comment removed. [5/8-comment reposted above]

A letter to Chris Bertram. I assume he's the one who did it since as in the past, my counter shows a hit at about the same time from "bris.ac.uk"

As always, I hope you read it first.

I don't care that Holbo lives in Singapore [repeats], or that you write this [ditto]:

"I'm sympathetic, I really am, to the idea that people should work and consume less and that we should attend more to real life quality. But this doesn’t seem very realistic in my own life..."

Can't you hear how weasely that sounds?

Do you remember Henry's defense of Holbo after I brought up the contradictions between his ideas and his life? He said that political philosophy has no necessary relation to politics.

G.A. Cohen on his money:

I give away some but not very much and the explanation is that I’m a less good person than I would be if I were as good as I could be. You know I just think that I’m not a morally exemplary person that’s all. That’s the reconciliation.

And he lectures us on socialism. It's the lectures that annoy me, not the life. His life was run of the mill.

But he dreamt of "mechanisms" [should have said technology] that would make him a better human being. Anything to avoid the work on his own of trying to be one. The attempt itself is what's important.

Zizek has shown more bravery in his life, intellectual and otherwise, than any of you have, first in Tito's Yugoslavia and now discussing Palestine.
In his actions he's stood for liberalism. What have your actions stood for?
Modern liberalism as you subscribe to it begins in self love. Zizek has the guts to be scared, but if you want to see him picked apart you can witness it here

Curiosity about the world demands curiosity about others. Curiosity about others demands curiosity about their interest[s even or especially] in things that may not interest you. Gratifying your own desires is not the same as understanding them, or understanding the desires of others. The latter takes much more work. The former has little moral value.
Disinterested reason is the scholar's ideal. That's a choice in opposition to self-interest.

SE: "Arguments for the nobility of greed are a recent development."
CB: If, by “recent” you mean 1705, you may be right.

As I said at the time, that's what I meant.
I was raised by scholars who took their moral responsibilities seriously.

Democratic responsibility and individualism are opposed. How is this not clear to you?
You're all wholly in love with yourselves.

Sorry if the grammar and spelling is off in this one. I'm livid.
You really are a shallow, self-absorbed and lazy bunch.
I try to read Erasmus and Montaigne to calm me down, but it doesn't work. I grew up in the university. It breaks my heart to see what it's become.