Tag Archives: empathy
The Ring of Gyges
There is a story that Plato tells in The Republic, his dialogue on political justice. Here’s how it goes. It starts with a man named Gyges. Everyone considered him to be a normal fellow. There was nothing odd about him. … Continue reading
Posted in absurdism, academe, action, agnosticism, alienation, art of living, atheism, authenticity, autonomy, bad faith, beauty, Biblical God, bigotry, books, bureaucracy, chivalry, class, conformism, contemplation, contradictions, cool, courage, cults, cultural politics, culture, desire, dialectic, erotic life, eternity, ethics, evil, existentialism, exploitation, faith, fashion, female power, femininity, feminism, freedom, Gnosticism, guilt and innocence, health, hegemony, 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, master, master/slave relation, memoir, memory, mind control, modern women, modernism, moral action, moral evaluation, moral psychology, morality, mortality, Nihilism, non-violence, ontology, oppression, pacifism, past and future, peace, Phenomenology of the Mind, philosophy, politics of ideas, postmodernism, power, power games, presence, psychology, public facade, public intellectual, radicalism, reading, reductionism, relationships, repairing the culture, roles, science, scientism, 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, the examined life, the problematic of men, the problematic of woman, the profane, the sacred, theism, theology, time, Truth, twenty-first century, Utopia, victimhood, victims, violence, war, work, writing, Zeitgeist
Tagged ant colony behavior, ant nest assignments, ant social structures, changes in behavior when no one is watching, discharged from hospital, empathy, ethical choices under pressure, evolutionary ladder, fairness, fracture, functional obligations, good when someone is watching, goodness and observation, Gyges, healing and reflection, helpless patient, hospital experience, human nature, illness and insight, institutional indifference, Is the just man happier?, just vs unjust, philosopher of biology, philosophy from the bedside, physical rehab recovery, Plato, political justice, Sandra D. Mitchell's Biological Complexity and Integrative Pluralism, self-advocacy, selfish behavior, social advantages and disadvantages of acting right, social advantages of acting justly, social insects, Socrates, study of ant behavior, The Republic, The Ring of Gyges, the truth of human behavior, the view from the hospital bed, true self and social presence, unkind behavior, vulnerability and dignity, What are we?, when the cat is away the mice will play, witness to life, writing from recovery
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Eminence?
Eminence? Nowadays I have been listening to the audio version of A Good Look at Evil (forthcoming on Amazon, early 2021). Jane Cullen, who was my editor at Temple University Press when this book first came out, has a young … Continue reading
Posted in absurdism, academe, action, alienation, anthropology, art of living, autonomy, books, childhood, cities, class, conformism, contemplation, contradictions, cool, courage, courtship, cultural politics, culture, desire, dialectic, erotic life, ethics, evil, existentialism, exploitation, faith, fashion, femininity, feminism, freedom, friendship, gender balance, glitterati, guilt and innocence, Hegel, hegemony, heroes, hidden God, hierarchy, history, history of ideas, id, idealism, ideality, identity, ideology, immorality, institutional power, legal responsibility, life and death struggle, literature, love, male power, martyrdom, master/slave relation, memoir, memory, mind control, modernism, moral action, moral evaluation, moral psychology, morality, novels, ontology, oppression, past and future, philosophy, poetry, politics of ideas, postmodernism, power, presence, propaganda, psychology, public facade, public intellectual, reading, reductionism, relationships, religion, roles, romance, scientism, secular, seduction, self-deception, sex appeal, social climbing, social construction, social conventions, social ranking, sociobiology, spiritual journey, spiritual not religious, spirituality, status, status of women, suffering, the examined life, the problematic of men, the problematic of woman, the profane, the sacred, time, twentieth century, twenty-first century, victimhood, work, writing, Zeitgeist
Tagged Abigail L. Rosenthal’s A Good Look at Evil, Abigail L. Rosenthal’s Confessions of a Young Philosopher, abstract claims, acquiring a life story, audio version, audiobook, audiobook listeners, audiobook narrator, Augustine’s Confessions, book editor, career moves, changing one’s paradigm, chess game of life, Confessions of a Young Philosopher, cultural identity, defending turf, drama, Eminence, empathy, enacting a book, enacting philosophy, fame and fortune, fame as career, Guggenheim Museum, hyper-feminine, Jane Cullen, life of ideas, life-shaping beliefs, life-shaping ideas, lived dramas, Matthew Cohn, meeting objections, Metropolitan Museum, personal brand, personal identity, philosophic argument, philosophic career, philosophic claims, philosophic critic, plotline, professional commendation, reading aloud, search for truth, self-correction, self-criticism, speaking for effect, speaking sincerely, St. Augustine, Stockholm syndrome, Success, suspenseful plot, Temple University Press, thinking time, time for thought, world of ideas
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How Hegel Helps
How Hegel Helps A British analytic philosopher friend read my “Obit” column of last week and noticed that I’d spent some of my professional time with G. W. F. Hegel, the nineteenth-century German philosopher. He emailed to ask what on … Continue reading
Posted in Absolute Freedom and Terror, absurdism, academe, action, afterlife, alienation, American politics, anthropology, art, art of living, atheism, autonomy, bad faith, books, bureaucracy, cities, class, conformism, contemplation, contradictions, courage, cultural politics, culture, desire, dialectic, eighteenth century, erotic life, existentialism, exploitation, faith, fashion, female power, femininity, feminism, films, freedom, friendship, gender balance, glitterati, Gnosticism, guilt and innocence, Hegel, hegemony, heroes, hidden God, hierarchy, history, history of ideas, idealism, ideality, identity, ideology, idolatry, immorality, institutional power, life and death struggle, literature, male power, masculinity, master/slave relation, memoir, memory, modernism, moral evaluation, moral psychology, nineteenth-century, novels, oppression, past and future, Phenomenology of the Mind, philosophy, poetry, politics of ideas, postmodernism, power, propaganda, psychology, public facade, public intellectual, radicalism, reading, relationships, religion, roles, romanticism, scientism, secular, seduction, self-deception, social climbing, social construction, social conventions, social ranking, spiritual journey, spiritual not religious, status, status of women, suffering, terror, the examined life, the problematic of men, the problematic of woman, the profane, the sacred, theology, time, twentieth century, twenty-first century, victimhood, work, writing, Zeitgeist
Tagged 19th-century German philosophy, a man’s world, advice for women, American universities, Ariadne’s thread, before and after WWI, boundaries on desire, British Analytic Philosophy, cultural era, cultural fad, cultural platforms, cultural studies, culturally relative truth, culture as way of thinking, defining an era, defining culture, empathy, fashionable feminism, female passivity, flappers, girls in the 1920s, Henry James, ideology v experience, intellectual fashions, intellectual groupie, key motivation, life as evidence, literary studies, lived experience, men and feminism, opinion-shapers, Parisian deconstructionist, Parisian intellectuals, Parisian post-moderns, philosophy in the Anglosphere, philosophy of history, Presentism, professional philosophy, queer studies, search for truth, the Absolute in culture, the downfall of a culture, the end of an era, the humanities, The Jazz Age, the right questions, thought-forms, WB Yeats’ The Second Coming, why cultures fall, women’s liberation, women’s studies, World War I
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Yom HaShoah
Yom HaShoah I really hadn’t wanted to go this time. It’s the night for commemorating/remembering the Shoah, the Holocaust, which my temple observes annually. Christian clergy sit on the raised platform at the front of the sanctuary and read, taking … Continue reading
Posted in Absolute Freedom and Terror, absurdism, academe, action, afterlife, alienation, American politics, anthropology, art, art of living, atheism, autonomy, beauty, Bible, Biblical God, bureaucracy, chivalry, Christianity, conformism, contemplation, contradictions, cool, courage, cultural politics, culture, desire, dialectic, erotic life, eternity, ethics, evil, existentialism, exploitation, faith, fashion, femininity, films, freedom, friendship, gender balance, glitterati, guilt and innocence, health, hegemony, heroes, hidden God, hierarchy, history, history of ideas, id, idealism, ideality, identity, ideology, idolatry, immorality, immortality, institutional power, Jews, journalism, Judaism, law, legal responsibility, life and death struggle, literature, love, male power, martyrdom, masculinity, master, medieval, memoir, memory, Messianic Age, mind control, modernism, moral action, moral evaluation, moral psychology, mortality, motherhood, mysticism, non-violence, ontology, oppression, pacifism, past and future, peace, philosophy, poetry, political, political movements, politics, politics of ideas, postmodernism, power, presence, promissory notes, propaganda, psychology, public facade, public intellectual, race, reductionism, relationships, religion, roles, scientism, seduction, self-deception, 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, twentieth century, twenty-first century, victimhood, victims, violence, war, work, writing, Zeitgeist
Tagged a past life, annihilation of the Jews, anti-Jewish imagery, anti-Zionism, Augustine's Jewish problem, Bishop Ambrose, board of trustees, burning synagogues, ceremony, choir, Christian clergy, Christian factions, commemoration, crazy history, David Nirenberg's Anti-Judaism: The Western Tradition, diaspora, Divine Presence, divine/human partnership, empathy, empathy with victims, enemies of God, Evil, ex-terrorist, factional disputes, genocide, graciousness, Hebrew revival, Hebrew Scriptures, historian, historicity, Holocaust, Kasim Hafeez, mass murder, mass persecution, meditative silence, memory, mercilessness, new Covenant, New Israel, nice guys, normalized history, norms of decency, old Covenant, Old Testament, past life memory, pitilessness, promised land, Reform temple, reincarnation, remembering, resistence songs, saints, sanctuary, school spirit, Shekinah, Shoah, showing the flag, sincere clergy, spiritual victory, St. Augustine, supersessionism, Swedish incarnation, temple, The Bible, The Longest Hatred, theology of contempt, truthful sermon, victims, wandering Jew, warm bodies, witnessing, Yom HaShoah
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“Ain’t I a Person?”
“Ain’t I a Person?” What’s a person? Am I a person? All the time? Is God? What’s going on when people say yes or no to questions like that? Jerry and I were in D.C. this week to celebrate the … Continue reading
Posted in Absolute Freedom and Terror, absurdism, academe, action, alienation, autonomy, chivalry, cities, contemplation, contradictions, cool, culture, desire, dialectic, erotic life, eternity, ethics, evil, existentialism, faith, fashion, femininity, feminism, films, freedom, friendship, gender balance, guilt and innocence, health, Hegel, heroes, history, history of ideas, identity, ideology, idolatry, institutional power, Jews, legal responsibility, life and death struggle, literature, love, male power, masculinity, memoir, mind control, motherhood, non-violence, ontology, peace, philosophy, political, political movements, power, psychology, public intellectual, reductionism, relationships, religion, roles, seduction, sex appeal, social conventions, spirituality, suffering, terror, the examined life, the problematic of men, the problematic of woman, theism, time, twentieth century, twenty-first century, Utopia, violence, war, work, writing, Zeitgeist
Tagged "the fix", academe, addiction, adulthood, alcoholism, anti-semitism, argument, autonomy, Brooklyn, Brooklyn College, collegiality, communication, corruption, D.C., dangers, defensiveness, dialogue, dignity, dumbstruck, empathy, fear, feminine identity, Feminism, fractional self, friendship, girlhood, God as Person, gothic, graft, grifters, happy child, healing, hidden self, higher ed, identity, inner core, innocence, interpretive frame, Jewish self-respect, Jewish students, life stages, loss, missing persons, opinions, orthodox Jews, person, personal God, personhood, philosophy, photo documentary, presence, reason, religious sincerity, righteous combats, self-respect, shock, teenage, toxic, trust, verbal hate, wholeness, womanhood, words, young-girl-in-flower
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“Losers”
“Losers” The Loser is the epitome, the spittin’ image, of what we don’t want to be. One time I shared, with a fireman friend, how it feels when you walk down the street feeling like one. “And everybody knows,” my … Continue reading
Posted in culture, life and death struggle, philosophy, psychology, relationships, social conventions, the examined life
Tagged abuses, aggression, birthright, blessing, crime, desolation, despair, economics, Edward Said, Emanuel Levinas, empathy, envy, fathers, firemen, French philosophers, hatred, Jacob and Esau, losers, manipulation, motivation, one-upmanship, philanthropy, psychology, rejection, self-destructiveness, sibling rivalry, sociobiology, solitude., street smarts, the Other, theories, violence, web of belief
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