The rationality in Renaissance culture wasn't remotely like wisdom. Only the number and variety of fields requiring narrow applications of rationality increased, in large part due to changing material conditions. Moreover, even those narrow applications didn't linearly evolve into the academic culture of today.David Quinn wrote: ↑Tue Jun 04, 2019 3:24 pmAs I use the term, the Dark Ages refers to the lack of an entrenched and evolving rational culture in Europe, a lack that more or less began with the collapse of Rome, or arguably with the collapse of the golden era of ancient Greece. The Renaissance signaled the reawakening of such a culture. I don’t really care how other people, who have different values, choose to define the term.
As for Renaissance philosophy, virtually all of it was written to pump up wealthy patrons' egos. It was filigreed exaltation of Christian Epicureanism, which is why none of it features in the "Genius canon". Machiavelli is the only Renaissance thinker comparable to a modern scientist or historian, and he was by his own admission a "teacher of evil" (i.e. how to keep the worthless peasants in line) to fat kinky aristocrats.
Truisms have no place in serious thought (whether academic or independent), for obvious reasons. Kevin's entire case against the "authoritarian left" is constructed out of truisms, as is your support for "liberalism". Both of you seem incapable of distinguishing between the abstract truisms you regularly employ in your philosophical rhetoric and valid opinions about real world events. An example from my email exchange with Kevin:To me, it is an obvious truism that when a culture becomes more rational, it increases the chances of rational philosophers emerging.
Here Kevin Solway argues: since Earth can exist without trading with Jupiter, the same applies to countries. This statement would be 100% true if "earth", "country", "capitalism" etc. were thought-squeezins emitted by Kevin's big, beautiful Brain. In reality, however, it is a laughably stupid thing to say, since the aforementioned entities exist physically and have specific properties.Kevin: This planet doesn't do trade with other planets, and yet capitalism can work on this planet. The same can be said for individual countries.
Jupiter: Countries or people on earth are not comparable to the earth. The earth also doesn't go to war with other planets, but that doesn't mean individual countries are peaceful.
Kevin: Trading between countries can reduce the amount of war, but there doesn't need to be a lot of trade for that benefit to be realized. And anyway, countries shouldn't be forced to trade under threat of violence.
Jupiter: The point was that your analogy between countries and planets is wrong. The earth doesn't enter into unions with other planets, but countries do. The earth doesn't break up into smaller planets or declare independence from other planets, but countries do. Your argument is bullshit.
Keeping that in mind, let us return to your own extremely stable Genius Brain:
It is logically undeniable that rational societies will create rational people. In reality, however, this statement is extremely problematic because of how you're applying your definition of rationality, and by extension a rational society or culture, to actual historical events and processes. Just as Kevin's argumentum ad Planetary Protectionism is irrelevant to actual trade, your conception of liberal politics is irrelevant to the actual development of western capitalist societies.If we lived in a society which truly valued rationality and wisdom and taught its children to think logically about basic truths such as cause and effect, then it would become much easier for people to launch themselves into the Infinite. To be sure, they would still have to put in the hard work and activate this launch with their own efforts, but at least they would be armed with greater reasoning powers and face fewer obstacles.
The same is true for any number of things. Flexibility of thought isn't wisdom. Reactionary political thought is very flexible, for example. Reactionaries interpret historical phenomena in such a way that they appear to vindicate their emotional attachment to a "flexibly" defined yet inherently existing thing/category of things in the present - be it monarchy or heterosexual love. Romanticism, fascism, alt-rightism - same deal.A key feature of wisdom is its flexibility, its ability to adapt to different situations. A sage has no form.
You are a reactionary too, but in relation to "the liberal establishment". A category broad enough to include everyone from Da Vinci to Murray Rothbard to your own enlightened self.
In fact, "Genius" philosophy is reactionary. Dear little Alex was/is right to be frightened of it, because he only looked at the semantics and style. The simple longing for honesty holding it all together was always out of his reach, and now it's dead.