>
>I wondered how long it would take Charles to get around to his tu qoque
>defense.
>
>^^^^^^^^
>
>CB: It is not exactly a defense . It is a counterattack. Implied in your
>characterization of the history of Soviet philosophy is that your
>philosophical school(s) of thought are "better" in a number of ways.
In every way, I'd say.
>On this point the implication is that Western philosophy somehow uses
>reason and fairness in deciding who will be philosophers, whereas the
>Soviets used an arbitrary and dumb "Stalinist" standard.
No, the Soviets used a cruel and tyrannical Stalinist standard. Our process is merely irrational and unfair. Of course that's not a reflection on the quality of the work. It is really not humanly possible to do good work under Stalinist conditions, where you are told what to say OR ELSE. It is merely difficult to do it under conditions of liberal democracy, where you have to watch yourself, keep up with fashion, not offend the powerful, or you may not get tenure or get hired.
>
>But even more, isn't Marxism in power supposed to upset the status quo,
>conventional academic apple cart some, including in philosophy. The notion
>that all philosophical traditions and schools of thought in Russia at that
>time would be tolerated does not recognize the seriousness attitude of
>Marxists toward philosophy.
>
Right, it's too important to allow freedom of speech and thought. Who knows where THAT would lead. So what, exactly, is the anti-Soviet slander in saying that the Bolsheviks and Stalinists repressed free inquiry in philosophy. Arent you saying they did it, and a good thing too?
>I know the forms of authority and discipline are not identical in the two
>systems , but I don't think the bottomline result is that different
Charles, the bottom line result was that after I was fired I went to a good law school, got a several federal judicial clerkships, and am interviewing for well-paying jobs; I continue to write and publish in journals of philosophy of law. Ryazanov (and scores or hundreds more of Soviet philosophers) was murdered in a labor camp when he fell out of favor.
>It is not surprising that a revolution would result in significant changes
>in personnel in many segments of society.
That's one way of putting it, a whole new meaning to "fired." (Bang!)
jks
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