The Road We've Traveled to Animal Farm

     Just when we thought it could not get any worse, it does.  I was hoping for that incontrovertible bit of proof that Squealer (aka Tom Hanks as narrator) was alive and well and then we hear him making his plea to give Napoleon "four more years".  I had just blogged on the relationship between the current political situation in Washington and then the propaganda machine jumps into high gear.
     After reading Animal Farm or watching the 1954 version free on Hulu, watch The Road We've Traveled and see if you don't agree.  We are in major trouble and it is more than scary.   

Books With Questions....Kolakowski's Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing?

     Books about questions or books that genuinely explore great questions are generally a step above most books that merely explore ideas by asserting.  Leszek Kolakowski's Why Is There Something Rather Than Nothing? 23 Questions From Great Philosophers is a fine way to introduce Philosophy to someone.  This book is not for a seasoned Philosopher, unless he has become so entrenched in Philosophy that he is mind numbingly boring and irrelevant.  
     This book is really for the person who has been given a false view of Philosophy as being unimportant or unapproachable.  By taking the approach of asking questions and thinking through those questions (doing Philosophy), Kolakowski's demonstrates the ongoing value of thinking.  See below just a few of the chapter titles and the Philosophers he examines.
Truth and the Good: Why Do We Do Evil? Socrates
The Good and the Just: What is the Source of Truth? Plato 
Life in Accordance With Nature: Can It Make Us Happy? Epictetus
God and Man: What is Evil? St. Augustine
God's Necessity: Could God Not Exist? St. Anselm
Knowledge, Faith and the Soul: Is the World Good? St. Thomas Aquinas 
Faith: Why Should We Believe? Blaise Pascal 
The Foundations of Certainty: What Can We Know and How Can We Know it? Edmond Husserl


Read, Think, Enjoy, Live!

Before You Vote, Read Orwell's Animal Farm and Politics and the English Language

     For Christians living in a culture such as our's, a key issue is the "grammar" and "rhetoric" of our daily lives.  Imagine what would happen if we embraced the vocabulary of our faith and it became the way we talked to one another and about one another.  I recently read Animal Farm and Orwell's essay Politics and the English Language, as well as Orwell's Inside the Whale.  Speaking of the English language (in Politics), Orwell remarking on our language says, "it becomes ugly and inaccurate because our thoughts are foolish, but the slovenliness of our language makes it easier for us to have foolish thoughts. The point is that the process is reversible." (103)

     In Orwell's essay Inside The Whale (1940), he brilliantly dissects totalitarianism. We, in America, should not be so ignorant of history or the workings of dictatorships to be so naive as to not recognize the real possibility that totalitarianism can even exist in the presence of a democratic republic. Orwell says, "almost certainly we are moving into an age of totalitarian dictatorships – an age in which freedom of thought will be at first a deadly sin and later on a meaningless abstraction. The autonomous individual is going to be stamped out of existence."

     Many Americans would stand and shout that this type of oppression exists "over there" in "other parts of the world," but where freedom of conscience is squashed, one can mark the days on the calendar before other freedoms are eliminated.

     One of the many advantages in reading the Great Books is that truly Great books have the ability to remove us from our present moment and take us somewhere else, expose us to different ideas, issues, and landscapes, and then return us to our own. This enables us to see our own world, and more clearly see our own moment and issues. Such a work is George Orwell's Animal Farm. Due to the recent attention to our political landscape, and what will certainly endure for the next several months, we all need a different way of seeing political debates, political advertisements, and political campaigns. Again, George Orwell's Animal Farm is of great assistance.

     While I have several favorite moments, and a few favorite characters for different reasons, I will not give away too much and hope that if you have never read this work you will read it, and if you read it sometime ago, you will read it again before you vote. In the story there is a character, Old Major, who says, "Man is the only real enemy we have. Remove man from the scene, and the root cause of hunger and overwork is abolished forever."

     Later the same character asks, does not "all the evils of this life of ours spring from the tyranny of human beings?" This reminds me of what happens when someone assumes the Oval Office, having promised instant improvement, but then blames the previous administration for months and even years for all the woes and evils he is facing. Adding that it will take four to eight years to correct all of these evils.  All the time ignorant of the woes and evils he is creating for the next President.
     Animal Farm is also an extraordinary exploration of the workings of propaganda. It is sometimes comical, but often deadly serious how characters such as Squealer (think White House press office or major network news media) will take a statement and twist and turn it and turn it and twist it to where it sounds like something very different from what is reality and from what was previously stated.

      It would also be well worth your time to read Jacques Ellul's Propaganda: The Formation of Men's Attitudes--a brilliant work that explores the nature of political propaganda and the more hideous sociological propaganda.  Back to Animal Farm.  In a number of key places, Squealer corrects what others are saying they know to be the truth, what they have heard, what they have seen and all that has even been painted on the side of the barn. At one place in the story it says this of Squealer, "the best known among them was a small fat pig named Squealer, with very round cheeks, twinkling eyes, nimble movements and a shrill voice. He was a brilliant talker, and when he was arguing some difficult point he had a way of skipping from side to side and whisking his tail which was somehow very persuasive. The others said of Squealer that he could turn black into white."
     Among the many memorable lines from Orwell's Animal Farm, no doubt the phrase "all animals are equal but some are more equal than others" is the best known. One can think of our current political and social landscape where we could say that in the United States of America all are equal, but more will be made equal by those who work, and accomplish and will be compelled to be responsible for taking care of the less equal by making the less equal the most equal.

     So when you vote now or anytime in the foreseeable future, ask these questions--Will I vote for Pigs (read Orwell's Animal Farm) to be in power?  Will I vote for the Grand Liars or the tiny liars?  Will I vote for the Evil Perverters of Truth or the evil perverters of truth? Words for thought, while some words still mean something!

The Metaphysics of Grammar: The Case for Keeping "To Be" Verbs

     I recently had a graduate student share with me something that was new to her, and indeed it was new to me.  Point in fact, if the article cited below is to be taken seriously, this blog has already received an "F."  You can read for yourself the entire article, but here is my response to the essence of the piece, "How to Elimintae 'To-Be' Verbs".  While the article is not completely muddled, the author provides some rationale for why "to-be" verbs need to be eliminated and the reader should be aware that there is much more at stake than the loss of some words.

     One example is, "the 'to-be' verbs: is, am, are, was, were, be, being, been are state of being verbs, which means that they unduly claim a degree of permanence. For example, “I am hungry.” For most Americans, hunger is only a temporary condition." We should immediately respond that in truth, for many inhabitants of the world, hunger is a temporary condition, and it seems leading that author highlighted the plight of nearly, never hungry Americans.  Not to quibble, as the author of this article does, hunger is always only a temporary condition.  At a point, all hunger will cease.

     Actually, to the metaphysical point, some to-be verbs do necessarily claim a state of permanence while others do not.  If I were to say, all men are mortal, that is a state of permanence.  If I were to add, Socrates is a man, this also is a state of permanence.  If I were to finish by asserting, therefore Socrates is mortal, this would indeed be an accurate state of permanence.  What if I were with Socrates at the local Athenian cafe and just before the food arrived, my friend Socrates said, "I am starving." I would infer, accurately I trust, that hunger is his current state of being, but it is not a permanent state of being.  As a matter of fact, if I inferred that it was a permanent state and suggested as much, no doubt, Socrates would demonstrate my need to better learn the language.

     The next bit of reasoning given in the grammar lesson is that "to-be verbs claim absolute truth and exclude others".  The example provided is, “Classical music is very sophisticated. Few would agree that all classical compositions are always sophisticated." Sadly, Ken Ward must have forgotten (for a second) that in the English language, we have words such as some, few, all, most, much, and many. Use of these terms allow us to keep our to-be verbs and convey a certain specific truth.  So we could assert with some degree of certainty that some classical music is sophisticated and requires attention to undertand it, while most popular music is simplistic and requires little attention to understand its shallow form and content.

     Ward adds, "the 'to-be' verbs are general and lack specificity. Our retort is simple: sometimes we want to be general and sometimes we want to be specific.  Also Ward says, "the 'to-be' verbs often confuse the reader about the subject of the sentence. Indeed, "to-be" verbs may confuse the reader, but a qualifying term often brings clarity to confusion.  On the other hand, there are special occasions one may desire to be vague.

     Reading this post-modern grammar lesson, calling for the death of "to-be" verbs reminded me what was known from the ancient up to the modern world, and that is our language (grammar) reflects a worldview about such realities as permanence and absolutes.  Knowing this truth, I will not be giving up on "to-be" verbs anytime soon.

Set Your iPad Aside, Open Your Books, and Let's Converse

     I distinctly remember reading Jacques Ellul's books on technology, and specifically even remember where I was sitting when I read his The Technological Bluff, where he essentially argues that it is all but over and people will give over to the tidal wave of technology/technique.  Here we are more than twenty years later, and if Ellul was right about anything, he seems to have nailed this one.  
     Like many, I do have a "smart-phone," an iPad (university issued), a laptop, and a desktop.  I do use email and a range of apps.  Despite that, I still consider myself a neo-Luddite at heart.  How so?  For me, I still see these as tools--tools to be used carefully recognizing the intended and unintended consequences.  One should recognize the gains and losses with the use of any tool.  It does seem the mad rush of the past decade to get an iPad (and other such tools) in the hands of all students to "make us smarter" follows on the heels of the illusion that if we could "simply get a computer in every classroom, in front of all students, they will all be smarter."  This craze started about twenty years ago.  Are we smarter?
     I have to tell my best students to turn off their cell phones during class or they will constantly be texting.  Additionally, I teach in an online, distance program that is extremely rewarding and some of the conversations have been among the very best I have ever been part of teaching on the university level.  However, the program is extremely bookish.  The students and I read the Great Books and we actually talk about them.  We spend about twenty-four hours per semester intensely discussing the books, the ideas, the issues, and the truth of what is. 
     Being part of a university that just implemented a university-wide initiative to get everyone an iPad by fall of 2012, I have heard some students who are very excited about the additional Angry Bird time and Facebook time they will be logging during class.  No doubt, some professors and some students will use it as a tool to access information that may assist toward learning.  However, I well imagine that in the near future, I will be telling my students, "ok everyone, set your iPad aside, open your books, let's look at one another, listen to one another, and let's think together."


Before it is too late, read:
Wendell Berry's Why I Am Not Going to Buy A Computer
Russell Kirk's Humane Learning in the Age of the Computer
Neil Postman's Technolopy: The Surrender of Culture to Technology
Jacques Ellul's The Technological Society, The Technological System, The Technological Bluff

Reading the New Testament With Fresh Eyes

     The expression, "read the Bible like you've never read it before" can only be true if you have actually never read it before, or you read a translation that is new to you.  The way it is often used as a call for "open minded objectivity" is a nice idea, but does not happen, even by those who affirm this nice idea.

   With that in mind, how might you read it fresh or anew? A different tanslation.  This is not a blog on translations, but a blog on a particular, but dated, translation of the New Testament.

     I have long admired the Classical scholar and translator Richmond Lattimore.  His works on Homer's Iliad, Odyssey, and select Greek tragedies are still the standard of fidelity to the original and high English translations of these masterpieces.  When I discovered some years back that Lattimore had done a translation of the New Testament, I was intrigued.  After having purchased it and having read most of it, and repeatedly consulted it for teaching, preaching, and general comparison, I have been delighted. I would encourage anyone interested in a faithful translation of the Christian Scriptures to read Richmond Lattimore's The New Testament (1996).

     Lattimore said of his translation philosophy, "I have held throughout to the principle of keeping as close to the Greek as possible, not only for sense and individual words, but in belief that fidelity to the original word order and syntax may yield an English prose that to some extent reflects the style of the original...trying to let the authors of the Greek speak for themselves in English" (vii, xii).

     In truth, because Lattimore was such a fine translator, there is a different tone and tenor with the different writers of the New Testament.  I remember studying Koine Greek in college and graduate school and clearly seeing differences in the original among the various New Testament authors.  Lattimore's translation goes far in conveying this in English. 

     Additionally, with Lattimore's translation, there is also something about seeing the New Testament writings without the artificial and choppy chapters and verses.  The layout is similar to a novel, and this alone brings new reading.  For those who are appreciative of a literary approach to the Bible, this translation helps in more than one way to read it as a whole.  So, as was exhorted to Augustine, so I exhort you, "Take, and Read."

Accepting the Invitation to the Great Conversation Extended by Mortimer Adler and Robert Hutchins

     If I think about it, I am saddened that I received the invitation later in life.  I wish I had received and accepted the invitation in High School, or college, or certainly graduate school.  It was not all my fault, I was not told about the invitation until about twelve years ago.  Since that time, I have invited hundreds and hope to invite many more.
     What is The Great Conversation? The actual wording I am most familiar with comes through the writings and lives of Mortimer Adler and Robert Hutchins.  Since the 1960's those two men and a handful of others fought valiantly against social and cultural trends that would all but be the end of the Great Tradition, the Great Books, and the Great Conversation.  While things have gotten considerably worse since these intellectual warriors declared a strategy of intellectual health, there are loving resistance fighters and pockets of resistance found here and there.  
     Robert Hutchins, "Until lately the west has regarded it as self-evident that the road to education lay through Great Books. No man was educated unless he was acquainted with the masterpieces of this tradition. There never was very much doubt in anybody's mind about which the masterpieces were. They were the books that had endured and that the common voice of mankind call the finest creations, in writing, of the Western mind."  
     Since Hutchins originally penned these words, various "isms" stormed the gates of the academy and established themselves as the norm.  My wife (a librarian, yes, there are still a few of those left also, yet to be replaced by "media specialists") and I were discussing several works of "Young Adult fiction" and both agreed how extremely dark they were, and concluded that where God is murdered, despair ensues.
     Later, in the same essay, Hutchins said of Liberal education, "The substance of liberal education appears to consist in the recognition of basic problems, and knowledge of distinctions and interrelations and subject matter, and in the comprehension of ideas."  With the ongoing debate about the meaning and value of a Liberal education, it should surprise no one that we have no way of addressing basic problems, and our ability to make distinctions has evaporated. The common inability to connect even the most readily connected shows what happens when we abandon education that is natural to and formatve of the human mind.
     It was Mortimer Adler, who later wrote, "the goods of the mind are information, knowledge, understanding, and wisdom."  That is, we naturally desire these things for the mind.  And yet, we have become inundated with trivial disconnected information, bombarded with surface knowledge, given a shallow understanding, and who really, talks about wisdom any longer?  If Adler is right (and he is) that wisdom, "is generally acknowledged to be the highest good of the human mind, " then we are in serious trouble being part of human history that no longer even uses the term.
     You do not need to be a Historian to know that "there is a clear break between this century and the twenty-five centuries that precede it in the tradition of Western civilization." We are paying dearly for our ignorance and rebellion.  We are reaping the consequences of of ignoring the invitation to join that Great Conversation.  Our only hope, on a humane level, is to hear the invitation and join in that conversation.  There is much knowledge, understanding, and yes, even wisdom found in that conversation.