[This excerpt is from Chapter 4 of Explaining Postmodernism: Skepticism and Socialism from Rousseau to Foucault] Fichte on education as socialization Johann Fichte was a disciple of Kant. Born in 1762, he studied theology and philosophy at Jena, Wittenberg, and Leipzig. In 1788 he read Kant’s Critique of Practical Reason, and that reading changed Fichte’s […]
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Business education is often good at teaching useful business theories and skills, but it is less often good at teaching ethics. Ethics is often seen as irrelevant or as an obstacle, so business ethics is either not included in the core business curriculum or offered as an elective ornament. Claim: Ethics is organically central to
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[This is Section 16 of Nietzsche and the Nazis.] 16. Eugenics Nazi education and censorship attempted to control people’s minds. The Nazis also controlled the bodies of their citizens as much as possible. Milder controls involved new public-health measures such as an aggressive campaign against smoking: the Nazis banned smoking in certain public places, ran
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[This is Section 17 of Nietzsche and the Nazis.] 17. Economic controls Through education and censorship, the Nazis attempted to socialize the German mind. Through public health measures and eugenics, they attempted to socialize the German body. A natural extension of both policies was to socialize German economic production. As would be expected by the
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[This is Section 18 of Nietzsche and the Nazis.] 18. Militarization The most important part of the new Germany was the military. On a historically unprecedented scale, the German economy became a war economy. Conscription had been reintroduced in 1935, and in 1936 Hermann Göring took over as Germany’s economic minister. Under Göring’s direction, Germany
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Following up on an earlier post contrasting modernism with pre-modernism, I here contrast post-modernism to both. Postmodernism as a philosophical system is defined by means of its characteristic claims in the five major branches of philosophy: metaphysics, epistemology, human nature, ethics, and politics. Postmodernism as a historical movement is defined by the time of its
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Intellectual systems and movements are defined philosophically by means of their characteristic claims in the five major branches of philosophy: metaphysics, epistemology, human nature, ethics, and politics. As historical movements, they are defined by the time of their formulation and most vigorous activity. So in the following table I offer a definitions of pre-modernism and
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Since 1990, the percentage of Americans who are Christian fell by 11 points, while the percentage of atheists rose 7 points. Those are, as Cathy Lynn Grossman of USA Today writes, “dramatic shifts in just 18 years.” According to this Pew Forum survey, religiousness in Illinois is below the national average, which may explain the
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