Tag Archives: French Revolution
The Owl of Minerva Takes Flight Again
This is being written the last Sunday evening before our national election. By the time it’s posted, tabulation of ballots will be under way, perhaps disclosing which way the political winds are now blowing. However, as Hegel wrote: The owl … 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, Biblical God, bigotry, books, bureaucracy, 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, 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
Tagged 2024 election, academic philosophy, Antonio Gramsci, art history in academe, campus politics, cancel culture, cultural movements and dialectic, French Revolution, Freudian influence, Gramsci and cultural power, Gramsci and evidential constraints, Gramsci and political power, Gramscian agenda, Gramsci’s Prison Notebooks, Hegel, Hegelian view of culture, humanistic fields, intellectual emptiness, intellectual exhaustion, Liberal Arts, literature in academe, new hypothesis, oppressor and oppressed, path-breaking exploration, philosophers and political forecasts, philosophical skepticism, philosophy and the zeitgeist, political wins, postmodernism and academic philosophy, postmodernism and contradictions, postmodernism and dialectic, postmodernism and evidence, postmodernism and logic, postmodernism and refutation, postmodernism as exercise in persuasion, postmodernism as rhetoric, postmodernism as skepticism, postmodernism past its peak, psychology in academe, refusal of dialectic, Reign of Terror, risking denunciation, social sciences in academy, the cultural landscape, the goddess of wisdom, the owl of Minerva, the spirit of the times
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“Thankfulness”
Abbie is unable to write a new column this week because she and her husband, Jerry Martin, are stuck in Denver, CO, where a succession of flights home have been canceled. She and Jerry were in Denver for a fascinating … Continue reading
Posted in academe, action, alienation, cultural politics, culture, desire, erotic life, faith, friendship, guilt and innocence, history, ideology, philosophy, psychology
Tagged anger, bad faith, blessings, candor, collective community, Committee of Public Safety, consensus, covenant, decorum, dissent, Foucault, French Revolution, gratitude, Hebrew Scripture, homophobia, honesty, ideality, inauthenticity, insensitivity, Islamophobia, Israel, kibbutz, Leviticus, Mount Sinai, personal sincerity, politeness, political correctness, popularity, prayer, racism, ritual, sacrifice, sexism, Thanksgiving, The Archaeological Method, The Terror, Thought Crimes, Torah Study, unity
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“Thankfulness”
“Thankfulness” The other day, in the Saturday morning Torah Study class at my Reform temple, we were studying the verses on the ancient temple cultus detailed – and I mean detailed – in the Book of Leviticus. My patience with these Memory … Continue reading
Posted in academe, action, alienation, cultural politics, culture, desire, erotic life, faith, friendship, guilt and innocence, history, ideology, philosophy, psychology
Tagged anger, bad faith, blessings, candor, collective community, Committee of Public Safety, consensus, convenant, decorum, dissent, Foucault, French Revolution, gratitude, Hebrew Scripture, homophobia, honesty, ideality, inauthenticity, insensitivity, Islamophobia, Israel, kibbutz, Leviticus, Mount Sinai, personal sincerity, politeness, Political Corrrectness, popularity, prayer, racism, ritual, sacrifice, sexism, Thanksgiving, The Archaeological Method, The Terror, Thought Crimes, Torah Study, unity
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“Peace in the Eye of the Storm”
“Peace in the Eye of the Storm” Today in morning meditation I noticed a sense of large-scale peacefulness in me. (Don’t worry, friends. It’ll pass, it’ll pass! I’ll still be me.) I must say it took me quite by surprise, … Continue reading
Posted in Absolute Freedom and Terror, academe, action, afterlife, alienation, anthropology, art, art of living, autonomy, bureaucracy, chivalry, cities, class, conformism, contemplation, cool, desire, dialectic, erotic life, eternity, ethics, evil, faith, fashion, feminism, freedom, friendship, gender balance, guilt and innocence, health, Hegel, history, history of ideas, identity, ideology, idolatry, institutional power, legal responsibility, life and death struggle, literature, male power, masculinity, master, mortality, past and future, peace, Phenomenology of the Mind, philosophy, political, political movements, power, psychology, public intellectual, relationships, roles, seduction, social conventions, sociobiology, spirituality, suffering, the examined life, the problematic of men, the problematic of woman, theism, time
Tagged adventure of life, Alexander the Great, Alexandrian empire, American Academy of Religion, Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Aristotle, Asia Society, bullies, burnout, cafes, cafes and philosophers, Charles Dickens’ Tale of Two Cities, classical civilization, college administrators, conceptual accuracy, cultural heritage, denouncers denounced, denunciation, Diogenes, down time, Emmanuel Levinas, Epicurus, foresight, foretelling the future, freedom of conscience, French Revolution, futurology, G.W.F. Hegel, Greek amphitheaters, groundless denunciation, guillotine, Hellenistic civilization, hindsight, Hitler, hope, Human Resources, hunters and hunted, ideological bullies, inner peace, intelligent hope, McCarthyism, meditation, Metropolitan Museum, micro-aggression, miracles, moral directness, museum exhibits, museum going, overloaded, owl of Minerva, pedagogic vocation, Pergamon, peripatetics, personnel file, philosophers, philosophic talent, Prometheus, punishment of Prometheus, Roman temples, safe space, Salem witch trials, search for truth, Stoics, Sydney Carton, tainted personnel files, Title IX effects, transmission of culture, wave of the future, witch hunts
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