Hacker News Reader

Comment by leftyted | Hacker News Reader

> We need to stop untethering the text from the historical and cultural milieu of its origination

The reason we still read these people at all (Thucydides, Machievelli, Clausewitz, Sun Tzu, etc) is because their work transcends "the historical and cultural milieu of its origination".

Time (and the accumulation of human opinions) is the real judge here and in the case of all of these writers, time has judged that they are, in fact, saying something eternally true about politics and fighting wars that transcends their historical circumstances. If you want to delve into their historical backgrounds, that's great -- and perhaps it will lead to new, valid intepretations. But it isn't wrong to read them as political philosophy, which is what we generally do.

View on HN

Isn't it even disputed among experts whether Machiavelli's the Prince is satirical or not?

I can't possibly imagine how one can both treat a source as holding profound and transcendent views and be uninterested or unsure of what the author meant when writing it; at that point it seems that the literary work is merely an excuse for the reader to project their own ideas into an authorative source, and the work is only valued for its prestige.

Compare https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Death_of_the_Author

> I can't possibly imagine how one can both treat a source as holding profound and transcendent views and be uninterested or unsure of what the author meant when writing it; at that point it seems that the literary work is merely an excuse for the reader to project their own ideas into an authorative source, and the work is only valued for its prestige.

What I've found is that, in critiques of an earlier philosopher, the most common attitude is an acceptance of key insights, but debate over their implications and the extent of their application. So, whether or not you see The Prince as satire, it is valued for its skepticism of abstract ideas and insistence on realpolitik. That is the transcendent perspective of The Prince, and that isn't really debated, as far as I know.

When I read Machievelli in school, we learned that he was a republican but that The Prince was really, truly advice for autocrats. There's no contradiction here because Machievlli is a realist and he understands that autocracies happen and sometimes they might even be necessary (hey, we in the US have martial law for a reason).

As eru tersely pointed out, most contemporary literary analysis and criticism is no longer based on what the author meant, but instead based on how the work itself, irrespective of the author's intent or the context within which it was written. Thus, instead of a search for "the truth" as expressed by the author's inner thinking, the question instead becomes how work affects readers. This, obviously, bothers many people, but is, IMO, a valuable approach.

Thus, "project[ing] their own ideas into an authoritative source" is perfectly fine if phrased a bit more nicely. Perhaps more like "adapt our understanding of the source material in light of contemporary thinking". Not to say that context doesn't matter at all, especially with translations. But in the end, when analyzing works such as "Art of War", it's unavoidable that we project our current context onto its text. As post-modernists point out, we cannot escape our biases, so why pretend to do so?

You're right. And this projection is both inevitable and welcome.

But you must admit it's at least a bit funny if when you read Sun Tzu's "attack your enemy's allies" you understand "work to undermine the alliance, maybe sow discontent so that they turn against each other" but wise old Sun Tzu actually meant "physically stab your enemy's ally with your sword. Right through the heart. That's what 'attacking' means, right? What do you mean 'undermine', anyway?".

Oh, attack the enemy's allies (slaps forehead.) I get it now.

Reading your earlier post, I was trying to figure out how it could possibly be helpful to attack your own allies on a battlefield.

It's an interesting commentary on Sun Tzu that someone could even imagine him prescribing such a course of action.

I can understand the concept of "how the work affects readers" in terms of, say, literary value (for lack of a better word) of a novel, or poetry.

It's much harder to translate that idea to essays or educative works, though.

The art of war is basically a text book, so it's as literal as you can get. Biases should matter about as much as reading the package leaflet of some meds, or a math book.

It's pretty obvious that the reason it's popular has more to do with the ancient and exotic origin, the suggestive title and the opportunities for the reader's self image it provides than for its actual content -at least in the West. But considering this effect anything other than an expression of ignorance, and actually judging the work for its unintended ability to cause such effect, feels... I don't know,a travesty. Almost as superficial as judging the book for the covers' drawing or its usefulness as a doorstop.

The same families that where in power in Florence at the time of writing of the Prince are still in power today.

That is also for Shakespeare and the families in GB. Maybe satire was necessary to disguise criticism. But the underlying meaning is crystal clear.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-3618720/amp/...

>> We need to stop untethering the text from the historical and cultural milieu of its origination

> The reason we still read these people at all (Thucydides, Machievelli, Clausewitz, Sun Tzu, etc) is because their work transcends "the historical and cultural milieu of its origination".

Yes and no. IIRC, Sun Tzu strongly advises against attacking walled cities. The edition of Sun Tzu that I read made the point that reason for that was because, at his time, siege engine technology was not up to the task. In Sun Pin, written a few hundred years later, the advice changed.

There's a core there that does transcend "the historical and cultural milieu of its origination," but you kinda need to tether the text to its milieu to find it.

>There's a core there that does transcend "the historical and cultural milieu of its origination," but you kinda need to tether the text to its milieu to find it.

Strong agree. Clausewitz has a whole Chapter on billeting armies. The advice presented is mostly of use to historians. Not everything he wrote was timeless. Applying a work in a modern context involves understanding its limitations and the context in which it was written.

Why did Clausewitz think X? If X is still relevant today, is it relevant for the same reasons that it was 200 years ago?

Does this idea X truly transcend time, or are there just many important similarities between our time and the time of Clausewitz?

I think the author here somewhat poisoned the well by starting with Clausewitz’s annoyance at the trope of invoking ancient history. The fact is, Clausewitz, Sun Tzu, Thucydides, and the rest are simultaneously both best understood within their historical context while simultaneously being timeless. How can that be? In the words of a devoted student of military history, James Mattis:

“Ultimately, a real understanding of history means that we face NOTHING new under the sun. For all the “4th Generation of War” intellectuals running around today saying that the nature of war has fundamentally changed, the tactics are wholly new, etc, I must respectfully say. “Not really”. Alexander the Great would not be in the least bit perplexed by the enemy that we face right now in Iraq, and our leaders going into this fight do their troops a disservice by not studying (studying, vice just reading) the men who have gone before us.”

> Alexander the Great would not be in the least bit perplexed by the enemy that we face right now in Iraq, and our leaders going into this fight do their troops a disservice by not studying (studying, vice just reading) the men who have gone before us.”

Alexander would just marry off tribal chieftain's daughters to his generals and move on to the next trouble spot, seems like a hard sell with today's mores & norms.

today, it would be bribes. Same method different "goods" passing around.

I think this line, and in fact the entire essay, isn't meant for general people, rather fellow academics. In the very next sentences author writes- "The Art of War’s brevity and malleability will ensure it remains a popular and frequently quoted classic in the West. But for those seeking deeper insight into the evolution of Chinese strategic thinking, it remains an important but insufficient means to that end."

I think a key point of the article is that The Art of War is actually way more literal and immediate than most people think it is. So if Sun Tzu wasn't talking in strategic generalities, but actually giving practical advice for the realities of his time (social, technological, etc) it's mistaken to "untether" it from its milieu, and also mistaken to consider it as a template for modern-day advice.

Like "print" really means to make hardcopy output on paper, and not some generalities about output that can go anywhere. We shouldn't cacsually untether that from the original context and use it in a terminal emulator, let alone for generating part of a web page.

People tend to consider philosophy/strategy in way more generalizable terms than tech words like "print". But what if Sun Tzu wasn't really all that generalizable?

What if he was literally telling you how to put an arrow through the eye of the enemy general? How do you write a self-help book "based on The Art of War" out of that? (You can still derive general meaning that wasn't put there by Sun Tzu, but it's a lot harder!)

Another expression for "eternally true" is often "bloody obvious" though. And even in cases where it isn't, the first source is not usually the one we go back to; it's certainly not true that we all keep reading Euclid's Elements to learn about the deep mysteries of maths.

No, just being right is an insufficient explanation for why textbooks will obtain the mythical status of the works you reference.

it’s obvious because it has already percolated into mainstream thought

Reply on news.ycombinator.com