Owen Goldin

t's a good time to remind ourselves of the Talmudic understanding of this week's parsha - the primary sin of the people of Sodom was the mistreatment of immigrants, and it was this for which the nation as a whole was punished.

www.sefaria.org/Sanhedrin.10...

Trump’s Tariff Tempest: Lessons from Kautilya's Dual Policy Introduction: Ancient Wisdom for Modern Trade Wars In an era of escalating trade tensions and economic brinkmanship, the principles of Kautilya’s Arthashastra offer timeless insights into navigating c...

I was wondering if anyone else made the connection and this guy in fact did. He thinks that Modi and Trump are both playing the same game, in regard to tariffs. pranavpatel.co/trumps-tarif... And he thinks it's a good game to play. Frightening times.

en.wikisource.org/wiki/Arthash... and so forth. Kautilya though is not totally amoral as is Trump -- there is rectitude and care for the citizenry -- within the nation. But outside the nation the king must follow the sheer logic of threats and violence.

Whoever is inferior to another shall make peace with him; whoever is superior in power shall wage war; whoever thinks "no enemy can hurt me, nor am I strong enough to destroy my enemy," shall observe neutrality; whoever is possessed of necessary means shall march against his enemy; . . . .

"otherwise (i.e., when he is provided with some help), he deserves to be harassed or reduced. Such are the aspects of an enemy." en.wikisource.org/wiki/Arthash...

"A neighbouring foe of considerable power is styled an enemy; and when he is involved in calamities or has taken himself to evil ways, he becomes assailable; and when he has little or no help, he becomes destructible;

To see the coherence of the Trumpian mob mentality, especially in international affairs, see Kautilya's Arthashastra. k works through the alliances and wars of kings, each seeking to maximize his own power. Alliances are temporary -- the weak submit to avoid destruction.

Really helps to have a partner, to keep one honest and on schedule. I'm learning with @freeandclear1.bsky.social

A prime directive of grad classes -- you have to be able to work with the original texts. So I'm back at it. Last time, Coulson. I am using Egenes this time. Must easier to learn from.

Coulson makes devangari optional. A mistake I think.

Like any language, you just have to stick with it.

I have an interest in Indian philosophy. I learned it years ago and could read Sankara but it all went away. The way to learn is to teach, and with deaths and retirements I finally have the chance to teach Asian philosophy. But for bureaucratic reasons it has to be a grad class.

Just a tool. But not looking forward to dealing with undergrad papers this fall.

But I must say that it has been a wonderful help in my study of Sanskrit, when text exercises stump me. gpt-4 got it right about half the time, gpt-5 almost aways.

gpt-4 would often hallucinate texts when prompted with a question like "Where does Iamblichus say X?" gpt-5 gets it.

I look on the age of AI with considerable trepidation. And I am aware of the problems that gpt-5 has had, shifting tasks to rather stupid submodels to "speed things up"

Bleecker and McDougal @60+; Benefit for Jail Guitar Doors; Linneman's Riverwest Inn Milwaukee WI January 25, 2025 - YouTube Videography: Stephen Vincent Anderson Please donate to Jail Guitar Doors here https://www.jailguitardoors.org/donate

Here is a link to the playlist of a show I produced not long ago, in honor of the old NYC/NE folk scene, a benefit for www.jailguitardoors.org I am very proud of how it turned out. Please check it out, and if you can, donate.

www.youtube.com/playlist?lis...

Last I heard the Ancient Commentators Series www.ancientcommentators.org.uk was looking for someone to do the NE Commentary, with which, I take it, Buridan was working. I have an unfinished paper on sophia in that commentary I should get back to.

That solution makes some sense! I am doing the Posterior Analytics not the NE commentary, so your solution I suppose would have all the pronouns be masculine.

It still strikes me as weird, when translating ancient or medieval texts. But the language is changing.

Finishing up another translation for the Ancient Commentators on Aristotle series. This, by Eustratius, a Byzantine bishop, who was hardly likely to have gender justine on his mind. But, when E is speaking of a generic thinker (not Aristotle) -- you you think it best now to go with "they"?

Coulson's big plus is to say -- never mind about memorizing sandhi rules -- just use the charts

Once I get through vol 2 of Egenes I am interested in finding other intermediate students with whom to work through some Sanskrit philosophical texts.

My first teacher, Stephen Beall, of Marquette University, has a pdf of good distillation of the Coulson, which serves well as a simplified textbook. He would very likely be ok with my sharing it

Egenes takes things at just the right pace. The main alternative seems to be Coulson, Teach Yourself Sanskrit, which I take it, is being revised. Coulson is a good supplement but gives the student too much too fast.

I would second the Egenes. I am relearning Sanskrit with friends. (I am teaching a course in Indian philosophy next year which for bureaucratic reasons must be at the graduate level too, and one must never teach a grad class without being able to work with the texts.)

OK suppose MAGA wins both 1) the power of the Executive branch to withhold money from public schools because of what is taught and 2) federal support of religious education. Then when a Democrat is elected they can use 1) to void 2) Right?

I really felt for the student, not only insofar as he is a solitary man facing death, but as forever haunted by the things he had to do.

If something is permitted or even necessary, then you do it, and that's the end of it. But reality seems so much messier. Even doing what we have to do, we are implicated in evil.

and said that the best you can do is to do your best. But I was also thinking about the renewed assault on Gaza. It may or may not be necessary -- I am not a military expert, I just don't know. But as "Orthodox Jew" I remain troubled by a simple appeal to halakhah --

With piercing eyes, he talked of combat experience in Iraq -- looking in the eyes of a man he killed. "That never leaves you." Even though he grants that he did what he had to do, he is still haunted, as he faces his own death. I brought up the concept of "dirty hands"

On Dirty Hands. Today I had a grad student advisee come in for paperwork for a temporary withdrawal -- cancer has taken a severe turn for the worse. He started waxing philosophical -- in the armchair sense, though Camus and Kant came up.

Human Nature and Transhumanism Proponents of transhumanism argue for the use of medical technologies to transform human nature into something better. Those who are opposed to taking steps in the direction of transhumanism sometimes...

It's forthcoming in the Journal of Medicine and Philosophy
If you can access Academia a pre-publication draft is here, I can send it to you if you want.

www.academia.edu/127408212/Hu...

I was stepping out a bit and wrote this piece on transhumanism. (I'm against it. I think the green light Musk has now, to merge a Neuralink with AI, is the biggest threat humanity is now facing.)