Editorial: 21st Issue August 1st 2019

Blog: http://michaelrdjames.org/

Journal site https://www.aletheiaeducation.eu/

https://joom.ag/Nw3e

The first lecture is entitled “ A Critique of The Conceptual Foundations of
International Politics: Lecture Nine”. The lecturer Jeffrey Sachs outlines a view
of the importance of the deep drivers of Globalisation:

“Sachs begins with a historical observation that the modern era began 200 years ago which
given the date of this lecture series in 2007 is around the time of Napoleon just after he
entered Königsberg, the home city of Kant who had died one year earlier in 1804. Sachs then
wishes to divide this era into two. The first 150 years and the last 50 years. In the first 150
years he argues that the Industrial revolution was the expression of what he called the force of
divergence which began to occur in the world between those North Atlantic countries who
embraced and drove the industrial revolution for all it was worth and those countries in the
world who experienced this revolution through contact with the industrialisers or colonisers
and the goods produced by a technological advantage they did not possess. This process of
divergence between the industrialisers and those countries affected, opened up a gap between
rich and poor which was very quickly experienced as a gaping wound.

In the second period of this 200 hundred year span--the last 50 years--this deep process of
globalisation has fundamentally changed its nature from divergence to convergence. Sachs
says the following:

"I believe in the last 50 years that process has fundamentally changed to a process of
convergence rather than divergence and the mechanisms that triggered this unprecedented
period of economic, military and geo-political development before are now a worldwide
process. So that China, India, South East Asia, Brazil and Africa can also now experience the
advantages of rapid development."

Technology is one of the deep drivers along with population growth, ecosystem
pressure and what he calls failed states. He refers to the political factor and the
role of political institutions in the globalisation process:
"The political decisions we need to take are more global than ever. We need global decision
making--we are not good at this. Most of the above issues cannot be solved at national level.
The most preposterous sight we can witness is that of the US trying to act and decide on these
issues unilaterally. This is 19th century thinking which we can clearly see did not work in the
20th century. George Bush may have been a good Sheriff in Texas in 1840.

What is somewhat perplexing is that Sachs does not mention the UN in relation to this
demand. Is he, one wonders, a "member of the great platoon of the walking wounded" who
believe that the UN inspired by the vision of Kant has had sufficient time to solve the
problems of the universe and has significantly failed in its declared missions? Kants response
to this would probably be to warn us of raising expectations too high when the problems to
solve are so complex.
All trans-national entities are met with skepticism by Sachs so it is not
particularly surprizing that Europe falls into this category:
Sachs is not a friend of Europe, the home of Socrates, Plato, Aristotle,Newton, Darwin, Kant
and Wittgenstein. He recognises that Economic development relies on ideas even more than it
does on coal, which was phased out when the internal combustion engine and oil proved more
efficient. Ideas were spreading rapidly over the world when , as he rather starkly puts it,
Europe went into a process of self annihilation with two world wars in a relatively short
period of time. The Great Depression followed the first world war putting an end to
Imperialism. Sachs does not mention that the second world war was fought over the issues of
racism and freedom or that the United Nations was formed shortly afterwards. It seems that
by ideas he means "economic ideas" and he does not appear to see History as Kant did in
terms of a progression in the understanding of the political significance of knowledge and
freedom. He does not either appear to see History in terms of the development of the
democratic form of the rule of law and ethical behaviour. A rule which also involve ideas but
of a kind which would subject his "drivers of globalisation" to a philosophical and ethical
analysis that would place them side by side with other "influences". Influences which seen
from a philosophical point of view would provide solutions to the logical problem of the
decisions that need to be taken if we are to survive the consequences of the spread of
economic ideas and destructive technology( such as the invention of the weapons of mass
destruction). In the realm of ideas worthy of being distributed the Europeans are not proud of
their history of colonisation and recognise that the phenomenon occurred because economic
ideas took precedence over the Philosophy of humanistic liberalism which was evolving.
Ideas connected to living a life in accordance with this Philosophy are the contributions
Europe can make to the world. In this Philosophy the factor of acting so as to actualise the
fulfilment of unnecessary desires which economic development encourages is the telos of
European development. There is no mention of these "constructivist" "influences" in Sachs'
account.

Collectives that are of interest are the communities of scientists but :

“Science has not got the greatest of records for its contributions to the causes of peace. It was
after all a similar collective that worked together on the Manhattan project and provided the
world the means by which it could destroy itself if it decided to do so. I do not know whether
this was on Sachs' mind when he chose the speech of John Kennedy to close his lecture. The
speech below was given shortly after the Cuban Missile Crisis where the world stared into the
abyss for a few brief moments as the advisors of Kennedy suggested he launch the missiles
that came from the collective effort of the scientists of the Manhattan project”

The speech from Kennedy is included in its entirety in the lecture:

“We need to examine our attitude toward peace itself. Too many think it is impossible. Too
many think it is unreal. But this is a dangerous defeatist belief. It leads to the conclusion that
War is inevitable, that mankind is doomed, that we are gripped by forces we cannot control.
We need not accept that view. Our problems are man made and they therefore can be solved
by man. No problem of human destiny is beyond human beings.
Man’s reason and spirit have often solved the seemingly unsolvable. I am not here referring to
the absolute and universal concept of peace and good will of which some fantasies and
fanatics dream. I do not deny the values of hopes and dreams but we merely invite
discouragement and incredulity by making that our immediate goal. Let us focus instead on a
more practical more attainable goal—based not on a sudden revolution in human nature but
on a gradual evolution of human institutions in a series of concrete actions and effective
agreements which are in the interest of all concerned. There is no single simple key to his
peace—no grand or magic formula to be adopted by one or two powers. Genuine peace must
be the product of many nations, the sum of many acts. It must be dynamic not static, changing
to meet the needs of each new generation. For peace is a process, a way of solving problems.
So let us not be blind to our differences but let us also direct our attention to our common
interests and the means by which these differences can be resolved, and if we now can not end
our differences at least we can make the world safe for diversity. For in the final analysis our
most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet. We all breathe the same air,
we all cherish our children's futures and we are all mortal.”

A brilliant speech with many Aristotelian and Kantian moments but also containing
wonderful moments of American pragmatism where one pretends to forget where all our
ideas and key democratic institutions came from.

The second lecture entitled “The absence of Ethics” is an essay on the

subterranean forces of Globalization. Hannah Arendt’s position on the Origins
of Totalitarianism is discussed in relation to the ethical imperative:
Jonathan Lear in his excellent work "Aristotle: the desire to understand" points out that we
moderns living in our modern world do not have resort to the kind of Universal justifications
that we used 300 years ago under the auspices of Religion. According to Lear neither do we
approach ethical issues as the Greeks did in the Ancient World by recourse to actively
(through complex deliberation procedures), seeking the reasons for our actions and activities.
Lear also claims that there are fundamental disparities between the Aristotelian and Kantian
ethical positions. He claims that both philosophers would have found each other's positions
fundamentally flawed.

This last claim is questionable given the influence Aristotle’s works had upon
the ethical theories of Kant. Kant clearly showed concerns over the concept of
Happiness being the principle of self love in disguise but both philosophers
were critical rationalists and Kant would hae perhaps seen his ethical theory to
be the logical consequence of Aristotle’s virtue theory which contains many of
the transcendental elements that Kant would have apprved of. Lear is however
descriptively correct in his description of moern ethical attitudes. There is
clearly a widespread conviction that there are no universal justifications for
ethical positions and any agreement are accidental or emotionally based. Kant
and Aristotle have much in common:
Kant built much of his critical theory from the same anti-materialistic and anti-dogmatic
rationalist commitments we find at the foundations of Aristotle's metaphysics. There are
differences of course and these may be due to the fate of Aristotelian thinking at the hands of
Christianity. Lear claims that Christianity brought with it the focus upon intention at the
expense of action. One could, that is, have a good heart but not be in any position to exercise
one's goodness because of the circumstances one was born into or finds oneself in. This is a
correct observation but is not a fundamental characteristic of ethical action. In Aristotelian
terms, the Christian is engaging in a deliberation process with all the complexity presented in
Aristotle's theory without finding the circumstances in which to perform his virtuous deeds.
He may not be doing so autonomously and both Aristotle and Kant would object to this
feature of the deliberation process and condemn it for being in some sense involuntary
deliberation.

Kant differentiated himself from Aristotle in his being able to tracethe history of
the concept of freedom from the time of Aristotle for almost 2000 years and
theorised in the following manner:
The idea of Freedom, for Kant, however, in many ways replaced the religious idea of God and
this signaled the Enlightenment's conviction of the importance of political society in the
developing of our rational potential(an idea he shared with Plato and Aristotle). Kant's vision
of a Cosmopolitan world suggests that he was not impressed with the idea of the nation-state
set forth in 1648 (The Treaty of Westphalia) and this is a major difference between Kantian
and Aristotelian ethical/political theorizing. In his eyes, the nation-state may have been a
necessary stage on the road of our ethical and political evolution but it was not by any means
the terminus of the process. Individuals need to find themselves in political environments
where they are free to organize their souls in a manner appropriate to an imagined state of
affairs in which each subject/citizen exercises their judgment in approving the laws of their
community as mirroring the rationality of their own thoughts about the law. This for Kant was
a state of affairs one hundred thousand years in the future which would replace the authority
of the commandment system of religious systems: a state of affairs in which the organization
of the souls of the citizens was absolutely in accordance with the demands of rationality. The
formulations of the categorical imperatives also provided us with a description and
explanation of fully ethical forms of behaviour which were logically universal and could
function as logical justifications of the forms of virtuous behaviour Aristotle discussed in his
ethical theory.

Christianity influenced ethical debate in several respects both in positive and

negative directions:
The teachings of Christ were in no sense theoretical and appealed only to the individuals
relation to God and not to universal argument. He exemplified the simple practical man with
only his faith and belief. Nothing was mentioned of the history of theoretical thought or the
theoretical thoughts of other thinkers in Christ's teachings. There are of course assumptions
about human beings but it is a total mystery as to where they originated from or indeed
exactly what they were. We know that the Jewish- Alexandrian school played some part in
the choosing of these assumptions. With the advent of Christianity, however, we encounter an
almost complete substitution of the spiritual for the rational. Knowledge was no longer man's
province: it belonged to an all-knowing God who inspired prophets with his messages for the
human race. There was no reference to the importance of the state or community to provide
man with a higher quality of life. There was a reference to a universal "brotherhood of man"
but it is unclear whether if one was not a Christian one could become a part of this "universal"
brotherhood. It certainly did not appear to be a cosmopolitan brotherhood. The primary
commandment was "love God above all else". There is no mention of the role of knowledge
or the importance of knowledge except in relation to "Knowing God". Much of the Greek
world was dismantled by Christianity. It is therefore not surprising that the idea of God was
diminished in importance in favour of the idea of Freedom in Kant's metaphysics of morals.

The lecture concludes with the following reflection:

The Enlightenment philosophy of Kant attempted to row the philosophical boat back to the
Greek shoreline but Kant's Philosophy too was rapidly overcome by the practical
individualistic spirit and theoretical scientific spirit of the Enlightenment. Our Modern World
contains the threads of Greek and Kantian thought and these were revived by the work of the
later Wittgenstein, the work of Heidegger(to some extent) and the work of Arendt(also to
some extent). The consequence is that ethical thought in accordance with categorical
universalistic dimensions had all but disappeared in the twentieth century and it is no
coincidence that this was the century of two world wars and two mass annihilations of civilian
populations via the use of weapons of mass destruction. The disappearance of the idea of
justification might, then, be more important, than one might suspect.

The third Lecture is entitled Introduction to Philosophical Psychology. Aristotle

Part Five Political Philosophy is the focus of attention. The lecture begins with a
discussion of the organic view of the state:
Aristotle then proceeds to resolve the whole of the state into its parts in accordance with his
hylomorphic strategy:
"He who thus considers things in their first growth and origin,whether a state or anything else
will obtain the clearest view of them."

The assumption behind these words is an assumption that many early modernist philosophers
such as Hobbes and Hume would reject, namely, that the state is a natural organic entity thus
falling into a category of things distinct from artefacts. Neo-Aristotelians see this to be a key
distinction between the concepts which we use to describe ad explain the human realm of
work and the concepts we use to describe and explain the human realm of action. On the other
hand, reductionist attempts by Hobbes Hume and other modern behaviourist psychologists to
reduce action to what can be observable from a third person point of view, namely "bodily
movement" clearly rejects Aristotle's claim that different realms of human activity require
different assumptions and conceptual frameworks for the description and explanation of
whatever is changing in these realms.

Discussion continues by referring to the good and the great souled man:
The good referred to in the opening quote from book one has , as he would say, many
meanings but in this work he specifically categorises the good into three areas: external
goods, the goods of the body, and the goods of the soul with this last area obviously being the
prime focus of the other two: external goods and the goods of the body are for the sake of the
goods of the soul. Here again, we see emphasis placed upon a developmental or actualisation
process leading to a telos or an end which is valuable both in itself and for its possible logical
consequences:- the great souled man.

Comparsons are made to current politics:

We need, however, to bear in mind that the nation states we currently inhabit are different
structures to what Aristotle imagined in terms of what he thought to be the maximum size of
governable entities. Although he spoke in favour of representative government for those
occupations such as mechanics and traders who do not have the available time to participate
in the political activities of the city, he nevertheless envisaged a city whose furthest limits
could be reached by the voice of a town crier.

Hannah Arendt’s argument that nation states have failed raises the question of
whether future political development will proceed in a global world, a nation
state, or a city state:
Hannah Arendt, too, was a critic of the nation state. In her earlier works she claimed that the
terrible events of the terrible 20th century point to the conclusion that the nation state has
failed. Clearly, our educational institutions have not been able to bear the Aristotelian
responsibility that has been placed upon them. In Aristotelian terms our educational systems
ought to have been concentrating their attention on the liberal and humanistic virtues,
developing both our theoretical and practical reasoning capacities to such an extent that
political participation at high levels are regarded as obligations to the constitution of the state.
By "participation" in this representative context is probably meant "acquisition of knowledge"
and informed debate using that knowledge, perhaps also close contact with ones
representative over the issues of the day and of course an obligation to vote. The word
"obligation" shall here be construed not in its modern sense in terms of social contract theory
where the relation between the rulers and the ruled is conceived to be a significantly artificial,
conventional, non organic affair. For Aristotle, the "obligation" of the rulers and the ruled
would be to ensure the common good prevailed for the whole city rather than the limited
goods that are conferred upon two contracting parties where freedom is bartered for security.
The idea of giving up ones freedom(an essential part of ones human nature, according to
Kant) so that a "policeman state" can regulate the hustle and bustle of city life is a very un-
Aristotelian position. For him modern men ought to regulate themselves socially and
individually by developing capacities into virtuous dispositions with the assistance of the
polis and its provision of public education. There is state regulation but of a liberal-
humanistic and academic kind. On this model there is no need for a "contract" to be used in a
tribunal in case one of the parties to the contract reneges on "the deal". Aristotle's citizens and
rulers trust each other: they are "friends". If the size of a nation state is such that virtuous
dispositions cannot be the result of education, then this, for Aristotle, would be an argument
against communities which are too large for such ventures.

What would Arstotle’s view of our current state of civilization have been?
How might Aristotle otherwise have responded to our large industrialised economically
driven conurbations? Well, firstly, he would have raised his eyebrows at two characteristics of
our "concrete jungles". Firstly, he would have been more than a little surprised at the
dependence of the nation state on a plethora of economic institutions and secondly he would
have wondered about the use of technology. "Oika" is the Greek root of economics and it
refers to regulatory activities of the household in the financial sphere. Aristotle, in this context
was specifically against the universalisation of the wealth accumulation principle which was
in the sphere of responsibility of the head of the household. He would have insisted that
oikonomous ought to be limited of course by the principle of the golden mean which regulates
all virtuous development. Wealth accumulated beyond the needs of the household would have
been anathema for Aristotle unless of course the excess was disposed of for the sake of the
common good as was the case when rich families sponsored public meals and events and even
entertained foreign dignitaries as a service to the state. Celebrating the richest people in the
world as we do irrespective of their charitable activities would not be in the service of the
common good. Both Socrates and Aristotle would have agreed that the art of acquiring wealth
was an art of secondary importance. The doctor practising the primary art of medicine would
feel obliged, given the Hippocratic oath to treat any patient needing emergency treatment
even there was no money for the treatment. The existence of vast business
empires(corporations) would exist for the sake of wealth acquisition would have been a form
of life that both Socrates and Aristotle would have criticised. It is not, however, clear what
Aristotle would have thought about our modern banking institutions and the business idea of
lending money for interest. He would certainly have disapproved of the practice of lending
money to the poor at interest rates which they could not afford, thus turning them into slaves
of their debts.The banking function of financing industry and thereby creating jobs for the
jobless and indirectly financing education through the taxes imposed on profits would
probably have been in his eyes for the common good. Extreme behaviour of such financial
institutions would have met with disapproval especially behaviour which required large
amounts of taxpayers money to keep such institutions in existence..

One could also wonder what Aristotle would have thought about the omnipresence of useful
and aesthetic artefacts in our cities: luxury cars and limousines, televisions, computers,
mobile telephones, internet, washing machines, dish washers kitchen and household
appliances etc. Some of these technological artefacts obviously are labour saving devices and
make the need for domestic help by slaves no longer necessary. Such possibilities might have
changed his position on slavery especially given the institutions society has created to help
the mentally and physically members of our society, making it possible for them, with
assistance to take some limited form of responsibility for their lives.

The lecture ends with a discussion of the criteria for a just revolution.

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