Thomas Akehurst on why Russell blamed German fascism on German philosophy.
http://philosophynow.org/issues/97/Bert ... _The_Nazis
Bertrand Russell Stalks The Nazis
Re: Bertrand Russell Stalks The Nazis
You would think that a philosopher like Bertrand Russell would have been detached, more astute and un-bias in his thoughts. But he too was human and fallible. Today I am sure he would have a better and broader understanding of what had transpired in world events to trigger the first world war. He might discover it was not all Germany's fault. There was enough fault to go around. He might discover that British philosophy and actions (or inactions) also had a hand in bringing on that devastating war. Were he around today he might have the brilliance of mind to quote something Hegel realized, that, like today, events are in the saddle riding mankind. British attitude at the time had grown complacent and encouraged stagnation and divisions in the world. Germany's war helped destroy that confining attitude.
In turn the Germans could have pointed a finger at British philosophy and said the war that was tearing Europe apart was also due to Darwin and what he had unearthed about evolution. The Germans might have added that Britain's policies of colonization and industrialization were also contributing factors in why the world had gone to war twice in Russell's lifetime.
When you think about it Germany's wars, ironically, helped bring about more stability and unification in the world. I wonder if Russell could bear that thought.
In turn the Germans could have pointed a finger at British philosophy and said the war that was tearing Europe apart was also due to Darwin and what he had unearthed about evolution. The Germans might have added that Britain's policies of colonization and industrialization were also contributing factors in why the world had gone to war twice in Russell's lifetime.
When you think about it Germany's wars, ironically, helped bring about more stability and unification in the world. I wonder if Russell could bear that thought.
Last edited by spike on Thu Sep 26, 2013 3:48 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Re: Bertrand Russell Stalks The Nazis
Imagine, Bertrand Russell was criticizing the German philosophical TEAM for advancing something that the British had already put into practice. German philosophers abstractly talked in mega terms of Humankind as an single entity. In contrast the British philosophers were hypocritical and contradictory. The British team championed individualism and independent thinking. Yet they were the ones who were concretely institutionalized and colonized the world so that one day it would work in tandem as the German philosophers imagined.
It was Kant, the German, who theoretically said that democracies don't go to war with each other. But it wasn't German philosophers who made that notion a concrete proposition. It was the British, with their language and institutions.
It was Kant, the German, who theoretically said that democracies don't go to war with each other. But it wasn't German philosophers who made that notion a concrete proposition. It was the British, with their language and institutions.
Re: Bertrand Russell Stalks The Nazis
Bertrand Russell criticized Hegel for thinking big. In contrast Russell was a small thinker. He was a logician and a nitpicker. Hegel unearthed the determinants of civilization and the world. Russell unearthed very little. He is mostly known for his contribution to the philosophy of mathematics and analytics. However, Russell had one advantage over Hegel. He was a better writer.
If you haven't noticed we live in a Hegelian world, not a Russellian world. It is not the logical world Russell would have liked but the conflicting, changing world Hegel envisioned. Russell was born into an aristocratic family, in a Britain of class destinations. Russell would have liked to keep it that way. In contrast German philosophy was radical and was for removing class destinations. For Hegel one of the chief determinants of humankind was the struggle for freedom and recognition. For Russell it was about maintaining the status quo.
Russell's gentry style Britain evoked a complacency and a superiority that eventually brought about its decline. Hegel and his disciples brought about the revolutionary world we see today and, ironically, the renewal and revitalization of the Britain we also see today.
If you haven't noticed we live in a Hegelian world, not a Russellian world. It is not the logical world Russell would have liked but the conflicting, changing world Hegel envisioned. Russell was born into an aristocratic family, in a Britain of class destinations. Russell would have liked to keep it that way. In contrast German philosophy was radical and was for removing class destinations. For Hegel one of the chief determinants of humankind was the struggle for freedom and recognition. For Russell it was about maintaining the status quo.
Russell's gentry style Britain evoked a complacency and a superiority that eventually brought about its decline. Hegel and his disciples brought about the revolutionary world we see today and, ironically, the renewal and revitalization of the Britain we also see today.
Re: Bertrand Russell Stalks The Nazis
Richard Wagner was not a philosopher as such but I am surprised that Russell didn't also blame him for Germany's fascism. His music was loved by the Nazis and it stirred a Prussian nationalism. But a reason I think why Russell did not lump him in with Hegel and Nietzsche as encouraging fascism is because Wagner was also a fellow pacifist and a womanizer.
Stephen Fry of the Guardian said this on why he loves Wagner despite the fact that he is a Jew: "The older you get, the more you realise that the complexities and ambiguities of art [as with philosophy] will always allow one person to run a magnet over its iron filings and make them all point one way. But that's doing a disservice to art. Art isn't like that [just like philosophy isn't like that].
Bertrand Russell could have used Fry's insight in his approach to German philosophers.
By the way, Picasso was also a pacifist like Russell and Wagner. But he was also a womanizer. A conclusion we can draw from that is that pacifists would rather make love, not war. Nevertheless, they all were fascists in their own right in how they treated women.
Stephen Fry of the Guardian said this on why he loves Wagner despite the fact that he is a Jew: "The older you get, the more you realise that the complexities and ambiguities of art [as with philosophy] will always allow one person to run a magnet over its iron filings and make them all point one way. But that's doing a disservice to art. Art isn't like that [just like philosophy isn't like that].
Bertrand Russell could have used Fry's insight in his approach to German philosophers.
By the way, Picasso was also a pacifist like Russell and Wagner. But he was also a womanizer. A conclusion we can draw from that is that pacifists would rather make love, not war. Nevertheless, they all were fascists in their own right in how they treated women.