"History is just one damn thing after another." (anonymous) This to some degree helps to understand the Rambam who saw learning history as Bitul Torah, a waste of time.

"History is just one damn thing after another." (anonymous)
This to some degree helps to understand the Rambam who saw learning history as Bitul Torah, a waste of time.
Yet there is some aspect of history that I think is important because it helps to understand the USA.  English History [especially the history of England after Elizabeth.] helps to understand the issues that became part of the USA Constitution.
And the USA was until around 1960 one of the great wonders of the world. But socialists could not stand to see the good times, and came over from Europe to destroy it by means of socialism, Therefore, it is important to understand the basic principles upon which the USA was founded.

After thought:
Democracy as in the USA actually stems from England with modifications based on English experiences with conflicts between with Parliament, and the King. So it has a long history. Even in ancient Rome elections took place. So the way democracy is understood in the USA is not actually all that new and has deep roots. So I feel it is unlikely to disappear any time soon.

On running for office in Rome

[The basic formula that made America great was the combination of Reason and Revelation. That is faith with reason.]

if you take the Rambam seriously about the importance of learning Physics that the way to go about it is to guard the first hour of the morning when you wake up for that alone. T

I am no expert but to seems to me that if you take the Rambam seriously about the importance of learning Physics that the way to go about it is to guard the first hour of the morning when you wake up for that alone. That is,- to get up and start right away immediately with no time lapse between waking up and getting started. [I think however a quike coffee is OK.]. And then just to say the words and go on as I mentioned before lots of times. [That is brought down in tractate Sabbath I think around page 63. Also the Musar book Paths of the Righteous brings that kind of learning. ]

[If you have a copy of Rav Shach's Avi Ezri or a Gemara,I think that is a good idea to  do them along with the Physics.  In fact I found learning Rav Shach's Avi Ezri and Tosphot to be a help to understanding Physics.]

Economic Equality

It seems if A lives a good life and B lives a vastly better life there is nothing wrong. Just the fact that they are not equal does not seem to matter at all to either one of them but only to  academic economists.

 Economic Equality seems to have nothing to recommend it as a goal except jealousy.   "Redistribution" is a kind way of saying "theft."

The problem seems to be kind of what you see in the philosophy of the Middle Ages. Axioms are picked that to them sounded good but to our ears seem strange. Then they go on to logical deductions from those axioms. But the deductions do not seem to hold water since the axioms themselves did not look solid.
Nowadays to convince young people of things the same process is done. They find some nice sounding slogan. Then draw the logical consequences from that slogan. Yet if you think about it you can tell there was nothing holding up the slogan in the first place but the fact that young people want to fit in with their peer group and the fact  that the slogan sounded nice.

critique against the Hegelian State by L T Hobhouse.

There was a well known critique against the Hegelian State by L T Hobhouse. Now it is more or less forgotten, but to me he makes some great points especially in the appendix where he brings out a major fallacy in Hegel's Theory of Right.

Edward Feser has gone back to Aquinas Michael, Huemer to Thomas Reid and the Intuitionists. But to me the best approach seems to be along the lines of Leonard Nelson. That Nelson school of thought [Kant-Friesian] anyway seems pretty close to Saadia Gaon and Maimonides--a lot more so than Hegel. [sunwall proves this on the web site of dr kelley ross]

Fries himself saw value in the approach of Hegel as he says in his history of philosophy, so i see value in the kant- fries school and hegel also.    

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But I can not help but feel sad that the basic approach of combining Torah with Physics and Metaphysics as the Rambam suggested is not implemented at least a little bit.

On one hand I can see that to learn Torah well one needs to concentrate on it like they do in Litvak yeshivas. All day, every day. But I can not help but feel sad that the basic approach of combining Torah with Physics and Metaphysics as the Rambam suggested is not implemented at least a little bit.
[As I mentioned, the other major Musar books agree with the Rambam. This you can see in the Obligations of the Heart  שער הבחינה he mentions learning the wisdom in God's creation. It is hard to see it there at first, but if you are exacting in the language you can see it.] However when one is involved in Torah to the degree that you see in Litvak yeshivas, I can see why people would not want to be distracted.

And after all, I am the biggest time waster of all-so who am I to talk? Still I can see the advantage in knowing at least a bit of Quantum Mechanics and Aristotle's book Metaphysics.
Today after Kant, I think one ought to approach Metaphysics along the lines of Leonard Nelson and the Kant-Friesian approach. [In terms of Metaphysics that means mainly Schopenhauer who is close to Plato. As such the whole thing is in fact close to Saadia Gaon and the Rambam.]

Much of philosophy has become absurd so most of the approaches are not worth the time and trouble. But I am very impressed with  Leonard Nelson. Where things went wrong seems to be when people spent just too much time and effort either defending Hegel or disagreeing with Hegel. Hegel seems to be like a kind of collapsed star-- that once one is in its orbit, there is no escape. It is like one gets trapped in that world view.





[The Rambam is tilting towards Aristotle but still remains in a Neo Plato context. So along with Saadia Gaon he corresponds well with the Kant/Fries and Schopenhauer streams of thought.  ]

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