Closing Of The American Mind -- What are the author's valu..

Friday, the 25th of June, 2004

michael wrote:

yeah, but the OP asked about Bloom's values... as far as i can tell from
a quick reading of *Ravelstein*, they must have had something to do with
excessive self-esteem and shopping for really expensive clothes...had
Bloom begun a tome with "I went down..." he probably would have ended it
with "on one of my admiring minions." We can only imagine that he was
wearing Armani at the time; thus is the american mind opened?


What a superficial and envious and, well, narcissistic
reading of _Ravelstein_, which is about friendship.

Mike Morris
(msmorris@netdirect.net)
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Michael S. Morris wrote:

> Friday, the 25th of June, 2004
>
> michael wrote:
>
> yeah, but the OP asked about Bloom's values... as far as i can tell
> from a quick reading of *Ravelstein*, they must have had something to
> do with excessive self-esteem and shopping for really expensive
> clothes...had Bloom begun a tome with "I went down..." he probably
> would have ended it with "on one of my admiring minions." We can only
> imagine that he was wearing Armani at the time; thus is the american
> mind opened?
>
>
> What a superficial and envious and, well, narcissistic
> reading of _Ravelstein_, which is about friendship.
>
> Mike Morris
> (msmorris@netdirect.net)


not at all... i found the book tedious... the friendship thing is clear
enough and not particularly intersting or "special"... maybe it impressd
you because you don't know this side of life, this close male-male
thing; many successfully married men don't, as far as i can tell...that
said, a man who shops obsessively for armani and has incredibly arrogant
notions about clothing and shoes in general seems like a twerp to me,
plato scholar or no...

the original poster asked about bloom's values... i find that to know a
man's values it's best to look at how he lives, not what he says about
how things should be... i realize that is definitely not your thing, but
it is mine and that is the perspective i was coming from in my post...
as intensely narcissistic as i can be at times, my response to
*ravlestein* wasn't the product of one of them.


michael
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Francis A. Miniter wrote:
....
>
> One may seriously consider then that a devotee of an esoteric
> philosopher may himself write esoterically, again attempting to engage
> his interlocutor (in this case, the reader) in a philosophic process,
> rather than declaring values outright.

One may, but the hard-core Straussians tend to think of Bloom as a
light-weight, and Bloom himself thought of _Closing_ as lightweight
book, the success of which surprised and amused him greatly. It's not
very subtle, and its message is the traditional liberal arts message,
the unexamined life etc. I don't think there's any call for further
exegesis. Really, to suggest it's "esoteric" is a bit bizarre.
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Steven O. wrote:
>>370-1). Bloom's values? Know thyself and, having learned,
>>teach others.
>
>
> ><snip>
> All this talk about process is all very nice, except for the part
> about it never getting anywhere.


How very like the frustration that Thrasymachus expresses
with Socrates for using sophistic tricks to defeat
Polemarchus in Book One of the Republic. Rightly so. As a
sophist himself, Thrasymachus saw the tricks and
distractions clearly and demands more.


Now, to understand where I come
> from, you might as well know that I don't share some of Bloom's most
> fundamental perspectives. For example, when I read Plato's Republic
> (Bloom's translation, as it happened), I was singularly
> unappreciative, for many reasons. But certainly, one reason (perhaps
> not the most important, but fairly important), was that after three
> hundred pages of circling around the question, "What is 'the good'?",
> Socrates never actually tells us what the hell *is* the good. Unless,
> of course, the very act of debating the question is, in and of itself,
> the good, but that seems both circular and void of substantiative
> meaning.
>
> <snip>
>
> Steve O.
>
>

Steve, I hope this snapshot of the Republic inclines you
more to the value of the work. While rather long for the
newsgroup, it is wholly inadequate as a discussion of the
dialogue.


I do not think that the issue in the Republic is "What is
the good". I think rather it is "What will redirect two
highly ambitious young men (Glaucon and Adeimantus) from
recklessly pursuing a life of politics when they know
nothing of the nature of man?" It is a drama played out in
dialogue. Plato never appears in the dialogues, but Glaucon
and Adeimantus were his brothers, maybe viewed together a
stand-in for Plato. Two strong personalities with different
leanings, one warlike, the other leaning to the arts and
humanities. Their leanings become useful as Socrates knows
to whom to turn to make whatever point he wants. Like a lot
of young men, they want to reform the society, make changes
and improve it. But Socrates recognizes that change can be
for the better or for the worse. Athens was, at the time, a
democracy, which at least gave more room to speak freely
than a tyranny did, though its limitations were made clear
in the execution of Socrates years later.


Socrates does not willingly begin this discussion. He is
outside Athens, returning from the celebration in Piraeus (a
port city, the point where new things including ideas would
enter the realm of Athens) of a feast for a foreign goddess
(Bendis, a Thracian goddess). Not necessarily the act of a
good citizen, but rather that of an inquisitive mind.
[Remember, Socrates was accused at his trial of seeking to
introduce new gods.] He is approached from behind and asked
to wait for Polemarchus. Glaucon, not Socrates, decides
they shall wait. Polemarchus, when he arrives, invites
Socrates to the house of Cephalus, a resident-alien, not a
citizen of Athens. In fact, none of the interlocutors in
Book One (Cephalus, Polemarchus and Thrasymachus) are
citizens of Athens. They are all resident-aliens. Socrates
would decline the invitation, but Polemarchus tells him he
can only refuse if he is willing to use force against the
majority. [The threat of force exists behind the will of any
majority to suppress a minority - including philosophical
minorities.] Socrates submits and goes to the house of
Cephalus. Book One surveys common views of justice and
Socrates confounds these views.


This discussion leaves a void that is recognized by Glaucon,
who challenges Socrates at the start of Book Two to stop
trying to defeat his opponents and try to truly persuade.
Glaucon asks Socrates to use true rhetoric to defend the
cause of the city - justice. Note, Steve, there may well be
a tension between a person or thing that is just and a
person or thing that is good. Glaucon presents an argument
that justice is a necessary evil whose purpose is to protect
the weak from the strong, an argument which carries with it
an implication that ontologically selfishness and greed and
injustice may precede justice.


Forced by Glaucon, Socrates embarks upon the long discourse
designed to redirect the ideas of Glaucon - and of
Adeimantus. From this point on, the discussion takes place
only among citizens of Athens. Here I am forced to skip
through the building of the Just City, but eventually
Socrates has constructed the idea of a city ruled by justice
(though not necessarily by love or mercy). But this city is
to have the principle of one man. one job, with the
philosopher ruling as king. But the philosopher par
excellence is Socrates, who will not mind his own business
and would be completely disruptive to the workings of a
government. And about this time, Adeimantus wants to know
about the role of women in the city. Socrates seeks to play
down this introduction of the erotic as the Just City was
founded on rationality alone. Eros would discombobulate it.
The erotic, therefore, is sublimated into friendship only
in order to get around the obvious problem - that human
nature would not allow such a city to exist.


Eventually, the Just City is finished, but instead of making
this a goal for achievement, Socrates immediately thrusts it
into a mythic irretrievable past, in order to (1) make it
temporally prior, and (2) dissuade our budding politicians
from pursuing it. Socrates then demonstrates change
downward from the Just City through the Timocratic City
[where honor is valued most], Democracy and eventually
Tyranny, where lusts and desires (the erotic again) rule
without the bounds of reason. He makes it appear that all
change is likely to be for the worst, implying that
preservation of what is is preferable. There is no
opposition to his bleak assessment. But in fact, the
Republic does contain an argument against the idea that all
change is for the worst. It was enunciated in Book One by
Cephalus, who recalls that his grandfather founded the
wealth of the family, that his father inherited it and
diminished it significantly, but that Cephalus was able
through his hard work to recapture about what his father
lost and to restore the family to the stature it had in his
grandfather's day. Change may be for the good or the bad.
But Socrates does not wish to point that out to Glaucon and
Adeimantus, because the aim of this dialogue is persuasion
of ambitious young men away from a life of politics.


Francis A. Miniter
 >> Stay informed about: Closing Of The American Mind -- What are the author's valu.. 

Steven O. wrote:
> If Alan Bloom actually intended to improve the moral and spiritual
> stature of American students, he would have done far better to tell
> them: Here -- *this* is a specific value system to live by.

Unless the good man found doing-as-prof-says was neither morally nor
spiritually appealing.
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Steven O. wrote:


><snip>
> Put simply: Being cryptic and oblique makes neither for good
> philosophy nor for good pedagogy. Setting people on the road to
> discussion is not even remotely helpful unless they have some specific
> focus for the conversation to begin with. Aristotle was a far better
> philosopher and teacher than Socrates/Plato -- quite apart from
> whether Aristotle's views were more or less correct on any given issue
> -- because Aristotle stated exactly what he thought (albeit in very
> terse form), and so provided clearly stated views that were subject to
> open scrutiny. Socrates, by contrast, brilliantly managed to never
> quite say what he really meant to say, evading interrogation like a
> slick Mafia lawyer-turned-defendant on the witness stand. (Or like
> Bill Clinton during the Monica Lewinsky scandal. More about Socrates
> below.)
>
> If Alan Bloom actually intended to improve the moral and spiritual
> stature of American students, he would have done far better to tell
> them: Here -- *this* is a specific value system to live by.
>

Yes, on this we are at different poles. I always found
those teachers who challenged reasoning processes and
compelled me to examine my presuppositions taught me more
than those who tried to declare their values as universal.
Without a dialectic process, the student (or anyone) cannot
test the propositions declared by the
teacher-writer-declarer. However, by understanding how to
proceed, the student is in the position of a chess player
able to weigh various lines of play to find the one that
works in the situation.

The situation. There it is. Ethics is like a chess game,
and the situation has to be analyzed each and every time.
Sometimes you protect your queen from attack; sometimes you
sacrifice it. There are principles representing values, of
course. We all know them. 1. Survival; 2. Family; 3.
Community; 4. Nation; 5. Honor; 6. Love. And, sure, there
are more. But knowing them does not tell you how to play
the game, because sometimes one of them seems more important
than the other, and then it shifts. Take the Bill of Rights
of the U.S. Constitution. Does one of the principles always
trump all others? No. Which competing provision wins
depends on the situation. The interrelationship of values is
complex. Learning a large number of situations helps to
clarify it - that is the way computers have traditionally
played chess. But learning to analyze each situation is so
much more powerful.

>
>
> Stating explicit principles does not, in any respect, deprive the
> student of the opportunity for rational understanding or the "will" to
> keep it. Quite the contrary, it provides the opportunity for much
> more meaningful, more substantiative debate with respect to a concrete
> system of clearly stated values. The student is still fully free to
> evaluate, and to embrace or reject as he sees fit. But at least he
> knows exactly what standard of ethics he is actually evaluating.
>
> As for "Plato's Republic" itself, I read the book very, very
> carefully. If there had been the slightest hint of irony in the
> dialog, I would have caught it. Socrates is dead serious, and dead
> literal: He is a fascist, who favors a self-appointed ruling elite
> controlling the lives of other people who are (in Socrates judgment)
> too inferior to run their own lives. And he would have liked nothing
> more than to have been that philosopher-dictator himself. The
> philosophy is appalling, in fact, it's outright evil. The only thing
> that makes the book so worthwhile, as a reading experience, is that
> Socrates employs such elegant sophistry, with such extraordinary use
> of graceful mythology, so that he makes a brutal dictatorship seem
> benign, even seductively appealling. Hitler could have learned some
> lessons from Socrates.
>
> Steve O.
>

If you do not see irony in the Republic, then again we start
our analyses from different premises. I will acknowledge
this. If the Republic is free of irony, then all that is
left is the kind of interpretation advocated by Karl Popper
[The Open Society and Its Enemies] and yourself. But since
irony pervades the other dialogues, why would you leave it
out of this one?


Francis A. Miniter
 >> Stay informed about: Closing Of The American Mind -- What are the author's valu.. 

"G*rd*n" <gcf RemoveThis @panix.com> wrote in message
news:cc4d8h$8qi$1@panix1.panix.com...

> "Bill Bonde ( ``There's sunshine in my stomach'' )"
> > How many people just want to make war?
>
>
> Quite a few, evidently. War is extremely popular with
> Americans -- right now, 96% of the probable electorate are
> said to support one of two candidates, both of whom have
> promised to continue policies of war and imperialism even
> though it is now well known that the pretext for embarking on
> them was a lie, and even though they have resulted in the
> death, maiming, torture and terrorization of many entirely
> innocent people. And judging by the news from the Middle
> East, Yugoslavia, Rwanda, and many other places, Americans
> are hardly alone in evidencing this appetite. I might also
> mention the large crowds which gather to admire and worship
> death machines at naval and air shows.
>
Stop the press. That stat doesn't say that 96% of Americans like war, it
just says that 96% of us prefer imperialist hegemony to a Nader presidency,
which is really saying something about Nader.

All right, there is also a bleed-off from potential Nader support into the
Kerry camp out of a not inconsiderable amount of "anybody but W" feeling,
but that doesn't help your case much either.

> Human beings urgently need to confront and deal with their
> own desires to do harm. One solution is, obviously, to get
> interested in something else; another might be to constrain
> the harm to some highly restricted setting, like violent sports
> or gladiatorial combat. I dislike looking at George W. Bush,
> but I might actually pay to see him get in an arena with Saddam
> Hussein, Osama bin Laden, Tony Blair, and a few hungry tigers.
>
I was about to respond derisively, but this really took me back to one
suggestion made during the 2000 ballot recount: that the whole thing ought
to be decided by Cagematch, a la Mad Max. Two Men Enter, One Man Leaves...

It's not such a bad idea. At least Diebold couldn't do anything to mess
with it.

>
> G*rd*n wrote:
> > > So it is a partial
> > > solution. In the case of the United States, which has attacked
> > > twenty or thirty countries which were not attacking it since
> > > the end of World War II, it might be the dominant part.
>
> "Bill Bonde ( ``There's sunshine in my stomach'' )"
> > So you would argue for some sort of hyper-westphalian view where America
> > never used military force unless the bad guys were actually invading the
> > United States? I suppose that would mean that the US shouldn't have gone
> > to Europe and helped free France in WWII.
>
> Actually, the U.S. didn't go to war until it was attacked.
> And the Russians did most of the heavy lifting. But I wasn't
> arguing for a particular policy -- I was just pointing out
> that historically, the U.S., as a state, has been very warlike
> and aggressive, which _I_ regard as a fairly serious problem.
>
That's odd, I thought we were generally isolationist and tended more toward
monetary than military imperialism. Granted, we do throw our weight around
this hemisphere a lot, but even in the Spanish-American War, we had to be
told that we were being attacked to get the American people to support
military action, and even then, there were plenty of people who objected
(ObShortStory - "Editha"). Remember the Maine *-- htd
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G*rd*n wrote:
> "herothatdied" <herothatdied.TakeThisOut@yahoo.com>:
>
>>That's odd, I thought we were generally isolationist and tended more toward
>>monetary than military imperialism. ...
>
>
> People in Cuba, Grenada, Nicaragua, Panama, the Domincan
> Republic, Haiti, Yugoslavia, Libya, Sudan, Lebanon, Vietnam,
> Cambodia, Laos, Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, the Koreas, China,
> Yemen, Uzbekistan, and some other places would be surprised
> to hear you say that.

of course they'd be surprised... not a very well-read lot all round i'd
say...

perhaps you've got an ObBook so that htd can read about what seems to be
to her an otherwise unimaginable block of hard reality... then she can
make it go away with irrepressible wit, verve and a superior command of
"technical" vocabulary...

maybe there's some academic discipline in which the word "isolationist"
refers very specifically to countries that have invaded or attacked
militarily Cuba, Grenada, Nicaragua, Panama, the Domincan Republic,
Haiti, Yugoslavia, Libya, Sudan, Lebanon, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos,
Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, the Koreas, China, Yemen, Uzbekistan, and some
other places... i mean, why have the bloody word if you can't restrict
its usage to something useful?


michael
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"G*rd*n" <gcf.TakeThisOut@panix.com> wrote in message
news:cc54tc$b66$1@panix3.panix.com...
> "herothatdied" <herothatdied.TakeThisOut@yahoo.com>:
> > That's odd, I thought we were generally isolationist and tended more
toward
> > monetary than military imperialism. ...
>
> People in Cuba, Grenada, Nicaragua, Panama, the Domincan
> Republic, Haiti, Yugoslavia, Libya, Sudan, Lebanon, Vietnam,
> Cambodia, Laos, Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, the Koreas, China,
> Yemen, Uzbekistan, and some other places would be surprised
> to hear you say that.
>
Woah, wait - you're including some countries there that we tried for what -
six hours - to invade and then gave up on it, plus some that we didn't send
military troops to, we just funded (goes to monetary imperialism), plus some
we trained (again to the monetary imperialism), plus at least one that is an
ally who asked us to come in to fight off an enemy, plus another one that we
went in only after the various sovereign governments involved all signed
agreements asking us to come on in and do some peacebuilding, and we got
_close_ to the Chinese border but I don't know how you figure we ever tried
to take over there. Our M. O. with China has generally been to sit back and
look grave while other countries have a go at salting down their own rivers.
(OT - the Frank Capra "Why We Fight" series has the truly funniest project
management thingamabob going in it. They have a checklist of the Tanaka
Plan; "Item 1: Conquer China." Getting off the sauce is a twelve-step
program but Conquering China - that's just the one. Gives me the giggles
every time I see it.) Cambodia was a true pooch-screw, I'll grant you, but
it doesn't go to showing that Americans as a people are imperialistic
because the decision to invade Cambodia was made solely by Nixon and
Kissinger (after a night spent drinking heavily and watching John Wayne
movies no less) and was kept a secret from the American people for as long
as possible. It is, generally and historically speaking, damned hard in
this country to put together a popular consensus to engage in military
action unless the public perceives that the country is under attack. There
are, of course, exceptions (why you didn't mention Mexico, Canada or Spain
in that mix I'm sure I don't know) but to say that we're non-isolationist
based only on the times we _did_ rush into war has about as much merit
calling the Vikings pacifists based on the days they stayed home. It's the
balance that counts. - htd
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"michael" <noname.RemoveThis@mungo.com> wrote in message
news:40E64367.8050909@mungo.com...
>
> G*rd*n wrote:
> > "herothatdied" <herothatdied.RemoveThis@yahoo.com>:
> >
>
> perhaps you've got an ObBook so that htd can read about what seems to be
> to her an otherwise unimaginable block of hard reality... then she can
> make it go away with irrepressible wit, verve and a superior command of
> "technical" vocabulary...
>
If this is the way I get criticized, I am going to have to say things worthy
of criticism much more often. Bring 'em on - htd
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"G*rd*n" <gcf DeleteThis @panix.com> wrote in message
news:cc93mo$1ik$1@panix1.panix.com...
> "herothatdied" <herothatdied DeleteThis @yahoo.com>:
>
> If Americans don't like wars, then why do they support and
> celebrate them? It's the 4th of July -- look around, if you
> can stand it.
>
You think the 4th of July is the celebration of war?
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Sunday, the 4th of July, 2004

Gordon:

If Americans don't like wars, then why do they support and
celebrate them? It's the 4th of July -- look around, if you
can stand it.

htd:

You think the 4th of July is the celebration of war?
Gordon:

Do I really have to explain that? What does it look like?


Actually, even before that you could start by explaining
what is wrong with celebrating war. Or if wrong is not exactly
the word you'd use, then you could explain what might be difficult
to stand looking at.

Mike Morris
(msmorris@netdirect.net)
 >> Stay informed about: Closing Of The American Mind -- What are the author's valu.. 

"G*rd*n" <gcf.RemoveThis@panix.com> wrote in message
news:cc9taf$5dj$1@panix1.panix.com...
> "G*rd*n" <gcf.RemoveThis@panix.com> wrote in message
> > > If Americans don't like wars, then why do they support and
> > > celebrate them? It's the 4th of July -- look around, if you
> > > can stand it.
>
> "herothatdied" <herothatdied.RemoveThis@yahoo.com>:
> > You think the 4th of July is the celebration of war?
>
>
> Do I really have to explain that? What does it look like?
>
It looks to me like a national holiday. Most nations have them. On ours we
do cookouts!

Seriously, the signing of the Declaration of Independence necessarily
predates any US wars, and an argument could be made that choosing July 4 as
our big national holiday instead of choosing say October 19 (Yorktown Day)
or November 11 (Armistice Day) or VE day or VJ day or any other end-of-war
day to celebrate as The Big National Holiday is in and of itself an anti-war
statement. Or maybe an end-of-war day would be a better anti-war statement.
Or maybe any of these holidays is only exactly what you choose to make of
them, or read into them. They're all nationalistic of course, but hey -
Switzerland has a pretty nationalistic streak and _they_ aren't pro-war. Of
course, they don't have to be: they have oodles of cash and they're uphill
from everybody else. Plus they're armed to the teeth. Don't mess with the
Swiss.

Hey, Muir - what's the Brit equivalent of July 4? Guy Fawkes day, Magna
Carta anniversary, QEII's ascension, what? Or should I say wot? - htd
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