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The following books by Robert Paul Wolff are available on Amazon.com as e-books: KANT'S THEORY OF MENTAL ACTIVITY, THE AUTONOMY OF REASON, UNDERSTANDING MARX, UNDERSTANDING RAWLS, THE POVERTY OF LIBERALISM, A LIFE IN THE ACADEMY, MONEYBAGS MUST BE SO LUCKY, AN INTRODUCTION TO THE USE OF FORMAL METHODS IN POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY.
Now Available: Volumes I, II, III, and IV of the Collected Published and Unpublished Papers.

NOW AVAILABLE ON YOUTUBE: LECTURES ON KANT'S CRITIQUE OF PURE REASON. To view the lectures, go to YouTube and search for "Robert Paul Wolff Kant." There they will be.

NOW AVAILABLE ON YOUTUBE: LECTURES ON THE THOUGHT OF KARL MARX. To view the lectures, go to YouTube and search for Robert Paul Wolff Marx."





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Thursday, July 31, 2014

PARIS OBSERVED

1.  Parisians have a great revolutionary tradition.  They regularly engage in huge manifestations, name little city squares after Communist war heroes, and currently have a Socialist government.  Nevertheless, Parisians never jaywalk.  They stand docilely at street corners, waiting patiently for the little red standing man to change to the little green walking man in the pedestrian signals before venturing across the street.

2.  Young French women are always better looking than the young French men they are with.  By contrast, young Italian men are always better looking than the young Italian women they are with.  Young Swedes are all good looking.

3.  Every morning when I take my walk along the Seine I see a river boat pushing a long barge up or down the river.  It is named the DeVinci [not the Da Vinci.  the French call Michelangelo "Michelange."]  I think it is cool to name a tugboat after the immortal Leonardo.

4.  Judging from my informal survey, the French cigarette of choice is the e-cigarette.  They are everywhere.  However, the French Health Minister is planning to ban them in bars and restaurants, while also moving to compel cigarette companies to make their packaging bland and unattractive, apparently convinced that young French men and women will find smoking less appealing if the Marlboro packs are no longer bright red.

5.  HUGANDYOU, the little upscale boutique across the street, is closed for the August vacances.   If Matt's comment from a week ago is right, a lot of people will have to get their drugs or launder their money somewhere else.

2 comments:

Jerry Fresia said...

Between the burden of the Objective Demand and the delicious set of Parisian observations that so often follow, I've been thinking:

1. Why is the Renaissance not called the Rinascimento, given that it was largely an Italian movement? (When I ask this to Italians, they just shrug and answer, "We call it Rinascimento.") A reflection of the hegemony of French culture of centuries past?
2. If you were to publish a "RP Wolff Reader," of about 250-300 pages, what would you include?
3. Available on YouTube is Billy Crystal's 700 Sundays (http://bit.ly/1u3wib9) which is brilliant, funny, and a reminder that the odyssey and humor of everyday life is serious stuff too.

Eggs Maledict said...

For what it's worth, plain-packaging laws here in Australia have actually been pretty effective at reducing smoking rates.