I am too late to this thread to jump right in, but I will say, great discussion. I was exposed to positions I agreed with and those I disagreed with, but the arguments were strong all-round.

I was surprised to see very little use of the term 'neoliberal'. It seems to me that many of the issues raised in this discussion are best exemplified as criticisms of neoliberalism?

I don't buy that the term 'neoliberal' is meaningless. It strikes me as a pretty clear switch towards the market and other technocratic innovations, pure rationality, per the technocrats, as the only legitimate guiding principals?

Morality as a personal brand?

Regardless, I think the OP is correct. Liberalism is myopic. Perhaps, per Chris Hedges, 'turning a blind eye' is an inevitable byproduct?

This means we ultimately decide everything, through, in Satan's words, the "unconquerable will." — Count Timothy von Icarus

Okay, good.

You can also see this tend in the idea that ontology might be oppressive if it is not creative. On the classical view, this makes no sense. Ignorance is a limit on freedom, and being creative in error just binds you in ignorance. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Agreed.

Next, Marxism had been fairly popular in the West, particularly in academia, for a long time. But by the late Cold War, the many infamies of Marxist regimes had come to light and they seemed more like the norm rather than the exception for that ideology. People had already argued that capitalism was bankrupt and couldn't turn back now. Yet their great alternative was revealed to be more akin to Hitlerism than utopia, and no new alternative was forthcoming. So there is a sort of reflexive shell shock militating against strong belief. — Count Timothy von Icarus

True.

So that's the broad context, but then this is paired with a number of influential skeptical arguments of "skeptical solutions" to questions of knowledge. Wittgenstein, who has been interpreted in extremely diverse ways, is especially influential here. The linguistic turn and a tendency towards deflationism (or just bracketing out questions of truth) in logic also helps. I mentioned this in the thread on pragmatism. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Good points all around. :up:

On the one hand, you have Analytics who, burnt by incompleteness and undefinablity, decided that, since truth couldn't be defined to their satisfaction, it simply could not exist. The rules of their "games" were thus the ultimate measure of truth, and since they had very many games there must be very many truths, with no game to help them choose between them.

Elsewhere in the Analytic camp were those who became so committed to the idea of science as the "one true paradigm of knowledge," that they began to imagine that, if science couldn't explain consciousness, then consciousness (and thus conscience) must simply be done away with (i.e. eliminative materialism, which gets rid of the Good and the agent who might know it).

From the other side came Continentals who came to define freedom as pure potency and power, and so saw any definiteness as a threat to unlimited human liberty. On such a view, anything that stands outside man must always be a constriction on his freedom. Everything must be generated by the individual. Perhaps we can allow the world to "co-constitute" with us, but only if a sort of freedom and agency, which in the end is really "ours" anyhow, is given to the world.

The result is a sort of pincer move on the notions of Truth and Goodness (and we might add Beauty here too.) We might envisage the two armies of Isengaurd and Mordor. The first is motivated by belief that it cannot win. The second, by pure considerations of power, and so it assumes that everyone else must have the same motivations.

Good stuff. Also, it would be great if you learned how to add links to your quotes. :razz: You can actually highlight text, click "quote," and the website will do it for you.

A. This misses how heroic and good historical events (e.g. ending slavery) also involve strong conviction; and

B. That plenty of disastrous events, e.g. the fall of the Roman Republic and the later collapse of the Western Empire, stem more from a lack of conviction, not a surfeit of it. As Yeats put it:

The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

Sounds familiar. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Yes, that's also a good point.

Republic, 442 b-c is one place (using the analogy of the city). I think Plato refers to the spirited part of the soul as the "natural ally" of the rational part when he first introduces the typology .. too, and maybe in a few other places. This comes out in the chariot image of the Phaedrus too. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Sure. I am familiar with those but I will revisit them.

I think you can find the same sentiment expressed at many points in the Philokalia though, for example by Saint Diadochos of Photiki, who, unlike many Pagans, does not see the irascible appetites, or anger in particular, as bad, but rather sees them as tools for rebuking the appetites, passions, and demons. He memorably advised that one fashion a whip from the name of Christ and drive out the demons from the soul as Christ drives out the merchants from the temple (the body itself being a temple to the Holy Spirit). — Count Timothy von Icarus

That's fair, although that tradition is also wary of anger, if not spiritedness per se.

St. Thomas lays out a similar role for the irascible appetites in the first part of the second part of the Summa (roughly questions 20-30 IIRC), where he covers all the appetites (concupiscible then irascible) and discusses how none are evil of themselves, but are evil in their use (object, ordering to reason, or effect on habit). — Count Timothy von Icarus

Yes, and you have Thomas following Aristotle in contending that a lack of anger can at times be a vice.

A deficiency that might be compounded if you did things like cut the cultural canon (Homer, Virgil, Milton, etc.) out of education due to concerns of "bias." Having removed all "bias," nothing supports one view over any other. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Right!

Once tradition is considered evil and reason is considered impotent, a sort of anti-tradition revolutionary mindset is largely all that's left (along with the ascendancy of the victim).

Once tradition is considered evil and reason is considered impotent, a sort of anti-tradition revolutionary mindset is largely all that's left (along with the ascendancy of the victim). — Leontiskos

But there is a third possibility, to recognize that tradition has good and bad elements and that reason has its power, but also its limitations. Less dramatic, but much more reasonable. Sure, those who are addicted to excitement will worry about lack of "conviction", but excitement, in itself, is neither a good nor bad thing - it depends on what one gets excited about.

Less dramatic, but much more reasonable

"Reasonable" as in "known as true/good by reason," or "reasonable" as in the procedural, safety-centered sense of Rawls and co.?

"Reasonable" as in "known as true/good by reason," or "reasonable" as in the procedural, safety-centered sense of Rawls and co.? — Count Timothy von Icarus

I've developed a habit of using "reason" when I'm talking about a limited sense of reason, which has to do with truth/falsity and logic. When I'm thinking of a more expansive sense of reason - especially a sense that enables one to think carefully and coherently about values of one sort or another especially in the context of action - I use "reasonable". I started doing that so that I at least could keep straight in my mind which sense I was in at any given time.
Without prejudice to any different usage that Rawls may make of the word. Though reading some of your comments, I've wondered whether you shouldn't be developing a Greek sense of balance - it would help when considering issues of safety and such.

Having removed all "bias," nothing supports one view over any other. — Count Timothy von Icarus

A good example of this is the incoherence of saying gender and sexuality are malleable objects of choice. If we suspend the “bias” of “assigning” gender both an essence (male is one way, female another) and an application (this baby is a boy, that baby is a girl), there will be nothing on the landscape for someone to choose from when they might later decide to reassign themselves a new gender.

During adolescence, we must break from the authority of our parents in order to become fully formed individuals. Liberalism is the reification of adolescence as if it was full maturity, seeking always to break and tear down. The liberal forgets that as they destroy one institution, it gets replaced by another, or the destruction simply leads to a diminishment of life, just like the adolescent has not yet learned that there are reasons the adults constrain them, and that they will find they impose the same restraints on themselves and their children one day.

Gotcha.

Though reading some of your comments, I've wondered whether you shouldn't be developing a Greek sense of balance - it would help when considering issues of safety and such.

Well, that you think:

One might be tempted to conclude that the best option is to return to the belief that tradition is good and reason omnipotent. But there is a third possibility, to recognize that tradition has good and bad elements and that reason has its power, but also its limitations.

Needs to be said to me suggests a rather dramatic misreading on your part. What part of "liberalism has difficulties with thymos-phobia and logos-skepticism/phobia" suggested to you: "traditional is always good and reason is omnipotent?" was remotely on the table?

Where has anyone suggested anything like that? This has sadly been the norm throughout this thread. That all critiques of liberalism tend to get reduced to Stalinism or theocracy is actually something Fisher spends a lot of covering. "There can be no alternative, the solution to the problems of liberalism is always more liberalism."


Second, a concern for safety would motivate a proper acknowledgement and orientation of thymos to logos. Without this, liberal societies are subject to the decay of the state and norms we currently observe. This does not promote safety. Instead, it tends towards radical destabilization, e.g. active duty military forces being sent into major cities, a general support of lawlessness whenever it is "right," etc.

This is exactly what Tacitus and Juvenal say about their own epoch of republican decline. The citizens, desiring safety over justice and the arduous work of self-governance (agony in the Greek sense), ended up going down a path where they got (and deserved) neither.

One might be tempted to conclude that the best option is to return to the belief that tradition is good and reason omnipotent. — Ludwig V

What epoch do you believe we would be "returning" to in that case?

Needs to be said to me suggests a rather dramatic misreading on your part. What part of "liberalism has difficulties with thymos-phobia and logos-skepticism/phobia" suggested to you: "traditional is always good and reason is omnipotent?" was remotely on the table? — Count Timothy von Icarus

I apologize. This was carelessly and badly written. I don't see what I can do to make things right but to apologize and delete this paragraph. I hope that does something to make amends.

What epoch do you believe we would be "returning" to in that case? — Leontiskos

See above.

This OP you wrote 7 months ago is quite excellent, and something I think about a lot of the time. The way I look at it is that modern liberalism is nothing but a decentralization of human authority/power to the greatest extent that it appears we can engineer it. I'll admit that i have liberal values (i value openness), but I think your critique modern sexual culture gets to the root of all of it. If you're not willing to risk pregnancy and disease, then this presents issues for having sex itself, even though I don't want anyone to think i'm saying that contraception is "wrong" or anything like that, but the expectations of safe and stable child-rearing, safe sex, and childless sex do de-value the impulsive drive of sexual urge and attraction.

Thanks for bringing this up as I hadn't read it before (I joined the forum late).



I'd also like to comment on the topic of the opening post. These will be a few comments on liberalism "from the outside."

First, I'd like to thank the author for the content. Your post, as always, is systematic and phenomenological, which in itself sets your posts apart from the more pragmatic approach that dominates this forum.

Now, regarding the content itself. Before joining this forum, I hadn't noticed the fact that, within liberalism, the concepts of authoritarianism and totalitarianism are often conflated. This seems very maximalist for a representative of a "non-Western culture," because for my region, these two concepts are crucially different. Not that you specifically did this, but I wanted to point this out for clarity.
I'll try to explain my understanding of this distinction and why I think it's important. Sources cite various characteristics that can be used to distinguish one from the other (for example, Linz on types of non-democratic regimes), but it's difficult to discern the difference until you've experienced it firsthand. I'd like to highlight one key characteristic (among others):

Totalitarianism is a phenomenon whereby a person, citizen, or individual is transformed into an instrument of the state's dominant idea (a person is reformatted to fit the ideology, and if not, is subject to repression; for those ideologically loyal, the task must be accomplished at any cost. A person is a tool).

Authoritarianism is a phenomenon when an individual, citizen, or personality can pursue their private lives without interfering in state affairs (a strong hand, but I can live my own life).

Soft authoritarianism is characterized by paternalism: here, unlike liberalism, social benefits are provided not through competition, but in exchange for loyalty or non-interference in politics.

As for me, at the moment, I'm inclined to believe that soft authoritarianism may be preferable to liberalism under certain conditions. Unfortunately, this is an extremely unstable construct (external interference or resource depletion quickly destroys it), but sometimes it lasts for decades—like the "stagnation" of the Brezhnev era in the USSR. I'm not promoting this, but it's worth considering the social guarantees of that era: housing was free (although there were waiting lists); education was free; healthcare was free (with sick leave paid up to 100%); plus sanatoriums and children's camps. This, at the very least, makes you wonder: is it worth "shouting about freedom" or is it better to focus on stability? At the same time, internal ideological criticism (so-called "righteous anger") remained permissible. Here I mean criticism of individual government officials for not fulfilling party standards.

All these benefits, which could be achieved without excessive competition, evoke sentiments opposite to those described by Khan in his book, "The Burnout Society." You don't need to be the best—just do your usual duties, and you'll have everything you need. People don't need to "burn out," but stagnation sets in: the economy slows, lags behind technological progress, and the system gradually collapses (unless there's a constant resource like expensive oil). The "burnout society" gives way to a "sleep society." And we know what happened to the USSR.

But a more interesting question arises: hasn't the individual in the "burnout society" become a "tool," as in totalitarianism?

Another problem with liberalism (and in this it's no different from other ideologies) is its hostility to any "supra-ideological" criticism. You can confidently criticize Republicans or Democrats, but if you criticize the ideology itself, the state, or its consensus, you risk marginalization (not in the mines, as in totalitarianism, but social isolation).

Here I would like to say that the myopia of liberalism, which you initially write about, in my opinion, is being overcome from within extremely slowly—so slowly that there simply may not be enough time for change. I think the solution to the problem (by the way, you are proposing roughly the same thing) lies in the honest recognition by liberalism of the following idea: Freedom from everything (that is, the loss of all boundaries or limits) leads to dissolution into nothing.

This topic intrigued me. Phenomenology is good because it provides new keys to understanding. Now let's take these keys (which I suggested above) and check the numbers. I'll use two countries as an example: Singapore, with its soft authoritarianism and paternalism (one party for 65 years, elections, but don't get involved in politics, paternalism - housing/healthcare in exchange for loyalty) and South Korea, with its liberalism (22nd place in the world on the Democracy Index and the birthplace of Byung-Chul Han) and burnout society. And AI helped me with this:

Overall happiness level (on a scale of 0-10):
Singapore - 6.52 (30th place in the world),
South Korea - 6.06 (52nd place).
Singapore wins by 0.46 points.

Percentage of people who consider themselves happy:
Singapore - about 62%,
South Korea - 48%.
Singapore is ahead by 14%.

Youth happiness (under 30):
Singapore - 31st in the world,
South Korea - 62nd.
Young people in Singapore are happier.

Senior happiness (over 60):
Singapore - 26th,
South Korea - 10th.
Seniors in Korea are happier.

Life expectancy:
Singapore - 83 years,
South Korea - 82 years.
Singapore +1 year.

GDP per capita:
Singapore - $84,500,
South Korea - $35,000.
Singapore is 2.4 times richer.

Birth Rate (TFR, 2024)
Singapore: 0.97
South Korea: 0.75
Source: Statistics Korea, Reuters, The Guardian (February 2025).
Singapore is 29% higher

Youth Suicide Rate (10-29 years, 2024)

Singapore:
Overall: 5.91 per 100,000 (all ages).
Youth: ~9.14 per 100,000
South Korea:
Overall: ~24.6 per 100,000
Youth (10-29): ~7-9.1 per 100,000

Sources:
World Happiness Report 2024 (Gallup/Oxford), Ipsos Global Happiness Index 2024, World Bank, WHO.

Draw your own conclusions

the honest recognition by liberalism of the following idea: Freedom from everything (that is, the loss of all boundaries or limits) leads to dissolution into nothing. — Astorre

I agree. There is a yin of conservative permanence (boundaries and limits) needed for the yang of liberal progression (marked by new boundaries and new limits). And vice versa. Breathing is both in and out.

It’s never been either/or despite what campaigning politicians tell us.

The myopia of liberalism is really the recent (enlightenment) moment of the ancient myopia of prideful human beings; liberalism just made this pride more available to more of the masses. So many today feel entitled to know better than others, to know better than history, so much so we can talk of imposing our enlightened wills through force. We allow ourselves willingly to stay blind (myopic) to any challenges to the holier than thou perches we’ve built for ourselves. Because this used to be the role of the king and the pope and the high classes, we think we are being progressing behaving as tyrannically as only kings used to.

Liberalism taught us that there is no essential difference between a “king” and a commoner, so there is no such thing as an actual “king”, and we are all just citizens. We the people alone consent to our government. This is a good political starting point, so liberalism is a force for good, certainly in politics.

But the west is hollowing its own good ideas of meaning and political application.

Today, liberalism has no ability to recognize what is worth preserving and cultivating. It demands constant motion and redefinition. “Freedom from everything” as you say. We all pontificate about basic rights, and then allow others to tell us what those rights look like in practice, and what those rights don’t look like in practice. So what good is freedom if we freely use it to pick our slave master’s? Too many of us ask for a king, a government, to save us - which is a complete affront to the original liberal ideas of a constitutional republic.

But only rigorous discipline, daily practiced anew, builds the possibility of freedom. For instance, only a constitution fixed in stone, can guarantee political rights remain alive and functioning in the world. New leaders and new laws aren’t needed to protect life and liberty. The constitution is enough. Now brave people are needed to live freely. It should be simple to see this now, though it remains hard to live in practice. But instead, today’s liberalism seeks to make everything easy to live in practice (insulting words need hate speech legislation - we want life to be so easy we never face mere insult), so they strain and squint on the myopic view and ignore how utterly difficult and unrealistic this makes life in practice.

We are building slaves to blindness, using bright lights to do so.

We need to resist our own urges for the simplicity of myopia. We need to listen more, and humbly seek assistance from neighbors (not a government), while still taking responsibility to contribute to peace and prosperity.

Instead “fight” is the most important word we demand to hear from every politician, more important than clarifying what we might be fighting for, and more important than showing how what we fight for must include all human beings or it becomes a recipe for failure. But the perpetual revolution must run out of fuel. Nothing we do is perpetual, which is why we are fools for not treating our constitutional norms as fragile and precious.

But only rigorous discipline, daily practiced anew, builds the possibility of freedom. — Fire Ologist

Government and discipline aren't absolute necessities for freedom though, they're means of structuring freedom which is the very conundrum that this thread is criticizing.

I agree. There is a yin of conservative permanence (boundaries and limits) needed for the yang of liberal progression (marked by new boundaries and new limits). And vice versa. Breathing is both in and out. — Fire Ologist

I agree. I'll try to expand on my idea a bit.

Shifting boundaries, rethinking boundaries—that's truly necessary. This is the very essence of the process of becoming: humans, culture, and society exist in a mode of constantly refining and clarifying limits. But the abolition of boundaries is not the same thing. Shifting is work, responsibility, choice. Abolition is a renunciation of responsibility, replacing becoming with dissolution.

I think this can be clearly seen in a simple example. Let's imagine someone deciding, "The skeleton limits human flexibility." They could even hold a rally demanding "freedom from the skeleton." I have a feeling nothing good will come of it. Because some boundaries are conditions for movement, not obstacles.

Here's an example of rethinking boundaries. With age, joints wear out, and some can be replaced. This is an intervention in boundaries, yes. But it is a conscious action that requires calculating risks, understanding the consequences, and taking responsibility for the body. We are not abolishing joints as a class of phenomena.

The same is true in a political-cultural sense. No being exists in an ontological void. When we shift boundaries, we always do something else: either we make room for another, or we take space from another.

And this is something that is often forgotten within the framework of that very "freedom from everything": that any gesture of liberation is always a gesture of redistribution of space between beings. And remembering this is no less important than remembering one's own rights and one's own development.

Today, liberalism has no ability to recognize what is worth preserving and cultivating. — Fire Ologist

This is the key point. How can this be surpassed from within the ideology of freedom from everything? I have no idea.

As long as the Western world had a solid skeleton of everything it was gradually freeing itself from, everything looked wonderful. Today, it's become clear that not everything is as simple as it seemed.



I'd also like to introduce a bit of honesty. We're so intent on exaggerating that rereading this text might give the impression that the world will collapse tomorrow. (It's not for nothing that governments around the world try to exclude criticism of their own ideology.) But no. For now, this looks like just the intuition of a small number of people. Tomorrow, the world could take a turn no one could have imagined.

I personally take those happiness measurements with a grain of salt...true "national happiness" relies on a balance of a lot of different things, and clearly happiness still is not guaranteed for everyone who lives in the country. National happiness probably has very little to do with ideology as well...for example, Finland is often tauted as the happiest country in the world, but their government and lifestyles are very much in line with liberalism, far exceeding south korea in the democracy index you brought up. Interestingly enough, the united states has a worse democracy index rating than south korea, but has a slightly higher happiness score...

Frankly, there's no methodological precision in presenting these statistics. I was simply suddenly intrigued by the question: what if we compare the indices of two very similar countries, but with different political regimes? There was no one to compare the US with.

Government and discipline aren't absolute necessities for freedom though — ProtagoranSocratist

But there needs to be something in place, some structure, before freedom can be enjoyed. Something needs to be necessary.

they're means of structuring freedom which is the very conundrum that this thread is criticizing. — ProtagoranSocratist

It does seem like a paradox. I see the conundrum of sorts, but don’t see it as an impasse or contradiction to the possibility of freedom.

This is the highest wisdom that I own; freedom and life are earned by those alone who conquer them each day anew. — Goethe

This is rigorous discipline. We don’t achieve freedom and then simply remain free. We achieve freedom by achieving, a rigorous acting towards modesties we have set for ourselves. Freedom exists in living freely, not in some stagnant, unmoving free thing being free with no effort. But nevertheless, the stagnant unmoving structure is that out of which one might live freely.

Shifting boundaries, rethinking boundaries—that's truly necessary. This is the very essence of the process of becoming: humans, culture, and society exist in a mode of constantly refining and clarifying limits. But the abolition of boundaries is not the same thing. Shifting is work, responsibility, choice. Abolition is a renunciation of responsibility, replacing becoming with dissolution. — Astorre

That is great stuff. :100:

No being exists in an ontological void. When we shift boundaries, we always do something else: either we make room for another, or we take space from another. — Astorre

Yes it is like freedom may exist (or may not) in the space between boundaries and structures.

And this is something that is often forgotten within the framework of that very "freedom from everything": that any gesture of liberation is always a gesture of redistribution of space between beings. And remembering this is no less important than remembering one's own rights and one's own development. — Astorre

Yes. It is like one person’s freedom must have a cost, and that cost involves an imposition (an oppression) on some other thing, or space, or another person.

Today, liberalism has no ability to recognize what is worth preserving and cultivating.
— Fire Ologist

This is the key point. How can this be surpassed from within the ideology of freedom from everything? I have no idea.

As long as the Western world had a solid skeleton of everything it was gradually freeing itself from, everything looked wonderful. Today, it's become clear that not everything is as simple as it seemed. — Astorre

Yes, it is romantic to feel so free as we tear every institution down, but now we find ourselves in a world where we no longer know what to do, and this is a new limitation, a new enslavement of sorts with nowhere to look to direct our iconoclasm and revolution.

I have no idea either, but think it has to do with two things. First, the western reification of linear rational thinking has led us to overlook the importance and raw reality of the paradoxes of being human. We in the west run into a paradox or an antimony and we call it a dead end, and turn around and run away. We need to embrace paradox, and occassionally recognize the reality of the impossible. This is how freedom immerges, impossibly. Second, we are the cause of our own slavery. Like original sin, it’s in our nature to enslave ourselves. We sort of fear or just fail to recognize the goodness of the limitations inherent in freedom and we lash out, destroying our own possibility of freedom. (And of course this is a paradox as well.).

I think it may be as simple as maturity. We have a duty (so a limitation is put on us) to seek and build our own freedom. We have to take responsibility away from the society and the government and biology and the universe and place our freedom in our own hands. (We can seek help, but it must remain up to me for me to be free.). We cannot be made to be free anymore. We need to make ourselves free. And then freedom only happens in flashing instantaneous moments, before we fall asleep again and need to start all anew…

So I may have merely in all of this really just reframed the issue, offering a description but no solution or reasoning.

But then again, a linear reasoning comprised of fixed, immobile beings, will not do justice to the becoming that is the heart of the things that live, like freedom and learning, and knowing and most of all loving.

Think of love as the purpose of freedom. No such thing as freedom, and there is no such thing as love. But no such thing as fixed knowable boundary, and there is no such thing as freedom. (I’m moving too freely now, so I’ll set my boundary right here…)

Think of love as the purpose of freedom. No such thing as freedom, and there is no such thing as love. But no such thing as fixed knowable boundary, and there is no such thing as freedom. (I’m moving too freely now, so I’ll set my boundary right here…) — Fire Ologist

This is a wonderful act of self-determination, something only a truly existing, becoming subject is capable of. (I'm actually working on a related ontology project.)

By the way, recently in another thread here on the forum, someone posted a link to a study in which scientists demonstrated the non-algorithmic nature of the world.

https://arxiv.org/pdf/2507.22950

And it was a great inspiration to me. For there are things in the world that we have yet to discover, things to be disappointed in, things to criticize, or things to repent of.