Sunday, September 23, 2018

An African philosopher




This is one of the few books I actually returned to the seller (a non-Amazon one, for the record). It was just too boring. Which doesn't mean Plotinus is, necessarily. As a blogger once put it: Plotinus is seriously stoned! However, the Cambridge Companion came to my mind the other day when students at the School for African and Oriental Studies (SOAS) in London demanded that only “African” and “Asian” philosophers should be taught at their institution. In and of itself, this is not an unreasonable demand – why does the SOAS give classes on Immanuel Kant, who never left Köningsberg in East Prussia? That's on the Baltic Sea, for crying out loud! Unfortunately, though, I think the students were just grandstanding á la political correctness. If not, prove it by buying and studying this anthology. Plotinus was Egyptian and would therefore qualify as an African philosopher… Good luck!

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