My Stuff

https://umass-my.sharepoint.com/:f:/g/personal/rwolff_umass_edu/EkxJV79tnlBDol82i7bXs7gBAUHadkylrmLgWbXv2nYq_A?e=UcbbW0

Coming Soon:

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Now Available: Volumes I, II, III, and IV of the Collected Published and Unpublished Papers.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, August 24, 2023

THIS AND THAT WHILE I WAIT FOR JUDGE CHUTKIN TO RULE

One of the often overlooked benefits of television advertisements is their ability to reassure one that one’s physical inadequacies are widely shared. For example, as I approach my 90th birthday, I have more and more difficulty putting on and taking off my socks, thanks to the fact that I continually lose flexibility. Even in a Continuing Care Retirement Community like the one in which I live, these problems are not the subject of casual conversation so that would be easy to suppose that they afflict me alone. But then I see an advertisement for a device that is designed to help put one socks on, and I realize that if it is worth advertising this gadget than the problem must be widespread. Curiously, that is reassuring.

 

I was not always thus. Seventy-five years ago, when I was a teenager at Forest Hills high school, I was actually a member of something called the Captain’s Corps.  We had special uniforms (long red pants and a T-shirt) and during gym did simple gymnastics exercises on the parallel bars and such like. In those days, I could actually press up into a handstand and walk about on my hands, accomplishments which, though not very impressive, strike me now is incomprehensible. Indeed, it was while showing off my gymnastic abilities that I suffered my one bone fracture. I was doing a handstand at a party on the arms of an easy chair and when I came down I banged my right foot on a wooden chair, cracking a bone in my big toe.  My uncle Anoch, who was an orthopedic surgeon, put a big cast on my foot, forcing me to stay home for several weeks while the toe healed. Having nothing better to do while I sat on a chair with my foot on a hassock, I spent the time learning trigonometry, and managed to pass the Regents examination at the end of the semester, thereby excusing me from taking the course on the subject.

11 comments:

Achim Kriechel (A.K.) said...

It's hard to imagine what you would have done if you had broken your leg.

Iulian Doroftei said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Iulian Doroftei said...

Mr. Wolff, I want to take this opportunity to thank you for the 9 Youtube lectures on Kant. I am 57 years old and decided to read Philosophy to keep my mind in shape - which naturally led me to Kant's CPR.
I have been reading the book along with watching the lecture video series and your analysis is definitely for me a sine qua non for understanding the intricacies of this great book. I scarcely know German but I am lucky to know English well enough to grasp your courses.
Currently just have passed the 8th lecture and am mustering all my ability to cover the second analogy before delving into your final lecture.
Thank you and bear in mind that somewhere far away there is a unity of apprehension brim-full of thankfulness for your work.
Have a nice ride and looking forward to meet each other in the noumenal realm :)

Robert Paul Wolff said...

Thank you, Iulian, It is for me a miracle that my lectures can reach so widely scattered an audience.

aaall said...

Lol:

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/F4VoHTJXkAAkRl6?format=jpg&name=medium

Michael Llenos said...

Whose mugshot looks more bad#@&: Giuliani's or Trump's?

Michael Llenos said...

Marc has emailed once again. Read at my website if you like...

David Zimmerman said...

To ML:

I got one too. Marc argues that every Georgia defendant was simply exercising his or her First Amendment right to say ridiculous things about the 2020 election, which is not a crime.

Sigh.

s. wallerstein said...

Marc sent me a further comment, which I can send those who write to

amosxxxx@gmail.com

Once again, I do not necessarily agree with the content of Marc's comment.

Politik said...

Trump spent days practicing that mug shot.

LFC said...

I can't reach M Llenos's site, as it happens (I've tried in the past). Perhaps just a quirk w the devices I happen to have.

As for what M.S. is writing, as long as he's not insulting me I don't really care. That stance is solipsistic, but so be it.