Greece, Europe, and the Hegemony of Psychopathy
Question: Why can’t Greece repay its debts? Answer: Because its economy is in shambles. Question: Why is its economy so bad? Answer: Because the EU destroyed it. That’s the short answer. It’s not the answer you’ll read in most newspapers or hear on the TV – those will tell you that it’s all the Greeks’ own fault. Their incompetent politicians and low productivity are too blame, they’ll tell you, or something similar. While it is undoubtedly true that Greece – like most other countries, by the way – has had its share of incompetent politicians, the story the mainstream press...
Anarchism as Metaphilosophy
Near the end of the prologue of Plato’s Republic, Socrates says to his opponent Thrasymachus that what they are discussing is “no ordinary/insignificant matter, but how we ought to live” (1.352d). As in many of Plato’s writings, Socrates here played the role of his mouthpiece: “How we ought to live” was indeed no insignificant matter for Plato, but the starting point and ultimate purpose of his philosophical investigations. Relegating the pre-Socratic philosophers to the discipline’s prehistory, it is sometimes suggested that Western philosophy started with Plato. Alfred North Whitehead even claimed that the history of Western philosophy “consists of a...