I’ve been under the impression that gangsta cultcha was pop rather than progressive or regarded as dispensing wisdom, though in some part authentically counter-cultural and validly so. — praxis

Yes, counter-cultural or anti-cultural sounds about right. And anything that serves as a substitute for traditional culture qualifies as "progressive" in certain quarters where deconstruction and replacement count as progress.

Please name your top five "ancient wisdom" reads for modern (beginner) philosophers. — 180 Proof

That would depend on which aspect/s of "ancient wisdom" one is interested in.

But I think that the introductory booklets on Plato, Aristotle, Augustine, Aquinas, and The Buddha in the Very Short Introductions series by Oxford University Press would be a good start.

Very Short Introductions - Oxford University Press

Edit. I would strongly advise against reading Maimonides. He probably had no access to Platonic texts and learned about Plato through Arabs like al-Farabi and Ibn Sina. He complained that there are so many parables in Plato's writing one can dispense with it and stick to Aristotle. The fact that he is held in high esteem by the likes of Leo Strauss speaks volumes.

I think there is a combination of factors.

If we judge bodies in terms of harmonious features, then male and female are probably equally “beautiful”. Animals, plants, and other aspects of the natural world can be equally “beautiful” in this sense.

The reason why we prefer the physical appearance of one type of body over another may have to do with evolution, reproduction, or upbringing.

For example, newborns are breast-fed by their mothers and children spend more time with their mother than with their father. The result is that feminine features are impressed on our mind as “desirable” and this can be projected into males who may be considered “more attractive” for example, when they have “feminine” facial features.

The female form may also be “more attractive” because it resembles youth more than the male (softer facial features, less body hair, etc.) thereby indirectly reminding us of our childhood.

Thus the female form ends up being more "coveted" by both sexes than the male. In evolutionary and reproductive terms, the female body which is associated with child birth is given priority over the male, etc.

I don't understand the difference between 'differential' and 'different' as adjectives. — scherz0

I think the English (and Americans) like using words in strange ways to confuse German spies and other foreigners. Like when they removed street signs during the war ..... :smile:

Another possible answer is that "different" means distinct or not the same, whereas depending on the context, "differential" refers to something that is related to the difference between two things. In some cases, it means the difference itself. It can also be a technical term in mathematics, law, etc.

You're either conscious or you're not. — RogueAI

But if someone can be "highly conscious", "barely conscious", and "unconscious", then this suggests different degrees of consciousness. At any rate, there must be increasing degrees of consciousness between unconsciousness and full consciousness, e.g. when we wake up from deep sleep.

Conversely, when we are extremely tired we may be increasingly less conscious than when fully awake and alert. The same is true when the normal function of our brain or general nervous system is impaired due to illness or other causes.

Capacity for 'self awareness 'is another ambiguous term. I would probably call that insight. — Tom Storm

Everything can be ambiguous without an agreed definition. Depending on what we understand by "self", self awareness may refer to awareness of oneself as a physical body or person, awareness of one's own actions and thoughts or position in society, or again, awareness of one's own existence as a conscious living being. "Insight" seems to suggest awareness of something that is hidden, not necessarily the self.

I agree that consumerism, hedonism, etc. are contributing factors in the general decline of civilization and culture. However, I think there are reasons to believe that the main culprit is the movement to actively and systematically deconstruct traditional culture and society initiated in the late 1800's and early 1900's by Fabian Socialists and allied liberals, including the likes of G. B. Shaw who declared that good statesmanship was to blow to pieces every cathedral with dynamite, whilst he was praising Lenin and Stalin as great statesmen, Annie Besant, who believed that the Westminster Abbey should have its "barbaric psalms" replaced with Wagner, whilst she was busy promoting Freemasonry and Theosophy as a replacement for Christianity, and many others who simply hated Western civilization even as they were making the most of its achievements. But I think this is a topic for another thread, or forum.

I don't think disabled people have any less consciousness than brilliant people. — RogueAI

I don't think it needs to be less. It may simply be different. Otherwise, what it is that makes them "disabled"?

Well, I for one definitely think that ancient wisdom is better than no wisdom.

And it seems to me that wisdom is fast disappearing from both language and culture under the modernizing influence of "gangsta cultcha" and other progressive trends ....

I've got nothing against Chinese or Indian philosophy but I think that historically Europe has developed its own philosophy.

For example, in Classical Greek and later Christian tradition there is the concept of "justice" or "righteousness", of always doing what it right for yourself and for others.

So, I tend to doubt that we need Buddhism or Confucianism to learn how to be civilized. Plus, India and China are not necessarily superior to the West in this respect.

Not a bad explanation. And interesting OP, too.

But do we do that before or after we learn how to drink, how to be a farmer, and how to be a bad emperor?

And what about why?

I have on occasion asked myself that question when it appeared that others were flagging my posts.

But I've never flagged moderators and I doubt that it actually works as they tend to enforce a forum's agenda and do as they are told from above. So they aren't exactly impartial, are they?

It shows that a state can be principled. That one guy, if Prime Minister, picks the rest of the government, and institutions of a state. — Down The Rabbit Hole

I agree that in some countries government and state are more or less the same thing. The ruling Communist Party of China, in any case, that has been in power since 1949, is the supreme authority.

But I tend to believe that in general the state and the government are two different, though related, things.

The state consists of legislative, executive, judiciary, military, police, secret service, financial, economic, and educational institutions, media and propaganda organizations, etc., whose supposed collective purpose is to ensure the security and safety, as well as stability and well-being of society. But the state must preserve itself in order to provide security, safety, and stability in the first place. So, presumably, it must have a desire to stay in power.

Government, on the other hand, is the executive branch of the state, or executive instrument of the legislature. Like the state, it also has a desire to stay in power. But it can do so only to the extent that the legislature and the constitution, i.e. the state, allow it. Its powers and time in office are limited by the state, usually for four to five years after which it must participate in elections.

In your UK example, parliament is the legislative institution of the state and the supreme political power. We can ignore the House of Lords as it doesn’t have much power. But the House of Commons where the real power is, is formed of members of parliament (MPs) who are elected, not picked by government.

The remaining state institutions may be differently managed under different governments, but they stay in place as part of the state. In fact, the whole political and economic system tends to stay the same. The system doesn’t change from constitutional monarchy to socialist republic or from liberal capitalism to communism and vice versa with every election.

Even in political parties there is a tendency to retain the same power structure and if possible win and hold on to power.

Once you are in power you want to stay in power. Your principles or policies might change over time but the desire to win power and stay in power remains unchanged.

For example, Labour started off claiming to represent the working classes and has ended up representing minorities, as a means to win power and on the calculation that as minorities become more numerous it makes strategic sense to side with them.

Similarly, the Tories held the referendum hoping that the Remain side would win. The Brexit side won and the Tories had to implement Brexit as per the referendum result. However, the question arises as to how principled a government is if it liberates the country from the EU only to make it dependent on China. Incidentally, the latter has always been Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s plan. If he now changes that plan under pressure from his own party, then he is an "unprincipled guy" and the state is "unprincipled" if we compare them with Corbyn and his hypothetical Labour government.

It follows that political leaders, governments and political parties in general may appear to do the “will of the people” when pressured to do so, but ultimately they have their own agendas.

Correct. You need to start from a general principle that you then apply on a case-to-case basis to particular situations as evaluated on their own merits.

Socrates (or Plato) chose to start from the idea of the Good from which flow truth, order, justice, beauty, etc. This isn't a bad start, if we think about it. It certainly isn't "skepticism" or "nihilism".

I now pose the question. Does different levels of intelligence mean different levels of consciousness and self-awareness? — Maximum7

Good question. I can't think of any particular study that would give you a definitive answer. However, it seems to me that intelligence, consciousness, and awareness are inseparable from each other.

Otherwise put, they are aspects of the same one thing, depending on how we choose to define them.

1. For starters, there would need to be consciousness.

2. Consciousness would imply awareness of itself and of other things.

3. And intelligence would refer to how consciousness operates in relation (a) to itself, (b) to the mind (thoughts, emotions, sense perceptions), and (c) to the world.

So, perhaps you could say that intelligence and awareness are functions of consciousness.

If this is the case, different levels of one would to some degree imply different levels of the others.

Of course, the oligarchs did have their share of blame. Boris Berezovsky’s story is quite instructive in this regard.

Berezovsky was a prominent businessman and former deputy head of Russia’s Security Council, who had close connections to Yeltsin. He was the head of the movement to build “oligarchic capitalism” around his gas company Gazprom and five to six other giant corporations.

However, Berezovsky was not the only one. There were rival political and economic factions competing for power. In addition to the general economic and political situation, this was a destabilizing and dangerous development.

Essentially, Putin’s task was to restore order and stability. When he came to power, he announced that he wanted to liquidate the oligarchs as a class. But he realized that some oligarchs could be useful in running the economy and the country. So, the oligarchs were told that from now on they have to play by the new rules. One wrong step and they would go straight to jail for fraud, tax evasion and other illegal activities.

There were about 36 of them. Berezovsky and two or three others didn’t like Putin’s suggestion and, unwisely, started organizing opposition. They soon realized that this was a bad move and fled to England. Berezovsky was later found dead by his wife in his London home.

In the meantime, the foreign corporations were going about their usual business. A number of them formed strategic alliances with Russian corporations to bid for Russian firms. In 1997 Royal Dutch/Shell teamed up with Gazprom (Berezowsky’s company) and Lukoil, and BP teamed up with Cidanco/Oneximbank in a bid for Rosneft, Russia’s largest state-owned oil company. The bid apparently failed but Shell later made other deals with Rosneft (or with Putin) and in 2017 Putin’s friend Gerhard Schröder was appointed chairman of Rosneft.

So, Schröder was Germany’s Chancellor until 2005. In 2006 he was hired by the Anglo-French firm Rothschild & Co (co-owners of Shell) as adviser and representative for their European and Russian operations. He also became a director of Anglo-Russian energy company BP-TNK, a post he held until 2011. After leaving Rothschild in 2016, he was hired by Rosneft of which the Rothschilds are shareholders ….

Gerhard Schröder – Rosneft

Obviously, foreign billions were invested in top Russian companies in exchange for shares and some form of control. The close collaboration with select foreign corporations has helped the Russian leadership to rebuild the economy and keep key sectors under control, and has simultaneously enabled the multinational corporations to advance their long-term objective of expanding their global control over resources and markets.

My guess is that the multinationals will win in the end. The final battle will be between them and China.

Such behaviour not only upsets the monastic routine but may even corrupt the Japanese monks, so that as a result of costly experience many Zen monasteries have now closed their doors to foreigners — Wayfarer

I agree that Westerners, and perhaps people in general, tend to pick the easy bits and ignore the discipline and the hard work.

But personally, I have always found Zen a rather intriguing tradition that reminds me of Christian monasticism that can be equally regimental. Apparently, the Japanese word zen comes from Sanskrit dhyana, “meditation” via Chinese chan and the roots of the tradition are traced to India in the early centuries of the Christian Era.

In any case, there are plenty of stories about the Early Christian saints that remind one of those told of Zen masters. For example:

One day when Abba (Father or Elder) John was sitting in front of the church, the brethren were consulting him about their thoughts. One of the old men who saw it became prey to jealousy and said to him, “John, your vessel is full of poison.” Abba John said to him, “That is very true, abba; and you have said that when you only see the outside, but if you were able to see the inside as well, what would you say then?”

One day some old men came to see Abba Antony. In the midst of them was Abba Joseph. Wanting to test them, the old man suggested a text from the Scriptures, and beginning with the youngest, he asked them what it meant. Each gave his opinion as he was able. But to each one the old man said: “You have not understood it”. Last of all he said to Abba Joseph, “How would you explain this saying?” and he replied “I do not know.” Then Abba Anthony said, “Indeed, Abba Joseph” has found the way, for he said, “I do not know”.

A brother came to Scetis to visit Abba Moses and asked him for a word. The old man said, “Go and sit in your cell, and your cell will teach you everything”

- R Altwell, Spiritual Classics from the Early Church

Incidentally, regarding the present, St Augustine writes:

… all the future follows from the past; and all, past and future, is created and issues out of that which is forever present … from what we have said it is abundantly clear that neither the future nor the past exist, and therefore it is not strictly correct to say that there are three times, past, present, and future. It might be correct to say that there are three times, a present of past things, a present of present things, and a present of future things. Some such different times do exist in the mind, but nowhere else that I can see …

- Confessions XI 20

C'mon, decades of voting against his own party and government, sacrificing his career, he was bound to be a PM guided by his principles. — Down The Rabbit Hole

Well, the fact that one guy is "principled", doesn't really show that a party, government, or state is not motivated by the desire to acquire or maintain power. Certainly as far as parties are concerned, politics seems to be about power regardless of political orientation. That's why they put so much effort and money into winning elections.

And, at the end of the day, he wasn't elected so there isn't much point speculating what might have happened had he won the elections.

After all, if you are an old man who has no money and knows you will continue to aggravate the youth against the established order, no matter where you go -- and you know that silence, on your part at least, is not attainable (cuz the gods/goods told ya it's good to talk about what's good) -- then perhaps it is better to die, because you realize that no matter which city you go to you will end up the same. Might as well die now, as a martyr, than later, as a prisoner. — Moliere

I agree. But I think Socrates' problem was not so much aggravating the youth as was annoying the old :smile:

Studies have shown that the 0.1% get nearly everything they want, and the population’s desires have almost no effect on policy. — Xtrix

You are probably right there. I think what tends to happen in so-called "liberal democracies" is that politicians come to power on certain promises that they make to win elections. In some cases they may even be serious about the promised policies.

However, for a variety of reasons, those promises are not always kept and even if they are, there is no guarantee that no other policies are implemented that represent the interests of groups other than the electorate, e.g. multinational corporations or political organisations with an ideological agenda.

Yes, but it doesn’t follow that the state has no desire to stay in power.

What you are saying seems to refer more to particular political parties and the position of individual politicians within those parties.

By state I meant more the organizational superstructure consisting of executive, legislature, judiciary, armed and police forces, etc., i.e. the thing that stays in place whilst governments or ruling parties keep coming and going.

In the Brexit example, Prime Minister David Cameron called the referendum under pressure from the electorate and the UK Independence Party (UKIP).

However, (1) he was under no obligation to do so, and (2) he agreed to a referendum because he thought that the Remain camp would win.

So, arguably, it all started with Cameron’s miscalculation.

Corbyn is a different matter. There is no way telling what he would have done if elected. He operated in tandem with trade union leader Len McCluskey, an old-style Marxist who may have chosen to go for Remain.

In the event, Labour’s Marxist left wing was ousted by the Fabian Socialist right wing that was pro-EU and pro-Remain. And that was the end of Corbyn’s left-wing takeover.

Edit. But I agree that business were overwhelmingly in favor of remaining in the EU - both during and after the referendum.

The state has the greatest potential for control, and will use it to satisfy its desires. — Down The Rabbit Hole

However, what is the precise origin and aim of the state's desires?

The state is supposed to represent the desires of the people. But it may only pretend to, or only partly do so, whilst in reality representing someone else's vested interests.

I think the success or failure of the state depends to a large extent on the success of the economy. And the economy depends on the commercial classes, the guys that control banking, finance, industry, natural resources and the media. Therefore, the commercial classes have some power in relation to the state.

This power can be exerted directly, by advising the state in economic and financial matters, or indirectly, through think-tanks, lobby groups, political parties, and media, funded, influenced, or controlled by the commercial classes.

Obviously, the state's main desire is to keep itself in power. But this is precisely why it must take other groups' desires into consideration. So, the question is, which group's desires and to what extent?

You need to stop and think about how stability is managed when there's separation of church and state. Corporations are part of that. — frank

I think it is quite funny how liberalism started as a project initiated by the emerging commercial classes for the purpose of restricting the power of king and church and gaining more power for themselves.

The result is that we now seem to have rule by corporations. And as their power increases, the power of the people decreases. With modern methods of mass surveillance, manipulation, and control, it isn't easy to see a way out of it ....

Then it begs the question of what is truth, morality and justice? That is something that needs to be examined. If they are subjective aspects of our consciousness then it is impossible to always act in ways that are always good for yourself and others. What you consider good might not be examined and interpreted in the same way as someone else. — Harry Hindu

Well, doing what is good for oneself and for others is the general idea. What this means in practice remains to be determined in each particular instance.

However, to begin with, it means acting in accordance with established custom, laws, etc. Athens had a legal system. Murder, theft, adultery, perjury, slander, blasphemy, etc., were punishable by law. So, moral conduct was not subjective.

Examining your beliefs and actions would mean first of all looking into whether your actions are in accordance with law and custom, that is, in accordance with what is generally held to be right, just, or good. Beyond that, everyone has to use their intelligence, knowledge, and power of discrimination to decide on a case to case basis.

The alternative to acting in ways that are good for yourself and for others is either (1) to act selfishly or (2) act in ways that are bad not only for others but also for yourself.

I'm not sure mansions are a particularly big problem. If Michael Jackson and Jeffrey Epstein can have one, why not Putin?

But I agree that something went horribly wrong somewhere and it is not that easy to piece it all together.

In any case, the key privatized assets that were of interest to foreign corporations were in industry, energy, and finance. And it was US industrial, energy, and banking giants (and some European ones) that played key roles in the project by providing loans to companies, etc.

First, "spontaneous privatization” was already underway by mid-1990.

Second, Russia in 1992 was “advised” by the (Rockefeller-founded) World Bank to privatize as much and as fast as possible. Rockefellers and associates represented by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, Chase Manhattan, City Bank, J P Morgan and Bank of America in collaboration with economic experts from Rockefeller-controlled institutions like Harvard University, told the Russians how to do it, and the IMF under G-7 (i.e. US-Rockefeller) pressure gave the Russian state a few billions in loans to encourage (or bribe) them to do it.

Third, the Russian state converted state-owned enterprises (SOEs) into shareholder corporations.

Fourth, the state gave control of companies to workers and managers.

Fifth, Russian businessmen and speculators, who had made huge profits in the 1980’s by buying cheap raw materials and selling them abroad for dollars, bought control of companies from the workers and managers.

Sixth, the new owners or controllers had a choice between (1) investing in their companies to make them more profitable, (2) transfer profits to off-shore companies, and (3) selling them for hard currency to foreign buyers or otherwise acting as middlemen for them.

Obviously, option (1) was not the most attractive to people whose main interest was quick profit.

Big foreign investors were lining up to enter the takeover game, advancing money to Russian partners to gain full or partial control of privatized companies. As Andrew Balgarnie of Morgan Stanley who had earlier opened their Moscow office put it in 1994, "There's more money that wants to come to Russia than there are quality places to put it."

Exactly what those big foreign banks did in Russia is not entirely clear. However, only a few years after the start of the program, in 1997, Russia’s Central Bank announced that it would no longer do business with 11 American and European banks: Chase Manhattan, J. P. Morgan, Bank of New York, Banque Nationale de Paris, Credit Suisse First Boston, two subsidiaries of the Deutsche Morgan Grenfell unit of Deutsche Bank, Credit Agricole Indosuez, Societe Generale of Paris, Union Bank of Switzerland (UBS)'s London operation and Salomon Brothers.

Russia Punishes 11 Financial Concerns – New York Times

So, how much money foreign investors actually made is hard to tell. The downside for Russia was that there was a massive cashflow out of the country that went to off-shore companies, many owned or co-owned by Russians. The economy was fast going downhill, and in 1998, the Russian currency collapsed and the country was basically bankrupt.

“From about 1991 to 1998 Russia lost nearly 40% of its real gross domestic product (GDP), and suffered numerous bouts of inflation”:

The Post-Soviet Union Russian Economy – Investopedia

According to Horowitz and Poe, the privatization resulted in a loss of USD100 billion to the Russian economy.

In any case, some Western corporations did get their hands on Russian assets at least in joint-ventures in the energy sector, for example, TNK-BP, and the aluminium giant Rusal. I think this was the overarching plan that was stopped in its tracks by Putin.

The pressure that the West is now putting on Russia must logically have the same object, to open Russia up to Western capitalist investment and, ultimately, control. Monopolism seems to be capitalism's biggest problem. We can't really blame China for trying to copy our own monopolistic tendencies.

There's a term in Indian philosophy, 'viveka' which means 'Sense of discrimination; wisdom; discrimination between the real and the unreal, between the self and the non-self, between the permanent and the impermanent; discriminative inquiry; right intuitive discrimination; ever present discrimination between the transient and the permanent' 1 . This is strongly reminiscent of the discussion of the discernment of the Forms in the Phaedo. — Wayfarer

Viveka in the Greek tradition is diakrisis.

In Plato’s Sophist it is compared to the acts of “sifting”, “straining”, “winnowing” and “separating” and it is the basis for purification of body and soul:

Stranger
Then since there is, according to my reckoning, one art involved in all of these operations, let us give it one name.
Theaetetus
What shall we call it?
Stranger
The art of discrimination.
….
Stranger
And yet, in the instance of discrimination just mentioned there was, first, the separation of worse from better, and, secondly, of like from like.
Theaetetus
Yes, as you now express it, that is pretty clear.
Stranger
Now I know no common name for the second kind of discrimination; but I do know the name of the kind which retains the better and throws away the worse.
Theaetetus
What is it?
Stranger
Every such discrimination, as I think, is universally called a sort of purification.
Theaetetus
Yes, so it is (226c-d).

For Socrates (and Plato), the examined life is a constant examination of our beliefs and actions for the purpose of establishing what is true, good, and just.

Awareness of justice or righteousness (dikaiosyne) enables the philosopher to always act in ways that are good for himself and others.

And the faculty by which one distinguishes between what is right and what is wrong is diakrisis, “judgement”, “discrimination”, “discernment”.

Both “righteousness” and “discrimination” passed into the Christian tradition. The Church Fathers taught that “discrimination is a kind of eye and lantern of the soul”, “mother of the virtues and their guardian”, “queen among the virtues”, etc.

I'll have to look up the exact reference. I think The Shadow Party by Horowitz and Poe has quite a bit on what went on with Russia’s privatization.

But you are right, it does sound like a high percentage. That’s because from the start the privatization program was dominated by foreign players from advisors to government with links to the State Property Committee that was in charge of the program to international institutions like the IMF, International Finance Corporation (IFC), the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), and American and European banks.

The first sale of Russian bonds in 1996 was done through J P Morgan and SBC Warburg which gives some idea of who was involved.

But foreign investors often acquired their stakes through Russian intermediaries and of course there was little regulation and a lot of corruption with rigged auctions, etc., which is why Russians called the program “grabification”. Yeltsin was forced to implement some cosmetic regulation and Putin had to renationalize key companies soon after coming to power.

In any case, the oligarchs or “kleptocrats” were only part of the problem. China's communists were much more in control at least on the surface, though it's hard to know what exactly went on. With the Communists still in power, there is much less info on China than on Russia. But my feeling is that a lot of China's billionaire "capitalists" have very close links to the Party, so that a lot of Chinese "capitalism" is more apparent than factual. The leadership has never forgotten Mao's dissimulation tactics ....

The Rockefellers and their associates from banking and industry had been dealing with the Soviets from inception, from the early years of the revolution. They were aware of the economic problems the Russians and the Chinese were facing. In the early 1970’s the Rockefellers were taking advantage of the oil crisis (partly caused by their own policies) and the weaknesses of communist economies in order to expand their petroleum and banking empire. Hence they promoted a policy of East-West rapprochement and David founded his Trilateral Commission, an association of multinational banking and industrial corporations, for the purpose.

When David Rockefeller and his representative Kissinger visited Beijing, the Chinese decided to open up to the West because they saw that they had no choice. Rockefeller reached out to Russia as well, even opening a Chase Manhattan branch in Moscow in 1973, the same year he was in China. But Russia was different, it was an empire with connections throughout the world and with a long and proud history in its dealings with the West. So the Russians opted for getting involved in projects like Afghanistan, and after that Reagan’s anti-communist initiative sealed their fate.

But I think in Russia’s defense it may be argued that there was no precedent for a totalitarian system of planned economy like that of the Soviet Union to transition to capitalism.

The oligarchs were only part of the problem. Privatization of state-owned assets was not simply state-appointed company directors taking over. Reintroducing capitalism required the creation of capital and this was possible only by selling state assets to foreign buyers who actually had the capital.

It was a matter of accessing international investment and credit. As the Russians had zero knowledge or experience, they were advised by the Rockefellers and their associates, i.e., Chase Manhattan, City Bank, Bank of America, J P Morgan, and Federal Reserve Bank of New York.

By 1993 more than 40% of Russian enterprises were owned by Western interests and a large part of the rest were co-owned by the same interests and their Russian associates.

So, Russia was on the road to becoming a third-world banana republic controlled by international banking and industry in collaboration with local oligarchs and corrupt politicians. "President" Yeltsin was suffering from heart disease and alcoholism. In 1999 Putin was brought in to restore Russian control of the economy and of the country.

Correct. At 92c Socrates makes fun of Simmias by pointing out that his previous statement to the effect that soul pre-exists the body does not work in harmony with his statement that harmony in the lyre comes after the lyre has been put together from its component parts. Socrates then stresses that if any argument should work in harmony it is an argument about harmony.

This can be seen again at 97c – 99d where Socrates mocks Anaxagoras for failing to use his intelligence. Anaxagoras held that intelligence both orders things and is cause of everything, a view that Socrates was delighted to learn. But to Socrates’ great disappointment Anaxagoras failed to use his intelligence in that he assigned the ordering of things not to some intelligent cause but to the four elements.

I think it is pretty obvious that this is, in fact, Plato’s position. He does not mock the belief in the immortality of the soul, afterlife, God, etc. but materialist views that lead to atheism.

The same views leading to atheism, according to which the four elements are primary and soul posterior to them, are criticized in Laws:

It appears that the person who makes these statements holds fire, water, earth and air to be the first of all things, and that it is precisely to these things that he gives the name of “nature,” while soul he asserts to be a later product therefrom. (891c)

As shown by A. E. Taylor:

Atheism is treated by Plato as identical with the doctrine that the world and its contents, souls included, are the product of unintelligent motions of corporeal elements. Against this theory, he undertakes to demonstrate that all corporeal movements are, in the last resort, causally dependent on “motions” of soul, wishes, plans, purposes, and that the world is therefore the work of a soul or souls, and further that these souls are good, and that there is one ἀρίστη ψιχή [ariste psyche], “perfectly good soul,” at their head.

- A. E. Taylor, Plato: The Man And His Work

This is not to say that people are not allowed to be atheists if they so choose, only that Plato in his dialogues does not teach atheism. On the contrary, he is committed to showing that intelligence is the ultimate cause of everything and that belief in this intelligence is the right belief for philosophers. Otherwise they would not be philosophers in a Platonic sense but materialist scientists.

Well, Koroljov was part of a Soviet team dispatched to Germany to recover rocket technology in September 1945, a whole year before Operation Osoaviakhim. And the R-7 took about ten years to develop with massive government backing.

But I agree that central planning does not seem to work especially within a system where the leadership's primary concern is to stay in power at all costs.

China's communists seem to have learned a lesson or two from the Russian failure, and even they have benefited from substantial technology and cash transfer from the West, started by David Rockefeller in the 1970's

I think at individual level there are many, including conflicting goals depending on the part of the world you happen to live, like getting a better job, buying a bigger house, getting a richer husband or younger and prettier wife, moving to a better area or country, etc.

Collectively, I can't think of any to be honest. Though, of course, there may be an evolutionary goal that Nature or God has planned for us and that has not yet been revealed. And even if it was revealed, most of us would probably be too busy with their own personal goals to be too concerned about the collective one.

Having said that, it is not entirely inconceivable that some collective goals may still exist if not globally, at least country-wise. For example, China's collective goal may be to take over the world in the near future.

The Soviets may have put the first man in space, but we must no forget how they got there. Aside from being provided with technological know-how by thousands of Western sympathizers (or useful idiots) and a worldwide industrial espionage network, most of the relevant technology was stolen from the Germans:

"Operation Osoaviakhim was a Soviet operation which took place on 22 October 1946, when MVD (previously NKVD) and Soviet Army units removed more than 2,200 German specialists – a total of more than 6,000 people including family members – from the Soviet occupation zone of post-World War II Germany for employment in the Soviet Union. Much related equipment was also moved, the aim being to literally transplant research and production research centers such as the relocated V-2 rocket center at Mittelwerk Nordhausen, from Germany to the Soviet Union, and collect as much material as possible from test centers such as the Luftwaffe's central military aviation test center at Erprobungstelle Rechlin, taken by the Red Army on 2 May 1945. "

Operation Osoaviakhim - Wikipedia

You need to show all of these are both impossible AND undesireable, and the same for socialism, to defend capitalism. — RolandTyme

I'm not saying capitalism is perfect so I don't need to defend it. The onus is on socialists to show that socialism is better than capitalism. And that is exactly what they have failed to do from the 1800's to the present.

IMHO, the real failure is a failure of liberalism as (mis-)represented by monopolistic capitalism on one side and totalitarian socialism on the other. And what they both seem to have in common is materialism.

Well, he may well have been someone’s hose nozzle as most politicians are. After all, politics is about power and power is where the money is.

However, he was already an anti-communist in the 1940’s when most people had some knowledge of the communist world and he simply expanded the existing anti-communist “rollback doctrine". Plus he was informed by the intelligence agencies once in office. So, he probably knew a bit more than the regular guy in the street.

I believe that this type of conception is promoted by atheists who approach this issue with a bias which encourages them to unreasonably reject the requirement of agency. — Metaphysician Undercover

Good point. Simmias’ theory of the soul as harmony is just a materialist proposition with a “Pythagorean” twist. It seemingly resembles the view attributed to some Pythagoreans, but there is no evidence to link it with an actual theory that makes exactly the same claims.

As observed by Sedley and Long, “no reliable source explicitly attributes to Philolaus the thesis that soul is an attunement”.

According to H. B. Gottschalk, the theory is actually Plato’s own creation. We need to recall that Plato’s main object here is to test his theories of Forms and Recollection and Simmias’ thesis presents a convenient opportunity to refute the views held by the materialists of the time.

H. B. Gottschalk, Soul as Harmonia – JSTOR

Socrates refers to it ironically at 77d-e and Cebes himself laughs at it just as Socrates smiles when Simmias presents his argument:

However, I think you and Simmias would like to carry on this discussion still further. You have the childish fear that when the soul goes out from the body the wind will really blow it away and scatter it, especially if a man happens to die in a high wind and not in calm weather.
And Cebes laughed and said, “Assume that we have that fear, Socrates, and try to convince us”

As shown by Lloyd Gerson, the whole Platonic project is based on an anti-materialist position. Plato believes in non-material intelligence and assumes an intelligent agency as ultimate cause.

So I think the issue of agency is an interesting one especially as at 86c Simmias generalizes his theory to include all the harmoniai found “in all the products of craftsmen.”

This reminds the careful reader of Plato’s Craftsman or Maker of the Cosmos ....

I do not see that this is a "different account". The soul, as an activity which rules over all the parts of the body must be present to all parts. So passions and desires, as emotions, are movements of the soul, and there is no inconsistency. — Metaphysician Undercover

Correct. Not "different account" but different perspective.

In the Phaedo, Socrates' objection is that the soul is non-composite in the sense of "not made of separate elements like the body" as implied by Simmias.

In the Republic, where Socrates is concerned with moral theory, the three "parts" of the soul are really psychological functions of the same one soul, in particular, as determinants of choice and voluntary action.

In addition, they are all governed by justice, dikaiosyne, which is the cardinal virtue of the soul and a manifestation of the Form of Justice that is responsible for order in all things including among Forms. (Which, incidentally, is why in Plato there is no need for a "Form of Harmony".)

Though the three functions of the soul (thought, emotion, desire) are often misconstrued as "parts", they were correctly seen as aspects of the same one soul.

For example, Aristotle in discussing the faculties of the soul, states that the soul is part rational and part irrational, adding that these may be seen "like the convex and concave aspects of the circumference of a circle and distinguishable as two only in definition and thought, and by nature inseparable".

By analogy, the soul's three psychological functions may be seen as the three sides (or corners) of one triangle or whichever way one chooses to illustrate it.

In any case, it is quite obvious that they can be understood only as pertaining to one inseparable whole.

I'm afraid it looks like Fooloso4 is totally unaware of the fact that the discussion is not about Pythagoras or Philolaus but about Simmias. In the Phaedo. Not in some other book, world or universe.

Admittedly, the confusion sometimes arises from the fact that Ancient Greek harmonia is not the same as English "harmony".

In English, the primary meaning of "harmony" is "combination of simultaneously sounded musical notes, especially as creating a pleasing effect".

In Greek, the primary meaning of harmonia is "a joining or fitting together". It does not even need to be a particularly good or "harmonious" one.

In musical terms, harmonia can mean the stringing of an instrument, a scale, mode or harmony, or music in general.

There is no doubt that various theories comparing the soul with a "harmony" were in circulation and that Simmias uses one version of these in his own argument.

However, it is clear from the context that in Simmias' argument, harmonia refers to the combination of the various parts of the lyre, viz., body, strings, pegs, notes, etc. that together make up the state of the instrument that enables it to produce the desired sound.

It is precisely for this reason that harmonia in better translations like the one by Sedley and Long (that I am using), is rendered as "attunement", not "harmony".

As Sedley and Long point out, "no reliable source explicitly attributes to him [Philolaus] the thesis that soul is an attunement" (p. 78).

In fact, there is no evidence that would link Simmias' argument with any theory of soul other than the one he himself describes in the dialogue, period. And what that theory is, I think has been more than sufficiently demonstrated.

As already stated, had "ratio", "proportion", or anything of that kind been central to Simmias' argument, he would have made this very clear. Instead, both he and Socrates keep talking about component parts of the body (elements and their properties) and of the lyre (lyre, strings, notes), and of both soul and attunement as being a "blend" or "compound" of those parts.

IMHO instead of making up his own dialogue, Fooloso4 should concede that he is mistaken and that he has lost the argument. Unfortunately, when people have taken the path of Straussian esotericism and sophistry, they are in constant danger of becoming lost in a fantasy world where every word, sentence or paragraph has a "secret meaning" that they alone can know and interpret for the rest of us ....

The short answer would have sufficed. But I guess two answers are better than none. And so long as Ivanka doesn't know more than we do, everything is alright :wink:

The dialogue under discussion is Phaedo.

Simmias makes no mention of proportions in his argument in this dialogue.

Simmias' argument is that the soul is like the attunement of a lyre.

The formula he uses is:

(A) x has F1 and F2
(B) y has F3 and F4
(C) F1 = F3
(D) F2 = F4
(E) Therefore x = y.

The soul (x) has F1 (“being composite like the body”) and F2 ("being a blend of the things in the body (86d) when these are held taut (92b))”.

The attunement (y ) has F3 (“being a composite thing (syntheton pragma) (92b)”) and F4 (“being a blend of the things in the lyre, body of the lyre, strings, and notes when these are tuned (86a, 92c)).

Therefore x (the soul) is like y (the attunement).

If y (the attunement) does not have features F3 and F4, then Simmias is unable to make his argument.

If y (the attunement) does have features F3 and F4, then y (the attunement) has the same features as x (the soul), viz., F1 (being a compound) and F2 (being a blend of the elements of the lyre when these are tuned), exactly as stated in the dialogue.

If "proportions" were the core of his argument, we can be certain that Simmias would have mentioned them in the discussion. After all, he was an educated person. The fact that he does not mention proportions but both he and Socrates mention "blend" and "composite thing" indicates that attunement here means "ordered arrangement" or "ordered compound".

"Harmony" can mean many things to many people and it may well be the case that Pythagoras or Philolaus would have presented the argument differently. But here we are dealing with the argument as presented by Simmias and it is unacceptable to put words in his mouth that he is not saying.

In any case, if a harmony is a "particular order", then a harmony is an order. And orders participate in the universal or Form of Order.

If Pythagoras has a "Form of Harmony," that is his problem. Plato does not need one, it does not occur in the dialogue, and it is nonsense to claim that it does. And even if it did occur, it would change absolutely nothing about the fact that in the dialogue Socrates proves the immortality of soul and that his conclusion is accepted by Simmias, Cebes, and Socrates himself.

Whatever the genetic or anthropological reasons for incest taboo, this is the one that matters to me. — T Clark

Could you explain "matters"? And do you mean you support or oppose the taboo?