I’ve finished skimming through *Fichte: The Republic of the 22nd Century* by Hideto Kumagai.
While I understood that Fichte envisioned a nation built on education, the author’s failure to grasp the unwritten cultural rule in the West—that “philosophy is the discipline that derives God”—means this book is a regrettable labor of love destined to offer value only to “non-Western Fichte scholars” (if such people even exist).
Upon hearing the news of the passing of Professor Todayama—famous for his introductory philosophy courses—I, who hold a rather strong image of philosophy as “a discipline that uses power words to create a nation blessed with happy words,” have no interest in the dialectical conclusions of the history of philosophy. However, if I were to recommend a single philosophy book to the target audience of an educational initiative—those “ignorant masses” who have philosophy in their lives but no connection to philosophy as an academic discipline, as in Char Aznable’s “Go ahead and bestow wisdom upon them”— I picked up a Japanese-authored commentary on Fichte from my bookshelf. However, I must admit it was nothing more than Japanese philosophy at its worst—pure intellectual posturing—and I finished reading it in a mere 90 minutes.
With philosophy books, the reading experience is more important than the content itself. Even while reading this one, I found myself thinking, “Since the problem is ‘scholarship hell,’ why don’t parents take out education loans using their homes as collateral, and then simply sell the property or pass it down after inheritance?” “That bizarre theory that ‘countries that go into debt experience economic growth’ is nothing more than a product of Japanese culture, which equates rising stock prices with economic growth itself. While debt may improve the penetration rate of economic policies, it is fundamentally a game of national ruin—a game of running the country through debt—and it’s despised by young people, the poor, and ethically sound citizens, Mr. Seko.” “The only wisdom granted to the ‘Kill Ueshima First’ mob—who have been ensnared by the imperial system’s ‘100 million total imbeciles’ policy—is to individually assassinate Masamichi Ueshima, who has turned the realpolitik of world politics against us.” I thought about things like this, but the fact that it amounts to nothing more than a confirmation of the current state of affairs is another matter entirely.