Category Archives: Absolute Freedom and Terror
The Stroke of Lightning
Tonight I want to revisit an experience whose status in modern culture is typically regarded with skepticism. The French call it the stroke of lightning (le coup de foudre). It’s the sudden descent/visitation of romantic love. It’s not the same … Continue reading →
Posted in Absolute Freedom and Terror, absurdism, academe, action, afterlife, agnosticism, alienation, American politics, anthropology, anti-semitism, appreciation, art, art of living, atheism, authenticity, autonomy, bad faith, beauty, Bible, Biblical Archeology, Biblical God, bigotry, book reviews, books, bureaucracy, childhood, chivalry, Christianity, cities, class, Confessions of a Young Philosopher, conformism, contemplation, contradictions, cool, courage, courtship, cults, cultural politics, culture, desire, Desire and Authenticity, dialectic, eighteenth century, erotic life, eternity, ethics, ethnicity, evil, existentialism, exploitation, faith, fashion, fatherhood, female power, femininity, feminism, filial piety, films, freedom, friendship, gender balance, glitterati, Gnosticism, guilt and innocence, health, Hegel, hegemony, heroes, hidden God, hierarchy, history, history of ideas, id, idealism, ideality, identity, ideology, idolatry, immorality, immortality, institutional power, Jesus, Jews, journalism, Judaism, law, legal responsibility, life and death struggle, literature, love, male power, Married Philosophers Discuss Confessions, Married Philosophers Discuss Confessions, martyrdom, masculinity, master, master/slave relation, medieval, memoir, memory, Messianic Age, mind control, modern women, modernism, moral action, moral evaluation, moral psychology, morality, mortality, motherhood, mysticism, Nihilism, nineteenth-century, non-violence, novels, ontology, oppression, pacifism, past and future, peace, Phenomenology of the Mind, philosophy, poetry, political, political movements, politics, politics of ideas, postmodernism, power, power games, presence, promissory notes, propaganda, psychology, public facade, public intellectual, race, racism, radicalism, reading, reductionism, relationships, religion, remembrance, Renaissance, repairing the culture, roles, romance, romantic love, romanticism, science, scientism, secular, seduction, self-deception, sex appeal, sexuality, slave, social climbing, social construction, social conventions, social ranking, sociobiology, spiritual journey, spiritual not religious, spirituality, status, status of women, suffering, terror, terrorism, the examined life, the problematic of men, the problematic of woman, the profane, the sacred, theism, theology, time, Truth, TV, twentieth century, twenty-first century, Utopia, victimhood, victims, violence, war, work, writing, Zeitgeist
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Tagged absolute risk, antiromantic skepticism, Brooklyn Connections vs Core Curriculum, choice at the crossroads, Coup de foudre, Dante and Beatrice, Dante’s Divine Comedy, detachment of the observer, Edmund Husserl, failing to rise above it, failing to stay detached, first kiss, Jerry Martin and Abigail Rosenthal, knowing you are in love, life choice, maintaining detachment, meaningful kiss, meaningful relationship, Medieval romance and gnosticism, Medieval romance and otherworldly, Medieval romance as model, medieval romance as subversive, mistaking infatuation with love, mutual attraction, no guarantees in love, obeying the summons of love, observer and observed, peak experience, phenomenological bracketing, phenomenological reduction, resisting the summons of love, rising above it, Romance, romance in fiction, romance in psychology, romance novels, Romantic Love, romantic risks, saving Brooklyn College, Saving the Brooklyn College Core in The New York Post, Saving the Brooklyn Core in The Jewish Daily Forward, saving the core curriculum, Saving the Core in The Chronicle of Higher Education, self awareness, self deception, skeptical of romance, the meaning of a first kiss, the stroke of lightning, The Stroke of Lightning vs societal norms, the summons of love, Tristan and Iseult, two paths in the wood
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The Chosen People
I don’t remember what I’d been intending to write about today. Perhaps no topic had as yet occurred to me. Earlier this afternoon I’d been talking to an Israeli cousin – about life and love and family lore – and … Continue reading →
Posted in Absolute Freedom and Terror, absurdism, academe, action, afterlife, agnosticism, alienation, American politics, anthropology, anti-semitism, appreciation, art, art of living, atheism, authenticity, autonomy, bad faith, beauty, Bible, Biblical Archeology, Biblical God, bigotry, book reviews, books, bureaucracy, childhood, chivalry, Christianity, cities, class, conformism, contemplation, contradictions, cool, courage, courtship, cults, cultural politics, culture, desire, Desire and Authenticity, dialectic, erotic life, eternity, ethics, ethnicity, evil, existentialism, exploitation, faith, fashion, fatherhood, female power, femininity, feminism, filial piety, films, freedom, friendship, gender balance, glitterati, Gnosticism, guilt and innocence, health, Hegel, hegemony, heroes, hidden God, hierarchy, history, history of ideas, id, idealism, ideality, identity, ideology, idolatry, immorality, immortality, institutional power, Jesus, Jews, journalism, Judaism, law, legal responsibility, life and death struggle, literature, love, male power, martyrdom, masculinity, master, master/slave relation, memoir, memory, Messianic Age, mind control, modern women, modernism, moral action, moral evaluation, moral psychology, morality, mortality, motherhood, mysticism, Nihilism, nineteenth-century, non-violence, novels, ontology, oppression, pacifism, past and future, peace, Phenomenology of the Mind, philosophy, poetry, political, political movements, politics, politics of ideas, postmodernism, power, power games, presence, promissory notes, propaganda, psychology, public facade, public intellectual, race, racism, radicalism, reading, reductionism, relationships, religion, remembrance, repairing the culture, roles, romance, romantic love, romanticism, science, scientism, secular, seduction, self-deception, sex appeal, sexuality, slave, social climbing, social construction, social conventions, social ranking, sociobiology, spiritual journey, spiritual not religious, spirituality, status, status of women, suffering, terror, terrorism, the examined life, the problematic of men, the problematic of woman, the profane, the sacred, theism, theology, time, Truth, TV, twentieth century, twenty-first century, Utopia, victimhood, victims, violence, war, work, writing, Zeitgeist
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Tagged American in Paris, anti-Zionist anti-semitism, anti-Zionist cover story, Australian anti-semitism, Bondi Beach massacre, Chanukah celebrants, chosen people, connecting to God in history, defying a lynch mob, family ties, family tradition, Fulbright in Paris, German doctorate in Judaica, internment camp for Nazis, Israel, Israel’s political power structure, Israeli ambassador to France, Israeli family, Israelis, Jewish dilemma, Jewish existence and Jewish essence, Jewish history and God, Jewish identity, Jews and God in history, Jews as targets, Jews endangered, Judaica, looking like God, looking like God in the Sistine Chapel, Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel, modernizing rabbi, Nazi spies off New York shore, Nazi Spy Ring discovered, Nazi sympathy in Yorkville, old country prejudices, personal authority, possessing authority, professor of philosophy, rabbinic lineage, rabbinical ancestry, Rehov Rav Tzair, renouncing a birthright, rescuing families from the Holocaust, resentful Nazi spy, stopping a pogrom, Sydney University Philosophy Department, the Duquesne Spy Ring and FBI, walking through bullets, WWII Allied Victory
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Does Life Have Meaning?
Books by Viktor Frankl had been lying around the house for years, but I had never opened one. Their titles in translation (e.g. Yes to Life: In Spite of Everything) – seeming to capture banality pure, unalloyed and fully platitudinous … Continue reading →
Posted in Absolute Freedom and Terror, absurdism, academe, action, afterlife, agnosticism, alienation, American politics, anthropology, anti-semitism, appreciation, art, art of living, atheism, authenticity, autonomy, bad faith, beauty, Bible, Biblical Archeology, Biblical God, bigotry, book reviews, books, bureaucracy, childhood, chivalry, Christianity, cities, class, conformism, contemplation, contradictions, cool, courage, courtship, cults, cultural politics, culture, desire, Desire and Authenticity, dialectic, erotic life, eternity, ethics, ethnicity, evil, existentialism, exploitation, faith, fashion, fatherhood, female power, femininity, feminism, filial piety, films, freedom, friendship, gender balance, glitterati, Gnosticism, guilt and innocence, health, Hegel, hegemony, heroes, hidden God, hierarchy, history, history of ideas, id, idealism, ideality, identity, ideology, idolatry, immorality, immortality, institutional power, Jesus, Jews, journalism, Judaism, law, legal responsibility, life and death struggle, literature, love, male power, martyrdom, masculinity, master, master/slave relation, medieval, memoir, memory, Messianic Age, mind control, modern women, modernism, moral action, moral evaluation, moral psychology, morality, mortality, motherhood, mysticism, Nihilism, nineteenth-century, non-violence, novels, ontology, oppression, pacifism, past and future, peace, Phenomenology of the Mind, philosophy, poetry, political, political movements, politics, politics of ideas, postmodernism, power, power games, presence, promissory notes, propaganda, psychology, public facade, public intellectual, race, racism, radicalism, reading, reductionism, relationships, religion, remembrance, repairing the culture, roles, romance, romantic love, romanticism, science, scientism, secular, seduction, self-deception, sex appeal, sexuality, slave, social climbing, social construction, social conventions, social ranking, sociobiology, spiritual journey, spiritual not religious, spirituality, status, status of women, suffering, terror, terrorism, the examined life, the problematic of men, the problematic of woman, the profane, the sacred, theism, theology, time, Truth, TV, twentieth century, twenty-first century, Utopia, victimhood, victims, violence, war, work, writing, Zeitgeist
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Tagged academic firing, academic job fight, academic life and conscience, academic politics, Arendt’s Origins of Totalitarianism, character test, collective unconscious, concentration camp dehumanization, conscience, conscience and moral law, conscience and personal decision, conscience in concrete situations, conscience in specific situations, consequential choice, consequential question, cultural contradictions, emotional drives, Frankl vs collective unconscious, Frankl's Man's Search for Ultimate Meaning, Frankl's Yes to Life: In Spite of Everything, Freud vs Frankl, Freudian therapy, Freudian therapy vs logotherapy, Freudian vs Jungian therapy, Hannah Arendt, Hannah Arendt’s political advice, harmless dodging vs dishonest dodging, harmless dodging vs harmful dodging, inner heights vs despair, instinctual drives, Kant and conscience, Kant categorical imperative, Kant universal law, life at the limits, life contradictions, limits of psychic mapping, living one’s conscience, logotherapy, mapping the psyche, moment of truth, moral challenges, moral courage, moral courage deprecated, Moral crisis, moral landscape, moral loneliness, moral test, one’s personal calling, personal despair, philosophy department politics, philosophy departments, platitudinous sayings, political pressure, politics of academic tenure, politics of experience, pre-feminism, question with life consequences, recognizing a defining choice, recognizing a moral crossroads, remaining oneself, shallow advice, social pressure, spiritual challenges, Ten Commandments, Ten Commandments and personal choice, Ten Commandments and unique situations, test of honor, the price of integrity, the price of remaining oneself, trial by fire, truth-telling and academic philosophy, untenured faculty, utilitarian greatest happiness, utilitarian maximizing happiness, utilitarianism, Viktor Frankl, Viktor Frankl’s death camp experience, well-intentioned therapist, women as second sex, women’s dependency
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The Photographic Negative of the Zeitgeist
On the night of Passover, during the dinner celebrated in commemoration of the Exodus from Egypt, a cup of wine is set on the table for Elijah – the herald of the messianic age – to drink when he stops … Continue reading →
Posted in Absolute Freedom and Terror, absurdism, academe, action, afterlife, agnosticism, alienation, American politics, anthropology, anti-semitism, appreciation, art, art of living, atheism, authenticity, autonomy, bad faith, beauty, Bible, Biblical Archeology, Biblical God, bigotry, book reviews, books, bureaucracy, childhood, chivalry, Christianity, cities, class, conformism, contemplation, contradictions, cool, courage, courtship, cults, cultural politics, culture, desire, Desire and Authenticity, dialectic, eighteenth century, erotic life, eternity, ethics, ethnicity, evil, existentialism, exploitation, faith, fashion, fatherhood, female power, femininity, feminism, filial piety, films, freedom, friendship, gender balance, glitterati, Gnosticism, guilt and innocence, health, Hegel, hegemony, heroes, hidden God, hierarchy, history, history of ideas, id, idealism, ideality, identity, ideology, idolatry, immorality, immortality, institutional power, Jesus, Jews, journalism, Judaism, law, legal responsibility, life and death struggle, literature, love, male power, martyrdom, masculinity, master, master/slave relation, medieval, memoir, memory, Messianic Age, mind control, modern women, modernism, moral action, moral evaluation, moral psychology, morality, mortality, motherhood, mysticism, Nihilism, nineteenth-century, non-violence, novels, ontology, oppression, pacifism, past and future, peace, Phenomenology of the Mind, philosophy, poetry, political, political movements, politics, politics of ideas, postmodernism, power, power games, presence, promissory notes, propaganda, psychology, public facade, public intellectual, race, racism, radicalism, reading, reductionism, relationships, religion, remembrance, repairing the culture, roles, romance, romantic love, romanticism, science, scientism, secular, seduction, self-deception, seventeenth century, sex appeal, sexuality, slave, social climbing, social construction, social conventions, social ranking, sociobiology, spiritual journey, spiritual not religious, spirituality, status, status of women, suffering, terror, terrorism, the examined life, the problematic of men, the problematic of woman, the profane, the sacred, theism, theology, time, Truth, TV, twentieth century, twenty-first century, Utopia, victimhood, victims, violence, war, work, writing, Zeitgeist
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Tagged absence of Jews from the non-denominational meetings of theologians, antisemitism and the Zeitgeist, antisemitism’s changes with the Zeitgeist, blaming the Jews, Cain and Abel, competing for God’s preference, converting to Judaism, Darwinian racism, Darwinian survival of the fittest, disparaging the Holocaust, Elijah and the messiah, Enlightenment and antisemitism, Exodus from Egypt, fratricide and Biblical history, fratricide begins Biblical history, interreligious discussions without Jews, Israel as ancient Jewish homeland, Israel as majority non-white, Israel’s false accusers, Jews and the Biblical record, Jews and the Zeitgeist, Jews as a people not a race, Jews as empty chair at theological discussion, Jews as negatives of the Zeitgeist, Jews as truthfully recording their history, Jews blamed for crucifixion, Jews defined by their covenant, Jews keep a truthful record, Jews not biologically defined, lying for Elijah, meetings of theologians, mental somersaults of antisemitism, modern and Biblical Israel, Nazi racial definition of Jews, Nazi view of Jews as a race, Passover, resurgence of antisemitism, righteous Gentiles, Romanticism and Jews, Romanticism and Jews as rootless wanderers, sidelining the Holocaust, status of Jews, thanking the Jews, the Holocaust, theologians, theological discussion without Jews, theology, Voltaire and Jews, woke prejudgements, world religions except for Jews
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Here Be Dragons
These days, I’m taking in the impact of two recent books: Jonathan Leaf’s The Primate Myth: Why the Latest Science Leads Us to a New Theory of Human Nature and Jeffrey Kripal’s Roads of Excess, Palaces of Wisdom: Eroticism and … Continue reading →
Posted in Absolute Freedom and Terror, absurdism, academe, action, afterlife, agnosticism, alienation, American politics, anthropology, anti-semitism, appreciation, art, art of living, atheism, authenticity, autonomy, bad faith, beauty, Bible, Biblical Archeology, Biblical God, bigotry, book reviews, books, bureaucracy, childhood, chivalry, Christianity, cities, class, conformism, contemplation, contradictions, cool, courage, courtship, cults, cultural politics, culture, desire, Desire and Authenticity, dialectic, erotic life, eternity, ethics, ethnicity, evil, existentialism, exploitation, faith, fashion, fatherhood, female power, femininity, feminism, filial piety, films, freedom, friendship, gender balance, glitterati, Gnosticism, guilt and innocence, health, Hegel, hegemony, heroes, hidden God, hierarchy, history, history of ideas, id, idealism, ideality, identity, ideology, idolatry, immorality, immortality, institutional power, Jesus, Jews, journalism, Judaism, law, legal responsibility, life and death struggle, literature, love, male power, Married Philosophers Discuss Confessions, martyrdom, masculinity, master, master/slave relation, memoir, memory, Messianic Age, mind control, modern women, modernism, moral action, moral evaluation, moral psychology, morality, mortality, motherhood, mysticism, Nihilism, nineteenth-century, non-violence, novels, ontology, oppression, pacifism, past and future, peace, Phenomenology of the Mind, philosophy, poetry, political, political movements, politics, politics of ideas, postmodernism, power, power games, presence, promissory notes, propaganda, psychology, public facade, public intellectual, race, racism, radicalism, reading, reductionism, relationships, religion, remembrance, repairing the culture, roles, romance, romantic love, romanticism, science, scientism, secular, seduction, self-deception, sex appeal, sexuality, slave, social climbing, social construction, social conventions, social ranking, sociobiology, spiritual journey, spiritual not religious, spirituality, status, status of women, suffering, terror, terrorism, the examined life, the problematic of men, the problematic of woman, the profane, the sacred, theism, theology, time, Truth, TV, twentieth century, twenty-first century, Utopia, victimhood, victims, violence, war, work, writing, Zeitgeist
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Tagged ancestral child-rearing pairs, apes’ social patterns, asymmetry of the sexes, belief systems of modernity, chimps’ social patterns, contradictory ideals for women, current courtship styles, Darwinian views, distinguishing before and after, dividing parental responsibilities, drawing distinctions in real life, eros and spirituality, eros of sainthood, erotic rewards, evolution and monogamy, getting above the battle, healthy as uninhibited, herd animals’ social patterns, historians of mystiscm, Holocaust survivors, Holocaust testimonies, homo sapiens' ancestors, human evolution, humans and dolphins, hunter gatherer groups, illusions of modernity, inhibitions as unhealthy, intelligent herd animals, Jeffrey Kripal, Jeffrey Kripal’s Roads of Excess Palaces of Wisdom, Jewish national historian, Jonathan Leaf’s The Primate Myth, kabbalistic mysticism, keeping the record, knowing when knowing why telling the difference, la femme facile, la femme libre, living in history, living on the timeline, love life of homo sapiens, love life of human forebearers, male cultural conditioning for women, male novelists’ ideals of women, monogamous early humans, mystical transcendence vs living in history, mystical/erotic unions, Mysticism, mysticism and erotic merging, mystics and erotic language, not from apes, pregnant out of wedlock, remembering as a duty, requirements of moral life, saints as lovers, sex and mysticism, sex as good in itself, sex as its own reward, sexual revolution and pregnancy, Simon Dubnow, Simone de Beauvoir's The Second Sex, staying on the timeline, the Biblical God, the free woman vs the easy woman, the God of post-Biblical history, the personal God, the slut reputation, transcendence and escapism, uninhibited but not a slut, uninhibited women of male novels, women and romance novels, women as cultural losers, women wanting romance, women's incompatible ideals, women’s balancing act, women’s biological and social dangers, women’s contradictory social directives, women’s incompatible social ideals, women’s no-win situation, women’s silent cultural dilemmas, women’s silent dilemmas
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Under the Chariot Wheels
Of late, I’ve begun to read certain well-regarded women writers. I started with Sylvia Plath and now it’s Joan Didion. Earlier in my reading life, I had stayed away from these writers, fearing that they were whiners after all – … Continue reading →
Posted in Absolute Freedom and Terror, absurdism, academe, action, afterlife, agnosticism, alienation, American politics, anthropology, anti-semitism, appreciation, art, art of living, atheism, authenticity, autonomy, bad faith, beauty, Bible, Biblical God, bigotry, book reviews, books, bureaucracy, childhood, chivalry, Christianity, cities, class, conformism, contemplation, contradictions, cool, courage, courtship, cults, cultural politics, culture, desire, Desire and Authenticity, dialectic, eighteenth century, erotic life, eternity, ethics, ethnicity, evil, existentialism, exploitation, faith, fashion, fatherhood, female power, femininity, feminism, filial piety, films, freedom, friendship, gender balance, glitterati, Gnosticism, guilt and innocence, health, Hegel, hegemony, heroes, hidden God, hierarchy, history, history of ideas, id, idealism, ideality, identity, ideology, idolatry, immorality, immortality, institutional power, Jesus, Jews, journalism, Judaism, law, legal responsibility, life and death struggle, literature, love, male power, martyrdom, masculinity, master, master/slave relation, medieval, memoir, memory, Messianic Age, mind control, modern women, modernism, moral action, moral evaluation, moral psychology, morality, mortality, motherhood, mysticism, Nihilism, nineteenth-century, non-violence, novels, ontology, oppression, pacifism, past and future, peace, Phenomenology of the Mind, philosophy, poetry, political, political movements, politics, politics of ideas, postmodernism, power, power games, presence, promissory notes, propaganda, psychology, public facade, public intellectual, race, racism, radicalism, reading, reductionism, relationships, religion, remembrance, Renaissance, repairing the culture, roles, romance, romantic love, romanticism, science, scientism, secular, seduction, self-deception, sex appeal, sexuality, slave, social climbing, social construction, social conventions, social ranking, sociobiology, spiritual journey, spiritual not religious, spirituality, status, status of women, suffering, terror, terrorism, the examined life, the problematic of men, the problematic of woman, the profane, the sacred, theism, theology, time, Truth, TV, twentieth century, twenty-first century, Utopia, victimhood, victims, violence, war, work, writing, Zeitgeist
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Tagged Abigail L. Rosenthal’s Feminism Without Contradictions, academic feminists, anomie, antiwomen bigotry, authenticity and feminism, changing public opinion, consciousness-raising group, construction workers’ catcalling, copouts of feminism, differences denied, dying spouse, exploitation of women, fashionable authors, feelings aren’t facts, feminism and American politics, feminism and chivalry, feminism and cultural politics, feminism and political incorrectness, feminism and rape, feminism and womanly sympathy, feminism’s denial of difference, feminism’s repressions, feminist complaints, feminist diagnostic, feminist disappointments, feminist infighting, feminist motivation, feminist pioneers, feminist theory and real women, feminists on TV talk shows, Gnosticism and feminism, Hollywood screenwriters, honor your mother, human motivation, Joan Didion, Joan Didion and John Gregory Dunn, Joan Didion on feminism, Joan Didion’s The White Album, Juanita Broaddrick, manipulating guilt, marital callousness, marital indifference, movie reviewers, movie-making processes, MS magazine, narcissist, philosophy and feminism, rape accusation, second-wave feminists, self-indulgence, sense of entitlement, social intelligence, sophisticated woman writers, spinsters, Sylvia Plath, the beauty myth, the male gaze, The Monist feminism issue, trail-blazing women, understanding men, Upper East Side discussion group, utopian feminism, vulnerability repressed, what women know, women and social intelligence, women as victims, women understanding men, women’s autonomy, women’s depth experiences, women’s friendships, world-weary anomie
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Naked Apes?
Lately I happen to have been reading two books on what Darwin – and his intellectual descendants (like Richard Dawkins in The Selfish Gene or Jane Goodall, In the Shadow of Man) – got wrong! The two books are philosopher … Continue reading →
Posted in Absolute Freedom and Terror, absurdism, academe, action, afterlife, agnosticism, alienation, American politics, anthropology, anti-semitism, appreciation, art, art of living, atheism, authenticity, autonomy, bad faith, beauty, Bible, Biblical Archeology, Biblical God, bigotry, book reviews, books, bureaucracy, childhood, chivalry, Christianity, cities, class, conformism, contemplation, contradictions, cool, courage, courtship, cults, cultural politics, culture, desire, Desire and Authenticity, dialectic, eighteenth century, erotic life, ethics, ethnicity, evil, existentialism, exploitation, faith, fashion, fatherhood, female power, femininity, feminism, filial piety, films, freedom, friendship, gender balance, glitterati, Gnosticism, guilt and innocence, health, Hegel, hegemony, heroes, hidden God, hierarchy, history, history of ideas, id, idealism, ideality, identity, ideology, idolatry, immorality, immortality, Industrial Revolution, institutional power, Jesus, Jews, journalism, Judaism, law, legal responsibility, life and death struggle, literature, love, male power, martyrdom, masculinity, master, master/slave relation, medieval, memoir, memory, Messianic Age, mind control, modern women, modernism, moral action, moral evaluation, moral psychology, morality, mortality, motherhood, mysticism, Nihilism, nineteenth-century, non-violence, novels, ontology, oppression, pacifism, past and future, peace, Phenomenology of the Mind, philosophy, poetry, political, political movements, politics, politics of ideas, postmodernism, power, power games, presence, promissory notes, propaganda, psychology, public facade, public intellectual, race, racism, radicalism, reading, reductionism, relationships, religion, remembrance, Renaissance, repairing the culture, roles, romance, romantic love, romanticism, science, scientism, secular, seduction, self-deception, sex appeal, sexuality, slave, social climbing, social construction, social conventions, social ranking, sociobiology, spiritual journey, spiritual not religious, spirituality, status, status of women, suffering, terror, terrorism, the examined life, the problematic of men, the problematic of woman, the profane, the sacred, theism, theology, time, Truth, TV, twentieth century, twenty-first century, Utopia, victimhood, victims, violence, war, work, writing, Zeitgeist
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Tagged abortion public opposition private need, abstract ideals vs lived views, ape reproductive strategies, apes and pair bonding, apes and parenting, Applied Ethics, Atheism, authenticity and sociobiology, Bible as history book, competition and courtship, Creationism, culture and theories, Darwin’s allies, Darwinian courtship, David Hume, David Stove’s Darwinian Fairy Tales, Desmond Morris’ The Naked Ape, DMA, erotic life and reductionism, etiquette for courtship, female guilt, female pliancy, groupthink, healthy relationships, herd mentality, Homo sapiens and monogamy, human brains and monkey brains, human evolution, human mating strategies, human psychology, idealism and cynicism, idealism vs real life, Jane Goodall’s In the Shadow of Man, jealousy in human beings, Jonathan Leaf’s The Primate Myth, lived philosophy, male guilt, MRI, Oedipus complex, pair bonding and human evolution, philosophical reductionism, possessiveness in human beings, power politics, prehistoric monogamy, primitivism and social style, profaning the sacred, Richard Dawkins’ The Selfish Gene, sex differences, simian reproductive strategies, social influence of theories, social result of wrong theories, sociobiology and bigotry, sociobiology and civilization, sociobiology and gender roles, sociobiology and human courtship, sociobiology and man/woman relations, sociobiology and misanthropy, sociobiology and misogyny, sociobiology and seduction, sociobiology and sincerity, sociobiology’s social influence, survival of the fittest, theology vs real life, theories and human reality, Thomas Malthus, toughness in women, unhealthy relationships, virginity and courtship, war of the sexes, who gets abortions, young men and chivalry
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“My Inescapable Femininity”
Sylvia Plath 1932-1963 Sylvia Plath is one writer I never wanted to read – partly because she seemed to have a “cult” following. My reluctance had, however, another motive: I don’t like to visit the lives or the works of … Continue reading →
Posted in Absolute Freedom and Terror, absurdism, academe, action, afterlife, agnosticism, alienation, American politics, anthropology, anti-semitism, appreciation, art, art of living, atheism, authenticity, autonomy, bad faith, beauty, Bible, Biblical God, bigotry, books, bureaucracy, childhood, chivalry, Christianity, cities, class, conformism, contemplation, contradictions, cool, courage, courtship, cults, cultural politics, culture, desire, dialectic, erotic life, eternity, ethics, ethnicity, evil, existentialism, exploitation, faith, fashion, fatherhood, female power, femininity, feminism, filial piety, films, freedom, friendship, gender balance, glitterati, Gnosticism, guilt and innocence, health, Hegel, hegemony, heroes, hidden God, hierarchy, history, history of ideas, id, idealism, ideality, identity, ideology, idolatry, immorality, immortality, institutional power, Jesus, Jews, journalism, Judaism, law, legal responsibility, life and death struggle, literature, love, male power, martyrdom, masculinity, master, master/slave relation, memoir, memory, Messianic Age, mind control, modern women, modernism, moral action, moral evaluation, moral psychology, morality, mortality, motherhood, mysticism, Nihilism, nineteenth-century, non-violence, novels, ontology, oppression, pacifism, past and future, peace, Phenomenology of the Mind, philosophy, poetry, political, political movements, politics, politics of ideas, postmodernism, power, power games, presence, promissory notes, propaganda, psychology, public facade, public intellectual, race, racism, radicalism, reading, reductionism, relationships, religion, remembrance, repairing the culture, roles, romance, romantic love, romanticism, science, scientism, secular, seduction, self-deception, sex appeal, sexuality, slave, social climbing, social construction, social conventions, social ranking, sociobiology, spiritual journey, spiritual not religious, spirituality, status, status of women, suffering, terror, terrorism, the examined life, the problematic of men, the problematic of woman, the profane, the sacred, theism, theology, time, Truth, TV, twentieth century, twenty-first century, Utopia, victimhood, victims, violence, war, work, writing, Zeitgeist
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Tagged academic mentor’s advice, academic mentor’s insensitivity, academic politics, Alice James, anti-fascism, anti-heroes, “My Inescapable Femininity”, Barnard College classmates, Bessel van der Kolk’s The Body Keeps the Score, biochemical psychology, brutal honesty, defining women, envying men’s freedom, Femininity, feminism’s over-simplifications, feminism’s personal cost, Freudian therapy, guilt by association, Henry James’ sister, living truthfully, love and suffering, male competition, personal honesty in culture, personal integrity in history, philosophy and femininity, philosophy as a masculine discipline, political extremism, prefeminist values, preventable suicide, preventable tragedies, psychic vulnerability, pulling moral rank, reductionism and femininity, rejecting cultural stereotypes, reversing trauma, Revolution and messianism, revolution and utopia, revolutionary competition, revolutionary purity, revolutionary sex appeal, self-masculinized academic women, Sigmund Freud, suicidal women, Sylvia Plath, the women’s movement, tightrope walking, trauma and the brain, Virginia Woolf, war of the sexes, William James’ sister, women and suicide, women defined as losers, women friends, women friends vs suicide, women in prefeminist culture, women supporting women, women writers, women’s failures
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One of a Kind
David Stove was a philosopher of the not-cut-to pattern kind. (Is that a kind? Just how many are there?) For example, he did not hesitate to kick the seemingly unassailable Charles Darwin in the shins for a train of errors … Continue reading →
Posted in Absolute Freedom and Terror, absurdism, academe, action, afterlife, agnosticism, alienation, anthropology, appreciation, art of living, atheism, authenticity, autonomy, bad faith, beauty, Biblical God, bigotry, book reviews, books, bureaucracy, chivalry, cities, class, conformism, contemplation, contradictions, cool, courage, courtship, cults, cultural politics, culture, desire, dialectic, eighteenth century, eternity, ethics, ethnicity, evil, existentialism, exploitation, faith, fashion, fatherhood, female power, femininity, feminism, filial piety, freedom, friendship, gender balance, glitterati, Gnosticism, guilt and innocence, health, hegemony, heroes, hidden God, hierarchy, history, history of ideas, id, idealism, ideality, identity, ideology, idolatry, immorality, immortality, institutional power, journalism, law, legal responsibility, life and death struggle, literature, love, male power, martyrdom, masculinity, master, master/slave relation, memoir, memory, mind control, modern women, modernism, moral action, moral evaluation, moral psychology, morality, mortality, Nihilism, nineteenth-century, non-violence, ontology, oppression, past and future, philosophy, poetry, political movements, politics of ideas, postmodernism, power, power games, presence, promissory notes, propaganda, psychology, public facade, public intellectual, radicalism, reading, reductionism, relationships, religion, remembrance, repairing the culture, roles, romanticism, science, scientism, secular, self-deception, social climbing, social construction, social conventions, social ranking, sociobiology, spiritual journey, spiritual not religious, spirituality, status, status of women, suffering, terror, the examined life, the problematic of men, the problematic of woman, the profane, the sacred, theism, theology, time, Truth, twentieth century, twenty-first century, Utopia, victimhood, victims, violence, war, work, writing, Zeitgeist
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Tagged Abigail L. Rosenthal’s A Good Look at Evil, Abigail L. Rosenthal’s Getting Past Marx and Freud, academic history, academic philosophy, academic politics, academic rivalry, Analytic philosophy, Anti-Utopianism, atheism and suicide, Australian academe, Australian politics, Bill Lycan, candid correspondence, capsizing an orderly life, Charles Darwin, colleagues and conformism, commonsensical philosopher, concealing a sensitive soul, conservatism and liberalism, Continental philosophy, crisis overpowering coping strategies, cultural assumptions, Darwin and human motivation, Darwin’s theoretical shortcomings, David Armstrong, David Hume, David Stove, David Stove Archive, David Stove’s Darwinian Fairytales: Selfish Genes Errors of Heredity and Other Fables of Evolution, dramatic life change, Edgar Allan Poe, empiricism, eulogy, ex-husbands, Feminism, first husband, gentlemanliness and politics, healthy common sense, ideology and academe, idols of the tribe, intellectual debts, John Bacon, kangaroos and black swans, Marxism, meritocracy, methodological empiricism and metaphysical materialism, Michael Devitt, moderation as lifestyle, non-believer, nonconformist academic, nonconformist philosopher, nonconformist thinking, obituary and posthumous friendship, overpowering crisis, philosophical absurdism, philosophical atheist, philosophical competition, philosophical conversation, philosophical correspondence, philosophical erudition, philosophical gossip, philosophical guide, philosophical Humean, philosophical marriage, Philosophical Materialism, philosophical pen pals, philosophizing with style, philosophy at Sydney University, Poe’s The Raven, political correctness, prayer for suicide victim, private despair, protecting a sensitive soul, providential divorce, providential life-turn, providential marriage, received views, research fellow, right wing and left wing, Roger Kimball, sacred cow, sensitive soul, shocking life-crisis, social conformism, suicide and afterlife, suicide and choice, Sydney Australia, Sydney University Staff Club, Trad and Mod Philosophy Dept, traditional and modern philosophy, tragic crisis in an even-tempered life, trendy philosophy, tyranny of one’s peers, tyranny of public opinion, unexpected crisis, University of Sydney, unsung heroes
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What Was the Woman Question?
Freud asked, “What does woman want?” It’s a good question, and let’s credit him with sincerely wanting to know. Even if his answers weren’t that good, such questions remain credible. When you ask that question of anybody, and want a … Continue reading →
Posted in Absolute Freedom and Terror, absurdism, academe, action, afterlife, agnosticism, alienation, American politics, anthropology, anti-semitism, appreciation, art, art of living, atheism, authenticity, autonomy, bad faith, beauty, Bible, Biblical God, bigotry, book reviews, books, bureaucracy, childhood, chivalry, Christianity, cities, class, conformism, contemplation, contradictions, cool, courage, courtship, cults, cultural politics, culture, desire, dialectic, erotic life, eternity, ethics, ethnicity, evil, existentialism, exploitation, faith, fashion, fatherhood, female power, femininity, feminism, filial piety, films, freedom, friendship, gender balance, glitterati, Gnosticism, guilt and innocence, health, Hegel, hegemony, heroes, hidden God, hierarchy, history, history of ideas, id, idealism, ideality, identity, ideology, idolatry, immorality, immortality, institutional power, Jesus, Jews, journalism, Judaism, law, legal responsibility, life and death struggle, literature, love, male power, martyrdom, masculinity, master, master/slave relation, memoir, memory, Messianic Age, mind control, modern women, modernism, moral action, moral evaluation, moral psychology, morality, mortality, motherhood, mysticism, Nihilism, nineteenth-century, non-violence, novels, ontology, oppression, pacifism, past and future, peace, Phenomenology of the Mind, philosophy, poetry, political, political movements, politics, politics of ideas, postmodernism, power, power games, presence, promissory notes, propaganda, psychology, public facade, public intellectual, race, racism, radicalism, reading, reductionism, relationships, religion, remembrance, repairing the culture, roles, romance, romantic love, romanticism, science, scientism, secular, seduction, self-deception, sex appeal, sexuality, slave, social climbing, social construction, social conventions, social ranking, sociobiology, spiritual journey, spiritual not religious, spirituality, status, status of women, suffering, terror, terrorism, the examined life, the problematic of men, the problematic of woman, the profane, the sacred, theism, theology, time, Truth, TV, twentieth century, twenty-first century, Utopia, victimhood, victims, violence, war, work, writing, Zeitgeist
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Tagged abusive and unethical psychiatrist, abusive and unethical psychologists, abusive psychiatrist husband, action and passivity in women, Age of Conformity, agnosticism and feminism, alienation and women, asymmetry of the sex act, atheism and feminism, attracting good guys, authenticity and women, autonomy and women, bad faith and feminism, beauty and feminism, Bible and women, bigotry and women, biological asymmetries between men and women, chivalry and women, Christianity and women, courtship and feminism, desire and feminism, discouraging bad guys, erotic life and feminism, ethics and feminism, existentialism and feminism, exploitation and women, fashions in feminism, femininity and feminism, feminism after Second Wave, feminism and absurdism, feminism and academe, feminism and adolescence, feminism and expanded options, feminism and identity, Feminism without Contradictions by Abigail L. Rosenthal, feminism’s new mythologies, Finding Mr. Right, Freud and women, Freud re the woman question, Genesis and male and female, Genesis and male female equality, Genesis and sexual asymmetry, Genesis and the man woman dynamic, heroic women, ideal women, institutional power and women, Jane Austen’s feminine virtues, Jane Austen’s heroines, Jane Austen’s values, looking for Mr. Right, men and accomplished women, men and intelligent women, men who feel threatened by women, men's relation to time, morality and feminism, novels and Jane Austen, obscuring the woman question, ontology and femininity, oppression and women, philosophy and women, politics of feminism, power and women, public feminist pioneers, radicalism and feminism, Second Stage Feminism, second wave feminism, sexual hierarchy, spirituality and women, surviving women's vulnerability, the Feminist wave, theology and feminism, theology and women, utopia and feminism, victimhood and women, what do women want?, wishing to be a deer, wishing to be an animal, woman and biological clock, women and protective partners, women and role playing, women and what life is about, women as public intellectuals, women attracting bad guys, women hiding vulnerability, women repelling attraction, women's relation to time, women's vulnerability, women’s attainable hopes, women’s biological receptivity, women’s desire to know, women’s love of wisdom, women’s need to attract, women’s need to look tough, women’s passivity, women’s preferences, women’s search for meaning, women’s search for purpose, women’s social receptivity, young girl’s hopes
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