[Leo Strauss] is clearly most worried that any position that links the right with what the will legislates for itself quickly slips down the slippery slope toward legal positivism, historicism, relativism, and finally nihilism....
After my paper on Ernest Nagel, Sander Verhaegh kindly asked me to contribute a paper to a collection on how exiles shaped analytic philosophy Stateside (or something like that). And because Nagel is one of the few analytic philosophers to have engaged Strauss in a substantive way (and so I am well placed to discuss it), and because I tend to think analytic philosophy's polemics are at least partially constitutive of its professional identity, I thought it would be illuminating to write a chapter for Sander on how Strauss and his school ended up being conceptualized as not philosophy/philosophical by analytic philosophy. And this last point would also also allow me to reflect a bit on the role of that strange hybrid, José Benardete, in the upstate NY revival of metaphysics within analytic philosophy.
But I have had to confront a scholarly problem. Within analytic philosophy nearly all the writing about Strauss and his followers is excessively polemical (and often not very good, alas). Much of the remaining scholarship in English on Strauss is by his students (and almost inevitably apologetic in character) or by people interested in tracing the misdeeds of neocons to Strauss or tracing the reception of Heidegger's views. And so while there is huge amount of material on Strauss reception (which is, perhaps, all I need), there is remarkably little sober scholarship on Strauss and his school. In fact, Robert Pippin has corned the market in that niche with three papers: in addition to the paper quoted above, there is a companion piece, "Being, time, and politics: The Strauss-Kojève debate." History and Theory (1993): 138-161, and a more recent work,"The Unavailability of the Ordinary: Strauss on the Philosophical Fate of Modernity." Political Theory 31.3 (2003): 335-358.+ (Feel free to nominate other work!)
All three papers are sober engagements with Strauss and repay study in their own right. They are not, if that were possible, impartial scholarship because each is written from the perspective of a kind of Hegelianism that is explicitly being defended against Strauss (and from Kojève's corruption of Hegelianism). In fact, Pippin generally suggests (and my quote above is exemplary in this respect) that Strauss has missed an (Hegelian) alternative in his (that is, Strauss') diagnosis of a philosophical situation or that Strauss has posited a slippery slope, which may be halted along the way. That is, Pippin's response to Strauss tends to engage in genuine philosophical disagreement where the details matter. Pippin also recognizes that one of Strauss' characteristic modes of argument -- something about modernity (say its 'crisis') is the effect, even inevitable fate, of philosophical assumptions of some past thinker -- is non-trivially Hegelian (e.g., "The Unavailability of the Ordinary:" 341). Finally, Pippen recognizes (and articulates nicely) how odd Strauss seems in light of the "usual way[s] of a professional philosopher in a modern university," ("The Unavailability of the Ordinary: 342) despite the fact that Strauss generated a quite successful school in the modern university.
Okay, with that in place, I want focus on a puzzle that reading Pippin raised for me (and perhaps for me alone). In his 2003 article, Pippin suggests that one of the main themes of Strauss' Natural Right and History (hereafter NRH), and "the central theme of all modern European philosophy since Hegel," is the "relationship between philosophy and experience." (336) In fact, Pippin makes point of reminding his audience that this is also a theme found "in the later Wittgenstein, Austin, Cavell" (344) that is, analytic philosophy (on p. 352 he adds Bernard Williams to the list).
Now, within analytic philosophy, it's Hume that is treated as the philosopher who first problematized the relationship between philosophy and experience (if you don't trust me on this go re-read Quine or Russell). Hume is not explicitly mentioned in Pippin's 2003 piece, but his language is adopted even quoted by Pippin at one key point when he explains that for Strauss the recovery of natural right (that we are said to "need" by Strauss) "would seem to require a dualism, a nonteleological science of the universe and in some way a different, teleological “science of man.” Strauss considers this the Thomistic solution but he clearly rejects it, boldly insisting, “An adequate solution to the problem of natural right cannot be found before this basic problem has been solved,” unmistakably implying that it has not yet and appearing to promise that he will solve it, in the book to follow." (344) What's interesting about this formulation (other than it being Humean terminology) is that there is by now a academic cottage industry, at least since Allison Simmons' 2001 paper showing that various early moderns (Descartes, Spinoza, and Hume) proposed nonteleological science of the universe, and yet somehow produced (consciously/intentionally or not) a teleological science of man.
With that in mind, in note 15 (in the 1992 paper) quoted above, Pippin is explicitly commenting on NRH; p 17. In that book, Strauss explicitly mentions Hume twice. First, a few pages later (p. 20), in the context of a discussion of historicism, Hume is treated (alongside Kant) as an originator of a "philosophical critique of a philosophic and scientific thought" that leads to skepticism. And Strauss uses the occasion to distinguish the philosophy of skepticism from historicism. Importantly, the contrast is drawn in the sense of how skepticism and historicism view themselves: skepticism is a permanent possibility for humanity (it is "coeval with human thought)," whereas historicism is indexed to specific historical situations. And even if one does not know anything about the larger project of NRH, the manner -- which is not historicist -- in which Strauss draws this distinction implies that Strauss identifies more with the skeptical self-understanding more than the historicist one (Pippin would not disagree, I think, see below).
It should be noted that near the end of the book, Strauss notes that historicism itself is an effect of skepticism about theoretical metaphysics. And this is a "skepticism which culminated in the depreciation of theory in favor of practice." (NRH 320) That is to say, Hume (and Kant) are treated both as contrasts to skepticism as well as the philosophical roots or sources of historicism. (We might say then that for Strauss historicism is at the bottom of the slippery slope from Hume.)
Second, near the end of NRH, in the context of analyzing Burke's defense of practical wisdom against the encroaches of theoretical philosophy, Strauss points out there is a connection between Burke's strictures on (and against) metaphysics and "the skeptical tendencies of his contemporaries Rousseau and Hume." And Strauss goes on to offer Burke's "theoretical work" [sic], A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of Our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful, as evidence for this claim.
Let's stipulate that these two mentions are not a "serious confrontation." But they do suggest that in so far as Strauss discusses skepticism, and especially where it shades into philosophy's critique of itself and science, it's legitimate to explore how he may well be drawing on, or engaging with, Hume. I don't mean to suggest this is always the case. For, Strauss also thinks there are different kinds of skepticism. For, 'Socratic wisdom' is in virtue of being self-knowledge of one's ignorance, explicitly "a kind of skepticism," albeit of an "involuntary" kind (NRH: 262). Such skepticism is "not dangerous."* Somewhat confusingly if one is unfamiliar with Strauss, in context it is not just Socrates, but also Rousseau who is being described as an exemplar of Socratic wisdom. Importantly, in Rousseau, Socratic wisdom also has an important effect: it allows for science that is compatible with virtue. (In that scheme, metaphysics is the science that is incompatible with virtue.) And Strauss treats Rousseau (but not Socrates) as somebody who thinks that science can be made to serve virtue (although the way this can be institutionalized is by no means obvious).
As it happens, (an)other kind(s) of Socratic wisdom is possible -- one not wedded to natural science (NRH: 277) -- so this kind of skepticism itself comes in kinds. Strauss clearly admires Socratic wisdom, which is philanthropic in character, and this suggests that in NRH, skepticism does not (always) have a negative connotation.
Rousseau is also treated as a source of insight on a "dangerous kind" of skepticism which is a consequence of the search for truth in modern science. And this is caused whenever scientific truth is useless or unattainable. (NRH 258) It is dangerous because in modernity science has discredited faith and opinion and is meant to replace faith and opinion, and so when science fails it leaves society with nihilism. (258).
Socrates, Hume, Kant, and Rousseau are not the only kinds of skeptics in NRH. Strauss treats Cicero as an Academic skeptic (155). In addition, Strauss recognizes that from the perspective of seventeenth century philosophy, in "traditional" philosophy (prior to the seventeenth century), there is also a form of skepticism that is a kind of natural accompaniment of dogmatism (NRH 171). I think this is clearly meant to be Pyrrhonean skepticism. And, as it happens, such Pyrrhonean skepticism is transformed in seventeenth century philosophy in NRH. For, Strauss treats Hobbes, Spinoza, and Descartes as sharing in the following commitment (one that is often attributed to Descartes alone based on a reading of the Meditations):
To guarantee the actualization of wisdom means to eradicate skepticism by doing justice to the truth embodied in skepticism. For this purpose, one must first give free rein to extreme skepticism: what survives the onslaught of extreme skepticism is the absolutely safe basis of wisdom. The actualization of wisdom is identical with the erection of an absolutely dependable dogmatic edifice on the foundation of extreme skepticism. (NRH 172)
The significance of this modern strategy to attain wisdom is not just epistemological. For, in raising a central challenge to Hobbes' philosophy (and the manner of the challenge is rather Schmittian as is also clear in the footnote I am about to quote) in his own voice, Strauss adds a curious footnote:
One may state this difficulty also as follows: In the spirit of the dogmatism based on skepticism, Hobbes identified what the skeptic Carneades apparently regarded as the conclusive refutation of the claims raised on behalf of justice, with the only possible justification of these claims: the extreme situation—the situation of the two shipwrecked men on a plank on which only one man can save himself—reveals, not the impossibility of justice, but the basis of justice. Yet Carneades did not contend that in such a situation one is compelled to kill one's competitor (Cicero Republic iii . 29-30): the extreme situation does not reveal a real necessity. (NRH 196 note 39)
This explicitly treats Hobbes' philosophy as erected on, derived from, a skeptical foundation. Now, to be sure, this kind of skepticism is not at all like Socratic wisdom. In fact, it is the explicit denial that a good life is good in virtue of being in accord with nature (NRH 95), which is the truth embodied in skepticism (that is the basis/foundational step on which Hobbes' dogmatic science is built).
But according to Strauss, Hobbes (not Descartes) generates a form of skepticism, too: "It is this fact that ultimately accounts for the persistence of skepticism and justifies skepticism to a certain extent. Skepticism is the inevitable outcome of the unintelligible character of the universe or of the unfounded belief in its intelligibility." (NRH 174; in my own research I tend to attribute this view to Spinoza, but it's not clear to me that Strauss does so.) Hobbes here is treated, thus, as the ultimate source of a "philosophical critique of a philosophic and scientific thought" that Strauss links to Hume and Kant (and their role in generating both the kind of skepticism coeval with thought and modern historicism).
Let me take stock of where we are because I am fast reaching the limits of a Digression. Running through NRH is a classification of different kinds of skepticism. This matters for the argument of NRH because some kinds of skepticism are treated as wise and as exemplary of the (partial) rejection of historicism that Strauss endorses. In fact, Pippen (largely correctly in my view) treats Strauss as a kind of skeptic: "The radically sceptical, incomplete, or zetetic character of Strauss's version of Socraticism." (note 12 of Pippin's 1992 article). To put my own exegetical cards on the table, I think the word 'radically' is a bit misleading because the tenor of Strauss skepticism is not Pyrrhonean but fideist (about which another time).
And so the question of skepticism in NRH is also a question of classifying Strauss. And as it happens in NRH, in this classification of skepticism, Hume plays a central role as a source , perhaps partially derivative of Hobbes, of modern historicism while simultaneously standing for the non-historicist always living possibility of skepticism in which the question of the relationship between philosophy and experience is central. In fact, what's notable about NRH is that Strauss invites the question which skeptics, if any, have Socratic wisdom, and leaves it to the reader to figure out the answer.**
It's worth noting, in closing for today, that according to Strauss (and he is right about this) Hume rejected -- what he claims Hobbes, Spinoza, and Descartes accepted -- that is, the skeptical denial that a good life is good in virtue of being in accord with nature. This Strauss notes in a different work in which he explains the difference between Hume and (modern) positivism(s) (see The Rebirth of Classical Political Rationalism: 21-22). And so my provisional, tentative conclusion is that Strauss does not have a serious confrontation with Hume because, while Strauss generally sounds like the student of Heidegger he was, in key respects he agrees with Hume (or so I claim ex cathedra). And this somewhat perverse result actually makes the vehement rejection of Strauss and Straussianism by analytic philosophy more interesting than I initially thought.
+I thank Jake McNulty for calling my attention to these papers. Also, I wouldn't be surprised to learn if Pippen has more passing comments on Strauss in his oeuvre.
*In immediate context it is not clear if the lack of danger is a danger to society or to philosophy. (As it happens Pippin takes a stance on this in note 12.)
**If Pippen is right, one (immodest) answer is Strauss himself.
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