Aristotle has it that the Prime Mover must be an intellectual nature. — Count Timothy von Icarus

As an aside, ‘intellectual’ is a very poor translation for what I take to be the intended meaning. ‘Intellectuals’ are stuffy fellows - they’re nearly always fellows - discussing arcane conceptions. It conveys none of the dynamism (a philosophical term that has its origin in Aristotle) that the word is really meant to convey. It’s more like the ‘pleroma’, a endless and timeless fount and source, the source of intelligibility which gives rise to everything and which reason is able to grasp (hence the ‘divinity of the intellect’ in Aristotelian philosophy.)

More to the point, from what I so far gather, modern metaphysical naturalism rejects the very notion of ontologically occurring purpose—this just as materialism/physicalism does. — javra

Because it seeks explanations in terms of physics, in which the notion of reason in the sense of ‘the reason for’ is excluded. Even the physicalist’s sense of ‘spirit’ is like that - it seeks to understand it as some kind of ethereal thing, rather than as being, which is what we are, not an object of analysis. ‘Too near for us to grasp’.

Plotinus is not talking about the relationship between knower and known — Paine

Indeed he is not, which is why it was not relevant to the question I raised, which was about that relationship.

'The gods' are, of course, those of the Greek pantheon
— Wayfarer

Are they? I would think that Plotinus would agree with Socrates' criticism of the gods in Euthyphro. — Fooloso4

When Plotinus says:

He will leave that behind, and choose another, the life of the gods — Ennead 1.2. 30, translated by Armstrong

which 'gods' are they? What does 'the life of the gods' refer to?

For I refer to all philosophers as divine.

Why would he consider philosophers, in particular, 'divine'?

In the Iliad Homer call salt divine (9.214) — Fooloso4

So if everything is divine, then the word means nothing. Is that the drift of the argument? That 'the divine' has no referent?

But they don’t cut it mate. I’ve said before, I respect your intelligence, I’ve learned things from you about philosophy of math (mainly, how little I know.) I have to say that you’re completely wrong about Trump, he’s malignant, mendacious, and a threat to the American Republic. Until you’re willing to acknowledge that, we have nothing further to discuss about it.

I could go on. — fishfry

You do.

I confess that my media diet is a little skewed to the right these days. — fishfry

And

The J6 committee was a fraud on the American people. — fishfry

The first statement explains the second. And, it’s more than ‘a little’. But there’s no way to make someone see what he or she doesn’t want to see, so let’s leave it for now. (Although how a forensic retelling of an attack on the American people could be a fraud on the American people beggars logic.)

Although as this is the Election thread, not the Trump thread, I’ll add I still don’t believe Biden will be the eventual Democratic nominee. I just wish folks would say that he should ‘pass the baton’. It sounds a lot less hostile than that he should resign or quit. It is really what he must be persuaded to do, and, I believe, will be.

Joe Stalin was an authoritarian. — fishfry

You know that Trump on multiple occasions has sucked up to Putin? That he stood on the world stage with him and said he trusted Putin above his own intelligence agencies? That he thinks Kim Jong Un is a really neat guy, even saying once that they were 'in love'? Why is it that the only political leaders he's ever expressed admiration for, if not because they're role models for him? Not that he's got anywhere near the guts or the guile to actually pull it off. Fortunately.

If you happen to have a reference to Trump's influence on the GOP abandonment of Lankford's bill I'd appreciate it — fishfry

Trump says border bill ‘very bad’ for Lankford’s career

Former President Trump on Monday railed against the bipartisan border agreement and took aim at Sen. James Lankford (R-Okla.), a key negotiator, for his role in brokering the deal.

In an interview on “The Dan Bongino Show,” Trump denied endorsing Lankford’s candidacy in 2022 — despite doing so publicly — and did not rule out endorsing a primary opponent when Lankford is up for reelection in 2028. ...

Ahead of the bill text’s release, Trump had attacked the prospect of the legislation, branding it as a political victory for Democrats ahead of the 2024 election — a message he repeated in Monday’s interview.“This is a gift to Democrats, and this, sort of, is a shifting of the worst border in history onto the shoulders of Republicans. That’s really what they want. They want this for the presidential election, so they can now blame the Republicans for the worst border in history,” Trump said. — Feb 2024

As mentioned, Lankford was then censured by his own party. This for a straight up-and-down Republican who has toed the party line on every single issue.

I just don't see how a guy who got so easily subverted by his underlings could be an authoritarian. — fishfry

And I just don't know how you can say that. He's on the record suggesting, for instance, that the constitution ought to be suspended, that he plans to purge the civil service and stock it with his operatives, and intends to use the Department of Justice against his enemies. The last few weeks, there's been a lot of press over Project 2025, which likewise plans to implement plainly authoritarian policies - Trump has been trying to disassociate himself from it, but it is almost entirely composed of ex-Trump aides and staffers, and he's spoken at the Heritage Foundation on a number of occasions. But then, you know, but seem to downplay or rationalise, that Trump sicked his mob on the Capital Building, leading to multiple deaths and hundreds of arrests and jail sentences, one of the darkest days in American history. Why you're OK with that I can't fathom.

Recall a few posts back, you said:

What I am trying to underline in the discussion is the particular way Plotinus offers a solution to your thesis — Paine

I have been arguing that the passage you referred to from the Enneads at that point is specifically about the distinction between 'civic virtue' and those seeking to attain 'likeness to the gods'. That passage addresses that distinction quite clearly. Hence my digression into the role of 'the divine' and revelation in the metaphysics of Greek philosophy in answer to Fooloso4's question.

Whereas, the thesis you were responding to, was Gerson's paraphrase of an argument in De Anima, to wit:

In thinking, the intelligible object or form is present in the intellect, and thinking itself is the identification of the intellect with this intelligible.

And that is a reference to the knowledge of forms, as represented Aristotle's hylomorphic (matter-form) philosophy: that the intellect (nous) is what grasps or perceives the forms of things, which is that by which we know what particulars truly are. I take this principle as basic to the epistemology of hylomorphism.

Furthermore, the principle of the 'union between the knower and the form of the known' becomes a dominant theme in ancient and medieval philosophy. There are many references to this in online digests of Aquinas' philosophy (e.g. here and here.)

Now, so far, what I've said above, I would regard as general knowledge, and not requiring specialist knowledge of the Greek texts.

So far so good?

I'm sorry, but I don't understand what you're saying. For the last several posts, I've been addressing the issue of the interpretation of the paragraph from the Enneads that you presented, which I think I have done. The additional point I made to fooloso4 about Leo Strauss was in respect of the broader issue of the relationship between philosophy and revelation and the bearing that might have on interpreting Plotinus. It can be taken as a footnote.

Gift link to today’s 5,000 word NY Times editorial, Trump is Unfit to Lead.

Some excerpts:

Mr. Trump has shown a character unworthy of the responsibilities of the presidency. He has demonstrated an utter lack of respect for the Constitution, the rule of law and the American people. Instead of a cogent vision for the country’s future, Mr. Trump is animated by a thirst for political power: to use the levers of government to advance his interests, satisfy his impulses and exact retribution against those who he thinks have wronged him.

He is, quite simply, unfit to lead. …

He lies blatantly and maliciously, embraces racists, abuses women and has a schoolyard bully’s instinct to target society’s most vulnerable. He has delighted in coarsening and polarizing the town square with ever more divisive and incendiary language. Mr. Trump is a man who craves validation and vindication, so much that he would prefer a hostile leader’s lies to his own intelligence agencies’ truths and would shake down a vulnerable ally for short-term political advantage. His handling of everything from routine affairs to major crises was undermined by his blundering combination of impulsiveness, insecurity and unstudied certainty. …

On Jan. 6, 2021, Mr. Trump incited a mob to violence with hateful lies, then stood by for hours as hundreds of his supporters took his word and stormed the Capitol with the aim of terrorizing members of Congress into keeping him in office. He praised these insurrectionists and called them patriots; today he gives them a starring role at campaign rallies, playing a rendition of the national anthem sung by inmates involved with Jan. 6., and he has promised to consider pardoning the rioters if re-elected. He continues to wrong the country and its voters by lying about the 2020 election, branding it stolen, despite the courts, the Justice Department and Republican state officials disputing him. No man fit for the presidency would flog such pernicious and destructive lies about democratic norms and values, but the Trumpian hunger for vindication and retribution has no moral center. …

Mr. Trump has demonstrated contempt for… American ideals. He admires autocrats, from Viktor Orban to Vladimir Putin to Kim Jong-un. He believes in the strongman model of power — a leader who makes things happen by demanding it, compelling agreement through force of will or personality. In reality, a strongman rules through fear and the unprincipled use of political might for self-serving ends, imposing poorly conceived policies that smother innovation, entrepreneurship, ideas and hope. …

Those who know Mr. Trump’s character best — the people he appointed to serve in the most important positions of his White House — have expressed grave doubts about his fitness for office.

His former chief of staff John Kelly, a retired four-star Marine Corps general, described Mr. Trump as “a person who admires autocrats and murderous dictators. A person that has nothing but contempt for our democratic institutions, our Constitution and the rule of law.” Bill Barr, whom Mr. Trump appointed as attorney general, said of him, “He will always put his own interest and gratifying his own ego ahead of everything else, including the country’s interest.” James Mattis, a retired four-star Marine general who served as defense secretary, said, “Donald Trump is the first president in my lifetime who does not try to unite the American people — does not even pretend to try.”

Mike Pence, Mr. Trump’s vice president, has disavowed him. No other vice president in modern American history has done this. “I believe that anyone who puts themselves over the Constitution should never be president of the United States,” Mr. Pence has said. “And anyone who asked someone else to put them over the Constitution should never be president of the United States again.”

And a shorter but essentially similar OP from the LA TImes:

...Trump is the only man in the presidential race manifestly unworthy of holding a position of power, and has no business ever returning to the White House. If the GOP had any decency left, its members would be discussing whether to dump Trump for a candidate who isn’t out to bulldoze democratic institutions in favor of autocracy.

Voters should resist viewing this contest through the politics-as-usual lens of past elections. This November is not about dueling personalities, middle-of-the-road policy differences, or as some might see it, an 81-year-old man being the lesser of two evils compared with a 78-year-old man. It’s nothing short of a referendum on our 248-year democracy, and a choice between a trustworthy public servant who upholds American values and a serial liar who wants to push the country into authoritarianism.

Could Karma be the expression of basic physical laws of motion emerging/permeating into the sphere of sophisticated societal dynamics? — Benj96

I don't think so. There used to be a lot of talk about Buddhism being a 'scientific religion' in the early 20th c based on the idea that karma was a kind of 'scientific law', but I think that is groundless. Nevertheless, I implicitly accept karma as the basis of my own ethical outlook, with the important caveat that it can easily lead to fatalism and finger-pointing. Karma should only ever be regarded as a regulative principle in my view.

No reader of Natural Right and History would think that is what just got said. — Paine

Well, I'm not among them. I'm too old to go into either Heidegger or Strauss in any depth, I only mentioned it to @Fooloso4 because it is through his posts that I've become familiar with Strauss at all, and I think the section I linked to about Strauss' view of the relationship of philosophy and revelation is germane.

FWIW, I think 'revelation' is equated with 'revealed religion', thence 'religious dogma' and automatically discounted on those grounds. Whereas I think there's a religious dimension to Greek philosophy, which is neglected on that basis.

Incidentally, and apropos of Leo Strauss, I find a section in his SEP entry on Philosophy and Revelation:

On Strauss’s reading, the Enlightenment’s so-called critique of religion ultimately also brought with it, unbeknownst to its proponents, modern rationalism’s self-destruction. Strauss does not reject modern science, but he does object to the philosophical conclusion that “scientific knowledge is the highest form of knowledge” because this “implies a depreciation of pre-scientific knowledge.” As he put it, “Science is the successful part of modern philosophy or science, and philosophy is the unsuccessful part—the rump” (JPCM, p. 99). Strauss reads the history of modern philosophy as beginning with the elevation of all knowledge to science, or theory, and as concluding with the devaluation of all knowledge to history, or practice.

Something with which I'm in agreement. I wonder if he had any professional contact with Mircea Eliade, who was a peer at the University of Chicago during his tenure, and from whom a lot of what I've learned about comparative religion was drawn.

I want to ask, from what I understand the forebrain was developed by our need for the use of tools in its earliest stages. I do want to know that how could something so simple as the need to use and create tools could have led to so much of what defines human beings. What are your thoughts on the matter? — Shawn

That the Darwinist account tends to invariably be reductionist, because it looks at the question solely solely in terms of the benefit it has for reproduction. That because of the role of Darwinian biology in our culture, as a kind of secular creation myth, it has no conceptual space for the kinds of questions that our highly-developed forebrain allows us to ask. And that this is one of the root causes of what John Vervaeke describes as 'the meaning crisis' - even while the evolutionary account may be perfectly sound in its own terms. (Now there's a can'o'worms for you ;-) )

I agree, but, is conceptualization something that can be specified any further? — Shawn

Looking at it, again, from a kind of biological anthropology - the evolution of the h.sapiens forebrain was one of the most (if not THE most) spectacular and unparalleled events known to evolutionary science. I read an interesting account, in a book by a medical science writer, James Le Fanu (ref), on what was involved in the transition from simian to hominid anatomy, because the hominid cranium is far larger than that of its simian forebears, and this also had to be accomodated with the shift to bipedalism. This mean the birth canal of hominids had to be smaller, while the head of the infant was much larger - the reason that human babies are born with soft skulls, the fontanelle, which hardens during the first months of life. All in support of this fantastically elaborated brain anatomy, which enabled language, conceptualisation, tool-making, story-telling and many of the other essentially human characteristics of our species. (Le Fanu also notes that the payoff for these developments had to take a very long view, as it results in far higher instances of birth trauma and maternal mortality than among simian species, while for many hundreds of thousands of years, the rewards of that larger brain capacity may not have been abundantly obvious.)

... but likeness to the gods is likeness to the model, a being of a different kind to ourselves.
— Ennead 1.2. 30, translated by Armstrong

What is the model that this is a likeness of? If for us this life is one of renunciate spirituality, is it that for the gods as well? Do the gods too have desires that they must overcome? Can we become a being of a different kind? — Fooloso4

They're foundational questions in this context. 'The gods' are, of course, those of the Greek pantheon, but from comparative religion, we learn that have much in common with the other Indo-European cultures, so there are parallels with the Indian pantheon. But in this case, they represent 'the divine' - a word is from the Indo-european root 'deva'. Notice that Parmenides' prose-poem is said to have been 'given' to him by the Goddess. The knowledge of which he speaks is rooted in revealed truth, not dialectical reasoning, although he then deploys reasoning in support of it. (I think in modern terminology, it would be described as 'trans-rational'.) But I notice references to the divine ('the devas') in many of the excepts being discussed in the thread in ancient philosophy. It is part of the assumed background of their world, and I personally think it's mistaken to regard it as a simple figment or archaic superstition, even if that is the consensus of today's disenchanted world.

Renunciate spirituality seeks to sever ties with or go beyond the sensory domain, 'the world' - the world of mundane attachments, pains and pleasures, so as to seek what Alan Watts' described as 'the supreme identity' in his book of that name. It means realising an identity with the One (or Brahman or the Godhead). Plotinus was said by Porphyry to have twice entered a state of supreme ecstasy corresponding to that awareness. It is said that his last words were 'to restore the divine (or: the god) in us (or: in you) back to the divine in the All'.

As to whether this is a realisable aim - the IEP entry on Pierre Hadot says

For all of Hadot’s evident enthusiasm for Plotinus’ philosophy...Plotinus: the Simplicity of Vision concludes with an assessment of the modern world’s inescapable distance from Plotinus’ thought and experience. Hadot distances himself from Plotinus’ negative assessment of bodily existence, and he also displays a caution in his support for mysticism, citing the skeptical claims of Marxism and psychoanalysis about professed mysticism, considering it a lived mystification or obfuscation of truth (PSV 112-113). Hadot would later recall that, after writing the book in a month and returning to ordinary life, he had his own uncanny experience: “. . . seeing the ordinary folks all around me in the bakery, I . . . had the impression of having lived a month in another world, completely foreign to our world, and worse than this—totally unreal and even unlivable.”

But I think this can be acknowledged, without thereby vitiating the mystical element in Plotinus' (and indeed Plato's) spirituality, which is a vital interpretive key in my view. Interpreted through that perspective, the meaning of the passage we're discussing sprang out at me, without any need to reference the political element of The Republic.

Is the fact that human beings are sentient that, we (human beings), are the only kind that contemplates the concept…. — Shawn

that contemplates any ‘concept’. Conceptualisation relies on abstraction, the ability to represent and to imagine. Is there evidence that any species other than h.sapiens possesses those abilities? (I know that Caledonian crows and some other species can display rudimentary reasoning abilities, but doesn’t qualify as truly conceptual ratiocination in my view.)

I think the question you’re asking can otherwise most profitably be viewed through the lens of anthropology and palaeontology. For instance Agustin Fuentes’ Why We Believe (although there are many others on the theme.) But it’s not hard to imagine early hominids witnessing the birth and death of their kin and prey animals, the cycles of the seasons and the bounty of nature and attributing it to or imbuing it with agency. And it’s also well-documented that humans have had a sense of the sacred since paleolithic times, evidenced by statuary, art and ritual burial practices. Of course the ancient origins are ‘lost in the mists of time’ as the saying has it, but it goes back well beyond the beginning of recorded history.

From my point of view non-duality means monism — JuanZu

I studied non-dualism (actually Advaita) as a unit in comparative religion, and one of the first things we were taught is that non-dualism is *not* monism. I’m now vague on exactly what was said, but it was along the lines that, in order for there to be ‘one’, there has to be another in order to be aware of it. Non-dualism means, rather, ‘not-divided’ or ‘not-two’ - actually the meaning of Advaita is literally that, as ‘a-‘ is the negative particle in Sanskrit (equivalent to ‘un-‘ in English) and ‘dvai’ is ‘dual’ or ‘divided’. So the meaning of Advaita is really ‘undivided’ or ‘not two’, and what it really means, is overcoming or dissolving the sense of ‘otherness’ that normally pervades all of mundane existence. As such it’s dangerous to make a theory or hypothesis out of it, as it is not a matter of propositional knowledge, but a state of being (designated sat-chit-ananda, ‘being-knowing-bliss’.)

I understand the idea of Atman being, shall we say, shards of Brahman, limiting itself in order to experience things in different ways. But that, itself, is speculation — Patterner

According to the Advaita, as I understand it, it is only a matter of speculation for the ignorant (in which I include myself of course). As for whether the material world is of a ‘different nature’ to mind, that assumes you can make an object out of mind and then compare it to the world. I see the point as being, rather, that even the experience of cold, hard reality - falling on concrete for instance - is still something that occurs within experience. It’s not as if there’s the material on one side and the experience on another, the reality is the experience of falling, the sensation of hardness, the pain of impact. Within which the objective and subjective elements are poles of experience, neither of which can be experienced in the absence of the other.

So you'd know the name Senator James Lankford, and why he made news a couple of months back.
— Wayfarer

Had to look that one up, perhaps I missed your point. — fishfry

Senator James Lankford is a strict conservative GOP member who was on a bipartisan committee tasked with addressing border issues. He drove a very hard bargain and got many more concessions out of the Democrats than anyone had expected, getting them to agree to what many of them thought were overly harsh measures that the GOP had been demanding for years. But then before it went to a vote, Trump got wind of it and said he didn’t want it to go ahead. Why? Because it would take away his talking points about the country being flooded with Mexican rapists. So Lankford was then pressured to vote against his own hard-fought legislation, rather than bring it to the floor - because it might have been a solution. Trump would rather keep his talking points than actually solve the problem. For his trouble, Lankford was then censured by the Oklahoma Republican Party, for the mortal sin of working with Democrats.

Trump was arguably less authoritarian than any of them, simply because he knew so little about how the government works that he got rolled by the bureaucrats and betrayed by the people who worked for him. — fishfry

That probably also explains why 24 previous aides and allies went on the record saying he was unfit for office and a danger to democracy.

Apologies to all if my above contributions have been off the mark.

But the good man may not be able to live the life of the gods, nor might he want to.

What does that life look like? This:

renunciate spirituality
— Wayfarer
?

Surely there is more to the life of a god. — Fooloso4

We discussed the various examples of what I'm referring to in an earlier thread on esoteric philosophies. I seem to recall I gave the examples of Advaita Vedanta and Zen Buddhism, to which you replied something like 'you have to be prepared to believe in such things'.

There are numerous references to 'the gods' and 'the divine' scattered through the ancient texts. What does that signify to you? Remnants of archaic beliefs now superseded?

I think one of the characteristics of Eastern philosophical religions, like Advaita and Tibetan Buddhism, is that for various historical reasons they seem to have been able to maintain a closer relationship with their ancient roots. Which is why for instance a Swami of the Vedanta Order still appears in monastic robes (in his many youtube videos!) Likewise for many Tibetan Rinpoches.

Plotinus goes far beyond Plato — Metaphysician Undercover

Nevertheless, didn't he himself insist that he was simply explicating what was implicit in Plato?

I thought this was one for the collection :-)

If I knew what that meant, perhaps I would feel insulted. — T Clark

Hey this is in Pollitico today, about weed drinks (i.e. beverages infused with THC.) Gotta say, if THC Iced Tea were available near where I live, I'd be all in. (It's probably better that they're not :yikes: )

I have followed southern border politics for decades — fishfry

So you'd know the name Senator James Lankford, and why he made news a couple of months back.

Bunch of unarmed people are invited in by the Capitol cops — fishfry

So you think Mike Pence should have hung?

Trump will, of course, not change, but with his king makers behind him, those who want authoritarian rule will rejoice — Fooloso4

I'm convinced that most of Trump's backers are not in because they like Trump or think that he's any good but because they can use him to pursue their own nefarious ends. And the only way that works is by sucking up to him and telling him how great he is. That's how Putin and Kim Jong Un have played him like a fiddle. Works every time, but only if he thinks you're someone who's opinion counts.

being disembodied means you are dead. — Paine

However, the Gerson paper you linked to 'The Unity of Intellect in Aristotle' (and thank you for it) says right at the beginning 'This (i.e. 'agent') intellect is, in Aristotle's view, all the things he repeatedly says it is, including immortal.' (However, I will continue with that paper.)

I understand the passage as demonstrating the vast difference between Plato and Plotinus when they speak of the philosopher's return to the cave. — Paine

Here is that passage again:

For instance, he will not make self-control consist in that former observance of measure and limit, but will altogether separate himself, as far as possible, from his lower nature and will not live the life of the good man which civic virtue requires. He will leave that behind, and choose another, the life of the gods: for it is to them, not to good men, that we are to be made like. — Ennead 1.2. 30, translated by Armstrong

Doesn't this plainly disparage the notion of 'civic virtue' and 'living the life of the good man' in favour of 'leaving that behind' and 'choosing another' - the 'life of the Gods' - and that we are to strive to be 'like them' and not simply 'good citizens'? The meaning seems very clear to me, without any external references. As mentioned, there are direct parallels to other schools of renunciate spirituality that characterised the ancient world, Eastern and Western.

And are there 'vast differences' between Plotinus and Plato? I readily grant at every juncture that your knowledge of the texts greatly exceeds my own, but I had thought it well-established that Plotinus saw himself as no more than a faithful exegete of Plato.

I don't see the value of the broad generalities offered by Gerson, Perl, Fraser, and the like. — Paine

I agree that we're talking past one another. That's why I've tried to explain my perspective on the topic. I'm not reading it as a classicist, comparing and contrasting various interpretations of ancient philosophy in which you're plainly better versed than am I (and I am learning a lot from it!) But I see Perl, Gerson, and Feser, as being concerned with retrieving what was and remains vital about classical philosophy as a living truth, not as museum pieces to be compared and contrasted. Many here among us will simply take it for granted that we're physical beings, no different in essence to other species, although considerably more dangerous due to our numbers and technology. But what if the truth were that we are 'immortal souls housed in corporeal bodies'?

Like Macbeth, Western man made an evil decision, which has become the efficient and final cause of other evil decisions. Have we forgotten our encounter with the witches on the heath? It occurred in the late fourteenth century, and what the witches said to the protagonist of this drama was that man could realize himself more fully if he would only abandon his belief in the existence of transcendentals. The powers of darkness were working subtly, as always, and they couched this proposition in the seemingly innocent form of an attack upon universals. The defeat of logical realism in the great medieval debate was the crucial event in the history of Western culture; from this flowed those acts which issue now in modern decadence. — Richard Weaver, Ideas have Consequences, Pp2-3

I sense I have worn out my welcome. — Paine

Not at all. The fact that we keep coming back to contesting Gerson's interpretations indicates that this thread has stayed on-topic.

there is actually quite a strong relationship between traditional philosophy and modern culture.
— Wayfarer

Interesting. Where do you mostly find this connection? How different would you expect them to be? Doesn't it depend on what is meant by the terms? — Amity

Actually I went back and re-wrote that passage, it was the opposite of what I had meant to say. I meant to say there's a strong tension between traditional philosophy and modern culture (hence I added the word 'suspicion'.)

It seems that there is indeed a rewinding of time and progress. Or is this all of an eternal cycle and we should expect it? Is this something we can fight against...? — Amity

It's a very tricky issue. I went to University with a convinced proponent of 'the traditionalists' who introduced me to them, including René Guenon and Frithjof Schuon. Guenon was a Frenchman who migrated to Egypt and wrote on esoteric and Eastern philosophy, his Wiki entry was here. I was quite favourably disposed towards him, but when I heard that Steve Bannon was quoting him I was appalled, as I despise his form of 'conservatism' (if indeed that is what it is). I've done some more reading and changed my view a little - there's a good scholarly book on 'the perennialists' called Against the Modern World, Mark Sedgewick. It makes their antagonism towards modernity and liberalism pretty clear. Nevertheless I think they're worth knowing about - I heard Bernardo Kastrup railing against them recently, that they're a cult movement with no scholarly integrity, but I don't agree with that, either.

In any case, they're hardly the only ones who are 'against modernity'. There are many critiques of post-Enlightenment philosophy, including some from the New Left (see the Critique of Instrumental Reason). Although I'm an advocate for science, economic progress and political liberalism, I also think it has a dark side which needs to be called out, as we're so deeply embedded in it that we're not aware of it. That's why, even despite that misogyny and autocratic tendencies in Plato, his criticisms remain significant.

I knew there was a good reason I didn't live in Sydney! — tim wood

Don't worry! You could live your whole life in Sydney, as I have, but never cross paths with a migrating eel. I only know about it because I read of it in the Sydney Morning Herald. (Although I have observed them stealing pieces of bread that the visitors feed to the ducks when I've visited Centennial Park.)

My only point was to argue that the view we have that 'purpose' is solely the prerogative of conscious agents is a very narrow one.

And on a similar note, there is actually quite a strong relationship between traditional philosophy and suspicion of modern culture. Traditional philosophy is, well, traditionalist, and much of it does tend to be conservative. I noticed when I studied the so-called ‘traditionalist movement’ in European philosophy, that some of it - Julius Evola being an example - was quite close to fascist in its orientation. I myself am not drawn to anything of the kind but then I can also see why some taken-for-granted elements of modern liberalism would be impossible to reconcile with tradition.

Those were the times. Initially, that is one of the reasons I didn't 'take' to Plato and those that followed his tradition. Exclusive and elitist. — Amity

Indeed but much can be lost by judging the past by today’s standards. I was never much moved by the complaints about the cultural hegemony of dead white males.

If that is not your objection, then what is? — Janus

So you would agree with the statement ‘all design is artificial’?

Doesn’t address my question. Is everything designed of human origin?

Honestly I still don't see the obsession people have with Michelle Obama, — Mr Bee

Nostalgia for Barrack.

Trump was already president for four years. He didn't put people in camps — fishfry

His policy of splitting migrant families resulted with many children being interred away from their families.

Trump is Trump, I get you don't like the guy — fishfry

My liking him or not is irrelevant. His danger to democracy is not a matter of opinion. He’s not only a terrible person, he’s a dreadful leader, his only policy is retribution. His speeches are horrific and contain nothing about policy as such, only threats and fear-mongering. How you can fall for his schtick beats me.

Biden is not ‘a husk’. He’s been an effective senator and president, but he needs to pass the torch.

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I note today that Gavin Newsom is acting as party whip for Biden. I believe he’s totally sincere in so doing, but also that he’s ideally positioned to step up if the torch is passed.

Good and cogent post in my opinion. At risk of some crossover from Tim Wood’s post on the nature of purpose, which seems to have some convergence with this one, I would add the following question.

I’ve noted in Richard Dawkins’ polemics the distinction between ‘real’ and ‘apparent’ design. This is crucial to him, of course, because purposelessness is central to his books such as Unweaving the Rainbow and The Blind Watchmaker. According to this view, what appears to us as marvellously designed in nature, really is due to the accretion of many incremental changes that occur over immense time-scales giving rise to what he calls ‘the appearance of design’. I wonder if that is also analogous to the discussion here about the nature of purpose, and whether there is any real purpose sans an intentional agent to enact it, as the same considerations will apply here also.

Now the question I have for Dawkins (and feel free to answer on his behalf if so inclined) is that, does his view entail that the only real designs are those created by humans, as humans are, to our knowledge, the only ‘intentional designers’ that we know of? That does appear a consequence of his view.

Given that Dawkins is a committed naturalist, it seems there might be a fundamental discontinuity in positing that human intentionality, a product of natural evolution, creates 'real' design, while natural processes can only produce 'apparent' design. How do we reconcile this distinction with a naturalistic view that sees humans and their capabilities as entirely natural phenomena, while at the same time denying that nature herself displays or generates designs as such?

It might be argued that human intentionality and the ability to design are emergent properties of complex natural systems. In this sense, human design is an advanced form of the same natural processes that create the appearance of design in nature. But in that case, it is contradictory to declare that design in nature is only apparent, as it is the basis of the human ability to design, which is made manifest in us, but is at least real as a potential in many natural forms.

This is why I keep going back to the question - does the assertion of the existence of purpose (or design or intention) in nature, necessarily imply that there must be a purposeful agency other than human agency? Because it seems the inevitable entailment of such a claim. Likewise, the requirement that Dawkins has to deny the intentionality of design in nature stems from his atheist philosophy.

we also learned that some animal behaviour is "hard-wired," instinctual - I do not know if that is still a valid viewpoint - and if so, then it seems fair to ask at such times what exactly is doing the intending or what it even means. — tim wood

I agree that it’s a very murky question, but I think there’s something fishy about it too. Sorry about the mixed metaphor, but speaking of murky and fishy, but a story that’s fascinated me is the account of the long-finned eels in Sydney’s Centennial Park. They live in murky ponds in the middle of said park, which is quite a few kilometres from the ocean. But every so often, at night and when it’s very wet, they’ll begin a migratory trek through a route that takes them across open parkland into some ponds connected to Sydney’s Botany Bay (hence their preference for wet evenings). And then they’ll make their way to a deep ocean trench near New Caledonia, which is about 1,800 km from Sydney, to breed. Their larval offspring then drift around for a few years, becoming elvers, and then when reaching their adult form, will make their way back to Sydney’s Centennial Park - even though they, as individuals, have never been there. But they know. Instinct, I guess.

There are many examples of migrating animals doing things like this - Pacific Salmon (or is it Atlantic? Whatever), who make their way back to their home stream from across thousands of miles of ocean. Birds who fly from the Arctic to Tasmania to breed. Obviously they don’t consciously calculate anything in the way a human would, but it makes me wonder whether how well we really understand what ‘instinct’ is, and how much of nature depends on these ‘instinctive’ processes. They’re not intentional processes, in the sense that human agents understand it, So in some sense they’re ‘intentional’ but also unconscious. (Schopenhauer devotes a section of WWI to this.)

But to try and tie this back to some of the points I brought up earlier, I’m wondering if it suggests a sense in which intentionality (or ‘will’ in Schopenhauer’s sense) is manifested at the most basic level of organic life. I don’t want to say that it is, but I think it’s an interesting question, and that it relates to questions of purpose and intentionality on a larger scale than the intentional actions of conscious agents.

He was from another epoch with a vastly different ‘weltanschauung’. But there are elements of Plotinus’ philosophy that remain vital in my view

To return to Gerson and the passage I quoted above: what do you think he means by the remark ‘you could not think if materialism was true’? Do you see how he appeals to Aristotle’s De Anima in support of that argument? Do you think it’s a valid point?

Quite so. I understand that Aristotle's 'hyle' was originally 'lumber' or 'timber', signifying the kind of generic material substance from which any particular might be formed. Interesting etymological point: 'matter' is derived from the same Indo-european root as 'mother', signifying the passive/receptive, 'that which is acted upon'. Form, then, is what 'actualises' the potential of matter to exist, because insofar as matter is formless, it can't be said to exist. (There's actually an ancient provenance to that idea, wherein Zeus is the 'creative principle' and earth the 'mother' - something I learned from Mircea Eliade's writings. This is reflected in the religious imagery of 'God the father'.)

In any case, the outlines of the general idea, and how matter came to be accorded primacy in Western culture, is what is of interest to me.

I'll check back in later. — javra

Sorry about that, wrongly transcribed, here it is again https://www.gornahoor.net/library/ThinkingBeing.pdf

I am mainly interested in the chapter on Plato. He shows where the predominant interpretation of the nature of the ideas or forms goes wrong.

I apologize for the dismissive manner I dealt with this upthread. — Paine

No problems at all.

I think I understand what that passage is saying - again it has parallels in Eastern philosophy, for instance in the contrast between the 'upright man' represented by Confucius and civic virtue, and the 'true man of the Way' represented by the taoist sage who 'returns to the source' and often appears as a vagabond or vagrant. It is a passage about the essential and total 'otherness' of the One, beyond all conditioned distinctions and human notions of virtue. It is a recognisable principle in various forms of the perennial philosophy.

But that is quite different to the point I was trying to make, which is the immaterial nature of reason. This is a thread that I picked up first from reading Edward Feser, but then also other neo-thomists that I then read (even if only in snippets and excerpts, as there is a lot of literature.) This is the principle that only the rational human intellect (nous) is able to grasp universals (kinds, types or species) which are the basis of rational thought. And that the rejection of transcendentals is one of the underlying factors behind the ascendancy of materialism.

Feser lays it out thus:

As Aristotelians and Thomists use the term, intellect is that faculty by which we grasp abstract concepts (like the concepts man and mortal), put them together into judgments (like the judgment that all men are mortal), and reason logically from one judgment to another (as when we reason from all men are mortal and Socrates is a man to the conclusion that Socrates is mortal). It is to be distinguished from imagination, the faculty by which we form mental images (such as a visual mental image etc...); and from sensation, the faculty by which we perceive the goings on in the external material world and the internal world of the body (such as a visual experience of the computer in front of you, the auditory experience of the cars passing by on the street outside your window, the awareness you have of the position of your legs, etc.).

That intellectual activity -- thought in the strictest sense of the term -- is irreducible to sensation and imagination is a thesis that unites Platonists, Aristotelians, and rationalists of either the ancient Parmenidean sort or the modern Cartesian sort. — Edward Feser

You can see the precedent for this general train of thought in e.g. The Argument from Equals in Phaedo. But it is central to the whole Platonist tradition.

Why is it significant? Because it goes to the point of the immaterial nature of mind (thought, reason) and that it can't be reduced to sensation or imagination. I'm not wishing to argue for Cartesian dualism, but then again, neither does Aristotelian philosophy (as described in another of Feser's blog posts). But I think this is the vital point at issue in the 'debate between Platonism and naturalism' that Gerson is describing.