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Tony Blair Christopher Hitchens
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"A debate about irrelevances, between two has beens? I gave it a miss!" Has beens? Ones dead the other charges £200,000 for a 20 min talk lol | |||
"A debate about irrelevances, between two has beens? I gave it a miss! Has beens? Ones dead the other charges £200,000 for a 20 min talk lol" Defrost give it a miss then. A total disgrace of a “man” talking to a dead man! | |||
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"A debate about irrelevances, between two has beens? I gave it a miss! Has beens? Ones dead the other charges £200,000 for a 20 min talk lol Defrost give it a miss then. A total disgrace of a “man” talking to a dead man!" Dude you should watch some Hitchens on youtube .He was razor sharp and highly intelligent.Clever funny and ruthless with language.  | |||
"I consider hitch to be one of the greatest thinkers of the 21st century.... Tony Blair I consider to be one of the greatest conmen of the 21st century although extremely charismatic" Yeah I agree Blair is a bit sceptic but it's an amazing debate on both sides to be fair | |||
"A debate about irrelevances, between two has beens? I gave it a miss! Has beens? Ones dead the other charges £200,000 for a 20 min talk lol Defrost give it a miss then. A total disgrace of a “man” talking to a dead man! Dude you should watch some Hitchens on youtube .He was razor sharp and highly intelligent.Clever funny and ruthless with language. "He's amazing..watched lots of his stuff since !! Much respect to both on this...love him or hate him Blair is as cool as a cucumber , thanks for the comment much respect | |||
"A debate about irrelevances, between two has beens? I gave it a miss! Has beens? Ones dead the other charges £200,000 for a 20 min talk lol Defrost give it a miss then. A total disgrace of a “man” talking to a dead man!" Dead man yes....legend definitely!! I glad the debate was above your head  | |||
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"Yeah some of those Hitch Slaps over the years have been priceless. His brother Peter can put the cat out as well. I do love reading his Sunday piece. Have any of you read Christopher's Mortality? Quite sad. If I recall it was posthumously published by Carol Blue." I haven't mate but I will have over the next week, I loved the debate and much respect to Blair he had some very valid points, I've thought much over the years regarding either part and I'm not still convinced either way...will checkout his brother Pete and Christopher's mortality | |||
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"If you get the chance buy a copy of Hitchens' 'Arguably'. It's a big old book but it's a decades worth of short essays and pieces from his output at Vanity Fair, the New Statesman, etc. The topics are varied and are for the most part highly enjoyable. And remember to utilize "Hitchens' Razor". It can be a match winner." Thank you mate  | |||
"I consider hitch to be one of the greatest thinkers of the 21st century.... Tony Blair I consider to be one of the greatest conmen of the 21st century although extremely charismatic" I am in complete agreement with this gentleman's comment. Tis a great shame that Mr Hitchens is no longer with us. I could not agree with his politics at times but with regard to atheism the man was bang on the money. I must watch this documentary now. Thanks for mentioning it. | |||
"If you get the chance buy a copy of Hitchens' 'Arguably'. It's a big old book but it's a decades worth of short essays and pieces from his output at Vanity Fair, the New Statesman, etc. The topics are varied and are for the most part highly enjoyable. And remember to utilize "Hitchens' Razor". It can be a match winner." And like much of Hitchens' output it's someone else's work, recycled. | |||
"If you get the chance buy a copy of Hitchens' 'Arguably'. It's a big old book but it's a decades worth of short essays and pieces from his output at Vanity Fair, the New Statesman, etc. The topics are varied and are for the most part highly enjoyable. And remember to utilize "Hitchens' Razor". It can be a match winner.And like much of Hitchens' output it's someone else's work, recycled." Expand if you want to. I'm by no means a Hitchling and if anything I lean more toward Peter's mindset but I did enjoy the contrarian's output. | |||
"my view is that i recall both blair and hitchins were paid several millions between them for less than two hours work" Blair is a war criminal! | |||
"And like much of Hitchens' output it's someone else's work, recycled." Ah, unless you're chiefly referring to Ockham. | |||
"If you get the chance buy a copy of Hitchens' 'Arguably'. It's a big old book but it's a decades worth of short essays and pieces from his output at Vanity Fair, the New Statesman, etc. The topics are varied and are for the most part highly enjoyable. And remember to utilize "Hitchens' Razor". It can be a match winner.And like much of Hitchens' output it's someone else's work, recycled. Expand if you want to. I'm by no means a Hitchling and if anything I lean more toward Peter's mindset but I did enjoy the contrarian's output. " It's actually a clumsy modern re-write of a nineteenth century Latin proverb that any well educated privileged boy like Hitch would know - Quod gratis asseritur, gratis negatur. It's such a truism that anyone with a pseudo classical education would be comefortable with it. | |||
"And like much of Hitchens' output it's someone else's work, recycled. Ah, unless you're chiefly referring to Ockham. " Nope, Occam's Razor is a genuine work of originality - which is what you'd expect from a great English thinker like him, although, even William of Ockham stood on the shoulders of giants like Aristotle. As I say above, Hitch's Razor is just an old Latin proverb dumbed down. | |||
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"Yes, regarding Occam's Razor I agree, as I think Hitchens probably would. I actually prefer Doyle's spin on it myself. But what is it about the bulk of his output that makes you lay a charge of unoriginality? Just wondering." You mean besides the fact that he wrote an essay called 'In Defence of Plagiarism'? Hitch was a great writer, but not a great original writer. He was a fine technician, both of writing and debate, but not an original. His razor was not some magnificent tool of logic and science, but a rhetorical foil designed to win college debates more easily. I have never read a Hitch article, or heard him say anything that wouldn't sound familiar, if well said, to anyone who had a decent grounding in political thought and philosophy. | |||
"You mean besides the fact that he wrote an essay called 'In Defence of Plagiarism'? Hitch was a great writer, but not a great original writer. He was a fine technician, both of writing and debate, but not an original. His razor was not some magnificent tool of logic and science, but a rhetorical foil designed to win college debates more easily. I have never read a Hitch article, or heard him say anything that wouldn't sound familiar, if well said, to anyone who had a decent grounding in political thought and philosophy. " Are you suggesting his above essay self-proves thus his lack of originality? Let's bring Hitch into this: "If you think to know what plagiarism is, you're making a very large claim; the fact that you know originality when you see it." I never raised Hitchens onto a pedestal here and I certainly didn't suggest his razor was a magnificent clause of originality. And just to sum. That bar you're setting, applies to all great minds from the western canon; so by your own reckoning it also stands that without Livy no Shakespeare's Coriolanus, without Hooke no Newton's Law of Planetary Motion, without Homer no Pope's Iliad and so on? I'm not even sure what we're debating here as I agree for the most part on your assessment so long as you extend and apply this to all else and then show me originality and how you perceive it to be such. I'll punt if do put forward an original writer, I'll more than likely be able to find an influence or two behind said writer's originality. | |||
"You mean besides the fact that he wrote an essay called 'In Defence of Plagiarism'? Hitch was a great writer, but not a great original writer. He was a fine technician, both of writing and debate, but not an original. His razor was not some magnificent tool of logic and science, but a rhetorical foil designed to win college debates more easily. I have never read a Hitch article, or heard him say anything that wouldn't sound familiar, if well said, to anyone who had a decent grounding in political thought and philosophy. Are you suggesting his above essay self-proves thus his lack of originality? Let's bring Hitch into this: "If you think to know what plagiarism is, you're making a very large claim; the fact that you know originality when you see it." I never raised Hitchens onto a pedestal here and I certainly didn't suggest his razor was a magnificent clause of originality. And just to sum. That bar you're setting, applies to all great minds from the western canon; so by your own reckoning it also stands that without Livy no Shakespeare's Coriolanus, without Hooke no Newton's Law of Planetary Motion, without Homer no Pope's Iliad and so on? I'm not even sure what we're debating here as I agree for the most part on your assessment so long as you extend and apply this to all else and then show me originality and how you perceive it to be such. I'll punt if do put forward an original writer, I'll more than likely be able to find an influence or two behind said writer's originality. " I think we do have more in common than divides us, but let me give you an example. Great minds leave behind, in my view, works of exposition as well as works of reportage. Hitch was a master of critical reportage, but where's the book of exposition, the piece of theoretical work that explains (forgive me) the world according to Hitch? Marx (who was a bloody awful technician, as a writer) did all three; exposition (Capital, Grundrisse) reportage (18th Brumaire, all the journalism) and criticism (Theses on Feuerbach, arguably). Capital and Grundrisse may have stood on the shoulders of giants, but they re-used and shaped the theories of others into a comprehensive world view. Want a more British example? What are the only original books of left wing thought in English between the thirties and the sixties? Until Hobsbawm and Thompson blossomed, arguably Bevan and Orwell. Both took prevailing ideas and re-shaped them in a way that was original. I'm willing to have my eyes opened, but I've never read anything expository by Hitchens that told me what his world view was, and why. | |||
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"I consider hitch to be one of the greatest thinkers of the 21st century.... Tony Blair I consider to be one of the greatest conmen of the 21st century although extremely charismatic I am in complete agreement with this gentleman's comment. Tis a great shame that Mr Hitchens is no longer with us. I could not agree with his politics at times but with regard to atheism the man was bang on the money. I must watch this documentary now. Thanks for mentioning it. ". I don't actually think atheism was his "great thing" I think he really was a man who loved reading more than anything, his knowledge of works and his ability to recall them was unmatched.. I'd guess he was more for secularism, logic, rationalism and humanism over religious doctrine and theocratic ideology and frankly you can be religious and still be in his side of the fence | |||
