Thursday, November 17, 2005
In-der-Blog-sein
Positive Liberty has a thoughtful post on Strauss and his critics, with reference to Celine via Bloom, and notes about them, nihilism, and the masses:
Positive Liberty has a thoughtful post on Strauss and his critics, with reference to Celine via Bloom, and notes about them, nihilism, and the masses:
More importantly the Straussians genuinely believed that keeping nihilism confined to the wise few was better for society, in a sort of utilitarian sense (though they weren’t utilitarians). It was, I sincerely believe, out of genuine concern for society. This is important: While they believe that Nietzsche and Heidegger were correct as to the ultimate nihilistic nature of reality, such a “Truth” could not be used to found political orders. And indeed, such a Truth gaining wider public acceptance made Weimar German more receptive to Nazism.I wonder if that last sentence was actually the case, or the public was simply confused, and tired, and just wanted a patriarch to provide them with jobs and security. Did the masses accept the Nazis' vision of a renewed German nation as an antidote to nihilism, or was that just the case with certain intellectuals? ¶ 9:10 AM
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I think it was just the case with certain intellectuals.
After all, while some German emigres certainly advanced the notion that the history of German thought led inescapably to nihilism, thus preparing the way for Nazification, others approached the problem of Hitler from vastly dissimilar angles. For example, many of the emigre psychologists and sociologists working for the war department postulated the kind of psychological explanations appropriate to their disciplines. One such emigre, Erik Erikson, speculated in part that the appeal of the Nazis lay in their embodiment of a kind of conflicted adolescence present in pre-war Germany which resonated with the national psyche.
Other intellectuals had different takes. I'm willing to bet, however, that none of them submitted a report to the OSS which enumerated an encounter with the abyss of Being as the likely cause of Hitler's rise to power.
After all, while some German emigres certainly advanced the notion that the history of German thought led inescapably to nihilism, thus preparing the way for Nazification, others approached the problem of Hitler from vastly dissimilar angles. For example, many of the emigre psychologists and sociologists working for the war department postulated the kind of psychological explanations appropriate to their disciplines. One such emigre, Erik Erikson, speculated in part that the appeal of the Nazis lay in their embodiment of a kind of conflicted adolescence present in pre-war Germany which resonated with the national psyche.
Other intellectuals had different takes. I'm willing to bet, however, that none of them submitted a report to the OSS which enumerated an encounter with the abyss of Being as the likely cause of Hitler's rise to power.
# posted by 
: 4:46 PM
: 4:46 PM
Go point about Being being a concealed truth from the OSS.
The way some contra-Heidegger journalists go on about his involvement with the Reich, one expects to see the crowds in German cities in the 1930s waving their copies Being & Time in the grainy back and white footage of those documentaries on the History channel.
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The way some contra-Heidegger journalists go on about his involvement with the Reich, one expects to see the crowds in German cities in the 1930s waving their copies Being & Time in the grainy back and white footage of those documentaries on the History channel.
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