.  :  |  A R C H A I C  |  :  .     ______________
           .  :  |   N E T W O R K S  |   :  .

Socrates was accused of educating tyrants in ancient Athens. Plato’s Socrates in the (Crito and Apology, if I recall) says something to the effect that it was the city that created him (comforted and nourished him through his life), which is the reason he gives for not leaving the city to save his life.

Perhaps in this Plato’s Socrates is pointing the ultimate finger at Athens. After all, just as the city was complicit in Socrates’ growth, education, support, and continued ability to breathe (until this point) - so was it complicit in Glaucon’s. Perhaps it takes a city to raise both the Philosopher and the Tyrant. (If, indeed, more than a thin partition do their bounds divide…)

In a world where the phrase “creative destruction” is understood and employed so easily, how can we possibly justify creation? When creation involves destruction so intricately and intimately… is there a justification of creation? Would it merely be a justification for destruction?

Will not be compared:

http://www.gilscottheron.com/lyrevol.html

http://journalism.berkeley.edu/projects/biplog/archive/000748.html

Yes, I’m a little late to pick it up.

I loved coming upon Nietzsche’s saying, “the false economy of division of labor.” Obviously, this little statement has deep impact on my career in the future, and on this entire body of “knowledge” that has built up in it. Specialization versus liberal education is a spector that has haunted me for years. I’ve been a “do-it-yourself” manner of person since I was young. When converting this concept to the realm of knowledge and education, however, I cannot help but think *everything* one can learn matters. A man no lesser than Adam Smith himself …

Specialization and division of labor is not economical. It is a constraint upon an individual and organization in an economic system. Economics as a study knows this, I now realize. It is why businesses will “diversify” their products and grow, constrained only by their resources. (Now, I’m as bored by that previous statement as the next person, mind you!) We individuals have far fewer resources.