Intro. [Recording date: May 26, 2025.]
Russ Roberts: Right now is Could twenty sixth, 2025, and my visitor as we speak is writer and instructor, and professor Leon Kass, the Dean of School right here at Shalem Faculty in Jerusalem. That is Leon’s second look on this system. He was final right here in March of 2021 speaking about human flourishing, residing nicely, and Aristotle. Leon, welcome again to EconTalk.
Leon Kass: Thanks very a lot. Good to be again with you Russ.
Russ Roberts: Our subject for as we speak is a thinker I’ve by no means revered, however I actually by no means learn both. In order that’s form of awkward. And I spotted with Leon’s assist that perhaps I had judged Jean-Jacques Rousseau a little bit too shortly.
So, what we’ll do as we speak: Leon’s going to present a quick abstract of Rousseau’s life and profession; and we’ll do a detailed studying of some paragraphs from his Discourse on the Origin and Foundations of Inequality amongst Males, which is also called the Second Discourse. We’ll hyperlink to that work, to the textual content we’ll be learning. You’ll be able to comply with together with this or you’ll be able to simply hear. We’ll be studying out loud a number of the passages that we’ll be discussing.
However, first, I might like Leon to present us a little bit background on Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Leon, it is all yours.
Leon Kass: Thanks. Rousseau was a large not solely of 18th-century European thought and tradition, however actually of all of Western philosophy. Born within the Republic of Geneva, 1712; dies in France, 1778. A prolific political thinker recognized for The Social Contract, a thinker of training, well-known for his Emile; writer of a romantic novel, composer of seven operas, a theater critic; an writer of the primary fashionable autobiography, The Confessions; and even a scientist writing an Components of Botany.
He lived a colourful and checkered life with good relations with Voltaire, d’Alembert, Burke, Boswell, and Frederick the Nice, however he had a horrible public battle with David Hume and he suffered political exile for his views. His books have been burned in Paris. He loved many amorous affairs and is alleged to have littered Europe with many illegitimate youngsters.
It is inconceivable to summarize Rousseau’s thought. His vary is big. His writings appear to contradict one another for they’re written from totally different views on the world.
Right here, he’s a citizen of Geneva. Whereas there, he is the person Jean-Jacques. All of his works are suffused with irony. His persistent pursuits are freedom and happiness, which he finds missing in fashionable bourgeois society, given to the love of achieve, luxurious, conformity, insincerity, and the joyless pursuit of getting forward. However as a result of he approaches the questions of freedom and happiness from totally different views, he appears to be confused, if not a instructor of error. He is each praised and blamed for the French Revolution, progressive training, and psychoanalysis. He is embraced by civic republicans and Marxist revolutionaries, by admirers of the noble savage, and admirers of the yeoman soldier. Studying him searching for settlement, any fashionable reader can discover a Rousseau that he’ll like and one which he’ll hate.
However, few folks see the actual Rousseau, who was not an ideologue however a real seeker after knowledge, and whose books provide not doctrine, however invites to joint inquiry. To study from Rousseau, we have to rescue him from his blinkered critics and simplistic admirers who see solely solutions mistaken or proper, and as an alternative comply with up his opening up of deep questions. Rightly learn, Rousseau is a instructor, an indispensable companion and information for anybody searching for knowledge concerning the enduring human questions of human nature and tradition, language and purpose, society and faith, love and marriage, happiness and politics. All of those are on the desk within the textual content we’ll talk about as we speak, the Discourse on Inequality.
Russ Roberts: Superior. Let’s get began.
And, what I’ve requested Leon to do, for these of you listening at home–as I stated, you’ll be able to comply with alongside; I’ve requested Leon to deal with me as his scholar. I’ve to say, Leon, your description of Rousseau jogged my memory of the best way I might describe you as a instructor who has quite a bit to say about a variety of issues. So, I am excited that we’ll discover this textual content collectively. It is a textual content I’ve solely learn for the primary time earlier as we speak, so I am certain I did not get all of it and you are going to assist me discover greater than I noticed.
Leon Kass: Okay. Let me introduce the work itself after which we’ll get began.
Rousseau wrote this as a response to an essay contest in 1753. The query is: What’s the origin of inequality amongst males and whether or not it’s licensed by pure regulation? The final half, Rousseau ignores. He says,
How do we all know inequality amongst males with out realizing man? And, how are you aware man as he comes from the hand of nature with out separating pure man from the varied accretions that historical past and circumstances have produced in him?
So, Half One of many discourse is an image of man within the pure state of nature–so-called the noble savage or nature boy–where pure man lives as a solitary, impartial, speechless and roughly senseless orangutan with prospects. He pursues the elementary wants of life and he enjoys with out complication the sentiment of his current existence.
In Half Two, Rousseau traces the processes whereby man by levels emerges from this pure state of nature ultimately to turn into the civilized creatures that we’re with our inequality, our unhappiness, and our vices.
We will decide up the story a little bit bit down the highway in the direction of civilization with the primary habitations and the primary settlements of settled households. And, we’ll comply with sure psychological and social insights on the themes of wishes and desires, love and jealousy, the delivery of self-importance and the will for recognition, and the declare to consideration and the will for vengeance when it is violated. That is the agenda Russ. I feel we should always get began.
Russ Roberts: Okay. I will begin by reading–shall I learn paragraph 13?
Russ Roberts: Okay. So, that is, I might say one thing just like the hunter-gatherer, the beginnings of households residing in crude dwellings. That is the lead-in, proper?
Leon Kass: Appropriate. Precisely.
Russ Roberts: Okay. Right here we go [Paragraph 13].
On this new state, with a easy and solitary life, very restricted wants, and the implements they’d invented to supply for them, since males loved very nice leisure, they used it to acquire many sorts of commodities unknown to their Fathers; and that was the primary yoke they imposed on themselves with out fascinated with it, and the primary supply of the evils they ready for his or her Descendants. For, in addition to their persevering with thus to melt physique and thoughts, as these commodities had misplaced nearly all their pleasantness by way of behavior, and as they’d on the similar time degenerated into true wants, being disadvantaged of them turned rather more merciless than possessing them was candy; and other people have been sad to lose them with out being blissful to own them.
Leon Kass: Superb.
What are commodities? What are these folks doing with their leisure?
Russ Roberts: What’s humorous about this, in fact, is that I am an economist and you are not. So, we’ll have an fascinating dialog right here.
What an economist would say is that folks develop some primitive instruments that allowed them to start to get pleasure from a barely larger commonplace of living–a barely larger degree of fabric well-being–than they’d earlier than. What these ‘commodities’ were–well, he says they’d nice leisure. Now, there is a debate about whether or not that is true, however let’s take him as being appropriate. That they had further time and they also used that point to style, presumably, a nicer hut, perhaps a greater option to catch fish, a greater option to carry down recreation, an iPhone. Nicely, perhaps not an iPhone, however a set of what we might name technological change, or innovation, or progress that he appears to assume isn’t necessarily–in reality positively isn’t–such an excellent factor.
Leon Kass: Good. So, commodities: all of those conveniences and facilities, the product of innovation, which is one way or the other constructed into the human beings all the time trying to make issues a little bit higher. However he says that is “the first yoke they imposed on themselves without thinking about it.” What’s a yoke?
Russ Roberts: So, it is this phrase you do not hear very a lot in on a regular basis English language as a result of it is a reference to agricultural life. Nothing might be extra acquainted to most of human history–of civilized human history–than a yoke; however it’s Y-O-Ok-E, not Y-O-L-Ok. Y-O-L-Ok is the egg yolk. That is the yoke that restrains an animal, sometimes an ox or some form of domesticated animal, and forces them to do their obligation to plow the sector, to create a furrow. It is one thing that retains you from being free. It’s a constraint, a critical constraint.
And he is arguing, clearly, that after we as human beings created issues that our ancestor did not have entry to, we misplaced a few of our freedom. Versus–many folks would see it the other: ‘Nicely, now we’re extra free. We’ve got know-how that liberates us in all types of the way.’ However evidently Rousseau felt in any other case.
Leon Kass: Nicely, he’ll clarify to us in what sense these new gadgets are in actual fact yokes with out our realizing it. He is not speaking concerning the facet effects–the hurt to the surroundings or varied different issues. A yoke is a constraint on a freedom. It is a type of servitude.
And, this is the sentence; you need to parse it for me: For along with softening, persevering with to “soften body and mind, as these commodities had lost almost all their pleasantness through habit”–and that is the a part of the sentence I would like your assist with–“and as they had at the same time degenerated into true needs, being deprived of them became much more cruel than possessing them was sweet.” We’re sad to lose them with out being blissful to have them. What does it imply to say that these new improvements, which final week we did not want, degenerate–that’s a giant word–into true wants?
Russ Roberts: Nicely, it is a remarkably prescient assertion. Earlier than we recorded this, Leon and I talked a little bit bit about Adam Smith, and Adam Smith talks about our pursuit of devices, in 1759 in The Concept of Ethical Sentiments. And he factors out that an individual will purchase a really fancy, costly watch that does barely higher at holding on his time, however does not make the particular person any extra well timed for the conferences that they are late for. And, what Smith is keen on is the wonder. He thinks we’re seduced by the fantastic thing about issues.
I feel he is onto one thing, however what Rousseau is arguing right here, I feel we are able to all relate to in fashionable instances. A tool comes alongside, a know-how comes alongside, and it is so significantly better than what we’ve that we, quote, “have to have it.” We wish to possess it. Nevertheless it’s stunning, is not it, how after a comparatively brief time period we are able to get extremely irritated when it does not, say, work the best way it is speculated to. You are on the train–if you have ever been on Amtrak between Washington D.C. and New York or Boston and also you’re browsing the Web performing some essential electronic mail, or one thing, or purchasing, and hastily the Web goes out. And you may’t imagine how annoying and irritating it’s. That is one thing that’s a rare miracle that it ever works in any respect. However, as soon as you have had it and as soon as you have turn into accustomed to it, it turns into a need–as Rousseau would phrase it. And the joys is gone, which I feel he is proper. Usually, not all the time, however typically.
Leon Kass: He’s providing us in right here in a means a definition of a true want. Yesterday it was a mere need or a want that we did not want. I imply, within the state of nature folks have easy wants. These are actual wants for meals and water and relaxation. However now, all types of different issues beforehand wishes degenerate into the class of a real want. What is the definition of a real want that he provides us proper on this paragraph? What makes a real want a real want?
Russ Roberts: Nicely, he is suggesting that–well, I am unsure, so I will bounce that again to you for a second. However one factor he is clearly saying is that the pleasure that we get from having them is dwarfed by the distress we’ve when we do not have them.
So, as soon as we’ve them, hastily the lack of them is comparatively massive relative to the achieve we acquired from them.
Once more, as an economist, that is arduous to simply accept. He is saying that civilization has immiserated us in some sense. Proper? It has created a set of false wants that, when glad, simply lead us to search for the subsequent new factor. Is {that a} truthful abstract?
Leon Kass: Yeah. I feel shut. I do not assume he is but speaking about that that is false satisfaction. He is saying, ‘Look, a real want is one thing that you just really feel you’ll be able to’t stay with out.’
Russ Roberts: Honest sufficient.
Leon Kass: What is important is one thing you should have. And, for the reason that pleasures of it vanish or decline drastically with familiarity, it is not that they make you depressing: it is that they do not make you any happier; and there are such a lot of extra stuff you now want that you’re now yoked to the will to must have increasingly more and extra lest you’re feeling you are lacking the issues with out which life could be inconceivable.
I do not know what number of people–I typically make a behavior of reminding myself to present thanks for a bathe, or indoor plumbing–all of simply the elementary issues that make life much less solitary, nasty, brutish, and brief. We do not give thanks for these issues. We take them as a right. If we’re lacking them we’re in a means slaved to these commodities, and we’re persevering with to supply new ones in order that our kids cannot think about residing with out their telephones or with out the Web or what have you ever.
And, this query, this isn’t a side-effect of know-how or know-how evaluation. That is the intrinsic impact of our instruments on our expectations and the malleability of want that final yr’s wishes as soon as routinely glad, turn into subsequent yr’s requirements; and the issues that turn into essential to stay develop and develop and develop. And, we’re in a means yoked by these issues.
Russ Roberts: You are fortunate should you can bear in mind to be thankful for a bathe on a random Monday morning. However, should you ever lose your bathe or your scorching water or your warmth, hastily you are in a panic. Particularly if you do not have a good friend whose bathe you’ll be able to borrow or a spot you’ll be able to go that is heat. You are in a state of chaos internally. When’s it going to get mounted? It is very, very tough to deal with that hardship.
Jogs my memory of the episode we had with Michael Easter on the consolation zone. We have turn into accustomed to consolation within the fashionable world and we do not respect it; and when it is taken away, we’re very sad to lose these comforts.
Leon Kass: Yeah. That is, as you stated early in the very first thing you stated, how prescient he’s. That is with respect to the only of applied sciences: We form our instruments after which our instruments reshape us. And, that a part of it’s hardly ever reckoned as a result of some great benefits of these instruments are completely well-known. However the prices of them are sometimes hidden; and the prices in the best way by which they remodel the entire economic system of what’s mandatory and what’s not mandatory continues to be altered.
Simply as an apart, within the 1939 World’s Honest, the American housewife was launched to washing machines, vacuum cleaners, dishwashers, dryers–all of these kinds of issues. My mom washed garments on an iron scrub board within the basement each Monday, and the garments have been frolicked to dry with a clothespin. There was a ringer to get the water out of it. That World’s Honest in 1939 confirmed folks issues that they actually needed as a result of the toil was arduous. I do not assume you might produce a World’s Honest as we speak of something that folks know that they want in the best way by which these wants might be anticipated and glad. And, all the satisfaction of these wants has not produced the form of contentment, as a result of one has forgotten what they changed.
Russ Roberts: Honest sufficient. I’ve written quite a bit on the transformation of our lifestyle over the twentieth century, and I’ve tried to debunk what I feel are incorrect tales about stagnation within the final 40, 50 years. Individuals declare that folks’s lifestyle hasn’t modified: the typical particular person’s hasn’t modified. And I feel that is completely mistaken.
And, at any time when I write about that, I all the time concede that whereas our materials well-being is very larger, say, than it was in 1900, say, in America or within the West–I used to be often writing these items as an American. Once I was writing that, I might concede that I am unsure we’re any happier. In actual fact, we is likely to be much less happy–which is what Rousseau is alluding to.
Having stated that: We do not wish to return. The picture of your mom’s washing within the basement–no one says, ‘Yeah, these have been the great outdated days.’ There is likely to be issues about that point that have been the great outdated days, however that is not considered one of them–the scrub board.
And, there are different issues I feel economists would add about longer life and the longer high quality of life at a excessive degree for an extended interval of time–higher high quality of life for an extended time period.
However, this is a captivating factor that 1939–by the best way, David Gelernter wrote a beautiful novel on the 1939 World Honest, which I actually loved, which I like to recommend. However, that 1939 World Honest, it is true that we as human beings craved these issues. Particularly girls who had unimaginable drudgery working within the early 1900s after they labored often 12 hours a day simply to boil water, make meals, clear garments. Only a horrible lifetime of drudgery. There is much less drudgery on the planet. However there’s not much more happiness–maybe. And that I feel is fascinating assertion concerning the human being.
Leon Kass: Yep. That, I feel is the primary level of this paragraph. The query is whether or not or not–at least there are new potential sources of unhappiness due to the deprivation of so many different issues with out which life now appears to be inconceivable.
Leon Kass: Why do not we go on and have a look at the subsequent vignette? This one, paragraph 15, and this now results in the event of recent human sentiments unknown earlier than.
Russ Roberts: Okay. Right here we go [Paragraph 15]:
All the pieces begins to vary its look. Males who till this time wandered within the Woods, having adopted a extra mounted settlement, slowly come collectively, unite into totally different bands, and at last type in every nation a selected Nation, unified by morals and character, not by Rules and Legal guidelines however by the identical form of life and meals and by the frequent affect of Local weather. A everlasting proximity can’t fail to engender at size some contact between totally different households. Younger folks of various sexes stay in neighboring Huts; the passing intercourse demanded by Nature quickly results in one other form no much less candy and extra everlasting by way of mutual frequentation. Individuals develop accustomed to think about totally different objects and to make comparisons; imperceptibly they purchase concepts of benefit and sweetness which produce sentiments of choice. By dint of seeing each other, they’ll now not do with out seeing each other once more. A young and delicate sentiment is regularly launched into the soul and as a minimum impediment turns into an impetuous fury. Jealousy awakens with love; Discord triumphs, and the gentlest of the passions receives sacrifices of human blood.
Nicely, that was going advantageous till it turned darkish there on the finish, did not it?
Leon Kass: Proper. Let’s hint it.
Russ Roberts: Okay.
Leon Kass: Inhabitants grows, folks have mounted settlements, they arrive collectively. The totally different households within the neighboring huts, they collect. The younger folks of various sexes meet. The passing intercourse of nature demanded–sorry–“the passing intercourse demanded by Nature”–sexual want, informal sexuality–“soon leads to another kind no less sweet and more permanent through mutual frequentation. People grow accustomed to consider different objects and to make comparisons; imperceptibly they acquire ideas of merit and beauty which produce sentiments of preference. By dint of seeing one another, they can no longer do without seeing one another again.” What’s he speaking about? Simply to that time?
Russ Roberts: Largely I feel love. Some idea of romantic love versus pure sexual attraction. However, the best way he describes it’s fairly extraordinary. He is speaking concerning the energy of judgment, of what we might name discrimination–not the best way the phrase is often used with the pejorative means, however merely the concept that some issues we’d discover extra interesting or engaging than others: some sense of benefit, some sense of magnificence. Whenever you’re residing by your self, you have acquired nothing to match your self to. Whenever you’re hanging out with your loved ones, you are all form of close-knit and every little thing’s hunky-dory. Should you’ve acquired one other household close by who’s extra athletic, lovely, has greater fish than you catch, and whose hut has extra bedrooms and bogs and a bigger garden, hastily issues change.
Leon Kass: That I feel–that comparability is in his account a little bit later stage.
Russ Roberts: Okay.
Leon Kass: Right here he is nonetheless speaking within the realm of sexuality and love. And, the concepts of benefit and sweetness, he is speaking about: there’s a couple of girl on the market.
Russ Roberts: Yeah. A couple of man.
Leon Kass: A couple of man.
Russ Roberts: It is the delivery of aesthetics. It is the delivery of the concept that–I imply, it is a unusual concept. We take it as a right that, proven two footage, most individuals can say that one’s prettier than that one. That one’s extra good-looking than that one. However, why is that, really, when you concentrate on it? Why would you simply say, ‘Nicely, there’s that one and there is that one and there is two of them now.’? However, evidently that is not the best way we’re made.
Leon Kass: Yeah. One thing emerges on account of the expertise. This one appears extra lovely to me than that one. And, this one is–there’s one thing about her qualities that I appear to love. And as an alternative of it is being nearly intercourse, it is: They wish to maintain seeing each other. On account of having seen them, they wish to see them once more, over and time and again. That is the transformation of lust to one thing like admiration and being admired.
After which, he says, “A tender and gentle sentiment is gradually introduced into the soul….” Very good.
Russ Roberts: Yeah. Stunning.
Leon Kass: Very good, “…and at the least obstacle becomes an impetuous fury.” Why?
Russ Roberts: Nicely, I feel as soon as on this present I discussed that there’s a form of love that the majority of us are blessed to have, the place when your loved one is absent, you do not simply say, ‘Oh: be good to be along with her or be with him.’ however you will have a bodily longing, a abdomen ache. The considered seeing the beloved is so overwhelming–and that is a technique of describing love–but additionally, should you’re not allowed to see that particular person or if that particular person isn’t keen on seeing, it is in fact devastating.
And, it is not apparent that the least impediment turns into an impetuous fury, as Rousseau says. However, that is his description. And worse, not only a fury which you can’t get to that particular person. There’s jealousy, which is that another person can.
Leon Kass: Nicely, if you cannot get to them, she is likely to be with any individual else.
Russ Roberts: Yeah.
Leon Kass: “Jealousy awakens with love.” Is that true?
Russ Roberts: I feel so. I might have hassle explaining why. I feel there is a possessiveness about love that actually Shakespeare and lots of, many different observers of the human situation have famous. We do not have to enter my or your private lives. However, yeah. Jealousy is–we are possessive, not nearly our instruments and toys, however concerning the folks we care about.
Leon Kass: Yeah, and the jealousy, I feel–the jealousy is in a means related to the sense that this form of love is unique. In different phrases, that I’m my beloved and she or he is mine. And, it does not have to come back merely to possession in a pejorative sense. However, there’s something about this sort of love: if it is genuinely love, form of excludes others–or so would hope. And subsequently, if there’s a sense that the love wanders or it isn’t unique, or if she’s absent, I wish to see her once more lest she be misplaced, or misplaced to another person, and so forth. And, I do not assume we’re susceptible, I feel–we’re susceptible as a result of we’re such good people–to assume that real love wouldn’t know jealousy. However, that is most likely an acquired training which isn’t primordial. This type of expertise of affection is form of unique. And, it appears to me that jealousy is correct behind.
Russ Roberts: I am certain even a mediocre evolutionary psychologist like myself might cook dinner up a evolutionary purpose for this.
Russ Roberts: However what I discover fascinating about Rousseau is he ends with a really darkish, darkish word. First he says, there is a “tender and gentle sentiment” that may result in fury. That jealousy is subsequent. “Discord triumphs”–that’s a really adverse assertion. And, “the gentlest of the passions receives sacrifices of human blood”–meaning violence is the pure follower of the delivery of affection. It is a fairly darkish picture of the human situation.
Leon Kass: As you your self stated, there are many such tales. The Trojan Struggle–pretty bloody enterprise for the sake of a girl.
You’ll be able to go any means you need. I feel the vital factor right here isn’t that he is acquired a lot a darkish image, however he is exhibiting how, of the issues that make us depressing, they must don’t with issues that have been current to nature boy, however that they comply with by way of the gradual levels of the emergence of our sophisticated humanity. And, there are not any free lunches. The assorted issues which are form of enchancment both soften us, or confine us, or enslave us, or make us weak as a result of: you give your life to another person, you might lose that, in case your happiness now will depend on her presence and returning and on her staying alive. Love is uncovered to all kinds of grief, and it is not for nothing that the traditional Epicureans instructed you to–the historic Stoics instructed you to restrict your wishes to the issues in your energy so that you’d be least more likely to be disillusioned, pissed off by issues that aren’t beneath your management.
To fall in love is to be weak. To fall in love is to be weak; additionally, its being misplaced to you and particularly being taken from you by a extra worthy–so she thinks–suitor. I feel he is simply telling it like it’s.
Russ Roberts: Yeah. I am positively sympathetic to that view of our nature. I do not assume faith is designed to make us blissful, however you might argue that a number of the strictures of faith,–say, I am fascinated with the Ten Commandments’ to not covet, which might be one other instance here–are methods to take away a few of your choices which may appear interesting however really are tough so that you can course of.
I could not assist thinking–we have been speaking concerning the want to see the particular person once more: That is why folks go to the flicks greater than as soon as typically. They’ve a crush on a male or feminine movie star, and a part of that thrill is you’ll be able to watch all of them you need; and now you’ll be able to take them residence with you and watch them on their[?your?] cellphone, and you should utilize your creativeness. And, these are unfulfilling thrills that weren’t obtainable to Rousseau’s particular person within the hut subsequent door. So, issues have simply in some ways simply gotten tougher.
Leon Kass: Yeah. Ought to we go on?
Russ Roberts: Certain.
Leon Kass: Or would you like do one thing extra with this?
Russ Roberts: No.
Leon Kass: Let’s do the subsequent paragraph. This has additionally acquired to do–in the one we have simply completed, he talks about seeing and desirous to see once more. Right here we have one other side of the eyes, barely totally different and rather more potent in its impact. Let’s do it: Paragraph 16.
Russ Roberts: [Paragraph 16]:
In proportion as concepts and sentiments comply with upon each other and as thoughts and coronary heart are skilled, the human Race continues to be tamed, contacts unfold, and bonds are tightened. Individuals grew accustomed to assembling in entrance of the Huts or round a big Tree; music and dance, true youngsters of affection and leisure, turned the amusement or quite the occupation of idle and assembled women and men. Every one started to have a look at the others and to wish to be checked out himself, and public esteem had a price. The one who sang or danced one of the best, the handsomest, the strongest, essentially the most adroit, or essentially the most eloquent turned essentially the most extremely thought-about; and that was step one towards inequality and, on the similar time, towards vice. From these first preferences have been born on one hand self-importance and contempt, on the opposite disgrace and envy; and the fermentation attributable to these new leavens ultimately produced compounds deadly to happiness and innocence.
Whooph! That is a heck of a paragraph.
Leon Kass: It is a terrific paragraph. It once more begins now with leisure. There are extra folks. They collect in entrance of the huts or round a big tree. As an alternative of simply digging for roots, they now sing they usually dance. The “children of love and leisure”–we’ve acquired the love from earlier than; now they’re on the market singing to one another, they dancing. And, every one begins to “look at the others and to want to be looked at himself.” As a result of, having public esteem–being thought nicely of within the eyes of the others–is now useful. Okay?
Now: “The one who sang or danced the best, the handsomest, the strongest, the most adroit, the most eloquent,” they turned those who have been “most highly considered.” And, “that was the first step toward inequality.” That is apparent, proper? You are making distinctions amongst skills and abilities. But in addition, “at the same time, toward vice.” And, it is the half about vice that I feel we wish to work on as a result of that is what he does ultimately of the paragraph. Are we okay up to now?
Russ Roberts: Yeah. However, I’ve to touch upon two issues first.
Leon Kass: Please. [More to come, 39:31]
