This essay is included in Volume 33 of The Collected Works of Eric Voegelin(Edited by Ellis Sandoz The Drama of Humanity and Other Miscellaneous Papers,1939-1985,1990,pp.384-394).According to the editor's note,the essay presents a transcript of a speech delivered by Voegelin at a seminar held in Tutzing,Germany,in 1981.Voegelin begins by reflecting on contemporary realities to investigate the meditative origin of the philosophical knowledge of order.After identifying and addressing the disordered phenomena in contemporary society,Voegelin sought to return and revive the Platonic-Aristotelian meditative tradition of ancient Greece.However,unlike Leo Strauss who strictly separated revelation from reason,Voegelin maintained that reason contains elements of revelation and vice versa.The divine-human tension within this framework manifests as a movement of moving and being moved.Different types of questing of truth fundamentally condition subsequent cultural patterns,from which Voegelin extracted the key and common concepts as materials for reflection and critique.Ultimately,this essay represents a crucial point in the development of Voegelin's later thought.Concepts such as"It-reality","complex"and"reflective distance"introduced here directly enriched the theoretical framework of Volume 5 of Order and History,titled In Search of Order.
The Republic's paradoxical definition of justice—minding one's own business—comes mainly from Socrates' examination of the arts.The definition applies well to artisans who specialize in single trades,but poorly to warriors who meddle in everyone's affairs.Are the warriors then unjust?Rather than conclude that they are,the paper maintains that justice is conditioned by class and that the justice practiced by warriors(self-sacrificing and homogenizing)differs from the justice practiced by workers(self-serving and differentiating).But because the formal definition never changes,despite the awkwardness of fit,the paper further suggests that something is askew with justice,with its demand for right order,and that the transcendence of justice is a goal which the dialogue secretly endorses.The paper thus supports those scholars who contend that the Republic falls short in its efforts to prove the goodness of justice or who see in the Republic a warning against the perfection of justice.
Plato briefly discussed the"diseases of the soul"(86b-87b)in his later dialogue"Timaeus".From a modern perspective,his pathological analysis of the soul is not so much a"psychiatry"as a"moral psychology"about the"root of evil".His basic proposition is that the diseases of the soul-including moral evils and intellectual defects-are the result of physical defects.Therefore,people should not be responsible for these defects and should not be blamed for them.
As an essential element of survival,auditory experience shapes the character of civilization.In Daoist thought,the Zhuangzi consciously discusses auditory experience,including clearly transcending vision with listening,and further transcending listening with empathy.In terms of what is heard,Zhuangzi surpasses"pipes of humans"(ren lai 人籁)with"pipes of the earth"(di lai地籁).The former is characterized by coordination and response,while the latter has visual structures.At the same time,Zhuangzi surpasses"pipes of the earth"with"pipes of heaven"(tian lai 天籁),which reflects on the sound of natural silence.On the methodological level of how to listen,through the depiction of"listening with the ears"(ting zhi yi er听之以耳),"listening with the heart"(ting zhi yi xin 听之以心)and"listening with Qi"(ting zhi yi qi听之以气),Zhuangzi also shows the ideological path of rejecting vision and sublating hearing and finally returning to empathy.The discussion of auditory experience in the Zhuangzi and its attitude towards hearing provide abundant resources and positive enlightenment for reflecting on the current auditory landscape.
As the conceptual bridge of Mou Zongsan to digest Immanuel Kant's philosophy,"intelligence intuition"and"thing-in-itself"which are made the interpretation of sensory metaphor can give us a perception paradigm behind Mou's digestion of Kant's philosophy."Thing-in-itself"cannot appear as"objects"in the dual structure with the subject,so Mou denied it is the concept of fact which is the deep reason.The theoretical concern points"how is non-object cognition possible".In coordination with the"non objectiveness"of thing-in-itself,it is understanding of Mou's"Non-vision Property"of intelligence intuition.Through the analysis of the different perceptual structures behind intelligence intuition,it can be found the difference between Mou and Kant.Kant supports visual thinking,while Mou holds that"Intelligence intuition"is auditory and gustatory.Consciously resisting vision,highlighting hearing and attributing to taste are not only the internal clues of Mou's ideological development,but also the perceptual evolution logic behind his digestion of Kant's philosophy.
