Are you machiavellian?

Niccolo Machiavelli was ignorant of the concept of "positive" government

I haven't read much about him.... What did he write/speak/philosophize about?

One doesn't need to teach a rubber ball how to bounce. That is just an inate quality of a rubber ball when one lets it bounce. Like the natural tendency for a rubber ball to bounce, it is also the natural tendency for governments to erode to the kind of natural state Machiavelli proposed.
So, Niccolò Machiavelli was a tyrant who led Western Europe further into the dark ages. Like Aristotle before him, he failed to grasp fully the significance of Socrates' concept of positive government as both Plato and Jean Rousseau were able to do. As Aristotle argued for Governmental Aristocracy while he later trained Prince Alexander to take his rightful place on his father's throne, this was basically Machiavelli's philosophy to. In comparison, the more courageous Socrates was arguing that the poor children (the peasant children in Machiavelli's day) could learn to live happier lives if teachers volunteered to serve them. This is why he likened himself as a "midwife philosopher to the poor."
For cripes sake, Niccolo Machiavelli was so ignorant that the behavior exhibited by Adolph Hitler later on would have pleased him.
 
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57. I've read the Prince btw...

It is VERY good if what you want is power etc.. but it is NOT a guide to Happiness...

I'd go so far to say it is a complete guide for unhappiness. If you have no conscience, you'll probably manage.. otherwise you're fked and will inevitably waste your life. Once you have power, if you manage to get it.. enjoy the paranoia you'll need to keep it.

MacBeth is a good read for setting that shit straight.
 
Hey, from what I know about Machiavelli, I'm glad my number is so low; he's the one who birthed the modern-day Neo-conservative.

uhhhh, no.

he gave you the playbook. they've just been the only ones using it.

interestingly enough, they have also consistently taken the actions that machiavelli expressly stated to avoid many times over. mercenary armies are only one small example.

if people had been reading and understanding machiavelli as an individual, rather than vilifying him via his art, the world would have been a much better place a very long time ago.

imo machiavelli, in an educated society, made being a ruler or a dictator damn near impossible.
 
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57. I've read the Prince btw...

It is VERY good if what you want is power etc.. but it is NOT a guide to Happiness...

I'd go so far to say it is a complete guide for unhappiness. If you have no conscience, you'll probably manage.. otherwise you're fked and will inevitably waste your life. Once you have power, if you manage to get it.. enjoy the paranoia you'll need to keep it.

MacBeth is a good read for setting that shit straight.

poor leaders, always with the furies.

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One doesn't need to teach a rubber ball how to bounce. That is just an inate quality of a rubber ball when one lets it bounce. Like the natural tendency for a rubber ball to bounce, it is also the natural tendency for governments to erode to the kind of natural state Machiavelli proposed.
So, Niccolò Machiavelli was a tyrant who led Western Europe further into the dark ages. Like Aristotle before him, he failed to grasp fully the significance of Socrates' concept of positive government as both Plato and Jean Rousseau were able to do. As Aristotle argued for Governmental Aristocracy while he later trained Prince Alexander to take his rightful place on his father's throne, this was basically Machiavelli's philosophy to. In comparison, the more courageous Socrates was arguing that the poor children (the peasant children in Machiavelli's day) could learn to live happier lives if teachers volunteered to serve them. This is why he likened himself as a "midwife philosopher to the poor."
For cripes sake, Niccolo Machiavelli was so ignorant that the behavior exhibited by Adolph Hitler later on would have pleased him.

Comparing Aristotle and Machiavelli is downright ridiculous. Aristotle really formalized logic, philosophy, and physics (what was considered for a long time "natural philosophy") for the first time in history. His reasoning was certainly flawed in a lot of ways, but the contributions he brought to every intellectual endeavor since his time are innumerable - perhaps the most significant and long-lasting contributions any single person has ever made, before or since. As far as his politics are concerned, he argued for a government that promoted the public good, and against those governments that promoted their own good, in direct contradistinction to Machiavelli.

Then you go on to praise Socrates for extolling the virtue of self-sacrifice to the collective will of society? Ugh. Socrates, not Aristotle, would have reveled in the nationalistic sacrifice to the State Hitler called for, much in the way he consented to the injustice of his own execution because he "belonged" to Athens.
 
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