Oh, and for people wanting an (even more) fictionalized take on what Plato's Republic might look like: the novel "The Just City" by Jo Walton. A brief summary:
"Created as an experiment by the time-traveling goddess Pallas Athene, the Just City is a planned community, [based on Plato's Republic], populated by over 10,000 children and a few hundred adult teachers from all eras of history, along with some handy robots from the far human future - all set down together on a Mediterranean island in the distant past"
If you're the sort to like extended thought experiments on 2,500 year old philosophical texts, then this is for you.
I think a dive into Plato would be great. His writings are still relevant to this day, and a baseline of shared Plato understanding would let us take some fun digressions into neoplatonic gnosticism and all sorts of other great, weird stuff.
My favorite professor in college, when he was feeling feisty and self-consciously reductive, would describe "western civilization" as an ongoing conflict/dialogue between the two forces of Dialectic and Rhetoric, symbolized primordially by Plato and Isocrates.
He favored rhetoric, begrudged Plato's dominance from the middle ages onward, and saw signs for hope that Rhetoric could become ascendant again in our new postmodern age.
Oh, I think they would have gotten along. This Prof. introduced me to McCluhan, Postman, Hofstadter, and Tom Robins.
He was also a mischievous Catholic who thought Fox News was the fairest mainstream source of news. He was a character.
(Speaking of Hofstadter, there's another rabbit hole we could go down: his theory of consciousness as a self-referential loop. Most famously introduced in "Godel, Escher, Bach" but much more easily articulated in " I Am A Strange Loop")
First, I really appreciate your posts about "Why Trump was elected" that dig deeper than "people bad". Really interesting stuff.
I haven't really think about ethos, like, ever. And reading part about "Aristotle’s rhetoric" I was like "damn, why I don't know anything about it, where should I start". So yes, I would really appreciate posts about Plato or Aristotle.
Oh, and for people wanting an (even more) fictionalized take on what Plato's Republic might look like: the novel "The Just City" by Jo Walton. A brief summary:
"Created as an experiment by the time-traveling goddess Pallas Athene, the Just City is a planned community, [based on Plato's Republic], populated by over 10,000 children and a few hundred adult teachers from all eras of history, along with some handy robots from the far human future - all set down together on a Mediterranean island in the distant past"
If you're the sort to like extended thought experiments on 2,500 year old philosophical texts, then this is for you.
That's delightful. Will have to keep an eye out.
I think a dive into Plato would be great. His writings are still relevant to this day, and a baseline of shared Plato understanding would let us take some fun digressions into neoplatonic gnosticism and all sorts of other great, weird stuff.
My favorite professor in college, when he was feeling feisty and self-consciously reductive, would describe "western civilization" as an ongoing conflict/dialogue between the two forces of Dialectic and Rhetoric, symbolized primordially by Plato and Isocrates.
He favored rhetoric, begrudged Plato's dominance from the middle ages onward, and saw signs for hope that Rhetoric could become ascendant again in our new postmodern age.
Anyway, good stuff.
I believe your professor and Marshall McLuhan might have gotten along quite well.
Or hated each other over minor disagreements. It can be hard to tell.
Oh, I think they would have gotten along. This Prof. introduced me to McCluhan, Postman, Hofstadter, and Tom Robins.
He was also a mischievous Catholic who thought Fox News was the fairest mainstream source of news. He was a character.
(Speaking of Hofstadter, there's another rabbit hole we could go down: his theory of consciousness as a self-referential loop. Most famously introduced in "Godel, Escher, Bach" but much more easily articulated in " I Am A Strange Loop")
First, I really appreciate your posts about "Why Trump was elected" that dig deeper than "people bad". Really interesting stuff.
I haven't really think about ethos, like, ever. And reading part about "Aristotle’s rhetoric" I was like "damn, why I don't know anything about it, where should I start". So yes, I would really appreciate posts about Plato or Aristotle.
Anyway, see you tomorrow.
I don't think it's an accident that the most popular book assigned in American elite universities is Plato's Republic.
It's fundamental thesis is that people are too ignorant to govern themselves and only a group of highly educated elites can think for them.
(This is a vast over-simplification of a genuinely great book, but it's definitely there)