Plato's Laws IX, 5

There is a whole school of interpreting philosophy, following Leo Strauss, that believes in reading philosophers ironically or without assuming they're really saying what they mean. The argument, which Strauss developed with care over many works, invokes the fact that death was always the likely fate of especially political and moral philosophers who disagreed with their society's elites. Socrates was executed; Aristotle nearly so, having to flee Athens to escape that fate; numerous Christian philosophers either were charged with heresy or threatened with it; and even in our own age, the fate of thinkers in many parts of the world has been grim. 

When Plato reaches the end of Book IX, he says something that makes me wonder if a reading like that is plausible. Strauss apparently posthumously published a book on the Laws, and perhaps when I'm done I will look it over. I am intentionally not reading other people's thoughts on the work before I've encountered the work and finished this set of notes about it; later I will compare my thoughts with those of others, to see where they provide insight or illumination to things I may have missed on my own. 

(Generally this is a good way to read serious philosophy, in my experience. You want to directly encounter Plato and Aristotle, etc., and form clear ideas of your own about the problems they are raising. Then, when you encounter scholars who have studied them with care, you will not merely assume their opinion; you will have brought something of your own out of the work as well. It is a matter for historians to decide which of you was right, if either; the work of philosophy is to struggle with the hardest problems of human life. You should do that yourself, and not simply be told what to think even by the Wise.)

Akratēs was the problem of the last section, and the Athenian's firm conclusion appears to be that all evil actions are involuntary. If one was not ignorant, seeing the truth of what was right and best, one would act according to a moral principle. Now he realizes that acting according to principle can sometimes bring harms -- a difference from Aristotle, for whom virtue as a state of character brings success, not just a principled decision. (Aristotle is proto-pragmatic in this way: you can judge the virtue of a man in part by how successful he is in noble undertakings.)

Ath. And now I can define to you clearly, and without ambiguity, what I mean by the just and unjust, according to my notion of them:-When anger and fear, and pleasure and pain, and jealousies and desires, tyrannize over the soul, whether they do any harm or not-I call all this injustice. But when the opinion of the best, in whatever part of human nature states or individuals may suppose that to dwell, has dominion in the soul and orders the life of every man, even if it be sometimes mistaken, yet what is done in accordance therewith, the principle in individuals which obeys this rule, and is best for the whole life of man, is to be called just; although the hurt done by mistake is thought by many to be involuntary injustice. Leaving the question of names, about which we are not going to quarrel, and having already delineated three sources of error, we may begin by recalling them somewhat more vividly to our memory:-One of them was of the painful sort, which we denominate anger and fear.

So the idea here -- similar to Kant, really -- is that one can only act freely when acting according to a rational moral principle. Otherwise, one is being driven along by base nature, and not really voluntarily choosing an action. Thus, all evils are involuntary in this special sense; all principled actions are good, even if they lead to harm "by mistake." 

Having established that "clearly, and without ambiguity," the Athenian proceeds into a very extended discussion of different kinds of homicide. What turns out to be extremely important to just punishment of these different kinds, though, is whether or not the decision was voluntary.

Ath. Having begun to speak of homicide, let us endeavour to lay down laws concerning every different kind of homicides, and, first of all, concerning violent and involuntary homicides. If any one in an athletic contest, and at the public games, involuntarily kills a friend, and he dies either at the time or afterwards of the blows which he has received; or if the like misfortune happens to any one in war, or military exercises, or mimic contests. of which the magistrates enjoin the practice, whether with or without arms, when he has been purified according to the law brought from Delphi relating to these matters, he shall be innocent. And so in the case of physicians: if their patient dies against their will, they shall be held guiltless...

Now remember that theft was to be punished the same way regardless of whether much or little was stolen, because all theft is of a kind: an involuntary overwhelming of the deciding capacity by some pleasure, or avoidance of pain, or passion, etc. Supposedly we've established that all wrongs are involuntary. But the very first question, and one explored at extreme length -- much too long to quote -- is all the ways in which a crime can be more or less voluntary. 

So a man who kills a fellow citizen at the warlike athletics is to be forgiven after ritual purification; that we already knew from earlier books. The city prospers by maintaining so vigorous and warlike a population, enough to justify the occasional death in training. What if you did mean to kill a fellow citizen, though? Well, one case is it might be your spouse, and done in a matter of passion; that deserves one level of punishment because of the strength of the passion (i.e., it was less voluntary because an ordinary person could be expected to be more overwhelmed in a case like this). This goes on and on. What if you used an assassin, and thus freely chose to murder, and also corrupted someone else into choosing to carry out the murder for you? Etc., etc.

It leaves me with the question as to whether the discussion of akratēs was ever serious at all. It seems to be; Plato returns to the problem over and over throughout his works. Per Aristotle, we believe Socrates took this to be a serious proposition. Is Plato here ironically refuting him, by first declaring for the principle and then showing at length that ordinary notions of justice completely reject it? That, indeed, the question of intent and voluntary choice pervades our ideas about justice?

Or are these issues somehow severable in his mind? Perhaps what he means is that 'in a way' these acts are involuntary; but 'in another way' they are obviously chosen after deliberation in some cases, and in other cases were not chosen but just happened. Even here, though, we are not in a clean binary between 'in a way' voluntary cases and complete mistakes or accidents; there are very fine degrees of voluntary choice and deliberation examined.

It's curious. See what you think of it.

Hunting Hedge Funds

So something really important happened today, and I want to talk about it a bit. 

GameStop is a company that sells physical copies of video games. It's mostly located in malls and strip malls around America. For a long time, hedge funds have been targeting it with short sales. They think its business model is dead, like movie theatres, and they're trying to rip the capital out of it a little at a time.

Short sales are not well understood. Not everyone can do them; you have to have a broker and a margin account, and have passed through various forms for gaining permission. It's a game for the rich and connected, mostly. It's not for everyone.

The way it works is that you enter into a contract to borrow someone else's shares of stock, promising to return them on a particular day. Since you think the business is losing money over time, you immediately sell the borrowed stocks. You wait until the last moment, buy the stocks again, and hand them back to the original owner. You pay a transaction fee to make it worth their while, and worth your broker's while. They make money at no risk: you borrow 500 shares (or whatever), you return 500 shares plus a transaction fee. Your broker makes money at no risk. You make money only if you can buy the stocks back for less than you got when you sold them.

What happened today was that Reddit went hunting short sellers at hedge funds. They went after the ones feasting off GameStop, American Movie Company, and a few other places.

Reddit put together a coalition of people with money to buy GameStop (etc) stocks. Now this caused the price to rise. It rose a lot.

When the contracts come due, within about six days, the short sellers are obligated to return the same number of stock shares as they borrowed -- or else make up the difference in market value. They lost, last I heard, $14 Billion today. 

When we get to the end of their contracts, they have to either pony up cash to the loaners of the stocks, or buy shares at whatever the cost is. Everyone who bought GameStop today, if they hold until that mark, is going to make a small fortune.

This model can be repeated anywhere hedge funds are shorting American (or other) stocks.

Connected firms and people panicked hugely today. They shut down trading on GameStop and AMC and others; they persisted in trading among themselves after hours (when most people are forbidden from trading) to artificially lower the prices, in the hope of scaring people who bought today into selling tomorrow. They're terrified. 

Good.

Today we learned an important lesson for fighting back against these internationalist, corporatist scoundrels. Remember it and look out for chances to do it, because you can profit by it too.

Country Music Revisited

 If we ever get to heaven, boys, it ain't because we ain't done nothin' wrong.

Akratēs Revisited

So I want to "circle back," in the current expression, on akratēs. Remember that in Laws III, the Athenian described this as the great destroyer of states. 

I think Plato might be doubly wrong here. I think he might be wrong to have decided that this is a sort of ignorance, and I think he is definitely wrong to think it is the worst kind. Rather, what is going on here is that a person knows what is right and chooses to do the wrong thing anyway because it is more pleasurable. This is a regular feature of country music songs about men who ought to be home being good fathers, but are instead out honky-tonking and drinking up their paycheck. (Roger Miller's "Dang Me," for example.)  It may well be ruinous behavior, but they aren't doing it out of ignorance. They know it is wrong, and are doing it anyway.

What strikes me as a worse kind of ignorance -- and properly a kind of ignorance -- is to have come to the conclusion that the base is actually noble, the bad actually good. It seems to me that the great destroyer of our nation is not the country music song case, where people are failing in what they nevertheless recognize are their duties. The great destroyer is that people have embraced a host of things that are wrong, but that they have learned and taught each other to uphold as right. Arson in our cities and riots that result in great damage to public buildings and the common peace, for example, are celebrated as the pursuit of justice. Abortion is said to be health care.

These people are often college educated, so they are not ignorant in the sense of having never been educated. They are nevertheless possessed of a towering sort of blind ignorance, which can no longer discern good from bad, but instead names the bad as good and navigates as if that were the case. 

[Example, and photo, removed]

Today the FBI arrested a guy for posting memes on social media... in 2016. They doubtless take themselves to be doing the right thing. They're trampling on our whole tradition of free speech, especially political speech, including satire; but what he said wasn't strictly true, you see. And he was on the wrong side.

D29 points out that Homeland Security is now in the business of policing wrongthink on the election. They think what they're doing is good, too.

They're also taking it on themselves to decide when your 'false narrative' beliefs might qualify as incitement to domestic terrorism. They're starting with a friendly case -- belief in lizard people, re: the Nashville bomber -- but the principle is supremely dangerous. 

So, the guy in the country music song is really wrong. He knows he's wrong; he accepts that he's sinning, and that sinning is wrong. He accepts his duties, and admits his failure in fulfilling them. He's putting pleasure in front of virtue. He plans on making some kind of account for it with God later. He may blow up his marriage; he may blow out his liver.

But how much happier would you be with America if he was the worst kind of problem we had to face? This 'country music problem' of akratēs is a serious philosophical puzzle, but my guess is that it's actually not nearly the great destroyer of states that Plato makes it out to be. If Cal Smith is your worst problem, maybe you as a nation can mind your business and let him do his thing. Even if there are a lot of Cal Smiths, they're ordered to the moral structure that undergirds society. 

We are in a much worse case.

UPDATE:

This doesn't even make sense in terms of making trans-men more comfortable. Half the toilets in the men's room require you to stand up. If all of us non-trans-men insist on sitting down to make trans-men feel "included," trans-men who need to sit down will have to wait a lot longer to go. What's less comfortable than that?

But again, here as elsewhere, the nature of human beings is to be rejected as a source of moral wisdom; the principle of diversity and inclusion is to guide us, even where it guides us to a greater misery for all. 

Akratēs in Country Music

 

Plato's Laws IX, 4: Akratēs

Akratēs is the Greek word for today's puzzle, the puzzle of someone who knows what is right but does the wrong thing anyway. This is linked with several other puzzles about virtue that Plato wrestled with all his life without solving; Aristotle came up with a set of answers to the puzzles that he found satisfying. 

One of the allied problems is whether or not virtue is a kind of knowledge. Socrates thought it was: that virtue was a kind of knowing what the right thing to do is. Since the virtuous man knows what is best, naturally he will do it, since to act as if the best thing was not really best would be an expression of ignorance rather than knowledge. 

If that is a correct account of virtue, then virtue (being knowledge) should be easily taught. Yet the sons of virtuous men often turn out bad, or weak, in spite of their father's example and all the wealth poured into educating them. (This is the subject of Plato's Protagoras.)

Also, the account seems a little insufficient. All a teacher of courage needs to do is to teach the student to know what is right to do in a dangerous circumstance like war, and that suffices. Only it doesn't, obviously. (This is the subject of Plato's Laches.)

Temperance, too: all I need to know in order to be temperate is the right amount of alcohol to drink, food to eat, etc. Knowing this, I will obviously lead a temperate life. Or will I? It doesn't seem like it always works out that way, leading to a puzzle about what it means for one to exercise self-control. How could a thing like knowledge regulate itself? Eyes see color, not 'sight'; ears hear sounds, not 'hearing'; so what kind of knowledge is this that isn't about knowing something, but about knowing what ought to be known? (This is the subject of Plato's Charmides.)

Another allied problem is the unity of the virtues. If virtue is a kind of 'knowing what is right,' how could you have one virtue without having all of them? There are many brave men who fight in bad causes. Consider this fellow, a highly decorated soldier and unrepentant evildoer. He clearly has the virtue of courage, but not the virtue justice. Now Aristotle will say that justice is 'fairness plus lawfulness,' where the laws (like the ones Plato is designing here) are supposed to be derived from human nature and seek to perfect human nature. Thus, unjust laws will lead a lawful man to injustice, because the laws themselves are inhumane. But if virtue is a kind of 'knowing the right thing to do,' how can it not be obvious to the virtuous man that the laws are unjust?

With all these background debates, the Athenian makes one last stab at trying to argue that virtue is a kind of knowledge -- only, he admits, somehow we don't always do what we know to be best. 

Ath. When any one commits any injustice, small or great, the law will admonish and compel him either never at all to do the like again, or never voluntarily, or at any rate in a far less degree; and he must in addition pay for the hurt. Whether the end is to be attained by word or action, with pleasure or pain, by giving or taking away privileges, by means of fines or gifts, or in whatsoever way the law shall proceed to make a man hate injustice, and love or not hate the nature of the just-this is quite the noblest work of law. But if the legislator sees any one who is incurable, for him he will appoint a law and a penalty. He knows quite well that to such men themselves there is no profit in the continuance of their lives, and that they would do a double good to the rest of mankind if they would take their departure, inasmuch as they would be an example to other men not to offend, and they would relieve the city of bad citizens. In such cases, and in such cases only, the legislator ought to inflict death as the punishment of offences.

Cle. What you have said appears to me to be very reasonable, but will you favour me by stating a little more clearly the difference between hurt and injustice, and the various complications of the voluntary and involuntary which enter into them?

Ath. I will endeavour to do as you wish:-Concerning the soul, thus much would be generally said and allowed, that one element in her nature is passion, which may be described either as a state or a part of her, and is hard to be striven against and contended with, and by irrational force overturns many things.

Cle. Very true.

Ath. And pleasure is not the same with passion, but has an opposite power, working her will by persuasion and by the force of deceit in all things.

Cle. Quite true.

Ath. A man may truly say that ignorance is a third cause of crimes. Ignorance, however, may be conveniently divided by the legislator into two sorts: there is simple ignorance, which is the source of lighter offences, and double ignorance, which is accompanied by a conceit of wisdom; and he who is under the influence of the latter fancies that he knows all about matters of which he knows nothing. This second kind of ignorance, when possessed of power and strength, will be held by the legislator to be the source of great and monstrous times, but when attended with weakness, will only result in the errors of children and old men; and these he will treat as errors, and will make laws accordingly for those who commit them, which will be the mildest and most merciful of all laws.

Cle. You are perfectly right.

Ath. We all of us remark of one man that he is superior to pleasure and passion, and of another that he is inferior to them; and this is true.

Cle. Certainly.

Ath. But no one was ever yet heard to say that one of us is superior and another inferior to ignorance.

Cle. Very true.

Ath. We are speaking of motives which incite men to the fulfilment of their will; although an individual may be often drawn by them in opposite directions at the same time.

Cle. Yes, often.

Ath. And now I can define to you clearly, and without ambiguity, what I mean by the just and unjust, according to my notion of them:-When anger and fear, and pleasure and pain, and jealousies and desires, tyrannize over the soul, whether they do any harm or not-I call all this injustice. But when the opinion of the best, in whatever part of human nature states or individuals may suppose that to dwell, has dominion in the soul and orders the life of every man, even if it be sometimes mistaken, yet what is done in accordance therewith, the principle in individuals which obeys this rule, and is best for the whole life of man, is to be called just; although the hurt done by mistake is thought by many to be involuntary injustice[,]

This is Plato's final attempt at a resolution of the puzzle. Virtue is a kind of knowledge, but two different kinds of ignorance are possible. The first one is a simple ignorance of the good, which is easy to repair through admonishment and education. The second is a determined ignorance, one that has settled upon the wrong answer and pridefully refuses to be corrected. 

If that sounds familiar, it is approximately the difference between error and heresy. Heresy is a matter of the will, which refuses correction even in theory, and adamantly holds to and even teaches that the wrong thing is actually right. (This was Meister Eckhart's ultimate defense against the charge of heresy for his mystical teachings; to whit, that he believed what he believed but he was open to correction if someone could show him that he was wrong about it, and would recant anything proven to be in error. Some of his doctrines were found heretical, but he himself was not condemned as a heretic.)

Plato's solution is likewise the same as the solution to the problem of heresy: when you find someone who is determined and fixed upon the wrong answers, you must kill him. 

Plato is still trying to explain actions in terms of knowledge; obviously, if you know the right thing you will do the right thing. If you don't do the right thing, you must somehow be ignorant. 

Aristotle's account of this puzzle is in Book VII of the Nicomachean Ethics. (Note that akratēs is given as 'incontinence' and its variants in this translation.) He says the issue is that it is possible to 'have' knowledge in one sense and 'not have' it in another; thus, one might know how to calculate properly in one sense, but be unable to do it when drunk or asleep. You haven't forgotten how to calculate, but in certain states you can't do what you would know how to do in the correct state. 

Aristotle has a lot more to say about it than that; the first ten parts of that book are on the subject. The basic answer, though, is to introduce a new concept that Plato wasn't using: the idea of being in a state. Virtue itself will become a kind of state of character, cultivated and lasting, rather than a kind of knowledge. You must still know the right thing to do; but the virtuous man will have also cultivated the character that does it. 

That doesn't actually solve the puzzle either. You still need knowledge, not just a state of character. And it turns out -- Aristotle says this over and over through his work -- that the virtuous man is the right judge of the right thing to do. So it isn't just a form of knowledge, but a state of character that produces knowledge that can only be judged by someone in that state. How would you know it if you got there, then? How would you recognize it from the outside, in order to see that you still had something to learn? 

This is the point at which a professor would say:  "Discuss." 

The Smell of Gasoline

Nothing substantive today. I'm too busy doing taxes and other garbage to think any interesting thoughts.

I always liked the smell of gasoline. I remember that from my childhood, pumping gas at my grandfather's service station. 

To the Immortal Memory of Robert Burns

Sadly this year there is no Burns Night supper to attend, all things still being shut down and canceled here in North Carolina. I hear other states -- even California! -- are opening up, but our governor remains convinced that this lockdown concept is a valuable one. 

Like so many things, we'll have to do it virtually this year.

Clay Pigeons

Mentioned in the comments Friday, a very nice song.

Plato's Laws IX, 3

The next important topic the Athenian discusses is punishment for crimes. He has an interesting principle to propose: theft should be punished the same way, by being forced to repay double what was stolen. The effect of this proposal is that the success of the thief determines the penalty, but that there is proportionate equality for all thieves in terms of the punishment received. 

This proposal receives pushback from his comrades. I'm not sure about it either. This would seem to serve as an excuse for a lot of thievery from the citizens, who have a secure source of wealth from which they could pay fines if they were caught (and which they cannot fall below). In Ivanhoe King Richard assigns Friar Tuck only the right to take three bucks per season, "but if that do not prove an apology for thy slaying thirty, I am no Christian knight nor true king." Here too a man who was in the upper quadrant of wealth might regularly engage in wanton thefts, knowing that if he got away with it he increased his wealth; whereas if he were caught in one of them, he only had to repay the double portion and go free.

The Athenian doesn't actually defend his proposition when challenged on it.

Ath. Once more let there be a third general law respecting the judges who are to give judgment, and the manner of conducting suits against those who are tried on an accusation of treason; and as concerning the remaining or departure of their descendants-there shall be one law for all three, for the traitor, and the robber of temples, and the subverter by violence of the laws of the state. For a thief, whether he steal much or little, let there be one law, and one punishment for all alike: in the first place, let him pay double the amount of the theft if he be convicted, and if he have so much over and above the allotment;-if he have not, he shall be bound until he pay the penalty, or persuade him has obtained the sentence against him to forgive him. But if a person be convicted of a theft against the state, then if he can persuade the city, or if he will pay back twice the amount of the theft, he shall be set free from his bonds.

Cle. What makes you say, Stranger, that a theft is all one, whether the thief may have taken much or little, and either from sacred or secular places-and these are not the only differences in thefts:-seeing, then, that they are of many kinds, ought not the legislator to adapt himself to them, and impose upon them entirely different penalties?

Ath. Excellent. I was running on too fast, Cleinias, and you impinged upon me, and brought me to my senses, reminding me of what, indeed, had occurred to mind already, that legislation was never yet rightly worked out, as I may say in passing.-Do you remember the image in which I likened the men for whom laws are now made to slaves who are doctored by slaves? For of this you may be very sure, that if one of those empirical physicians, who practise medicine without science, were to come upon the gentleman physician talking to his gentleman patient, and using the language almost of philosophy, beginning at the beginning of the disease and discoursing about the whole nature of the body, he would burst into a hearty laugh-he would say what most of those who are called doctors always have at their tongue's end:-Foolish fellow, he would say, you are not healing the sick man, but you are educating him; and he does not want to be made a doctor, but to get well.

From here he departs into two of Plato's favorite arguments: a criticism of the poets for portraying unjust things in heroic persons, and the Socratic argument that no one does wrong voluntarily. The first of these we have seen often enough that I will pass it by unless any of you wish a further discussion; if so, ask after it in the comments.

The second one Plato treats differently here than elsewhere, and it will require a little time to construct a proper comparison. Thus, I will end here for today with the question (for you, if you'd like to discuss it): what do you think of this idea of formal and proportionate equality in punishment? Does the fact that there is only approximate equality among citizens in society make this unjust? (There is even less equality among slaves and foreigners; but inequality there was built into the Athenian's justice system, which formally assigns them different and lesser punishments on the assumption that they are less blameworthy because they lacked the education in virtue.)

MOB VI

I recommend this book (a B&N link because I'm minimizing the business I do with Amazon as much as possible. I suspect it's available there, too), by medically retired Navy SEAL Justin Sheffield.

It's a raw description of his evolution from trouble-making teenager through highly successful SEAL through heavily emotionally and physically (primarily brain) damaged SEAL through his eventual, in the main, recovery.

There was some subtext that greatly interested me, too: the heavy dependence on technology of the SEALs and of our military generally, both in the run-up to a fight and during the fight itself.

I have to wonder--and worry--about how effective our troops would be in a war when ASAT EMPs have been employed, and when battlefield EMPs have been employed both over the approach/engagement and over Division and Army headquarters. How well can our men and women function in a manual environment? How well can units of any size coordinate with each other without their electronic com?

And mind you: it doesn't take nuclear weapons to generate an EMP. Nor are any of our enemies, state actors or network entities, nearly as dependent on technology as we are.

Eric Hines

Plato's Laws IX, 2: Treason and its Fruits

When we get to the highest crime that America knows how to recognize, treason, the Athenian is willing to allow for corruption of the blood -- but only in extreme cases. 

Ath. Next, after what relates to the Gods, follows what relates to the dissolution of the state:-Whoever by promoting a man to power enslaves the laws, and subjects the city to factions, using violence and stirring up sedition contrary to law, him we will deem the greatest enemy of the whole state. But he who takes no part in such proceedings, and, being one of the chief magistrates of the state, has no knowledge of the treason, or, having knowledge of it, by reason of cowardice does not interfere on behalf of his country, such an one we must consider nearly as bad. Every man who is worth anything will inform the magistrates, and bring the conspirator to trial for making a violent and illegal attempt to change the government. The judges of such cases shall be the same as of the robbers of temples; and let the whole proceeding be carried on in the same way, and the vote of the majority condemn to death. But let there be a general rule, that the disgrace and punishment of the father is not to be visited on the children, except in the case of some one whose father, grandfather, and great-grandfather have successively undergone the penalty of death. Such persons the city shall send away with all their possessions to the city and country of their ancestors, retaining only and wholly their appointed lot. And out of the citizens who have more than one son of not less than ten years of age, they shall select ten whom their father or grandfather by the mother's or father's side shall appoint, and let them send to Delphi the names of those who are selected, and him whom the God chooses they shall establish as heir of the house which has failed; and may he have better fortune than his predecessors!

I'm trying to think of a family that has attempted to dissolve a state for three generations running, let alone four. The Jacobites come close,* with an important clarification: they were in fact the lawful kings who were themselves overthrown. Their generations-long attempt to overthrow the British state was (in their eyes and the eyes of their supporters) an attempt to restore the lawful state rather than to dissolve the current one. Even then you get only James II (Battle of the Boyne), James 'the Old Pretender' (1715 uprising), and Bonny Prince Charlie -- after the 1745 uprising there were no more.  Bonny Prince Charlie's great-grandfather was Charles II, the Merry Monarch, beloved and successful king of England and Scotland.

In any case it worked out more or less as the Athenian wanted: the Stewarts repaired themselves abroad, and after the direct line died out, their claim passed to obscure members of the European nobility. You've probably never heard of the current heir.

The definition of treason here is less strict than ours. The Founders gave it as actually waging war against the state, or giving aid and comfort to those who do; here it is merely 'a violent and illegal attempt to change the government.' Of course as a practical matter, claims of treason usually end up with both sides charging each other with violence and illegality. In the famous (and in my opinion heroic) Battle of Athens, a band of World War II veterans in Tennessee seized arms and overthrew the local government; but the local government was actively involved in voter intimidation and stealing an election. It is definitely true that the losing side would have accused the winning side of 'a violent and illegal attempt to change the government' if they'd managed to come out on top. That they were themselves breaking the law, having seized the ballot boxes by force of arms under color of law, would have seemed immaterial to them.

For this reason I have come to the surprising conclusion over the years that treason isn't always wrong; that perhaps, just as blasphemy has been effectively dissolved as a crime, treason ought to be too. Perhaps just as we no longer consider God's interest in the law, or 'the gods',' we should no longer consider the state's. What we should consider is whether the act was done to keep men free, or to make them subject; to uphold the natural rights, or to suppress them. 

* Kant definitely did not approve of the Jacobite cause, which to him seemed like a clear-cut case of treason. This gives rise to one of my favorite examples from Kantian ethics. Kant talks about the Jacobites to illuminate his view of honor. Consider two Jacobites captured waging war against the crown, the says. Both of them are offered a possible choice of punishment between death or slavery. The more virtuous man loves honor more than life. The Jacobite who was a man of honor would prefer death, because he is “acquainted with something that he values more highly than life, namely honor, while the scoundrel considers it better to live in shame than not at all.”

The right thing is to execute both, Kant says. The moral difference between them makes it right to give the man of honor what he prefers, and the scoundrel what he hates. (If any of you want to look that up, it's Metaphysics of Morals 6:334).

Sidelining vs. reverence

When you're not sure what science is exactly, it's hard to know whether you're sidelining or revering it.

[I]n the U.S., all 50 states are autonomous on most matters. This is what former President Trump soon realized when the virus started spreading. Each state had different approaches. Trump claimed power over them that was absolute, but Georgia and Florida approached the virus with a very light touch, while New York, California and New Jersey were very heavy-handed. Translated for those with limited knowledge of the Constitution, Trump’s embrace or dismissal of so-called “science” was in many ways immaterial.

So while the Times reporters claim that “Science was sidelined at every level of government” on the way to “Failure at Every Level,” the reality is that states were free to keep “science” off the sideline to their heart’s content. New York, California and New Jersey presumably did? How did it work?

Give peace a chance

Friday Night Foley

Written about Ronald Reagan, of course, hated in his day as much as any President ever was.

Blaze Foley wasn't as well known. Clearly in large part it was drugs, but they all did lots of drugs. His instability went deeper. There was a great episode about him on Tales from the Tour Bus that captures what was great and tragic about him.

Cultural Vandalism

It's bad enough to stop teaching Chaucer; it's worse to replace him with something positively harmful, which these critical studies on race and gender happen to be.

The University of Leicester will stop teaching the great English medieval poet and author Geoffrey Chaucer in favour of modules on race and sexuality, according to new proposals. Management told the English department that courses on canonical works would be dropped in favour of modules that "students expect" as part of plans now under consultation.

Wasn't the idea that the students were the ones who had something to learn? That was why they were coming to the University?

Foundational texts such as The Canterbury Tales and the Anglo-Saxon epic Beowulf would no longer be taught, under proposals to scrap medieval literature. Instead, the English faculty will be refocused to drop centuries of the literary canon and deliver a "decolonised" curriculum devoted to diversity.... 

They would end all teaching on texts central to the development of the English language, including the Dark Age epic poem Beowulf, as well as Sir Gawain and the Green Knight.

Sir Thomas Malory's Le Morte D'Arthur, the Viking sagas, and all works written earlier than 1500 would also be removed from the syllabus.

They are actually cutting out the very best parts of British literature, in my opinion; even if you prefer 20th century authors like Tolkien and Lewis and Chesterton, all of them are rooted in these earlier works. Indeed, one of the great joys of studying those works as a fan of Tolkien is finding signpost after signpost plainly labeled, "J.R.R. was here." 

If you had something superior to replace it with, perhaps it might be one thing; but all they've got for a replacement is corrosive poison. 

Plato's Laws IX

The Ninth Book of the Laws turns to the judicial power. This is a subject on which our own Founders might have wisely spent more time. They famously considered the judiciary the 'least dangerous' branch, and as such the form they put to it was ill-defined. They only asserted that there should be a Supreme Court, but said little about its composition; they left open the potential for as many inferior courts as might chance to occur; and they established that all crimes should be tried by jury. Because they set so few limits the judiciary quickly arrogated to itself the right to determine whether or not laws were constitutional, and that power has grown into the power to be a rolling committee on amending the Constitution itself -- a power the Founders plainly never intended to grant. Likewise, the jury trial they did establish was so unhampered by formal restrictions that it has largely ceased to exist; over 90% of criminal cases in America are settled by plea bargain, with the jury trial in which the state has to prove its case a rare exception instead of the rule. 

So it is worth looking at other ideas about how the judicial function might operate, even if we do not adopt or advocate for them. One day we may have the opportunity to re-imagine how to draw up the laws for the exercise of this power; certainly someday someone will. Having an alternative starting point might give rise to ideas that would never occur to those who have only ever known one approach.

The Founders only took care to define one law in the Constitution, treason, which will be the subject of the second part of the commentary on Book IX. In the first part, the Athenian begins with an even higher crime that the United States decided to define out of criminality -- blasphemy, that is, treason against the gods. It's still possible to incur a harsh penalty here for robbing a church, but not a higher penalty than for robbing a store; for burning a church, but not because it expresses hatred towards God but because it expresses hatred towards men. 

For the Greeks, however, blasphemy was still the highest possible crime. It was the one for which Socrates was executed; we usually hear it said that he was guilty of 'corrupting the youth,' but the particular way he was supposed to be guilty of corrupting them was religious. (Perhaps contemporary readers assume this is a euphemism for sexual immorality with the youth, as priests sometimes get up to today, but this is not at all true: recall Socrates' gentle reproof of Alcibiades.) He was accused of "failing to acknowledge the gods that the city acknowledges" and "introducing new deities." Neither charge was quite fair, but alleged blasphemy was what convinced the Athenians to kill him. 

The Athenian in the dialogue first wants to make clear that he thinks it is a shame even to have to talk about a judiciary, as it assumes that crime might occur even in a population as completely devoted to virtuous training as the one they are attempting to construct. He allows that slaves and foreigners in the community might get up to some bad things, however, not having the fullness of citizen training. Yet the truth is that he knows citizens will as well, because he goes on to construct systems for punishment of citizens that are different from the ones for slaves and foreigners. Even in pre-Christian Greece, the fallen nature of mankind was obvious. 

The punishments for blasphemy for the slaves and foreigners, etc., are very harsh but leave them with a chance to go elsewhere and try again -- although they will be branded on both their hands and forehead with a mark that indicates them to be blasphemers, which will presumably somewhat impair their fortunes. Citizens of course are to be executed, and buried 'in silence, beyond the border.' The Founders and Plato did hit upon one common note in that both ban what the Constitution calls 'corruption of the blood.' The children and other relatives of the condemned receive all of his property, and an honorable name so long as they do not repeat his errors. The family's approximate equality in the community is to be maintained; the Athenian notes that, even in lesser cases punishable by fines, fines may not exceed the amount that would reduce the family below the basic level of wealth all households are to be allotted. (In such cases, corporal punishments will have to do instead; not exile or outlawry, however.)

More important than the punishment is the form of the trial. It is similar to the way elections were to be done in that it is supposed to be repeated over three days, finalized only at the end. 

First of all the plaintiff shall make one speech, and then the defendant shall make another; and after the speeches have been made the eldest judge shall begin to examine the parties, and proceed to make an adequate enquiry into what has been said; and after the oldest has spoken, the rest shall proceed in order to examine either party as to what he finds defective in the evidence, whether of statement or omission; and he who has nothing to ask shall hand over the examination to another. And on so much of what has been said as is to the purpose all the judges shall set their seals, and place the writings on the altar of Hestia. On the next day they shall meet again, and in like manner put their questions and go through the cause, and again set their seals upon the evidence; and when they have three times done this, and have had witnesses and evidence enough, they shall each of them give a holy vote, after promising by Hestia that they will decide justly and truly to the utmost of their power; and so they shall put an end to the suit.

Note that for citizens this is almost a trial by jury. The judges will be their peers, citizens like themselves, and if I have understood correctly they should be 12 in number -- one from each of the major divisions of the city of 5,040 households. Evidence and witnesses are a kind of afterthought; the main action is more like a Supreme Court proceeding, with each judge questioning the two sides until they are satisfied. It differs from our Supreme Court in that they get three bites at the apple, in case the questioning from one day raised an issue they want to ask about later. It differs from a jury in that a majority vote decides it, rather than unanimity as our juries require.  It also differs in that the functions of judge and jury are not separated, but combined.

For aliens and slaves, the process looks much less happy just because the judges are not their peers. The judges come from a class that views itself as superior to them, and that looks down upon them as lowly characters in need of control rather than fellow citizens possibly falsely accused, possibly in need of correction. However, as a practical matter this is more like our own system than not. Most of the cases that come before the court are of relatively poor people, lacking the fine education of the judge and the lawyers acting as prosecutor and defense attorney. Only occasionally do they end up trying one of their own "class," and I think it is fair to say that they tend to be far less harsh even when they render a guilty verdict; and also that they do so far less often.

This problem of factionalism among the classes concerned Aristotle; Plato will address it in the writings on treason, which I will save for tomorrow. 

Easiest Prediction Ever

Just the other day, I closed a post on the National Guard by saying, "Spare a thought for those poor bastards, pardon my French. They deserve better and will receive worse before it's over."

So guess what happened today? 

Thousands of National Guardsmen were forced to vacate congressional grounds on Thursday and are now taking their rest breaks outside and in nearby parking garages, after two weeks of sleepless nights protecting the nation’s capital in the wake of the violent assault on Jan. 6.

One unit, which had been resting in the Dirksen Senate Office building, was abruptly told to vacate the facility on Thursday, according to one Guardsman. The group was forced to rest in a nearby parking garage without internet reception, with just one electrical outlet, and one bathroom with two stalls for 5,000 troops, the person said.

“Yesterday dozens of senators and congressmen walked down our lines taking photos, shaking our hands and thanking us for our service. Within 24 hours, they had no further use for us and banished us to the corner of a parking garage. We feel incredibly betrayed,” the Guardsman said.

Well, you have been betrayed. Loyalty is a two-way street, a reciprocal obligation if it is to be an obligation at all, and they have no loyalty to you. In fact, they don't even like you. Nor do they trust you, which is why they kept you unarmed and had the FBI scour your lives to see what they could dig up. Now they want you out of the way, and if that means you have to sleep in a cold garage in January until your superiors can dispose of you properly, that's really your problem and not theirs.

UPDATE: Satire from the Bee; but it does look as if the popular backlash has caused the Congress to retreat on forcing the soldiers to sleep in the cold. One Donald J. Trump, a retiring private citizen in Florida, offered the use of his DC hotel.

UPDATE: Another easy prediction: hundreds of National Guard now test positive for COVID after being thrown into tight quarters with people from other states.

An Artistic Interlude

("Quel squardo sdegnosetto" by Monteverdi)

"The kings go up and the kings go down,

And who knows who shall rule;

Next night a king may starve or sleep,

But men and birds and beasts shall weep

At the burial of a fool.

"O, drunkards in my cellar,

Boys in my apple tree,

The world grows stern and strange and new,

And wise men shall govern you,

And you shall weep for me."

-G. K. Chesterton, selection from The Ballad of the White Horse

Plato's Laws VIII, 3

This is the final post on Book VIII. The rest of the book treats many important subjects, but mostly they are contingent on facts about the particular location of the colony. As contingencies, they aren't of great universal philosophical interest. 

For example, having determined to have public meals, they need to work out where the food is coming from to supply those meals. Now if you remember, the colony is on a part of the large island of Crete that is mostly uninhabited and quite a distance from the sea. Thus, the Athenian reckons they won't need regulations about fishing. That's probably true, but it doesn't mean that fishing regulations aren't philosophically interesting (as much as any regulations). It just means the colony isn't by the water.

Likewise one of the most crucial topics in many places is water rights. On Crete, it's not such a big deal. The Mediterranean climate is generous, the volcanic soil is rich, and the mountainous terrain supplies numerous springs. As such, it's fine to offer the fairly simple set of arrangements the Athenian proposes. It would be a different matter on the Mesa Verde. 

The respect for property lines and markers is good. There's not a lot to say about it, though. The most that comes to mind is how carefully they treat the border cases, in which they might be intruding on a foreigner's holding instead of a fellow citizen's. The Athenian advises that they treat these cases exactly as if they were fellow citizens, doing justice to the stranger:

Ath. [L]et the first of them be the law of Zeus, the god of boundaries. Let no one shift the boundary line either of a fellow-citizen who is a neighbour, or, if he dwells at the extremity of the land, of any stranger who is conterminous with him, considering that this is truly "to move the immovable," and every one should be more willing to move the largest rock which is not a landmark, than the least stone which is the sworn mark of friendship and hatred between neighbours; for Zeus, the god of kindred, is the witness of the citizen, and Zeus, the god of strangers, of the stranger, and when aroused, terrible are the wars which they stir up.

In addition to avoiding wars and divine punishment (which may well be the same thing in this case), this is a Golden Rule case; but Plato does not invoke anything quite like that principle, which is interesting as an omission. The philosophical principle he invokes instead still has an Old Testament flavor:

Ath. In the next place, many small injuries done by neighbours to one another, through their multiplication, may cause a weight of enmity, and make neighbourhood a very disagreeable and bitter thing. Wherefore a man ought to be very careful of committing any offence against his neighbour, and especially of encroaching on his neighbour's land; for any man may easily do harm, but not every man can do good to another.

That sounds like a principle that you should not harm your neighbor because you may not be able to do good to him in equal measure. That may be true, although presumably one can do more good for one's neighbor than will usually be the case for those further away.

There's another section on the physical quality of the town and its buildings, but it is not interesting compared with the earlier book's.

Finally, the subject of immigrants comes up. Now immigrants are presumably also protected by 'Zeus, the god of strangers,' but he doesn't come up there. The interest of the Athenian is just in preserving the character of his state. Foreigners won't be fed at the public mess, which is for citizens, so they'll need to buy food; so will artisans, who aren't deemed worthy of being full citizens. Aristotle agreed about this; it's an oddity of Greek thinking that artisans are at once the clearest cases of knowledge, but still considered unworthy of citizenship because they have to earn a living through skill rather than having one provided for them via land.

However, the Athenian does not want his state to be commercial in character; the hustling and bustling of markets horrifies him, as does the lure of lucre. He proposes that there be only twelve market days a year for buying food, one a month, and that the artisans and foreigners be required to purchase their rations a month at a time. These markets in the agora should be run by foreigners anyway, to prevent citizens from being merchants. 

Yet there are things one cannot buy a month out at a time, like raw meat; and there are other things like fuel that might be purchased wholesale from producers in the country, which for some reason is perfectly fine with the Athenian. (But no credit is to be extended, or if it is in spite of the rules against it, the law will not enforce the contract and you'll just have to accept not being paid if you aren't.) All together a confused relationship coming out of this distrust of commerce, which tries to map itself on a world in which commerce is a practical necessity.

The basic rule of immigration is that borders are open for all skilled migrants, and residence can last for as much as twenty years, but then you have to go home. There is no path to citizenship. For an immigrant who does some special service, this twenty year period can be extended at the discretion of the government; it can even be extended to lifelong residence, if the service is of great character. 

The children of the foreigners remain foreigners. They also are permitted a twenty year residence, provided they learn the skilled trade that their father brought to town; however, their twenty year clock doesn't start until they turn 15. They may thus stay until age 35, and then they have to go: unless, of course, they can persuade the council to permit them to remain. 

Over time this is likely to lead to a large class of foreign-born non-citizens without political power. Even if they usually do leave at 35, any children they have had will be entitled to stay; and they are likely to reproduce as well. The need for someone to be present to care for children and teach them the trade is likely to prove an acceptable excuse for not expelling 35-year-old fathers who are skilled tradesmen. Given open borders for immigration and natural reproductive increase, then, in a few generations there will be a class of people with necessary skills for the continuation of the state, who nevertheless live under threat of expulsion and lack political power or respect. 

That's an explosive set of circumstances for the Athenian to have built into the plan. 

Inconceivable!

 

Purge the Military

I met Lloyd Austin in Iraq, very briefly. He seemed like a decent guy. I expect he's just saying what people want him to say, which is how you get to be a general of any sort.

What a hell of a thing to say, though.

A Toast to Free America

A 21-part video in celebration of America, by Johnny Cash.

UPDATE: 

That link was working earlier this evening, but the playlist seems to have failed. So here's another Cash tune that isn't about America.

Uncritical Reading

If you've been following the discussion of literary vs. unliterary reading at AVI's, you may also be interested in this essay on the perils of reading like a critic.

Take a moment to think about your favorite book. Now ask yourself: Would you be willing to reveal your thoughts to other readers? Most people wouldn’t think twice about sharing their enthusiasms. But literature professors are not most people. One of the first lessons you learn in grad school is to hide your personal taste or risk being shamed for liking the wrong sorts of things.

Liking the wrong things, or for the wrong reasons, is a social process; it's about the in-group. Finding out some honest facts about what you like and why is worth doing for the same reason that Socrates thought 'the unexamined life is not worth living.' 

I've written praise for Loius L'amour novels here, for example. These were never 'high art,' but they're good books. You can still find them for sale today on shelves in any truck stop in America; I got most of my copies of dusty MWR shelves in tents in Iraq, where they'd been deposited by soldiers who'd read them and left them for others. They're easy to read, and they're easy to follow: somewhat like how Taco Bell mixes about six ingredients in different ways on different tortillas, L'amour has around six plots that he combines and re-combines in different ways. There are even fewer protagonist types: the seriously dangerous virtuous man, the youth set on a difficult course who must learn virtue, and the backcountry man demonstrating folk virtues. Because they are all virtuous in the Aristotelian sense, however, they're really variations on a theme -- but also worthy variations on a theme.

Popular art does not have to be bad art, in other words; it too can convey very worthy things. Or not:

Still the prevailing mode of literary criticism, symptomatic reading holds that the critic’s duty is to uncover the oppressive or subversive elements within literary narratives. For many critics, though, tools of literary theory (including Marxism, psychoanalysis, deconstruction, and other approaches) that once felt empowering now look routine. The inevitable disenchantment set in when novels were all read in the same way—that is, with an eye toward their political implications in the world—with no discernable impact on the world outside their covers.

The mode of criticism the 'critical' reader is being taught to bring to these works lessens them. Whereas the stated intent was to show the reader things about the work he or she had been missing, the actual effect is to compress all the various works into a single wavelength. A tremendous amount is lost by reading the books only in this one way.

Letting go of 'one way' of reading being right also allows you to admit to yourself what you do like, and that it's all right to like it. 

Suspicion was far from my mind as I found myself grappling with aesthetic questions given scant attention by the literary criticism of recent years. Temporarily setting aside my habitual skepticism forced me to confront complicated feelings toward books and what draws me to them—and toward what it means to read as a critic while still being myself.

That may leave you, of course, realizing that you like simple things; or erotic things; or other kinds of things that may not attain the very heights of human excellence. To return to the last reading from the Laws, though, these things are also goods; there is no reason to live in privation from simple joys and the like. The best course is to try to create art that intertwines the lower joys with the higher ones, as Tolkien combines the earthy love of mushrooms with the powerful realization that the beauty of the stars lies forever beyond the grasp of evil. And that's only one character!

Cascade Failure

One of the things I've been trying to piece together is how all the various security forces we have in place at the Capitol failed on 6 January. It's quite embarrassing, really: the Capitol Police alone have 2,000 men, the DC National Guard another thousand-plus battalion, and then there's the FBI, the Park Police, the Metro Police Department, the National Guard units from VA and MD that could be called with short notice, even the 3rd Infantry Regiment in Arlington (and the Marines not too far down the road in Quantico). 

We had plenty of guys who could have been there, and plenty of advance notice of a demonstration likely to spin out of control. Yet somehow, dudes with bison hats were wandering the halls of Congress. 

Here's another part of the puzzle.

"The Politics of Multiracial Whiteness"

I can't better this post at Instapundit by Ed Driscoll, so I'll just link to it. If I were of Latino extraction, which is a perfectly honorable thing to be, I should be quite put out by these people deciding first that I was obligated boldly to assert my ethnic identity in the first place, and also that I must stop doing so as I preferred to do and call myself "Latinx" instead.

Maybe I just want to be respected as a good mechanic down at the shop, go to church with my neighbors wherever they're from on Sundays and holidays, and generally just root myself in my community.  And hey -- per hypothesis the community is apparently willing to accept me if I do. Fine. Great! Right? 

No, it's a moral sin against the order of the day.

Loyalty Checks

Not political but military-oriented:

Our governing class responded to the Capitol failure by setting up a Green Zone around central DC, blockading the bridges, cutting off vehicle access except via a few checkpoints, and bringing in two divisions of National Guardsmen to protect them from their fellow Americans. 

Now they've decided the Guardsmen can't be trusted and that they need their secret police, the FBI, to perform loyalty checks on the National Guard.

This is of course completely unnecessary. It's also insulting, but military service entails suffering regular insults like this. The unnecessary nature of this process is what draws my attention. Chains of command know their troops quite well already, and can easily tell you which ones they're worried about. If there's really some concern here you can assign those guys to special "volunteer" garbage-collection units who will be kept away from anything important. The FBI isn't going to be able to do a better job than their company commander of identifying the problem cases.

The Army is, of course, doing just that kind of thing. 

Army Secretary Ryan McCarthy told The Associated Press on Sunday that officials are conscious of the potential threat, and he warned commanders to be on the lookout for any problems within their ranks as the inauguration approaches. So far, however, he and other leaders say they have seen no evidence of any threats, and officials said the vetting hadn’t flagged any issues that they were aware of.

”We’re continually going through the process, and taking second, third looks at every one of the individuals assigned to this operation,” McCarthy said in an interview after he and other military leaders went through an exhaustive, three-hour security drill in preparation for Wednesday’s inauguration. He said Guard members are also getting training on how to identify potential insider threats.

The lack of military service among our elected officials is noteworthy. They really do feel threatened by our own people. The very people they brought in to guard them are now seen as a potential 'insider' threat. They don't understand the service or the ranks, or that the Army and the National Guard are the best-integrated part of America (governed by an officer class who have all been to college, and none of whom who did so in the last decade will have escaped university wokeness indoctrination). There is very little danger of an 'insider threat,' not from these guys; and the few who are a little 'out there' are definitely on their bosses' radar and have been for a while.

Now another thing I can tell you about these troops without the bother of asking them is that they hate being there. They were deployed in titanic numbers without any preparation; it's cold; they've been pulled away from their homes and families to stand watch over streets that have checkpoints every block. It's got to be one of the worst assignments ever, even without being insulted, even without being subject to the FBI prowling through your life looking for reasons to punish you.

Spare a thought for those poor bastards, pardon my French. They deserve better and will receive worse before it's over. 

Motorhead Girl

Since Tom liked the first one, try this one. If you hang around here you'll like the visuals, anyway. There's some beautiful machines on display here, and no mistake.

Certain other forms of natural beauty are also on display, for example, an impressive display of flames at about the one minute mark. All beauty is good; I have often argued that the first division of the Good is into the True and the Beautiful.

UPDATE:

Here's one with less natural beauty, but a fine collection of machinery and more traditional Rockabilly. 

Plato's Laws VIII, 2

We have reached the "Footloose" section of the document, in which the problem of horny teenagers is raised. In a way it is strange that it comes up here instead of before, when the whole business of marriage was hashed out in great detail. But no, it is only at this point -- when the business of the city's citizens proves to be athletic and musical contests and dancing and warlike exercises -- that the Athenian worriers that young people in such good shape might turn to 'sport' of other kinds. This must obviously be prevented. 

In fact the problem ends up generalizing to giving in to sexual impulses outside the context of marriage. These arguments from a Greece that has not encountered Judaism, long before the birth of Christ, are going to sound very familiar to those who have ever heard what the Catholic Church has to say about the subject. Partly this is because the Church has adopted them from Plato, whose work provided a great deal of inspiration in the early (and Greek) part of the Church's formation. 

The Athenian begins by suggesting that the business of encouraging sexual morality is both easy and nearly impossible. It's easy (not as easy as he claims, sadly) to get people to live alongside the fair without having sex with them because we can see that they do not so engage in sexuality with their fair brothers or sisters, or own children. Thus, as long as we can persuade everyone to adopt the same wholly negative view of having sex with non-spouses that we have for incest, a society should in principle be able to attain the end.

The near impossible part is, of course, convincing everyone to go along with that view.

So he begins by proposing first arguments, and then legislation to enforce the conclusions of his arguments. Now the arguments he uses are much more familiar to most readers from Plato's Symposium. They are given here in a much more straightforward form, without the drama of Alcibiades' attempted seduction of Socrates and Socrates gentle rebuff of the younger man's attempt. Here the Athenian just lays out the principles Socrates used in his defense:

Ath. The friendship which arises from contraries is horrible and coarse, and has often no tie of communion; but that which, arises from likeness is gentle, and has a tie of communion which lasts through life. As to the mixed sort which is made up of them both, there is, first of all, a in determining what he who is possessed by this third love desires; moreover, he is drawn different ways, and is in doubt between the two principles; the one exhorting him to enjoy the beauty of youth, and the other forbidding him. For the one is a lover of the body, and hungers after beauty, like ripe fruit, and would fain satisfy himself without any regard to the character of the beloved; the other holds the desire of the body to be a secondary matter, and looking rather than loving and with his soul desiring the soul of the other in a becoming manner, regards the satisfaction of the bodily love as wantonness; he reverences and respects temperance and courage and magnanimity and wisdom, and wishes to live chastely with the chaste object of his affection. 

This is an argument that assumes an equality between men and women, notice, rather than (as we often hear) that they are contrary:  if male and female were contrary, then love between even man and wife would fall under the scheme that is used to reject love between the young man and the older man, or between the rich and the poor. (In the laws on marriage, the rich are actually supposed to marry the poor by regulation; but because it unites their households and their wealth, this reinforces equality. The argument here is that a rich man loving a poor boy creates an inequality so steep as to make true and virtuous love impossible between them.) The importance of equality to friendship will be revisited in Aristotle's ethics; here, the implication is both that men and women have an equality, and also that man and wife should seek to love each other's souls more than bodies. 

Of course there must be children; there's already been quite a bit of legislation proposed about making sure they get to that part also. Perhaps strangely, though, there is a differential in age there: women are to marry between 16-20, and men between 30-35. For whatever reason, this does not strike the Athenian as the same kind of inequality that worries him when he is rejecting the Greek system of man-boy love.

We also get the usual arguments from nature against homosexuality, so that Alcibiades' general impulse is to be "utterly" rejected and suppressed on pain of losing citizenship and all honor. (This same punishment is to attend anyone who has sex outside of marriage in any way, e.g. a man who had sex with a female servant would be punished just the same way as a partner in a man-boy relationship; presumably also unfaithful wives.)  So you get the argument that nature plainly forbids 'spending your seed on unfertile soil,' i.e. other men, but also on fertile soil where a crop is not wanted. 

The arguments from nature are generally rejected these days, following one of two quite different lines. The first (often citing Hume) is that 'you cannot get an ought from an is,' i.e., that you cannot reason from facts about what happens to be true about nature to what ought to be true. Thus, nature is rejected as a source of moral argument (for Kant, in favor of practical reason).

That approach has always struck me as wrong. Every moral principle is going to be founded at least partly on facts about reality. Murder is only wrong, if it is, because you can die; if it were not possible to kill a man, we would not need to have rules against doing it. Kant's practical reason would find no purchase on murder in a world in which death was impossible. Likewise these sexual rules are only going to exist to regulate a nature we happen to have. It's only important to regulate sexuality because we can have sex; it's only important to take care that children are born into families that can support them because children are a thing that can happen with sex; and they have natures that require nurture for survival; and stable families provide... etc. Not only can you get an ought from an is, what is happens to be the only place you can get your oughts.

(Furthermore, reason itself belongs in the realm of what is. So you can't escape the problem by flying to practical reason or even pure reason: you're still appealing to a part of what exists to obtain whatever oughts you wanted.)

The second approach addresses arguments like the Athenian's other point, which is that we ought to be better than beasts, and yet we can observe in birds both an avoidance of homosexuality and faithful mate-pairing. If the birds can manage to suppress their bestial lusts so well, why shouldn't human beings be able to do it?

The usual counterargument is that, you know, birds may do this or that; but humans have much closer relatives in nature, and they do seem to engage in homosexuality, non-paired sex, and a lot of other things. Why cherry pick the birds? If you're going to reason from nature, why not from the natures closer to our own?

The Athenian doesn't receive this challenge, but I'm not sure what kind of counter-argument he would raise against it. I think he feels like he's obviously proven the immorality of male-male sex already, both on natural grounds of the first type and also on the Symposium grounds that it leads to a lower type of love. But these arguments stand as a challenge to the first kind of natural arguments too; it may be that the social benefits of intercourse among members of a troop offer a second natural function for human (and near-human) sexuality, one that is proper to reason from as well as reproduction is, and according to its own facts. Here, for example, one might say that homosexuality has an advantage in that it can't produce offspring, so that the social goods (whatever they are) can be had without running the risk of a child who wouldn't be supported. If that kind of argument were right, Alcibiades' offer might be reasoned to be superior to engaging in sex with someone where reproduction would be possible.  It's natural to beings of our sort in a way, apparently, and this form of it can attain that second end more efficiently and with fewer unwanted side effects. Thus, Alcibiades could argue that it was much better to pursue with him this second social good, instead of the first reproduction good; when the first good was wanted, well, that's when it would make more sense to prefer a female. Practical reason, right?

(The Athenian doesn't raise disease, as Catholics often used to do, as an additional natural argument against homosexuality. I don't know if they had the medical apparatus to appraise it; we are still close to Hippocrates, who was the first to suggest that disease occurred for natural causes rather than out of spiritual corruption, curses, etc.)

The Christians have an argument against that which Plato doesn't have, which comes out in Aquinas but is adapted from Augustine's thinking on the problem of evil. For Aquinas, there are not two but three natural goods to be had from sex. Yet to pursue only one or two of them, rather than all three together, is a privation of the fullness of good that God intended for the act. From Augustine, we learn that evil is in fact a privation of God's intended fullness of good; this explains why evil can exist in a world created by a perfectly good God. God gave you the tools to attain all the goods, but you chose to prefer only a subset, and thus we fell away from the perfection; and everything we call evil is an example of us attaining only some of the goods God enabled. 

Thus, Aquinas can argue (but Plato cannot) that the existence of a second good doesn't imply that you can elect to pursue only one or the other; and since the goods must be pursued together, they can only be pursued at all in a case in which all are possible, e.g., in a heterosexual marriage in which all the goods can be obtained. That happens to be exactly what Plato's Athenian wants as well, but I think he lacks the philosophical apparatus to get there. 

This approach ends up endangering the Symposium argument in another way: why should I pursue the spiritual and chaste soul-love of my beloved only, rather than pursuing that good and the erotic goods together? Aquinas can still point out that it is only in marriage that you and your beloved can do that without giving up the fullness of the goods on the table (to include the good of having a stable situation for any children produced, which is a very great good for them!). Yet it does seem as if the Symposium is suggesting a kind of privation by avoiding the erotic goods; maybe the answer lies in elevating the erotic to a level of equality, and always in the embrace of the love of the spiritual and virtuous good of your beloved as well. 

(A contemporary reader might ask: what about birth control? It does not come up for the obvious reasons, but if you are seeking your own moral guidance from these arguments today, you'll have to decide what you think about that. The Church obviously teaches that it is definitely a privation because it disables the reproductive function that is one of the goods -- indeed, Aquinas calls it the principle end.)

Friday Night Show: Corb Lund + Ian Tyson

An hour of good Alberta country songs and stories.

Plato's Laws VIII

We have moved on from education to practice, and specifically the practice of war. This is to be done through competitions held at regular festivals throughout the year. In fact, like the Church's practice of having every day a sacred day in one way or another, all 365 days shall be festivals sacred to one or another god or hero, who will be remembered by the appropriate officer; but twelve days (once a month) will be to the greater gods.

Warlike competitions are the most important aspect of all of this, because it is the way in which the people of the city will remain free from foreign domination and also because it develops excellence.

Ath. No man can be perfectly secure against wrong, unless he has become perfectly good; and cities are like individuals in this, for a city if good has a life of peace, but if evil, a life of war within and without. Wherefore the citizens ought to practise war-not in time of war, but rather while they are at peace.

There is a lot of talk about this practicing, which has many subdivisions and is especially focused on fighting in armor. There are horse competitions as well, but these are not as interesting to the Athenian ("horses aren't much use in a place like Crete," but he does favor competitions for armored javelin-throwing riders and such). These war games are to be as realistic and dangerous as possible, because they really are preparations for war -- a war that might even be avoided, if everyone else is impressed with the city's vigor at these games. 

Ath. [T]he legislator [will] ordain that soldiers shall perform lesser exercises without arms every day, making dancing and all gymnastic tend to this end; and also will he not require that they shall practise some gymnastic exercises, greater as well as lesser, as often as every month; and that they shall have contests one with another in every part of the country, seizing upon posts and lying in ambush, and imitating in every respect the reality of war; fighting with boxing-gloves and hurling javelins, and using weapons somewhat dangerous, and as nearly as possible like the true ones, in order that the sport may not be altogether without fear, but may have terrors and to a certain degree show the man who has and who has not courage; and that the honour and dishonour which are assigned to them respectively, may prepare the whole city for the true conflict of life? 

Plus, hardship builds virtue, which is important enough that the real risk of death should be courted:

Ath. If any one dies in these mimic contests, the homicide is involuntary, and we will make the slayer, when he has been purified according to law, to be pure of blood, considering that if a few men should die, others as good as they will be born; but that if fear is dead then the citizens will never find a test of superior and inferior natures, which is a far greater evil to the state than the loss of a few.

Given how much emphasis was placed in the prior book on the equality of women in military service, it may be surprising to discover that the Athenian does not think women should have to compete in these games unless they individually desire to do so. It is striking how unwilling the Athenian is to try to compel women to do much of anything at all. They are definitely to be afforded the opportunity to study all forms of warfare equally, but remember that girls could opt out of the lesson and instead learn to dance in armor; public messes, so important for building political friendship and social cohesion, should be made available to women but he expects to be ridiculed for even suggesting such a thing; and here, too, these perilous and virtue-building exercises are open to women, but only if they feel like it.

Along the way we learn that there are two evils that lead to all other evils, principally by preventing men from practicing for war as vigorously as they ought to do. The first one is love of money, and the comforts it can bring; the second is government. 

Ath. I say that governments are a cause-democracy, oligarchy, tyranny, concerning which I have often spoken in the previous discourse; or rather governments they are not, for none of them exercises a voluntary rule over voluntary subjects; but they may be truly called states of discord, in which while the government is voluntary, the subjects always obey against their will, and have to be coerced; and the ruler fears the subject, and will not, if he can help, allow him to become either noble, or rich, or strong, or valiant, or warlike at all. These two are the chief causes of almost all evils, and of the evils of which I have been speaking they are notably the causes. 

Strange indeed to find such a conviction -- with which I am inclined to agree -- in the middle of a large work on the subject of government, and a government that has been granted a massive capacity to compel. Poets cannot so much as recite a poem without getting the prior approval of a magistrate; twelve times a year you shall be compelled into the lists to live or die as best you can; you are to marry at this age and divorce if you don't produce children quickly and regularly, after a period of having to perform under the watchful eye of state officials assigned to make sure you're doing your husbandry correctly. You can't have silver or gold, unless you are going on a journey that requires it; after you return you must hand it back over to the state, plus any excessive profits. There is a 100% tax on wealth once you cross a threshold value. 

Yet the Athenian declares that this constitution avoids both those evils, and Cleinias mildly agrees with him. 

The Pseudo-Reichstag Fire

Google and Apple take Parler off their app stores. Amazon apparently breaks its own terms of service to take Parler offline ASAP.

Airbnb is cancelling reservations in the DC area during the week of the inauguration.

The language of 'coup' is all over the place in the MSM, it seems:

Abram Brown, senior editor at Forbes:

Since the conservative social media app Parler went down over the weekend, a widely shared Telegram group called Parler Lifeboat has emerged. It has 16,000 members and has established itself as a space to venerate President Trump and the Jan. 6 attempted coup, “an awesome event,” as one rhapsodic anonymous user described it on Monday night.

The "attempted coup" language has been adopted by writers at a number of other outlets.

Assault on democracy: Sen. Josh Hawley has blood on his hands in Capitol coup attempt

Trump Launched A Deadly Attempted Coup, Encouraging A Mob To Breach The US Capitol Building Because He Lost The Presidential Election

It’s Our First-Ever Coup Attempt—and There’s No Doubt Who’s Behind It

This Is a Coup

Yes, It Was a Coup Attempt. Here’s Why.

The Attempted Coup at the Capitol Proves This Is the United States of QAnon

Trump Supporters Attempt Coup at US Capitol After GOP Objects to Arizona’s Electoral Votes

And the inevitable:

How to talk to kids about the attempted coup at the US Capitol

I dunno. This didn't look much like a coup attempt to me. It was an expression of anger, a riot. But I am not an expert in these things, so what do I know?

However, all the language about coups and insurrection leads me to think this will be overplayed to crack down hard on dissenters and any other targets of opportunity on the wrong side of the political fence.

The big tech oligarchs shutting down communication by the sitting President seems a lot more dangerous to democracy to me. I bet they will defend their actions by claiming they feared a coup if Trump got his message out.

Anyway, this clearly isn't the Reichstag Fire, but maybe they can build it into one.

Next Day D'oh!: I can't believe I forgot the impeachment. That's great cover for anyone taking extraordinary measures against Trump supporters.

Nostalgia & Assumptions

A review of Anne Applebaum's new book.

The author of the review is largely unsympathetic to her, on the grounds that her center-right/centrist politics are too easily aligned with what he calls the "far right," by which he means governments like Poland's or Hungary's. He notes that she is still a friend to Christian Hoff Sommers, and so how can she critique her former friends if she can't see the problems with her current ones?

I'm poorly placed to enter the discussion, since I think Poland and Hungary and Sommers are all better characters than he believes them to be. Poland, I hear, is considering using its power to restrain social media giants like Facebook from censorship; that's hardly the side of oppression. Where I would look for dangerous authoritarianism is the People's Republic of China and those doing business with it or currying its favor. 

Still, both Applebaum and the author have some points that are worth considering in our fraught present moment. 

Competition Means Lower Revenue

If only there weren't so many women willing to sell nudes of themselves online, those who do could make more money. The NYT reports.

Apparently this is big business these days. Everybody's getting in on it -- well, the younger generation, anyway. 

“I’m a mom of three kids. I never thought anyone would pay to see me naked,” said Ms. Hall, 27. “It’s been a confidence boost.”

She has made about $700 so far — not enough to change her life, but enough to make the holidays special.

You could join the Navy at 27 and get more than that every month, but I suppose that's out of the question. Not that the Navy needs more single mothers; that basically is the Navy these days. 

It's a very bad world we've wandered into. I don't disdain these women, not at all; but I do wonder at the world that has made this choice seem reasonable and appropriate. So reasonable and so appropriate, in fact, that the market is saturated. 

Ska Jackson

 

Plato's Laws VII, 4

If you thought we were surely done with restatements of the importance of women sharing equally in military service, we're not: it comes up again towards the end of the book. I'm not going to quote the argument at length this time, but if you're interested in reading every version of this argument, it's there.

The ending section of Book VII contains an array of subjects: how to judge good poetry from bad, and therefore which to teach to students; dancing and wrestling; the correct playing and therefore teaching of a particular musical instrument; and how much a good person should sleep (not much). 

There is also a particularly important question raised by the Athenian: what exactly are we leaving these people to do, given that we will have provided for all their needs including cooking for them at a public mess? I'll get to the answer in a moment, but notice first that this approximately equal "second best" society contains a huge masked inequality: the citizens are being cared for by a large mass of servants, who are barely mentioned.

Ath. What manner of life would men live, supposing that they possessed a moderate supply of all the necessaries, and that they had entrusted all the crafts to other hands, and that their farms were hired out to slaves, and yielded them produce enough for their modest needs? Let us further suppose that they had public mess-rooms—separate rooms for men, and others close by for their households, including the girls and their mothers—and that each of these rooms was in charge of a master or mistress, to dismiss the company and to watch over their behavior daily; and, at the close of the meal, that the master and all the company poured a libation in honor of those gods to whom that night and day were dedicated, and so finally retired home. Supposing them to be thus organized, is there no necessary work, of a really appropriate kind, left for them, but must every one of them continue fattening himself like a beast?

So the citizens of this noble republic aren't working their equally-divided farms; they have slaves for that. (Hamilton translates this as 'viliens,' preserving the sense of a city dweller who is of both lower class and presumptively lower character than a noble.) They aren't cooking their own food, or cleaning up after the meals. (This alone is reason to doubt the Athenian's assertion that women would reject public messes; I do most of the cooking around here, and quite a bit of the cleaning up, and while I enjoy cooking I certainly don't mind to pass it off once in a while.) 

In fact, so much of the actual labor of life is being done by others that the Athenian wonders what they would pass their time doing. Well, it's not hard to guess the answer: the answer is to pursue virtue.

That, we assert, is neither right nor good; nor is it possible for one who lives thus to miss his due reward; and the due reward of an idle beast, fattened in sloth, is, as a rule, to fall a prey to another beast—one of those which are worn to skin and bone through toil hardily endured. Now it is probable that if we look to find this state of leisure fully realized exactly as described, we shall be disappointed, so long as women and children and houses remain private, and all these things are established as the private property of individuals; but if the second-best State, as now described,  could exist, we might be well content with it. And, we assert, there does remain for men living this life a task that is by no means small or trivial, but rather one that a just law imposes upon them as the weightiest task of all. For as compared with the life that aims at a Pythian or Olympian victory and is wholly lacking in leisure for other tasks, that life we speak of—which most truly deserves the name of “life”—is doubly (nay, far more than doubly) lacking in leisure, seeing that it is occupied with the care of bodily and spiritual excellence in general.

Note the slipping-back-in of the idea that giving up families in return for a full communal living is really best, and our unwillingness to do it is likely to lead to problems sooner or later. But this 'second best' society will nevertheless produce an opportunity for us to pursue excellence: we shall all be Olympic athletes and/or poets, prophets, and sages of one sort or another. 

This is an idea that our Marxists recovered in the 19th century, when they likewise imagined their ideal society -- one that somehow did away with the mass servant class, and attained luxurious communism.

And finally, the division of labour offers us the first example of how, as long as man remains in natural society, that is, as long as a cleavage exists between the particular and the common interest, as long, therefore, as activity is not voluntarily, but naturally, divided, man’s own deed becomes an alien power opposed to him, which enslaves him instead of being controlled by him. For as soon as the distribution of labour comes into being, each man has a particular, exclusive sphere of activity, which is forced upon him and from which he cannot escape. He is a hunter, a fisherman, a herdsman, or a critical critic, and must remain so if he does not want to lose his means of livelihood; while in communist society, where nobody has one exclusive sphere of activity but each can become accomplished in any branch he wishes, society regulates the general production and thus makes it possible for me to do one thing today and another tomorrow, to hunt in the morning, fish in the afternoon, rear cattle in the evening, criticise after dinner, just as I have a mind, without ever becoming hunter, fisherman, herdsman or critic.

Speaking of hunting and fishing, Book VII closes with a treatment of that, too. This book is focused on education, both physical and intellectual, and hunting is supposed (by Plato as the medievals) to be especially good for one's moral education. Plato's treatment of it is similar to medieval takes in that it privileges the chase, which he sees as especially worthy of noble men. In general hunting is praiseworthy or blameworthy depending on how hard it is to accomplish (e.g., fishing with stupefying chemicals is to be forbidden; fishing with net traps is merely discouraged).

If you are curious about the answer to the question of how to best judge poetry, by the way, it is that you should study philosophy. The Athenian asserts that this whole discussion has a kind of poetry to it, and those who learn it best will be the best judges. So congratulations; you're on your way to being a prime literary critic.