Footnotes to Plato from the foothills of the Superstition Mountains

Category: Friendship

  • The Trump Friendship Criterion

    If you are still friends with X after November 2016, X is a true friend. If not, not. Trump has proven to be quite the catalyst of clarification. Preternatural is his power to cause people and parties to show their true colors.

  • Friendship and Enmity

    One difference between the two is that friendship is mutual: A and B are not friends unless A is B's friend, and B is A's.  Not so with enmity. It suffices for A and B to be enemies that just one party be the enemy of the other.

  • Friendships Superficially Satisfying

    I had known him for years. Our friendship was an acquaintanceship that remained on the surface. Never having gone deep, it never drifted toward the hazards the deep waters hide: the differences that most truly define and distinguish us, but also oppose us to others. And so when he died I could not bring to…