Zach Wu AP Lit Blog

Hello friends. 

We have made it to the endzone of Philosophantasy. See, that’s funny because endzone is football terminology and this blog heavily featured football in the fall semester. For my final installment, I’m going to be doing a semi-extensive breakdown of the implications of Machiavellism. We’re going to talk about a couple of critical nuances in his theory of governance and leadership. If you’ve read this far, I hope you will learn something or maybe even be able to identify a Machiavel in a book you’ve read or a movie you’ve watched. Let’s philosophize, one last time!

Here’s a brief recap of what we know about Machiavelli: 

• He was a Florentine diplomat in the 15th century. 
• Italy was splintered into many warring city-states, of which Florence was usually the weakest. 
• As such, Machiavelli sought to build institutions and systems for governance that could withstand the turmoil and the constant upheaval around him. 
• To this end, he disputed the Platonic notion that the best or most effective rulers were the ones who were most virtuous and good, in a moral sense. As such, politics is irreducible to morality.

With all of this, we get the pithy “it is better to be feared than loved” from Machiavelli. In this post, I want to try to figure out whether this maxim is overly reductive. For starters, it seems strange to suggest a ruler should care more about entrenching their authority over legitimacy. If Machiavelli was so bent on avoiding the constant tumult and disruption to authority that typified his era, how could he conscionably endorse a philosophy that accepted the disapproval of the people as a condition of rulership?

Seems counterintuitive at best, and destructive at worst. 

Machiavelli has three layers of responses to this admittedly incisive challenge. 

Firstly, his theory of effective leadership is situational. Machiavelli does not promote or encourage people to act in morally transgressive ways all the time. He is simply pointing out that there are a wealth of scenarios where winning and maintaining political power is only possible if a leader is readily willing and capable to act outside the moral codes that govern the lives of ordinary individuals. In other words, he is not prescribing indiscriminate harm. He wants rulers to be comfortable with it in limited cases, and economize it. 

Secondarily, Machiavelli also agrees that in the medium to long term, it is more important to avoid being hated. After all, the people did outnumber the landed aristocracy so if interests were ever to be misaligned, it is unlikely a ruler could avoid revolution or mass unrest. 

Tertiarily, Machiavelli favored a famous animal analogy to explain this idea. He believed that a successful ruler should acquire characteristics exhibited by both a lion and a fox. The lion is the more typical projection of strength and absolute power, being the animal most feared, and as such, is often how we think about Machiavelli’s preference for fear over love. However, Machiavelli also encourages rulers to adopt more foxlike qualities. For instance, while the nobility of princes that always keep their promises is admirable, the more successful princes are ones who cared little for keeping their word and instead learned how to disguise promise-breaking as legitimate. A successful ruler should outwardly represent an image of fear (the lion), despite performing generous and more good-natured actions that would disguise all the duplicitous promise-breaking (the fox). 

I want to examine Machiavelli’s theory and its implications vis-a-vis other major philosophical schemes. In the pursuit of an effective principality, is Machiavelli saying “the ends justify the means” or, rather, that to be an effective political leader means doing things that are not fully justifiable? This question, I think, is especially salient because it asks whether Machiavellism requires a certain utilitarian or non-utilitarian moral frame. Let’s use torture as our example. There are practically three schools of thought. 

First, you can argue that torture is categorically wrong and should never be practiced. 

Second, you can believe that torture is wrong, but sometimes warranted and NOT wrong (or not as wrong) when it is used to achieve good outcomes. For instance, calling back to the text we analyzed in the first installment of Philosophantasy, Peter Singer might argue that torture is wrong as a general principle but torturing suspected terrorists is not wrong for welfare maximization for the greatest number. 

Third, is the Machiavellian view. Torture is wrong (as in, we agree that is is the wrong thing), but it sometimes should be done. This belief tracks with Machiavelli’s theory because the responsible leader has to be bad, to a degree. Regardless of whether torture is good or bad, the ruler should be willing to use it.

This distinction vis-a-vis the main utilitarian view of torture is what nuances Machiavelli in a very interesting way. Machiavelli is telling rulers to learn to be able NOT to be good and to use this and not use it according to necessity. Under Machiavelli’s view, there is a relevant difference between being NOT good and NOT being good. He would concede that torture is morally wrong and that its application is immoral, but still argue for its use, whereas the classical utilitarian would say there are particular instances where torture would change from not good to good (if it were utility-maximizing). 

Here, I will make a cheeky little appeal to the audience. 

If you want a rock-solid example of Machiavellian behavior, look at the book you’re currently reading. In Hamlet, Claudius kills his own brother and uses lying and other forms of manipulation of the people around him to gain power and glory. At the same time, he also disguises his malintent with theatricality and an amenable public image to gain the support of the courtiers and the people around him. 

Additionally, note the other motivations and machinations of the characters in Hamlet. Claudius conspires with people to spy on Hamlet and even sends him out of the country. Hamlet focuses on play-acting and convincing everyone that he is mad with grief. The characters Rosencrantz and Guildenstern function strictly as instruments of this deception and duplicity. 

Machiavellism is all around us. The world, whether effectual or fictional, contains so many situations and the interplay of interests that come straight from Machiavelli’s manuscript. 

“Everyone sees what you appear to be; few experience what you really are.” 

Thanks for reading. 

Hello friends. 

In honor of my favorite four days of April, The Masters, I am going to spend this blog post telling you about one of the premier masters of all time, Niccolò Machiavelli. Arguably history’s most well-known master of lies, manipulation, and politics, Machiavelli’s discourses make for some of the most interesting deep dives into power and thought-provoking examinations of human nature that you could possibly find. Here, Machiavelli may be a more familiar and palatable name for folks, if there is anyone here who has persisted to this installment of Philosophantasy out of their own volition and not by compulsory assignment.

Moreover, I also think Machiavellism, if I may, inheres within all dimensions of human conduct, including but not limited to politics in the conventional measure of the word (think legislatures and diplomacy). Machiavellian ideas are uncannily salient in offices, board rooms, and even families around the world. 

In other words, this post is gonna be a banger. Trust. 

Before we even get into the substance, I want to forwardly tackle the question: why Machiavelli? If you polled the teachers in the Social Studies Department here at Naperville North and asked them what Machiavelli’s occupation was, I’m dubious that any of them would characterize the Florentine diplomat as a “philosopher.” His writings were certainly politically influential, but it’s admittedly unclear why Machiavelli’s scholarship merits a seat at the philosophy table. But I would make that case. 

I think the best proof of Machiavelli’s worth as a political philosopher (or however you might term his idiosyncratic brand of thought) is the vivacity of the scholarly debate that succeeded him. The Prince, Machiavelli’s seminal work, stood unequivocally against notable ancient philosophers like Plato, a figure you more than likely have studied at some point in your K-12 career. His theory in The Prince was, if nothing else, a direct call-out of the Platonic scheme and the classical view that the strongest political regimes are governed by the most virtuous people. As a consequence, Machiavelli commanded staggering attention and invited lively responses from thinkers like Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Baruch Spinoza. 

 

At the core of The Prince lies not a political prescription, but an ethical proposition. And at that, one that is highly relevant to scores of thinkers since the time Machiavelli was alive. Now we can talk about what Machiavelli actually believed and wrote about.

Let’s philosophize!

 

 

First, some helpful historical context. Niccolò Machiavelli lived in a uniquely interstitial era. For anyone out there who has taken a European history class, you’ll recall that the 1648 Peace of Westphalia marked the formal ratification of ideas like sovereignty and the relationships between sovereign territories. Machiavelli was prolific a full century before this treaty, but his ideas, highlighting the need for a new order and system of governance in a post-medieval world, were not all that different from the reality that eventuated in the Holy Roman Empire following the Thirty Years’ War. 

Renaissance Italy (14th and 15th centuries, approximately) was composed of many city-states, including Genoa, Milan, and Rome. Each of those city-states, headed up by a feudal prince, was characteristically seeking to expand and endeavor against one another. So, only through marital alliances and impermanent loyalties was a delicate balance of power preserved between the Italian states. Machiavelli serves Florence, the smallest and weakest of the states, and spends most of his time persuading the surrounding states to neither invade nor expect their help in kind during warfare. With regimes regularly undergoing upheaval and the balance of power in constant oscillation, Machiavelli wanted to establish enduring institutions and a modern apparatus of government for Florence that could guarantee continuity and stability amidst such strife and disorder. 

Specifically, the common view during Machiavelli’s time was that political power was only rightful if acquired and exercised by a rightful and virtuous ruler. To many philosophers of this time, ethical goodness and the right to rule went hand in hand. In The Prince, Machiavelli labels this moralistic view as antiquated and defunct. He accurately perceived that republics were extremely fragile and that Florence was particularly susceptible. Thus, leaders that placed their commitments to ethical goodness before the maintenance of power and the protection of the state were even likelier to fail. Goodness, righteousness, virtue, and morality are wholly insufficient to win power, let alone maintain it. 

For Machiavelli, politics is irreducible to morality. The political and the moral are two spheres that may but needn’t overlap. The clear implication of his theory that we must treat politics as its own domain instead of a subset of morality is that oftentimes, politics will transgress morality. 

This treatise is, in part, where we get the Machiavellian maxim that it is “better to be feared than loved.” Machiavelli’s perspective was that the legitimacy of any given law rested entirely on the ability to enforce it. In other words, the goodness of the law matters very little because human subjects do not obey laws out of reverence for their goodness, but out of fear of the power of the state. For instance, I may disagree with certain parking restrictions imposed by Naperville North HS and think that they are nonsensical, but I will nonetheless obey them because I do not want to have my privileges to park revoked. I can only defy these rules if I can resist the school’s demands or endure the school’s consequences (hint: I cannot). So, this sharp criticism of the moralistic tendencies of the Middle Ages is not unfounded. The dependence on power to induce submission and obedience is an observable reality. 

Machiavelli described men as “ungrateful, disloyal, insincere and deceitful, timid of danger and avid of profit” (pp. 62 in The Prince).  For a prince seeking to defend the interests of his own principality against other acquisitive and expansionist principalities, it is deeply unstrategic to prioritize morality. As a result, Machiavelli preached a novel conception of legitimate authority and effective rulership that balanced mercy with ruthlessness and virtue with duplicity. 

I don’t want to put all the eggs in one basket, so I will leave some meat on the bone for the next post, wherein I want to talk about some of the nuances of Machiavellism and compare its implications vis-a-vis other philosophical schemes. We may even revisit Peter Singer and talk about some of Machiavelli’s more utilitarian moments in The Prince. 

In closing, I will leave everyone with a trenchant quote from Old Nick. 

“A man is quicker to forget the death of his father than the loss of his inheritance.”

Hello friends. 

This week we continue our deep dive into Austrian economist and conservative intellectual Joseph Schumpeter. After doing a cursory skim of the last post I authored on this subject, I realized that there are a few contextual gaps probably worth filling and a few additional notes to make as an addendum to the first installment from December. Read it here. Before I continue my explication of the “competitive theory” of democracy Schumpeter promulgates in CSD, I want to revisit some of the components of the last post for clarity. 

Let’s philosophize!

First, I’ll recap what we know about Schumpeter. He identifies democracy as a method. On the classical side, you have what Rousseau and other Enlightenment-era thinkers tend to espouse: democracy is an institutional arrangement for arriving at political decisions based on harnessing the general will of the people. Importantly, democracy is about producing sound laws and decisions based on the assumption that electoral processes accurately reflect the preferences of civilians. 

However, Schumpeter is suspect of this assumption and frames his criticism of the classical doctrine around effective volition. He calls into question the idea that the citizenry is just a massive warehouse of preferences. Regarding the ordinary person, Schumpeter believes that people do not have as strongly articulated or appreciable preferences as the classical doctrine suggests. The Rousseauian “will” is not so much a will at all. Instead, Schumpeter argues that democracy is the method of elites competing for power. The vote, in his model, is still valuable. It legitimates the elite’s influence by providing the method of choosing which elites will rule and make decisions. 

Here, I will make an important clarifying observation that I think might help isolate why Schumpeter has a problem with “participatory” democracy. Neither the classical doctrine nor his own model of competitive elitism gives much importance to the central rhetorical promises of democracy. So, instead of emphasizing the supposed substantive commitments that democratic regimes have towards egalitarian freedom, Schumpeter focuses strictly on the method. This distinction is really significant because using this understanding, democracy does not preclude persecution or any of the behavior we would characterize as thoroughly undemocratic. 

For instance, in CSD, Schumpeter brings up an interesting litmus test to decide if values like equality, freedom, and justice really define and distinguish democracies. Let’s say a country practiced witch burning. Let’s additionally suppose they did so in a sufficiently democratic fashion: pretend that the overwhelming majority of the citizenry voted to support this persecution. 

Schumpeter’s provoking question is then — according to the rules of democratic procedure, would we approve of the democratic constitution (re: system) itself that produced such persecution in preference to a non-democratic one that would avoid it? Feel free to pontificate about it and post your answer to this question in the comments below. 

Though there is ambiguity in how a democrat (small-d) would answer this question, more interestingly (or perhaps frighteningly), it isn’t really just a hypothesis. Persecutions of Christians in Rome were rubber-stamped and legitimated by the Roman court of public opinion. They wouldn’t be any less vehement or any milder if Rome satisfied modern democratic conditions. In other words, over the course of history, these outcomes have grown directly out of the soul of the masses. Yet, with the benefit of hindsight, we are quick to condemn and abrogate. This is all to say that our rational allegiance to democracy tends to presuppose a schema of values, like equality and freedom from persecution, and a certain set of circumstances in which democracy can be expected to work in ways we approve. 

The same can be said for the Schumpeterian model. What conditions must be satisfied in order for elitist democracies to produce the type of competitive selection which Schumpeter describes? 

1: Voters are not choosing their representatives, because otherwise, they could select anybody they saw fit from the total eligible population. In nearly all cases, the ball is in the candidate’s court to begin with by electing to run for public office in the first place. As a result, the electorate’s choice is always confined to accepting someone’s bid for leadership or rejecting it.

2: Electoral initiative is “further restricted by the existence of parties,” whose chief function is to “act in concert in the competitive struggle for political power” (CSD 283). Schumpeter rails against the classical idea, mainly championed by the father of conservatism Edmund Burke, that political parties organize around some principle or ideological plank. Parties only exist, in Schumpeter’s view, to regulate and constrain the masses. So, behind the scenes, political parties are still empowered to control the options put before the electorate.

3: Most of the time, the playing field is not level for competition. The “elitism” in competitive elitism stems from a combination of the previous two subpoints (1) and (2). Democracy is a system of governance where elites are advantaged because rather than coming from the masses organically (a), leaders are almost always drawn from a small circle of elites abetted and systematically tied together by the organization of the party (b). This fundamentally explains Schumpeter’s belief that democracy is but a continuation of the influence and rule of the elite. 

I want to try to wrap this up because I think I can build in Part 3 of the Schumpeter series rather than try to squeeze all the substance out of it in the next 100-200 words. So, in closing, I am reminded of the George Carlin interview with Bill Maher where he explains why elections often serve as the confluence of oligopolistic interests, yet offer an illusion of choice. 

“These people went to the same universities and fraternities. They are on the same boards of directors. They’re in the same country clubs. They have like interests. They don’t need to call a meeting, they know what’s good for them.” 

William Blake’s “A Poison Tree” is actually quite straightforward in its message: it deals with the fundamental human emotion of anger. Blake warns his readers of the destructive consequences of bottling up their anger and resentment. I cheated a little bit on this assignment because it is not that hard to understand what the poem means. It is not characteristically confusing or strangely constructed like EE Cummings or some of the other poems. The challenge of “A Poison Tree” comes from the ancillary set of questions you ought to ask after you feel like you get the gist. Yes, we are talking about anger and how contempt for our foes leads us to duplicity, deceit, and destruction. This much is clear. For me, the real difficulty in understanding the poem comes from the deeper layer, revealed first by dissecting some of the very specific language Blake uses here, and second, by tapping into some of the motifs in Blake’s other poems, and the thematic commonalities shared between those works. In particular, my difficulty in understanding the meaning and the broader allusions of “A Poison Tree” relate to the loss of Christian piety and Christian forbearance.

“A Poison Tree” isn’t about the anger or animosity I harbor for my foe, and why that anger can turn sour for me and for my foe. It’s about contempt vitiating conscience and the deferral of piety through underhanded malice. It is reductive to say I am at fault for the harm that befalls my foe: Blake seems to think the foe is equally malicious and resentful, almost by nature. 

Before I talk about the substance, I think there are some syntactical and structural components worth making note of. Beginning with the most facile of the “difficulties” in this poem, the first device I noticed about the structure and syntax of the poem was the meter that Blake employs throughout. Each line is composed of four trochees–one stressed followed by one unstressed syllable.

On my first, cursory read of the poem, I struggled to put together the correct syllabic structure because I was emphasizing the wrong words. For instance, the stress is placed on the word “I” in the entire first stanza, so naturally, while reading it aloud the first time, I placed the same stress on the same word “I” in the second stanza. Yet, in the second stanza, the trochaic pattern switches up. No longer is the emphasis placed on the subject “I.” Instead, in an anaphoric fashion, the leading “and” in each line becomes the stressed syllable. Moreover, the meter is particularly tricky because the poem is constructed catalectically, omitting the last syllable of every tetrameter. Because each line conspicuously and deliberately cuts off without the final eighth syllable to complete the last trochee, the poem feels very choppy and abrupt. The connection between lines is interrupted by each line both finishing and ending with a stressed syllable. As a result, the tone of the poem is declarative and ordered. Neither the language nor the form flows ‘poetically,” modeling the parlance of wrath–extreme pent-up anger the narrator harbors for his or her foe.

On the substance side, my primary difficulty arose from understanding the act of poisoning. Specifically, in the relationship that emerges between the poisoner and the poisoned. In the fourth stanza of Blake’s poem, the foe lies “outstretched beneath the tree,” presumably dead after ingesting the apple of the narrator’s tree. However, Blake emphasizes that this apple is “stole[n]” after the foe trespasses into the narrator’s garden, seemingly absolving, or at the very least, diminishing the narrator of culpability for the foe’s death. However, through the language and the exposition within the poem, it is eminently clear that there is enmity and hostility toward the foe. This bitterness festers and grows inside the narrator, and insofar as it is directed toward the foe, seems deliberate and intentional in its malice. The narrator is even described as “glad” and exultant upon seeing the corpse of his foe in the morning. However, in my first read or two, I was very hesitant to assign the blame for this death onto the narrator. There was no direct act of violence or harm inflicted on the foe by the narrator, no matter how malicious the narrator was in intent. That is to say, the foe is not slain. So, to who should we assign the blame for the death? 

On a deeper examination of the poem, I made note of a couple of major concepts that answer this question, at least in part. First off, because Blake describes the wrath as that which takes root, grows, and eventually becomes a full-grown tree, there is an extended metaphor of the tree that confers more of the culpability for the death onto the narrator. In my annotations, each of the green-highlighted verbs and phrases imply an act of active nurturance, conveying the overwhelming sense that the person harboring this intense wrath must actively contribute to its growth. The wrath doesn’t just grow or intensify unattended. As a result, all of the actions taken by the narrator to nurture and cultivate their tree of wrath are deceitful by design. The narrator’s “smiles” and “wiles” feign faux friendship and benevolence toward the foe. Under these pretenses, the narrator seemingly dupes the foe into trusting him or her.

But alas. It is not that simple. There is yet another layer of nuance to complexify this question. The narrator’s wrath is matched in equal measure by the foe. 

Because the foe “knew it was” the narrator’s apple when they “beheld it shine,” it becomes equally deliberate and intentional for the foe to rob the narrator of that apple. In this act of thievery, the exchange of enmity and wrath between the narrator and the foe is laid bare. Though the poisonous apple is a trap set up to exact vengeance on the foe by the narrator, the foe is clear in his intention to steal the narrator’s fruit. This reciprocity in malice is what stands out to me after many careful and nuanced reads as the most poignant and sinister about the poem. Both the narrator and his foe are contemptful but choose to conceal that contempt, instead operating in sly, underhanded methods. The narrator’s tree and the bright apple that grows from it serve as the trap he wants the foe to walk in. The foe’s propensity for ill will toward the narrator informs his decision to walk into the narrator’s spiteful trap. 

Of course, this apple described in the third stanza is in reference to the biblical story of the Fall of Man, wherein Adam and Eve are enticed by the serpentine devil to eat the forbidden fruit from the tree of knowledge. Importantly, this motif of poisoning frequently appears in Blake’s other poems. According to scholar Stuart Peterfreund, the poisoner models the figures of Urizen (a deity of order and law created by Blake), Jehovah, and even Satan. By ingesting the poisonous apple growing on the tree, the poisoned moral constitution of the poisoner (in this case, the narrator) is transmitted onto the poisoned. Effectively, Blake is making a point about the loss of Christian piety and the erosion of virtues due to contempt for one another. In the end, neither party is left any more innocent than the other: wrath exacts a heavy toll on both the narrator and the foe. The wrath I have for my foe, if allowed to fester, will invariably compromise the morality and the behavior of others around me. 

Blake’s poem is short and simple. It is not difficult to read, nor is it difficult to surmise its theme. There is no ostentatious language or confusing artifice that veils the message. However, the poison tree that Blake describes is not just a one-dimensional representation of wrath and repressed anger. When you ask me who is to blame for the demise of the foe at the poem’s conclusion, it unravels multiple layers of nuance, exposing the moral failings and the total departure from normal behavior set off by repressed wrath. 

I was looking forward to continuing my exposition on Joseph Schumpeter and his minimalist conception of participatory democracy this week. Alas, for a number of reasons, I will defer this discussion to next time. As a byproduct of having to do a lot of thinking about democracy and its fragility for my Humanities Capstone project, I have become a little jaded (the prospects for democracy are dim in a world full of fascist lies and doublespeak, as it turns out) and won’t be able to faithfully represent the Schumpeterian theory. I wouldn’t want to make a half-hearted effort and risk all my fans (joke) developing a hazy understanding of Schumpeter’s transformative ideas.

Life is full of trials and tribulations, ups and downs, peaks and valleys, ebbs and flows. For as long as I can remember, my father has never cared about any of that. Not in a nihilistic, “life is meaningless” sense, but because he never spent time dwelling on defeat, and he spent even less time celebrating success. For him, life’s peaks aren’t worth rejoicing over because there will always be a valley, and the valleys aren’t worth crying about because from the deepest despair the only direction is up.

From the time I was very young, my dad instilled in me a sense of resoluteness. No matter how impressive the victory, no matter how crushing the defeat, the answer is always the same. 

“Move on.” He preaches. 

Those close to me know that my dad influences me in more ways than one, but nothing he has ever said or done cuts as deep as these two words. A little while ago, I won a debate tournament — the biggest championship in all of the national debate circuit, for that matter. That particular tournament was one I had been chasing since I was 12. Half a decade of work went into that one victory. If I were a pro athlete, it would be my Olympics or World Cup. 

Naturally, on the night of the big win, I picked up the phone to call and celebrate with two close friends. Not long after, Dad walked into my room and told me to put the phone down and go to sleep. Tomorrow was a new day — one that did not care whether you were champion or last place.

“Life is too short to get bogged down and be discouraged. You have to keep moving. You have to keep going. Put one foot in front of the other, smile, and just keep on rolling.” — Kobe Bryant 

I think all folks should heed my old man’s wisdom, but probably particularly high school seniors. 

To frame this all in a more palatable fashion, I’d refer any incoming senior to the story of James Stockdale. Admiral James Stockdale was a Vietnam POW. During the time of his imprisonment, Stockdale was the highest-ranking naval officer held captive in Hanoi. For seven years, he was brutally tortured and stripped of his dignity and resolve. When Stockdale spoke about his time imprisoned, he noted that the people who didn’t make it out were always the optimists: prisoners who asserted that they’d certainly be “out by Christmas” typically died of hopelessness when Christmastime rolled around and they weren’t out. 

So how did Stockdale himself survive? 

He explained that instead of brute force optimism, he lived life day-by-day, never looking forward to the Thanksgiving, Christmas, or Easter when he’d finally be rescued. Though Stockdale never lost faith that he would not only get out but also turn his imprisonment into a defining experience, he also “had the discipline to confront the most brutal facts of his current reality, whatever they might be.”

I’ve let the “Stockdale Paradox” guide the way I live life this semester. For the past six months or so, I have lugged myself out of bed every morning, knowing that there are things I have to confront, no matter how daunting or scary. Sometimes the day will go swimmingly. Other times it won’t. But regardless, I have never wavered in my confidence that in the end, I will be more than fine. 

“There’s nothing truly to be afraid of, when you think about it, because I’ve failed before, and I woke up the next morning, and I’m OK.” — Kobe Bryant 

This semester, I stopped checking my grades. Like, not once. The first time I did was last week when I needed to figure out what classes I needed to spend the most time studying for. I haven’t updated Infinite Campus app on my phone since sophomore year, so I don’t get notifications (actually the app just gives me a 404 error whenever I try to log in). In the Wu/Stockdale formulation, it shouldn’t take a bunch of percentages aggregated together to impel me to work hard. If I just did what I needed to do, took every test and assignment seriously, and put in the requisite time, the grade I received would reflect that. I don’t have a want or need to know. Motivation doesn’t get more intrinsic than that, in my opinion. 

“Rest at the end, not the middle.” — Kobe Bryant 

I also spent a lot of time on things I was genuinely interested in. I triple-dog dare you to read my latest blog post, for anyone curious about what those things are. In this class, I spent the last week poring over Jacques Lacan, a French psychoanalyst whose work, apparently, is an insightful way of reading Beloved. Was this a waste of time? For most students, yeah. Probably. But I enjoyed it. His theory kept me awake, burning the midnight oil as I tried to understand what Lacanian ideas like jouissance and objet petit a mean. Most of what I learned I didn’t put into my essay, but all of what I learned I will take with me. 

In closing, I will leave my readers with one final quote from Kobe Bryant. 

“Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life.”

See everybody in 2023!

Hello friends. 

This week we are exploring the ideas of Joseph Schumpeter. Since September, ardent Philosophantasy reader Varun has been patiently waiting for this installment. Let’s philosophize! 

Joseph Alois Schumpeter was, by profession, an economist and not a political theorist or jurist of any kind. Schumpeter served as Finance Minister for post-WW1 German Austria, before coming over to the United States to teach at Harvard University. His 1942 seminal work, titled Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy (hereby abbreviated as CSD) discusses lots of ideas about capitalism and describes the process of creative destruction with respect to a capitalist economy’s pattern of constant innovation. 

I am a big fan of this part of CSD. I think Schumpeter is pretty astute in his description of capitalism and how it will eventually cause its own destruction. Long-time friends of mine might recall that I have preached the same story in the schoolyard since the ye olden days. However, I’d like to shelve the economics discussion for a later time. CSD’s most scintillating and polemical discourse relates to the political, not the economic. Varun, “down for some fresh democracy hot and spicy,” has requested that we explore the Schumpeterian criticism of democratic theory. 

I will spend a thousand words or so in this post trying to explain Schumpeter’s criticism of the major elements of participatory democracy. The next time you read Philosophantasy (in 2023 :o), we can revisit Schumpeter and delve more deeply into the alternate modality he imagines to measure democratic effectiveness. 

In one sentence, what does Schumpeter argue about democracies? Any democracy based on ideals like representation or participation probably sucks. 

In CSD, Schumpeter argues against what he labels the “classical doctrine” of democracy, as described by 18th-century thinkers like Jean-Jacques Rousseau. As he understands it, the democratic method is an “institutional arrangement for arriving at political decisions which realizes the common good by making people itself decide issues through the election of individuals who are to assemble in order to carry out its will” (CSD 250). In layman’s terms, Schumpeter thinks the major consideration of democracy, classically defined, is the political decision-making made by the representatives elected by the people. Through electoral processes, democracies are able to aggregate individual political preferences. This aggregation produces a “common good” that elected officials are then charged with representing in legislative contexts. His characterization of the “classical doctrine of democracy” is in reference to the Rousseauian idea that the object of a state is to produce and effectuate the “volonté générale” of the people. In English, that means “general will.” 

Hope that makes some sense. Schumpeter isn’t redefining or making any super revelatory observations about the classical doctrine, so we can understand the democracy he goes on to criticize as representative in character. He then offers two criticisms of this doctrine. 

First, the classical definition assumes that there is a common good that we can all agree on and arrive at, which can then be measured in an electoral fashion. Schumpeter thinks not. Even though individuals may express general likes and dislikes about politics and the public sphere, this hardly constitutes a “will.” Individual interests vary to a degree that there can not be a “uniquely determined common good that all people could agree on or be made to agree on by rational argument” (251). Additionally, even if we could agree on a common good, it’s unlikely we would agree on the means of achieving it. Ideals like health are agreeable, though people still widely disagree on practices like vaccination and vasectomy. 

The second Schumpeterian criticism is that even if the general will existed, it would not be the cause of the political process, but rather, the effect. Schumpeter considers that citizens often yield to “irrational prejudice and impulse” and that ordinary voters are susceptible to the influence of political leadership and mass media (262). In effect, because human nature is so tractable, the political process creates general will by exerting influence over preferences and choices, not vice versa. In order for a common good to be reliable, citizens have to independently and effectively make rational choices, discern facts from impressions, and accurately formulate opinions about politics. 

I think it’s worth noting that this second objection is particularly prescient, considering the state of politics in democracies like the United States. I am skeptical that even well-read voting-age Americans can satisfactorily fulfill the responsibility to make rational choice when it comes to the formation of a general will. Put it this way. Despite this skepticism, I am sympathetic to the ordinary voter here. Why would an ordinary person have clear and articulate views on complex issues? There is quite literally no credible context in which those views would be called upon or tested. In a mass electoral democracy, you are typically asked binarily who to vote for on a ballot. 

Taken together, a classical interpretation would align well with our traditional, “AP US Government” understanding of a democratic system. Advocates of this doctrine would promise rule of people through electoral decisions, trusting that the choices in representatives the citizen body makes at the ballot box would reflect the policies, perspectives, preferences, and priorities of that body. Or, indirect governance BY the people, in a bit more familiar language. According to this understanding, the selection of the representatives (democratic practice) is relegated to a secondary role to the actual deciding of issues.

Schumpeter, distrustful of the electorate’s ability and dubious over mass participation in politics, proposes that these priorities be flipped. He’d assert that the actual decision-making and policies passed or defeated by an elected legislature are less important than the kind of competition for leadership that he believes ought to define democracy. In his own words from CSD, democracy is the “institutional arrangement for arriving at political decisions in which individuals acquire the power by means of a competitive struggle for the people’s vote” (269). Under this framework, called “competitive elitism” people are the commodity competed over by those seeking power. What makes democracy meaningful is that competition amongst rival politicians, whereas the classical doctrine holds more representational ideals (the idea that people can control laws) supreme. 

On face, this alternate theory of democracy might seem pretty unaccountable. Does Schumpeter seriously expect us to ignore the political actions of the individuals we elect, insofar as those individuals are compliant with the requisite levels of competition in their ascent to leadership? Next time, we’ll explore the limits, constraints, and conditions that Schumpeter goes on to stipulate must be placed on a democracy in order to achieve his model of competitive elitism. 

Hello friends. 

This week I am fielding some questions I’ve received through the Google Form I posted last week in response to Ivy’s idea for a fantasy-themed advice column. Here is the link if you or a loved one are in need of wisdom at any point this season. I hope I can be of assistance to your team as we enter the second half of the fantasy football season. 

Q: Is it worth dropping an OUT player (eg Gordon Hayward) or do I just keep him on IR? 

Hi Perplexed Paul. My answer to this type of question will always depend on who the player is. It matters whether or not the player was making a significant fantasy-relevant contribution before their injury. Gordon Hayward is someone who contributed value pre-injury in the range of 30 FPPG, so it makes sense to hold even while he’s out. If a player is only chipping in a few fantasy points per game, and then receives an Out designation, dropping him is more than fine. If you have the luxury of extra space in your IR, then it’s fine to hold. 

Q: What should I be looking for when picking players up off of the waiver wire? How often should I be doing so / changing my roster?

Hi Roster Regina. This question reveals one of the key differences between fantasy football and hoops. Because of the nature of daily games, it is almost always advantageous to be making pickups every day. Designate one of your roster spots to add an active player each day. For Monday, I added Yuta Watanabe. Then, after Monday’s slate wrapped up, I promptly dropped him. On Thursday, I used that roster spot vacated by Yuta and added Jordan Goodwin.

This concept is pretty intuitive once you think about it. If you leave one roster spot flexible every day, over the course of a week, you can get a few more games than you would have, had you expended that spot on a player who will only, at max, play 3 times a week. In practice, managers may not always remember to add a guy every day, so bear in mind that you don’t actually need to be rotating in a “player per day” for this type of tactic to help maximize your points over a week. 

In terms of what to look for on the wire, I typically try to identify players who are moving up the depth chart on their own teams. Is the starter injured for a week, elevating a backup player to a more pronounced and fantasy-relevant role? Is someone getting a big uptick in minutes played, providing a meaningful opportunity for fantasy relevance? 

An example might help. If I sort the waiver wire by 7 Day scoring, which will highlight the players producing the most in the last 7 days, I can identify options like Kyle Anderson and Grayson Allen, who are averaging around 30 FPPG over their last few games. These are guys I’d be targeting to add in favor of people on my roster who are performing unsatisfactorily. While writing this, I just dropped Jordan Goodwin for Jevon Carter. This move employs that first principle of roster churn because Carter plays on Friday, but Goodwin doesn’t. I also grabbed Carter with the knowledge that Jrue Holiday, the starting point guard on Carter’s team, is injured (sorry Meg), providing Carter with a really strong opportunity to produce. Opportunity is king in fantasy.

Q: Is Justin Fields good at football or is his production unsustainable and a false representation of who he is as a QB?

Hi Hopeful Harry. Justin Fields is such a fascinating and prescient case study in patience. It is truly a virtue. The sophomore QB’s first four weeks were abysmal. He didn’t manage a single strong fantasy day as he adjusted to Coach Eberflus’ new offensive scheme in the post-Nagy era of Bears football. However, over the last five weeks, he’s been the QB2 overall in PPR scoring. It really seems as though Fields has turned a massive corner here. Here are a few considerations I’m making as I decide how to project and value him the rest of the way. 

1 – His legs are what give him a QB1-type ceiling. He broke a record on Sunday for the most rushing yards in a regular-season game by a quarterback with 178 yards on the ground. The Miami game wasn’t necessarily one-off though. This year, Fields is 1st in QB rush attempts, 2nd in QB rushing yardage, 2nd in QB YPC, and 2nd in QB rushing TDs. 

2 – There’s also a non-zero chance his passing and his production through the air improve too. Fields’ completion percentage has increased from 51.94% over Chicago’s first four games to 63.96% over their last five. He’s also just taking more downfield shots. At the deadline, Chicago also added Chase Claypool, another field stretcher and downfield weapon for the young quarterback. 

3 – I’m not fazed by the rest-of-season strength-of-schedule. The Bears face Detroit and Atlanta in Weeks 10 and 11, two of the league’s most favorable matchups for the QB position in terms of fantasy points allowed. Fields’ toughest tests will be in Philly and Buffalo. But, Fields has demonstrated an ability to produce against tough defenses, going for over 20 fantasy points in Weeks 7 and 8 against New England and Dallas — by no means easy matchups. 

Fields is passing more and passing better, using his legs a ton, and finally has an OC and a playbook that opens up the offense for him. No flukes here. To me, Fields represents a top-12 option at the position the rest of the way. There might be a few bumps in the road, but I’d have no problem starting him with confidence. 

Q: How does position factor into the points they score? Should I be thinking about this when filling my UTIL slots?

Hi Positional Pete. Nah, not really. The only point worth noting to me is that PGs make up the lion’s share of the top 20 players in points leagues this year. Your league might have scoring settings that slightly reward big men (PF and C) stats like points for offensive rebounding or points for blocks, but usually, these slight differences in scoring settings shouldn’t meaningfully impact your start-sit decisions. Start whoever’s been producing. If it’s a coin toss between two otherwise statistically identical options, maybe roll with a PG over a PF. 

Q: How do I avoid getting scammed on fantasy trades?

Hi Dupable Dorothy. Frequently, the key to trading is to identify positional scarcity and surplus. If you have 3 really good RBs but only 1 consistent WR, you should be eyeing trades that allow you to exchange one of those RBs for another WR. Not necessarily scams, but poor trades, occur when managers don’t understand this idea. They don’t improve where they need to improve and make lateral moves like trading one RB for another similarly-ranked RB. 

Additionally, it’s often a telltale sign that a novice manager is getting scammed when they are the ones giving up the best player in the deal. If I make an offer for Stefon Diggs, one of the best receivers in fantasy football right now, I’d be acquiring the “best player in the deal.” Don’t trade away your top guys for below their market price. Make your leaguemates OVERpay. 

Q: Who is the best waiver wire addition for week 10? 

Hi Waiver Warrior Winston. For me, it’s Jeffrey Wilson Jr, who was just acquired by the Miami Dolphins at the Nov. 1st trade deadline. He was probably dropped in a lot of spots after his job got taken by superstar Stanford product Christian McCaffrey in a trade with the Panthers. Pick him up! The former 49er rejoins his old coach Mike McDaniel, as well as his old teammate Raheem Mostert. Wilson was immediately involved in this game, splitting the carries evenly (9 and 9) with Mostert. Although Mostert was the back who scored a rushing TD, Wilson had a higher rushing yardage total. Then, in the aerial game, Wilson eclipsed Mostert handily, earning 3 targets with a route run on 42% of his offensive snaps. 

There is a legit shot Wilson and Mostert split the backfield in Miami 50-50. Considering it was Wilson’s first game as a Dolphin, it is encouraging to see that he earned such an outsized share of the opportunities. Importantly, as my fellow born-and-bred #winner Louisa pointed out about Raheem Mostert, he does not catch balls. Wilson does — he even scored a receiving TD on Sunday.

Also, Louisa if you are reading this I am officially hitting the panic button on Raheem. Bro might be trash. Sad!

Best of luck in your matchups this week!

(tinyurl.com/philosophantasy — I will likely return to philosophy next post, as Varun has been dying to hear about Harvard political economist Joseph Schumpeter. You can still submit your questions. Might still include a “top transactions” type thing in the blog.)

Hello friends. This week we are pivoting over to the -phantasy suffix of my blog, as Varun has decided to take a strange surprise trip to Mexico, and he may potentially be the only person that takes interest in my musings on philosophy. Admittedly, they can be boring if philosophy and ethics are not your cup(s) of tea. 

For those that don’t know, I am a fantasy sports enthusiast. The talk of the town on these blogs has been fantasy football. I’m glad to see that folks are so invested in their fantasy leagues, as it is an esoteric obsession of mine that is hard to understand unless you just experience it for yourself. I am so into this fake game that I developed a spreadsheet that combines air yards and yards-after-catch statistics to predict the top-performing wide receivers. For those curious, my metric correctly called the meteoric rise of Cooper Kupp last season. Not to brag or anything though. 

This year, however, I am crestfallen. Dejected. Shattered in spirit. In the league where I am defending a glorious championship from last year, things are not looking good. My squad has lost both Javonte Williams and Breece Hall to ACL tears, and Hollywood Brown has found a place on my Injured Reserve until the week before the fantasy playoffs. Unlucky! But, such is the way of fantasy football. I will probably still make a playoff run only to lose in the semifinals or something, but it’s just not as fun knowing the star-studded, repeat-champion-destined team I put together is in shambles. 

Those who really know me well will know that my real passion lies in fantasy basketball, an entirely different challenge than fantasy football. The NBA season tipped off last Tuesday, and with it, the exhilarating fantasy season has also begun. Here is the team I drafted: 

  (a 14 team league)

The biggest problem with this team is that some of these dudes got no heart. I have a personal policy of always drafting at least one Blue Devil on my fantasy teams, being a die-hard Duke MBB fan. Unfortunately, because both Paolo Banchero and Zion Williamson were taken before my picks, I had to settle for the single middest basketball player on the planet, RJ Barrett. 

He is not good. He is less efficient than me studying for MVC while primetime NFL football is on. Besides offering occasional and inconsistent scoring, he does nothing else. For fantasy purposes, it does not make sense to draft him. Yet, I am irresistibly compelled by superstition. 

The actual basketball is just the tip of the iceberg. More importantly, in the 2019 NCAA Tournament, I picked the Blue Devils to go all the way. There was no way any team could check them. Zion was unstoppable, with Barrett, Cam Reddish, and Tre Jones providing ample support. Coach K was just plain out-coaching most teams. Then came MSU in the Elite Eight. Duke probably should have won this game had RJ not missed a pair of crucial free throws late in the fourth quarter. To this day, I resent RJ for his 2019 tournament performance. I really think my life went considerably downhill after that Duke squad lost, in, like, all aspects. I really think RJ hexed me. Sad.  

I hate him. I hate RJ Barrett.

Anyways, enough negativity. I am not supposed to offer fantasy football advice because there are certain folks in this class that might read it and get an advantage in their ultra-competitive, high-stakes league. 

Instead, here are five fantasy basketball transactions that I think are worth making if you play. 

1. Add Josh Richardson. If Devin Vassell (and Joshua Primo) miss more time, J-Rich is that dude. And it’s looking like Vassell is going to miss more time. 
2. Add Jaylen Nowell. He’s getting 20-25 minutes a game and scoring at an elite clip. That is sufficient for fantasy-relevant production. Worth at least a speculative roster spot, IMO. 
3. Add Bol Bol. Of course, he will regress. He is blocking something like 7 or 8 shots per 100 possessions. But he is officially better than both Mo Bamba and Chuma Okeke, his teammates at the center position. 
4. Sell Bojan Bogdanovic. I don’t know how this is happening, but I guess Bogey is making threes now. My gut tells me it’s fool’s gold. Regression looms. 
5. Buy Jamal Murray. I watched a little Nuggets film yesterday and it’s clear that he doesn’t have all his lateral quickness back. I think it’s worth floating an offer for him while his value is low. We know how good he can be (re: 2020). 

Have a fun Week 2! Or Week 8 if you’re sticking to football. 

Last time, in the first installment of this blog, we discussed the philosophical position of Peter Singer. Two quick refreshers on the type of argument that he espouses in The Life You Can Save (TLYCS): 

1. According to Singer, because there is no morally-relevant distinction between an action and the omission of that action (re: failure to complete that action), failing to help people in need of assistance is the same as doing harm unto them.
   
2. Our moral responsibility is to give and keep giving, as long as we aren’t giving up something nearly as important as saving someone suffering. On principle, this prescribes and posits a pretty substantive burden on the relatively affluent to give.

This week, I want to situate Singer’s philosophy within a broader framework of classical utilitarianism, which you are probably already familiar with, to some extent. Then, in order to challenge Singer, I think it worthwhile to understand and examine his account vis-à-vis alternative philosophical paradigms and reveal some of its absurdities. 

Part A: Why Singer thinks he is right

Singer is a hedonistic utilitarian. What do these words mean? Well, the foundation of classical utilitarianism broadly is the principle of utility, which establishes that the right action is the one that maximizes pleasure while minimizing pain. In layman’s English, utilitarianism is what we mean when we say “the greatest good for the greatest number.” The utilitarian’s defining principle is derived from the recognition that there is a common principle from which an act can be considered right or wrong. 

Why is utility said common principle? 

According to utilitarians, maximization of pleasure is the only pursuit that is self-evident. The English philosopher Jeremy Bentham, regarded as the father of modern utilitarianism, argues that ALL humans behave through “psychological egoism,” which suggests that every action must be motivated by self-interest. Even a religious ascetic maximizes by seeking the pleasure, whether intellectual, spiritual, or moral, of divine awakening. All experiences are based on the badness of pain and the goodness of pleasure. This is, as NYU Professor Thomas Nagel playfully points out in 1986, why we “have a reason, and not just an inclination, to refrain from putting [our] hand on a hot stove.” 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thus, if we operate hedonistically, meaning what ought to be pursued is pleasure and what ought to be avoided is pain, we should recognize that others’ pleasure is also worth maximizing. This point is where Singer’s account of stopping global suffering starts to surface. 

Hopefully this all makes sense! The TL;DR is kind of like – pleasure is intrinsically good and pain intrinsically evil because pleasure and pain are the only things universally worth pursuing and avoiding respectively for their own sake. 

Also, important PSA to not touch hot stoves because it would defeat the utilitarian’s major premise. 

Part B: Why I think Singer is probably wrong* 

Here, I have identified a few major objections to the hedonistic utilitarian and the maximization framework. They are quite complex, but I have tried to do a faithful job to distill them into palatable arguments from ivory tower mumbo jumbo. 

1: Supererogation

There is a relevant distinction between moral worth and moral obligation. Happiness, expected well-being, and pleasure may all very well be good, but there need not be an obligation to maximize them. Utilitarianism thus generates morally optional paths – “supererogatory duties.” To give an example, Steve Rogers throwing his body onto a live grenade to save his platoon would probably maximize utility. But it would also be “beyond his call of duty.” It would be, morally, and in all other senses, optional. 

2: Demandingness 

Utilitarianism generates excessive, or seemingly infinite demands. These are objectionable. Rahil aptly alluded to this type of objection in his comment to my last post. He writes that “you can’t force someone to uphold a responsibility unless you somehow compensate them for doing so or punish them for not doing so.” Funnily enough, utilitarianism attempts this exactly. 

Moral obligations are not absolute. If we are unlimited in our obligation to the entire world of suffering, we cannot maintain that obligation. Perhaps I am obligated to save a knowable victim of malnutrition with a few of my dollars because if I did not, they would die. Yet, am I also obligated to cure that person’s cataracts? Cataracts detract from their pleasure, and as a utility maximizer, I should. Right? It is so unclear where our obligations end, and accordingly, this is why Singer himself never advocates for a view this extreme. 

3: Overridingness 

If maximization is moral, and thus, a priori, what are we asking of individual agents? That they override their personal projects for the sake of maximization? It is important that I take care of my sister Addison. I endeavor to help her whenever I can and I am invested in her future. But, Addie is not the neediest sister on the planet. Heck, she’s probably not even the neediest sister at North or in the freshman class. If I adopted Singer’s account that I am morally responsible for minimizing the pain of others’ sisters, I would no longer pay my own sister much attention. Other people’s sisters need my sage wisdom. 

I think this objection raises a salient question of the erosion of agency altogether. Bernard Williams, a relativist who is deeply critical of utilitarianism, refers to this as an “attack on integrity.” Williams’ view is that utilitarianism asks that you weigh your commitments equally with everyone else’s in order to make a sufficiently utilitarian calculation. However, that means commitments become self-defeating. If my commitments are situated amongst everyone else’s, and able to be overridden by everyone else’s, my commitments would not be commitments at all.

*He is philosophically wrong. I would still recommend Feeding the Starving Children and donating to mutual aid organizations. Just not because I am ethically moved by Singer’s account. 

—

This wraps up my thoughts on Singer. I think it’s a great starting point for lots of philosophical conversations about moral obligations and where they come from. The utilitarian view is obviously not meritless, but I do not think it is sufficient to guide action. However, if Singer is wrong, what’s the best way to address the problem of global poverty?