DANIEL DERONDA: George Eliot - FULL AudioBook: Part 1/3,https://youtu.be/fsBTAJ3aKbE?si=nDhG1tF9vaMoUYzj

https://library.harvard.edu/sites/default/files/static/onlineexhibits/james/religious/6_8.html

Opening Lecture - Learning What Our Place in the Natural World Might Be   by Andy Gilman - July 31, 2018 Delivered at the Humanity's Place in the Natural World summer intensive ​ What is nature? What does natural mean? Or, more specifically, what is natural for humans to do and to be in the world, and what is our relationship to the world? Do we belong to the world, are we wholly made of the world, or are we a part of it and also alien to it? What is our responsibility to the world?  To investigate these questions we will explore examples from mythology, biology, physics, psychology, philosophy, linguistics, and the arts.   There are origin stories from around the world that describe our situation as partly of the world and partly not of the world. Here are just three stories, and they are amazingly congruent:   From Greece - Prometheus and Epimetheus were spared imprisonment in Tartarus because they had not fought with their fellow Titans during the war with the Olympians. They were given the task of creating humanity. Prometheus shaped man out of mud, and Athena breathed life into his clay figure. Prometheus had assigned Epimetheus the task of giving the creatures of the earth their various qualities, such as swiftness, cunning, strength, fur, and wings. Unfortunately, by the time he got to humans Epimetheus had given all the good qualities out and there were none left for man. So Prometheus decided to make man stand upright as the gods did and to give him fire.   …   Native American - In the beginning there was no land, no light, only darkness and the vast waters of Outer Ocean where Earth-Maker and Great-Grandfather were afloat in their canoe... Earth-Maker took soft clay and formed the figure of a man and of a woman, then many men and women, which he dried in the sun and into which he breathed life: they were the First People.   …   Old Testament - Then God said, “Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness, so that they may rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky, over the livestock and all the wild animals, and over all the creatures that move along the ground. God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground.”… Now no shrub had yet appeared on the earth and no plant had yet sprung up, for the Lord God had not sent rain on the earth and there was no one to work the ground, but streams came up from the earth and watered the whole surface of the ground. Then the Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.   The simple way to read these accounts is that our bodies are made from the same stuff as every other natural thing, such as clay, and the breath of our life comes from supernatural forces that created and govern the world. Even in comparison to the animals, of which at least our bodies have so much in common, humans are particularly situated not just with life but also with a god-like fashioning. Other aspects of these peculiarities include morality, language, abstraction, timing, calculation, imagination, understanding… in short, what reason produces.      Differing Abilities and Their Consequences Even if we want to criticize these origin stories for uniquely raising the status of humanity to divine proportions (or at least divine instigation), it’s difficult to deny that our experience in the world appears to be distinct from other life. Let’s consider a few examples:   You can watch a nature program and see a group of lions single out a juvenile antelope, cut it off from the herd, tackle it, keep a firm bite on the antelope’s neck until it falls, and then the lions begin to tear the flesh away while the antelope dies. It’s gruesome. We understand that this is the way of nature, and the entire living world only survives with the death of other living things. Even plants require the nutrients that soil provides, and the difference between soil and sand is dead plants and animals. Even floating sea plants metabolize the soil-like nutrients found in the water, the product of former living things. The disturbance here is that we know this is how life works and if we want to be alive we have to cause the death and potential suffering of other living things, but we can’t ignore the pain and presumed terror of the antelope, nor the suffering of the hungry lion. But of course the lion is not being cruel. The whole system seems cruel to us because we can imagine what it’s like to be all of the creatures. Not only that, we also find life and living things profoundly beautiful and rare in, at least so far, an otherwise lifeless universe. By nature, it seems, we are fundamentally driven to want to continue to survive while we abhor (when we deeply think about it) the method of our continuance. When we don’t think about it we just enjoy our burger. It does seem strange that nature would have an offspring so ill-disposed to the process, but hold that thought for now.  If we try to define music, we typically come up with something like the following:the science or art of ordering tones or sounds in succession, in combination, and in temporal relationships to produce a composition having unity and continuity. Or more simply: vocal, instrumental, or mechanical sounds having rhythm, melody, and harmony. So, by these definitions, when wind chimes are blown and making sound are they also making music? And when birds are singing in the forest are they making music? Let’s take each question in turn.A stove in action is only hot for beings that have nerves. For a rock, the stove is not hot, better said the stove is in greater molecular motion which will influence the molecular motion of the rock if the rock is close enough. That is a way of understanding what temperature means, and we are lucky to be able to sense it in order to avoid injury. Similarly, when the wind chime is in motion, we hear the sounds it produces and find it to be beautiful and even musical, but the chime does not hear or understand what it is producing, nor did it compose the sounds. The maker of the chime intended those sounds, and that maker is also a potential maker of music, just as we listeners are. So, the chime does make music, for us.The singing bird in the forest is intending to make the sounds it’s making, unlike the blowing chimes. Again, we may find the sounds to be beautiful and musical. All of our observations of birds singing seem to involve communication of territory and mating readiness, although we should always be cautious about defining the intention of animal behaviors with absolute confidence. Still, we would not call all bird “communication songs” harmonious. Kingfishers rattle, owls hoot, and woodpeckers seem to use hammering to communicate as well as to find food. Contrast these bird examples with a woman alone at home, learning to play a song on her guitar. Why might she be learning to play a song? If the song has lyrics we could say that the music is speaking to her experience or emotionally moving her. Let’s say this is a song without lyrics… the song is not about anything, it is just melody. Why learn the song now? Maybe she plans to perform the song in a crowd, in the hopes of attracting a mate. Let’s say she is shy and never intends to perform the song in front of others. Why now? What’s the point of learning the song?Music has the distinct honor of being the most muse-like of all of the art forms, hence the name. In its non-representational melodic and rhythmic forms, music seems to have the potential to elicit fantastically rich responses: excitement, sadness, melancholy, joy, wonder, peace, etc. Of course the addition of lyrics can make music be about something particular, and that is just another dimension of the form. Consider what more is within the practice of music – ratios. When we hear a C, and a C’, they are stacked, they belong to each other. Then we learn that the C’ vibrates at double the frequency of C. Then consider the perfect 4th and its ratio of 2:3, and the perfect 5th at 3:4. Were we simply interested in making maps we would say that it makes sense that the 4th or 5th work with the root, because there is a proportion that appeals to our cognitive sensibility. Luckily we are not just mapmakers… these notes together also sound beautiful.The name music suggests that this art is a gift from the gods, and therefore not originating from the natural world… another example of our peculiarity. Learning a song certainly does not feel artificial or unnatural to us, but it does seem to be a unique activity in the world.  As some thinkers have questioned, if we were to visit another world and look for a sign of intelligence there, what might we look for? An easy and demonstrable sign would be a made image. Why? Consider what goes into the making of an image, such as a prehistoric painting of a bison on a cave wall. The producer of this work must be able to do the following things:a) Hold a mental image from the past and reproduce it in the present,b) Have the ability to discern essential qualities of a many instances of thesame general kind of thing, and reproduce that essence,c) Both a) and b) suggest the ability to experience time outside of thepresent awareness and abstraction outside of the present senseperception.d) If the bison happened to be present and modeled for the artwork, theimagemaker is still deciding what is essential to reproduce from themodel, since some truncation must occur.Beings who can make images also time and abstract in a manner non-image-making beings do not seem to be doing, and this might be the beginning of symbolic, abstract language. In the animal kingdom we do find signs, such as urine marking territory or location, but these signs seem to lack the dimensionality and depth of definition we see in human image making.    In the animal kingdom apart from humans, suicide is extremely rare and, when it does occur, seems to generally take three manifestations:a) self-destruction to defend the colony – as in the case of carpenter ants,b) suicide-inducing parasites – such as worms that control crickets fromearly age and then, in adulthood, get them to die in water so theworms can reproduce and find new crickets to zombify,c) animals such as dogs and ducks that appear to be depressed about thedeath of the human master or the life-long mate, and thenabstaining from food until the animal dies.Approximately 0.5% to 1.4% (varying by country) of people die by suicide, a mortality rate of 11.6 per 100,000 persons per year. Suicide resulted in 842,000 deaths in 2013 up from 712,000 deaths in 1990. Rates of suicide have increased by 60% from the 1960s to 2012, with these increases seen primarily in the developing world. (Wikipedia). In the U.S, firearms account for 51% of all suicides in 2016 (American Foundation for Suicide Prevention). This highlights a difference between human and the rare animal suicide: we use tools. According to Psychology Today, there are five main reasons people attempt suicide:a) They're depressed,b) They're psychotic,c) They're impulsive,d) They're crying out for help,e) They have a philosophical desire to die.The last cause offers the most to consider for our purpose here. Our peculiarity gives us a distorted view, or a view that exposes too much, and makes some of us to prefer unconsciousness over continued consciousness.  Healthcare professionals will say that some thoughts of suicide are normal… So whatever happened that triggered our long ago ancestors to be able to see and do more came at a price. Jeff, our storyteller on Friday morning, will touch on this.  Sometimes a bright young person will ask: “I know in English we call that thing over there a dog, and in Spanish we call it a perro… but what does the dog call itself?” The answer: “We’re not sure if it calls itself anything, or even if it calls anything anything.” What avalanche of cognitive implications does (simply) giving something a name suggest, and how does that indication separate the named thing from all other named things? So much has been said of human language and we need not reiterate it here, we can just point out that while we continue to learn more about animal communication and different species’ abilities at recall and limited abstraction, the spectrum of animal abilities (humans included) does not seem incremental… rather exponential or at least with enormous qualitative gaps. We will certainly learn more about animal’s abilities in the future.       There is a lack of consensus on the difference between humans and our close animal cousins (in nature, without being trained). In general, the following list summarizes what many say are the observable divergent attributes, while omitting more obscure abilities such as self-reflection:    Symbolic, recursive language Fashioning permanent tools Image making (abstraction) Making art (visual, musical, etc.) and, Burying our dead Perhaps we can take this list as a tentative group of examples to suggest why, in the area of abilities, we sometimes feel alien to the world.     The World as a Testing Ground In religions and philosophies that involve an afterlife, the world is often considered a testing ground, and humanity’s performance during the test will determine what will happen in the next phase. Sometimes the next phase is coming back to the world to be tested again, an example of this system being the karmic cycles in Hinduism or in Buddhism. But just as in the final-resting-place type of afterlife, the karmic cycle can end in a final destination of non-existence when all goes well (Nirvana). So, within this framework of losing the self or maintaining the self in something like heaven, the world is not our true home… it’s our temporary home, just as our body would be our temporary suit. Within these beliefs, the breath of life (or the spark of human consciousness) given by the creating powers is our real self, or at least the self or essence or quality that will endure for the next or final phase.   There are at least three ways we can respond to the world-as-testing-ground proposals:   The afterlife accounts are right, or perhaps one of the accounts is right. We don’t really belong to the world and whatever kinship we feel to other life or non-life ends at the body. Our essence, which manifests in abilities we don’t share with other life, is evidence of our difference in kind. The reason we might feel alienated or expatriated is because we are longing to go to our final home, which is God, Nirvana, etc.  If one does not subscribe to a traditional religious or philosophical belief that advocates for an afterlife system, one could propose that the afterlife accounts are a consequence or an attempted soothing reaction to the differing abilities we described above. More explicitly, when we first encounter the death of a beloved, we say “what was the most her or him is not there now… the body is still there but the main thing is not… the animating thing is not.” And since we have the ability to time in a way that can hold both the past and the future, including the past before us and the future after us, we quite naturally ask where the departed beloveds are now? Where were they before their birth? Where will I be after my death? It’s comforting to think of the beloved or ourselves as continuing after death, but perhaps the richer question for our task now is to ask How can we imagine eternity and glimpse universals and seemingly be at least somewhat free from the mechanical constraints we see in matter, and yet be finite, clunky, self-delusional flashes of ephemera? How can both be true?The mechanical or reductive view that is sometimes posited is that human life and human abilities solely reside on a spectrum that includes animals and plants, and extends further to non-living matter, since that is what everything is made out of. The Enlightenment view of matter is that it is predictable, extended, measurable, governed, and can be useful when viewed through these mechanical laws. By extension, this paradigm can be applied to complicated things (e.g. the heart is like a pump), which too must be guided by material laws. Finally,  even the most complex things we can find would also fall within these material structures, and living organisms are by far the most complex phenomenon we have encountered.Animal life seems to will and want things, and more complex creatures seem to have an inner lives (e.g. dogs dreaming). Human life also has a sense of free will and all of the abilities we described before. But within the mechanical view, some have argued, the human abilities mentioned above are not the essential forces or attributes that define and motivate human kind. Instead, the forces that govern humanity are the same forces that motivate all life: the drives to survive and reproduce. Consider the following quotes:“We are survival machines – robot vehicles blindly programmed to preserve the selfish molecules known as genes. This is a truth which still fills me with astonishment.” ― Richard Dawkins, The Selfish Gene“Individuals are not stable things, they are fleeting. Chromosomes too are shuffled into oblivion, like hands of cards soon after they are dealt. But the cards themselves survive the shuffling. The cards are the genes. The genes are not destroyed by crossing-over, they merely change partners and march on. Of course they march on. That is their business. They are the replicators and we are their survival machines. When we have served our purpose we are cast aside. But genes are denizens of geological time: genes are forever.” ― Richard Dawkins, The Selfish GeneSometimes the human abilities above our animal kin are called epiphenomenal, generally meaning that the abilities are there but are not the main thrust of our being. They are more like attribute such as hair color… they are real but not essential. Some thinkers believe these abilities are actually illusions, the most common culprit being the feeling of having a free will which seems to be at odds with determined matter. Others would argue that our ability to reason is an aid to survival and reproduction, but also causes us to do things that don’t seem evolutionarily beneficial, such as voluntary celibacy or committing suicide. Or sometimes the argument is that the origin of something like music comes from ancestors such as bird songs… useful origins that have abstracted and don’t have their original function.So, in this view, we are lying to ourselves when we say the world is a testing ground. It is the only ground. The faculties we possess allow us to hold the past and the future within the present thought, and makes the non-existence of the beloved or the self unbearable, so we make up a story that we will meet again some day. This might be the kind of thinking Francis Bacon is critical of in The New Organon, whom we are discussing tomorrow. Whatever alienation we feel from the natural world is caused in part by the stories we tell ourselves, exemplifying that we are different from the rest of the world in the most essential ways. If we do feel alienation from the natural world because we are different, an alternative response could be that our accidentally enhanced awakenness is just allowing us to see the world more of the way it actually is. Sometimes the way it is is harsh and perhaps meaningless, and our final resting place, our “home state or homeostasis”, is non-consciousness and material dissipation. This should sound like a bummer.       Imagine a vertical line, where on the top you have the following:a) The body, wholly made of matter, following all physical laws,b) The soul (animating principle or force), which is not made of matter, and therefore not subject to physical determinism. The substance ofthe soul is what the gods breathed into the clayNow, on the bottom of the line, you have the following:a) Everything about a human, and all life, is made wholly of matter andsubject to all physical laws and biological imperatives. If the humandoes something out of the determined ordinary, it’s a quirky,inessential byproduct. The mind is a feature of the brain and isstrictly a physical phenomenon.Of course this is just another way of describing options 1) and 2) above, and is also the famous mind/body problem. The mind or soul does not seem to be the same thing as the body, but all of the work and scientific discovery since the Renaissance has been in the realm of matter, with the incorporeal substance of the mind or soul nowhere to be found. Our third way of responding to the world as our natural home versus a testing ground is to take the bottom of our vertical line and circle it to the top, connecting the ends to become one thing. It will be a cautious approach, step by step. (Much of this portion is elaborated by Hans Jonas in The Phenomenon of Life, whom we will be discussing on Thursday).Let’s start from what is closest to us, and that is our inner life. We should be more convinced that we have inner lives than that each other actually exists. An inner life is our first fact. We also have a strong sense that we get to make choices. We have a sense of beauty, even if it’s hard to exhaustively define. We have some moral sense, even if the origins of that morality are debatable or obscure. We can calculate, imagine, perceive, create, and emote. These qualities and their relatives are the exact opposite of epiphenomenal, in fact most of us prize these characteristics above many others that seem more basic. A life without these rich abilities is no life we would want. So, we will posit step one: Attributes that are dearest to us are most essentially us.Next, when we study non-human living things we see incredible similarity in body structures and many behaviors. As we mentioned above, if our natural abilities are on a spectrum with other animals, there are some huge qualitative gaps. But, the evidence of our senses indicate that we have much more in common with our animal kin than we have differences between us. If we are to take that evidence as true, it’s not a big leap to say that animals too must have some form of inner lives (the dreaming dog), even if that inner life is the faint irritation in the single-celled creature. All metabolizing beings have inner and outer dimensions, and it could be argued that this makes us related not just in body but in essence, at least foundationally.  If, just for the moment, we are to set aside incorporeal soul-stuff, simply because we can’t find it, and say that matter is the sole source of life and nature, then we need to rethink what matter is capable of, because here we are. In the 20th and 21st centuries, much work has been done in the fields of Complexity, Chaos, Emergent Properties, investigations into dark matter and dark energy, and the instances of Quantum strangeness continue to amaze and puzzle us. Without detailing all of these theories here, we can simply say that there is a lot happening with matter that we cannot predict, especially when structures get complicated. The vision of Enlightenment material predictability does not categorically pan out upon further scrutiny. Even cause and effect relationships betray our own limitations in understanding and our use of overly simple categories. Can’t we take this last step and wonder… since we can do all of the wonderful things we are naturally able to do, and if we are made solely of matter, than matter is capable of making beings who can do these wonderful things. Therefore matter is much richer than it appears.If we stick with our senses, what appears to be the norm after the death of an organism is for the material and energy to dissipate into other life forms. In this view individuality does seem to be a dance of moving parts. But since storytelling is something the natural world has fostered in us, it will be our privilege and duty to carry on the story of the world.  Conclusion - Rethinking what Natural Means Is a beaver’s dam natural? Everyone says yes to that. Is a building natural? Put another way, is it natural for people to make buildings? If it is not natural for people to make buildings, what do we mean by natural? A dichotomy many make is that there is the natural world and the human-made world, which is another way of saying that we are not a part of the natural world… or perhaps we used to be a part of it but when we ate the apple we were exiled from nature. In this scheme the building is unnatural to the world. However, if we ask: Are people natural to the world or unnatural, and if we answer that people are natural to the world, then we belong to the world and our buildings do too. If we change what natural means to: What frequently and regularly occurs then buildings are natural to people, just as dams are to beavers and nests to birds. But conversely, we see that if people spend insufficient time in non-civilization (what is typically called nature), they can become fragmented, anxious, and depressed. Our “at-homeness” in the world seems to require some time away from the stuff we made in order to plunge into what made us.   We will conclude that if humans are natural to the world then what we naturally do is also a product of world. The list of natural activities include reasoning, music making, abstraction, laughter, appreciation of beauty, mathematics, emotion, having a sense of time, morality, storytelling, image making, curiosity, kindness, and so much more. Instead of these abilities setting humankind apart from the world, by re-understanding the natural world and what the world has actually made in us, we can potentially recognize a richer home here. If we see that the world made creatures who are kind and artistic, then the world must at least have the potential of these qualities within it in order to generate these traits in its offspring. The so-called dumb matter swirling in a meaningless void has, in the right configuration and complexity, the potential to make creatures who can see the world, embrace the world, and make meaning in and of the world. Again, if our senses and essences are any guides, our job is not simply to reproduce, it is to love what is most precious to us… to recognize the cosmos because we participate and partake of that same cosmos.     I would like to conclude with a poem by Mary Oliver, whom we will read on Friday: Blackwater Woods   Look, the trees are turning their own bodies into pillars   of light, are giving off the rich fragrance of cinnamon and fulfillment, ​ the long tapers of cattails are bursting and floating away over the blue shoulders ​ of the ponds, and every pond, no matter what its name is, is ​ nameless now. Every year everything I have ever learned   in my lifetime leads back to this: the fires and the black river of loss whose other side   is salvation, whose meaning none of us will ever know. To live in this world ​ you must be able to do three things: to love what is mortal; to hold it ​ against your bones knowing your own life depends on it; and, when the time comes to let it go, to let it go.

Thriving Public Schools Affect Us All Whether we have school-aged children or not, a vibrant public education system should be as vital as water, to every one of us. When we read about recent developments at Ojai Unified School District we rightly feel a threat to our community’s future flourishing, and when we feel threatened it’s natural to brace ourselves and launch into fight or flight mode. Consider another possible response: We take this opportunity, jarring as it is, to embrace collaboration and cultivate a new vision for public education in the Ojai Valley we love. Imagine a future where people move or return to the Valley because of our outstanding public school offerings and alliances, just like they come here now for our natural environment and culture. How might we do this? First is to understand that it can and must be done. It is disgraceful that a community like Ojai, with eight high-end private schools, one third of the population college educated and beyond, an outsized proportion of wealthy and prominent citizens who claim highly developed levels of consciousness, sophistication of ideas, and social equity values, would at the same time offer its children a level of public education marked by mixed achievement, bankruptcy, and desperation. It’s natural to think of this as ‘them’. “Oh our public school system is a mess, they don’t know what they are doing.” But it isn’t them, it’s us. We the public are the ones responsible for public education. And we are enabling unacceptable failure. Second is to organize resources and develop a strategy. What have we got, why isn’t this working, what would make a difference, and how do we get there? We have a school board, city government, a group of elite private schools, non-profits who support education, financial resources, intelligent citizens who value public education, facilities, and teachers. What don’t we have? In a nutshell we lack vision. Along with thinking it is they who are the problem we have fallen into a deep hole of complacent ignorance. We haven’t bothered to take an interest. What if 500 serious citizens of the Ojai Valley decided to take it on? Is the welfare of our children worth it? Are they important natural resources that should be nurtured and protected? We outline here some of many alternatives for fulfilling our obligation to deliver thoughtful education to our children. Providing the best possible choices to our students should be the goal of our collective public interest and spending in education. Collaboration with educational non-profits, such as Rock Tree Sky, The Ojai Educational Foundation, BRAVO, O-Higher Ed and many others is one way to increase the range of opportunity. Another vehicle to add energy, focus, and purpose in educational choice is to encourage the creation of charter schools in our valley. Charter schools are public schools, free to families, typically with some area of focus such as science, environmentalism, citizenship, as so on. Charter schools are generally formed by passionate groups of parents and teachers who want to build educational choices for families. Charter initiatives apply to a sponsoring agency, first their local district, who then evaluates the merits and readiness of the initiative. If approved, the school can begin, with the requirements for its staff being the same as for all public schools in California. There are many ways the charter school, the school district, private schools, and educational non-profts and businesses can collaborate. The usual argument against charter schools is that funding is leaving the public school district and following the student to the charter school. But notice how entrenched this argument is. The smaller charter school, acting as an autonomous district, can be more supple, streamlined, and focused with the use of resources. Not all charter schools are good, just as not all educational non-profits are good, and just as not all public schools are good. However, when these smaller organizations are working well they can be fantastic. They work well when the leadership talent of the community take on the task. Now is the moment for innovation. To our current OUSD board, and to the two additional board members soon to be appointed, we want to encourage a time of radical re-imagining and serious soul searching. There are energetic families hoping for alternatives, and groups of well-resourced community members ready to invest their time, wisdom, and money in dynamic prospects. Do we really want to become simply a tourism / retirement community where one third of the students in the Valley attend private schools and our public school system is beleaguered and apologetic? We can do this. Our future needs us to do it. “Education is not preparation for life, education is life itself.” - John Dewey “Next in importance to freedom and justice is popular education, without which neither freedom nor justice can be permanently maintained.” - James Garfield Andy Gilman and Tom Krause of the Agora Foundation

Issues of import to our community present a great challenge, especially in fostering fair and fruitful conversations and decision making when good people disagree and passions are high. At the Agora Foundation we strive to support civil exchange in our community through our seminars, panels, videos, and writing. Having explored and discussed the writings of great thinkers throughout history and geography, especially those who have wrestled with political and moral decisions, we offer these guideposts for our Ojai Valley leadership, and hope it will influence their decision-making and action: Philosophical Dimension - 1) Am I treating others the way I want to be treated? 2) Am I acting is such a way that I would will my act to be a law for all people? 3) Can I state, clearly and distinctly, how my action appeals to reason? 4) Have I sought facts pertaining to my action in every reasonable way? 5) Have I sought out contrary opinions and really listened, prepared to change my mind if moved to? Practical / Social Dimension - 6) Do I believe that the end of my action is worthy of concerted effort? 7) Is there historical precedent that my action produces the desired effect? 8) Is my action unbiased, sustainable, and inclusive? 9) Does my action map to generally accepted moral practice? 10) Does my act have the potential to uplift humanity? Political Dimension – 11) Am I acting for the common good, with goodwill toward all involved? 12) Am I deciding what is best for my constituents, even though a large portion have declared their interest in the opposite way of my intention? 13) Does my act apply the rules to everyone consistently? 14) Does my action benefit the greatest number of people? Psychological Dimension - 15) Have I asked myself, alone and facing the mirror, why I am pursuing this action? 16) Might I be self-deceived? 17) Have I been convinced in the past that I was right, later to be proven wrong? How is this time different? We hope that as our elected officials move through difficult decisions (and 2023 has begun dramatically), they can pause, reflect on some of these criteria, soul search, and listen to each other and to their communities. And we, as a community, can do our part to support goodwill, reason, patience, and civility in return. - Andy Gilman The Agora Foundation

https://youtu.be/DloB2yoX14I

Can different peoples ever fully trust and understand one another while maintaining their distinct identities? This is one of the key questions of civilization, and a challenge we continue to struggle with today. It seems that anything other that a nuanced response to this inquiry would yield a flat pronouncement - Yes or No - of which, in either case, history would provide numerous contrary examples, with gradations between the poles. In attempting to answer the question, the first concept to explore would be the idea of different peoples, of which we might attach distinct identities as their expression and self-recognition. If we were to compare England and France, as geographically close peoples for an example, we could say that they have different customs, distinct languages (although with many shared words), and claim separate lineages. There is a long history of mistrust (Shakespeare’s history plays are great sources for details), war between the two nations, competition for colonization, and stereotypical disdain for the other’s mode of living. These two peoples also allied in two world wars in the last century and in the last 75 years have mostly stood shoulder-to-shoulder against shared enemies, especially against the Soviet Union and later Islamic extremist organizations. Perhaps England and France would not be termed radically distinct, since they have so much shared history, and perhaps that is why they can be allies. It seems they understand and trust each other enough to be partners while still maintaining differences, even if these differences are seen as sometimes slight, and other times less so. What these countries do deeply share is Western Culture, in the fullest sense of the word. Further, France and England are two of the largest contributors to the meaning of that cultural expression. Perhaps the general shared values of the West is enough to overcomes pedestrian cultural differences when the circumstances call for it. Ancient Athens and Sparta might offer an even closer example of adjacent peoples who were allies and also fought, and while sharing language and culture (e.g. worshiping the same gods) they also held important differences. If we consider other peoples who are more clearly distinct from one another, such as the Americans and Chinese, we see a more difficult relationship. These counties are very different in language and history, in political systems, and in several expressed values, such as how to achieve social order. These two nations do co-exist, though the motivations might be driven by economic benefit and mutually assured destruction in the case of large-scale conflict. Consider these lines from the Annual Threat Assessment Report issued by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, April 9, 2021, “The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) will continue its whole-of-government efforts to spread China’s influence, undercut that of the United States, drive wedges between Washington and its allies and partners, and foster new international norms that favor the authoritarian Chinese system. Chinese leaders probably will, however, seek tactical opportunities to reduce tensions with Washington when such opportunities suit their interests. China will maintain its major innovation and industrial policies because Chinese leaders see this strategy as necessary to reduce dependence on foreign technologies, enable military advances, and sustain economic growth and thus ensure the CCP’s survival.” Trust between these two peoples seems to be a faraway dream, and perhaps even understanding, though less of a commitment, is shallow, at least at the governmental levels. At the same time, there is an appreciation of each other’s food, art, skill, and philosophy. Perhaps less so now, there was a huge immigration of Chinese into the United States, with the wealthy Chinese still sending their children to private U.S. elementary and high schools, as well as colleges and universities. Individual meetings between Americans and Chinese, whether in China or America, can be warm and mutually friendly. Perhaps these individual connections can offer a clue to achieving trust while maintaining distinction, which could be applied to groups of peoples around the world. Finally, we might consider differences and difficulties within one nation. What is at the forefront of so much of our reading for Agora within the past two years has been American history, politics, and literature focusing on the black experience in our country. For the sake of the exploration, we might group citizens of generally European descent (even if just in morphology) with citizens of African descent as two peoples now striving to co-exist with trust and understanding, while maintaining distinct identities. Crucially in this case, the African people were initially brought to the American Colonies against their will and then enslaved and bred to continue enslavement through generations. That legacy of power difference continues to influence relationships today. The principle of respect can transform the relationship between distinct peoples. American colonists revolted against England, but the relationship warmed pretty quickly. The relationship between black and white Americans is taking longer, for obvious reasons. Developing respect between distinct people will facilitate understanding and, eventually trust, but generous efforts will have to be made.

What makes a classic work a classic? This question seems to be obvious to answer, but is actually curiously difficult. It’s pretty easy to write that Homer, Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Virgil are classic authors (as writers of works from the ancient Greek and Roman periods). But what about the Greek and Roman works that are extant but not engaging and rarely read? Further, when one includes books such as Moby Dick, War and Peace, and Emma into the classic category, the question of what makes a classic work becomes not just time-bound, rather it encourages other dimensions to the definition of classic. Finally, when one exclaims that the ‘69 Chevy Camaro is a classic car, what could possibly by meant by that expression? Classic must mean more than objectively or relatively old. Classic must mean an art object that also speaks of the human response to the most important inquiries that have spanned over millenia, but which also spark a specific inspiration in the present day... hence, “this modern work is destined to become a classic.” We could suppose this last statement means that the contemporary work will be in the classical cannon someday in the future. How is this possible? It must mean that the work is speaking within the classical conversation of the deepest questions which have only an accidental or cursory interest in ancient or passing time. The obvious implications are that human nature and human experience are generally constants. But classic, besides implying a launch of the Great Conversation, also involves aesthetic considerations. We speak of classic architecture, painting, sculpture, and engineering. We describe art that references past art as classical, or we encapsulate a period of time or a mode as classical, such as classical music. To further complicate definitions, we call contemporary music that is written for ensembles or orchestras as contemporary classical music. Even if we don’t particularly like a piece of ancient or modern orchestral music, we tend to think the activity and the artifact is worthy, and in at least some sense we think it is good. Classic seems to also imply good. The Greek, Roman, Hindu, and Chinese ancients speak in ways that is surprisingly current. The problems, wonderings, and beautiful expressions they produced are among the same considerations, worries, and impulses we have today. If it is true that the human condition is a constant, then classic might mean that which is speaking intelligently and beautifully to these perennial considerations. If that is true, classic is possible now.

Some thoughts on voting As we head into this election season, our valley is facing some formidable challenges. Managing the watershed, preparing for the next wildland fire, the struggle for housing, striving for balance and diversity in our economy, declining public school enrollment, and sustaining our natural environment are just a few of the issues many of us are thinking about and working on. The general feeling seems to be, and with justification, that the decisions we make now will largely set the direction for the next decades and perhaps further. This dynamic is always true, but seems to be especially vivid now. With this critical moment in mind, I want to propose the following strategy as we listen to our candidates for public office, work to understand the proposed measures, read the news, participate on social media, and politically engage with our neighbors, friends, and colleagues: 1. Civility - Act as if we are all on the same team. In fact, we are on the same team as co-residents of our valley. We basically want the same sorts of things, such as community flourishing, but may disagree on how to achieve these ends. Listen carefully, and listen more than speak. Believe that the person you are talking with has a general good will, and that a worthy goal is to try to understand each other, even if your minds do not change. Ask questions respectfully, and when others are offering facts, ask to be pointed to the sources of those facts so you can also investigate. Overall, have your language be open, your mind not immovably set, and your demeanor calm and inquisitive. 2. Patience - Democracy and liberal society are slow moving by design, requiring enormous energy and consensus to make big changes. Allow for this time, and come to count on it. Does this mean that efficiency can’t be improved? Of course not. Work to understand why things take longer to change than we might like by asking our representatives and city and county employees about the processes they employ to make the best decisions they believe they can. Then evaluate from a place of knowledge. Further, patience with each other in our conversations can go a long way toward building camaraderie and momentum. 3. Diligence - It is more common than not to read a social media post where someone posits a seeming fact (e.g. can you believe they voted on “x”, or against “y”), but the account is truncated, narrow, and potentially misleading. In conversations too, how often is hearsay taken for veracity? Do you own homework. To understand the current state of water, listen to the Casitas or OBGMA Board meetings or check out their website reports. To understand an Ojai City Council decision, attend the meeting or watch it online, or reach out to the representatives or staff people directly. This takes time, energy, and attention, and it is easier just to be upset. Instead, suspend judgment until you feel you have some grounding and distinction in your views, and then you will become a beneficial force to inform and potentially persuade. Tether your facts to their sources whenever possible, and be ready to cite those sources to others. 4. Scrutiny - Listen to our candidates for public office carefully when they speak. Separate concrete proposals from emotional appeals. Work to parse confounded statements and keep the conversations steady, focused, and taking as long as they need to take. At the upcoming September 28 Ojai City Council Candidate Forum, taking place at Oak Grove School, don’t come ready to cheer or boo. Come ready to listen like a hiring manager to an eager applicant. This holds true for any opportunity to engage with all of our candidates for public office. Be ready to ask tough questions and respectfully press when the answers are vague. Be keen-eyed and open-eared, looking and listening for clarity, consistency, and details. This is our chance to set a valley trajectory and we don’t want to miss the opportunity because of laziness, tribalism, rigidity, or ignorance. The values of civil discourse and sustained, honest inquiry cannot be overstated. We would not have our country without these virtues. All of us have a lot at stake here, and the next steps are not as obvious are we might like, so we are going to have to work together. Now more than ever. End

Why is a liberal education relevant today? This question is a great example of the soul-searching individuals and institutions have been doing for some time. Other closely-related questions are “What is the right kind of education?”, and “Given a finite amount of time and money, what should be studied and what should be omitted?” These are important considerations not just for an individual’s edification, but also for our society and our world. An initial response to the question must include a definition of liberal education. A common approach to a definition includes an integration of learning across curriculum and between academic and experiential modes, usually with a variety of options for the student to choose from. But within the deeper context of the opening question, a more pointed rendering might be the appropriate education to cultivate a free human being or an education every free person (that is to write, all people) should have. With these later definitions, choice becomes an interesting dimension. Will anything suffice to cultivate a free person? Almost certainly not. But if you don’t specifically read this or that book are you excluded from the realm of the free? Probably not. So, perhaps the focus is not specifically on particular authors, rather on disciplines or areas of thought and societal development. Of course developments are achieved by human beings, and there are some individual authors who, if they were to be omitted from the conversation (e.g. Aristotle and philosophy, or Newton and physics) one could reasonably argue that the studied subject is lacking. Still, if we were to focus on areas of study, perhaps the following would be a natural starting point: What is the best way to live a life? How do we know what we know? What is the best political system to encourage human flourishing? What is the nature of reality and of human kind? What is the nature of matter? Is there a God and what might God’s nature be? How can we recognize the good, the just, and the moral? What is happiness? From the farthest antiquity to the present day, these are among the questions of liberal education. The most business-driven student has the above questions as central cares, even if they are not at the foreground of consideration. If this is true, then an education that addresses these areas would be one that is serving a great purpose. If the business- or practically-focused education does not address these cares, at least in part, then perhaps this is an education that will need to be amended. But the reverse is also true... as a part of living a good life, people need to support themselves financially, and that means having skills not just of value but hopefully of enjoyment. A proper education, within a school or outside of it, would seem to need to address these practical concerns as well. A further dimension to consider is development over time and place. A criticism of classical liberal education, specifically within the accepted great books variety, is that the vast majority of the included authors are European males, which may miss a wide variety of experiences and understandings. The criticism is worth careful consideration on at least three points. First, the West has set the primary pattern for the larger world in politics, science, technology, mathematics, logic, and economics (there are many reasons for this, but that is the subject of another paper). It is true that part of the West’s dominance came through colonization and violence. It is also true that this dominance came from discovered truths (at least in the hard sciences and mathematics). It follows that a deep understanding of these discovered truths and Western development in general would begin with Greece and move forward where developments occurred. It also follows that Western citizen men were allowed and encouraged to explore and develop these ideas where others were not, hence the disproportional representation. Second, when all genders and nationalities are allowed and encouraged to develop exploration, thought, and creativity, we see production completely on par with Western men. Therefore, there is nothing particular about Western men that can produce these works, rather this work is the imperative of any interested and dedicated human. Third, if we are to focus on areas of study instead of authors, the liberal education cannon vastly opens to keep Plato, Aristotle, Aquinas, Kant, and everyone else in the great books conversation, but can also include the Tao Te Ching, the Bhagavad Gita, the Quran, Confucius, Murasaki Shikibu, Toni Morrison, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Jorge Luis Borges, Frederick Douglass, Richard Feynman, Hannah Arendt, Daniel Dennett, Steven Pinker, and too many others to mention. The preliminary work for teachers and leaders is to strive to understand this expanded thinking, to incorporate these developments into the full response to the central cares mentioned above, and to modify, augment, redefine, and re-evaluate how knowledge, progress, and flourishing are accomplished. This is the task that belongs to everyone, to all people... naturally and self-evidently free. So... Liberal education will only become irrelevant when human nature changes to such an extent that we are no longer human. “The riddle of existence is the college curriculum that was laid before the Pharaohs, that was taught in the groves of Plato, that formed the trivium and the quadrivium, and is to-day laid before the freedmen’s sons by Atlanta University. And this course of study will not change; its methods will grow more deft and effectual, its contents richer by toil of scholar and sight of seer; but the true college will ever have one goal, — not to earn meat, but to know the end and aim of that life which meat nourishes.” — W.E.B. Du Bois - The Souls of Black Folk, Chapter Five

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