>Wherever philosophy arises, the moral health of the nation

>>9087709
He can only say this after doing a philosophical analysis of morality.

I hate these kind of hypocrites.

E.g.,

Buddha:
>the path to hapiness is non-striving
Bitch, you fucking lived like a fucking kind all your life, in a harem of sex and aesthetic pleasure. The rest of us are not sick of those things yet.

Leary:
>drop out of formal educational systems
Bitch, you received the highest possible educational honor and got to be a Harvard fucking professor in your chosen field, the rest of us are not ready to retire

Singer:
>live utilitarian ethics
Bitch, you're a fucking rich author academic who gets payed to travel the world and read a book you wrote decades ago, the rest of us want a cheap burger after a hard days work

Etc.

>>9087709
>Was he wrong /lit/?
Yes, the cause and effect are flipped. Philosophy is theology without God, and a society that forgets God is morally decayed.

>>9087709
Philosophy is just an extension of the fall from the original state to Rousseau.

He really is hilarious to read in a certain sense,

In a way, I guess, but not as he tries to put it. Naturally, philosophy is more interesting to people when "the nation" isn't doing all that well. I wouldn't say it needs to be a literal nation today, though, as cultural landscapes expand well beyond that.

Kinda makes sense if you think about it. The conditions required to create great thinkers usually means a country is experiencing either a period of great prosperity and stability or a period of great conflict and social upheaval. Both cause non introspective people to act a fool

>>9087748
I agree if your idea of God isn't some blue eyed old guy hanging out with a blue eyes jesus and pigeon in the sky

>>9087740
I like your points.

I don't get the sympathy for Rousseau that many have.
>noble savage
Rousseau can fuck off

>>9087823

What if it is? Don't let the ideology hit you on the way out.

>>9087740
Replace buddha and leary with the cynics and stoics then if you are that bothered by hypocrisy.

Fuck Singer tho.

>>9087740
What does Leary expect everyone to do instead?

>>9087893
Drop out of structured institutions and social norms, turn on to your own inner inspiration and personal creative vision, tune into society and change the culture to match your vision.

Wash, rinse, repeat.

>>9087740
Do you really not understand all the holes in this line of thought?

>>9087929
Are you dense? You think holes in a particular line of thought are a problem for the masses that follow it? He was after all talking about 'the moral health of the nation'.

This explains Zizek

>>9087709
Of course he was.

>>9087748
Plenty of theists in philosophy.
>>9087740
You don't need to be able to say this to have moral health. No hypocrisy here.

>>9087842
'noble' is often misunderstood in this context.
Savages kill and rape just as much. They just don't dress it up nicely like civilization does.

But yeah Rousseau as a person was a pretty terrible human being if we have to believe Russell (then again he was biased strongly against any brand of irrationalism, he blames Rousseau for Hitler lmao)

>>9088191
>You don't need to be able to say this to have moral health. No hypocrisy here.
You don't need to be able to say this to have moral health, but you need to be able to conduct moral philosophy in order to say it, which he did.

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>>9087748
>Philosophy is theology without God, and a society that forgets God is morally decayed

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>>9087709
No.

>“Our great democracies still tend to think that a stupid man is more likely to be honest than a clever man, and our politicians take advantage of this prejudice by pretending to be even more stupid than nature made them.”

RUSSELL'D

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"However much Philosophy, as the thought and conception of the Mind of a particular time, is a priori, it is at the same time just as really a result, since the thought produced and, indeed, the life and action are produced to produce themselves. This activity contains the essential element of a negation, because to produce is also to destroy; Philosophy in producing itself, has the natural as its starting point in order to abrogate it again. Philosophy thus makes its appearance at a time when the Mind of a people has worked its way out of the indifference and stolidity of the first life of nature, as it has also done from the standpoint of the emotional, so that the individual aim has blotted itself out. But as Mind passes on from its natural form, it also proceeds from its exact code of morals and the robustness of life to reflection and conception. The result of this is that it lays hold of and troubles this real, substantial kind of existence, this morality and faith, and thus the period of destruction commences. Further progress is then made through the gathering up of thought within itself. It may be said that Philosophy first commences when a race for the most part has left its concrete life, when separation and change of class have begun, and the people approach toward their fall; when a gulf has arisen between inward strivings and external reality, and the old forms of Religion, &c., are no longer satisfying; when Mind manifests indifference to its living existence or rests unsatisfied therein, and moral life becomes dissolved. Then it is that Mind takes refuge in the clear space of thought to create for itself a kingdom of thought in opposition to the world of actuality, and Philosophy is the reconciliation following upon the destruction of that real world which thought has begun. When Philosophy with its abstractions paints grey in grey, the freshness and life of youth has gone, the reconciliation is not a reconciliation in the actual, but in the ideal world. Thus the Greek philosophers held themselves far removed from the business of the State and were called by the people idlers, because they withdrew themselves within the world of thought."

Yes. Truth and morality are at odds with one another. Discovering that you lack free will, that the universe is immense and cold and uncaring, that you arose from the competition and cruelty of nature and that your love for your fellow man is just a side effect to make you take advantage of group survival - these are not realizations we were meant to have, and they do not a moral society make. Plato was right the whole time.

>>9087823
>being this triggered
Lmao get the fuck out of here you sensitive little cunt. Mommy and daddy shouldn't of spoiled you that much.

>>9088202
A society that forgets God eventually becomes morally decayed as it becomes vulnerable to acts that contradict what God's word teaches us.

>>9088246
>literally praying to a sandnigger god

>>9088253
>what God's word teaches us
there's no such thing

>>9087709
Rousseau was a fucking idiot

>>9087709
well he was french and france has always consistently had the worst philosophers

>>9088306
>He says on a French image board

>>9088199
Ability to conduct moral philosophy says nothing about the likelyhood to do it, which is what Rousseau was concerned about.

To add to that, Rousseau was a deeply immoral man, who gave his children up to orphanages rather than take the responsibility of being a father

>>9088216
Russell was better at throwing insults than he was at designing a satisfactory epistemology.
That's why he got famous critiquing others.

>>9087709
Rousseau didn't say this, it was that moron Will Durant.

Nice try, an0n

>>9088232
Truth and morality are not at odds.
We have free will in the sense that we project the universe and see different options ahead. The universe is caring in the way that it allowed for us to exist. And the origin of our love does not negate it.
Thoughts of a pessimist, because philosophy is generally practiced by those unhappy with life.

>>9088293
>>9088306
>>9088210
>>9088202
>>9087753
>>9087748
>>9087740

He didn't say this /lit/ as >>9088332
points out. What he did say, which was somewhat similar, was:

"Technology is the means to spiritual malaise."

>>9088351
>he didn't say this
Who cares? It was said, and that's what we're talking about.

>>9088326
But it WAS done, and then the outcome was, "shouldn't do it." It's a contradiction is all I'm saying.

>>9088332
Apparently Will Durant is not too dumb then, or well, at least his quotes.

>>9088385
Because a lot of people are discussing it under the presumption that it was said by an intelligent man, therefore their preconception that it's in any way legitimate is significantly increased. It's a rubbish quote, and I'm sorry if people like this >>9088454 think otherwise.

You *might* be able to argue that moral decay causes philosophy to arise, but the inverse is frankly absurd.

But hey, I could be wrong.

>>9087740
all of those are correct though, they learned from their mistakes so that you don't have to make the same ones.

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>>9088510
>I'm sorry if people like this >>9088454 (You) think otherwise.
Read Badiou; if we by morality means the dominant praxis and attitudes of a society, then philosophy - which always carries the burden of never-ending critique, will by necessity result in the critique and 'corruption' of those values.

I'm quite sure Will Durant did not intended it in this fashion though.

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A philosopher is a friend of wisdom, yes?
Surely you will also admit that God himself has to be wise?
That that which is Godly is necessarily also Good, that should be clear to all of us here, if we are not utter fools.
Would you then claim that by seeking wisdom and becoming closer to God, not Good but rather it's opposite, Bad, would be the result? But if you have followed me thus far, clearly this cannot be the case. This leaves us with no other option than to take back our initial claim and instead claim the opposite.

>>9088517
I posted both
>>9087740 and >>9087919
And I really respect the work of all three examples (actually probably not Singer to the same extent).

But this hypocritical philosophising completely lacks respect for the concept of lifespan development. It's like saying that a toddler needs to be independent, because I learned to be independent later. These lifespan developmental stages don't just stop after childhood, we need to always be building foundational skills for higher levels.

Take Leary for example. His Drop Out, Turn On, Tune In model makes a lot of sense in order to become an active creator rather than passive consumer of culture. But he totally assumes that anyone who reads his work would have the inbuilt ability to navigate this process. He was able to do it, after years of Harvard education in psychology, and his crew were (sometimes) able to do it, because they were benefiting from the constant guidance of himself and other very well educated men.

Someone with a lack of wise support, and a lack of personal ability to work with complex and sometimes challenging emotions, and ideas that clash with status quo... maybe not so much.

>>9087709
>was he right?
Who cares?
He's fucking hot!

>>9087709
I'm pretty sure he didn't say that. Is this bait?

>>9089108
Never mind, should have read the thread >>9088332

>>9088220
Nice

>>9088550
Whenever Nikes have existed, war and rape has also existed

>>9087709
He is either implying: Philosophers rise because the moral health of the nation decays. Or the seemingly more likely vice versa.

Which in that case, may imply 'bad/wrong/immoral/powerless/dumb' philosophers? There have only been like 1000 or so philosophers in history, maybe less than 400 good ones.

Oh and now rereading the quote I see that he does not not say 'philosophers', but 'philosophy',

meaning the love of wisdom, or maybe colloquially, 'thinking, questioning, wondering'?

So is he implying, when populations start 'thinking and questioning' (maybe in relation to the church dogma), the rates of anal sex and cuckholdry increase?

Yes and No.

>>9087842
>>noble savage
>Rousseau can fuck off

spotted the turbo-pleb

get a trip so i can hide all your future posts

Honestly, stoicism was a form of brainwashing written by rich kings and emperors in an attempt to keep the plebs from revolting. Letting the people persecute christians was icing on the cake.

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>>9089081
>Rousseau will never "force you to be free"

Y even live senpai

>>9087884
How were the Stoics hypocrites?

>>9089689
yes