Sunday, December 31, 2017

Ancient Science and Modern Science

Horses can be studied for varying purposes.  For example, as part of a Zoological comparative study, e. g.  involving quadripeds, they would likely be observed in a natural habitat.  In contrast, in preparation for use as a mode of transportation, how to feed a horse, how to shelter it, how to ride it, etc., would all likely be objects of examination.  Now, while human interference could be detrimental to the objectivity of the first project, it would not be to the second.  Rather, the criteria for any judgment involved in the second might include effectiveness of a procedure, e. g. whether or not a specific diet conduces to a horse's being ridden, morality of any treatment, e. g. whether or not medication that promotes speed constitutes abuse, etc.  Indeed, even the riding of a horse itself might be open to challenge.  But if so, it would be on Moral, not Epistemological grounds.  Likewise, some opposition to Experimentalism on grounds of principles of Philosophy of Science, e. g. Whitehead's, may be either misplaced or disingenuous.  That is, because of the alliance between Ancient Science and Medieval Theology, the exact source of a criticism of Modern Science, e. g. that it tampers with its object, might be difficult to determine, even by the one voicing it.

Saturday, December 30, 2017

Grasp and Causality

When being grasped by a human, an object conforms to the contours of a hand.  Likewise, when being harnessed, an environmental process, e. g. a force, conforms to a human interest.  In other words, conformation-to is a novel modification that can be attributed immediately to only Formal Causality.  Now, in Whitehead's system, the 'Prehension' of an external object is a Feeling, i. e. a Sensation, and, hence, is fundamentally no more than an effect of Efficient Causality, i. e. a rudimentary passive reaction to an external influence, subject to subsequent Teleological mental modification.  Thus, his judgment that manipulation, e. g. controlled experiment, can be only a contrivance that is part of a mechanical sequence, is rooted in either an unawareness of the synonymity of 'grasp' and 'prehension', or an abstraction of Prehension from its fundamental physiological shaping operation.

Friday, December 29, 2017

Experimentalism and Causality

Whitehead recognizes two types of Causality--Efficient and Teleological.  Accordingly, his concept of Organism is defined in terms of the two, as is Kant's.  Now, in his system, Teleological Causality is the source of Novelty, i. e. an Impulse that initiates a novel Concrescence is a reaction to the insufficiency of the given.  Consequently, Skill and Method, as opposed to Novelty, can only be modes of Efficient Causality, i. e. mechanical procedures.  So, he cannot consider the possible roles of either Formal or Material Causality, e. g. that Organism is a Hylomorphic concept.  Likewise, he cannot consider that Skill and Method are modes of Formal Causality, the Matter of which are various motions, e. g. rolling a ball down an incline, blowing into a saxophone, etc.  So, another false dichotomy that leads to his criticism of Experimentalism is that of Teleological Causality vs. Efficient Causality.

Thursday, December 28, 2017

Impulse and Novelty

Whitehead's observation that "imaginative zest is tinged with impulse" is perhaps an illusion to Dewey's concept of Impulse as the origin of Novelty.  But, regardless, there is a significant difference between the two concepts of Impulse.  Now, according to Dewey, Impulse initiates Action, whereas, in Whitehead's system, Impulse initiates a Teleological Mental event.  In other words, for Dewey, Novelty consists in changing the world, while for Whitehead, Novelty consists in re-interpreting the world.  Whitehead thus seems committed to the position that one can read a new book, but one cannot write a new book, or improvise musically.

Wednesday, December 27, 2017

Experimentation and Improvisation

Whitehead opposes "skill" and "imaginative zest".  So, it is perhaps because he conceives that the former can "stifle" the latter that he accuses Bacon of a lack of imagination, and experimenters as "cooking the facts for the sake of exemplifying the law". He also calls the attempt to combine the two a "paradox".  But, if so, then Jazz is 'paradoxical', which does not seem to inhibit it from existing, or skill of players from being imaginative, i. e. improvisational.  Rather, it evinces that Experimentation is essentially Improvisation, which, in some contexts,  can be a means to a worthy deliberate exemplification of a law, e. g. curing diseases.  So, Whitehead's judgements about Experimentalism may be based on a false dichotomy.

Tuesday, December 26, 2017

Philosophy and Thought Experiment

At least some Philosophy can conceived as a thought experiment, an attempt, beginning with a set of assumptions, to produce certain results.  For example, Foundational Empiricism attempts to derive all Knowledge from Sense-Data.  However, it fails to do so in two important cases--imaginable though never actually perceived colors and tones, and the time-ordering of Cause and Effect.  Now, since the latter is first recognized decades later, by Kant, Hume is unaware of it.  However, he directly addresses the former, recognizing that his 'missing shade of blue' does indeed constitute a failure for his enterprise, but judges it to be too insignificant a failure to warrant jettisoning the project.  In contrast, Whitehead disagrees, using the failure to introduce into the original set of assumptions the theses of the existence of what he calls 'Eternal Objects', e. g. all the musical tones, all the colors of the spectrum, that influence actual specific Sense-Experience implicitly.  The result, as it is for Kant, is a new thought experiment, incorporating a more comprehensive set of assumptions, an ironic development given Whitehead's opposition to Experimentalism, as has been previously discussed.

Monday, December 25, 2017

Experimentalism, Truth, Efficacy

In the following assertion, the otherwise usually insightful Whitehead expresses a misunderstanding of Experimentalism: "Experiment is nothing else than a mode of cooking the facts for the sake of exemplifying the law."  The root of the misunderstanding is expressed in the "cooking the facts" image, which implies a falsification.  But, the measure of the Experimental method is not Truth qua correspondence between representation and fact, but Truth qua efficacy.  Accordingly, for the Experimentalist, "exemplifying the law" means "confirmation that effects can be reliably produced", the primary concern of Technology, regardless of Whitehead's Leibnizian orientation, which does not recognize the reality of such efficacy.

Sunday, December 24, 2017

Experimentalism and Empiricism

Given that 'Empiricism' is widely applied to the Foundationalism of Locke, Berkeley, and Hume, while the Baconian Method incorporates instruments and the production of effects, the latter might be more accurately termed 'Experimentalism'.  Likewise, while the aim of that Empiricist tradition is the establishment of Knowledge that is certain, either immediately or mediately, Experimentalism is a method that aims at the repeatable production of effects.  Consequently, its values are not Certainty and Necessity, but, as Peirce later introduces and Dewey refines, Fallibility and Probability.  Hence, Experimentalism is inherently non-Foundationalist, and the topic that absorbs Hume--whether or not Causality entails Necessity--is irrelevant to it.

Saturday, December 23, 2017

Method and Logic

Deductive Logic and Inductive Logic are two methods of extending Knowledge.  The arc of the former is from Universal to Particular, while that of the latter is the inverse.  Thus, insofar as Rationalism begins with a Universal, and Empiricism with a Particular, Deductive Logic is a method usually associated with Rationalism, and Inductive Logic with Empiricism.  However, Hegel employs neither in the Phenomenology.  Its arc from Particular to Universal might seem to be effected by Inductive Logic.  But, while in Inductive Logic, a Particular subsists after it is extended from, in Hegel's method, a Particular is unstable because insufficient, eventually giving way to a more comprehensive Particular, etc., until a stable Universal is reached.  This method is, of course, Dialectical Logic, derived from the methods of Plato and Kant, and classified as Rational.  But, Hegel's Rationalism departs from both the Rationalism and the Empiricism of the preceding era.  For, his Universal-Particular contrast is that of Whole-Part, whereas the Universal-Particular contrast of each of those traditions is that of Class-Member.  In other words, traditional Deductive and Inductive Logics are each Categorial, while Hegel's Dialectical Logic is Holistic.  Hence, the aim of his method is not extending Knowledge, but completing it.

Friday, December 22, 2017

Empiricism and Causality

Hume's concept of Causality is often rendered as Constant Conjunction.  However, that formulation is imprecise in two respects: that it is an observed pattern of association, but, more important, a previously observed pattern of association that, by habit, is expected to continue in the future.  But, a habit itself is a past pattern that is expected to continue in the future.  Thus, as Kant eventually discerns, the concept is rooted in a cognitive mechanism, that, if not innate, is prior to any experience.  Furthermore, there is no consideration in Hume's analysis of the type of Causality that is of especial interest to Bacon: the deliberate attempt to produce effects, which when repeatedly successful, can be formulated, via Induction, as a scientific law.  In that context, Causality is Production; the Conjunction is that of Attempt and Success;  the sequence is actively generated, not merely passively observed; and any expectation of repetition is based on confidence, not habit.  So, significant differences between Baconian Empiricism and Foundational Empiricism are epitomized by their respective concepts of Causality.

Thursday, December 21, 2017

Method, Baconian Empiricism, Foundational Empiricism

Three features of Baconian Empiricism absent from the Foundational Empiricism of Locke, etc. are 1. the equation of Knowledge and Power; 2. the deliberate production of effects to be observed; and 3. the employment of instruments in observation, e. g. telescope and microscope.  In other words, his is an active Empiricism, while theirs is passive.  The distinction between the two accounts for that between the two editions of the Critique of Pure Reason, as the references to Bacon in the second signify.  In particular, Kant's update takes into account the experience that he calls Self-Affection, in which one observes what one is doing, e. g. drawing a line.  He thus seems to appreciate the innovations of Baconian Empiricism better than do the British 'Empiricists', as they are often characterized, though not to the extent that he would classify it as a Method, to be subjected to Transcendental analysis, i. e. his own Method.

Wednesday, December 20, 2017

Method, Empiricism, Power

Aristotle's method is Empiricist, but not in the Foundationalist sense of Locke et al., i. e. he seeks Knowledge via observation, not extends it from immediate Sense Knowledge.  Now, though Bacon pioneers Modern Empiricism, the title of his major work, Novum Organum, signifies a divergence not from Aristotelian Epistemology, but from his Logic, which is presented in the Organon i. e. the primary contrast is that of Inductive vs. Deductive reasoning.  Nevertheless, there is another decisive break that could be classified as Epistemological.  For, Bacon's formulation Knowledge is Power constitutes a supplanting of Contemplation by Techne as the highest Knowledge.  In that respect, the true continuation of Bacon's innovation is to be found in the works of not Locke, Berkeley, and Hume, but of Spinoza, for whom Will and Understanding are one and the same, or of Nietzsche, who explains Aristotle's proposition that humans by nature desire to know as Will to Power.

Tuesday, December 19, 2017

Method, Reflection, Praxis

The Socratic compound reflection 'I know only myself' is the basis of Modern Epistemology, i. e. elaborated as entailing knowledge of the existence of a deity, of Secondary Qualities, of the Forms of Knowledge, etc.  But, as such, in each case, it continues as it is for Socrates--a method for distinguishing what to believe from what to not believe.  It is thus as much the basis of detachment from external information as it is of detachment from external attraction or repulsion.  In other words, even as the foundation of Modern Epistemology, Reflection functions as a Practical Method.

Monday, December 18, 2017

Method, Socrates, Reflection

The Dialogic method usually called "Socratic" is, more accurately, Platonic, ascribed by Plato to his character Socrates in fictional dialogues.  Instead, if there is a Method that can be attributed to the actual Socrates, it is Reflection, formulated by the Delphic principle Know Thyself.  Another product of the confusion between a fictional and actual Socrates is the meaning of the proposition 'I know only that I do not know anything', which, taken at face value, expresses Agnosticism, but interpreted as ironic, in a contrived scenario, expresses methodical Skepticism with the ulterior purpose of establishing some other Knowledge, much like the pattern of Cartesian meditation.  Now, each of the prominent Methods of Modern Philosophy originates in Reflection, but is extended in a direction not necessarily entailed in the possible Agnostic modesty of its founder.

Sunday, December 17, 2017

Method, Phenomenology, Attention

Hegel's Phenomenology is not to be confused with Husserl's, which is based on a different concept of Consciousness, entailing a different concept of Intention.  Nevertheless, they share a disregard for one mode of Consciousness--Attention.  The significance of this disregard is that Attention is a fundamental factor in Method--it is the Consciousness of what one is doing, without which a Method cannot be executed.  Underlying this disregard is adherence to the traditional concept of the immediate object of Consciousness being either some external object or itself, rather than one's Motility, which includes writing, looking, listening, etc.  But the execution of neither method of Phenomenology is possible without attentive Consciousness guiding it.

Saturday, December 16, 2017

Method and Phenomenology

Hegel presents Phenomenology as a hybrid of Rationalist and Empiricist methods, a Logical path from immediate Sensation, to Absolute Knowledge.  But, what is actually there in the text is a written account of an anti-Atomist thought experiment, which demonstrates, via a Dialectical method, that any This, Empirical or otherwise, is necessarily a Part of a Whole.  In other words, regardless of his intentions, he continues the Modern tradition of Philosophy as an Experiment, i. e. an attempt that may or may not succeed, which would be discovered in a reflection on Method, a concept that, like his predecessors, he presupposes without examination.

Friday, December 15, 2017

Method and Transcendentalism

Kant's attempt to combine Rationalist and Empiricist methods results in an innovative method--Transcendentalism.  Transcendentalism is traditionally Rationalist, because since its contents are ideas, concepts, etc., and it is traditionally Empricist, since it limits the scope of those formations to Sense-Experience.  This Transcendentalism also inherits the inattention to Method of its progenitors.  Now, Kant does devote a section of the Critique of Pure Reason to Method.  But, not merely is the topic an afterthought in the volume, its title exposes its misdirectedness.  For, "Transcendental Doctrine of Method", which he attributes to Pure Reason, misses that Transcendentalism is itself a Method, just as Descartes, Locke, etc. miss that their Rationalism and Empiricism are Methods.

Thursday, December 14, 2017

Method and Temporality

A Method is a Means to an End.  It therefore consists in at least two stages; but these stages are not simultaneous.  In other words, Method is inherently Temporal, and, as has been previously discussed, ordinally so, i. e. a Means precedes an End, but not vice versa.  Now, even though Time is of only marginal interest to the pioneering Rationalists and Empiricists, it is implicit in the Foundationalism that they share--they each begin with some certain element, and then derive others, e. g. more complex elements, copies, etc.  But that inattention to Time is more than incidental in both traditions--the privileging of Eternity by the Rationalists relegates Time to a subordinate status at best, and the Associationism of the Empiricists is symmetrical, and, hence, atemporal.  It is not until Kant recognizes the inadequacy of that Associationism to Causality that the fundamentality of Temporality to Experience gets recognized, though he still misses its role in Practice.  Nevertheless, to whatever extent Philosophy is Methodical, it is Temporal.

Wednesday, December 13, 2017

Method, Volition, Self

A Method is a plan of Action that may or may not be successful in particular instances.  But, regardless of the outcome, an attempt at executing it has been made.  In other words, Method entails Volition.  Thus, entailed in the Epistemological methods Rationalism and Empiricism, and typically abstracted from their execution, is Volition, and its immediate expression--I Will.  Now, Volition might be neutralized, but not contradicted.  Thus, not only can I Will not be the object of Skepticism, it is, in fact, its subject.  So, the various notable Rationalist and Empiricist attempts to conceive the Self, e. g. Cogito, Bundle of Perceptions, etc., are misdirected from their textual outsets.

Tuesday, December 12, 2017

Method and Mathematics

A Method is a plan of action in pursuit of some goal.  It is thus designed to be executed, with respect to which a Theoretical operation such as examining it or contemplating it is derivative and inessential.   A Method has an inherent sequential structure, or, in other words, it is inherently Ordinal.  Thus, it is inherently Mathematical, i. e. it entails First, Second, etc.  Accordingly, the Mathematical concepts of the predominant Modern Methods, Rationalism and Empiricism, e. g. that Mathematical knowledge requires the existence of a deity, that it is constituted by static associations of representations of Sense-Data, etc., are all derivative.

Monday, December 11, 2017

Method, Certainty, Infallibility

Certainty can be either Theoretical or Practical--the former is Necessity of Truth, while the latter is Infallibility.  Thus, for example, a Proposition that is certain is necessarily true, while a Method that is certain is one in which success is guaranteed.  Likewise, to doubt a Proposition is to consider that it might be false, while to doubt a Method is to consider that it might be unsuccessful.  Now, a notable confusion of the two varieties is in a traditional argument against Skepticism--that applied to itself it cancels itself--the pioneering version of which is Descartes'.  But Skepticism is in this case a Method for determining Theoretical Certainty.  Hence, it is inapplicable to itself, which is why Descartes cannot doubt that he is doubting, and, thus the presumed contradiction--that he is both doubting and doubting that he is doubting--does not obtain.  Likewise, because the negation of Practical Uncertainty is not Theoretical Certainty, as a Method of determining Theoretical Certainty, his Skepticism about Skepticism fails.

Sunday, December 10, 2017

Metamethodology and Modern Philosophy

The study of Method per se could be called Methodology, but since that term is commonly used for more specialized purposes, an alternative is Metamethodology.  So, insofar as each of the main doctrines of Modern Philosophy, Rationalism and Empiricism, begins, as has been previously discussed, as a Method, the study of Modern Philosophy, if not the foundation of any Philosophy, is Metamethodology.  Now, a Method is an organized way of proceeding.  Hence, Method connotes both How-to and Can-do.  In other words, it is an expression of Techne, and evinces the equivalence of Knowledge and Power, in the most general sense of the latter concept.  Thus, for example, Descartes' I Think, arrived at via a Method, is preceded by both I Know How and I Can Do.  Likewise, whether or not Locke is correct to assert that there are no innate Ideas, his Empiricism is a Rational procedure.

Saturday, December 9, 2017

Interpreting the World, Changing the World, Escaping the World

To Marx' contrast of Philosophy as interpreting the World and Philosophy as changing the World can be added a third option: Philosophy as escaping the World.  For example, Modern Philosophy begins with Bacon as Method, one aspect of which is the attempt to "produce effects".  From that origin, on the one hand, Descartes extracts the Cogito, attached to the World only by the pineal gland.  Leibniz then severs his Monad from any such connection, and speculates that it might inhabit other Worlds, leading eventually to the denial of any Actual World by some contemporary Modal Logicians.  On the other hand, Locke reduces Empiricist Method to sensory Ideas, which Berkeley further reduces to private phenomena that are the medium of divine communication.  Subsequently, Hegel also spiritualizes Phenomena, and Heidegger, via Husserl, ontologizes them as Being, differentiated from Beings inhabitating the World.  In other words, to add to another of Marx' famous sayings, Philosophy is the opiate of some Philosophers.

Friday, December 8, 2017

Knowledge, Power, Mathematics

Bacon's fundamental principle--Knowledge is Power--means that Knowledge is fundamentally Techne, i. e. Know-How, a formulation usually falsified by its fragmentation into Knowing-That and Having-Power-Over.  Likewise, the foundation of Modern Epistemology is Method, from which, in accordance with that fragmentation, competing concepts of Knowing-That emerge--Rationalism and Empiricism.  Thus, still remaining disavowed by mainstream Philosophers, is the rogue insight two centuries later that Descartes' Discourse on Method is an expression of a Will to Power.  Also overshadowed in the Meditations, the usual attention to which is on a Jesuit's wrestling with orthodox Theology, is its more radical heterodoxy--the introduction of Mathematics as Techne, i. e. founding it on the Cogito, thereby supplanting the tradition, beginning with Pythagoras, of it as a Knowing-That.  So, Descartes can be conceived as advancing Baconism with a principle that is formulated as: Mathematics is Power, the consequences of which have been much of subsequent history.

Thursday, December 7, 2017

Rationalism, Empiricism, Incorporealism

If the standard American academic Philosophy curriclum is any indication, the Modern era begins when Descartes breaks from Medieval dogmatism, and establishes the Cogito as the foundation of Philosophical endeavor.  Then, in response, Locke insists on the irreducibility of Sense-Experience, thereby setting in motion the Rationalism vs. Empiricism dynamic, typified by the exchanges between Locke and Leibniz.  But, this narrative is deficient in two main respects, with a common root.  First, it abstracts the Meditations from Discourse on Method, thereby suppressing that antedating the latter is Bacon's formulation of Method, which as an autonomous, corporeal activity, constitutes a more profound break from Medievalism than does the incorporeal Cogito.  In other words, the original Rationalism of the era is Experimental Reason, i. e. constituted by instrument-aided methodical procedures of producing and measuring effects. So, too, is the original Empiricism Experimentalist, from which Locke et al. abstract the mere observation of an object falling, from the deliberate dropping of it for the purpose of measuring it.  As a result, Modern Philosophy reverts to Medieval Incorporealism.

Wednesday, December 6, 2017

Political Philosophy and the United States

The arrival of the United States, as expressed in the Constitution, presents a counter-example to much of the preceding Political Philosophy.  It is a product of collective construction, a response to specific historical circumstances, dubbed an "experiment" because of its uncertain future.  In that context, ideas such as Freedom have value not as absolute truths, but as sound building materials.  Likewise, that it might be a response to biological need does not guarantee modal Necessity of success as a viable social organization.  And, it demonstrates what gets suppressed in Plato's leap from a vision of the Idea of Good to the effecting of social harmony--Reason that is both Techne and Experimental.

Tuesday, December 5, 2017

Experimentalism and Political Philosophy

In Process and Reality, Whitehead mentions Bacon only twice, and very briefly.  In both cases, it is to criticize Bacon for ignoring the value of Speculation in the pursuit of Knowledge, though absent in these passages is any reference to Bacon's novel, New Atlantis, arguably the first work of Modern Political Philosophy.  On the other hand, he elsewhere brands as "cooking the books" Dewey's Experimentalism, the pioneer of which is--Bacon.  Now, Whitehead is far from alone in under-appreciating Bacon--it is perhaps the only thing contemporary Philosophy and Political Science academic departments have in common.  Accordingly, little consideration, at least prior to Dewey, has been given to the characterization of the formation of the United States as an "experiment", to which mainstream Political Philosophy, neither Ancient nor Modern, seems adequate.

Monday, December 4, 2017

Organism, Ecologism, Supernaturalism

Heliocentrism entails the end of Geocentrism, which entails the end of Anthropocentrism.  Arising out of Heliocentrism has been Ecologism, the first significant systematic recognition of which has been Darwinism, which imbeds Human History in Natural History.  Plato's World-Soul is potentially Ecologic, but he does not pursue the consequences of a Philosopher-King, on the basis of a vision of the Idea of the Good, including Human-Environment relations in his project of harmonization.  Now, the formidable resistance to Ecology has been varieties of Supernaturalism, according to which Humans are fundamentally separable from any Ecosystem.  One example of that resistance is Leibniz' Monadology, according to which a Monad is essentially unaffected by its environment.  In contrast, Whitehead does allow that an Organism is a product of its Environment.  But, by excluding from Actuality any process of modification by an Organism of its Environment, he, implicitly, even if not completely, continues the Supernaturalist resistance to Ecologism.

Sunday, December 3, 2017

Organism and Prehension

Whitehead's Actuality is constituted by processes of intake from its environment by an Organism, which is itself at any moment the culmination of prior intakes.  But, lacking in this scheme is Motility, as if only certain plants were Organisms.  Now, a general term that he uses to characterize these events is Prehension.  However, he does not seem to recognize that Prehension means Grasp, which entails Motility, i. e. a hand enfolding some object.  To so recognize it is to also recognize that in the Organisms with capacity for Grasp, it is not a termination of a process but a preparation for further Motility, e. g. wielding a tool.  He is thus precluded from considering that a fundamental moment in the experience of an Organism is that it modifies its environment, not merely takes from it.

Saturday, December 2, 2017

Organism, Process, Political Philosophy

Whitehead conceives a Leibnizian Monad as both a Process and an Organism.  However, he does not explain the application of a dynamic concept of Organism to the traditional one, to which, as a living Whole of Parts, duration seems inessential.  One possible exception, though, is Aristotle's, according to which it is in the pursuit of an End that the parts of a body are both animated and unified.  So, writ large, a Polity that is both an Organism and a Process is one that harmonizes its citizen by the pursuit of a common Good.  Now, typically throughout history, such a unifier of a society has been a potential enemy, if not an actual conflict.  But, a Leader who is acting on the basis of a vision of the Idea of the Good is one who would transcend the particularity of an End that is contingent on animosity.  So, an extension of Whitehead's concept of dynamic Organism to Political Philosophy yields a criticism of the particularity of most prior models of the best Polity.  But, insofar as Leibniz does not recognize Monads as collectively constituting an Organism, Whitehead might not approve of such an extension.

Friday, December 1, 2017

Leadership, History, Cosmopolity

If the Idea of the Good in the Republic is identical to the World-Soul of the Timaeus, then the Polis harmonized by the Philosopher-King, in accordance with a vision of the Idea of the Good, can be either only a Cosmopolity, or a more localized Polity in transition to be incorporated in an eventual more comprehensive entity.  But, it is not until Kant, Hegel, and Marx that the historicization of Political Philosophy begins to be considered.  Accordingly, all prior Political Philosophy, Ancient and Modern, has become obsolete in many of its details, e. g. that self-preservation is the sole motivation for an individual human entering into association with others.  Likewise, not taking into consideration that an effective Sovereign must have, as has previously discussed, diachronic Leadership qualities, i. e. by means of which a local Polity might constitute an episode in the historical progression towards a Cosmopolity, is a deficiency in those models.

Thursday, November 30, 2017

Leader and Follower

The main works of Political Philosophy all appear in reaction to some problematic circumstances--the death of Socrates, the English Civil War, the decay of the Feudal order, etc.  And yet, each of them is presented as unconditioned, entailing universal truths--the Idea of the Good, Psychological Egoism, Individual Right, etc.  Accordingly, they preempt consideration of the significance and characteristics of Leadership, which, as has been previously discussed, is integral to periods of social transition.  Hence, for example, the Leader-Follower relation, which, because possibly obtaining in a period of dissolution, cannot be reduced to an eternal or institutional structure.  Hence, it cannot be easily attributed to Reason.  Instead, the perhaps uncanny resonance of a Leader in a Follower suggests a binding together, in particular circumstances, effected by an instinctual influence, e. g. a Species-drive.  So, insofar as in stable periods, a Leader-Follower relation underlies a Ruler-Ruled relation, i. e. accounts for a personal dimension that is otherwise lacking, e. g. compensated for by threats or promises, the major works ignore what might be a significant factor in a Political Philosophy.

Wednesday, November 29, 2017

Form of the Good, Genius, Species

The distinction between Ruler and Leader can be illustrated by the contrast between Solomon and Moses--even the Philosopher-King might not be a pioneer.  Likewise, beyond the Form of the Good as a motivator, there is Genius, which breeds exemplary conduct, and, hence, inspires others to follow, without any of the trappings of established Power, even benign ones.  Now, Genius needs no supernatural explanation; rather, it might be a manifestation of a Species-drive, with a Leader as the medium of propagation.  So, a Ruler might be the appropriate sovereign in a period of stability, and a Leader, in a period of transition, a distinction not recognized in standard Political Philosophy.

Tuesday, November 28, 2017

Ruler and Leader

Though 'ruler' and 'leader' are sometimes used interchangeably, there is one important distinction between them.  While the ruler-ruled relation is synchronic, that of leader-follower is diachronic, i. e. to 'lead' is to 'go first'.  Thus, the Ideal Ruler does not entail change, while the Ideal Leader does.  Accordingly, the object of the vision of the Ideal Leader is not the Idea of the Good, but the Idea of the Better, relative to the status quo.  So, not only is the significance of Leadership not taken into account by Plato, whose Republic is static, but by Marx, as well, who does recognize the historicity of Political Philosophy, but fails to appreciate the essentiality of Leaders in the revolutionary process.

Monday, November 27, 2017

Monism, Pluralism, Dualism

The standard Monist-Pluralist contrast of Spinoza and Leibniz connotes that the former recognizes the existence of one entity, while the latter, many entities.  But, underlying that Pluralism is a Creator-Creature Dualism that Leibniz shares with the other 'Rationalist' of the tradition, Descartes, as well as, correspondingly, a Mind-Body Dualism. Similarly, unlike those Rationalists, Spinoza is not an Epistemological Dualist.  For, his primary distinction in that respect is Adequate Idea and Inadequate Idea, with two varieties of the former--Intuition and Reason--while Inadequate is, more properly, Semi-Adequate.  So the difference between Reason and Sense for Spinoza is not, as it is for Descartes and Leibniz, absolutely Dualistic.  But perhaps the most important distinction between Spinoza and the other two is that his concept of Reason is fundamentally Practical, i. e. he conceives it as identical to Will, while for them, Cognition-Volition is another manifestation of the Theological Dualism.  In other words, for Spinoza, Reason is fundamentally Techne, which also explains why he, unlike Descartes and Leibniz, can extend it to a Political Philosophy.

Sunday, November 26, 2017

Monism vs. Pluralism, City of God, City of Man

The standard academic classification of Spinoza and Leibniz as each a 'Rationalist', with the former a 'Monist', and the latter a 'Pluralist', is both misleading and uninstructive.  It is misleading, because it does not take into account Spinoza's Intuitionism, and because it does not distinguish between Spinoza's concept of Sense-Experience as incompletely real, and Leibniz' of it as irreal.  It is uninstructive because it abstracts from the Theological ground of the Monist-Pluralist distinction.  That ground is that Spinoza's deity is corporeal, while Leibniz' is not.  Consequently, while they agree that the only real Causality is divine, it is immanent in the corporeal inter-Mode Causality of the former, while there can be no corporeal inter-Monad Causality for the latter.  Hence, because connected, the Modes are part of the same Substance, but because disconnected, the Monads are Plural.  Now, a further distinction between the two is lost in the limbo that separates Philosophy from Political Science in academic.  The immanence of Spinoza's deity entails that the City of God and the City of Man are one and the same, whereas on the basis of the transcendence of Leibniz' deity, only the City of God is real.

Saturday, November 25, 2017

Action and Fallibility

As Whitehead posits, and Neurophysiology has confirmed, the stimulation of a sense-organ by some object, and its reception in the brain, are not simultaneous.  Accordingly, even if the initial content remains unmodified along the neural path, there is an irreducible differential between an object of perception and the cause of the perception.  But it does not necessarily follow from that differential that the perceptual field is irreal, or that any attempt to modify it is inherently in vain.  Rather, it can also follow that Action is inherently probable but fallible and experimental, which therefore grounds the shortcomings of an immanent Species-drive.  In other words, on that basis, there is not the need for an extrinsic rationale for the existence of disharmony, as there is if human existence is attributed solely to an omnipotent deity, e. g. the rationale that this is "the best of all possible worlds", or, equivalently "God moves in mysterious ways", or "God has a master plan".

Friday, November 24, 2017

Perspective, Epiphenomenon, Prospective

Leibniz characterizes the perceptual field of a Monad variously as Perspective, Reflection, and Representation.  But, Whitehead's detailed analysis reveals crucial distinctions between them.  For sure, to begin with, none of them is a Phenomenalist In-Me World, i. e. entirely Second Quality.  However, while Perspective is For-Me, Reflection suggests not, say, the surface of an object facing one, but a variety of Epiphenomenon, i. e. an insubstantial representation of such a surface.  But what Whitehead bears out is that the representation, like that of the Gestaltists, is a projection, more accurately characterized as From-Me.  In other words, the perceived surface, is a product of a cognitive synthesis that includes the causal effects, slightly previous, of the surface on sense-organs, as well as what is subjectively added, e. g. structuring.  However, like Leibniz, Whitehead does not seem to recognize the organic function of this projection--to present a field of potential Action, rather than a mere object of Contemplation or Geometrical analysis, i. e. that it is a Prospective.  So, Whitehead, perhaps unwittingly, reinforces Leibniz' Theological thesis that the only source of Agency is a deity, with the implication that bettering the World via Political Philosophy is an expression of no more than human vanity.

Thursday, November 23, 2017

Psychology and Cosmopolity

According to what, for at least centuries, has been the predominant Psychological theory, the principle of all individual behavior is personal survival.  On that basis, as Hobbes influentially draws out, the existence of others, and a Species-drive, can only be conceived as radically transcendent to, if not antagonistic to, one.  But, within the past two centuries, that principle has been challenged in two ways, though not yet effectively enough to supplant in the popular imagination.  First, the Will to Power and Evolution, in themselves, entail more than mere survival, i. e. growth, in some respect.  Second, Darwinism, especially, suggests that individual behavior can, in fact, be a manifestation of a Species-drive, as it more patently is in Reproductive processes.  On that basis, immanent in even the most mundane bit of personal behavior can be, contrary to traditional Psychology, the promotion of a Cosmopolity that, millennia after the origin of the Species, is now becoming a concrete reality.

Wednesday, November 22, 2017

Species, Family, Harmony

The best available evidence suggests that all members of the human species have common ancestors.  It also suggests that the species first spread out globally from the site of its origin, and in recent centuries has been coalescing.  Thus, the species can be classified as a Family, and that this Family is governed by some principle or principles of organization, so that Family is the fundamental mode of human social organization.  On that basis, paticular families are all branches of the general Family, and a Polis is a modification of the fundamental principles of organization.  So, whether this Family is conceived as evolved from apes, or as postlapsarian, Harmony can be attributed to it without recourse to supernatural premises, and without a pre-established limitation of bestness.

Tuesday, November 21, 2017

Pre-Established Harmony and Internetwork

For some, the concept of human interconnectivity is Metaphysical, such as Leibniz' thesis of Pre-Established Harmony.  But, the essence of the latter is the principle of Predetermination, which Leibniz buttresses with the Best of All Possible Worlds thesis to explain the existence of suffering--a condition that is unsurpassable by human agency, because of the irreality of any such agency.  In contrast, fundamental human interconnectivity is, with no such mystification, as easily accounted for by the underlying unity of the species as is the commonality of blood types, genetic material, etc.  Furthermore, that plain fact is not constrained by the modal limitation of Leibniz' concatenation, thus leaving open the possibility of betterment.  Among the means to such betterment are improvements in the means of production, of communication, and of transportation, as well as in modes of social organization.  The aim of Political Philosophy is to devise the latter, and, unhindered by restrictions such as Leibniz' Theological commitments, a malleable human Internetwork can be recognized as the raw material of such a project.

Monday, November 20, 2017

Society, Internetwork, Interindependence

The previously described model of Society, developed from Leibniz' and Whitehead's systems, can be characterized as an Internetwork.  This Internetwork is a Hylomorphic concept, the Matter of which is its individual nodes, the Form of which is their malleable concatenation.  It can be characterized as interindependent, rather than interdependent, to emphasize that each node, i. e. each member of society, is fundamentally active, in addition to fundamentally sentient, which is emphasized by Leibniz and Whitehead.  This Internetwork thus fills the lacuna in Plato's model--the gap between writ small and writ large, between the internal and the external dimensions of the experience of a citizen, between the World-Soul and the Person-Soul--all one and the same lacuna.

Sunday, November 19, 2017

Experience, Atomism, Holism

Foundations of Atomist systems are usually experiences isolated from other experiences, e. g. a Sense-Datum, a Thought, etc.  In contrast, Whitehead's variation of Leibniz' system shows how those apparent Atoms are abstracted from Holist concantenation.  For, rather, each new experience is one's modification of the hitherto entire universe, which includes both one's own past actions and those of everybody else.  On that basis, human  society is a Network of interdependent, or, better, inter-independent, since active members.  A Person and/or a Person-Soul can then be defined in terms of one's ongoing history of actions, and a Polis can be defined as a type of organization of the Network.  The two intersect in one's perspective of the Network, which is a Concrescence, to borrow Whitehead's term, of all the influences hitherto.  Accordingly, the Person-Soul is both a Part of the Whole and independent of the rest of it.  So, an Atomist Atom of Experience is abstracted from the social Network of which it is originally a component.   Likewise, Leibniz detaches the cognitive phase of a novel experience from its function as a prelude to the modification of the cognized given, leaving him with an image of the universe, which, as thus inert, he can relegate to Epiphenomenality.

Saturday, November 18, 2017

Holism and Network

Thanks to Voltaire, the best-known example of Leibniz' compromising a Philosophical vision with Theological commitments is his application of Modal Logic to the existence of suffering, i. e. his Best of All Possible Worlds principle.  A more detailed example of that compromise is his Monadology, in which he subordinates a Holist concept of human society to Atomist Psychology.  That is, in order to preserve the separability of the Person-Soul from the Species, which is fundamental to the Theology of the Salvation of the Person-Soul, he relegates his vision of human society--a network of Perspectives--to mere Epiphenomenality.  So, it is unclear whether he would be pleased by or chagrined by the actualization of that vision a few centuries later, i. e. the World Wide Web.  Likewise, by the actualization of an Atomist antithesis in the guise of Capitalist Egoism.

Friday, November 17, 2017

Person, Polis, Internalization

Applying Leibniz' concept of Monadic Perception to Plato's writ small-writ large relation: a Person-Soul is an internalization of a unique perspective on the Polis.  Leibniz himself cannot conceive Appetition this way, since his Theological orientation requires a concept of the Person-Soul that is independent of the rest of the World.  But absent that orientation, a Person can be conceived as in interaction with each other member of a Polis, with behavior a Concrescence, to borrow from Whitehead, of all interactions. One important consequence of this model is that personal Happiness or Unhappiness is a reflection of a general social condition that is internalized, a concept of Psychology that is unrecognizable in an Atomist society, such as the contemporary U. S.  Nevertheless, it explains the uniqueness of a Person in a way that Individual, which is a generic concept, cannot.  Now, it is unclear if Plato would accept such a scheme; regardless it offers a derivation of Person-Soul from Polis-Soul in his Holism.

Thursday, November 16, 2017

Happiness, Organicism, Egoism

While Moore's well-recognized argument against Utilitarianism is that it commits a Naturalistic Fallacy, unexplored is the challenge that his Organicism poses to it.  For, the principle that a Whole is greater than the sum of its Parts surpasses the Utilitarian Calculus, the maximum of which is a mere sum.  It also exposes a deficiency in Egoism--the increment of Happiness that is unattainable outside of an harmonious social whole.  Likewise, Plato's strongest response to Glaucon's Ring of Gyges example in the Republic is that getting away with stealing is less happy than a maximum personal satisfaction that is in harmony with the rest of the Polis, i. e. that the Just person is happier than the Unjust person.  Such an argument also remains relevant against American Individualism.

Wednesday, November 15, 2017

Happiness, Justice, Harmony

The motor of the Republic is the question 'Is a just person happy?'.  Plato's response is not merely affirmative, but, more resoundlingly, that only a just person is happy.  The basis of that response is the thesis that Justice and Happiness are one and the same: Harmony.  In the Republic, that thesis is grounded in the Idea of the Good, a more concrete version of which is likely the concept of a World-Soul, which he presents in the Timaeus. Now, left unexplained in such Holism is the possibility of unhappiness, but implicit in the Republic is that it is a Political problem, as opposed to a Psychological problem in an Atomist system.

Tuesday, November 14, 2017

Philosopher, King, Legislation

While the best-known portion of Republic VII is the complicated figurative scene at its outset, later Plato presents a simple prosaic statement of purpose.  At 519-20, he asserts that the Philosopher has a civic duty to apply a "vision of the good", via "law", to "harmonizing" the Polis, i. e. to become a Philosopher-King.  So, he goes beyond even Marx, in defining Philosophizing as not merely interpreting or even changing the world, but ruling it.  However, at this juncture, Plato is himself still a Philosopher but not a King, offering definitions, even if Practical.  So, it is in the Laws, when he himself begins to Legislate, that, on the basis of his vision of the Good, he rules as well.

Monday, November 13, 2017

Good, World-Soul, Organic Unity

One similarity between Plato and Moore is that the former offers no definition of 'Good', while the latter asserts that it is indefinable.  A second is the former's concept of a World-Soul, and the latter's of Organic Unity.  Finally, a third is the lack of connection between, on the one hand Good and World-Soul, and on the other, Good and Organic Unity.  So, unexplored are, on the one hand, if the Idea of the Good is that of the World-Soul, and, on the other, if the indefininability of the Good is that of the distinction between the sum of the Parts and their Whole.  Not similar is their respective concepts of Nature, so that if Plato conceives the World-Soul as 'Natural' it would serve as no indication of whether or not the distinction between the sum of the Parts and the Whole is for Moore likewise 'Natural', with the implication that the Good is indeed 'Natural', contrary to another of his prominent principles.

Sunday, November 12, 2017

Shadows, Sun, Evil

While for many, the main function of Sense-Experience is Cognition, and, hence, is a topic in Epistemology, for others, it is also a factor in behavior, and, hence, a topic in Psychology and Ethics.  Now, when considered in its entirety, as well as in its general context, the scenario at the beginning of book VII of the Republic is plainly a representation of a corrupt Polis--Sophists manipulating Citizenry by pandering to their prejudices--as relevant today as ever.  So, if shadows do indeed represent Sense-Experience, as the medium of manipulation, it is qua behavioral, not qua cognitive.  Accordingly, the structural significance of a shadow, as opposed to that of mere copies such as an echo or a reflection, is derived from the meaning of the Sun in the passage.  That is, if the Sun is the Idea of Good, and a shadow is the result of a blocking of the Sun, then a shadow represents Evil, an interpretation that coheres with the classification of Sense-Experience as Psychological and Ethical, but not Epistemological.

Saturday, November 11, 2017

Sense-Experience and Shadows

Plato's likening, in book VII of the Republic, of Sense-Experience to shadows, is less than a sound basis for the prototype of a repudiation of Empiricism that it has been taken by many to be over the centuries.  For, to begin with, a shadow is not like Sense-Experience; it is a Sense-Experience.  Second, unlike a hallucination, an after-image, or a Secondary Quality, a shadow does not inhere in the percipient.  Finally, unlike an echo or a reflection, a shadow is no mere copy of an original.  Instead, the cognitive flaw that is the focus of passage is that a shadow is taken to be a self-subsistent entity.  But, that is an error of interpretation, and, hence, an intellectual error.  So, regardless of Plato's intention, what the passage illustrates is a misuse of Sense-Experience, not its Ontological inferiority.

Friday, November 10, 2017

Platonism and Esotericism

If, as some assert, there is an esoteric Platonism that remains veiled in the Republic, it can only be the system developed in the Timaeus, beginning with the principle of a World-Soul.  On that basis, a Polis-Soul is part of the World-Soul, and a Person-Soul is part of the Polis-Soul.  But, if the Whole is prior to the Part, Harmony is pre-established, and, so, any inquiry into the nature of Justice must begin by explaining how 'Injustice' is even possible.  Now, there seems to be two general approachs to such an explanation.  First, 'Injustice' is an irreal product of a partial, i. e. incomplete, cognition.  Second, the Parts of a Whole have the capacity for limited scope of free exercise, on the basis of which real uncoordination between Parts can arise.  Accordingly, the role of the Philosopher in the first case is to educate, e. g. via illuminating dialogue, and, in the second, to guide the Polis on the basis of a vision of the Whole.  Now, which of these, if either, might be Platonist Esotericism is unclear.  But less unclear is that those who classify it as an Inegalitarianism, coincidentally similar to their own, lack a full grasp of the scope of the issue.

Thursday, November 9, 2017

Platonic Irony, Language, Thought

The term 'Socratic Irony' is dubious in two respects.  First, the passages from which it originates usually involve a fictional Socrates, and, so, 'Platonic Irony' would be more accurate.  Second, Socrates' professions of ignorance in these passages, may, contrary to the standard interpretation of them, in fact be true, as an expression of his rigorous standards of Knowledge, and, hence, are not ironic.  Now, better evidenced, though more complicated, alternative examples of Platonic Irony are those in which he asserts the inadequacy of Language to Thought.  The first level of Irony in these passages is that he is using Language to deprecate Language.  But, then, a second level emerges--such assertions cannot be the content of mere Thought, since the possibility of Language exceeds Thought.  In other words, the second level of Irony is that such assertions entail, inversely, the subordination of Thought to Language, a thesis explored notably by Derrida.

Wednesday, November 8, 2017

Political Philosophy and Harmony

The primary aim of a Political Philosophy is to define the best Polity, which, even if not actual, serves to evaluate systems that are.  Accordingly, what Plato presents in the Republic is an analysis of what many agree constitutes the best Polity--a condition of universal Harmony.  On his analysis, the fundamental feature of that condition is a one-to-one correspondence between what is liked and what is needed, mediated by his observation that, anticipating Aristotle, personal Happiness consists in the exercise of one's natural abilities.  So, universal Harmony obtains when the Division of Labor that is needed is commensurate with the available talents.  That Plato presents that model patently in the text refutes the interpretation of some that the Republic is not to be taken at face value, since, rather, his true doctrine is esoteric, and just happens to coincide with their self-serving political agenda.  Advocates of that interpretation seem to not understand what the primary aim of Political Philosophy is, instead attributing to Plato a smaller-minded ulterior ambition.

Tuesday, November 7, 2017

Platonism, Beauty, Justice

Some have characterized Plato's Just Polis as a Kallipolis--a beautiful city.  But, regardless of whether or not Plato himself is among them, the characterization is problematic.  For, it suggests a kinship between Justice and Beauty, most likely that each is a kind of Hylomorphic Harmony.  But, Beauty is specifically a Harmony of some Sense-Experience, so to abstract from that dimension of it is to falsify it.  Beauty is a thorny problem for Platonism in general, since that Sensibility is abstracted from in the Intelligible Form of Beauty.  So, the concept of a Kallipolis complicates, not clarifies, the as is convoluted Republic.  More instructive is the formulation that Justice is Harmonious, constituted by the commensuration between needed Division of Labor and the natural abilities of the Citizenry.

Monday, November 6, 2017

Justice and Law

Strongly confirming the contention that Platonism is fundamentally Political Philosophy is the plain fact that by far his two longest works are the Republic and the Laws.  Now, he asserts that while the model of the former might be ideal, that of the latter is inferior but more practicable.  That inferiority can be gleaned from a contrast of Reason and Judgment--the former privileges the Universal over the Particular, while the latter aims to strike a balance between them. Thus, a Law can be Unjust to a Particular in some cases, but its generality is more wieldy than the particularity of Justice.  In any case, the thesis that Platonism is fundamentally Epistemology, Metaphysics, or Theology needs to explain the textual evidence that suggests otherwise.

Sunday, November 5, 2017

The Good, the Dead, the Actual

Perhaps the defining moment of Plato's oeuvre is in book VII, of the Republic, when the escapee from the cave returns.  This signifies that the function in Platonism of the world of Forms is Political, not Ontological, i. e. that its status as a 'better' world befits it as a source of influencing the actual world, rather than as a permanent residence.  Accordingly, even though in the Phaedo, Socrates seems to be asserting that humans are better off dead, those words may just as likely be designed to console his grieving followers.  Instead, the reason for his refusing the exile option may be the simplest one--that he is too old for such a change.  Likewise, comparisons between Socrates and Christ, e. g. Kierkegaard's, tend, in their zeal for afterworldliness, to overlook the mundane fact of the vast age difference at the time of their deaths.  Platonism is fundamentally Political Philosophy, not Theology.

Saturday, November 4, 2017

Platonism and Dialogue

With the banishment of Plato's Political writings to the Political Science Department, Platonism is typically presented in contemporary American academic Philosophy as fundamentally Epistemology, the central thesis of which being that Knowledge is Justified True Belief.  On that basis, Dialogue is an inessential style of presentation.  However, with the Republic, etc. included, the arc of Platonism is from the execution of the wisest man, to the Philosopher-King.  In that context, Epistemology functions to clarify the concept of Wisdom, and Dialogue is a continuation of the Apology, except with the wisest man now the prosecutor rather than the defendant.  And, even as himself an academic, Political Virtue remains for Plato a, if not the, focus of his concept of Philosophy, as is also the case with his star pupil.

Friday, November 3, 2017

Dialectic and Dialogic

As has been previously discussed, Plato and Marx share Political Materialism and property Communalism. But, a primary difference between them is not as absolute as it might seem.  What Marx rejects about Plato's Classism is the thesis that variations in ability are immutable, not that given the predominant Means of Production in a period, Economic hierarchy is unavoidable.  Likewise not absolutely opposed is Dialectical Materialism and Plato's Dialogic.  For, what the former is antithetical to is the Dialectical Idealism of Hegel and Kant, whereas, as the aporetic dialogues indicate, the pattern of that Dialogic is not as contrived and schematic as it is sometimes taken to be.  Accordingly, as an alternative to both Dialectical Materialism and Dialectical Idealism, attributable to Plato might be the thesis that it is concrete Language that is inherently Dialectical.  For, in his system, Dialectics is a property of neither Matter nor Ideas, the former being inert, the latter being changeless.

Thursday, November 2, 2017

Polis and Need

As Plato enumerates the needs to the meeting of which a Polis is a means, he implicitly defines a Polis as an organization of labor.  That definition contrasts sharply with more recent alternatives such as: a means to stop humans from killing each other, part of the path towards the Salvation of a Person-Soul, and a medium for the pursuit of personal happiness.  The second might be especially astonishing to Plato, a grotesque extrapolation of the thesis, in which he occasionally dabbles, of a Soul-Body separation. So, regardless of the influence of Plato on Medievalists, via Augustine, his closest kin among his successors might be one of their staunchest opponents, Marx, for whom, regardless of its Classism, Plato's invention is the prototype of a Polis the Base of which is Economic relations.

Wednesday, November 1, 2017

Species and Mother of Invention

Over the centuries, the passage from Republic, 369C: "Let us create a city from the beginning. . . .Its real creator, as it appears, will be our needs" has been modalized as "Necessity is the mother of our invention", trivialized as "Necessity is the mother of invention", and, more recently, appropriated from for the name of a group of Dadaist musicians.  Accordingly, lost has been the uniqueness of the passage in the history of Political Philosophy.  For, while the foundation of the typical Modern contribution to the genre has been the Happiness-seeking individual person, Plato begins by positing the biological needs of the collective: food, shelter, clothing, etc.  Thus, at the beginning of Political Philosophy, but hardly repeated since, not even later in the Republic, the Species briefly appears as the progenitor of the enterprise.

Tuesday, October 31, 2017

Soul and Reproduction

One of Schopenhauer's fundamental theses is that sexual pleasure is Nature's means to stimulate Reproduction.  On that basis, the long and continuing tradition of treating sexual desire as a merely personal phenomenon is erroneous; rather, it a manifestation, in a Person, of a Species drive.  But, despite being the prototype of a critic of Empiricism, Plato takes sexual desire at face value, classifying it as one of the drives of the Appetitive portion of the Person-Soul.  He thereby misses an opportunity to systematically link the Person-Soul to a Polis-Soul, a World-Soul, or to any other trans-personal Soul, from which different concepts of Happiness and Justice might be developed.

Monday, October 30, 2017

Soul, Justice, Happiness

One of the fundamental questions of the Republic is whether or not the Just person is Happy.  Consequently, while the explicit topic of the dialogue is Justice, the implicit and perhaps more fundamental one is Happiness, with Socrates arguing that the various concepts of it held by the interlocutors, and relecting common opinion, are faulty.  Instead, anticipating Aristotle, Plato defines Happiness as the condition of a well-functioning Soul, constituted by each part, under the guidance of Reason, performing its proper function.  Now, writ large, i. e. applied to the Polis-Soul, such well-functioning entails that each Citizen performs their proper function, and, presumably, are Happy doing so.  However, writ small, i. e. applied to the Person-Soul, no such concept of personal Happiness is entailed, since there is no part of Plato's concept of the Person-Soul the function of which is Political.  Likewise, Aristotle's concept of Friendship as a Virtue is systematically anomalous, since it transcends his concept of the Person-Soul, and, hence, that of personal Happiness.  So, in sum, the concept of Happiness in the Republic that is the basis of Plato's demonstration that a Just person, and only a Just person, is Happy, is not quite adequate to the purpose, primarily because his concept of the Person-Soul lacks any inherent connection to the Polis-Soul.

Sunday, October 29, 2017

Person-Soul and Polis-Soul

Even though Plato likens the structure of the personal Soul to that of the Polis, he does not attribute a Soul to the latter.  Now, in the Timaeus, he attributes a Soul to the World, so he is not commited to restricting a Soul to a person.  Accordingly, that a Polis, too, has a Soul is implicit.  But, if so, then a Person-Soul can only be part of the Polis-Soul, which, at minimum, complicates the exposition of the Republic.  For, the Part-Whole relation undermines the Writ Small-Writ Large analogy, and there must be some component of the Person-Soul that evinces a fundamental connection to the Polis-Soul.  Accordingly, the concepts of Happy Person and Just Person, i. e. that are the central issues of the dialogue, need to be revised, even if the essence of the rebuttals to Glaucon and Thrasymachus remain intact.

Saturday, October 28, 2017

Soul, Polis, Philosopher-King

Like any analogy, Plato's concept of the relation between personal Soul and Polis as writ small-writ large suggests a parallel, and, hence, an inherent non-coincidence of the two terms.  As such, the essential segregation of Soul and Polis seems at home in a Theology of the Salvation of the Individual Soul, expostulated in a work entitled City of God.  However, in the Republic, Plato proceeds to violate the parallel. For, rather, Soul and Polis converge--in the person of the Philosopher-King, a Just person under whose Rational rulership the Polis becomes Just.  Likewise, Aristotle's concept of the Just person is part of the education of Political leadership.  The lacuna in Plato's concept of a Just Polis is that it does not explain how the Souls of the ruled become Just, since they, unlike that of the Philosopher-King, are inherently Unjust, i. e. not ruled by Reason.  Regardless, the Republic is a City of Man, not a City of God, as its corporeal necessities indicate.

Friday, October 27, 2017

Contributive Justice and Volition

Doing one's share can be either voluntary or involuntary, or, equivalently, for its own sake or as a means to another end, e. g. avoiding punishment.  Now, among those who regard the distinction as essential are Plato, Aristotle, and Kant, who attribute personal Justness to the Soul, Character, and Intention, respectively.  On the other hand, Mill is among those for whom Volition is not distinct from Action.  Thus, likewise on Consequentialist grounds, he rejects the segregation of Voluntary and Involuntary on the basis that the former is in the realm of 'Ethics' while the latter is not.  But, regardless, any such segregation is irrelevant in at least one case--Economic Contributive Justice, which consists completely in overt actions, e. g. paying dues, performing a chore, etc.  In such situations, motive might be relevant to some considerations, but not to whether or not one has done one's share.  So, Volition is not an essential factor of Contributive Justice, or, hence, of Justice in general.

Thursday, October 26, 2017

Contributive Justice and Communism

Probably the only two prominent examples of Contributive Justice being entailed in a Political Philosophy are from Plato and Marx.  In both cases it is the concept of each member of a society doing what they do well, the difference being that the former, but not the latter, distinguishes those abilities by natural classes.  Regardless, they share a communist vision of the best society.  Under such conditions, doing one's fair share is not regarded as an imposition, but as a pleasure, just as it is in any collective enterprise.  Conversely, therefore, the rarity of Contributive Justice as a principle in the history of Political Philosophy is a reflection of the predominance of Atomism, even in the case of Aristotle, whose pronounced Holism is inconsistent, as has been previously discussed.

Wednesday, October 25, 2017

Varieties of Justice

A simple model illustrates how Economic Justice combines Contributive, Reciprocatory, and Distributive Justices.  If 5 investors each purchase a share for $100, and the return is $1000, each receives $200 back.  So, $100 is Contributive, 5-way split is Distributive, and $200 is Reciprocatory.  Likewise, if one of the 5 purchases 4 shares, and the yield is $1600, that one receives $800, and the others $200.  So, in this case, Contributive Justice remains $100 per share, Distributive Justice consists in a 4-1-1-1-1 pattern, and Reciprocatory Justice involves 4 $200 and 1 $800 returns.

Tuesday, October 24, 2017

Contributive Justice and Democracy

Contributive Justice is an uncommon term for a not uncommon practice that has rarely received systematic attention.  It connotes 'doing one's share', exemplified by dues-paying and mandatory military service, but alluded to in the context of a general social doctrine by probably only Marx' ' From each according to one's ability' formulation.  The concept is certainly germane to that of a Participatory Democracy.  So, that even mandatory voting is regarded as an imposition is a symptom of a deficiency in a presumed 'Democracy'.

Monday, October 23, 2017

Justice and Requital

Since terms like Retributive Justice and Rectificatory Justice typically connote punishment, theories of Justice tend to ignore Just positive requital, e. g. a reward.  So, what can be called Reciprocatory Justice is the more general category of Just requital.  Now, in many cases, positive Reciprocity is, like punishment, e. g. an eye for an eye, based on a one-to-one formula, e. g. a bonus.  But in other cases, e. g. profit-sharing, a determining factor in the formula is a scheme of Distribution.  Thus, most generally, Reciprocatory Justice is coordinated with Distributive Justice, with simple one-to-one requital a special case, i. e. when return is not delimited.

Sunday, October 22, 2017

Hylomorphism and Economic Justice

Despite classifying Justice as a personal attribute, Aristotle proceeds to examine varieties of Distributive and Reciprocatory Justice, all of which are transpersonal.  Absent from his usual thoroughness, is any attention to what might be called Contributive Justice, the best-known formulation of which is Marx' 'From each according to his ability'.  So, from the three combined is a Hylomorphic concept of Economic Justice--a distribution of goods in accordance with a reciprocation commensurate with contribution.  Accordingly, since Private Property, as well as its abolition, is each a scheme of the distribution of some goods, Aristotle's advocacy of the former, in opposition to Plato's of the latter, as the Hylomorphic concept illustrates, expresses a disagreement over in the category of Political Justice, whether or not he recognizes such.

Saturday, October 21, 2017

Just Person and Just Polis

Plato's concept of the relation between a Just Person and a Just Polis as a Writ Small-Writ Large analogy, entails that the two conditions are mutually independent.  It therefore further entails the possibility of a Just Person inhabiting an Unjust Polis.  However, the concept of Justice as an internal condition avoids the complication that a Person has external relations within a Polis, to which that concept seems inadequate.  Thus, for example, that someone does an honest day's work on an assembly line in the manufacture of gas chambers in Germany in 1942 seems, at minimum, to complicate Plato's concept of a Just Person.  Perhaps a better indication of the inadequacy is an example of what might be required to eliminate the complication.  Whether or not Plato would subscribe to it, Leibniz offers such an elimination via his two theses--external relations between Monads are illusory, as is any apparent disharmony between them.  Absent such difficult to confirm theses, Plato's concept of Justice is problematic.

Friday, October 20, 2017

Polis, Justice, Hylomorphism

In the Nichomachean Ethics, Aristotle classifies Justice as personal Virtue, and asserts that "all men mean by justice that kind of state of character . . .".  But, this is plainly untrue in the case of Plato.  For, in the Republic, he presents two concepts of Justice: one, indeed, of a person, but the other, of a Polis.  More precisely, the latter, which as Writ Large is the more clearly discernible of the two, is a Hylomorphic concept, consisting in a correlation between the Form of a Polis, i. e. its division of labor, and its Matter, i. e. the natural abilities of its citizenry.  Now, in the Politics, Aristotle argues, against Plato, that the elimination of private property can stifle the individual Citizen.  Yet, he does not recognize that he is disputing, on Hylomorphic grounds, one of Plato's instances of Political Justice.  Perhaps via a methodology consistent with his professed Holism, in which he treats Justice as a property of the Whole, he would have arrived at that recognition.

Thursday, October 19, 2017

Hylomorphism and Justice

While Hylomorphism is usually presented as a Theoretical principle, corresponding to it is the Moral principle: The Highest Good of any entity is a balance between its Form and its Matter.  In an Artistic entity, that condition can be called Harmony, in a Biological entity, Health, and in a Political context, Justice.  Thus, an example of a Just society is one in which each citizen is Healthy, since its Matter is not suppressed by its Form. Accordingly, Plato's concept of a Just Polis has a shortcoming.  For, that concept entails two concepts of a Just Citizen of a Polis, and they do not coincide.  One is that of a part of the Matter of the Form of the Polis, i. e. of fulfilling a natural role in the division of labor of the Polis.  The other is that of a similar though "writ small" Form of the internal Matter of the Citizen, i. e. a Soul governed by Reason.  But, the two coincide only in the case of the Philosopher-King--any other role is natural for only an irrational Citizen, i. e. a Citizen who is Just according to one concept, and Unjust according to the other.  Moral Hylomorphism exposes the source of the discrepancy--Plato does not consider that a Form can also be part of the Matter of another Form, in the absence of which he can relate the two Forms only by analogy, e. g. his Writ Small-Writ Large relation.

Wednesday, October 18, 2017

Hylomorphism and Logic

The Hylomorphic principle--Every entity is the Form of some Matter--i. e. is the Unity of a Multiplicity, entails the possibility that a Form can itself be part of the Matter of another Form, and that any Matter can be the Form of some other Matter.  However, the principle is indeterminate as to whether or not there is either an ultimate Form or ultimate Matter.  So, from the evidence of the naked eye, Aristotle might be justified in positing the existence of limits in both cases, whereas a modern Cosmologist, with the benefit of the telescope and the microscope, might be justified in positing infinitude in both directions.  In any case, the fundamental axioms of Hylomorphic Logic are: 1. some A are B; some B are C; therefore, some A are C and 2. all C are B; all B are A; therefore, all C are A, with B part of the Matter of A, and C part of the Matter of B.  Seemingly isomorphic, the inverse directions of the two axioms suffice to preclude the reduction of one to the other, which would implicitly privilege either Form or Matter, i. e. one of the starting points, contrary to the equiprimordiality of the Hylomorphic principle.

Tuesday, October 17, 2017

Aristotelianism and Hylomorphism

Aristotelianism might be Hylomorphic insofar as it proposes that an actual entity is constituted by both Form and Matter.  However, it does not itself well exemplify the concept.  For, if it were Hylomorphic, it would evince equal attention to detail and coherence.  But, while his production of differentiations is meticulous, the general organization of them is only occasionally comprehensively coherent.  For example, though On the Soul, the Nichomachean Ethics, and the Politics are inter-connected, the latter is Holist while the Prior Analytics is Atomist, as has been previously discussed.  Also, while he recognizes an extended hierarchy of Universals, e. g. Species and Genus, he does not relate them to the status of a Nation as a Whole, and, in the other direction, the subdivision of Matter does not extend beyond the immediately perceivable, even as he characterizes Matter as composite.  So, Aristotelianism is structurally more Hylo- than Morphic, regardless of its contents.

Monday, October 16, 2017

Hylomorphism, Holism, Atomism

'Hylomorphism' is a term that has been used to characterize Aristotle's thesis that every actual entity is constituted by both Form and Matter.  Accordingly, Form and Matter are equiprimordial, i. e. neither is prior to the other.  Thus, Hylomorphic Logic is distinct from both Holist Logic, in which the Whole is prior to the Part, and Atomist Logic, of which an Individual entity is the irreducible foundation.  So, since, as has been previously discussed, he advocates each of those two in different places, 'Aristotelian' Logic can mean any of three things.

Sunday, October 15, 2017

Individual, Holism, Atomism

The Part of Holist Logic and the Particular of Aristotelian Logic are often equivalent, each expressed by the quantifier Some.  However, they diverge in the status of Individuality.  For, in Aristotelian Logic, an Individual is a Particular that can never be a Predicate, and, hence, can never be a Universal.  In contrast, in Holist Logic, an Individual can be both a Part and a Whole, e. g. Socrates is a part of Athens, and a Whole the parts of which are legs, a face, etc.  That Aristotelian Logic does not recognize such analysis of Individual entities exposes it as essentially Atomist, in contradistinction to his Political Holism.

Saturday, October 14, 2017

Whole and Universal

As has been previously discussed, Aristotle's Logic inverts his Political Holism.  But, the inversion more than merely exchanges the terms involved.  For, in the transformation of Whole-Part to Particular-Universal, while Part and Particular might be exchangeable, Whole and Universal are not.  For example, in Kant's appropriation of the Aristotelian Practical Syllogism, the Universal, the Kingdom of Ends, cannot be a Whole, since the Whole could be the Human Species, while the Universal cannot be, since it includes a non-Human--his deity, as well as any other non-human Rational entity.  More generally, Universal connotes all of a set of Particulars, which, unlike the Parts of a Whole, are otherwise inherently ununified.  Indeed, for Kant, constructing such unification is the fundamental problem of Morality, the effort of which is the foundation of his Theology. In contrast, any such Holistic project consists in making explicit the implicit collective unity, and/or further developing it, with therefore no place for a transcendent deity, and no need for an associated Theology.  So, Kant's doctrine bears out the full implications of Aristotle's inversion.

Friday, October 13, 2017

Syllogism, Whole, Part

In the Politics, Aristotle asserts that the Whole is prior to the Part.  Accordingly, an example of a Syllogism that expresses such priority is: some Americans are Texans; some Texans are Houstonians;  therefore, some Americans are Houstonians.  However, no such pattern is considered in the Prior Analytics.  Instead, a pattern that he does recognize, and that is apparently equivalent, is, for example: all Houstonians are Texans; all Texans are Americans; therefore, all Houstonians are Americans.  But, in this pattern, the Part is prior to the Whole, in which case, the two patterns are not equivalent, and, of greater significance, his Logic contradicts his Political Philosophy.

Thursday, October 12, 2017

Manumorphism and Logic

As has been previously discussed, the concept of a substantive originates in the object of manual grasp.  Now, from such immediate knowledge, other knowledge can be inferred.  For example, from the holding of a peapod, it can be inferred that some peas are also being held.  In other words, Manumorphism is also the original locus of Logic, the fundamental pattern of which is: If A contains B, and B contains C, then A contains C.  Likewise, for example: some Americans are Texans, some Texans are Houstonians, therefore, some Americans are Houstonians--a pattern that is clearly and unambiguously represented by Venn diagrams, and is faithful to Aristotle's interest in hierarchical classification.  However, Aristotle inverts the pattern, which converts each quantifier from Particular to Universal, and renders the relation of containment as the equivocal copula, resulting in the Barbara scheme.  He thereby abstracts both the pattern and the relation from their manumorphic origin, presenting them instead as "prior" to concrete experience.  Accordingly, Logic gets transformed from a tool to a supernatural force.

Wednesday, October 11, 2017

Manumorphism and Sculpture

Not all objects of Manumorphism are potential or actual tools; in some cases, they are ends in themselves.  Those are generally called Sculptures, some of which are representational, others of which are not.  So, it is the latter cases that are the most primitive examples of Formal Causality.  But, while the Matter of Sculpture is usually recognized to include bronze, stone, etc., it can also be colors, sounds, words, or physiological movement.  As such, Sculpture is the fundamental Art, or, conversely, all Art is a mode of Sculpture.

Tuesday, October 10, 2017

Manumorphism and Evolution

As has been previously discussed, the prototype of the bearer of attributes--the discrete solid thing--is an object enclosed in a grasping hand, and, thus, originates as neither a sense datum, a manifold of sense data, nor a thought.  Now, insofar as Knowledge is conceived as an essentially incorporeal process, that physical activity is Epistemologically irrelevant.  However, insofar as Knowledge is conceived as constituted by some Mind-Body correlation, e. g. Spinoza's concept, the significance of Manumorphism is profound.  For, if, as Darwin holds, the distinctive feature of the Human species is the versatility of the thumb, and, hence, of manual grasp, then, given a Mind-Body correlation, the increased complexity of the Human Mind is an Evolutionary development corresponding to that physiological emergence.

Monday, October 9, 2017

Anthropomorphism, Mentomorphism, Manumorphism

Kant's Anthropomorphism is, more precisely, what can be called Mentomorphism, since it is to the Forms of the human Mind that it is adapted, i. e. Knowledge is his Anthropomorphization.  Now, an important element of his concept of Mind is what he sometimes calls the Transcendental Object, without which there can be no unified things in Empirical Knowledge, which is essentially perspectival and superficial.  However, he does not consider that an object can be wholly and immediately given in manually grasping it, an process that neither reduces to a mere manifold sense-data, nor requires the positing of a Transcendental Object as a substratum of such a manifold.  Instead, it can be classified as a Technical Object, since, as has been previously discussed, grasping an object is the beginning of knowing how to use it.  Hence, the Transcendental Object is abstracted from the Technical Object. Likewise, his Mentomorphism is, more fundamentally, what can be called Manumorphism, i. e. the most basic human shaping of the world is by the grasping hand, from which the Mental shaping of it, in Theoretical Knowledge, is derived.

Sunday, October 8, 2017

Geocentrism, Anthropocentrism, Anthropomorphism

While Kant conceives his Copernican Revolution as an instructive analogy, it actually involves a more fundamental discovery.  The analogy is between the Sun-Earth relation and the Mind-Object relation, concerning an inversion in each relation of which term is oriented to the other.  But, as the Medieval appropriation of the Ptolemaic system reveals, Geocentrism is really Anthropocentrism.  So, what Kant's Epistemological inversion shows is that that Anthropocentrism is actually Anthropomorphism, i. e. that For-Us is an Epistemological, not an Ontological, relation.  In other words, in Kant's Copernican Revolution, an apparent analogy between two pairs of terms is actually a replacement of one by the other.

Saturday, October 7, 2017

Hand, Tool, Form

To modify Aristotle's analogy, the hand is not only the "tool of tools", it is the "Form of Forms", as well.  For, the most primitive occurrence of Formal Causality is the shaping of some material so that it can be grasped by the hand, i. e. the hand is the original Shape, prior to geometrical figures.  Thus, the aptly named handle, adapted to the contours of the hand in order for a tool to be usable, is the link between the two characterizations of the hand.  Now, Comprehension is distinguishable from other seemingly synonymous Mental operations, e. g. Understanding, as etymologically related to the functioning of the hand.  Thus, Comprehension, in its proper meaning, connotes a concept of Mind as fundamentally Practical, e. g. the Comprehension of the Idea of the Good is equivalent to knowing how to use it, rather than to merely looking at it.  Similarly, Spinoza's Adequate Idea, which entails Causal knowledge, is a product of Comprehension.

Friday, October 6, 2017

Form and Grasp

For most Philosophers, starting wth Plato and Aristotle, 'Form' may have a variety of meanings, but the fundamental one is Shape.  Now, Aristotle classifies Shape as a Common Sensible, i. e. it can be an object of any of the Senses.  However, he does not explain how any of them can be the source of the circumambience required to cognize, either via direct surface contact or via a synthesis of direct surface contacts, a solid object.  Instead, that source can only be Grasp, i. e. the enfolding hand.  Accordingly, if analogy is involved in the Knowledge of any Form, it can be only with the hand, not the eye.  Thus, Aristotle's likening of Mind as the Form of Forms, to the hand as the tool of tools, is more literal than he appreciates.

Thursday, October 5, 2017

Idea of Good, Acting Wisely, Contemplation

In book VII of the Republic, Plato's metaphorical Sun, the Idea of Good, is presented as a necessary condition if one is to "act wisely".  The analogy thus suggests two ways that it might function as such.  One is that is guides one to an appropriate action, just as the Sun makes some object visible.  The other is that it empowers one to such action, just as the Sun, via photosynthesis and carbohydrates, energizes one.  But, neither of these is how he conceives the requisite interaction with the Sun.  Rather, the attitude that he exalts is Contemplation, for which there is no clear justification.  For, since Contemplation is distinct from the Idea of Good, there is nothing inherently Good about it.  Furthermore, in the absence of a systematic account of the relation between the Contemplation of the Idea of Good and acting wisely, the former can be an impediment to the latter, as Schopenhauer brings out in his concept of Platonic Contemplation as quelling any Action.  So, the traditional Philosophical privileging of Theory over Practice begins in a lacuna at the heart of Plato's solar metaphor.

Wednesday, October 4, 2017

Weakness, Individuality, Strength in Numbers

The Christian promotions of Pity and Meekness are antithetical to the promotion of Strength by the Will to Power.  Furthermore, the Christian promotion of individual Salvation is antithetical to the collectivity of the Dionysian festivals, described at the beginning of Birth of Tragedy.  So, Nietzsche's opposition to Christian values targets both Weakness and Individuation, each an antithesis to the principle of strength in numbers.

Tuesday, October 3, 2017

Sun, Enlightenment, Empowerment

The solar metaphors of Plato, Plotinus, imply that it is as enabling visibility that the Sun is most important to humans.  Those Ancients must be aware of it as also a source of warmth, but they apparently find nothing philosophically significant about that function.  But, it is less likely that they are aware of the Modern discovery of the contribution of solar energy, via photosynthesis, to human nutrition, e. g. carbohydrates.  On that basis, perhaps more philosophically significant than as a source of Enlightenment, is a metaphorical Sun as a source of Empowerment, which even Nietzsche misses with his Sun-deity Apollo.

Monday, October 2, 2017

Dionysian, Will to Power, Political Philosophy

Nietzsche remains a Dionysian throughout his oeuvre, from which it can be inferred that the collective experience that he describes at the beginning of Birth of Tragedy is what, in traditional terms, he conceives to be the Highest Good for a person.  Thus, according to his doctrine of Will to Power, the experience is one of maximum Empowerment.  Accordingly, though it is rarely explicitly stated in his works, implicit in all of them is the concept of strength in numbers, i. e. numbers of a coherent collectivity, not in a dissolute rabble.  Conversely, a society is only as strong as its weakest member, from which it follows that a fundamental responsibility of a Ruler is the maximum empowerment of the Ruled.

Sunday, October 1, 2017

Henosis, Dionysian, Communitarian

Nietzsche's version of Henosis, likely based on personal experience, described in the opening sections of Birth of Tragedy under the rubric Dionysian, is non-Cognitive and collective, with all social divisions dissolved.  The experience thus seems more conducive to grounding a Holistic or a Classless Political Philosophy, e. g. that of Aristotle, Rousseau, or Marx, than the Oligarchical or Individualist one often associated with his own later writings.  However, in #45 of Human, All Too Human, he makes it clear that it is the capacity for community that is a characteristic of superior types, while petty self-interest is characteristic of the fragmentary rabble.  So, contrary to the standard interpretation, he is both a Dionysian and a Communitarian, though not necessarily Egalitarian.

Saturday, September 30, 2017

Wonder and Empowerment

Plato and Aristotle agree that philosophizing begins with Wonder, and, probably, that it ends with Knowledge.  Where they disagree is about what happens in between--Dialectics vs. Analysis, respectively.  Thus, whether they conceive Contemplation as Wonder or as Knowledge, they implicitly agree that it cannot be a self-contained experience, contrary to how Aristotle presents it.  Furthermore, each demonstrates that Wonder is the beginning of something else--Communication, i. e. written, in the case of Plato, oral, in the case of Aristotle.  Thus, Wonder also ends in the learning of another.  Hence, it is also a social act, even if it begins with a private moment.  Thus, even if instantaneous Enlightenment occurs at some phase of the process, Wonder is fundamentally an initial moment of Empowerment, as Plato and Aristotle show, even as they might articulate otherwise.

Friday, September 29, 2017

Henosis and Wonder

Plotinus presents a qualification of the shared assertion of Plato and Aristotle that Philosophy begins in Wonder--it begins in Wonder about specifically Henosis.  But, it is perhaps not until Nietzsche, under the influence of Schopenhauer, systematically contrasts Henosis and Wonder, distinguishing the Dionysian principle of the former from the Apollinian principle of the latter.  However, he stops short of considering the possibility of an interaction of the two, and hence of the possibility that Henosis is more than a self-contained event.  Rather, as is plainly evident, its larger context is comprised of, first, a transition from a condition of separation to a condition of primal unity, and then a re-separation.  He does briefly more comprehensively consider the rhythm of these transitions, but focuses, instead, like Schopenhauer, on the eventual separation exclusively, the result of which is a fixed dualism of the Dionysian and the Apollinian, and, hence, of the abstraction of Wonder from Henosis, thereby undermining a possible internal critique of the effete Intellectualism of some Philosophy, sometimes formulated as the priority of Theory over Praxis.  That critique could be grounded in the interpretation of Wonder as a secondary Henotic moment, and, accordingly, of Cognition, in general, as essentially Volitional.  Regardless, he preserves the non-Cognitive character of his Henosis, avoiding even an interpretation of it as consisting in an anti-Intellectual Intuition, e. g. Bergson's interpretation.

Thursday, September 28, 2017

Henosis, Empowerment, Enlightenment

One prominent Ancient Monadist, properly Monist, unlike Leibniz, is Plotinus, whose system is probably best known for the Emanation that is his characterization of the Monad's creativity of the Universe.  Now, within this Universe, the peak experience of a created being is Henosis--its fusion with the Monad--an experience that Plotinus reportedly attributes to both Plato and Aristotle, as well.  But, Henosis is not to be confused with the retrospective interpretation it, e. g. in Plotinus' case, the moment of a created being's awareness of its own divine creativity, retrospectively reduced to a mere Intuition.  Likewise, Plato does not thereby do Good when encountering the Form of the Good, but merely knows it, while Aristotle's Active Mind is most fulfilled when merely contemplating eternal principles.  In Modernity, too, the unity of a Spinozist Mode with its creative deity is Intuition, as is Bergson's experience of Creative Energy.  In other words, Plotinus epitomizes the long-standing philosophical tendency of reducing Henosis from a moment of Empowerment, to that of Enlightenment, i. e. from a dynamic moment with consequences, to a self-contained static one.

Wednesday, September 27, 2017

Monad, Dyad, Circle, Ellipse

It is unclear if Leibniz is aware of the historical precedent of his use of the term Monad.  That is Pythagoras', and it is the name of his diety, the simple and original entity from which all else follows, including the Dyad, his term for Matter.  So, Leibniz' use is perhaps doubly ironic--the existence in his system of a plurality of Monads is contrary both to what the term connotes, as well as to the Monism of his ancient predecessor.  Now, the Pythagoreans represent the Monad as a point within a circle.  So, the irony in their case is that these pioneers of Geometry seem unaware that a Circle is a special case of an Ellipse, and, specifically, of a figure with two foci.  In other words, the image of an Ellipse with two foci could represent the Dyad, which therefore precedes the Monad.  Indeed, the reduction of an Ellipse to a Circle could represent one of the most ancient of philosophical endeavors--the attempt by a complex entity to posit the prior existence of a simple entity from which it is derived.

Tuesday, September 26, 2017

Monad and Dyad

Leibniz' Monad is the Soul of a Body, the Unity of a Multiplicity, the experiences of which are a succession of Perceptions, each itself a Unity of a Multiplicity, driven by Appetition.  Now, a problem with this model is signified in the formulation 'the Monad is the Soul of a Body', since it suggests a separation of Monad from Body.  Furthermore, since Experience is constituted by Perceptions, the model is subject to the challenge raised by Descartes, and amplified by Phenomenalists--the supposition that the Body even exists is ungrounded, and, hence, is problematic.  But, that challenge abstracts from another dimension of Experience--Motility, the product of Volition, constituted by setting in motion multiple corporeal parts, e. g. each of the legs.  In other words, the Monad is a Formal Principle that abstracts from its complementary Material Principle, i. e. the Monad is half a Dyad.

Monday, September 25, 2017

Active Mind and Practical Syllogism

Aristotle' contrast of Active Mind vs. Passive Mind is that of created particulars vs. received particulars, or, in other words, Knowledge from Deduction vs. Knowledge from observation, e. g. that Socrates is mortal as a conclusion from the proposition that all men are mortal vs. watching him die.  So, Mind is Active only to the extent that there exists at least one non-empirical Major Premise.  And, for such to exist, it can only be discovered in Reflection, i. e. in the self-contemplation of Mind, perhaps aka 'Intuition', a term that he occasionally uses.  Now, he recognizes that a Syllogism can be either Theoretical or Practical, though he does not seem to go so far as Spinoza or Kant in recognizing the existence of Practical Particular propositions derived purely from Reflection.  Accordingly, his concept of Active Mind has a lesser extent than do theirs.  Likewise, he cannot recognize that Active Mind is fundamentally Practical, as is Reflection, from which passive Contemplation is abstracted.

Sunday, September 24, 2017

Particulation and Re-formation

The process, attributed by Aristotle to Active Mind, of creating a particular can be called Particulation.  It can also be called Materialization, since a Class is the Form of its Particulars, though that term is laden with other connotations.  And, since the addition of a new member varies the given Class, the process is a variety of Diversification, as well.  So, for example, by Particulation in 1959, the United States created the State of Alaska.  But, at the same time, Alaska has its own Particulars, i. e. its inhabitants.  Furthermore, the addition of a new side to a rectangle can be accompanied by a re-formation, resulting in a pentagon.  These familiar examples illustrate that the Formal Principle and the Material Principle are complementary processes, in contrast with the many uses of 'material' and 'matter' throughout history that connote them as antithetical to some corresponding term, e. g. to Spirit, to Mind, etc.

Saturday, September 23, 2017

Mind and Binarity

The binarity of Mind is evident in the sensory-motor duality of the brain, i. e. is the end-point of the reception of information, and the origin of motility, from which follow the pairs of Cognition-Volition, and Theory-Practice.  Furthermore, Motility is itself constituted by a coordinated multiplicity of motions, even simple walking, and, hence, combines the Material Principle, i. e. multiple particular impulses, and the Formal Principle, that unites them in a pattern.  However, what has complicated the study of these twofold phenomena is a commitment to reductionism that forces the suppression or subordination of one of the principles, usually the Material one, e. g. the subordination of Practice to Theory, the effort to attribute causal efficacy to mere Contemplation, etc.  But, the abandonment of often strained Monism, implicit or explicit, leaves the binary character of Mind easier to recognize.

Friday, September 22, 2017

Mind, Formal Principle, Material Principle

Aristotle likens Mind as the Form of Forms, to the hand as the tool of tools.  But a tool is not just ready-to-hand, to borrow from Heidegger; the hand builds it.  Likewise, as Spinoza observes, Mind creates its intellectual tools.  Thus, the relation of Mind to its Forms is twofold: it is their model, and it produces them.  In other words, Mind is both their Formal Principle and their Material Principle, a binarity that is difficult to conceive clearly without the introduction of the latter.

Thursday, September 21, 2017

Society, Growth, Material Principle

Insofar as a Whole is a Whole of its Parts, it is co-extensive with them.  Accordingly, it is unclear how it is, as Aristotle asserts, "prior" to them.  But, one case in which that priority is clear is when a Whole generates a new Part, e. g. the birth of a new member of a family, of a village, of a society, etc.  In other words, that priority entails the possibility of the growth of a Whole.  Now, as has been previously discussed, the process that produces particulars is the Material Principle.  Thus, the Material Principle is ingredient in the growth of a society.

Wednesday, September 20, 2017

Material Cause and Material Principle

To avoid confusion with Aristotle's very different long-established concept of the same name, what has been called here "Material Cause" will instead be termed 'Material Principle'.  Correspondingly, the inverse process will be termed the 'Formal Principle', though it has more in common with Aristotle's Formal Cause that the Material Principle has with his Material Cause.  This use of 'Matter' might be historically eccentric, but it accurately reflects the Unity-Multiplicity connotation of the traditional Form-Matter contrast.  It also avails Aristotle a systematic grounding of his attribution of the production of particulars to Active Mind.

Tuesday, September 19, 2017

Active Mind and Material Causality

According to Aristotle, in On the Soul, III, 5, Active Mind is "a cause which is productive in the sense that it makes" all the particulars in a class.  However, there is no obvious way that this productive process exemplifies one of his four Causes.  Nevertheless, since 1. the production of particulars is the inverse of their unification; 2. unification is effected by Formal Causality; and 3. the multiplicity corresponding to a Form is its Matter, this productive cause should be characterized as Material Causality.  In other words, Material Causality, properly considered, is defined as the production of multiplicity, rather the mere presence of inert stuff, which is how it is conceived in the Physics.  Thus, Matter is the product of Material Causality, not merely a given inert existent.  The implications of this gap-filling revision at the heart of the origin of Intellectual History are far-reaching.

Monday, September 18, 2017

Logic, Holism, Atomism

Aristotle's Logic is Holistic.  It is presented in a work called Organon, the first section of which is called the Categories, the fundamental topic of which is the formal relations between Genus and Species, which, according to his Holism, are related as Whole to Part.  Accordingly, that relation is reflected in his subsequent study of Deduction, in the third section, called Prior Analytics, in the formulation Universal to Particular, i. e. 'particular' connotes a Part.  In contrast, Modern Logic is Atomistic, the fundamental contrast of which is Universal and Individual, with the latter independent of the former, as is expressed in the formulation 'there is an x such that . . .', which, in the case of the predicate 'is a human', signifies a relation other than one in which a Whole is prior to a Part.  So, even if Modern Logic is commonly taught as an ideologically neutral tool, its fundamental components are inherently prejudicial.

Sunday, September 17, 2017

Holism and Soul

In On the Soul, Aristotle presents his concept of the human Soul.  In the Nichomachean Ethics, he begins his study of its Happiness, and completes it in the Politics, according to which that Happiness consists in being a Part of a Whole.  However, he also posits that a Whole is prior to its Parts.  If so, then the Soul of the Whole must be present in that of the Part.  Now, the likely candidate in the individual Soul is Mind.  However, by attributing that dimension a capacity for self-contained Contemplation, he isolates it from the greater Whole.  Consequently, his concept of the Polis may be Holistic, but that of the Soul of a Citizen is Atomistic.

Saturday, September 16, 2017

Friendship and Reflection

In Aristotle's concept of Friendship, one treats a Friend as "another Self".  However, he does not consider the possibility of the converse relation--treating oneself as a Friend, probably because his concept of the Psyche as individualized excludes any alterior components.  In contrast, in some more recent concepts of the Psyche, e. g. Freud's and Mead's, internalization of alterity is inherently part of structure.  So, more significantly than that those ground the possibility of treating oneself as a Friend, they ground the possibility of any internal self-relation, i. e. of Reflection.  Accordingly undermined are Aristotle's two cardinal concepts of Reflection--human Contemplation, which, as presupposing the existence of others, is not self-sufficient, and Thought-Thinking-Itself, which is impossible in a monotheistic deity, i. e. one without any other.

Friday, September 15, 2017

Polis, Voluntary, Friendship

Many hold, and it is unclear if Aristotle is among them, that membership in the best Polis is voluntary.  But, at least one member of a family, a child, is involved involuntarily, and any association motivated by Economic necessity is also at least partly involuntary.  Instead, within Aristotle's system, the prototype of that concept of the best Polis is his one example of a voluntary community--Friendship, the political significance  he vaguely alludes to in the Nichomachean Ethics, but does not seem to explicitly formulate.

Thursday, September 14, 2017

Circle and Ellipse

It is unclear whether or not Aristotle is aware that a Circle is a special case of an Ellipse, i. e. is a closed regular plane figure of precisely one focus.  If he were, he might consider that divine, because perfect, motion might be Elliptical, and not merely Circular.  He might also recognize the deficiency of presumably self-sufficient Contemplation--that it lacks the companionship that obtains in more comprehensive enclosed contexts, e. g. Friendship, which is constituted by two foci.