On Fri, 8 Feb 2002 [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > W must have been a truly unique and bizarre man. In the book Russell clearly > is in awe of W. I wonder if that is his appeal to philosophers who by > definition are interested in and extraordinarily good at well thinking. > Popper was an accentuated normal man. Smarter than almost everyone, more > ambitious more insecure more grandiose but all of his traits are just the > extremes of normal while W seems to have been outside in both his intellect > and his interactions with the world. The question I have is whether his > extreme intelligence pushed him out of the norm or was he outside the norm > emotionally and this in a way freed his intellect to explore novel areas.
I think I'd lean towards the latter. The pattern of his life before settling doing in England suggests a driven, ascetic personality. The sort of person driven to cast off the world for something more real. Marvin Long Austin, Texas
