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The First and the Last
The first of the two pieces by Isaiah Berlin is a short story written in 1922 at the age of 12 in English just one year steer his family immigrated to London from St. Petersburg. The story is important because it points forward to Berlin's repeated later insistence in his writing and teaching that one can never justify present suffering as a route to some future state of bliss.
The second was written in 1996. A professor of philosophy at Wuhan University in China wrote and asked Sir Isaiah to provide a summary of his ideas for translation into Chinese. The piece would be included in a volume intended to introduce Chinese philosophers and students of philosophy to Anglo-American philosophy, hitherto largely unavailable in Chinese. Berlin agreed to the project because he felt this new audience in China was important. This piece forms the bulk of the book.
- GenresPhilosophy
144 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1999
68 people want to read
About the author
Isaiah Berlin
208 books800 followersSir Isaiah Berlin was a philosopher and historian of ideas, regarded as one of the leading liberal thinkers of the twentieth century. He excelled as an essayist, lecturer and conversationalist; and as a brilliant speaker who delivered, rapidly and spontaneously, richly allusive and coherently structured material, whether for a lecture series at Oxford University or as a broadcaster on the BBC Third Programme, usually without a script. Many of his essays and lectures were later collected in book form.
Born in Riga, now capital of Latvia, then part of the Russian Empire, he was the first person of Jewish descent to be elected to a prize fellowship at All Souls College, Oxford. From 1957 to 1967, he was Chichele Professor of Social and Political Theory at the University of Oxford. He was president of the Aristotelian Society from 1963 to 1964. In 1966, he helped to found Wolfson College, Oxford, and became its first President. He was knighted in 1957, and was awarded the Order of Merit in 1971. He was President of the British Academy from 1974 to 1978. He also received the 1979 Jerusalem Prize for his writings on individual freedom. Berlin's work on liberal theory has had a lasting influence.
Berlin is best known for his essay Two Concepts of Liberty, delivered in 1958 as his inaugural lecture as Chichele Professor of Social and Political Theory at Oxford. He defined negative liberty as the absence of constraints on, or interference with, agents' possible action. Greater "negative freedom" meant fewer restrictions on possible action. Berlin associated positive liberty with the idea of self-mastery, or the capacity to determine oneself, to be in control of one's destiny. While Berlin granted that both concepts of liberty represent valid human ideals, as a matter of history the positive concept of liberty has proven particularly susceptible to political abuse.
Berlin contended that under the influence of Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Immanuel Kant and G. W. F. Hegel (all committed to the positive concept of liberty), European political thinkers often equated liberty with forms of political discipline or constraint. This became politically dangerous when notions of positive liberty were, in the nineteenth century, used to defend nationalism, self-determination and the Communist idea of collective rational control over human destiny. Berlin argued that, following this line of thought, demands for freedom paradoxically become demands for forms of collective control and discipline – those deemed necessary for the "self-mastery" or self-determination of nations, classes, democratic communities, and even humanity as a whole. There is thus an elective affinity, for Berlin, between positive liberty and political totalitarianism.
Conversely, negative liberty represents a different, perhaps safer, understanding of the concept of liberty. Its proponents (such as Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill) insisted that constraint and discipline were the antithesis of liberty and so were (and are) less prone to confusing liberty and constraint in the manner of the philosophical harbingers of modern totalitarianism. It is this concept of Negative Liberty that Isaiah Berlin supported. It dominated heavily his early chapters in his third lecture.
This negative liberty is central to the claim for toleration due to incommensurability. This concept is mirrored in the work of Joseph Raz.
Berlin's espousal of negative liberty, his hatred of totalitarianism and his experience of Russia in the revolution and through his contact with the poet Anna Akhmatova made him an enemy of the Soviet Union and he was one of the leading public intellectuals in the ideological battle against Communism during the Cold War.
Born in Riga, now capital of Latvia, then part of the Russian Empire, he was the first person of Jewish descent to be elected to a prize fellowship at All Souls College, Oxford. From 1957 to 1967, he was Chichele Professor of Social and Political Theory at the University of Oxford. He was president of the Aristotelian Society from 1963 to 1964. In 1966, he helped to found Wolfson College, Oxford, and became its first President. He was knighted in 1957, and was awarded the Order of Merit in 1971. He was President of the British Academy from 1974 to 1978. He also received the 1979 Jerusalem Prize for his writings on individual freedom. Berlin's work on liberal theory has had a lasting influence.
Berlin is best known for his essay Two Concepts of Liberty, delivered in 1958 as his inaugural lecture as Chichele Professor of Social and Political Theory at Oxford. He defined negative liberty as the absence of constraints on, or interference with, agents' possible action. Greater "negative freedom" meant fewer restrictions on possible action. Berlin associated positive liberty with the idea of self-mastery, or the capacity to determine oneself, to be in control of one's destiny. While Berlin granted that both concepts of liberty represent valid human ideals, as a matter of history the positive concept of liberty has proven particularly susceptible to political abuse.
Berlin contended that under the influence of Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Immanuel Kant and G. W. F. Hegel (all committed to the positive concept of liberty), European political thinkers often equated liberty with forms of political discipline or constraint. This became politically dangerous when notions of positive liberty were, in the nineteenth century, used to defend nationalism, self-determination and the Communist idea of collective rational control over human destiny. Berlin argued that, following this line of thought, demands for freedom paradoxically become demands for forms of collective control and discipline – those deemed necessary for the "self-mastery" or self-determination of nations, classes, democratic communities, and even humanity as a whole. There is thus an elective affinity, for Berlin, between positive liberty and political totalitarianism.
Conversely, negative liberty represents a different, perhaps safer, understanding of the concept of liberty. Its proponents (such as Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill) insisted that constraint and discipline were the antithesis of liberty and so were (and are) less prone to confusing liberty and constraint in the manner of the philosophical harbingers of modern totalitarianism. It is this concept of Negative Liberty that Isaiah Berlin supported. It dominated heavily his early chapters in his third lecture.
This negative liberty is central to the claim for toleration due to incommensurability. This concept is mirrored in the work of Joseph Raz.
Berlin's espousal of negative liberty, his hatred of totalitarianism and his experience of Russia in the revolution and through his contact with the poet Anna Akhmatova made him an enemy of the Soviet Union and he was one of the leading public intellectuals in the ideological battle against Communism during the Cold War.
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June 4, 2024
«Οι άνθρωποι ίσως να μην μπορέσουν να φτάσουν σε αυτές (τις απαντήσεις) επειδή τους προκαλούν σύγχυση τα συναισθήματά τους ή επειδή είναι πολύ ηλίθιοι ή πολύ άτυχοι· ενδέχεται επίσης οι απαντήσεις να είναι να είναι πολύ δύσκολες, τα μέσα ανεπαρκή, οι τεχνικές εξαιρετικά περίπλοκες για να ανακαλυφθούν· αλλά, ότι κι αν συμβαίνει, αν τα ερωτήματα είναι γνήσια, οι απαντήσεις πρέπει να υπάρχουν. Αν εμείς δεν γνωρίζουμε, οι διάδοχοί μας μπορεί να μάθουν· ή πιθανόν οι σοφοί της αρχαιότητας να γνώριζαν· κι αν δεν γνώριζαν, ίσως γνώριζε ο Αδάμ στον παράδεισο· ή αν δεν γνώριζε, πρέπει να γνωρίζουν οι άγγελοι· ακόμη όμως κι αν δεν γνωρίζουν, πρέπει να γνωρίζει ο Θεός – οι απαντήσεις πρέπει να υπάρχουν.»
Γνωριμία με τον Μπερλίν μέσα από τη μικρή και σαφή φιλοσοφική αυτοβιογραφία. Μάλλον είναι η πρώτη φορά που συναντάω πνευματικό έργο με τόσο σαφές λόγο. Καταθέτεται λοιπόν, περιεκτικά, η ιστορία της σκέψης του και μέσα από τα μεγάλα ανθρώπινα ερωτήματα, όπου και προκύπτει το τι είναι το ανθρώπινο ιδανικό· πως η πίστη σε οποιοδήποτε καθολικό τύπο δεν μπορεί να είναι παρά μια ακόμα ανθρώπινη προσπάθεια να ξεφύγει κανείς από το απρόβλεπτο της ζωής, και μια ρομαντική αριστερή τοποθέτηση, πως ο κόσμος της τέλειας δικαιοσύνης δεν συνάδει με τη μόρφωση, εάν δεν πρόκειται για ίση μόρφωση για όλους – διαφορετικά διαμορφώνονται όσοι ξέρουν καλύτερα για τους άλλους, μια αρχική σκέψη πολλών δεινών και ματωμένων σελίδων της ιστορίας. Μάλιστα το παραπάνω γύρω από τον ναζισμό, εξετάζεται με απλότητα αλλά όχι απλοϊκότητα, τοποθετώντας τον πλουραλισμό των διαφορετικών κόσμων σε μια φιλοσοφική θέαση πολύ κατανοητή. Μου άρεσε η εμμονή με τη λέξη «ιδιοφυΐα» που μάλλον είναι η μοναδική που δεν έχει όρεξη να αναδομήσει.
Γνωριμία με τον Μπερλίν μέσα από τη μικρή και σαφή φιλοσοφική αυτοβιογραφία. Μάλλον είναι η πρώτη φορά που συναντάω πνευματικό έργο με τόσο σαφές λόγο. Καταθέτεται λοιπόν, περιεκτικά, η ιστορία της σκέψης του και μέσα από τα μεγάλα ανθρώπινα ερωτήματα, όπου και προκύπτει το τι είναι το ανθρώπινο ιδανικό· πως η πίστη σε οποιοδήποτε καθολικό τύπο δεν μπορεί να είναι παρά μια ακόμα ανθρώπινη προσπάθεια να ξεφύγει κανείς από το απρόβλεπτο της ζωής, και μια ρομαντική αριστερή τοποθέτηση, πως ο κόσμος της τέλειας δικαιοσύνης δεν συνάδει με τη μόρφωση, εάν δεν πρόκειται για ίση μόρφωση για όλους – διαφορετικά διαμορφώνονται όσοι ξέρουν καλύτερα για τους άλλους, μια αρχική σκέψη πολλών δεινών και ματωμένων σελίδων της ιστορίας. Μάλιστα το παραπάνω γύρω από τον ναζισμό, εξετάζεται με απλότητα αλλά όχι απλοϊκότητα, τοποθετώντας τον πλουραλισμό των διαφορετικών κόσμων σε μια φιλοσοφική θέαση πολύ κατανοητή. Μου άρεσε η εμμονή με τη λέξη «ιδιοφυΐα» που μάλλον είναι η μοναδική που δεν έχει όρεξη να αναδομήσει.
August 21, 2012
Magnificent, among the very best. The book begins with Berlin's first known writing, a story from age 11: cute, as far as Russian intrigue by a pre-teen goes, but hardly more. Next comes his final written piece (hence the title of the book), followed by several tributes by those who knew him.
A university in China wrote Isaiah Berlin in 1996, asking him to contribute a piece on Western thought. Having written practically nothing the previous eight years, he put down a single page of notes and dictated this essay into a tape recorder. At 54 narrow pages, it rivals anything I know for brevity, clarity, and meaning.
Excerpts: "I am not a relativist; I do not say 'I like my coffee with milk and you like it without; I am in favor of kindness and you prefer concentration camps'--each of us with his own values, which cannot be overcome or integrated. This I believe to be false. But I do believe that there is a plurality of values which men can and do seek, and that these values differ....
"Liberty, in whichever sense, is an eternal human ideal, whether individual or social. So is equality. But perfect liberty (as it must be in the perfect world) is not compatible with perfect equality. If man is free to do anything he chooses, then the strong will crush the weak, the wolves will eat the sheep, and this puts an end to equality....
"Liberty and equality, spontaneity and security, happiness and knowledge, mercy and justice--all these are ultimate human values, sought for themselves alone; yet when they are incompatible, they cannot all be attained, choices must be made, sometimes tragic losses accepted in the pursuit of some preferred ultimate end... the very idea of the perfect world in which all good things are realized is incomprehensible, is in fact conceptually incoherent. And if this is so, and I cannot see how it could be otherwise, then the very notion of the ideal world, for which no sacrifice can be too great, vanishes from view.
"...all the justifications of broken eggs for the sake of the ultimate omelette, all the brutalities, sacrifices, brainwashing, all those revolutions... all this is for nothing, for the perfect universe is not merely unattainable but inconceivable, and everything done to bring it about is founded on an enormous intellectual fallacy."
And from one of his friends' tributes: Berlin believed "faith in universally valid formulas and goals was an attempt to escape from the unpredictability of life into the false security of fantasy." (This last passage reminded me of John Dewey's A Common Faith, another short and marvelous work I recommend.)
In the third section of the book, reading the recollections of friends, we see the greatness of the man. The foregoing might imply a descent into nihilism, but his friends remember him with wonder: "No one else was remotely like him. Of course he had charm, but he had more than that... He was loved by people with whom he had nothing in common... He was a man of invincible modestly... he seems to me to have offered the truest and most moving interpretation of life that my own generation made... [he] made it his business to make others joyous in his presence... unlike many clever talkers, had no desire to bully... a kind of prodigal opulence of intellect which astonished his audience... nothing cheap or tawdry could stand even half an hour of contact with him. All pretentiousness, all pompousness, all pedantic self-importance, simply fled from him or melted like wax before a fire... [his] combination of what many have seen as a tragic vision of the world with an inexhaustible curiosity and an irrepressible sense of fun."
The real deal, friends, the real deal.
A university in China wrote Isaiah Berlin in 1996, asking him to contribute a piece on Western thought. Having written practically nothing the previous eight years, he put down a single page of notes and dictated this essay into a tape recorder. At 54 narrow pages, it rivals anything I know for brevity, clarity, and meaning.
Excerpts: "I am not a relativist; I do not say 'I like my coffee with milk and you like it without; I am in favor of kindness and you prefer concentration camps'--each of us with his own values, which cannot be overcome or integrated. This I believe to be false. But I do believe that there is a plurality of values which men can and do seek, and that these values differ....
"Liberty, in whichever sense, is an eternal human ideal, whether individual or social. So is equality. But perfect liberty (as it must be in the perfect world) is not compatible with perfect equality. If man is free to do anything he chooses, then the strong will crush the weak, the wolves will eat the sheep, and this puts an end to equality....
"Liberty and equality, spontaneity and security, happiness and knowledge, mercy and justice--all these are ultimate human values, sought for themselves alone; yet when they are incompatible, they cannot all be attained, choices must be made, sometimes tragic losses accepted in the pursuit of some preferred ultimate end... the very idea of the perfect world in which all good things are realized is incomprehensible, is in fact conceptually incoherent. And if this is so, and I cannot see how it could be otherwise, then the very notion of the ideal world, for which no sacrifice can be too great, vanishes from view.
"...all the justifications of broken eggs for the sake of the ultimate omelette, all the brutalities, sacrifices, brainwashing, all those revolutions... all this is for nothing, for the perfect universe is not merely unattainable but inconceivable, and everything done to bring it about is founded on an enormous intellectual fallacy."
And from one of his friends' tributes: Berlin believed "faith in universally valid formulas and goals was an attempt to escape from the unpredictability of life into the false security of fantasy." (This last passage reminded me of John Dewey's A Common Faith, another short and marvelous work I recommend.)
In the third section of the book, reading the recollections of friends, we see the greatness of the man. The foregoing might imply a descent into nihilism, but his friends remember him with wonder: "No one else was remotely like him. Of course he had charm, but he had more than that... He was loved by people with whom he had nothing in common... He was a man of invincible modestly... he seems to me to have offered the truest and most moving interpretation of life that my own generation made... [he] made it his business to make others joyous in his presence... unlike many clever talkers, had no desire to bully... a kind of prodigal opulence of intellect which astonished his audience... nothing cheap or tawdry could stand even half an hour of contact with him. All pretentiousness, all pompousness, all pedantic self-importance, simply fled from him or melted like wax before a fire... [his] combination of what many have seen as a tragic vision of the world with an inexhaustible curiosity and an irrepressible sense of fun."
The real deal, friends, the real deal.
May 29, 2021
This probably would have been a 5 had there just been more of his writing instead of half the book being tributes extoling Berlin's magnanimous and giant personality. Still, those tributes provide the picture of a person to be emulated. A few quotes on that:
"He showed us virtue in action, not as obedience to a set of rules but as a generous responsiveness to the creative possibilities of the present moment. One always came away from a few hours in his company with a sense of living more intensely, with all one's perceptions heightened, although the topics of conversation were often far from exalted."
"[H]e honored anyone in search of truth."
"He made room for everyone in his dense little diary, then met them, and enchanted them off their feet with his warmth, with his instant sense of familiarity, and above all with his mesmerizing stories."
His writing (and thus his thinking) was clear, concise, sharp. He delves into some of the great human questions and issues and his results are good and true, though one may not agree on all of the scaffolding necessary to reach them or the apparent outcomes. Convenient to what I've been writing and thinking about, he touches on the contrasts between justice and mercy, along with other opposed ideals.
"Similarly, a world of perfect justice--and who can deny that this is one of the noblest of human values?--is not compatible with perfect mercy. I need not labor this point: either the law takes its toll, or men forgive, but the two values cannot both be realized."
While I think what the law is remains subject to debate and that mercy is more capable of perfect realization than Berlin might here indicate, the point is well taken. The better point comes just a little earlier.
:Liberty, in whichever sense, is an eternal human ideal, whether individual or social. So is equality. But perfect liberty (as it must be in the perfect world) is not compatible with perfect equality. If a man is free to do anything he chooses, then the strong will crush the weak, the wolves will eat the sheep, and this puts an end to equality. If perfect equality is to be attained, then men must be prevented from outdistancing each other [this writer's note: see, e.g., Vonnegut's Harrison Bergeron], whether in material or in intellectual or in spiritual achievement, otherwise inequities will result."
His goal appears to be the avoidance of unnecessary human suffering, justified by monism, which is on display in modern times just as ever. The word unnecessary is worth unpacking, and I didn't get full answers there. It arose in another context that also concerned me: "In spite of his criticism of Zionist politics, when it unnecessarily deprives Palestinian Arabs of their homes, he saw Zionism as a success story with regard to his central concern, the revival for the Jews of the sense of home." The emphasis is mine. Unnecessarily adds a subjective bent to the question. I wonder how Berlin would have reacted to the happenings of the last month, the death of so many children, suffering that, in my view, was certainly unnecessary but which many Zionists would argue was absolutely necessary.
Still, his theme that we cannot bunch humankind into a universal set of rules has great appeal, at least in the present life (and certainly on the whole if present life is the only life, which appears to have been his point). I greatly enjoyed his writing and am deeply interested in reading more.
"He showed us virtue in action, not as obedience to a set of rules but as a generous responsiveness to the creative possibilities of the present moment. One always came away from a few hours in his company with a sense of living more intensely, with all one's perceptions heightened, although the topics of conversation were often far from exalted."
"[H]e honored anyone in search of truth."
"He made room for everyone in his dense little diary, then met them, and enchanted them off their feet with his warmth, with his instant sense of familiarity, and above all with his mesmerizing stories."
His writing (and thus his thinking) was clear, concise, sharp. He delves into some of the great human questions and issues and his results are good and true, though one may not agree on all of the scaffolding necessary to reach them or the apparent outcomes. Convenient to what I've been writing and thinking about, he touches on the contrasts between justice and mercy, along with other opposed ideals.
"Similarly, a world of perfect justice--and who can deny that this is one of the noblest of human values?--is not compatible with perfect mercy. I need not labor this point: either the law takes its toll, or men forgive, but the two values cannot both be realized."
While I think what the law is remains subject to debate and that mercy is more capable of perfect realization than Berlin might here indicate, the point is well taken. The better point comes just a little earlier.
:Liberty, in whichever sense, is an eternal human ideal, whether individual or social. So is equality. But perfect liberty (as it must be in the perfect world) is not compatible with perfect equality. If a man is free to do anything he chooses, then the strong will crush the weak, the wolves will eat the sheep, and this puts an end to equality. If perfect equality is to be attained, then men must be prevented from outdistancing each other [this writer's note: see, e.g., Vonnegut's Harrison Bergeron], whether in material or in intellectual or in spiritual achievement, otherwise inequities will result."
His goal appears to be the avoidance of unnecessary human suffering, justified by monism, which is on display in modern times just as ever. The word unnecessary is worth unpacking, and I didn't get full answers there. It arose in another context that also concerned me: "In spite of his criticism of Zionist politics, when it unnecessarily deprives Palestinian Arabs of their homes, he saw Zionism as a success story with regard to his central concern, the revival for the Jews of the sense of home." The emphasis is mine. Unnecessarily adds a subjective bent to the question. I wonder how Berlin would have reacted to the happenings of the last month, the death of so many children, suffering that, in my view, was certainly unnecessary but which many Zionists would argue was absolutely necessary.
Still, his theme that we cannot bunch humankind into a universal set of rules has great appeal, at least in the present life (and certainly on the whole if present life is the only life, which appears to have been his point). I greatly enjoyed his writing and am deeply interested in reading more.
September 1, 2014
My friend gave me this book as a gift, and with the exception of the Brother's Karamazov and Les Miserables--two other gifts from close friends / family--is the best book gift I've had. This is a kind of book-end to Berlin's formidable career as a public thinker. Public in the best sense of developing ideas connected to current concerns. This book gives a personal intellectual history of Berlin's thought, and therefore it is very valuable: I've often though that intellectual histories told through the lenses of human experience are the very best and most memorable, and this book is yet another example of that.
Some gems:
"If pluralism is a valid view, and respect between systems of values which are not necessarily hostile to each other is possible, then toleration and liberal consequences follow, as they do not either from monism (only one set of values is true, all the others are false) or from relativism (my values are mine, yours are yours, and if we clash, too bad, neither of us can claim to be right)."
"Liberty and equality, spontaneity and security, happiness and knowledge, mercy and justice - all these are ultimate human values, sought for themselves alone; yet when they are incompatible, they cannot all be attained, choices must be made, sometimes tragic losses accepted in the pursuit of some preferred ultimate end. But if, as I believe, this is not merely empirically but conceptually true - that is, derives from the very conception of these values - then the very idea of the perfect world in which all good things are realised is incomprehensible, is in fact conceptually incoherent. And if this is so, and I cannot see how it could be otherwise, then the very notion of the ideal world, for which no sacrifice can be too great, vanishes from view."
This latter quote squares nicely with Millers views in 'Speculative Grace' about the inherent messiness of reality--and that it is through such messiness that grace is indeed manifest through the continual resistance and availability of all objects.
Some gems:
"If pluralism is a valid view, and respect between systems of values which are not necessarily hostile to each other is possible, then toleration and liberal consequences follow, as they do not either from monism (only one set of values is true, all the others are false) or from relativism (my values are mine, yours are yours, and if we clash, too bad, neither of us can claim to be right)."
"Liberty and equality, spontaneity and security, happiness and knowledge, mercy and justice - all these are ultimate human values, sought for themselves alone; yet when they are incompatible, they cannot all be attained, choices must be made, sometimes tragic losses accepted in the pursuit of some preferred ultimate end. But if, as I believe, this is not merely empirically but conceptually true - that is, derives from the very conception of these values - then the very idea of the perfect world in which all good things are realised is incomprehensible, is in fact conceptually incoherent. And if this is so, and I cannot see how it could be otherwise, then the very notion of the ideal world, for which no sacrifice can be too great, vanishes from view."
This latter quote squares nicely with Millers views in 'Speculative Grace' about the inherent messiness of reality--and that it is through such messiness that grace is indeed manifest through the continual resistance and availability of all objects.
January 29, 2015
This is a short little book that is very thought provoking.
Isaiah Berlin is one of the best thinkers from the last century. This little book is a copy of his first known essay (when he was 12) and his last essay. The one when he is 12 is no more than a short novelty. But the last essay was written as a brief summary of his lifelong learning or perspective on what he has learned or thought about in his life. It was really very good. If you like philosophy it is good. While he is a pretty clear and lucid writer it does use some philosophy terms that can make it difficult if you don't know what those terms mean. But it is mostly written to non-philosophers. Anyway. . . I enjoyed it a great deal.
Isaiah Berlin is one of the best thinkers from the last century. This little book is a copy of his first known essay (when he was 12) and his last essay. The one when he is 12 is no more than a short novelty. But the last essay was written as a brief summary of his lifelong learning or perspective on what he has learned or thought about in his life. It was really very good. If you like philosophy it is good. While he is a pretty clear and lucid writer it does use some philosophy terms that can make it difficult if you don't know what those terms mean. But it is mostly written to non-philosophers. Anyway. . . I enjoyed it a great deal.
February 28, 2013
The first published story he ever wrote, written after about a year of English, a prize winning story by a young man, is kind of wonderful. Complete with missing periods, grammatical mistakes and creative spellings. Really a fantastic little story.
After that it's the usual philosopher stuff. Very readable, as far as philosophy goes (philosophers can't write worth shit), so that was nice. It's a pleasure to glean Wittgenstein and Nietzche and Herder and the other guys through Berlin, who renders them readable.
After that it's the usual philosopher stuff. Very readable, as far as philosophy goes (philosophers can't write worth shit), so that was nice. It's a pleasure to glean Wittgenstein and Nietzche and Herder and the other guys through Berlin, who renders them readable.
November 19, 2013
An excellent first introduction to Isaiah Berlin. The first story was exactly what you'd expect a precocious eleven-year-old to write. He demonstrates a healthy paranoia of authoritarian government and a moralistic streak. The last essay surveys his body of work from a personal perspective and completely hooked me. I've heard so much about his "two types of liberty" and his views on pluralism -- I will definitely be reading more of him.
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