This extended essay joins an old conversation at the intersection of freedom and necessity. Though it takes place at the beginning of the twenty-first century by the "Christian" reckoning that has become an integral part of European identity, it will at times read like a conversation between classical Greece and nineteenth-century Europe. The cast consists of characters drawn from Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, and Plato as well as the authors themselves - Plato, Aristotle, Locke, Hume, Kant, Kierkegaard, MacIntyre, and Nussbaum. Some of these writers have been associated with displaced, displacing claims of universality; but each is in place and in time in ways that are instructive for ethics. Myth, the matter of stories, becomes also the matter of critical reflection, which in turn is subjected to critical reflection. Every fragment of philosophy is a contribution to the reflection, and it is nothing if it is separated from the matter - the stories, the myths, and the characters (including us) who both make them and live in them.
CONTENTS
FOREWORD by Thomas Magnell
PREFACE
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
ONE
Walking Backwards
1. From Is to Ought: The Place of Value
2. Freedom and Necessity
3. Orientation
TWO
A Labor Theory of Value
1. Alienation and Objectification
2. Symbols and Signs
3. Possibility and Play
THREE
The End of Ethics
1. A Principle of Utility
2. Silence
3. Activity, State, and Habit
FOUR
Virtue in Action
1. Two Arts
2. A Science of Measurement
3. Living Life and Saving It
4. Numbering and Knowing
5. Knowledge and Desire
FIVE
The Shape of Character
1. Prudence
2. The Order of That Which Has Parts
3. Vulnerability
4. Active Desire
5. Perception and Passion
6. The Necessity of Experience
SIX
The Shape of the City
1. A Hunt
2. A Poetics of Particulars
3. Culture and Nature
4. Entropy and Art
SEVEN
Nature and Human Nature
1. The Way of Revolution
2. The Language of Rights
EIGHT
Cultivating Rules
1. Practical Reason
2. Moral Development
NINE
Rule and Relationship
1. The Soul of Tragedy
2. The Temptation of Knowledge
TEN
Confession and Community
1. Status Confessionis
2. Profession
ELEVEN
Practicing Value
1. Kenosis
2. Reading the West
3. Embracing the World
REFERENCES
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
INDEX
CONTENTS
FOREWORD by Thomas Magnell
PREFACE
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
ONE
Walking Backwards
1. From Is to Ought: The Place of Value
2. Freedom and Necessity
3. Orientation
TWO
A Labor Theory of Value
1. Alienation and Objectification
2. Symbols and Signs
3. Possibility and Play
THREE
The End of Ethics
1. A Principle of Utility
2. Silence
3. Activity, State, and Habit
FOUR
Virtue in Action
1. Two Arts
2. A Science of Measurement
3. Living Life and Saving It
4. Numbering and Knowing
5. Knowledge and Desire
FIVE
The Shape of Character
1. Prudence
2. The Order of That Which Has Parts
3. Vulnerability
4. Active Desire
5. Perception and Passion
6. The Necessity of Experience
SIX
The Shape of the City
1. A Hunt
2. A Poetics of Particulars
3. Culture and Nature
4. Entropy and Art
SEVEN
Nature and Human Nature
1. The Way of Revolution
2. The Language of Rights
EIGHT
Cultivating Rules
1. Practical Reason
2. Moral Development
NINE
Rule and Relationship
1. The Soul of Tragedy
2. The Temptation of Knowledge
TEN
Confession and Community
1. Status Confessionis
2. Profession
ELEVEN
Practicing Value
1. Kenosis
2. Reading the West
3. Embracing the World
REFERENCES
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
INDEX