Author: Ariel

Review of "Autobiography of a Yogi"

One of my supplemental readings for my F.I.C.A.M. courses was Paramahansa Yogananda’s Autobiography of a Yogi, which from a quick Goggle search I learned that the book is listed as one of the top 100 most important books in religious literature and was re-read annually by Steve Jobs. Of all the lives that one could read about, be it famous artists with rich and illustrious personal lives, great leaders who play decisive roles in world-historical affairs, etc. the one of a guru is perhaps not the most immediately interesting due to the strict personal discipline required of such a life. Rather than a boring tale, however, Yogananda writes compellingly on his spiritual journey and the wealth of insight and beauty that lay underneath the surface of his life. These words are as deep as those found in the Upanishads, and due to the story which frames it helps show how these ancient Vedic insights are still pertinent to living a fulfilling life today.

Overall I was impressed with the book for the insight that it provides into religious attitudes in India and ashram life, the latter of which I have experienced only as an outsider in India for a short time, but it is clear that the reason for the books popularity is it’s constant engagement with Vedantic thought. As befitting someone that has devoted their life’s work to the propagation of such knowledge, the book is littered with aphorisms and reflections that would cause a good reader to question the assumptions upon which they live and to at least get a glimpse of the profound peace that is possible by becoming master of oneself. Because of this it is impossible to separate these two aspects, something that monists like Yogananda would deny is impossible anyway, though I think it is fitting to say that taken solely as a narrative it is uninteresting though as an expository work of yogic thought it is brilliant. Almost every page is adorned with golden phrases giving insight into the human condition and though at times Yogananda seems overly pre-occupied with justifying his thought by quoting or alluding to other thinkers it is never so much that it becomes overwhelming. His meetings with various spiritual thinkers known (Gandhi, Tagore) and unknown (Yukteswar, Lahiri) allow him to put wise and concise descriptions of the Vedic viewpoint in their mouths that, framed as it is as steps in his spiritual development, don’t come off as didactic.

All of these compliments aside, one of the issues with I have with Hinduism in general and this book in particular is the preservation of beliefs and traditions which have been discredited as lacking in any material basis. This criticism applies to most if not all religious dogmas, and in the context of the book it is prominent in several sections where other yogis are described. In a several of the meetings with the “divine personages” Yogananda describes them as having siddhis, or “special powers”. While there are several siddhis that I would categorize within the realm of scientific possibility, there are also those that defy possibility and which for me ends up detracting from the narrative. For instance in Yogananda’s travels in India he claims to meet people that, haven’t eaten food in years, have been able to turn a wild lion into a vegetarian pet, and are able to transport their image over hundreds of miles to relay messages to someone else. Then there is Babaji, not a person but an immortal incarnation of the divine that works in humble obscurity in order to keep the knowledge of yoga alive. I recognize that to focus on this and neglect the other, positive and powerful aspects of the book I described above is to do it a disservice, however an objection to these kinds of miracles must be raised most specifically as their supposed “powers” take away from the significance of the core tenants they are voicing.

A brief on the political aesthetics of "Step Up: Revolution"

The newest film in the Step Up franchise, Step Up: Revolution piqued my interest as one of the writing projects I’m currently working on concerns the depiction of political radicals in American cinema during this, the post-Soviet epoch. The first two films in the series addressed issues of class in a facile way but generally progressive way: mutual love of dance and sexual attraction are able to unite people with vast differences in social standing to winning a contest. This installment keeps the poor boy meets and falls in love with a rich girl narrative framework, here the stakes towards which they unite are much higher. In this film the class element in the Step Up series refers not just to the notion of “stepping up” to win a place in a dance company or a street contest but also refers to issues of social mobility. The final goal which unites the two lovers, Ryan and Emily, is to keep capitalist gentrifiers from taking over a working class neighborhood in Miami and the means by which they attempt to do this is organized, direct action.

To say that the dancers in the film are socialists would be an overstatement. The initial organizing impetus for the dance troupe and production team known as “The Mob” is to win a YouTube contest rewarding money to whichever group can get 10 million views on their channel. While this is incentive, we learn from the group’s co-founder Sean that they are more interested in having “a voice” and we see through their action a socialist mode of political subjectivity that becomes framed in such a way that they become populist heroes fighting against capitalism.

One of the most visible ways we see the groups anti-capitalistic core is where the group practices. Taking no heed to property laws that make trespassing illegal even in areas not used by their owners, The Mob practices in one of Miami’s many unoccupied or partially constructed buildings. Additionally the similarity between the name “The Mob” and “The Masses,” the early 20th century American socialist politics monthly, is noteworthy. While it’s unlikely that the authors planned this, it is yet another of many qualitative overlaps with socialist organizations. Furthermore the idea of a dance troupe being a revolutionary avant-garde is evocative of more early 20th century radical history, this time in the form of anarchist Emma Goldman’s famous quote: “If I can’t dance, I don’t want to be part of your revolution.”

As Sean introduces Emily to members of “The Mob” we see that the group is an approximation of a good model for an international socialist organization. For one, thanks to the ethnic population of South Florida, the membership is truly international in origin. Secondarily, we see a skilled division of labor amongst the group to maximize the efficiency of their production. Additionally we see that the dancers, like good socialists, are not prone to the vices of excessive drinking or smoking as it keeps them from being able to perform their labor of love. Whether or not they have to abide by a “Points of Discipline for Party Members” would be purely conjectural, but it is worth noting the difference between this group and that found in The Anarchist Cookbook. While the message the group puts out may be ambiguous, at least as Sean’s voiceover narrates, “When the Mob speaks, everyone listens.” Though not at first explicitly political, as the group develops they receive positive, populist expressions of sympathy and solidarity as a result of their actions, which would presumably lead to greater community involvement. Finally, we see that The Mob’s joy is dangerous. In the opening dance scene they stop traffic outside of Ocean Drive, Miami’s upscale shopping area, and the one following they invade SoHo Studios, one of the more famous Wynwood art galleries. In the first case normal business activity is interrupted by spectacle while in the other the hallowed halls of culture are briefly occupied, alluding to practice outlined by anti-capitalist, Situationist theorist Guy Debord.

After Emily has been told by her perspective Wynwood dance company leader that she needs to be more unique, seeing this dance performance, and reading the note that “Sometimes you need to break the rules” given to her by Sean that she decides to try to join The Mob. Emily is immediately given the role of lead dancer.

Following the revelation that a developer, who happens to be Emily’s father, wants to buy up local businesses and homes from renters the group diverges from it’s initial plans for “be heard” and becomes something of a proper socialist undertaking that instead wants “to be listened to”. While previously The Mob’s events were for the purpose of self-aggrandizement, they decide they want to try to protect their neighborhood from capitalist investment.

While terse and lacking theoretical depth, the dialogue following this revelation could be taken from socialist debates on the nature of art. While I doubt that Duane Adler and Amanda Brody, the authors of the script, bothered to research this it doesn’t take away from the substance. After Sean and Emily learn of her father plans to purchase and redevelop the working-class waterfront area she proceeds to exercise directive control of the group their her revolutionary exhortations:

“You’ve got four million viewers but you’re not saying anything that actually matters. It’s not ok to make art for fun anymore.”
“What are you proposing?”
“Enough with performance art, it’s time for protest art.”

Following this decision the group decides to “mob” the planning meeting that decides the fate of the projected gentrification area. After stopping the meeting by pulling a fire alarm, the group dances in hats and business attire. Reading direct messages into their dance is the beyond the realm of my interpretive powers, however it is worth noting that one of the sampled songs in the quasi dub-step song the DJ stitches together is by the notoriously anti-corporate musical group Radiohead. The grand finale of this particular Mob dance production? A giant metal sculpture of an executive holding a briefcase that opens and has spray-painted on the inside: “We are not for sale.”

While Trip, developer Bill Anderson’s protege, is undaunted by this performance the Mob is awash with pride as now they have achieved the national recognition they so badly wanted as the YouTube video of the performance is viewed by millions. The wave of euphoria is short-lived. Eddie discovers Emily’s real identity and decides to have an “mob” performance without Ryan’s authorization. This performance, at a private banquet, results in arrests and the group’s expulsion from the contest. Emily upbraids them both for the stunt that outed her as an anti-capitalist sympathizer and activist to her Dad. However she soon realizes the Ryan had nothing to do with it and her just formed sentiments against the group are reversed, leading her to greater resolve to halt the gentrification process.

The Mob unites despite the attempted (Stalinst?) grab at leadership, and the film closes with the capitalist developer Bill Anderson taking a paternalist role to enhance and develop the community that already exists rather than kicking them out for a richer group of tenants. The new goal of the group accomplished, the leads kiss.

While it would be acceptable for the film to end here, it’s not. The Mob faces one last test of their “socialist” identity and fails. Given the opportunity to work as part of a promotion team for Nike, The Mob immediately assents to the offer and thus becomes commodified. This isn’t surprising as the dance team was never truly socialist in orientation, but that a group that had just fought so hard for the working class would so quickly and happily join forces with an trans-national corporation widely known for it’s child labor and incredibly pay is telling – not of the group itself but the relations which produced it.

Review of "Explosion in a Cathedral"

Alejo Carpentier’s book Explosion in a Cathedral has the distinction of being amongst Lolita and several of Henry Miller’s novels as books which have required me to reference the dictionary in search of rarely used words. It is in these terms for shipping that the layman doesn’t know and in architecture and science terms of the time as well as the gothic descriptions of surroundings that causes this book to be seen as one of the ur-text’s of Latin American magical realism. Set in the island of Guadeloupe during the time of the French Revolution, the novel’s main characters are three wealthy orphans, the siblings Sofia and Carlo and their sickly cousin Esteban, and the adult Victor Hugues. While the youths are fictional, Victor was in fact a historical personage who was the French Revolutionary government’s military leader of the assault to retake the island of Guadeloupe from the British and later Governor of various French holdings in the Carribean.

The novel begins “I saw them erect the guillotine again to-night” and then follows by telling of the death of the family patriarch. The children isolate themselves from the local community and begin purchasing through catalogs the newest literature, scientific instruments and fine arts that they can fit into their house. They amuse themselves with games of the imagination and experiments with the scientific equipment until Victor comes knocking at the door, bringing with him all of the conflict present in this age of Atlantic revolutions. We quickly learn that though a businessman, Victor idealizes the classical Republican conception of virtue. This aspect of Victor’s can be seen in his quotations of Roman orators while playing pretend with the children as well as his stated manner of identifying his motivations as stemming not from private interests that causes him to profit off of others, but from a notion of universal brotherhood. Such a set of beliefs at such a time sets him in league with a number of interesting characters who make brief appearances amidst the turmoil which soon commences. Voodoo doctors with Masonic ties, and a corrupt Catholic executor of the dead father’s estate are just two examples of the island population. In his characterization and description, Carpentier is deft in showing that each of these characters are not simply representatives of fundamental energies of the age but are also individuals. Through this stylization, he is able to illustrate the social complexities of the global system in a very personal manner.

The play that characterizes Victor’s first appearance in the orphans house soon vanishes as rumors strike upon their idyllic shore that those involved in the Masonic lodges may soon be expelled from the French dominions. Forced to choose between abandoning their new friend and going with him and his black, voodoo practicing associate Oge, they leave and begin an adventure that will cause them to be separated for years and mature in ways that they never thought possible. The characters rich internal life that is shown to be constantly at odds with the situations in which they find themselves. For instance Esteban finds himself trying to navigate the dangerous position of being a Guadeloupean working for the French on the border of Spain with Revolutionary sympathies for the party that has just been ousted in the Thermidorean reaction. Though he has been nothing but felicitous to their cause, as he sees the heads start to roll from Paris outward and surveys the task he’s been assigned as impossible, his beliefs are sorely questioned. Sofia, though loyal to the rhetoric that Victor embodies, abhors the violence that comes with it’s ascent and is empathetic with the Africans who now no longer slaves are forced into capitalist market relations with a mother country that has brought them naught but suffering and compulsive labor.

Timothy Brennan suggests in his introduction to the novel that the book was a prescient defense of the Cuban revolution’s values, an interpretation that I agree with. Unlike, the novels by Rizal that I reviewed earlier, as the above should suggest the novel succeeds not only as a thinly veiled defense of Cuba’s new political powers but as an aesthetic work itself. As a defense of the revolution, it constructs the framework of the conflict impelling the youths out of the comforts of their home as originating amongst foreign powers vying for control of islands viewed as little more that rebellious forced labour populations. Lacking the industrial goods and capacity, the population, history of armed self-defense on the scale with which foreign powers could bring to bear upon them – the island of Guadeloupe and the others around it are de facto tributary vassal states. Such a terrain of complex relationships is not something that is not merely described but narrated, to use a distinction made by Georg Lukacs, in such as way that shows the deep historical research that Carpentier put into the book. One of the issues that I have with Brennan’s interpretation in the introduction is his conception of Sofia as the “only positive character” by citing an interview where Carpentier says that she represents praxis. Praxis understood via Marxist categories is something that is broad and applies to all individual and groups actions that are based upon their beliefs and material situatedness. As such she is not the only positive character. Victor is as well, though in his role of cleansing the inherited oppressions and inhumanity by using those same tools he is deeply alienated. Sofia, from the Greek word signifying wisdom, however sees this as both necessary AND horrible and thus represents the second stage of the transition to a new society.

Also worth mentioning is that in addition to the historically veiled defense of the revolution, the book is also a call to the intellectuals of the period to remove themselves from the confines of their houses and studies, which the children were once in, in order to take an active role in the management and direction of the newly created polity, as Esteban and Sofia do. Victor, a charismatic leader, is the point of convergence for Esteban and Sofia’s respective sentiments of admiration and romance and alludes to the many historical circumstances where intellectuals have rallied around an energetic leader that seeks to level the inherited norms to make way for greater material progress.

One of the methods that I have for a novelists in determining how good a book is if after reading it it makes me want to read their other works, in this case it’s a resounding yes and as soon as I make my way through the other books I have on my list I’ll definitely make an effort to pick up Carpentier’s other renowned novel
The Kingdom of This World.

Book published!

I’m a little behind in getting notice of it, but the book Attention Dynamics Program that I co-authored with my father Dr. Brian Sheen is now available for purchase.

This is a great book for guiding adults, children and their immediate social network to realizing their full potential for happiness, well being, health and peace by utilizing the most effective, evidence-based therapeutic techniques currently available in scientific research today. These include a wide variety of cognitive-based and behavioral oriented techniques.

Readers and participants will learn how to enhance their retention and self-management skills to be able to make better connecting choices at home, work and/or at school. Children will increase their level of self-motivatation, become more organized as well as increasing their effective communication skills by learning and applying the tools they learn.

Review of "Why We Love Sociopaths: A Guide To Late Capitalist Television"

Why We Love Sociopaths: A Guide To Late Capitalist Television is the most pleasurable works of contemporary cultural criticism that I’ve read in long time. Some of this pleasure is in knowing most of the television references that Kotsko uses, such as The Wire, Dexter, Mad Men, Breaking Bad and House, while the other is the fact that he foregoes the baroque terminology and labyrinthian logic found in other words of this type I’ve read. Rather than excessively quoting or citing seminal thinkers for justification of his thesis, he relies upon the strength of his argument alone. If this seems unusual to add in a book review, I’ll explain at the end.

Kotsko opens by defining and illustrating a particular character type found within group and social relations: sociopaths. He describes them as amoral, adept manipulators of social conventions that don’t, at least on the surface, fully identify with the social structure of which they are presumed to be a part. Whether or not we are to love, loathe or be ambivalent about sociopaths thus hinges on our understanding of society. Kostko states that a vast majority of humans interactions are scripted in the sense that that they are designed to smooth, ease or otherwise engender a sense of comfort and predictability to our daily patterns of living. Such unwritten rules of behavior structure of our social sphere and can be as simple as not cutting in line, asking a persons level of income and avoiding confrontation. The problem with these rules, however, is two fold. One, there is not unusually a prescribed means for correcting anti-normative social behavior and the social order doesn’t always fulfill the purported function of allaying anxiety and can instead act in a personally, socially and professionally repressive manner. By pointing out the failings of the overvalued social order, Kostko thus provides space for sociopaths to receive a more positive valuation. He then proposes, I believe rightly, that this is part of their appeal to television viewing audiences. Sociopaths may be classified as morally ambiguous or inferior due to their willingness to break conventions, but they are also attractive in their ability to effectively instrumentalize themselves to obtain their desires. It is sociopaths recognition that mores simply perpetuate a specific social order rather than productively provide shared goals and their ability to achieve their goals that makes them attractive to audiences, even if their desires are dubious or in the end don’t give them the satisfaction that they expected.

The flip side of this is ability to mobilize or discard at will social conventions for one’s purpose is found in the category of awkwardness. This has been further described in Kotsko’s book Awkwardness, which I have not read but plan on now that I’ve read this work. In the shorthand explanation Kotsko provides here, Awkwardness occurs in situations where the cultural norms of interactions are unclear, have broken down or don’t exist. Lacking “scripted” socials strategies to follow people feel anxious at the fact that they must exist even only for a few short moments according to their own rules.

Kostko then categorizes different examples of them into three classifications: Schemers, Climber and Enforcers. This tripartition functions more as a continuum from lower (schemer) to highest (enforcer), to allow for some of the sociopathic characters he categorizes as occasionally displaying the traits of others. For instance Gregory House is classified as an Enforcer in the text, however in the show he also is depicted as constantly playing pranks on his colleagues. The classifications themselves relate primarily to characters desires and their perception of barriers to them. Schemers are trying to obtain something they don’t have, climbers are trying to get more of something that they already have, while Enforcers have something and they are trying to keep it.

If this sounds overly simplistic and lacking depth, that’s because it is purposely so as it would defeat the purpose of this review to go into any kind of sustained restatement of Kostko’s analysis of the classifications of sociopathic series protagonists both as I am in accord with them and because of the books relatively short length to do so would give away too much and discourage you from reading something insightful and enjoyable yourself. Instead, I’ll note that the interspersed throughout andante especially towards the end are some devastatingly insightful criticisms, such as how: “our culture-wide fascination with these sociopaths is not sophisticated or rebellious or counter-cultural – rather it serves only to reinforce our collective Stockholm Syndrome” (77).

The conclusion of the text points to the profound social dissatisfaction felt in “late capitalist” society and then illustrates how the listed sociopaths manipulation of the system is insufficient for their goals. Violations of social law are often for the very sake of that law that was broken.For instance Dexter from Dexter, McNulty from The Wire and Jack from 24 all break the law for the sake of the law that is, according to it’s current incarnation, unable to fulfill the promises that it was formed to realize. Kostko’s call for an ever more radical sociopath that “combines the joy of the schemer and the single-mindedness of the enforcer with the creativity, persuasiveness and unsentimental outlook of the climber” is provocative but not simply for the point of being shocking (99). He points, I think correctly, to the manner in which familial and culturally instilled timidity allows for the continuation of a fundamentally anti-social order and the need for people to do more than further it for their own cynical betterment but change it at the root.

Review of "Freud, Adler, and Jung: Discovering the Mind Volume 3"

As Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit was the summation of all philosophy up until that time, and in many ways held criticism against those that made the similar intellectual errors mistakes that he himself or others made, Walter Kauffman’s “Discovering the Mind” trilogy has the same function. The last part of the series, Freud, Adler, and Jung: Discovering the Mind Volume 3 focuses strictly on Freud’s development of psychoanalysis and the developments that followed from his disciples.

For Kauffman Freud is like Abraham. Rather than leading people into the promised land, however, he brings them to an understanding of themselves that can lead to increased self-knowledge and self-actualization should they work towards foregoing self-deception. In the reconstruction of the Freud’s development
of a poetic science that could benefit humankind’s aspirations for greater autonomy, Kauffman shows how it is Goethe’s conception of science that Freud replicated in psychoanalysis and how this means that he is a major contributor to the discovery of the mind.

Freud’s discovery of the importance of sex, his discovery of the importance of childhood experiences for character development, his new therapy, his interpretation of dreams, his psychopathology of everyday life, his interpretation of mental illness, his interpretation of jokes, his analysis of literature, art and religion and even his personality are cited by Kauffman as his key achievements in the discovery of the mind. In each of these sections he clarifies terms of Freud’s that have entered into the everyday vocabulary in order to bring attention to the originators understanding of them rather than watered down popular misunderstandings of them. He does this on the larger conceptual level too, for instance pointing out that Freud never endorsed his patients to decline responsibility for themselves in order to blame their parents, society or religious upbringing. While Freud would say that these factors helped bring about a certain neurosis, this sort of self-victimization was anathema to him. Kauffman also highlights examples of lesser known terms, such as “mischievement”, that ought to enter into our vocabulary and thus help us analyze our life and lead to insights that thus applied could batter our self. Kauffman also points out how it is that certain terms of latter commentators or practitioners of psychoanalysis, such as Thanatos, did not originate from Freud and how he thought that these words obfuscated the object of their description.

Besides the recreation of Freud’s intellectual development and exegesis of some of it’s major components, he is defended by Kauffman from other informed commentators such as Sartre and Popper as well as popular misprisions of his ideas. In brief Poppers criticisms are shown to be coming from the school of science that values only quantitative methods, a methodology that disavows the qualitative development of those under analysis while Sartre’s desire to form an existentialist psychoanalysis based upon the total translucency of consciousness is shown to be out and out baseless when presented with case studies. Rather than using unadulterated rationalism and defending himself dogmatically, we see that Freud consistently based his theories on the empirical situation and revised them when necessary. One of the prime examples is in relation to expanding the source of much human motivation from just the libido to include the aggressive drive.
For doing this and in many other ways he is repeatedly praised as one of if not the most honest man that has lived. Kauffman relates these contribution in a biographical fashion in much the same way that Freud understood himself – it was his outsider status as a Jew in Vienna and his incredible love of literature that helped him to discover a talking cure for people’s neuroses.

In this series thus far, this book is the longest and also the most tedious however this is because a majority of the subsequent analysis devoted to Adler and Jung are concerned with correcting the well-documented but oft-misunderstood breaks between these two with Freud. As Kauffman amply documents, the decision and strategy pursued to achieved personal and professional separation from Freud by these two is intimately connected to the form their intellectual work took. In short Adler and Jung are disparaged for providing no redeemable insights into the human psyche or society and their behavior is shown to be equally opportunistic, uninformed, ignorant, or out and out disturbing.

Adler is shown to be a poor writer that is overly-concerned with escaping the shadow of Freud and establishing himself as a professional by heaping personal insults on him instead of producing work which shows failings, a poor thinker that makes no great effort to understand Nietzsche yet uses a poor approximation of his though in his own work, a man unwilling to revise his theories in the face of new evidence, a man afraid of “idea theft” rather than research and someone that wants at all costs to stay within the bounds of then-current social conventions rather than work towards developing a science that leads to greater knowledge. After the devastating account of Adler, one would assume that Jung could not possibly come off worse, however we see that this is not true.

Jung repeats several of Adler’s qualities such as poor writing skills and the inability to think with a scientific rigor, and adds to it a strange penchant for taking upon the role of guru. Besides deracinating the notion of extroverts and introverts, something that is clearly absent in Freud and is suitable only for positivistic physical sciences and not that of the mind, he examines Jung’s notion of archetypes – probably due to the then ascending influence of Joseph Campbell, parapsychology and occultism. The reasons why this is specious, both on the historical and personal level, are readily apparent and yet still have credibility for a reason that Kauffman is wise to point out – it allows for patients to skip deep personal analysis and instead play with symbols that are magically inherent in the consciousness as a means for self-growth. Here, Kauffman’s differentiation between scholarship and erudition is important to recall – the former being intellectual self-discipline that involves the scrupulous consideration of objections and alternatives while the later is mere book knowledge.

If I give Adler and Jung only a little attention and don’t bother to go into all of Kauffman’s criticisms of them and their work, it is because they serve Kauffman only as negative counter-examples of what self-knowledge looks like. These were men deceiving themselves and others and produced works we, after having placed them in a wider intellectual web, can now leave them behind much in the same way that Kant and Heidegger were in the previous two books.

The closing chapter of the book, titled Mind and Mask, gives a moving summation of what was to be Walter Kauffman’s last project before his unexpected death. Throughout his life Kauffman sought to bring attention to the creative and scientific works that could ennoble a caring reader. This section does not give a distilled, singular method for achieving this, a task that would have been anathema to Kauffman’s method of thinking, but instead presents a series of philosophical precepts, considerations and attitudes that lead to a honest, productive life. Indeed, I dare say, a good life. In this manner Kauffman is reminiscent of Epictetus, who sees the study of philosophy as the means which one orients oneself to a flourishing life. We can say than that intellectual exertion is not enough, but action and embodiment of these qualities are required if we are to life the best possible life of the mind.

Review of "Nietzsche, Heidegger and Buber: Discovering the Mind Volume 2"

Continuing my research into secondary literature to assist forming a course on German philosophy with specific emphasis on psychological tenors I read the second of Walter Kauffman’s trilogy on the discovery of the human mind Nietzsche, Heidegger, and Buber. Given Kaufmann’s widely recognized credentials as a superb teacher and the writer, I was again rewarded with insight in how to make choices for texts to require and those to ignore especially so in this case as Kauffman personally knew Heidegger and Buber, has been widely acclaimed for his translations of Nietzsche and Buber, and is thus in a unique position to weigh the contributions of these three thinkers.

Kauffman, unsurprisingly given his previous writings on Nietzsche in, Nietzsche: Philosopher, Psychologist, Antichrist, devotes most of the book to laying out the case for Nietzsche’s contributions to, if not founding of, depth psychology. He relies not only on quotes from people such as Freud to demonstrate that he was one of the most self-aware people of his time, but also shows this via his identification as a psychologist (which is not necessarily an indicator of self-knowledge, though in his case it is) that he was concerned with wrestling with the dominant, moralistic and hedonistic assumptions of his age.

Kauffman does to great ends to disabuse many of the misinterpretations of Nietzsche, which abounds due to the style in which he wrote by doing what his detractors have not done – specifically giving contextualized, extensive quotation. Kauffman highlights the psychologically emancipatory aspects of Nietzsche, such as his encouragement of reflective writing practices, his hypothesis on the will to power, his theory of masks, his recognition that not only “philosophy” enriches the study of the human mind but art, literature and religion as well and does so while also noting the problematic aspects of his body of work. While many of Nietzsche’s claims at the time of their publication were considered revolutionary, many of them now seem almost commonplace. Stating that consciousness is a surface that sometimes resists the truth, experiences aren’t absolute but determined by frames and moods, body and spirit are not divided, it is important to to identify one’s heroes and villains to better define oneself now seem platitudinous. However as the first psychologist, and indeed the first psychohistorian, Nietzsche’s contributions to the study of the mind are legion. Just as important as demonstrating Nietzsche’s positions, Kaufmann complicates them and other’s criticisms against them – a practice that he inherited from Nietzsche.

One of the more rewarding sections for me was this second section on Martin Heidegger. During my time as an undergraduate and graduate student, I’d formed a dismal view of Heidegger due to his enthusiasts and the reasons why this was so is explained in Kauffman’s criticism of him. In a few short words Heidegger is shown to be a theologian, a categorization that Heidegger himself claimed and it’s shown that his approach to texts is not so much a matter of interpretation as that of placing his ideas, largely taken from others, onto the text. Kaufmann focuses his reading on Being and Time as this is widely regarded by man, including the author, to be his masterpiece. In the analysis which follows we see that Heidegger’s (1) “existential ontology” is dubious anthropology, (2) his thinking is deeply authoritarian, (3) Heidegger’s analysis of authenticity and inauthenticity is shallow and Manichaean, (4) Heidegger neither solved important problems nor opened them up for fruitful discussion but covered them up, (5) Being and Time belongs to the romantic revival in Germany, (6) Heidegger secularized Christian preaching about guilt, dread, and death but claimed to break with two-thousand years of Western thought, and (7) he blamed his own shortcomings on our “paltry time” rather than take responsibility for himself.

Kaufmann, not one for the same type of inflammatory invective used by Nietzsche, closes his analysis of Heidegger by stating not only that those who look to him to answer important questions due so out of a religious need but also that “he is a false prophet” (238). If this seems out of place for an academic text, one need only look to the above criticisms to see why this is so – or look at the picture included in the text where Heidegger wears the Nazi Party symbol and has the same mustache as Hitler.

Martin Buber is given a very short treatment in the book, a mere 37 pages, for reasons which Kaufmann makes clear as soon as he is introduced. Specifically that even though his major work I and Thou is widely regarded as his “classic work”, it is quickly dismissed as untenably dualistic. While Kauffman admits that it hints at profundity in it’s recognition theory, it is only speciously so and this is why Buber never finished the other books that he planned would build off of this framework. Classifying Buber’s philosophical writing as a conscious variation of Hegel’s early desire to create a rational folk-religion< Kauffman finds Buber's redeeming qualities in his theories of interpretation and re-writings on the Tales of the Hasidim - which he acknowledges as a classic of modern religious writing and wisdom literature. In these latter writings he rejects the theological notion of God which typify exegetical thinking and instead places it within the context of living communities. In Buber's theories of translation, Kauffman points to his recognition that to translate one had to make great efforts to know the author, and that this growing knowledge about someone else enhanced the knowledge of the self. This respect for the other which is also the self is a prominent value and gives insight into how we are to best approach others, as well as ourselves, should we wish to gain deep knowledge.

Review of "Art of Living"

The Art of Living: The Classical Manual on Virtue, Happiness, and Effectiveness is practical codes for living a good life according to the ancient Greek stoic and sophist Epictetus. While the translation by Sharon Lebell is quite free in its adherence to the original text, hence her deeming it a “new interpretation”, this is not a weakness as the book contains a good amount of pithy insight that can be used as a guide for positive living.

Advice such as “Avoid making idle promises whenever possible, ” “New experiences are meant to deepen out lives and advance us to new levels of competence” and “Most of what passes for legitimate entertainment is inferior or foolish and only caters to or exploits people’s weaknesses” are somewhat platitudinous, but they are nonetheless important reminders as to how one can live a life of character and integrity while adhering to one’s specific life goals. I read this particular translation for the first time as part of research for a course on classical Greek philosophy and drama that I would teach as a F.I.C.A.M. elective. I will be pairing this with selected works of Plato, Aristotle’s The Nicomachean Ethics and some plays by Euripides and Sophocles. What is perhaps most interesting about the book is that much of the self-help literature of today is so similar to its message with the exception that the style of the writing, eighty or so short messages, that it evades the need to present an overarching, developmental thrust.

In this regard I find it difficult to delve into too much analytical depth as to do so would be to engage each brief message directly. What I can say as that even though there is much good here, there is also an element of political quietism to it that those in the modern context and not in the “elite” a fact already recognized by Hegel in his Phenomenology of Spirit. Despite this, however, it is an important read and so short that it begs to be repeatedly read or referenced at random by seekers of inner peace.

Review of "Goddess of the Market: Ayn Rand and the American Right"

My sense of irony compelled me to read Goddess of the Market: Ayn Rand and the American Right by Anne C. Heller after having just finished Marx’s biography. Especially considering that both of these thinkers have an upsurge in their popular reference in discussions on the current state of the economy, I think it’s not just amusing but fitting. I’d read Atlas Shrugged and The Fountainhead a few years ago and found myself impressed and underwhelmed. Impressed at the creation of true heroes without some sort of existential angst, the self-help aspects inserted amongst Rand’s prose and defining her characters as well as her ability to tightly plot a novel of ideas such that it wasn’t completely boring, but also critical due to it’s highfalutin style, one dimensional characters, and the dangerous potential for readers to deploy a mimetic adoption of a character’s qualities via worship of them without incorporating a properly developed critical, historical consciousness. Thus while I am empathetic to Whitaker Chamber’s review of Rand, I also see several positive aspects worthy of recuperation.

Heller’s biography of Rand starts by immediately peeling back the aura of mysticism around her philosophy. Attending to her early childhood, we learn Rand experienced similar dynamics as other Russian exiles, such as Vladimir Nabokov, that led them to rail against the system of social relations in Russia following the end of the civil war once they’d moved to America. The privations created by civil war and the repressive political environment it created, crop failure, brain drain, trade embargoes and experimentations in production processes led those who fled to holistically decry the new Soviet state. This position is completely understandable: When market forces aren’t abstracted into an invisible force and cited as the justification for the behavior of police agents upholding “property laws” but are instead decided by a centralized planning authority and it’s agents one comes to resent the government for causing shifts in relations that lowers one’s status. This aspect of Rand’s history in Russia is then expanded by examining her first forays into philosophy. By quoting her notebooks, we see an early Rand who was wrestling with Nietzsche’s celebration of the aristocratic – something that a highly cultured, intelligent, secular Jewess with upper class upbringing would have easily identified with. It’s also worth noting that during her time enrolled in university in Russia she was given an elementary education in Marxism, reading such works as The ABC of Communism and found the logic of Aristotle to be particularly attractive (in fact “A is A”, a logical presupposition popularized by Aristotle, would later be the name of a directory for Objectivist oriented projects). Also in Russia we see Rand, like so many other people across the globe following the second world war, absolutely enthralled by Hollywood cinema. She watches them and loving them so much considers going to Film School, but knowing that this would mean she would create Soviet propaganda, decides to escape to the USA via an educational visa and then breaks ties with her family.

Once Rand makes her way to L.A. after a brief stay with distant family relatives, she reads Nietzsche more and begins writing using many of the the themes founds in his writings, even attempting to adopt his aphoristic style. She gets film work by being in the right place at the write time and soon starts to see “pinks” and “reds” everywhere and decides that it is of the utmost importance that the United States doesn’t go down the collectivist path of Russia and so writes and donates her time to fight this. It is this activism that starts to expand her view, albeit slightly, in the realm of political economy and more so in the way of America in general. Rand, in contact with several prominent intellectuals, is shown to repeating a similar process throughout her professional life. At first a connection is made between points upon which Rand and this other person agrees, Rand then goes through an almost Socratic like process of finding out their “premises” and then berating the other person each time theirs differs from hers, even if in the end they are at a similar position, and then tries to show them how they should adopt her position wholesale. This is the case both with her friends, such as Isabel Paterson, her “false friends” (conservatives that used the rhetoric of altruism or pragmatism to justify their positions) such as F. A. Hayek, and the people whom she wanted intellectual recognition from such as Sidney Hook. Indeed to a large part the biography is a retelling of two major themes: how she personally kept pushing people away from here that were able to intellectually match her and keeping around orbit younger people that were more open to her influence and how she would get involved in an organization and due to one issue or another denounce it as insufficiently “reactionary”, a term she used with positive valuation as she saw those that would restrain capitalism, the ideal economic system, as evil people.

One of the biography’s more interesting revelations to me, which speaks to this very process of alienation, was the fact that Ayn Rand was addicted to benzedrine. While the amphetamine was prescribed to her, Heller shows how it was this drug that fueled her late night discussion sessions, gave her the energy to write sometimes for over 12 hours at a time, kept her thin, and assisted in her habituation to a two pack of cigarettes a day habit (which according to Rand wasn’t unhealthy as the doctors weren’t trustworthy as they used statistics to provide their evidence, a fact that Rand’s lungs must not have been aware of as she died of cancer). I find this especially interesting given this similarity between her and Sartre, who she despised and who also ruined his health with uppers while writing Critique of Dialectical Reason at the time as Rand was ruining hers writing Atlas Shrugged. This clearly had a role in intensifying Rand’s negative personal characteristics, but also assisted her when she held court amongst her disciples once she decided to turn her own though into a school as the universities weren’t giving it sufficient attention.

Once Rand has finished her fiction and she devotes her time solely to essays, she also focuses solely on maintaining the apparatuses that she helped build with Nathaniel Branden. Thankfully Heller devotes only a small part of the book to their affair, pointing those interested to the autobiographical exposes, and does most of her writing on how the Nathaniel Branden Institute (NBI) formed into it’s very own cultural grouping of likeminded people that would socialize almost exclusively with other Objectivists and would study Rand’s works and Leonard Peikoff’s and Branden’s exegesis of them. Clearly placing these groups within the milieu of the 60’s and 70’s and showing their evolution following the dissolution of the NBI amidst the schism caused amongst her inner circle following Rand’s discovery that Nathan had been involved with someone else other than her for four years is where Heller truly shines.

As a historian of the American conservative movement, she is able to deftly chart some of the influence of the Objectivists and show their populist appeal despite “trad”, traditional, conservatives disdain for their atheistic appeal to human rights. She shows how the Volker Fund paid for economics professors to get teaching positions at universities expire their marginalization from the profession, a fact under reported in my conversations with others about Von Mises or Hayek, and how it was the Koch brothers who created the Cato Institute on principles charted by Rand. Rand’s role as inspirer for the creation of the Libertarian Party is acknowledged, as is the wealth of student activism and publications against various policies such as the draft, drug laws and taxes. Young Americans for Freedom and Students for Individual Liberty are cited as prominent outlets of Objectivists related activism and it is her reaction and attempts at “reigning in” those that were inspired by her that she loses them. The anarcho-capitalist versus minarchist state positions controversy are outlined here as well, though it would have been to the benefit of the book to go into more detail on this considering this is a debate that continues to have relevance amongst libertarians today.

At the end of her life Heller shows Rand largely discredited amongst her early followers as her personal character alienated them and her pronouncements on morality had moved from the daily interactions to commentary on the world-historical. Lacking the background to make such judgements, many made fun of or rightly decried her racist or genocidal positions that she deemed as moral (for instance her claim that the Native American’s received what they deserved as they had no private property). Indeed this was at a time when Libertarianism was gaining the intellectual recognition that Rand would have loved. Robert Nozick published Anarchy, State, and Utopia and won the National Book Award for it in 1975 while Milton Friedman won the Nobel Prize in Economics in 1976. By the end of the biography we can clearly see why Rand continues to get cited in American politics today as a person of inspiration, but also why those who uncritically laud her should be someone to watch out for.