{"id":4924,"date":"2017-12-27T05:52:53","date_gmt":"2017-12-27T05:52:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2017\/12\/27\/the-unavoidability-of-the-political\/"},"modified":"2017-12-27T05:52:53","modified_gmt":"2017-12-27T05:52:53","slug":"the-unavoidability-of-the-political","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2017\/12\/27\/the-unavoidability-of-the-political\/","title":{"rendered":"The Unavoidability of the Political"},"content":{"rendered":"

 Skholiast at Speculum Criticum<\/a> sends a friendly greeting that I have shortened a bit:<\/span> <\/p>\n

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Like the recent correspondent you quote in your Christmas post, I've been reading you a long time — I guess ten years now — and I read you from across the political divide. Possibly I am further "left," or "radical," or whatever, than that reader — I know I don't think of myself as "liberal," anyway. But when my liberal acquaintances get irritated with me, it's as likely to be because I've cited Burke, or Robert George, as Marx or Cornell West . . . <\/span><\/div>\n
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I'm closer to apolitical (duly acknowledging the dangers and possible incoherence of such a stance). Sure, you and I would have plenty to argue about — and we would argue because the differences matter — but I like to think we'd walk away still respectful, if shaking our heads. . . . Still, I read you for a lot more than curmudgeonly politics. It's for your critiques of scientism, your sane openness to mystery (does the [desert] landscape reinforce that?), and above all your study-everything-join-nothing stance, which has always resonated with me. <\/span><\/div>\n
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I share your love of — and I think your reasons for loving — Kerouac.  And there's no other blogger from whom I'm more likely to learn a new name to track down.  (For a long time, you were the only philosophy blogger I'd ever read who had cited [Erich] Pry[z]wara.)<\/span><\/div>\n
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You are right (I am afraid) that 2018 will bring more acrimony, not less, to politics . . . . My real concern is simply that philosophy itself remain possible (though *arguably* philosophy must seek justice & so must remain politically — & socially — "engaged," this is not obvious). Some regimes, and some social climates, are better than others for the possibility of philosophy. I am fairly persuaded that the acrimony doesn't help, but who knows? Perhaps philosophy is threatened more, in a different sense, when it is easier for it to fly under the radar w\/o giving "offense." In any case I hope that real thinkers will always be able to recognize each other.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n
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My concern too is that "philosophy itself remain possible."  I would prefer to let the world and its violent nonsense go to hell while cultivating my garden in peace.  Unfortunately, my garden and stoa are in the world and exposed to its threats.  My concern, of course, is not just with my petty life, but with the noble tradition of which I am privileged to be a part, adding a footnote here and there, doing my small bit in transmitting our culture. In the great words of Goethe:<\/span><\/div>\n
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Was du ererbt von deinen V\u00e4tern hast,<\/em><\/span>
erwirb es, um es zu besitzen!<\/em><\/span><\/div>\n
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What from your fathers you  received as heir,<\/span><\/div>\n
Acquire if  you would possess it. (Faust<\/em>, Part I, Night, lines 684-685, tr. W. Kaufmann)<\/span><\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n
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The idea is that what one has been lucky enough to inherit, one must actively appropriate, i.e., make one's own by hard work,  if one is really to possess it.  The German infinitive erwerben<\/a> has not merely the meaning of 'earn' or 'acquire' but also the meaning of aneignen<\/em>, appropriate, make one's own.<\/span><\/div>\n
 <\/span><\/div>\n
Unfortunately the schools and universities of today have become leftist seminaries more devoted to the eradication of the high culture of the West than its transmission and dissemination.  These leftist seed beds have become hot houses of political correctness.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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The two main threats, as I have explained many times, are from the Left and from Islam. They work in synergy, whether wittingly or unwittingly. <\/span><\/div>\n
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So politics, which has too little to do with truth and too much to do with power, cannot be ignored. This world is not ultimately real, but it is no illusion either, pace <\/em>some sophists of the New Age, and so some battling within it, ideological or otherwise, cannot be avoided. But philosophy is not battling, nor is it ideology.  There is no place in philosophy for polemics, though polemics has its place.<\/span><\/div>\n
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There will be plenty in the year to come. <\/span><\/div>\n
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<\/a>Islamists threaten to crack down on Muslims wearing Santa hats in fatwa against Christmas<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/fieldset>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

 Skholiast at Speculum Criticum sends a friendly greeting that I have shortened a bit:  Like the recent correspondent you quote in your Christmas post, I've been reading you a long time — I guess ten years now — and I read you from across the political divide. Possibly I am further "left," or "radical," or … Continue reading “The Unavoidability of the Political”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[306,48,198],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4924","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-activism-and-quietism","category-social-and-political-philosophy","category-tributes"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4924","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4924"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4924\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4924"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4924"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4924"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}