classics digests, reflections and reviews
To be, or not to be, it matters not. To Shakespeare, the world is a stage, so the relationship between the play and the actor is akin to that between Life and man. He introduces a play within a play in Hamlet, in order that the theatre audience may recognize the similarity. As a character, Hamlet is almost paralyzed, like a bad actor who is incapable of enacting the art […]
Read moreThe Procrustes in Us According to Greek mythology, Procrustes offered hospitality to passers-by with the intent to kill them. He had only one bed for all comers. To make them fit the bed, he hammered the short men and stretched them across the length of the bed, but sawed off the portions of the long men that projected beyond it. The hero Theseus eventually subdued Procrustes by forcing him to […]
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I wish Hume had taken Philosophy 101, with an emphasis on Logic, from Aristotle. That thought crossed my mind many times when reading the Enquiry. Hume should have known that Aristotle have defined long before him many ideas he had difficulty expressing. He could have saved himself some trouble reinventing the wheel. The reader could have saved some time clearing away the rubble of logical inconsistencies. They rather obscure Hume’s […]
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Hume and Moral Philosophy Hume speaks of “moral philosophy” in the very beginning of his treatise. I suspect that one of the main purposes of his writing is to overthrow moral philosophy and religion. Nietzsche attempted the same a century later. Hume didn’t come right out and attack Christian philosophy, perhaps because blasphemy law was still in effect in the U.K. Epistemology and ethics are closely related branches of philosophy. […]
Read moreThis is my first time reading Marx and Engels. I’m amazed by their prescient predictions of world capitalist development, penetrating descriptions of the Bourgeoisie and criticisms of capitalism. However, I find their economic theory of property, capital and wage-labor perplexing and far less persuasive. It is a diagnosis without cure. Portrait of a Bourgeoisie The bourgeoisie has put an end to all feudal, patriarchal, idyllic relations. It has left no […]
Read moreDo not answer a fool according to his folly, Lest you also be like him. Answer a fool according to his folly, Lest he be wise in his own eyes. –Proverbs 26:4,5 Blaise Pascal, a Catholic theologian, scientist and brilliant thinker, wrote these letters to defend his Jansenist friends against charges of heresy by the Jesuits. I tend to think that Pascal and Kierkegaard are kindred spirits. First, they both […]
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The important thing in Democracy is not to win, but to take part; the important thing in Life is not to have conquered but to have fought well. –The Olympian Socrates v. Scalia About four years ago, I had an interesting group discussion about the trial and death of Socrates. Someone said that the Athenians were good at sophistry, not sound reasoning, whereas the judicial system in the US was […]
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