Great Books Education & Lifelong Learning, Western Civilization & the Great Conversation
Вставка
- Опубліковано 15 лип 2024
- An overview of Great Books Education, the University of Chicago / Encyclopedia Britannica Collection of the Great Books of Western Civilization by Mortimer Adler, Great Books for Eastern, Indian, and Islamic Civilizations, opportunities to engage in lifelong learning via reading and discussion of Great Books. Time Stamps:
00:00 Introduction and Overview
02:15 What are "Great Books?"
04:40 Tour of The Great Books of Western Civilization
12:52 Critique of the collection; Great Books of Eastern, Indian, Islamic Civilizations
16:45 Great Books Education in American colleges
22:09 Lifelong Learning for adults via Great Books discussion circles
24:54 Some options for adult lifelong learning
27:05 Option of engaging in Great Books discussions with me
Textual Resources:
Lists of Great Books from various sources, universities, civilizations:
www.interleaves.org/~rteeter/g...
Great Books of the Western World - Volumes 1-54 at the Internet Archive:
archive.org/details/encyclopa...
The Sacred Books of the East
holybooks.com/the-sacred-book...
www.sacred-texts.com/sbe/inde...
Resources for adults to engage in lifelong learning through Great Books discussions:
The Great Books Foundation - free support for starting your own group
www.greatbooks.org/book-groups/
Online Great Books - provides books, monthly meeting with experienced guide:
onlinegreatbooks.com/
Join my Great Books discussion circles:
please fill out the application at www.alexanderarguelles.com/ac...
If you can think of anyone else who might be interested in joining my groups, please pass the above information along to them.
If you are in a position to support my efforts to spread knowledge through these videos, I will gratefully accept any contributions to ko-fi.com/alexanderarguelles
The problem for someone who loves books is that there’s not enough time to read them all!
Have a beautiful day professor!
Not enough hours to read all one wants, or, alas, to learn all the languages one wants...
So true.
I have the entire Great Books set as well as the Great Ideas Program, the Great Ideas Today and the Gateway to the Great Books. I also have all the Harvard Classics. I have read the entire core set of the Great Books which took me about 30 years and about 6 months ago finally finished the Harvard Classics which took about 15 years. I am now on the final volume of Will Durant's Story of Civilization.
Congratulations! Have you done this all on your own, or in conversation with others?
Look who is here .. the adorable tuxedo Cat
He would not miss a lecture!
That cat is awesome!
@@david2284180 Thank you! Have you seen him in his stand-alone feature? ua-cam.com/video/vI3eoYg3hXU/v-deo.html
Literally clicked on this one because of the cat.
The cat was listening carefully! He/she shall be wiser by the side of Professer. How cute it is to have not moved at all in front of the camera. He must have been appreciating a lot of the professer's speech. Just imagine that I were the cat. It's funny to think about if a cat can actually learn a language..
If a creature can learn by osmosis from the environment, then Merlin is a very learned and wise cat indeed. Like this comment if you would like to be him!
Mortimer Adler was a benefactor of mankind! He was interviewed by Firing Line (William F. Buckley Jr.) a few times.
Nice cat, by the way. Must be a genius.
For a pure virtual Merlin experience, go here: ua-cam.com/video/vI3eoYg3hXU/v-deo.html
If you might possibly be interested in virtual options for working with me to improve your skills in reading French, German, Latin, or Spanish literatures, or to engage in English-language discussions of the Great Books of Western, Eastern, Indic, and/or Islamic Civilizations, please fill out the application form on my website at alexanderarguelles.com/academy/ If this is not for you, but you know someone whom it might interest, please pass this information on to them.
Hello Merlin, thank you for bringing Prof A with you and for showing us how to be calm and present in your loaf posture.
Prof A, thank you for getting the academy started. Hopefully you will have something for pre-intermediate occasional help when stuck.
Prof A, please do a session on grammar. Struggling with German adjectives. which grammar books have you found helpful for German, please ?
Thank you.
I believe it was Samuel Clemens who said something to the effect that the definition of a classic was "a book that everyone wants to have read but no one wants to actually read."
When you dig into (some of) these together through the discussions, what seems dry and hard to a single brain, wrestling with the concepts alone, can become interesting and fruitful when multiple minds go at it together.
@@ProfASAr Yes! So true. I have found this with studying mathematics. It can become mind numbing when learning alone but when discussing with others it takes a life of its own.
Great way to attract new viewers! A bunch of books and a super cute cat
They are indeed, and both of them are natural and sincere!
I remember the day when I first saw this collection of books, it was 1980.
I was a homeless kid coming from El Salvador living in a rich Jewish household my mother was the housekeeper and I used to sit in the private library going through them one by one I didn't know how to read the English language or the Spanish language either. I found one of those in the streets and I picked up and brought memories. I currently reading Vol. 55 and I found the whole collection in the public library.
Congratulations on reading them all!
I've started to read the Series from 2022. I am reading volume 07 (Dialogues of Plato) now. This is the best decision I took in my life.
Thank you for confirming the value of doing this challenging but rewarding reading!
Thanks so much for the mention! You are doing good work here sir.
You are very welcome. All of us involved in this need to support each other!
Thanks a lot for sharing these invaluable resources. Much appreciated!
You are welcome - I am glad they are helpful.
I just subscribed because of the cat. The fact that you're a professor talking about great books helped me make my decision - but yeah, it was the cat. :)
In that case, watch this: ua-cam.com/video/vI3eoYg3hXU/v-deo.html
Thank you for another great video Professor! I hope you will show us more books from your library in the future.
Thank you, Katerina. This is kind of a test case - these are certainly some of my more accessible books, so if there seems to be a genuine interest in this video, sure, I will make others like it.
A good regimen is to read chronologically and based on the grouping in the great book series (which is also color coded). The groupings are: literature, philosophy, science, mathematics, and history. So a first year grouping might be Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey, Plato’s Dialogues, Hippocrates’ Writings & Galen’s Writings, Euclid’s Elements and Herodotus’ History.
It also helps to have like minded friends involved in the same regimen.
Thank you for the knowledgeable suggestion.
Professor Arguelles, God bless you for everything you do, and also for being an advocate of Great Books, particularly during our very foolish age. Circa 1999, I first read both Adler's HOW TO READ A BOOK and Fadiman's (NEW) LIFETIME READING PLAN. A young man at the time, devouring these books set me on a path of enrichment I continue to tread this very day. Adler's chapter, ''Reading and the Growth of the Mind'' is a life-changing exchanging experience in itself, and I've recommended that particular chapter to many friends over the years. Anyway, keep up the great work. You are an international treasure. (Russian and Hebrew are my foreign languages of study, by the way.)
Thank you so much for your kind words of appreciation, and for confirming the value of Adler's (and Fadiman's) approach to the whole Great Book endeavor. I hope you will watch and comment upon the follow-up video to this one, in which I further discuss the Syntopicon and also Great Books of other civilizations.
Having seen your presentation, Alexander, as well as an interview with Adler led by Buckley (what a style these two fellas!), I am seriously considering embarking upon this journey of going through the 54 volume set and learning all the foreign languages on the way in order to read these books in the original - using English (or my native Polish) as an aid on the way. This way I will have a meaningful goal spanning many years to come, a framework to learn very concrete tongues for very concrete a purpose, and challenging literature chosen by inspiring people as representative of The Great Ideas of the Western Civilisation, literature being a genuine food for thought and a cornerstone for the educated man. (to be proven by own experience)
I am very glad that I could provide you with the inspiration to aspire to this!
I recently acquired the 54 volume set from a local bookstore and I am very excited to start learning.
Thank You for a wonderful introduction to this series and where it can lead.
I will definitely be returning to your channel once I begin this journey. Happy learning, everyone!
Please consider joining my Great Books reading and discussion circle as of January 2024.
So glad I found this channel 😃
You are most welcome here. I love sharing my knowledge and experience with all who would like to have it.
I'm profundly grateful with you. I've been searching the Great Books for a couple of years and had lost hope of finding them in digital and for free.
This means a lot for me. I'm 25 years old and didn't have the luck of going to a college, but always had an urge to develop my intellect. Thank you.
I am glad to have provided the link for you. Maybe you can join our circle some day.
This cat look so cute 😍
Thank you. Have you seen his feature film?: ua-cam.com/video/vI3eoYg3hXU/v-deo.html
I love that series. Original works. We have it in our school library. 🙌🏽
Have you read any?
What a great video. I'm looking to read both the great books of the Western world and the Harvard classics. I'd love to see more videos on these two book sets. Also a video discussing the differences between the first and second edition of the great books of the Western world would be extremely interesting, as well as reviews of each and why you may or may not recommend one or the other.
Thank you for the appreciation of this video and the suggestions for others.
Prof. Arguelles, Thank you for this inspiring video, which reminds me of the book "The Priceless Gift" by Cornelius Hirschberg. :)
Thank you most kindly for that wonderful reference to a classic work about an autodidactic approach to real education through reading.
Thank you for posting this video; I've had a set since 1985 and I think that the first volume, where Mortimer Adler focuses on why this set was created is very important. He and Robert Maynard Hutchins argue that it is the responsibility of a democracy to educate voters to the highest standards so that the 'demos' can make the very best and well educated choices for their representative leadership. How very much we need to be reading this set right now!! I would recommend everyone start with the Great Books and append these with modern political, scientific, and literary works to create a well informed populace.
Thank you for a post with details that will be of interest to many.
Hello Alexander,
It's a wonderful presentation!
Thanks for motivating us to read what is really worth!
Greeting from Vienna
Michael
Thank you, Michael, if you don't have the books sitting on your shelves already, I hope the links to resources I provide will be helpful.
The University of Chicago Great Books program years ago was pretty good.
I remember reading about it over 20 years ago. Always intrigued me.
It hasn't changed since then, so whatever intrigued you will still be there.
Hi Professon Alexander I just finished reading 'How to read a book'. It's fascinating. I already have a lot of books to get through so I need to stop buying more. Though the 'great books of the East' sounds interesting, I might just have a glance at the list. Also I'm on lesson 4 from 'French Without Toil' and loving it. Thanks for the vid. Len
Wonderful to hear that you are on you way to access French texts in the original! The actual name of the "other" series is Sacred Books of the East, and I can't believe I failed to mention my actual credential for leading a stab at understanding these, namely my degree in the comparative history of religions... If enough people ask for this, I'll open a section.
Great video, thank you for the information 😊
You are very welcome. If this interests you, do look at the digital versions and then consider getting the physical ones.
lovely, thank you very much !
You are very welcome. I am glad you found it instructive.
I am very much looking forward to the great books course offering. I dare say your cat alone has had a better education than myself.
Having lived his entire life in the atmosphere of my library, I dare say Merlin is probably more than magical, but also knowledgeable and perhaps even getting wise...
I get excited to just see a set in the background or hear it mentioned in passing. Can't wait to watch
(edit: the primary works themselves are still in print the sets are not)
I hope it is instructive when you can watch the whole thing, and thanks for the update about the in-print status.
@@ProfASAr You mentioned you complied your own list for Eastern Canons, are these similar to William Th. de Bary's? The Sacred Texts list has a place but I wouldn't say it's a good equivalent to GBWW, where as de Bary's actually wrote the short lists in the GBWW annual (The Great Ideas Today) and his Sources of 'X' Tradition series. Thanks.
@@spelcheak Honestly, I did this so long ago that I cannot really member, but my project was not so much creative as comparing, contrasting, and combing other lists, and I am 99% sure I did comb through de Bary's.
Excellent video! Very interested in this topic.
Thank you, I hope it satisfied your interest!
I love my complete set - been diving into it for years! $2/bag! What a deal!!! As Thoreau so aptly wrote - "They only talk of forgetting them who never knew them" (Walden, Reading)
Thanks for passing on that great quote from Thoreau. And enjoy your continued exploration of the set!
Thanks for the info sir this is very helpful for people who want to read more
You are very welcome.
Good explanation. The first step is to won the set of 60 vols along with the gateway to GBWW 10 vols. Make a routine to spend a specific time to specific literature, philosophy or science. This way one can cover them all. For sure it shall take years to finish them. Regular reading may help in complete in a span of 12 years (5 books a year). All book does not demand the same intensity however. Personally it took me 15 years to complete. Now that Brittanica has stopped publishing it, people may look for used editions with various international sellers online. Namaskar.
Thank you kindly for contributing your experienced suggestions as to a way to go through it, as well as noting the fact that not all volumes require the same effort.
I was in a Great Books program over my four years of college (graduated in 1996). A year ago I looked up the program again, and found out they stopped reading the books in the early 2000s. They apparently couldn't get enough people to join the program anymore. I felt like I had been kicked in the stomach. Reading those books, with weekly lectures from professors on campus who were experts on those particular books--and a weekly colloquium where we students discussed them--changed my life. I had spent most of the last 20 years believing the program still existed. (Well, it does in the sense that it has the same name. But now they have "interdisciplinary seminars", whatever that means.)
I am sorry to hear this has turned into "studies" as that probably means watered down in an effort to make it current, etc. But I am glad to hear how you profited from the experience. What college is this?
@@ProfASAr Central Washington University. The program was (is) the William O. Douglas Honors College.
@@greyeyed123 Again, please accept my condolences on the passing of the program. Unfortunately, I believe this is not the only such case, and that even in many institutions where "the core" is still kept, it has been "updated" such that it is not really the classic Great Books anymore, but rather has made many concessions to keep current. As my sons are now at Columbia, however, I do know for a fact that the curriculum there is essentially the same as it was when I was there 40 years ago, and I have a fading memory of an aging professor then telling me that it hadn't really changed since he was there 40-odd years before that...
Love the kitty ❤
Thank you!
I'm really glad to see that Charlie Sheen has turned his life around and is doing some true introspective work!😂
Spotted!
Great video. I guess my "great buy" of this set for only $15 was not the best deal after all. It is an estate sale find and is missing the volume on Freud for which I'm grateful. 😂 It is a fantastic set and I'm glad I finally found one that was affordable. I will subscribe to your channel and am looking forward to more videos. Thanks so much.
Thank you. I am sure someone will come along with a $6 story to top mine at some point...
I found the audio recordings for French Without Toil on the net. Excellent.
If you are about to purchase the book, make sure that the edition matches the recordings before you do so.
I enjoyed your presentation. Thank you!
You are so very welcome. Might you either consider joining one of my reading and discussion circles or recommending them to your acquaintances?
@@ProfASAr Thank you, can you tell me more about the fees you charge? I would be interested in reading and discussing the Great Books.
@@vanessa271 Please have a look at this page, where you can find information about current prices, meeting times, readings, etc.: www.alexanderarguelles.com/academy/
I originally followed you for language but now I follow you for your cat. Also, nice jacket!
I hope you enjoy both (cat and languages) and I'll try to wear that jacket more - it is nice.
Great video, thank you
Thank you. Since you found that to be the case, I am sure you will enjoy the follow-up / continuation video that I posted yesterday, so please watch it and let me know what you think.
@@ProfASAr I will certainly do that, cheers
The cat is so well behaved.
He loves to study, and he can help you do so, too: ua-cam.com/video/vI3eoYg3hXU/v-deo.html
I just got my set yesterday
Wonderful! Any interest in joining my reading and discussion so as to have accountability and be sure to use them?
Enlightening video, Dr. Arguelles. I got really curious about the part you said that, and I paraphrase your words, "the GB collection is good but many important western books on other languages got left out". The idea of a "great book" in the way Adler says it is still nebulous in my mind, even though I saw the explanations sometimes before and I read Adler myself. I would like to see a video where you talk about the books that were left out of the GB canon and specifically why that book is important(I am inclined to believe each book has a small discrepancy in the reason why it is a great book).I believe some great books are still being released from the 2000s till the time we speak right now, but I can't really pinpoint them without a clear definition on my head. Also, would you be kind enough to consider to release some of the virtual academy discussion circles on youtube, for the layman's appreciation, Dr Arguelles? I would love to participate, but my financial situation is far from leaving me to do so D:
Edit: paraphrase clarification.
Hello William! Thanks for the comment, but I certainly did not mean to imply that collection was "subpar!" What I said was anyone can find fault with it from various perspectives, but certainly all the works were included for a valid reason. Also, while it is easy enough to come up with a list of books that might be better, what would be enormously difficult to do would be to rework the Syntopticon, the first two volumes where all the volumes of the set are cross referenced in regards to the ideas that they contain, i.e., where can you find notions of duty, habit formation, etc., - and it tells you just what texts, volumes, and sections talk about this. I meant to discuss the Syntopticon, but somehow left it out of the video that was otherwise satisfactory, and as that discussion could be quite long in itself, I thought to leave it for another video if there is sufficient interest. You other points are all noted, thanks.
@@ProfASAr Yeah, I felt that word didn't express what you said- I pondered really hard about what words to use to paraphrase your statements but , unfortunately, the only one that I used was a poor one. For that I apologize. I certainly heard of many, if not all works in the GB list(even read some) and I wanted to say that all are important, but the list left out a lot that are also important. One idea that could be interesting is a community-driven "Syntopticon II"- basically we could as a community deconstruct other books(that were left out of the GB) and cross-reference them, in the same way of the syntopticon. For sure, this is a hard work for a single person, but I am sure that if you provided us with such a book list, we as community could figure something out for them :D the only reaally confusing part is the book list itself. Since you already had one on your site, many years ago, all we need is a way for the community to operate on them. Discussion circles could also have this directive :D
I edited my first comment, hopefully now is aligned with what you said! :)
@@Studios421 I agree with you observation that the great ideas have a lot of cognates in newer(and older) books, stretching as far as we are right now. However, Dr. Adler didn't(at least as far as I am aware) showed clearly what constitutes a great book, or what constitute a great idea. He just talks about people reading it and mentioning those. A "syntopicon II" would tackle exactly this question , and give the reader the mental tools to recognize new great ideas and great books on the fly. A great book isn't necessarily a book that teaches new things. It can also be a great resume of ideas of other books, or a narrative that binds such great ideas into a greater whole.
In this context, the syntopicon itself is a great book. I think Dr. Adler never adresses the great books in these terms because he didn't want to glorify his own work. But I think new ideas have flourished in the XXI century-even if those are just antitheticals to the old great ideas- so the syntopicon MUST be augmented, not only in number of books, but also in number of ideas.
Besides, some new ideas are just a combination of old ideas, that weaved themselves over new terms and new behaviors. I believe that the process of idea creation is unique. Because of that, we don't add ideas, they interconnect and grow in a process such as the whole is bigger than the parts' sum. A "syntopicon II" would also tackle this structure formation of the new(and old) ideas. Also, it could augment the idea of "great books" to become "great literature" instead with the objective to include famous(and infamous) science papers that shows both good science and bad science, so we can understand more about both.
Ebbinghaus' paper about memory is one example of a great science paper that(in my opinion) must be added to the syntopticon as one of the pillars of understanding the great ideas.
Overall, your idea is interesting, but essays are too long: I think the main idea of the syntopicon is to help piece all of the great books together, not to take a long time immersing in it and not having time(or mental energy) to read the great books themselves.
Hi... from Brazil 🇧🇷
Olá e bem-vindos ao meu canal.
The cats like..."Is this dude talking to me?"
I talk to him all the time!
I bought the gb of the western world collection for $40 off Facebook marketplace. It’s priceless. Though not all encompassing as it’s missing a lot of very important works. Xenophon, Geoffrey of Monmouth, Bede, and a lot of Germanic works of the Middle Ages. But it’s still an invaluable collection.
It certainly is, and in particular because of its Syntopicon, which I highlight in the follow-up video.
@@ProfASAr I would argue they should release a 4th addition that fills the ridiculous gap between the 4th-14th centuries. Yes there are one or two works here but historically it goes from Tacitus to Machiavelli, literarily from Virgil to Dante, philosophically from Augustine to Aquinas. These are absurd, nonsensical gaps. At minimum there needs to be additions of Arrian, Jordanes, procopius, Bede, Monmouth, Beowulf, and the Eddas. That way we will get rid of this grotesque omission of the works of late antiquity and the early Middle Ages.
@@johndees4997 I would clearly and emphatically support this!
I love that cat !
Then you should love this: ua-cam.com/video/vI3eoYg3hXU/v-deo.html
I have this same library in the brown leather back.
I believe that would be the 1990 edition.
I love these types of things, as an intellectual and philosopher. But honestly, most people won't read these, don't read these and don't care. Having said that, I'm looking forward to reading my newly obtained Tao Te Ching in the original Chinese.
Right you may be, but welcome to the perhaps teeny tiny corner of the internet, or at least of UA-cam, that does care!
Totally inspiring and fascinating. Hope to read some of these in addition to my addictions to thrillers and my attempts to learn French, Spanish, Russian and a wee bit of Hebrew.
If you might be interested in participating in some live discussion circles for these, please fill out the expression of interest form linked at the top and in the description.
♥
Thank you.
I've read all 60 volumes. It took me 5 years.
Well done!
I've always seen literature as a source of entertainment first and foremost, but I also believe that the best works of art are both entertaining _and_ thought-provoking. My go-to example for that would be the TV series Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul, which have absolutely gripping narratives and are both steeped in symbolism and there is much to analyze and to take away from these series, even if it's something you already knew. There are similar examples in the world of video games, and I want to one day create a series of books that would, in a similar manner, have both entertainment value, but would also be thought-provoking under the surface, as I've never seen anything quite like that in my life.
At the same time, I am intrigued by what you're proposing here, Professor: reading something for the sake of discussing it and learning from that discussion never really occurred to me. I do not really have anyone to discuss such things with right now, nor do I have the time to do so on a regular basis, but I would like to try it out with you if I get the opportunity, cause it sounds really quite fascinating to experiment with!
Thanks for your comments, Yan. It would be WONDEFUL to have a polytmath like yourself in a one of these circles some day!
@@ProfASAr I am most flattered, Professor! One quick thing: I wanted to add this comment to the Google form, but I'd already sent it, so I'll bring it up here instead: it would be convenient to give people the option to pay for single-time visits to your discussion circles, as a lot of people, students in particular, have very busy and fluctuating schedules and even if they're available at the scheduled time for the discussion circle they might end up feeling absolutely drained from their daily activities that they would either not be able to perform adequately during the discussion or would opt to skip the meeting entirely! And yet some might be willing to give it a go once or twice, just to say that they've done it. I suspect that you might disapprove of this and would rather have people go through the whole series of discussions, and that's why you hadn't included this option on the list, but I still wanted to bring it to your attention because simply giving this option could increase the number of people that you would reach this way. Just a thought.
Breaking Bad is not a good example of great art. For TV series The Sopranos, Battlestar Galactica or Mad Men are to me better examples of great art.
@@vodkatonyq No problem if your picks are different from mine
There is something quite sad about buying old books that (judging by their condition) have never been read. Some years back I purchased many of the books published by the Linguaphone Institute during the period from 1960-1985. Most of them were in truly immaculate condition! I remember almost being shocked when I unpacked their Serbocroat Course and found it had actually seen active service from a previous owner.☺️
(Speaking of Linguaphone, I wonder whether Professor Arguelles would recommend their course for Korean?)
I hadn't thought of it that way, but I do see your point. Regarding the Linguaphone Korean Course - it has been decades since someone absconded with mine. As I recall, it was most certainly of assistance to me when I first moved to Korea back in 1996. It is not a typical Linguaphone course, however, i.e., it does not have the same descriptive dialogue alternating with question and answer about the dialogue structure that almost all of the other courses have. Again, as it was stolen from me a quarter of a century ago I don't remember just what it was like, just that it wasn't typical. So, yes, recommended to the best of my recollection, but just don't expect it to be like the others.
@@ProfASAr Many thanks. I'm very sorry to hear your copy was stolen. I notice from the Linguaphone website it is one of the editions which is still available today. (As I'm sure you know, many of the languages they used to offer were discontinued about 15 years ago - but Korean was one that survived, so you could still replace it in your library for use by future students.)
@@j.burgess4459 I don't know who the thief was, but I would like to extend the benefit of the doubt and imagine that it was someone who borrowed it and forgot to return it rather than deliberately abscond with it.
When it comes to reading in general, is a pain in the ass for me. To be honest, i love reading all kinds of books fantasy, history, and books like the ones you have in your collection. Time management is the problem, im a college student and trying to read and do classes can be really painful sometimes and i myself want to become a writer one of these days inspired by these amazing beautiful pieces of work. However the main problem is that their are more so called fun books like you said, than their are books that are trying to teach you something. Throughout my experience, history is hard in general and when trying to find a good book most of them look like they are for children who know nothing about the world. They miss allot of information, also the way they teach is almost like they didnt even try to write a history. For example Europe a history, china a history, books that have a history arent bad they just start with this long introduction then start off with the messiest piece of work ive ever seen, instead of going through order they just go through topic and topic making it into a confusing mess. Whats worse is this is all of them, i find these hard books more enjoyable because unlike the easy books, they aren't repetitive, they dont talk about the same topic just with a different writer and style.
Thank you for the insightful comment.
Great video! Thanks for sharing and giving different approaches to these books! I have a set of these books myself that were passed down from my grandfather and have been very interested in the collection and just finished the first volume of the set. But I'm rather new to poetry and studying philosophy and just don't know how to read, reflect and truly comprehend these books and not to mention how long this set is, it's kind of nerve racking. Is there anything that I should practice before approaching this set such as reading less difficult literature and poetry? Because I know me, sometimes I'll read and not really take the time to understand something, and at the end of reading, it become a waste of time because I didn't take the time to really understand what the author had intended. And I really don't want that to be the case with this set as it is very long and difficult. Anyways, any tips? Thanks!
The best thing would be NOT to try to read them on your own, but to join a reading and discussion circle for them. I believe the original publishers have advice on how to do this, and there are a few other places that you can do this as well, but since you found this here, why not visit my great books reading and discussion circle to see what it is like?
Hello Dr. Arguelles! Your old website had an expanded Great Books list sorted by language. Are you planning on bringing that back at some point?
Yes, that is the very next page to come on my new website. Working on it now!
One of the books that I am currently going through in this spirit is the Bible. It is Western, it is stimulating (not as much as Plato is, though, or a strictly philosophical text, but certainly as far as the realm of imagination is concerned), and it has probably been the most influential single volume in the western history. So... I decided to read it, even though I do not consider myself a believer. One thing I am clear about though is that after eight hours of work in front of the computer tryging to analize numerical data, charts, invoices and excel stuff, I can no longer stand small font of a written paper text.
SO I BOUGHT THE BIBLE FOR THE SHORTSIGHTED! -- and it changes the game completely. I need to use that idea with other books as well.
I concur! Some evil wizard came into my library and put a shrinking spell on the print of many books that used to be perfectly legible just a few short years ago, but now, reading glasses notwithstanding, the letters in them just keep getting smaller and smaller.
@@ProfASAr Not a wizard, Alexander, the book WORM. Eating away at the font, sneaky sneaky.
It's not western, it's middle-eastern.
Hello, just wanted to point out that the link in your UA-cam "About" page may be outdated?
Thank you for pointing that out. I just updated it.
I can't wait to be done with grad school so I can have more time to do things like read this collection
Indeed, grad school must be a time of deferment in order to get the task at hand done. All my best in this endeavor!
@@ProfASAr thank you for your kind wishes. I graduate in August!
@@haicautrang5304 With what degree in what area?
@@ProfASAr Health Administration
@@haicautrang5304 And you also have all this interest in languages - congratulations on being a polymath!
Professor Arguelles, thank you for another great video and for the resources. Some questions/comments:
From Wikipedia: “A second edition was published in 1990 in 60 volumes. Some translations were updated, some works were removed, and there were significant additions from the 20th century located in six new, separate volumes.” (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Books_of_the_Western_World) What are your thoughts on the second edition? (This is the one I own.)
How important do you think secondary academic literature is to understanding original texts? And do you have any advice on how to find good secondary literature without getting bogged down by it? There are probably more pages of secondary literature regarding original texts than the number of pages of the texts themselves, which can be overwhelming.
Also, it seems academics often make a big deal about the quality of translations, and choosing the “right” one. How much do you think that applies to this set?
Considering the vast number of “great books” from the various traditions of the world, it can be overwhelming to figure out which works you want to read in the original and which you will settle for reading in translation. Learning a foreign language is a huge time commitment, and that is time that could be used to read works in translation. I’ve seen extremes from people saying that learning foreign languages is not necessary because you don’t need the original languages to understand the ideas, to people saying you’re not truly reading a work unless you’re reading it in its original language. Mark Van Doren states in his that it would be ideal to read all works in their original languages, but that this will never be. He says you should just settle for learning Ancient Greek. He’s doesn’t explain why, but I’m assuming perhaps because Ancient Greek is the best Western language to learn for understanding grammar? And of course, his book is biased toward the Western tradition.
Also, I was happy to see in one of your comments that you hadn’t seen something in such a long a time that you had mostly forgotten the specifics of it. This is another overwhelming issue I often deal with: spending time reading a work closely and then forgetting the specifics of it when enough time has elapsed. My brain seems to dump information rather quickly. I’ll even sometimes forget that I’ve ever read a certain work. I suppose I need to do a better job of following the advice of Adler’s in order to keep the appropriate notes, etc., to “make a book my own.”
Hello, Chad, and thanks for commenting. I don't regard the 60 volume set as an improvement. Nothing at all is done about the 8 century gap between Augustine and Aquinas - all the additions are in the last 500 years which are already overrepresented. And adding so much 20th century material while still in the 20th century... One of my principles for such lists is that you have to be dead for 100 years to get on them, to ensure that you had a lasting influence and were not just trendy for a while.
One of Adler's principles is to avoid secondary literature as much as possible, and I concur with that.
Certainly, the ideal stance is to read as much as possible in the original, not in translation.
I do forget specifics if I summarize, write things down, etc., and it is worth doing that with things worth remembering. I am not sure that I recall the specifics of what I recently wrote about not recalling the specifics, however, but I think it may have been either to the procedure of compiling lists (not reading) or to the content of Linguaphone's Korean course - not exactly a classic worthy of inclusion in such a list as this.
@@ProfASAr Thank you for the reply, Professor Arguelles. And yes, my comment was in reference to compiling lists.
Do you happen to know which printing the books with the multi-colored bindings belong to? I have a full set and, while I plant to hold on to them, I'm trying to find out more about them.
I have the linen bound multi-colored set like you have behind you.
They all state 1954, but I suspect they are from different printings over the years.
Somewhat recently I started to have a bigger interest into reading some classical books. My goal is not read these books as a lifestyle where I read them repeatedly. I'm aware that I miss stuff that way, but there are various things to do, so any decision I make causes me to miss other stuff. If there is an audiobook of these books, how many hours would that be? Just a rough guess is enough. I intend to read them anyways, so I'm curious how big of a time investment it will be.
I didn't know that there are the Great Books of Eastern Civilizations. I also saw your video on it and I will start watching it as soon as I finish this comment. Is there a similar collection for Africa, America (pre columbus) and Oceania/Australia?
One such book collection I also have my eye on are the 38 volumes of The Early Church Fathers.
Audiobooks for most of these thick tomes would probably be 30+ hours each. In my circle, participants usually spend about 3 hours or so per week reading. I don't know if I will live long enough to read all 52 volumes with this group, but the younger members might be able to read through the set in this fashion (once a week meetings) so they don't have to miss other "stuff" to do this! If you might be interested in visiting our ongoing discussion circle, write to me at my website and I will send you a link.
@@ProfASAr I will look into your discussion circle. I don't know yet if such a discussion circle is something I want to do or if I prefer a different reading style. But thank you for the offer.
I just clicked for that magnificent chonker
Hey hold on just a minute - he's magnificent all right, but he's no chonker! It's the camera angle - yeah, that's it, it's the camera angle. OK, he's not as thin as he was when he was a kitten, but a chonker....? Have a look at him in his own full feature and see if he still looks that fat... ua-cam.com/video/vI3eoYg3hXU/v-deo.html
@@ProfASAr He looks great ! The camera angle on the thumbnail made him look a bit wide is all :)
@@paulspl2581 Whewwww, thanks! I'm still going to measure his food a bit more carefully after this scare...
I like your cat
Thank you, and I imagine you will love his full feature here: ua-cam.com/video/vI3eoYg3hXU/v-deo.html
My problem with this collection is the small font and the double column set up. This makes the set hard, at least for me, to read.
I cannot read at all without reading glasses these days, but with 2x magnification, I don't find the font here to be particularly small, though there is an evil spirit who has come into my library and shrunk the fonts of many of my books.
Out of curiosity, do they explain why they did not include the Bible? I'm not familiar with this particular collection, but at first glance it seems somewhat odd to leave it out, given its influence on the history and development of ideas throughout the Western world.
Great point. I will talk more about this in the follow-up / continuation video next Saturday.
Hello. Firstly thanks for useful videos. I would like to ask two question :
1)Do you have specific techniques to read / for note-taking ( when I try to take notes, I don't know what should be noted and I start to note everything) ? I suffer from forgetting.
2) I try to read on different topics ( psychology, language learning,philosophy, sociology, literature, natural sciences etc.). Is this useful or useless?
Thanks.
Thank you for the substantive post. I am afraid I cannot answer your questions adequately in the context of a comment section. I suggest you read the book I show, How to Read a Book, and practice summarizing aloud what you have understood, then outlining what you have lectured. Reading widely is certainly most useful!
Best to learn what you're interested in.
Thanks for answering
There are less known great books which one needs to read them,
books such as * El Criticon * by Gracian , or * Gog * by Papini , and Seneca`s * Epistulae *...
Thanks for the input! Gracian and Seneca are both already on my own list as major authors. Papini will have to wait 100 years from his death to see if he is still being considered a classic.
@@ProfASAr "Papini will have to wait 100 years from his death to see if he is still being considered a classic." a witty comment indeed . thanks and regards .
First of all, let me begin by saying that I loved this video and I expect more tours of your private library. I enjoyed the video so, please, do continue like this. Second, regarding critiques, I wouldn't say it's eurocentric, but I think the whole idea of "western civilization" is misleading at best. Antiquity and Late Antiquity were aperiod of time which the world was MEDITERRANEAN, many ""western thinkers were, actually, of semitic or northern african origin (Augustine of Hippo was amazigh, maybe carthaginian or numidian, he refer to himself as african; Iamblichus was of semitic origings and lived in Egypt and Syria, and also author like Philo of Alexandria, who was a jew). So my problem with the whole conception of "western" is that is biased, the idea of "european" was born in the Renaissance with little regard of how the world actually was before the Middle Ages. So why would Augustine count as "european" but not Ibn al-Haytham, who had a huge influence in western science (Roger Bacon, Witelo...)? They both were MEDITERRANEAN. That's all, thank you very much!
Good points, Alejandro, about Mediterranean culture and the origins of authors like Augustine in it.
Can anyone tell me the text size within the books… small text kills me!
I can still handle this, with reading glasses, no problem. I know what you mean!
What are The Great Books? --- they are the books that:
1. are on the list of Classics
2. have stood the test of time
3. have been judged by the group of educators to be invaluable in understanding how the thought process of a culture of a time period works
4. stimulate other ideas
5. give the foundation for belief systems and values and the way people think and operate
6. are designed to stimulate the mind
Thanks for the numbered summary!
Oswald Spengler - Decline of the West
Is on my personal list of Great Books of the Western world.
Alexander explaining putting his whole heart into it literally for half an hour...
People : look.... A CAT 😍
.
Cats know how to get the spotlight lol
Thanks for the appreciation.
The cat 🥺
...has his own full feature here: ua-cam.com/video/vI3eoYg3hXU/v-deo.html
I like anybody who likes cats. The sign of true intelligence!
Thank you kindly. If your own cat is not available to help you study, you may borrow mine: ua-cam.com/video/vI3eoYg3hXU/v-deo.html
hi prof arguelles
Hello!
A beautiful cat too? I have four 🐈🐈🐈🐈 but they won't sit still so beautifully like yours, one of them probably will bite off my jaw if I start to talk loudly.😇😇😇😇😇😇😇😄😄😄
It is precisely for cats like yours that we made this training video. Play it repeatedly in the background in front of them and eventually they should become calm and conditioned. ua-cam.com/video/vI3eoYg3hXU/v-deo.html
That cat is THICC
This is not a language that I speak or understand. If you like the way he looks, please watch this: ua-cam.com/video/vI3eoYg3hXU/v-deo.html
I'm not sure I understand the definition of "Western Civilization", especially in the context of "Western Civilization and Slavic Civilization", which suggests there's a clear distinction between the two.
Western Civilization means European civilizations so includes Slavic.
@@ProfASAr OK. Thanks.
Maxime felix est feles inter antiguos libros
Verum scripsisti!
Great books? Let's talk about how great that cat is
We have made this short feature for those who think like you: ua-cam.com/video/vI3eoYg3hXU/v-deo.html
The great books of the western canon and no Bible in sight?
Have you seen the video I posted yesterday about the basic overall anti-... Catholic / Christian take of the mindset behind this? Nonetheless, I do recall a statement somewhere that they did not include the Bible in the 54 books as it already went "without saying," and both Old and New Testaments are indeed cross referenced in relevant portions of the Syntopicon / Great Ideas.
@@ProfASAr I can hardly imagine any argument that would take away the Bible, christian or atheist but ok. I also thought that maybe yes, it's there without needing to mention it.
Curiosity definitely did not kill this cat, on the contrary, we must say.
Indeed, he is quite wise!
The cat.
Will help you focus and concentrate: ua-cam.com/video/vI3eoYg3hXU/v-deo.html
today's world is kinda busy. do yourself a favor and cut any communications with outside world and you will have .. some free time.... to read or whatever your projects are. don't cry you won't have internet or tv or radio or newspapers. you won't miss much, believe me. good luck.
Very good points! Thanks for articulating it this way.
chonk cat
"Chonk..." I had to look that up. Hmmm... well, maybe he is getting a somewhat paunchy in middle age, but unfortunately there are so many genuine fat cats out there that I like to think he is, relatively, on the slim side..
That's why readers and writers prefer cats. A dog would've created hell by now. But cats, they are not there yet there.
Not quite sure what you are saying, but it is clearly pro-cat, so I am all for it!
@@ProfASAr it means that cats are silent and calm, patient yet alert but dogs are clamorous, fidgety and panting. You can't expect a dog to sit there like that at the same place for half an hour. A man with an Intellectual bent of mind requires calm and silence to think clearly yet he doesn't doesn't want to be alone. In other words he requires solitude but not loneliness. Cats meet that requirement. Therefore they are preferable by writers and readers.
@@sourabhchatterji5734 Absolutely, 100% right, totally spot on! I honestly believe that, any literary and/or linguistic scholarly merit they may have aside, my recent videos are providing documentary proof that cat is (thinking) man's best friend (over and against the tritely common "dog is man's best friend." Thanks for pointing this out!
Thicc cat
No, no, no, no, no! He is really Thinn cat - look at him in his own video here: ua-cam.com/video/vI3eoYg3hXU/v-deo.html
@@ProfASAr thank you prof
Cat
Full on: ua-cam.com/video/vI3eoYg3hXU/v-deo.html