Straussian Secular Humanism

[Matt the Poet]

A position statement (which isn’t so much mine as something that occurred to me, and that every premise of which, as well as its conclusion is absolutely debatable and might be fun to debate).

1) There is no way to prove, logically, that human life has any intrinsic worth, that the weak and vulnerable should be protected, or that we should treat other people with tolerance, kindness, courtesy and respect

2) Nonetheless, to maintain a stable and pleasant society of the sort in which we can all at the very least rely on being able to sit down for a cup of tea and a biscuit without being stabbed in the face by Mad Max-style characters, it is necessary for us all to pretend that these things are in fact true.

3) People who ascribe to the philosophy of Leo Strauss would claim that we therefore need to maintain the deception of Religion. This will help those who haven’t quite got, and possibly won’t ever get, their heads around the mental subtlety implied in (1) and (2), by convincing them that they are not pretending at all.

4) Religion, however, appears to have a distressing tendency to import along with its useful moral structure a bunch of at-best self-contradictory precepts that its adherents drive themselves and everybody else mental trying to defend. It appears that these attempts are beginning to harm the kind of stable society we’re all after.

5) Secular humanism is not a religion but pretty much, as far as I understand it, takes the things set out in (1) as articles of, for want of a better word, faith while stripping out all the ancillary magical nonsense.

So…

A deliberate Straussian approach to the promulgation of Secular Humanism of precisely the kind fundamentalist Christians claim is going on all the time (but which quite clearly isn’t), is therefore good for society. The powers that be should be making underhand, devious efforts to change minds by disseminating humanist propaganda and combatting established religion.

Yes? No?

 

[AlBell]

Some think substituting Scientism for Religion is step forward.

Widespread, effective, and ongoing generation-to-generation promulgation of any moral system needs some driver other than brute force to provide general buy-in .

To date appeals involving a supernatural component have been useful.

 

[Dave Rogers]

1) There is no way to prove, logically, that human life has any intrinsic worth, that the weak and vulnerable should be protected, or that we should treat other people with tolerance, kindness, courtesy and respect

2) Nonetheless, to maintain a stable and pleasant society of the sort in which we can all at the very least rely on being able to sit down for a cup of tea and a biscuit without being stabbed in the face by Mad Max-style characters, it is necessary for us all to pretend that these things are in fact true.

Doesn't premise 2, therefore, disprove at least the second half of premise 1? We should treat other people with tolerance, kindness, courtesy and respect because that has been found to be necessary to maintain a society in which we ourselves are treated thus. We don't have to justify everything from first principles; we're allowed to be pragmatic enough to generalise from experience.

Dave

 

[Matt the Poet]

I don't really recognise 'Scientism' as a vector of moral values. It concerns itself with 'ises' rather than 'oughts', and its sole morality is that the accumulation of 'ises' has an intrinsic moral worth. Which I'm totally down with, but does it get us to the sort of socially useful propositions listed in 1)?

Appeals involving a supernatural component are only useful up to a point - - the point at which the supernatural element becomes intrinsically linked in a non-logical manner to the moral one.

Creationists (some of them, at least) genuinely appear to believe that there will be moral and societal chaos if everyone doesn’t sign up to their rather peculiar views of prehistory. Whereas, in fact, the opposite seems true – if we adopt their approach to understanding the world our complex technological society is liable to collapse completely, because it will be staffed by idiots.

This probably needs dealing with, and since I agree with you that brute force won’t work, don’t we need to be underhand and sneaky about it?

 

[AlBell]

Underhand and sneaky works for religious indoctrination. Will it work longer-term with no supernational forces to allude to?

 

[Matt the Poet]

Doesn't premise 2, therefore, disprove at least the second half of premise 1? We should treat other people with tolerance, kindness, courtesy and respect because that has been found to be necessary to maintain a society in which we ourselves are treated thus. We don't have to justify everything from first principles; we're allowed to be pragmatic enough to generalise from experience.

Dave

Yes, I suppose it does (I don't find that personally satisfactory, but only because of my own, rather neurotic, desire to get everything back to first principles anyway. Sorry).

But...this sort of admirably logical, pragmatic loop of thought is something that only some people might be able or willing to take. For people who aren't - is it justified to bamboozle them into some minimal set of values?

(Brief real life disclosure - I'm going for a post-work pint then commuting home. There will be a gap in any responses...)

 

[Matt the Poet]

Underhand and sneaky works for religious indoctrination. Will it work longer-term with no supernational forces to allude to?

Are allusions to supernatural forces
especially persuasive, then?

 

[brenn]

1) There is no way to prove, logically, that human life has any intrinsic worth, that the weak and vulnerable should be protected, or that we should treat other people with tolerance, kindness, courtesy and respect

2) Nonetheless, to maintain a stable and pleasant society of the sort in which we can all at the very least rely on being able to sit down for a cup of tea and a biscuit without being stabbed in the face by Mad Max-style characters, it is necessary for us all to pretend that these things are in fact true.

Seems to me that contains the argument that you say it doesn't.

"to maintain a stable and pleasant society of the sort in which we can all at the very least rely on being able to sit down for a cup of tea and a biscuit without being stabbed in the face by Mad Max-style characters, it is necessary for us all to" agree "that the weak and vulnerable should be protected, or that we should treat other people with tolerance, kindness, courtesy and respect"

The difference being, there is no reason to "prove, logically, that human life has any intrinsic worth" - enlightened self-interest works just fine.

3) People who ascribe to the philosophy of Leo Strauss would claim that we therefore need to maintain the deception of Religion. This will help those who haven’t quite got, and possibly won’t ever get, their heads around the mental subtlety implied in (1) and (2), by convincing them that they are not pretending at all.

I agree - most of the people will not be able to make the decisions and maintain the conduct that preserves civilized society, without something to scare them into it and religion is one of the things that tries to do that. Here, again, we only need to rely on self interest to control conduct - that is the major strength of religion.

4) Religion, however, appears to have a distressing tendency to import along with its useful moral structure a bunch of at-best self-contradictory precepts that its adherents drive themselves and everybody else mental trying to defend. It appears that these attempts are beginning to harm the kind of stable society we’re all after.

That's what happens when you let the masses, for whom religion was a necessary deception to begin with, take charge of the religion.

 

[Pacal]

Leo Strauss is the inspirerer of many so called conservatives of today. He preached that the "Ancients" in a effort to avoid "persecution" encoded "secret" knowledge in their texts which only a "elite" suitably armed with special toolsw of analysis could decode. This techniques were kabalistic, esoteric and only available to those "enlightened" by Strauss or his Disciples these techniques are of course utterly impervious to rational analysis and totally rely on submission to the psychic influence of Strauss and since he is dead his followers. Non Strausseans generally find the decoding efforts of Strausseans to be utterly absurd, far-fetched and the "findings" grounded in fantasy not the texts.

A basic premise of Strauss with those "Ancients" he liked was if a text said something, plainly he liked it the text meant rthat; if the text said something he didn't like than it "really" meant something he (Strauss) liked regardless of what the words said.

Through this decoding technique Strauss found that the "Ancients" he liked agreed with him.

Thus through these esoteric decoding technique Strauss found out the "real wisdom" of the "Ancients" which they had to keep hidden least they face "persecution". This secret esoteric knowledge was of course only for the elite, the "philosophers" who were superior to the mob that had to be pacified by the lies of religion to pacify them so that the elite could enjoy their precious truth.

This truth has to be hidden from the mass of the population, and in doing so the "philosophers" and their allies the "Gentlemen" were entitled to lie, decieve and trick because the "truth" was not for the mass of the population but only the "philosophical elite" who are utterly superior to the masses. Thus the masses must be fobbed off with bread and circuses, religion, wars and other systematic lies and of course be continually manipulated and decieved so that the "Philosophers" can enjoy the quiet contemplation of their superiority and secret esoteric knowledge and of course hold the masses in utter contempt.

Of course to a Straussean real democracy is a threat because the masses must only think they are ruling, when of course they should be properly manipulated because in a real Democracy they might get out of control and disturb the "Philosophers".

Suggested reading.

M. F. Burnyeat, Sphinix Without a Secret in New York Review of Books, v. 32 No. 9 (May 30, 1985), pp. 30-36.

Shadia B. Drury, The Political Ideas of Leo Strauss, Updated Edition, Palgrave Macmillian, New York, 2005.

 

[D'rok]

Suggested reading.

Some Strauss.

This thread is filled with the usual uninformed crap.

 

[INRM]

I don't like Strauss. He held a number of views that were contrary to a democracy and a free-society.

 

[D'rok]

Really? What views are those and which of Strauss' writings did you read them in?

 

[brenn]

I don't like Strauss. He held a number of views that were contrary to a democracy and a free-society.

I've never read Strauss, but if your current views equate democracy and "free society" I think you should think more about that. Democracy certainly doesn't mean the same thing as "free society" in my thinking. In fact, the whole purpose of our constitutional Bill of Rights is to pretect a free(ish) society from the tyranny of democracy.

 

[D'rok]

I've read a fair bit of Strauss, and I have never seen such a disconnect between the popular impression of a writer and that writer's actual writings. Can't people be bothered to pick up one of his books and see for themselves? I weep for the youtube generation.

 

[Pacal]

Lets see I've read The Arguement and Action of Plato's Laws, On Tyranny, Persecution and the Art of Writing, Studies in Platonic Political Philosophy. And Of course the two writers whose works I've listed Burnyeat and Drury have read much more of Strauss and have come to some very negative conclusions about him. But then given the kabalistic, turgid way Strauss wrote I'm not surprised many people don't get it about him. He is one of the worst philosophical literary stylists I've ever read.

But then I've read alleged followers of Strauss on the Web who admit that their real views must be hidden from the population. I am in touch with Prof. Drury who I contacted after reading her book, which finally helped me make sense of Strauss' dreary tomes. I originally read Strauss to see what he thought about Plato and was aghast at what can only be described at his willfully perverse interpretation of Plato. Prof. Drury told me that she had meet Straussean after Straussean who had admitted that her interpretation of Strauss was correct but it wouldn't do to admit that in public. That knowledge is only for a select few you see.

As for recomending that people read Strauss considering what a torture it is to read him. Don't, Unless you have to.

 

[AlBell]

May I ask if this article shares your views?

http://www.secularhumanism.org/index.php?section=library&page=drury_24_4

 

[D'rok]

Lets see I've read The Arguement and Action of Plato's Laws, On Tyranny, Persecution and the Art of Writing, Studies in Platonic Political Philosophy. And Of course the two writers whose works I've listed Burnyeat and Drury have read much more of Strauss and have come to some very negative conclusions about him. But then given the kabalistic, turgid way Strauss wrote I'm not surprised many people don't get it about him. He is one of the worst philosophical literary stylists I've ever read.

But then I've read alleged followers of Strauss on the Web who admit that their real views must be hidden from the population. I am in touch with Prof. Drury who I contacted after reading her book, which finally helped me make sense of Strauss' dreary tomes. I originally read Strauss to see what he thought about Plato and was aghast at what can only be described at his willfully perverse interpretation of Plato. Prof. Drury told me that she had meet Straussean after Straussean who had admitted that her interpretation of Strauss was correct but it wouldn't do to admit that in public. That knowledge is only for a select few you see.

As for recomending that people read Strauss considering what a torture it is to read him. Don't, Unless you have to.

What's perverse about Strauss' interpretation of Plato? He follows Cicero in his interpretation of the Republic, and his conclusion is really quite simple: the Repuplic is not a political manifesto, but rather an illumination of the nature of political things. That's the big "secret kabalistic" teaching; namely, that the perfecftly just city in speech is possible only in speech, not in practice. Here's the concluding paragraph:

As Cicero has observed, the Republic does not bring to light the best possible regime but rather the nature of political things - the nature of the city. Socrates makes clear in the Republic of what character the city would have to be in order to satisfy the highest need of man. By letting us see that the city constructed in accordance with this requirement is not possible, he lets us see the essential limits, the nature, of the city

In other words, utopian politics don't work, including all of Plato's crap about noble lies, philospher kings and elite guardians. That goes beyond the limits, the nature, of the city. It's better to stick to the possible and the practical.

Oooo...scary stuff.

Drury is so befuddled with blame-America-for-9/11-ism that she is incapable of rational thought and wastes so much paper demonizing a dead, apolitical philosophy professor. Strauss is not Wolfwoitz or Cheney. That's probably why she is stuck in the intellectual Siberia of Regina.

Strauss' project was totally benign, very simple, and explicity stated by Strauss himself. It was to restore political philosophy as a valid means of enquiry in light of two dominant trends:

1. The empty empiricism of social "science"
2. The nihilistic relativism of what we now know as post-modernism

His method was to re-interpret the ancients by close reading of the classics of western civilzation. Not because they necessarily got it right, but because they were enagaged in the correct questions - like what is the best regime, what is the good man, what is the nature of the good. Neither contemporary political science nor post-modern relativism even considers those proper or answerable questions. The quest to obtain knowledge about good and bad wrt political things has been abandoned. Strauss wanted to take up that quest again.

And yes, his interpretations were purposive and likely beyond the intent of the original authors, but so what? That is the point. What can we learn from the ancients and their enquiries into politics? Let's go back and re-ask these questions (Strauss is saying).

On Tyranny is a perfect example. Strauss is worried that contemporary political science can't even provide a ground for saying that tyranny is bad. (Strauss considers tyranny to be bad). So, following his method, let's look at what the ancients say about it. Which is what he does in his interpretation of Xenophon's Hiero.

It boggles my mind that you could read On Tyranny and conclude that Strauss would somehow support authoritarian politics. Aside from the fact the he expressly declared his teachings to be apolitical, the bulk of that book is Strauss, rooted in antiquity and the classics, arguing against tyranny as a valid politics, with Kojeve, rooted in Hegel and modernity, arguing for tyranny as a valid politics.

Everything I have read by Strauss has followed these themes. The only way I can see for someone to misinterpret him other than willfully is to mistake his exegisis of certain arguments as if they were his arguments. His style is dry and professorial - he does a lot of explaining of concepts.

 

[D'rok]

May I ask if this article shares your views?

http://www.secularhumanism.org/index.php?section=library&page=drury_24_4

Quintessential Drury. This is utterly false. In almost every instance, she attributes to Strauss exactly the opposite position that he takes in his writings. It looks to me like she attributes to Strauss the positions of the writers on whom he commented. She attributes Plato's excesses to Strauss. She attributes Schmitt's excesses to Strauss. That last is really the worst offence. (Schmitt was a Nazi philosopher who had an evil reductionist view of the political world boiled down to the distinction between "friends" and "enemies".) Strauss did not support Schmitt's views. He was a German Jew.

Drury shames the academy.