The Best of Cordwainer Smith. Cordawiner Smith. New York: Ballentine Books, 1975) The scanners in Cordwainer Smith’s story “Scanners Live in Vain” are heroes who have sacrificed their humanity...
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Monsters of Duty: Cordwainer Smith’s Attack on Kantian Morality and the Suppression of Feeling in Scanners Live in Vain
By Richard Cocks / September 22, 2019
Kant on History and Culture as a Means to Ethical Evolution
By Lee Cheek / September 21, 2019
The “Conjectural Beginning of Human History”[1] is Kant’s attempt to recast the creation story of Genesis. The procreative act of Yahweh is cooperative in the sense heaven and earth are combined,...
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Plato’s Apology and the Gorgias: Yearning for Political and Spiritual Regeneration
By Lee Cheek / September 20, 2019
In the Gorgias, like the Protagoras, Socrates must confront one of the great figures of his time, Gorgias of Leontini, who is not merely a rhetorician, but an innovator of...
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The Contribution of Roman Law to Modern Legal Systems
By Eamonn G. Hall / September 19, 2019
Roman law was the law of the city of Rome and subsequently of the Roman Empire. The influence of Roman law on modern legal systems has been immense: several legal...
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Globalism, Technology . . . and the Humanities?
By Jason Baxter / September 18, 2019
I would like you to imagine the following situation: Sometime after graduation a college student is hired as an intern at his university’s newly founded Center for Leadership Studies (CLS,...
Read More The Best of Cordwainer Smith. Cordawiner Smith. New York: Ballentine Books, 1975)
The scanners in Cordwainer Smith’s story “Scanners Live in Vain” are heroes who have sacrificed their humanity for the good of humanity. The contradiction that one might love humanity enough, not to just give up one’s life for humanity, but to give up one’s humanity while alive, undergirds the…
The scanners in Cordwainer Smith’s story “Scanners Live in Vain” are heroes who have sacrificed their humanity for the good of humanity. The contradiction that one might love humanity enough, not to just give up one’s life for humanity, but to give up one’s humanity while alive, undergirds the…
The “Conjectural Beginning of Human History”[1] is Kant’s attempt to recast the creation story of Genesis. The procreative act of Yahweh is cooperative in the sense heaven and earth are combined, as well as the essence of the Divine and humankind. According to Genesis 2:4, creation is the work of generations (toldoth); however, Kant’s creation is presented as a single, direct…
In the Gorgias, like the Protagoras, Socrates must confront one of the great figures of his time, Gorgias of Leontini, who is not merely a rhetorician, but an innovator of rhetorical approaches and an accomplished teacher. Werner Jaeger describes Gorgias as the man who “set the tone for the last thirty years of the fifth century” and as “the embodiment…
Roman law was the law of the city of Rome and subsequently of the Roman Empire. The influence of Roman law on modern legal systems has been immense: several legal systems of the world (including the civil law system of Europe) have been shaped significantly, directly or indirectly, by the concepts of Roman law.
The development of Roman law comprises more…
I would like you to imagine the following situation: Sometime after graduation a college student is hired as an intern at his university’s newly founded Center for Leadership Studies (CLS, it would no doubt be called). Within the first year of the internship, the CLS wins a major grant to host an international symposium, and the new graduate is asked…
Absurdistan is a modern adaptation of a classical Greek comedy, inspired by a Turkish news story from 2001, featuring a Czech leading lady and an East German leading man, both speaking Russian in an Azeri village with Georgian supporting actors and extras. Given that the story of Absurdistan all takes place in the same small village of fourteen families in…
Last month before leaving for Tulsa, I watched the Aqan Sataev film Jaýjúrek myń bala, the dastanic national epic written for the twentieth anniversary of Kazakhstan’s independence, centered on the life and exploits of the orphaned Sartaı. Sataev’s later piece is a tribute to Kazakhstan’s now ex-President Nursultan Nazarbaev, who – the end of the movie states explicitly – finished…
The Anthropology of Intentions: Language in a World of Others. Alessandro Duranti. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015.
How and to what extent do people take into account the intensions of others is the question The Anthropology of Intentions answers. By analyzing data collected over three decades in the U.S. and Samoa, Duranti shows that a variety of discourses exist where some…
How and to what extent do people take into account the intensions of others is the question The Anthropology of Intentions answers. By analyzing data collected over three decades in the U.S. and Samoa, Duranti shows that a variety of discourses exist where some…
The Quran Problem and Islamism. Salim Mansur. Mantua Books, 2017.
Salim Mansur writes as a self-described “dissident Muslim,” which he defines as “someone who either critically questions or rejects the 'officially’ sanctioned views, doctrines, and dogmas of traditional Islam in favour of ‘rethinking Islam’ within the modern context” (3). His concern is the “crisis of Islam” caused by the rise of…
Salim Mansur writes as a self-described “dissident Muslim,” which he defines as “someone who either critically questions or rejects the 'officially’ sanctioned views, doctrines, and dogmas of traditional Islam in favour of ‘rethinking Islam’ within the modern context” (3). His concern is the “crisis of Islam” caused by the rise of…
The Case Against Education: Why the Education System is a Waste of Time and Money. Bryan Caplan. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2018.
According to Caplan, an economist professor at George Mason University, education is primarily about signaling: information about a person’s productivity is signaled to an employer by what sort of degree and certification a prospective employee possesses. While admitting that…
According to Caplan, an economist professor at George Mason University, education is primarily about signaling: information about a person’s productivity is signaled to an employer by what sort of degree and certification a prospective employee possesses. While admitting that…
Inaugural Message from Ellis Sandoz 
God is Not Just the Good, as Plato Claimed But Love 
What Enlightenment, Exactly? 
What is a Miracle? 
New Political Religions, or An Analysis of Modern Terrorism 
Eric Voegelin as Master Teacher 
The Irish Dialogue with Eric Voegelin 
The Collected Works: The Drama of Humanity (Volume 33) 
“A Cow Is Just a Cow”: George Grant and Eric Voegelin on the United States 
The Life of the Scholar 
Monsters of Duty: Cordwainer Smith’s Attack on Kantian Morality and the Suppression of Feeling in Scanners Live in Vain 
Kant on History and Culture as a Means to Ethical Evolution 
Plato’s Apology and the Gorgias: Yearning for Political and Spiritual Regeneration 
The Contribution of Roman Law to Modern Legal Systems 
Globalism, Technology . . . and the Humanities? 
James Burnham’s and Daniel Bell’s Critiques of Globalization and Liberalism 
Globalization’s Liberalism 
VoegelinView’s Partnership with Louisiana State University’s Eric Voegelin Institute 
VoegelinView’s Partnership with the University of Wisconsin’s Center for the Study of Liberal Democracy 
Absurdistan: Light Magic-Realist Veit Helmer Comedy 
Learning Through Stories: How to Start Teaching the Truth