Respect for the Greek inheritance of Philosophy

August 29, 2025 - I just read a short news item about the Taliban in dispute with the Chinese over oil well drilling in an Afghanistani valley. The Taliban accuse the Chines of reneging on the contract and the Chinese accuse the Taliban of "robbery" for forcible take-over of the oil wells and taking a dozen Chinese oil expert/workers hostage and confiscating their passports.

It is interesting to me in so many ways because the Taliban are, in fact, a lot like a criminal gang in the sense that they make their own rules and do not abide by those established by the outside world. And those rules established by the outside world, I was thinking about that and how much we owe to the ancient world, in particular to Greece and the evolution of Philosophy where thinkers examine and establish the core ideas upon which social governance and behavior get built.

My sister and I were talking about that on the phone and how religion fits in. I would say that religion was an early origin for philosophy in that it is a deal making kind of relationship between people and the outside world. People need something to turn to. After a time, savagery has demonstrated to lead to utter destruction and despair, so savagery must be reigned in. In despair and hoping to find some cause for things and some succor, people created gods, first on the elements: weather, sun, seasons. I will give you something I value if you give me something I need. This basic exchange, it seems to me, is at the heart of everything.

In the Western world we value Christianity because Jesus Christ made a lasting human example of a man so good he put love as the highest power, not lust or conquest. In the Western World we have put education and the value of learning what developed in our ancient civilizations in regard to social governance and human behavior at the heart of our civilization. The Greeks gave us philosophy and the search for the roots and functions of values, and Christianity gave us selfless values and devotion to the greater good rather than selfish savagery.

It will be interesting to see the Taliban trying to interact with the outside world when they have no cultural respect for or system for the learning (since they deny secular education and rely entirely on religious education for boys) of the historic devolopmnet of ideas on social governance and human behavior beyond savagery. They don't have a shared value for the social contract only a reliance on primitive savagery. When savages and tyrants try to make deals.

Respect for the Greeks and for Christianity AND especially for EDUCATIOM - my passion and my career field! >p/> wrightj45@yahoo.com