I find this most poignant. A moment in time. And an appreciation after the event of how rare and exceptional the exchange of ideas.Fooloso4 wrote: ↑September 12th, 2018, 10:51 am Georgeanna:
Yes, it was something existential for me. I had started out planning to major in sociology - so I could help fix the world. Instead I turned to the problem of fixing myself. I believed in the Forms and that I was on the ascent out of the cave. It was a kind of religious quest. It took me several years to figure out that one does not escape the cave of ignorance by listening to stories of a transcendent reality, no matter how appealing they may be. This did not turn me off on Plato though, but rather turned me in a new direction, a different way of reading him. A peak behind the mythology of Forms.I think this exceptional ‘most important intellectual experience’ he mentions must be of a life-changing type … a provocation or an answering of an existential question or angst - who am I and what kind of a life do I want to lead ?
Is that what happened to you ? And do you think you were alone?
As to the kind of life I wanted to live, it would have been an idealized notion of academia, with students and colleagues eager to read and discuss important books.
I was not alone. My roommate and I took our first philosophy class together where we read the Republic. He went to graduate school at the University of Chicago to study with Bloom and others. Along with the professor who taught the class another professor in the Political Science department and a few students discovered the Republic at about the same time and were profoundly influenced as well. We met regularly in class and out. A moment in time. I did not know then how rare it was.
Wow.