3,209
Emily Wilson
Seneca: A Life
Penguin Random House UK, 2014
Martin Heidegger once famously opened a lecture on Aristotle with a rather potted biography of the philosopher known as the Stagyrite: “He was born, he lived and worked, and then he died.”
Concise, although more than a little dismissive, but biographies of great men and women necessarily decline in detail the further back in time the subject of the biography lived. (more…)
978 words
Walter Lord
A Night To Remember
R&W Holt, 1955
In this dark time, in our crumbling civilization, where a feral black kid stabs a white student in the chest over a seat, the US dollar is tanking and America is being invaded from the south, it was a pleasure for me to read A Night To Remember, the nonfiction novella about the night Titanic sank. (more…)
5,738 words
CHAPTER 9
AUTOGNOSIS
Know thyself 2.0
The beginning of philosophy is to know the condition of your own mind.
Epictetus
“Know thyself” was famously inscribed on the Temple of Apollo at Delphi and seen by Socrates’ friend Caepheron on a visit there to enquire as to whether Socrates was the wisest of men. Socrates himself tells the story at his trial, and Plato’s Apology represents one of the greatest acts of self-knowing in the history of literature. (more…)
Socrates
Socrates
3.118 słowa
English original here, French, Spanish
Część 8 (Rozdział 1, Rozdział 5, Rozdział 7)
Obecna wersja tego eseju to przemowa, którą wygłosiłem w Seattle 14.10.2012. Dziękuję wszystkim, którzy byli obecni, za inspirującą dyskusję. Pierwotną wersją tego eseju był wykład otwierający zajęcia ze „Wstępu do filozofii”, które prowadziłem dla studentów studiów licencjackich w latach 1990-tych.
Tytuł tego eseju jest poniekąd mylący, ponieważ zamierzam dowodzić, że filozofia ma znaczenie dla wszelkiej ludzkiej aktywności, nie tylko dla polityki. (more…)
Socrates
Socrates
3.754 palabras
English original here, Traducciones: Francés, Polaco
Capítulo 1 aquí, Capítulo 5 aquí
La más reciente reproducción de este ensayo fue una charla el 14 de octubre de 2012 en Seattle. Quiero dar las gracias por la estimulante discusión a todos los que estuvieron presentes. La presentación original tuvo lugar en mi lección de apertura de las clases sobre Introducción a la Filosofía que daba en la década de 1990 en la universidad. (more…)
Epictetus, in an eighteenth-century English artist’s imagining.
Epictetus, in an eighteenth-century English artist’s imagining.
1,834 words
Socrates was not in prison since he was there of his own free will. — Epictetus
I’m free.
And freedom tastes of reality.
— The Who
We should talk about slavery. Goodness knows, it’s not a subject we hear talked about much these days. That’s my dose of irony, now for some history. If you were at school or college today in the West, you would know that no slavery existed until a man called Jim Crow had his people — probably the Ku Klux Klan, or Donald Trump’s ancestors — sail to Africa, cast black people into chains, and then bring them back to America to pick cotton and be lynched. (more…)
28 words / 9:34
Counter-Currents presents a new video of Greg Johnson’s essay “Blaming Your Parents,” about why it’s a bad idea to blame your misfortunes on your upbringing or genetic heritage. (more…)
Young Sailor Ripley lacked “parental guidance.”
Young Sailor Ripley lacked “parental guidance.”
73 words / 10:18
Greg Johnson has published a recording of himself reading his 2018 essay “Blaming Your Parents,” on the fallacy of blaming one’s parents for one’s misfortunes, and it is now available for download and online listening. The original essay is currently being featured in Counter-Currents’ new Classics Corner (see the right-hand sidebar). (more…)
Edvard Munch, Melancholy (1894)
Edvard Munch, Melancholy (1894)
1,151 words
During a livestream on July 2, 2022, I was asked what advice I would give to people who are contemplating suicide. Hyacinth Bouquet transcribed my answer, which I have edited. I want to thank her and the original questioner. (more…)
150 words / 2:12:52
Have you done your homework? Greg Johnson tried something new on the last installment of Counter-Currents Radio. Bowing to the many requests to create audiobooks, he read his essay “The Uppity White Folks Manifesto” from his book, White Identity Politics. (more…)
87 words / 1:03:55
Greg Johnson was joined by Morgoth to discuss David Lean’s classic film The Bridge on the River Kwai on last weekend’s livestream, and it is now available for download and online listening.
Topics discussed include:
Visual beauty in older films
David Lean
The original novel
(more…)
1,495 words
Seneca and James Romm, ed., trans.
How to Keep Your Cool: An Ancient Guide to Anger Management
Princeton University Press, 2019
Long before self-help books, pop-psychology gurus, TED talks, non-fiction political punditry, and “anger-management” classes, the ancients dispensed wisdom on a variety of topics, personal and societal. (more…)
395 words
Translated by Greg Johnson
We are approaching Christmas (another name for the winter solstice). Associated with the evergreen tree, Christmas has always been celebrated in European countries (more…)