Study of Philosophy Makes Gains Despite Economy | Philly.com
Confirmation for my belief in the utility of the philosophy major.
RAND, Cold Warriors and the Failure of 'Rational Choice Philosophy' | NYT
According to Hegel, history is idea-driven. According to almost everyone else, this is foolish. What can “idea driven” even mean when measured against the passion and anguish of a place like Libya?
But Hegel had his reasons. Ideas for him are public, rather than in our heads, and serve to coordinate behavior. They are, in short, pragmatically meaningful words. To say that history is “idea driven” is to say that, like all cooperation, nation building requires a common basic vocabulary.
“Marx My Words” Playlist
This is the CD from our presentation on Marx, which addressed his Critique of Hegel’s Philosophy of Right, On the Jewish Question, Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts of 1844, Theses on Feuerbach, The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Napoleon, Grundrisse, and The Communist Manifesto.
Marx My Words
1. Arlo Guthrie – Change the Moment
2. Ani Difranco & Utah Phillips – The Internationale
3. Pete Seeger - L’Internationale
4. Billy Bragg – The Internationale
5. Utah Phillips – Preamble to the IWW Constitution
6. Bruce Springsteen – I Ain’t Got No Home
7. Ani Difranco & Utah Phillips – The Most Dangerous Woman
8. Judy Collins & Pete Seeger – Union Maid
9. Jeff Cahill & Mark Ross – The Organizer
10. Ani Difranco & Utah Phillips - Heroes
11. Phil Ochs – I Ain’t Marching Anymore
12. Kris Kristofferson – Third World Warrior
13. Linton Kwesi Johnson - Wat about di working claas
14. Utah Phillips – The Boss
15. Hugh Blumenfield – Longhaired Radical Socialist Jew
16. Tracy Chapman – Talkin’ ‘Bout A Revolution
17. Gil Scott-Heron – The Revolution Will Not Be Televised
18. Sarah Jones – Your Revolution
19. Arlo Guthrie – Till We Outnumber Them (This Land Is Your Land)
20. Jane Sapp, Pete Seeger & Si Kahn – I Am A Union Woman/Which Side Are You On?
21. Tom Paxton – What Did You Learn in School Today?
“I ‘Enjoy’ Being A ‘Girl’” and “I’m Gonna Be An Engineer” Playlists
Near the beginning of my doctoral program, I took The Amazing Mary Dietz’s graduate seminar on late modern political thought (i.e., Hegel - Freud). Being that sort of nerd, I made mix CDs for my two class presentations (dragging a certain LBW into the fray with me). Having recently happened upon the playlists, here’s the two-disc set inspired by our presentation on John Stuart Mill’s On the Subjection of Women:
I “Enjoy” Being A “Girl”
1. BJ Baker – I Enjoy Being A Girl
2. Sarah Jones – Your Revolution
3. Diana Ross – I’m Coming Out
4. Destiny’s Child – Independent Women, Part I
5. Eurythmics – Sisters Are Doing It For Themselves
6. Salt-N-Pepa – None Of Your Business
7. Ani Difranco – In Or Out
8. James - Laid
9. Peggy Lee – I’m A Woman
10. Aretha Franklin & Blues Brothers Band – R-E-S-P-E-C-T
11. Destiny’s Child – Survivor
12. Lesley Gore – You Don’t Own Me
13. Dar Williams – As Cool As I Am (live)
14. Dixie Chicks – Goodbye Earl
15. Dolly Parton – 9 to 5
16. Meredith Brooks - Bitch
17. Ani Difrano – I’m No Heroine
18. Indigo Girls – Letter to Eve
I’m Gonna Be An Engineer
1. Jane Sap, Pete Seeger, Si Kahn – I’m Gonna Be an Engineer
2. Nirvana – Been A Son
3. Ani Difranco – My IQ
4. Dar Williams – When I Was a Boy
5. India Arie – Video
6. Ani Difranco – 32 Flavors
7. Pete Seeger – There Was a Young Woman
8. TLC - Unpretty
9. Tracy Chapman – Woman’s Work
10. Eva Cassidy – Single Girl
11. Mary Chapin Carpenter – He Thinks He’ll Keep Her
12. Sweet Honey in the Rock – No Mirrors
13. Indigo Girls – Virginia Woolf
14. Jonatha Brooke – I’ll Take It From Here
15. Barbra Streisand – On a Clear Day
16. The Burns Sisters – Dance Upon This Earth
17. Ben Harper – I’ll Rise
18. Helen Reddy – I Am Woman
Chomsky: One of the problems with the perspective offered by the Man-Elf coalition is that you have to try so hard to get at the truth of the conflict, at what is really going on; it’s so obscured by their propaganda and relentless militarism. I mean, here we have swords being distributed to the Hobbits by Strider so they can protect themselves against these “evil creatures.” Now, in this case, it’s probably warranted, though the “evil creatures” are looking for the ring in their own individual self-interest. They’re behaving in a purely rational way.
Zinn: The Nazgul have been ordered to get the ring. So, that’s what they’re doing.
Chomsky: There are conflicts in rationality as well. Sometimes valid rationality is forced into conflict because of the structures of culture. But working through those cultural differences is where the peace lies. It doesn’t lie in destroying some magical ring. This takes me back to the media’s involvement in all this, and the way the media is being controlled by Gandalf, such as when he covers Saruman’s palantir in Orthanc. This is the stone that allows one to see, and thus communicate with, different cultures.
Unused Audio Commentary by Howard Zinn and Noam Chomsky for the Fellowship of the Ring DVD | McSweeney’s Internet Tendency
Monty Python’s Philosopher’s World Cup
Where SuperFreakonomics Falls Down | The Big Money
Rationalism versus social construction in economics.
The primary task of a useful teacher is to teach his students to recognize ‘inconvenient’ facts—I mean facts that are inconvenient for their party opinions. And for every party opinion there are facts that are extremely inconvenient, for my own opinion no less than for others. I believe the teacher accomplishes more than a mere intellectual task if he compels his audience to accustom itself to the existence of such facts. I would be so immodest as even to apply the expression ‘moral achievement,’ though perhaps this may sound too grandiose for something that should go without saying.
Thus far I have spoken only of practical reasons for avoiding the imposition of a personal point of view. But these are not the only reasons. The impossibility of ‘scientifically’ pleading for practical and interested stands except in discussing the means for a firmly given and presupposed end—rests upon reasons that lie far deeper.
‘Scientific’ pleading is meaningless in principle because the various value spheres of the world stand in irreconcilable conflict with each other. The elder Mill, whose philosophy I will not praise otherwise, was on this point right when he said If one proceeds from pure experience, one arrives at polytheism. This is shallow formulation and sounds paradoxical, and yet there is truth in it. ….
We live as did the ancients when their world was not yet disenchanted of its gods and demons, only we live in a different sense.
Kant’s Least Favorite Political Maxims
- Fac et excusa: Do it and make excuses later
- Si fecisti, nega: If you did it, deny it
- Divide et impera: Divide and conquer