5 comments about Isaiah Berlin: A Life.

1. Ignatieff is at his best in his painstakingly detailed biography of that intellectual giant, Isaiah Berlin. This is how biographies should be written. Ignatieff has a wonderful ability of marrying the man and his ideas with the politics of the times he lived in. An elegantly written and honest homage to a life lived! I highly recommend this fantastic read!



2. This is a superb biography, and it also provides a very good survey of Berlin's ideas as they developed over his lifetime. That latter is no mean feat, as Berlin did not produce a highly organized corpus. Berlin's habit was to produce something, then proceed to the next thing, and never look back. He was also not very tidy in his scholarship, with a tendency to present "quotations" that are his remembered version of what the other person wrote. It is due to the extraordinary efforts of Henry Hardy that Berlin's writings having been gathered into various anthologies, with missing footnotes added, quotations cleaned up, etc.
   
   If you have tried to get into Isaiah Berlin's thought and have been discouraged by his sometimes baroque mode of exposition, I would recommend starting with Ignatieff's book. Then read around in Berlin's essays for a while and, following that, pick up "Isaiah Berlin," by John Gray, a succinct critical survey of the central themes and ideas in the man's work. At that point, you will be able to pick up anything Berlin wrote and read it with complete comprehension. Promise.



3. How can such a great book have such a low sales number? Or such a cheap price and only available used? I found it new for less than $4 in a book store during Christmas break in Cape May, NJ. Of all the books I was reading this one grabbed my attention and was most frequently the one I chose to read until I finished it. Gems! This book is loaded with them. Getting to know Sir Isaiah Berlin has been wonderful. An example: Teaching in an American University in January 1949 "His students didn't seem to know how to read or write, at least `not as these activities are understood at our best (British) universities'." (p. 190) His course was at Harvard! Now I can't feel a sense of connaissance since I was a student no sooner than a decade later. How do I know I know how to read?
   
   Reading p. 188: "individuals must have secure cultural belonging if they are to be genuinely free." It occurs to me while reading the book that without such a book about Isaiah Berlin a great deal of what he thought would not be obvious in what he published. He often did not say what he thought. Was this because he was not very secure in his sense of cultural belonging? (Yes).
   
   
   I had not realized how much Sir Isaiah was a philosopher of the sort I would like to be some day. Because of his experiences he was a polyglot. He spent time in the service of his country using his intellectual and social skills. His philosophical views bridged the Western analytic tradition, engaging Wittgenstein in argument for example, but at the same time applying the Continental philosophy of the Hegelian tradition, his excellent introduction to Marx for example. I personally find so much to like. I have found another soul mate.
   
   I also thank those who took the effort to write such good reviews, often including other information to make the experience even more worth while, and leave me with little to do than mention a few quotes as a reminder for myself. This book ought to be read by more people than are apparently reading it.



4. Twentieth Century philosophers in England fall into two groups. The bigger is the one whose members engage in analyzing the meanings of words and the ways that we use them. While this is undoubtedly an important enterprise, it is often rather arid and does not touch on what is really significant to most people. These philosophers tend to teach us cleverness.
   
   The other, rather smaller group, to which Isaiah Berlin belonged (after having started as a member of the first group), addresses itself chiefly to human concerns, to how we ought to live. I maintain that men like him teach us wisdom.
   
   Isaiah Berlin certainly did not live in an ivory tower; and in Michael Ignatieff's immensely attractive biography we can follow his engagement in the great world. Like many other academics, he worked in government during the Second World War: at the Ministry of Information in New York and then at the British Embassy in Washington and (very briefly just after the war) at the Moscow Embassy. As a committed Zionist, he played a minor but not unimportant role, acting as an intermediary between his friend Chaim Weizmann and American politicians during the period when American attitudes towards the aspiration for an independent Israel were being shaped. Weizmann and Ben Gurion both asked him to move to Israel and play a part in shaping the nascent state; but Berlin declined. One reason for this was that he felt himself temperamentally unfitted for the intrigues, infighting and abrasiveness that such a role would involve.
   
   Ignatieff shows repeatedly how, although Berlin had political commitments - particularly to Zionism and to anti-Communism - he shied away from being put into a confrontational position. He did not like making enemies; he liked to please; he was uncomfortably aware of his dual allegiance when working for a British government which was unsympathetic to Zionist aspirations. There seems to me no doubt that the philosophy which would develop in due course was a sublimation of his psychology. It should go without saying that this is not said in denigration of his philosophy: some of the greatest achievements in creativity have been driven by personal needs of this kind. One must judge the value of a philosophy by the quality of the end product, not by its psychological origins.
   
   One of Berlin's essays is entitled The Hedgehog and the Fox. The fox, so an ancient Greek once said, knows many things; the hedgehog knows one big thing. Ignatieff argues that Berlin indeed knew many things but that he had been in search of the one big thing that would make sense not only of the tensions he felt within himself, but also of those which any open-minded person must feel when seeing that in so many important conflicts, whether in personal life, in the history of ideas, in politics, or in philosophical situations, there is so much to be said for each side. He found this one big thing in the notion of Pluralism.
   
   Pluralism means that every individual and every society must accept that there is never one absolute value to which other values must be subordinated. There are many values in life which all command respect; but the most important of these - freedom, justice, equality, tolerance, compassion, loyalty - often must collide. Take, for example, Liberty and Equality. Both are rightly sought after; but equality can only be achieved by curtailing the liberty of action which, if granted, will result in some people pulling ahead of others. And even a single value, like equality, has tension built into it: do we look for equality of opportunity or equality of outcome? Again, if we want equality of opportunity, the result may be inequality of outcome; if we want to ensure equality of outcome, we cannot also have equality of opportunity. There are occasions when unavoidable collisions of values - of allegiance or of moral duty, for example - are the very stuff of tragedy.
   
   Berlin was a liberal and believed in rational discussion; but he thought that no amount of rational discussion can resolve these conflicts of values; and for him it was certainly not a solution to give to any one value absolute priority over others which have as good a claim to be universal.
   
   Berlin was as fascinated by those ideologies which he regarded as inhuman as he was by those he shared. He once said that he would never describe Nazism as mad. It did indeed rest on totally perverted axioms, but upon these axioms its theorists did erect an intellectual structure: how else could one explain that fascism was espoused not just by thugs, but by many academics at universities and by thinkers in other walks of life? Even more so was this the case with Marxism: he detested it, but he truly understood it from within. Ignatieff comments that "Berlin was the only liberal thinker of real consequence to take the trouble to enter the mental worlds of liberalism's sworn enemies." And although liberalism and nationalism, usually allies in the first half of the 19th century, parted company thereafter, Berlin was also one of those rare modern liberals who had respect for nationalism. The freedom to give expression to national identity was an important freedom, but of course it must not itself become oppressive of other people's national identity.
   
   As the book's title suggests, this is a biography that focusses most strongly on the philosopher's life. An exposition of his ideas is skilfully woven into the narrative; but it is not until we are two-thirds of the way through the book, when Berlin had reached the age of 40, that we come upon the chapter headed "Late Awakening" - awakening, that is, to the ideas for which he became famous. But I cannot praise highly enough the loving and vivid portrait of Isaiah Berlin that Ignatieff has given us and the fascinating account of his private and public life.



5. This is the life- story of the most important historian of ideas of the twentieth century. The story is told with clarity and sympathy . And something is caught of the tone and spirit of the person considered to be ' the greatest talker the English language had ' since Coleridge. Berlin was a person not only of remarkable learning, but of tremendous intellectual enthusiasm. His understanding of how it may be impossible to reconcile ' ultimate value claims' is at the heart of his championing of liberal democracy. The story is a remarkable one including not simply his climbing to the top of the pole of the English intellectual establishment ( despite his Jewishness) but his able service in the cause of freedom during the Second World War. One of Berlin's great volumes ( edited by his devoted student Henry Hardy)'Personal Impressions' tells of Berlin's warm friendships with many of the greats of the twentienth century. One such friendship was with Chaim Weizmann first President of Israel. Berlin was a 'Yom Kippur Jew' and ardent Zionist who contributed much to Israel . On a recent walk on Keren Ha- Yesod street in Jerusalem I took special pleasure in seeing a quiet little square named after him. This book should be an introduction to reading his own collections of essays which Hardy put together. They are the remarkable record of a most remarkable mind.

3 comments about Kant's Life and Thought.

1. It has been so long since the original German version of this biography of Kant was written by Ernst Cassirer in 1916 (and first published in 1918, due to "the delay inflicted by the war on the progress of the edition of the complete works," (p. 2) according to the Foreword by Ernst Cassirer dated August 14, 1918) that it might be considered quite proper that the recent biography of Kant by Manfred Kuehn deserves to be much more modern in its point of view. My review of Kuehn's book emphasized how modern Kant ought to be considered for someone who lived in his times. Kuehn also put a major emphasis on Kant's desire for perpetual peace, a topic which might have been considered questionable for anyone writing in German at the time when Cassirer was writing this book for use as a supplement to the study of Kant's complete works.

   I should admit that I have not attempted the study of Kant's work in the manner for which this book is meant to be a guide. I might even be considered too political to be offered a position on such a faculty, so I have no expectation of ever becoming a professional philosopher, and furthermore, I might even be so comical that I would dare to consider Cassirer and Kant as representative of philosophers in the way that Merry and Pippin were typical of hobbits in the movie cycle, "The Lord of the Rings." The set of 4 DVD disks covering the first movie, "The Fellowship of the Ring," allows easy access to specific points in the movie, and scene 44, "The Breaking of the Fellowship," on the second disk, shows the two hobbits (knowing that Frodo Baggins was the only important target) acting as decoys, crying, "Hey! Hey, you! Over here!" Logically, this follows scene 40, "The Fighting Uruk-hai," in which Saruman declares his creation, the Uruk-hai, a perfect creature for war, much as Prussia is described as a highly disciplined place during Kant's life in this book. Philosophically, Kant's writings, which reflect his use of thought processes, can be selected and their relevance to "The whole moral voice of the Enlightenment, as it lived in the purest and greatest spirits," (p. 83) are here demonstrated as logically as Pippin and Merry's exclamations, "It's working!" "I know it's working! Run!" could be considered a histrionic reflection of the admiration for tactics similar to the praise for Kant's philosophy which this book exhibits.

   This book also exhibits an eagerness to bring God into every discussion in a manner which has become much less popular as the experience of the godly has been tied detrimentally to the likes of Osama bin Laden in the last hundred years or so. My interest in the early part of the book was primarily in comparing the competing Cosmologies of that time. Kant's early work, UNIVERSAL NATURAL HISTORY AND THEORY OF THE HEAVENS (March 14, 1755), which was dedicated just three months before Kant became a doctor of philosophy on the strength of his treatise, DE IGNE (ON FIRE), was not well known in his time because "The publisher had gone bankrupt while the work was in press; his entire warehouse was sealed up, and therefore this book never came onto the market." (p. 40). In attempting to think beyond the laws of motion which had been established by Newton for a Kantian cosmogony which Kant derives from such laws, "The planetary world in which the sun, acting with its powerful attraction from the center of all the orbits," (p. 47) is considered the cause of the planetary system, and particularly accounting for "the `unanimity of the direction and positions of the planetary orbits'." (p. 49) Kant also uses this explanation "in order to think of it as in proportion to the power of the Infinite Being, it must have no limits at all." (p. 47). Newton could have come to the same conclusion about the origins of planetary motion "if instead of seeking the physical bases of the system of astronomical phenomena exclusively in its present state he had turned his gaze backwards to the past of the system, if he had pushed forward from the consideration of the systematic state of the universe to its systematic becoming." (p. 49).

   The big jolt in Kant's cosmology was caused by his attempt to comprehend a heavenly system of a different kind, described in Part 3 of the second chapter of this book. "The Critique of Dogmatic Metaphysics: DREAMS OF A SPIRIT-SEER," (pp. 77-92) on Kant becoming "aware of the marvelous tales surrounding the `visionary' Swedenborg, which led him to immerse himself deeper into Swedenborg's work, the ARCANA COELESTIA. We use this account here not to repeat it, but are content to make reference to it. Who will seriously believe that because he had bought the eight quarto volumes of Swedenborg's works, at a considerable outlay of trouble and expense, Kant would have decided to perform a literary analysis on the book?" (p. 79). Kant's book on Swedenborg "appeared anonymously" (p. 78) and he was determined that "I shall never become a fickle or fraudulent person, after having devoted the largest part of my life to studying how to despise those things that tend to corrupt one's honesty." [Kant to Mendelssohn, April 6, 1766] (p. 79). Swedenborg's ARCANA COELESTIA might still be considered a work in which the dreams of a religious writer were collected with more enthusiasm than anyone prior to Freud had shown for understanding his dreams, and Kant's problem stems in large part from Swedenborg's understanding of his dreams being considered an explanation of heavenly forces, or more often, of the conflicts between heavenly and hellish spirits. Cassirer is willing to venture "that the whole idea of the spiritual is due to habit and prejudice, rather than to exact scientific analysis." (p. 81). Lacking such habits, modern people can read this book for a philosophical guide to how Kant's thought went on from that point, or spend their time watching hobbits, with the 4 DVD disks that show how the "Lord of the Rings" movies were made, or make countless other choices. People who believe this book might spend a lot of time studying Kant, as the author certainly did.




2. One of the mysteries of the rise of the modern world is the sudden appearance of the grand phase of German philosophy beginning with the work of Kant, as his thought suddenly flowered late in life with his precipitous Critique of Pure Reason. Like an echo reverberating across the ages, Kant's breakthrough both recovered and surpassed the height to which philosophy had reached in Plato. This thunderclap just at the takeoff of the revolutionary passage to a new era is the prelude to an entire new universe of thinking, and joins the world of science, the Enlightenment, with a world as ancient as the Upanishads and as futuristic as Quantum Mechanics. Cassirer's philosophical biography is one of the clearest and most cogent introductions to the Kant's life and work and is a classic in its own right.



3. Over the past few years, I had increasingly developed an interest in the Kantian system. I had approached several of Kant's most important works in order to gain an understanding of his thought, but I found that I often struggled to make clear sense of many of his ideas. Although I had obtained a basic knowledge of his philosophy and some lasting insights from these works, I found that Kant's method of presentation often presented some difficulties regarding a complete understanding of them.

   Ernst Cassirer's book provides the student of philosophy with an excellent elucidation of Kant's system of critical thought and both the characteristics of this philosopher's personality and the currents of thought that were prevalent during and preceding his lifetime that led him to develop the philosophic views for which he is well-known. Cassirer also amalgamates Kant's theoretical, ethical, and aesthetic aims into a whole system that reflects Kant's fundamental philosophical outlook. A great deal of material containing many subtle and frequently misconceived points is presented in a very clear, though well-detailed, way. Cassirer's discussion of the Critique of Judgment, a book that has long stupified many readers, is especially thought-provoking. The impression one receives of Cassirer's deep admiration is understandable given the astonishing intellectual depth and breadth of Kant's achievements This book is highly recommended for anyone seeking a more profound understanding of Kant's life and works.

5 comments about Karl Marx: A Life.

1. Wheen tries to follow a current fashion and divorce the man and the politics. This is often done to Marxists because authors don't want to show what the theory of Marxism is. In the his introduction to Trotsky's autobiography, Joeseph Hanson makes a statement that could very well apply to Marx, too. "To make a truthful film of Trotsky requires taking him as a political figure, but not the kind characteristic of the bourgeois world of today. He was of a different kind-commited, like a great artist, to presenting a faithful reflection of his times, or, moe accurately, a scientist who has become convinced that the main problem facing mankind is to change the framework of our times, to end the agonizing epoch of warring classes and to replace it with a society built on the foundation of a rationally planned economy. He could be pictured truthfully as a tribune and fighter preoccupyed with constructing the organization required to win socialism on a world scale. To make a film of Trotsky in which all this is cast aside is like presenting Pierre and Marie Curie without their drive to discover the secret of radioactivity or the drudgery of fracinating huge amonts of pitchblende in order to isolate the mysterious substances, polonium and radium; or a "drama" of Loius Pasteur without his passionate interest in bacteriology and the painstaking laboratory work he engaged in against the advice of well-meaning friends who sought to persuade him not to waste his valuable time on chimerical and insoluble problems."
   Marx's writing on the Civil War In France and others show that he was indeed interested and active in the politics of his time. The Communst Manifesto actually grew out of his work with the international. Any revolutionary will tell you: It's not about the men, it's about the IDEAS. Revolutions, down-swings, life of a revolutionary revolves around the smell of a fresh print. The man and the idea become bound together flesh and blood, and to seperate Marx from his ideas is to cut off his greatness, leaving a messy bookworm in Soho, London.



2. If you want the best inside look of the man,Karl Marx, this is it.There are no weighty theories or politicial axioms edified in this cornerstone book.One book-example given is of Marx's young daughter,Eleanor,giving him a personal quiz.What is your favorite colour? (Answer-)Red! What is your favorite past-time? (Answer-)Book-Worming! etc.etc.
   Years later,after Eleanor got into a tense arguement with her husband ,she committed suicide.Gray-haired Marx ,the rebarbative rebel and Mary Burns the Irish red-head firebrand, had a son together,who later become an auto mechanic. -Yet,Marx was a sinecure thinker,thanks to Engles.Marx rather liked to play the part of the agent provocateur.He miasmatically smoked black cigars ,lazily reading the afternoon London newspapers,on his Soho couch. He was an arm-chair philosopher,and not an active participant in storming the governmental offices of repression.This book is the best personal portrait of a very complex and mysterious historical thinker .An excellent biograghy !



3. As the reader below observed, this book was a chilling read. Marx was a very strange fellow and this reading this book felt like surveying the scene of a car accident. It hurts to continue but one finds themselves so intrigued that they can hardly stop. For my part, I disagree thoroughly with just about every idea Marx had. Still, I thought it refreshing to read a biography of the man that objectively treated Marx as human first, ragamuffin later; Unlike the brief essay on him in Paul Johnson's "Intellectuals," which is meant only to slam Marx and infuriate the reader.

   I took half a star away for the a-little-less-than-constant humor (or so the author thought.) At first it was mildly amusing, probably do to its gauche inapropriateness. After the first few chapters though, it became a nuisance. How about this one? "Like another Marx, Karl did not want to belong to any club that would have him as a member." PUKE!!

   The other half star is deducted for a suggestion the author makes about three-quarters through, when discussing Das Kapital. He suggests that Marx did not mean Kapital to be a work of science, but a work of ART (he means this literally, not figuratively.) His evidence? Marx refered to Kapital as his "work of art" (my guess, this is metaphor). Also, the author argues, if Marx had already summed up the themes of Kapital in a speech a few years earlier (he did), then why did he write a 1000 page tome espousing the same ideas (he did). Honestly, with flimsy evidence like that, this claim looks utterly ridiculous - not to mention likely insulting to any Marxist or person who takes Marx seriously as a thinker. Enough to cost half a star.

   Otherwise, this book is an unbiased, humanistic read that plays just like a novel. Marx, of course, is a far superior character than any author could ever devise and in the end, my bet is that whether you love or hate him, you will find yourselves modifying your opinion to ambivalence as Marx (the person, not the manifesto) is much too complicated to love or hate.




4. I would not have imagined that a biography of Karl Marx could be such an entertaining and interesting read. This was. Much more has been written about the 'ism' than the man. This is a fascinating insight into his life, his poverty, his exile, his contradictions as well as his thinking.

   What was most noticeable was the remarkable loyalty of Engels - friend, ghost-writer and benefactor - who even became a stranger in a strange land (Capitalism) to help finance publication of Marx's ideas, often in the face of staggering procrastination by the latter.

   This is a very readable account of the life and carbunkles of one of the last century's most influential figures.




5. Let's write a book about Karl Marx which wants to talk about the Man, rather than simply about the Ideas. Sounds great, right? Except that in Wheen's hands, the relationship of the life to the ideas and the ideas to the life are brutally banalized.

   The opportunity to write a good biography obviously presented itself, but what we have instead is some charming personal biography by a man who does not grasp the smallest part of Marx's ideas nor any meaningful engagement with Marx's political activity.

   This book is so lame on the theoretical level that one would think that Wheen spent too much time reading old Stalinist schoolbooks on Marx, avoiding any actual scholarly work, such as Debord, C.J. Arthur, the journals Common Sense and Capital and Class, the work of Lukacs, Korsch, Adorno, Horkheimer, Rubin, etc. Wheen's treatment of the politics is less than worthless and mars his obviously generous sentiment towards Marx the man because Wheen simply cannot grapple with Marx as a whole human being.

   Instead, we are treated to tawdry discussions of Marx's 'psychologically induced illnesses' every time deadlines came due. And these are tawdry not for being uninteresting, but because we never get a sense of the juxtaposition between Marx the researcher (who happily spent a great deal of time in the London Library system) and Marx the writer who did not simply hate deadlines, but who struggled with the content and style of each line he wrote. We never get any sense of why Marx might be the single most influential thinker of the last 150 years.

   I gave it two stars because I do not see Wheen as intentionally malicious, but as merely incompetent. In a world where malicious intent and lack of scholarly scruple towards Marx seems welcome, this is not the worst book ever written on the man, but certainly not one worth reading.

5 comments about Pythagoras: The Mathemagician.

1. A writer that can actually make a person reading his words, feel like they are walking along with the characters, is very gifted. I believe Karim has an extrodinary gift of mixing reality with mystisism giving us all the feeling of being apart of his books. I look forward to reading more of your books, keep writing.



2. When I first heard about the book, I didn't give it much attention. Of course I was excused, because in my opinion, the author's previous book titled "blooming planes" was a disaster. It is true that Karim's debut with "Reflecting Unitas" was excellent, but it was very depressing with the second one.
   
   Anyway, the author is a friend of mine, and I had to buy the book just to see what's inside. But when I started reading, I was kind of amazed because this book was very different from both its predecessors.
   
   Storyline:
   The storyline is well built. The life of Pythagoras is astoundingly described based on historical facts. No doubt Karim has made lots of research and interpreted tons of history books before writing this book. The events are accurately placed in the chronological timeline. Furthermore, the story is of an exploratory nature in a way that the reader is always yearning to read more.
   
   Style:
   The writing style is firm even though it is written in simple English, no complicated expressions, just simple and clear with good descriptions and dialogues. Simplicity and solidarity are both present in the author's script.
   
   Conclusion:
   All in all, a stunning book that really deserves all the awards it has won. And a must-have to every person interested in Greek or Middle Eastern history.



3. The first question I ask myself when I face a book on Pythagoras: "did the Author subjectively limit Pythagoras to a particular specialization like math, music or philosophy? In this book on Pythagoras, the author has succeeded to present Pythagoras as a "polymath"... breaking the bonds of subjectivity to reach a global view... In this context, the familiar image that often presented the "scientific" and the "spiritual", the "tangible" and the "subtle" as diametrically opposed, is replaced with a view that unites both in the oneness of knowledge and the Love of Wisdom - the ultimate Philo-Sophia.
   Someone attached to numbers, like the Pythagoreans, would have felt comfort if they read page 7 which elucidates the "spiritual royal purple color" - the 7th ray... Even if we neglect the page numbers and count the pages from the beginning of the book up to the special number 33, we will find ourselves in front of the famous quote graved on the plate above the entrance...: "Man, know thyself...", and the author did not hesitate to proceed at the end of the same page with "... you will know the secrets of the universe and the gods"
   WATCH OUT! The book may grab you by the thought and leads you to the "Pytha-Goras" concealed deep in each of us... You start reading a book on history and philosophy and you end up - somehow - I do not know how - hearing the music of the spheres...



4. In Pythagoras: The Mathemagician, Karim El-Kousa has written a delightful story about a great philosopher. But he has also managed to convey vibrant details of a great civilization that I am most proud to be one of its descendents: The Phoenicians. Having lived the first twenty one years of my life in the great Phoenician city of Byblos and being the grandson of a Saydounian family makes this story really personal.



5. While reading this book, my surprise and delight went increasing. My surprise first, for discovering Pythagoras represented much more than his well known theorem as he also was a philosopher, a great traveller through space, time, spirits and dimensions. The author Karim, like Pythagoras a seeker of harmony, provided me with great delight as sweet thoughts wandered in my imagination when his book made me dive back into ancient civilisations and traditions described so precisely and so charming, in a state where these two worlds of reality and mysticism brush against each other often and mix with each other sometimes. A great thank to the author and to his thorough and complete research and work in its description of what was Pythagoras life.

3 comments about Hypatia of Alexandria: Mathematician and Martyr.

1. The disappointing thing about this book is the lack of a good narrative. The problem is that there is so little known about Hypatia and her world that not a lot can be said. Try to imagine a colony in Egypt of mostly Greek ethnicity, where pagans and Christians both fought and coexisted and interacted, if not always well, with a Jewish minority. The culture was in decline and the science, such as it was, died with Hypatia. This resembles the contemporary USA more than Egypt or any place in North Africa or the Middle East today. The academic mathematics community has become utterly moribund and it is being followed by theoretical physics (see Lee Smolin's book "The Trouble with Physics"). Who is our version of Hypatia? Perhaps Lynn Margulis, a biologist whe dares to be different.



2. This book is very good. The historical context about Hypatia's time and life is very interesting. Read this book, you'll learn much more about the christian's church in the first times.



3. This is a difficult book to evaluate. Deakin is a mathematician, not a classical historian, and apart from his discussion of Hypatia's place in Alexandrian mathematics, this biography contains little that is not already to be found elsewhere, most notably in Dzielska's study. Deakin does a reasonable job of putting Hypatia in a cultural context, but his understanding of late antiquity is superficial and admittedly garnered largely from encyclopedias. On the other hand, he has closely studied the sources for Hypatia's life (which he includes in an appendix) and the meagre evidence for her influence on philosophy and science. His introduction to astrolabes and conic sections is of some intrinsic interest and helps illuminate the state of knowledge in the fifth century, but since we have not one shred of writing that is inarguably Hypatia's work, the connection is rather tenuous. Nonetheless Deakin's conclusions give a valuable new perspective on this best-known of female Hellenists: one of a teacher with a wide range of interests, if not an original thinker.

5 comments about Spinoza: A Life.

1. Emotions are to be avoided, religion is inherently illogical, only rational philosophy can bring you contentment, free-will is a myth; these are the tenants of Spinoza and, yes, the credo of all Vulcans. All these years of trying to get a sense of Spinoza and 3/4 through the book the image of Mr. Spock came floating through the text. Think about it, if Spinoza was successful in changing the metaphysical paradigm of western civilization, we'd all be Vulcans today. Seriously, this is a good book for any serious Spinozists, and puts into context the genius and guts that was Spionza as well as the remarkable period of tollerance which was the golden age of the Dutch Republic. I would suggest reading Yirmiyahu Yovel's, "Spinoza and Other Heretics" for anyone interested in getting a sense of the Pre-converso environment of the Marranos.



2. The book give a great details about the life during the inquisition time in Spain Portugal & Holland..
   Is has a very good view about the terrible consequences of fanatics in the Catholic religion, and show why the world was intellectually almost paralyzed during the dark ages of the religion terror.
   
   However, the book only give small inside about the wonderful philosophical thinking of Spinoza, is more a historic book than a philosophical one..



3. Steven Nadler skillfully guides the reader not only through Spinoza's life but also through the turbulent times of the 17th century Holland. All the more useful ride to enable us to see the courage of an outstanding man, citizen, a brilliant philosopher who taught us that GOD is Nature and us. Great reading!



4. I simply could not relate to this book, a reaction which may or may not reflect an adequate idea.



5. Baruch de Spinoza (1632-1677), an early figure of European Enlightenment like a Netherlands Descartes or Giordano Bruno, - he fought with his publications for the inauguration of modern times, influenced by sober reason - but still caught in the historical context of a society, which was ruled by the dictatorial interests of confessions and government cabals.

   During Spinoza's lifetime (only 45 years) Amsterdam probably has been Europe's most alive, free and multi-cultural large city - the true mother of Nieuw Amsterdam = New York. As freely however, that anyone could philosophize, whatever he liked to sermonize - no, that wasn't possible staying completely unpunished.

   Many of the perforce secret supporters of Spinoza (publishers, booksellers, authors) landed in the prison or in banishing. Most glaringly is the story of the brothers Johan and Cornelis de Witt, who had protected Spinoza, providing him with food, money and legal support: A furious mob of Monarchists and Calvinists in 1672 got them out of prison and carried out a lynching court in the style of that time: they mangled the bodies and pulled out the hearts, showing them full of triumph to the audience - many of the members of the aristocracy, sitting in carriages. A very anarchistic version of almost forgotten Inca- and Aztec-rites. Only with strive Spinoza's friends could prevent him from posting a placard near the site of the massacre, reading ULTIMI BARBARORUM (You are the greatest of all barbarians).

   Spinoza's family, Jewish, harassed by the Inquisition, had escaped Spain like thousand others to find refuge in the Netherlands, which showed more toleration. Spinoza's first thinking results, which regarded the Bible as an historical writing collection of different humans (thus by no means written by God), led him to be excommunicated from the Dutch community of Portuguese Jews. The autocratic Sephardim rabbinical leadership wrote 1656 in beautiful calligraphic letters: "As to the judgement of the angels and statement of the holy we banish, curse, bewitch and condemn Baruch de Spinoza. Beware of operating with him verbally or in writing, beware of proving him the smallest favor, beware of reading his books..."

   The remainder of his life (like an early forerunner of the famous Anne Frank, who was hidden by Amsterdam citizens from Nazi pursuance) Spinoza hid mostly in small grave chambers of rooms and he lost all the wealth of his family business. Secretly he was supported by friends. Additional he earned money by lens grinding (but the sharpening of glass caused an early death: the inhaled dust destroyed his lungs). Convinced of the correctness of his thinking he as long as possible continued writing, persistently and annoyingly - however anonymous.

   He did not want to die in public at stake like his forerunner Giordano Bruno in Rome 1600. Spinoza was fascinated by the hypothesis of a Pantheism, first developed by the efforts of Giordano Bruno. In his "Treatise on the Emendation of the Intellect" he defined God as ruled by the same causes like nature ("deus, siva natura"). At that time neither the Jews nor the Christians had been ready to accept such dogmatic changes or at least to tolerate such opinions (which of course weakened the religious authorities).

   A large city is - today like at that time - characterized by the fact, that trends in different parts of the society are not simultaneous. The aristocratic, bourgeois, working class or religious circles always have different speeds. The intellectual circles, sympathizing with Spinoza, seemed to live already in the 18th century.

   Because Spinoza, inspired by Hobbes, also risked to formulate basics of a democratic society, he came immediately into conflict with the Netherlands Orangists, who controlled the state. The mob, brought to a level of puppets as well by the princes as by the clerical - the mob was not enlightenmentable by the shy and sensitive considerations of a cautiously hidden publisher.

   We would have to thank Spinoza (if it would be possible) for his persistance, which helped to develop modern constitutions of states and stabilized the opinion, that a religion must not be monopolized, but, in the contrary, has to follow individual interpretations as well. With regard to September Eleven and the US-reaction against fundamentalist assaults we faster could decide, how to response. I think: not using military, but using reason: no religion should lead us to a Crusade or a "Reverse Crusade" anymore. Monopolizing trends of denominations should be stopped. By the name of Spinoza!

5 comments about Street Zen: The Life and Work of Issan Dorsey.

1. I read this book because I heard about a renowned Buddhist named IssanDorsey at a dharma talk. I'm gay myself, and hearing that Issan Dorsey was also a gay man made me interested in finding out about his life. So, I popped his name into a search engine, and ordered this book from amazon.
   Up until recently, my relationship with religion in general has been a bad one. The tendency of Western religions to preach hate toward my kind has made it all but impossible for me to participate in any of them. Legislators on both sides of the political aisle have used religion as a vehicle for either passing laws to restrict my freedom or turn a blind eye to these efforts, for fear that any support for my community would render one 'unelectable'. None of this has made for a very good advertisement of religion for my community.
   Buddhism struck me as being fundamentally different, and when I read this book, I realized just how different it was. Issan Dorsey was from my side of the tracks, and instead of preaching self-loathing to him, Buddhism taught him how he could make a major difference in the lives of those who needed him the most.
   I'm pretty inspired to give this Buddhism thing a try now. I've never heard of a religion that doesn't judge people before. Maybe this is the one for me.



2. I enjoyed this book, and nearly gave it four stars, but I felt that it was missing something.
   
   There was a little too much of the dark history. I know it was setting the stage, but I found that it went from depressing to numbing. Perhaps that's my own baggage: Having known drag queens, drug addicts, drug dealers, and hustlers, I guess I could have skipped over most of the first half of the book.
   
   The intimate details of death towards the end of the book were powerful, and appreciated. Again, perhaps it's just me, but it was refreshing to hear such honest detail without the author becoming gruesome or patronizing. Death, without the facade we in America often use to hide from it.
   
   Two things I would have enjoyed: (1) More details about the author's relationship with Issan, e.g., more conversations they had had simply as friends; (2) Samples of Issan's talks and teachings.
   
   Still, a good book about a great man.



3. My impression from this book was it was a story of a present day Bodhisattva.
   A story of a man whom lived life fearlessly. Who lived as a Herman Hesse's Narcissi but in reality not between book covers. In this book I felt was a true betrayal of the concepts of the Bodhisattva. Issan seems to have had spontaneously.
   
   
   Earlier statements of cheapness is sad.Value statements betray a judgment and lack of Bodhisattva sentiment. Was Milarepa's story a cheap story? The fact that murderer he was? Or is it part of the story of that Bodhisattva's life? I find Issan Dorsey's life neither cheap or over blown. I have known others with similar lives so the fellow whom judges this book as " straight " has a "bent" view. Again cheapness ...well it saddens me to hear a student of Dharma make such a statement.



4. I read the reviews of this book before purchasing it. As a queer writer in Spirituality and Religion I have a great deal of sensitivity about heterosexist bent towards gay characters and history. So, David Sunseri's review of the book sat perched on my shoulder as I read this book.
   
   Having finished this book I have to say that I am left seriously questioning Sunseri's criticism of the book. It is a wonderful story and a tender account of a remarkable person. Having read this book and appreciating the care given to speak to the myriad parts of Issan Dorsey's (full) life story, I have to wonder if Sunseri isn't speaking from a place of internalized homophobia. Nowhere did I find the "sensationalizing" of homosexuality that Sunseri and Harper Leah (?) mention.
   
   In fact, I am now left to believe that Sunseri and Leah would prefer a completely sex-free, queer-free reading of Dorsey's life.
   If the book had sensational parts, that's because parts of Issan Dorsey's life were sensational and outrageous. That's not heterosexist bias dear ones. Heterosexist bias would be to "clean up" those stories and de-queer Dorsey. Fortunately Schneider doesn't suffer from any such prudery.
   
   A closer reading of Sunseri's reviews show what is clearly a bitter bias towards anything involving the entire Soto Zen community. Sunseri states that quite vividly in his review of Robert Winson's "Dirty Laundry."
   
   Fortunately, I don't suffer from that bias. I approached this book wanting to know more about this intriguing person, Issan Dorsey, who, by all accounts, wasn't afraid to embrace the totality of his life's existence and who has left a legacy of caring for others in need.
   
   Do not miss this book if you're interested in a truly remarkable story of a Gay pioneer and spiritual elder. It is not the complete story. But it is one of the stories and it deserves to be read. Perhaps members of the Hartford Zen Center complaining about the lack of Issan's "teachings" in the book could get off their zazen pillows and publish them. I'm sure they have more access to it than anyone.



5. I found this book extremely inspiring. The life of Issan Dorsey is a must read for anyone who has ever felt dragged down, left out, and mentally or physically ill. That should include everyone!

1 comments about Life of Apollonius of Tyana, Vol. 2: Books 5-8 (Loeb Classical Library).

1. _This is the definative, unabridged translation of Philostratus' _Life of Apollonius_ for your permanent library. The Jones translation was made from the Teuber text of C.L. Kayser.
   
   _Philostratus completed this work in C.E. 220, while the historical Apollonius was generally thought to have left this world around C.E. 98. Apollonius is presented as an example of the ideal spiritual and good man in the classical world. In a Roman Empire ruled increasingly by force, violence, and greed, this Apollonius would be the ideal role model. Indeed, that is what you encounter in the books, example after example of Apollonius encountering worldly and wicked men and setting them straight. It is still rather inspiring, even though you realize that this Apollonius is probably a composite character of many philosophical and religious characters of the classical world. This is not to categorically state that there was no original, Pythagorean, named Apollonius that served as the original inspiration- it is just that we do not know how much of the original is still there.
   
   _Apollonius was to be understood as the champion of traditional "pagan" cults and philosophy against the new religion of Christianity. Apollonius is shown to be tolerant to other religions and faiths- something that the new cult, even then, was not. Perhaps his very name reflected this tolerance and defense of the traditional. This is also no doubt why he visits India during his travels, for even in those days the Vedic tradition was seen as the "root" of all religious tradition.
   
   _In any case, the account is still quite edifying in its depiction of what was considered the archetypical example of the good, just, and tolerant man in the late classical world.

2 comments about Gentle Regrets: Thoughts from a Life.

1. One has to be awed by the range of cultural references in this book of autobiographical essays. Coming from a home which was not interested in books, the young Scruton was captivated by Bunyan at the age of 13. At 15 he was into Rilke and Dante. At 16, he and a group of sixth form friends `declared war on kitsch'. By the time he was a Cambridge undergraduate, inspired by T.S.Eliot, he was into Culture in a big way: he and his friends there were `consciously aiming to better themselves', and were establishing hierarchies among works which were not kitsch: the superiority of Mozart over Vivaldi, Milton over Carew, Titian over Veronese, and - Paul McCartney over Mick Jagger. They were elitists, and as such rebels against left wing rebels who were then fashionable. And an individualistic conservative he remained for the rest of his life.
   
   As a 24 year old he was in Paris, and witnessed the events of 1968. He was an admirer of De Gaulle because the General defined the French nation in terms of its high culture, and he detested Foucault, one the gurus of the students, for his shallow relativism and for teaching that `truth' requires inverted commas.
   
   So he was a defiant fish out of water as a lecturer at Birkbeck College at a time when academia in Britain (unlike in the United States) considered conservatism as an aberration, and when, to find an English conservative philosopher, he had to go back to Edmund Burke. In 1978 Scruton sought a parliamentary seat; but his Burkean philosophy was so unfashionable that he was not selected, and `I ceased to be an intellectual Conservative, and became a conservative intellectual instead'. The chapter called `How I Became a Conservative' is a splendidly vigorous presentation and illustration of his beliefs.
   
   For me the finest chapter in the book is the Burkean one on architecture, in which Scruton lambasts modern architecture for its contempt of tradition and for the people on whom it inflicts its soulless and anti-communal monstrosities. Scruton was once Professor of Aesthetics; aestheticism lies at the heart of his conservatism and nowhere does it find more eloquent expression than in this chapter. His hatred of what modern architects have perpetrated was shared by his father, an activist in this respect and whom elsewhere in the book he frequently describes as a foul-tempered tyrant, but who here is given generous filial praise.
   
   Conservatives are sceptical of schemes to make the world a better place: and in religion, too, Scruton is attracted by people who believe that `the duty of a Christian is not to leave this world a better place. His duty is to leave this world a better man.' In one chapter he describes two such Christians - both Roman Catholics - who have been very important to him: here we have an aim of self-improvement which is the spiritual equivalent of the aim he has pursued in the cultural realm. The last chapter (which I found went way over the top in its sweeping claims of the damage done by the lack of religious faith) goes beyond that: it is a sermon on the need for our society and for individuals to recover faith: to bring us together again as a community, to understand suffering as sacrifice, to teach us that we have obligations to the generations who have preceded and who will follow us, to preserve us from the impiety of scientists being allowed to tamper with God's creation, both human and environmental.
   
   There is a chapter on what music in general and opera in particular has mean to the author, in which he conveys his hatred for modern productions that interpose the producer's `message' between the music and the audience.
   
   There is a remarkable chapter called `Living with Sam', the name first of a pet dog, then of a hunter (Scruton is devoted to hunting) and then of Scruton's son. In that chapter he mingles beautiful descriptions with philosophical thoughts about the relationship between humans and animals, about the soul, about personhood and the nature of parenthood, about marriage (which should be a vow and not a contract), and about television (than which `in the armoury of nothingness there is no weapon more lethal').
   
   The rest of the book strikes me as bits and pieces to pad out the volume, without obvious connections to its main theme. There is a chapter on the resonance of names (Scruton's own included); an evocative one on the contrast between Prague and Warsaw in communist and in post communist times (during the former period Scruton did some underground lecturing there). Another chapter reproduces his diary of a six day visit to Finland as a lecturer, fairly relentless and quite funny in its mockery of the lugubrious Finns and their soulless modern buildings. There are diary entries about his friend Iris Murdoch, and about a visit to Soweto in 1983.
   
   The book evoked varying reactions from me. Sometimes I found its tone smug and precious; I enjoyed him when he argues, less so when he asserts. His style varies from the limpid, poetic and beautiful to passages which are too dense to be any of these. He does not suffer fools gladly - robustly and joyously including among them many whom others regard as sages. I think that, like many combative conservatives, he relishes his unpopularity. I was always struck by his fundamental seriousness: it seems to me that almost every aspect of daily life evokes from him philosophical ruminations and associations. Not an easy companion, I would guess; but surely a stimulating one.



2. Gentle Regrets seems to be the perfect title for this work. Especially strong are his writings regarding religion and the Catholic Church, ironic since he is not Catholic. It is also evident that he has suffered through the years from the liberal establishment that holds university life in a vice, refusing to even hear, let alone consider, reasoned dissent. His writing is as strong as his philosophical thoughts.

No comments about Wittgenstein in Cambridge: Letters and Documents 1911-1951.