Understanding Politics: Introductory Reading List, 2nd Ed.
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Plato Notes
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Pierre Manent’s Beyond Radical Secularism, updated notes
Pierre Manent’s Beyond Secular Radicalism Preface Manent begins with a reflection on the political formation of modern France. Many of his reflections apply more broadly to Europe, and […]...
New Manent Seminar: Beyond Radical Secularism
Message from David Alexander: I would like to propose that we read Beyond Radical Secularism by Pierre Manent and do so on the following schedule: 26OCT- parts 1-5, to pg. […]...
Greek Discovery of Mind, Socrates, notes
Socrates The intrusion of the systematic exigence into the realm of common sense is beautifully illustrated by Plato’s early dialogues. Socrates would ask for the definition of this or that […]...
Manent, The City of Man, Ch. 4, pp. 137-155, Parts 15-23
15 Locke does not deny that man has an essence or a substance but claims, in fact, that it is unknowable. Man’s being is enclosed in the opaque tautology: […]...
Manent, The City of Man, Ch. 4, pp. 126-137, Parts 8 – 14
8 John Locke agrees that man is different from the animals, distinguished by his power of abstracting. It is only that we do not know what his substance is and […]...
Pierre Manent’s City of Man, chapter 4, notes
Notes on Manent’s The City of Man, Chapter IV: The Hidden Man 1 Manent has described thus far the three major spheres in modern man’s self-consciousness: History, Society and Economy. […]...
Pierre Manent’s City of Man, ch. 3, Notes
Notes on Manent’s The City of Man, Chapter III, “The Economic System” by David Alexander 1 Where Montesquieu cautiously established the English experience as a new authority, Adam Smith accepted […]...
Pierre Manent, City of Man, chapter 2, notes
Notes on Chapter 2 of Manent’s The City of Man “All literature, all philosophy, all history abounds with incentives to noble action, incentives which would be buried in black darkness […]...