persuaded the Guardians via the Idealists: in the case of Bacon [—a Machiavellian philosopher—], in the case of Plato, and apparently even in the case of Homer.”
I associate the Idealists with the class of the warriors, who are indeed characterised by vigor (in Manu, rajas; in Plato, thumos; in Nietzsche, strength of temperament).
The banner beneath which the strong can assemble is that of the ouroboros, or that of the Hindu swastika, or perhaps rather a combination of the two or an alternative for this combination: the cycle of the four ages, inasmuch as eyesinthedark’s call to transcend the Democratic/Republican dichotomy is a call to overcome our Machiavellian Age.
No, I’m not. Overcoming unfairness is about changing yourself, something a person can do. Changing unfairness is about changing other people, which no one can do.
To that I’d have to say tough shit. We already live in a “state of nature” whether or not you acknowledge it, this is evidenced by the inherently unfair, unlevel “playing field”. You can attempt to change other people to make them “fair” until your head explodes, it’s not going to work. Yes, our society has drifted towards fairness, but not because of law, because of peoples changing attitudes in what is morally right or wrong, meaning people have changed themselves, not been forced to change.
Well that’s unfair. We should pass a law to make lions as strong as elephants.
No no.
It is easier and more economic to form a law to make elephants as weak as lions and lions as weak as mice.
Everything is merely relative, so the lower the better.
Agreed. The mess of definitions aside, I would expect to find more American military people among the republicans than among democrats. More people who would give their life for the “republic”.
This question will always be important: what is the republic worth to “me” (any given individual)?
In the case of Rome, and heyday-America, belonging to the echelons of the republic gave a sense of power, of self-valuing, that one could not attain by simply being “free”.
In Rome, a freed slave still did not have the rights, or the sacred duties, of a Roman citizen.
This is how I’d summarize the civil matter of freedom versus duty: To be deemed worthy of sacred duty is greater than to be free from duty, even if freedom is preferable to being tied to profane duty (slavery).
Perhaps no nobility was ever truly free from slave-morality, from deeming certain acts “evil”. Consider Odysseus, and Homers empathic denouncement of the men who had taken over his house. Is there not a very basic “good versus evil” conflict there? And in the case of Rome, was it not considered “evil” to be an enemy of the state?
We must consider that what N saw as slave-morality is tied in particular with the condemnation of the pride of strength, more than with the general term “evil”.
As to the pride of strength: It is nicely demonstrated in the finale of the series Rome (indeed very good viewing), where Cleopatra says “that is a slave’s answer” (and consequently heeds that answer). A slave favors life over honor, a master the opposite.
A God-form is often enough simply a means for hailing an aspect of existence.
I’m having trouble with that. I would see Achilles and Odysseus as warriors (indeed aimed at identity, name, glory of the family), and the scientists and philosophers, who lived later, as aimed at knowledge.
I think that these are symbols behind which only philosophers would gather, i.e. those who are not tied to any particular phase. The banner for the currently predominant people (the exitables) must be fit specifically for the coming age.
And a single image would not suffice. This actually ties into the advertising debate - what would be advertised is a particular future.
Penelope’s suitors were definitely bad, not evil. As for enemies of Rome: these were usually looked down upon (“barbarians” and the like); in exceptional cases, like Caesar, or Hannibal, I guess one might say they were regarded as evil, yes.
Achilles, yes. Odysseus, however, is a very complex case. Achilles chooses eternal glory—in death—over returning home to his family. Odysseus chooses returning home to his family over eternal life—with Calypso. Note also the association in that Tarot book you have—by Hanjo Banzhaf—of the King of Swords with Odysseus (and, interestingly, Sisyphus). In the Republic, Plato presents Socrates as an Odysseus figure.
You’re probably right. However, the excitables are not the Idealists.
Here’s a thought I had. Perhaps we should compare the four ages, or the four transitions between the ages, with astrological phases. For example, in Chinese astrology, one who is born in the year of the Horse “is” thereby a Horse; but that Horse person can then be living in another year of the Horse, or in the year of another sign. For an excitable to be living in the late Machiavellian or early Nietzschean age may be like a Horse person living in a year of the Horse. (In astrology, the four types are most like the four Western elements, but that would be too complex to use as an example.)
Do you mean a single image for all four ages?
Its an arbitrary differentiation of "Western Society" into the New world and the Old world. The continentals designating the Old World.
The Old World including or excluding the Ancient World, depending on the type of approach , use, or context and perspective taken. (Sorry I’m late in picking up this response.)
According to Keirsey, whereas the Artisans value being excited, the Idealists value being enthusiastic. And he writes—with his usual license with etymology—:
“It may seem strange to distinguish between enthusiasm and excitement, especially when dictionaries present them as synonymous. But they are quite different attitudes. To be enthused is to be aroused by something inside—an idea, an image, a goal. To be excited is to be stimulated by something outside—a game, a contest, a challenge, an opportunity. Thus the prevailing mood of the SPs is opposite that of the NFs, with SPs frequently and easily becoming excited, but only slowly and rarely becoming enthused; and with NFs frequently and easily showing enthusiasm, but only slowly and uneasily getting excited.” (Source: Keirsey, Please Understand Me II, page 56.)
There’s this NF I know who has often confused me with her SP-like behaviour. However, I now suspect that she’s enthused by the idea of SP values—this is the “Year” of the Artisan, after all—: e.g., by the ideas of “tasting everything” and “living all the way”. I now suspect that the Artisan’s reality is her ideal. Nietzsche, of course, is a master at enthusing people with such ideas—“live dangerously”, “live as if you shall live the same way over and over again”, etc.
A thread asking to get past the left/right debate turns into an argument among a bunch of liberals trying to define what the hell a conservative is in the absence of having actually ever fucking spoken to one before, much less read a book written by one. I really don’t know how else to better characterize the place.
Ucc, in Alabama, even the liberals are conservative.
That’s what the internet is for.
What do you mean? I gotta come on the internet to find real liberals?
I mean that the internet, far from bringing people together, is primarily used to protect us from having meaningful interactions with people we might not agree with. I've 'met' all sorts of folks that brag about being immersed in a political culture they are opposed to, but thanks to the internet, they never have a meaningful conversation with such a person, and just quietly despise them until they can jump onto their favorite blog/messageboard/chatroom/whatever and whine about it.
Take me, for example. I'm living in a very liberal university town now. If it wasn't for the fact that I went to school here for four years pursuing a degree in a politically charged field, I could easily avoid talking to these people about any serious matter at all- and would happily do so; I have the web to scratch that itch. Once upon a time, if a person wanted political discourse, they had to have it with people physically around them. Now, though, saying something like "I know all about liberals because I live in NYC" don't mean a thing.
You mean I don’t really know conservatives? I’m surrounded by caricatures of stereotypical ones all the time. Or do you mean I don’t really know liberals because I only get to talk to them online?