When I was in high school I saw  a film about the black plague. And from my reading about history I have an idea of what plagues were like. This seems to be different.
It might not be made by Communist China in order to cripple the economy of the USA, but it might have been a convenient chance to do so.

I mean to say that I grew up during a time when there was a kind of rivalry between the USSR and the USA. And in spite of attempts, and even many people of good will on both sides, still there was still the reality of each side hoping the other would go down.

I would not be surprised if China was thinking along the same lines--to see the end of the capitalistic West. 

w78 G Major  [w78 in midi format]

Robert Hanna suggested a way to differentiate between different Kantian  and Husserl approaches. Strong and weak. So in terms of "dinge an sich" (things in themselves) there might be the strong transcendental,-- we can not know not even if they exist. The weak approach might be: They exist, but we do not know anything about them.  Hegel would say to this we do not know now,- but we will in the future.

You actually see this in Rav Nahman [Breslov] in the left out parts of the LeM {Hashmatot} where he says that when Reason was first created it was expanding without limit. And then God set a boundary for it. So that boundary can be itself expanding.

[Robert Hanna was not the first to notice the problems with 20th century philosophy. It might have been Allan Bloom. In any case I saw this first in the blog of Dr. Kelley Ross, who is also suggesting a kind if "forward to Kant" but in particular the brand of Leonard Nelson and Fries. However I can see that Hegel and other people after Kant had some good points. And a further confusing issue is how does anything in philosophy relate political structures?]

[Kant had a few people after him and Fries was one of the least popular. However he does have a justification for faith that makes sense to me.]

Laws of Slaves. Section 5. law 3 in the Rambam. Letting a slave go free in Rav Shach's Avi Ezri

The basic idea of letting a slave go free comes from a Gemara and is brought in Laws of Slaves. Section 5. law 3 in  the Rambam. Kinyan Sudar [handkerchief] does not work to the Rambam. but it does to the Raavad. [Normally letting a slave go free is by a document, or money, or injury. So what about exchange? or Handkerchief?  The handkerchief might work if it has a penny's worth.  This seems to be an argument between the Rambam and Raavad. But neither makes a distinction if the handkerchief is worth more than a penny!]
This comes directly from a Gemara where in fact someone tried to let his maid servant go by throwing a vessel at her. He threw it and said "by this you are let go". Rav Nahman [of the Gemara, not of Breslov] said that does not work. And the Gemara concludes the reason is because the vessel belonged to the owner.
So if it had belonged to the maid servant she would have been freed. So this looks like a straightforward proof to the Tosphot Ri''d that marrying by means of a handkerchief would work of the handkerchief is worth more than a pruta/penny.

What makes this hard to understand is that barter itself ("halifin") does seem to be in the category of money since it works only if each object is worth more than a penny. And that is not the same as with acquisition by handkerchief.

So could Lincoln legally free the slaves? It seems to me that it was not legal simply because the Constitution granted to Federal government only specific powers.  If he had powers granted by the Constitution that however would have been Okay. But it seems that that was not one of the powers granted to a president. As for the war itself, that I guess has been argued about but it also seems almost as clear as the first point--but not as clear. After all it seems not to be within the right of the Federal government to force the states to stay within the Union. It also seems like over stepping the bounds of the powers granted by the Constitution. 

I see that Robert Hanna brings down a whole long list of many people in philosophy departments that have noticed the bareness  and irrelevance of philosophy today. However I have to say that the first to bring this issue up was the Allan Bloom in the Closing of the American Mind.

I would like to suggest is that people in philosophy got too hung up on "making progress". What was wrong with learning philosophy as Socrates understood it--as effort to understand the world.

Not get academic "browny points".

 Rav Nahman [Breslov] said a correction for for sexual sin is to say the ten psalms 16, 32, 41, 42, 59, 77, 90, 105, 137, 150.
This was said mainly for the case of "nocturnal pollution" however it applies to all kind of sexual sin and in fact to all other types of sin also as you can see in the LeM of Rav Nahman vol I section 19.
[That is the reason for the name "Tikun Klali"--general correction].


Also especially nowadays when people have more free time I want to bring up the issue of private conversation with God that he suggested. [This was not meant in place of formal prayer, but this was something that he himself spent a lot of time doing.] He even said that one that really wishes to serve God ought to go out to some private place in the woods of wilderness and spend the whole day talking with God in one's own language.

In terms of learning he suggested saying the words and going on. This was not meant to replace learning in depth. But sometimes learning in depth is not possible until one gets the general idea in the first place. This he meant to be done for learning the two Talmuds and Midrashim and Rif, and Rosh and Tur. But I also think it applies to Physics and Mathematics as per the Rishonim that held these too are a part of the commandment to learn Torah.

You see in the Mir in NY and all Lithuanian yeshivas based on the Gra that the morning is spent on in depth learning and the afternoon on learning fast. I recall walking by the place where Rav Shmuel Berenbaum [One of the teachers at the Mir] was learning in the afternoon and saw that through the course of one afternoon, he would go through at least ten or more pages.
[That means according to the way of learning fast in the afternoon at the Mir. That was Gemara with Tosphot--but just fast. That was not same as the in depth learning in the morning. But the morning in depth really just meant preparing fir the class of one of the four teachers depending on whose class you were in.  And their classes were a mix of Rishonim and later authorities. That is why it is hard to explain. The best I can do to give you an idea of what that means is to learning Rav Haim of Brisk and Rav Shach's Avi Ezri. That will give you an idea of what the average class at teh Mir was like.

Rule of the stupid. When respect for reason falls, monsters are born (teachers and students of Psychology).

 The IQ of people in universities  is not the same among different departments. The highest IQ people are the  Physics students and teachers. The lowest are the teachers and students of Psychology. But the latter are the one that determine the curriculum of schools and even who is considered sane in the larger society. So what we have is the rule of the stupid.  That is that the most stupid are the one who control the direction of society.

When respect for reason falls, monsters are born.