Sitemap - 2024 - digressionsimpressions’s Substack
A post on Newton's and Spinoza's metaphysics, Pt 1. Nature does nothing in Vain.
Let's call this post On the Human condition
Bertrand Russell's Realist Moralism on International Law and the World State (pt. 1)
Manent and the Politics of the Common Good
On Hazony, Burke, and Renan on the (Idea of a) Nation
American First, and Trumpism (after the post-mortem)
A Post-Mortem, at the end of the month
On Burnham's mitigated defense of Free Speech
Podcast with Walter Veit on Synthetic Philosophy and Meta-philosophy
On a feature of Smith and Marx on Alienation
Schmitt and G.D.H. Cole on the Political
Strauss (and Auden) on the open society ca 1941
On the obsolescence of much political philosophy
On Orwell on Swift and Aesthetics, with some Arendt.
Carl Schmitt and Ideology Critique (with some Weber, Nietzsche, and Foucault)
On that Selzer poll, Montesquieu, and the caprices of voters.
Oakeshott on the Conservative Disposition in the art of government and Classical Liberalism
The Port Huron Statement, some Newt Gingrich, and Polarized Publics
On Oakeshott on the Art of the Deal
Kaufman and Krishnamurthy and the role of teach-ins in academic freedom.
On Hume, Coordination Costs, and the Political Influence of the very Wealthy
On the Absence of Population Limits on Bensalem
Long covid diaries: Good news.
On Callard, on Teaching & Learning and student protests
Spinoza and Smith on meritocratic political climbing in aristocratic government
On Adam Smith's program of enriching of people and the sovereign.
Roger Scruton (and some Kant and Foucault) and the Conservatism of accountability
On Thoreau, Locke, Nancy Rosenblum's Another Liberalism and the relationship of consent to trust
Polybius' Mixed Constitution of Rome, and some Political Economy
(Early) Robert Owen and the Transition Problem
Animeauxnationalism: “they are eating the pets” [Guest post by Sanne Van Oosten]
On Robert Owen and the Prehistory of Experiments in Living
On Nasrallah's Strategic mistakes
On Machiavellian Virtu, Quintilian, and Smith's Science of the Legislator.
Bacon On [Philosophic] Prophecy, and New Atlantis
On Polybius and democratic rule.
On the Sublime in Malebranche, Adam Smith, Longinus, and some Newton and Reid.
Thomas More, Spinozism, and democratic radicalism.
On Federalist Papers 18, imbecility and distraction, the new federalism, and the Achaeans
Adam Smith, sublime science and some Galileo
Long Covid Diaries: Fall edition.
On Hume and Polybius (with some Federalist Papers and Clientelism thrown in).
On the New Federalism in More's Utopia
When Selling Out is Worth It. On Panaetius of Rhodes and his Roman audience.
On the Iconoclasm of Today's Climate Action.
On Prudential Liberalism, Bright and Historiography of political theory, pt. II
On Smith and Hume and the origins of the Rule of Law in Hayek (and Knight)
Second thoughts on the proto-Spinozism in Part 1 of More's Utopia.
On Stebbing's Ideas for Moral Philosophy.
On Political Duopolies: floodgates and antitrust.
On Liberalism and Mass Democracy
No, John ('Jack') Rawls did not kill off Western Marxism!
Adam Smith and Cicero on eternal return, and harmony of Spheres (with some Spinoza)
Algorithmic Macroprudential Risk, and a legal case.
On Samuel Francis on Burnham, and what it means to read outside the intellectual Overton window.
End of Summer, Long Covid Diaries Style
On Prudential Liberalism, the Balance of Power, and the retreat from an International Moral Order
On My debts to Some Heterodox Marxist philosophy of science
On John Bright and Byron and Biblical rhetoric
On the limits of Cost Benefit Analysis in Heath's Philosophy of the Executive, pt 3
On Jennifer Frey's Criticism of Hume's rejection of the Monkish Virtues, p. 2
On Pareto efficiency in Heath's Philosophy of the Executive, pt 2
On Heath's Philosophy of the Executive, pt 1.
On Jennifer Frey and the art of educating intellectual independence.
On Dull and Lifeless philosophy, and peer review.
On a passage in Hume's Dialogues
Against Clarity, again (with some Stebbing and Diplomatic practice)
Long Covid Diaries: Summer Break
On Manent on Liberalism; with Montesquieu on polarization and patronage
On Norm-Engineering a Moral Future.
On the Neurath/Morris-Kallen debate over Orchestration and/or Unity of Scientific language
On Chomsky and the Responsibility of Intellectuals
Reichenbach's tempered Machiavellian ethical politics
On Condorcet and Tucker on Locke as a democratic majoritarian
On Liberal Democracy as Identity Formation
Condorcet on Civilizational Progress, and its limits
On the Market as Daily Plebiscite
On student protests as a feature of academic freedom
On the Prehistory of Technical Population Ethics, Malthusianism, in Condorcet's Art of Government
Condorcet's critique of the social contract and his praise of Locke's political philosophy
Condorcet, and Philosophy as the Queen of the Sciences
On MacIntyre's Anti-Liberalism
Power Without Knowledge: a partial critique of a Critique of Technocracy
On the State of Spinoza and the Sciences.
On Quine's Conservatism, and the separability of philosophy from (technocratic) politics.
On Quinn (part II), Hume, More, and the hybridity of Civilization.
On Mandeville, Spinoza and the tropes of anti-Utopianism
On Quinn's How the World Made the West
A week in the Rare Books room of the British Library.
Hume's and Smith's defense of Clientelism.
Adam Smith's "New" Liberal Imperialism
Long Covid Diaries: setbacks and all that.
Structural Injustice, and the Piacular
The Hebrew Scholia in Spinoza's Ethics
Academic and Political Freedom, Social Safety, and Frustration Intolerance (with some Spinoza).
Some remarks on Stanley Fish on Academic Excellence and Campus Protests
On accommodating student protests
On Wells, Polanyi (Michael), Foucault, and the necessity of Synthetic knowledge
Bonus Post: Foucault, the Benthamite in 1978-1979
On H.G. Wells, World Order, Spontaneous Order, and some Graeber and Michael Polanyi
Dear University President, you could run out the clock; a plea for repressive tolerance--and renewal
On Blessedness in the Short Treatise
Scientific Models and Political Decision-Making (on Winsberg & Harvard)
Some Spinozistic Themes in Seneca's Letter 58.
Going Meta on The Flavour of Truth and culture wars.
On Douglas on Beatitude in Spinoza, part II
A personal remembrance of Dan Dennett (1942-2024)
Some Spinoza on Sin and the Fall with Alex Douglas (and some Dan Dennett)
Lorenzini's overreach on Foucault (with some Feyerabend and Rorty)
On Defeat in Ukraine, and Liberal International Politics
Morgenbesser, Imperialism, Adam Smith, and the usefulness of philosophy
Foucault, Lorenzini, and Spinoza on Games of Truth (with some Carnap and Tarski).
On Synthetic Philosophy; or Williamson vs Kitcher, again.
Okay, effective altruism and shallow ponds, again. On Pettigrew's Criticism of Wenar (etc.)
On Wallas, Mill, The Great Society, and the Art of Government
Leibniz, Ibn Tufayl and the pre-history of a famous thought experiment anew (oh Mary)
Foucault, Cryptonormativity (via Kolodny and Lorenzini)
On Travel through Darkness; On Letter 57
On Hayek and Smith on the/a Great Society
On Academic Freedom and Institutional Neutrality (Jacob T. Levy)
The Sooty Empiric's Suspicions of Liberalism reconsidered.
On Gaus and Kukathas on the nature of an Open Society, and toleration.
RIP Howard Stein January 21, 1929-8 March, 2024
On Williamson, Kitcher, and the uptake of analytic philosophy
Smith and Montesquieu on a Platonic passage, and the fate of Spontaneous Order.
Adam Smith on Commercial Society; On Paul Sagar's Adam Smith Reconsidered, Pt 2
Smith on the art of government, corruption, and tax policy
Humboldt and Mill on harmful speech, liberty, and shunning
State Political Epistemology in (and at the start of) Wealth of Nations
Humboldt, Public Epistemology, and Professional Certification
Condorcet and the origin of Patriarchy
Long Covid Diaries: downs and ups
Wilhelm von Humboldt on Slavery and the Snobbishness of the Philosophers
Feyerabend, Open Exchange, and Collective Decision-making
Newton, Fontenelle, Aesthetic Cosmology, and Extinction.
Manon Garcia and the new Sexual Revolution
Feyerabend and Mill on Transformative Experience and Science's Authority.
Bentham and Foucault on Biopolitics and Political Epistemology
On the Crisis of Liberalism (IX); the housing accessibility shortage.
On the very idea of Special Sciences
Bertrand Russell on Locke as the Philosopher of the Global Social Contract
Bertrand Russell, Platonic Myths, and Japan
Adam Smith, Mercantilism, and the Caricature of Locke (on the origins of liberalism)
On the ICJ (SOUTH AFRICA v. ISRAEL)
A Digression on Mill and Foucault; and Hacking.
On Williamson, Kitcher, The Great Endarkenment (pt. II) and Meta-Expertise
On early Friedrich Engels on Adam Smith and the theorist's responsibility for consequences.
Montesquieu and Spinoza on Federalism (with a whiff of Adam Smith)
The State as Machinery of Record or as Witness of Truth. On Pink on Vallier and Catholic Integralism
On Old and New Federalism: William Penn, Constant, Adam Smith, and Jacob Levy ,
On the recursive Utopian tradition in Modernity, Jerusalem and Athens.
Friedrich Engels, Foucault on Chicago Economics and the social demand for criminality.
Kendall on Locke on Majority Rule, (With Some Blackstone, Adam Smith, and federalism.)