 So once again, it's my pleasure to welcome one and all to the fourth lecture in the Soras World Philosophies Lecture Series. The lecture series is organized by the World Philosophies team here, so it's, and it is of course in line with understanding of philosophy in the World Philosophies program here. Today's approach taught and researched as a robust human activity with diverse and rich history emerging from different traditions of the world. And so these lectures are meant to revisit issues surrounding the suppressing and marginalization of this robust history and how the discipline can be enriched and organized. And this makes our lecture to the very time. These lectures will also be exploring specific themes and issues in specific traditions of philosophy over time. So before the lecture begins, I would like to introduce Dr. Andrew Hines, who is a key member of the philosophy team here. I do not think a subject head has connected yet. Andrew, did you hear? I don't think so. I do not. You heard the moment. The subject head for the World Philosophies program is Dr. Sean Hawthorne, who might join us a bit later. And now to our guest lecturer today, Professor Peter Park. Peter K. J. Park is a professor emeritus at the University of Texas at Dallas. He received a PhD in history at the University of California in Los Angeles. And he is one of the co-editors of Sanskrit and Orientalism, Indology and Comparative linguistics in Germany. And his other book, which I consider very important, particularly for the World Philosophies program, is titled Africa, Asia, and the History of Philosophy, Racism in the Formation of the Philosophical Canon, 1780 to 1830. This book was selected as a Franz Fanon outstanding book by the Caribbean Philosophical Society. Park is also very proud of being the first ever to propose the creation of ethnic studies curriculum for the University of Texas at Dallas, which he drafted into it. Since becoming emeritus in 2019, he has been a visiting scholar in the College of Ethnic Studies at San Francisco State University. I was keen on getting Peter to speak in this series because his book Africa, Asia, and the History of Philosophy, which we mentioned earlier, has been part of our core reading for some of our modules, such as the module debates, reference and themes in world philosophies. So it is such a fascinating book and we are therefore very pleased to have him with us today to speak on some of these issues. Peter will be speaking on the theme, Enlightenment, Racialogy and the revision of the history of philosophy. We really look forward to your talk, Peter. And as Andrew said earlier, if you could please remain muted. After the talk, we will have the opportunity to make our comments and ask questions and then you can use the reason feature and then unmute yourself or then use the chat feature as well. So Peter, we warmly welcome you to the lecture and you have our attention. Thank you. Thank you to the Department of Philosophy and Religion at SOAS for this prestigious invitation. I'm part of a lecture series that follows a talk given by Hamid Tabashi, who I admire highly and also you will have other speakers whose work I follow keenly. I would like to congratulate the Department of Philosophy and Religion for holding this lecture series during and through a pandemic time. I think that already in Elvis' introduction of the lecture series, the problem at hand was already articulated. The problem of Eurocentrism in the teaching and conception of philosophy, exclusion, marginalization, understanding the causes for or the reasons of such marginalization and how scholars today can address the problem. What I would like to do is I would like to begin my PowerPoint and briefly use a very distinct voice from the last century, early part of the last century to articulate again the problem that Elvis alluded to. Let me share my screen. Wonderful. Thank you. There it is. I would like to use the voice of W.E.B. Du Bois from one of his autobiographical writings from 1910. How easy then by emphasis and omission to make children believe that every great soul the world ever saw was a white man's soul. That every great thought the world ever knew was a white man's thought. That every great deed the world ever did was a white man's deed. That every great dream the world ever sang was a white man's dream. And from his essay of the culture of white folk, and in this essay he is addressing white supremacism in the U.S. context and also delivering commentary on Europe's World War I. Europe has never produced and never will in our day a single human soul that cannot be matched and over matched in every line of human endeavor by Asia and Africa. Run the gamut if you will. And let us have the Europeans who in sobered truth overmatch Black Nefertiti, Mohammed, Ramesses, and Askel, Confucius, Buddha, and Jesus Christ. If we could scan the calendar of thousands of lesser men in like comparison the result would be the same. But we cannot do this because of the deliberate, the deliberately educated ignorance of white schools that they remember Napoleon and forget Sonia Ali. So Du Bois, as my PowerPoint is loading up, Du Bois is connecting Euro-centered, white-centered education with modern colonialism and also connecting it to imperial war such as World War I waiting for the PowerPoint. Okay. And sees Euro-centered knowledge as a part of colonialism and race-based economic and imperialist exploitation. So what he's alluding to is, for example, philosophy's own account of what it is through its history, its account of its origins. What I do in my book and also to set up the question is to survey histories of philosophy ranging from the last 200 plus years. In Julius Bergman's History of Philosophy from 1892, he writes, just as its name so philosophy itself is originally Greek. It's a philosophy by Friedrich Michalis. 1865. And the opinion that no Asian people has lifted itself to the heights of free human contemplation from which philosophy issues. Philosophy is a fruit of the Hellenic spirit. Albert Fagler's German History of Philosophy in Outline. 1863. And where does philosophy begin? Obviously, at the point when the first search for the final philosophical principle for the ultimate reason for building for being was made in a philosophical manner. In other words, with Greek philosophy. Edward Seller, a neocontain from the late 19th century. In his history of Greek philosophy. The notion of philosophy's origins. All the sea, he writes all the same we do not need to search for any foreign sources. The philosophical science of the Greeks, maybe completely explained by recalling the spirit, the devices and the educational status of the Hellenic tribes. If there were ever in a people which has suited, which was suited to generate its sciences on its own. It was the Greek. Similar opinions and numerous other works by historians of philosophy. I'll pass over. Some of these, including the one by George Henry Lewis. This one is written in English from 1781. As well as guy. Martin's a history of philosophy. And the ancient world among the Greeks, the same articulation, but in his own idiot, Martin Heidegger what is philosophy. So I've shown you the problem. Through the sources themselves. And as remarked on by Du Bois. Okay, and this. Some years ago. Call for investigating. At the time, I received no help from European scholarship on the history of philosophy. Gels etzer. The scholar writing in French, Lucian Brown, the Italian team led by Giovanni Santinello, and the German scholar. I'll reach you on your hand is Schneider. These are works that are on the reflective level concerning the history of philosophy. Schneider's work takes lessons from Foucault. In his approach, which he calls an archaeology of the history of philosophy. Not a recognition of Eurocentrism as actually a problem. Reflective work on the history of philosophy that shows that something like an archaeology of philosophy is required. And yet European scholarship lacks, lacks a view, probably because of its inside position. Steve helped from the sociologists of knowledge. Du Bois. Emanuel Wallerstein. Annie Balkiano. And the sociologist at Hamburg. Wolf the hunt. Keanu's work. Whenever he begins an essay, or a lecture. He begins with his critical theory of race. The frame by which he lets his readers understand Eurocentrism and his connection to the history of colonialism. I quote him from the 16th century on this racial principle. The idea of race has proven to be the most effective effective and long lasting instrument of universal social domination. So the most older principle gender or intersexual domination was encroached on by inferior superior racial classifications. So the conquered and dominated peoples were situated in a natural position natural in the sense of material, materially subordinated. So the position of inferiority and as a result, their phenotypic traits, as well as their cultural features were likewise considered inferior. In this way race became the fundamental criterion for the distribution of world of the world population into ranks places roles in the new society structure of power. He adds as a center of global capitalism Europe not only had control of the world market, but was also able to impose its colonial dominance over all the regions and populations of the planet, incorporating them into its world system, and a specific model of power. For such reasons and populations, this model of power involved a process of historical re identification, re identification from Europe, such regions and populations were attributed new geocultural identities. And this is how the decades of sociological analysis in a Latin American context. was handy for a study of the coloniality of knowledge. Globally, and Professor hunt in the 16th century race. This is his critical theory of race is founded through the inclusion of the lower classes and colonial land seizure genocidal settlement policies, and a plantation economy based on slavery. In the 19th century science combines the views on human groups of different skin colors with notions of cultural and intellectual superiority synchronized with climate theoretical reflections on the relationship between environment and culture, as well as historical cultural ideas about the progress of humanity, and finally incorporated in the race theory formulated by content others. So, what I would like to do now is show you some sources textual sources to draw a picture of the openness and inclusiveness of the hit of histories of philosophy and the conception of philosophy until in the long period in the long duration leading up to this 1780s. Then I would like to show you developments in science in European science. Right about at that point of the last quarter of the 18th century, in order to show you how the history of philosophy, the writing of the history of philosophy changed. Here's this is text lives and opinions of eminent philosophers this is a very frequently used source for the history of philosophy into the modern centuries. It is also the source of those historians of philosophy, who claim that philosophy should be understood as a Greek conception a Greek invention. And then, of course, is to argue that philosophy did not quite exist, apart from the Greeks, that is among the non Greek peoples before, and also contemporaneous with the Greeks. The barbarians had no word or concept of philosophy. I just want to point out that this is a not definitive for historians of philosophy from the Renaissance to the early 19th century. We shall see that the question remains open. Despite the opinion of this. Frequently cited authority. There is a history of philosophy by Georg Horn from 1655. He claims that the first philosophers Adam. And this is within a Old Testament model of human history. Thomas Stanley's work, a history of philosophy, published in London around the same time with several successive editions. The first chapter of Stanley's history. He calls Thales, the first or describes Thales as the first who introduced natural and mathematical learning into Greece. Thales is given a geography militants. The geography as Stanley notes is on the edge of Asia and Stanley comments that Thales had Asian parentage the nation and traveled through Western Asia, and that he brought philosophy from what he learned in Egypt, and was the one who averaged that we are that knowledge of philosophy. As he says, into his own country. In terms of origin of philosophy. He writes that it has a Greek original specifically called Ian, which is a name for Babylon, and the Egyptians. He called the call deans the most ancient of teachers, a history of philosophy by Vosius from 1657 surveys, the philosophies of the ancient Asian peoples and Egypt, and Egyptians and Ethiopians before turning to the philosophy of the Greeks. Thomas Burnett's history of philosophy begins with Noah. He was reminded of the Old Testament model of history. Abraham de Grau, a history of philosophy published in the Netherlands begins with Moses, but names Thales. Noah, and Badaeus claims Adam as the first philosopher at the turn of the 18th century, the Italian Capasso. In his first in his history of philosophy in Latin. Adam is called the first sage, and that philosophy spread from the Hebrews to the other nations. Samuel for me, or me's history. And names, Adam as the first philosopher, Yacka broker. I will pause a while here is the author of the most often referenced. The most often exerted. And reproduced history of philosophy. In the middle of the 18th century. And I have an image of the table of contents to show you that he like all the rest begins his history of philosophy. And he has a ethic or nations based organization of the history of philosophy. And with the philosophy among the Hebrews, called deans, Persians, India, Arabia, Phoenicia. What I've also done is I have done some counting of the pages. The number of pages dedicated to non European philosophies. In chapter four of his volume four is partly his supplementation of the earlier chapter of the earlier volumes of his. Historia critical. And in volume four. The page is dedicated to philosophy of the Asian peoples in general. And pages dedicated to Asian philosophy in general. There are 28 pages dedicated to the philosophy of the Malabar people. So in Southwestern coastal India. There are 82 pages dedicated to the philosophy of the Chinese 16 pages on the philosophy of the Japanese. And 15 pages on the philosophy of the Canadians or Native Americans. As late as the end of the 18th century, the convention, or tradition of writing of the history of philosophy began with Philip philosophical traditions, as Europeans understood them in Asia and Africa. Friedrich Lagal was a German literary critic and Orientalist among other roles. Raymond Schwab in his book titled the Oriental Renaissance, called him the founder of said Oriental Renaissance. He was the first historian of philosophy to treat Indian philosophical ideas together with European ones in one historical context. Drawing from his knowledge of Sanskrit language and Sanskrit sources. Schlegel is credited with propagating the study of Sanskrit in Germany through his book on the language and wisdom of the Indians from 1808, and I have a image of the title page. So, in this book, which was a sensation in the years after it was published. Schlegel states that the physical differences of the human tribes are so far as their present development, not of great historical importance. Already in reply to writers. Who understand the physical differences of the human tribes as decisive. He also writes. I quote a harmful prejudice in this regard has been and still is the merely assumed and arbitrarily accepted distinction between Oriental and Greek learning and minds as if this difference were completely grounded in truth. Schlegel also left us his lectures on the history of philosophy, which were written down by his by his students. He had a few students in Cologne in the early 19th century. And in these lectures, which I also study and write about in my book. He used the example of the Sanskrit text bug of a Gita, as a preeminent philosophical document, saying that it is more strictly philosophical in form than Lucretius's de Rerum Natura, making his point that from these investigations. He writes from these investigations, it emerges sufficiently that the Indians had real philosophy in both form and method, and that at this time we lack only sufficient documents to be able to incorporate it into the history of philosophy. What I would like to turn now is, I've given you a view of the manner in which historians of philosophy treated Asia and Africa in the period starting with the Renaissance, and into the 19th century. I would like to turn your attention to a development starting in 1735. What I have on the screen is an image of Karl von Linné's work, Systema Natura. This is an account, which is similar to other historians, whereas in the first half of the 18th century, the preeminent science was mathematical physics. In the second half of the century, it was natural classification and natural history. The last quarter of the century, the most exhilarating development within natural classification and natural history was the pseudo scientific study of human races. Raciology is a name that I give to this exhilarating new field. In my account, as well as others, a mass of racial concepts and racial theories were invented in this period. Their inventors were prominent enlightenment philosophers. And this phenomenon was revealing the source of Foucault's archaeology of knowledge as it concerns the 18th century. The natural classification, natural history is Foucault's best example of the 18th century episteme he writes in his work titled The Order of Things, the project of a general science of order, a theory of science, analyzing representation, measurement of identities and differences into order tables. These constitute an area of empiricity in the classical age, which is his name for the Enlightenment period that had not existed until the end of the Renaissance, and that was destined to disappear early in the 19th century. And what I will do in my presentation is suggest that that last part needs a revision that this episteme was destined to disappear early in the 19th century, I'm going to suggest that it did not. So continues, it is patent that these three notions. This is part of this analysis of the 18th century episteme. It is patent that these three notions, met thesis taxonomia genesis designate not so much separate domains as a solid grid of kinships that defines a general configuration of knowledge in the classical age. So, you know, whereas historians find Foucault's grasp of 18th century to be errant in many of his claims. I believe that this claim stands up. And I do refer to it. In my understanding of 18th century science and continues the center of knowledge in the 17th and 18th centuries is the table. Elsewhere he says that elsewhere he says or uses the word grid. So let's let us apply a Foucault's analysis to the work of the natural historians. This was a Swedish botanist and natural historian professor in the medical faculty at Uppsala University. He was a founder of the binomial nomenclature that is still in use in taxonomy today. He is also noted as the first natural historian to include man, that special creation of gods in natural classifications. He is the author of the system and not to write his work of natural classification in a succession of additions. By the end of his effort, he had classified around 4,400 species of animals and 7,700 species of plants. I've copied out the page classifying homo sapiens from the 10th edition of system and not to write. And here you see the binomial naming homo sapiens, ordered under the animal kingdom, and under the class. And under that the order primates, homo sapiens, the genus and species is further ordered into at this point. We shall say varieties. We shall say homo sapiens, ferrus, or wild, four-footed, mute, hairy, homo sapiens, Americanas, red, choleric, erect, homo sapiens, aropeus, a sanguine temperament, cichus, sallow, pale yellow, laredes, temperamentally melancholic, or humorally, and rigid, Africanus, black, phlegmatic, lazy. You notice that the description for Africanus is longer. There's more interest in that variety on the part of Linnaeus. Curly hair, wide nose, extended labia, and so on. No need for me to cover all the Latin. And there were these dubious varieties that he also included because they came back in travel reports by Europeans, monstrosis, and troglodytes. Already in Linnaeus' classification, humans are described according to complexion or skin color. The varieties are given geographical definitions, and in other editions, the moral qualities are included in the description of the four varieties. If we exclude wild man and monstrous man. George-Louis Leclerc, the Comte de Befol, was the director of the Royal Gardens in Paris. He was a leading author of the Histoire Naturelle. A work of natural history totaling 44 volumes. The final volumes were completed after his death. Befol was a pre-formationist concerning the question of the origin of species. That is, he believed that all species were created at the biblical creation. And by the way, this is a position of Linnaeus. That species are fixed in number and kind, but that there can be variations within species. For the human species, he described six varieties. Among his contributions is his scientific definition of species. He defined species as a constant succession of similar individuals that can reproduce together. By the way, this definition of species is no longer current. Befol also contributed a climate theory of variations of species. And I will briefly describe that climate theory. Members of a given species migrate away from their geographical origin. They come into different climates and geographies that cause variations within species. Included in climate and geography are conditions such as soil, water, air, food, sunlight, altitude, latitude on the globe. And so the natural classification of humans proceeds onward in theoretical and empirical elaborations. Emmanuel Kant, besides our knowing that he is a professor of philosophy. He was a professor of philosophy at Königsberg in East Prussia. And we ought to know that he also gave a lecture course on physical geography every year or something like that of his teaching career from 1756 to his retirement in 1796. By 1770s, by 1772, he created a separate course on anthropology, which he also taught regularly until his retirement. He was a popular teacher for the reason of his physical geography and anthropology courses. And in these courses is where he taught his raceology stemming from these courses was his work on a scientific theory of race. In the 70s and 1780s Kant published three essays on the topic of human races. 1775, his essay on the different races of men. 1785 essay, determination of the concept of race. And the 1788 essay on the use of teleological principles in philosophy. In these essays, Kant affirms that there is one human species, but names and briefly describes four basic races, many more half races, and one or two incipient races. The causes internal and external of racial characteristics and also established skin color as a prime characteristic. That is, however, following on Linnaeus' use of skin color in racial description. Kant builds on Bufalne's external causes for variation within species, but also introduces his own internal causes. He has a wild theory of internal causes, a theory of seeds or germs, in combination with the natural predisposition of the human body. The third essay in this list is his defense of his scientific claims about races against criticism by the naturalist and explorer Georg Forster. According to Kant's classification, there are four races, four genuine races, that of the white, or that of the whites, the Negro race, the Hanish race, and the Hindu or his Hindustani race. And he revises that over these, over the course of these researchers. In fact, I can't, usually I cannot keep them clear in my mind, but the work of natural classification is division, sorting, and, of course, description. Along with his, please let me know if there's something going on that there's something going wrong. I'd like to correct it. That's what I will do is, I will also turn on the chat view, maybe that will help me. No worries, someone logged in so you can continue. Okay, thank you. I'm towards the end of my talk. So description of the races. Okay, as you see that actually, how we describe the human races were captured in the transcriptions by his students. And they're, they can be found in his collect writings. And what I will do is I will just reference one of these instances. Okay. So, these are reflection and sort of anthropology those are also cons lectures cap cons lectures from his own notes. Okay, so what he has is, first, you can imagine him giving his lecture in anthropology. Okay, and now he is going to teach the human classification. So he begins with the argument for monogenesis. Then he enumerates for races and describing the characteristics of each. And in these notes he has the Americans, the race of the Negroes, the race of the Indians, and the race of the whites. So, part of this description is to, is to set out these definitions, or the race of the Americans and the race of the blacks are not capable of self government. They're amenable to state of slavery. Okay, and then further down, it is only the race of the whites who have brought forth all the revolutions in the world. The other three races, not at all. And then the, the last quote, the last quoted material. Quoted matter. Our ancient history of humans goes far as far back as the race of the whites. And that is inclusive of inclusive of Egyptians, Persians, Thracians, Greeks, Celts and Scythians. And he, and he adds explicitly he must be stating explicitly in lecture. Not yellow Indians. And not black Africans. Okay, these are his anthropology lectures again captured in students trans transcriptions. So students heard him say, all Oriental peoples are not in a position to establish through concepts a single property of morality or law, rather all their morals are based on appearances. So they have no conceptual or theoretical approach to, to law, or, or moral theory, moral teachings. And over here, this is, again, more transcription by students of what he said in lecture. Yeah, I think it's more worthwhile to show you Blumenbach. So he was a medical professor at the University of Goettingen. This is his racial classification. He is the one who gave us these names, specifically the Caucasian name for the white race. Okay, and this is another 18th century philosopher. This is his racial classification. It's becoming nauseating. He has two branches, right? Tartar or Caucasian and Mongolic on the other hand. Okay, and he revises his racial classification. And his racial descriptions. All right. So, I'm really looking forward to the discussion. So what I will do is go over here. So the exclusion of Africa and Asia from the history of philosophy began in the 1780s. I have researched and found these three historians of philosophy who excluded African and Asian philosophies, and they all come at the end of the 18th century. Okay, and so if there is a change, it is quite recent. Okay, and this, this changes, you could see it in its, you could see it in its, in its germ, its starting point. And what I have here is the Kantian historian of philosophy, Tenamon. This exclusion is literal. And why I have the table of contents on the right side to show you is that Oriental, over here you see it one quarter of the way down. The philosophy of the Orientals, or Asian philosophy, African philosophy, right, is discussed in a short manner before in the introductory comments, before he, before he recounts the history of philosophy in earnest. And so that non European philosophies are literally on the page, excluded from the history of philosophy. Okay. And I have slides here to show you that, that this exclusion is consonant with what Kant lectured during those times that he remarked on the origins of philosophy. So the, the Kantian historians are in agreement with Kant. Okay, so obviously, we can consider them a school of historiographical thought. I think that's good to stop right there. And to bring others in. Thank you for sharing, just to give everyone a break from the nausea. Thank you, Peter. That was really fascinating. History of how the criminalization of philosophy took root, particularly during the enlightenment. There's, there's, there's a lot. I'm happy that lecture has been recorded that there are a lot of sources you've used a lot of positions that many of us would like to go back into and, and really look at. And it's very interesting that prior to the enlightenment that there were a lot of historical account of philosophy that took into consideration the different philosophical traditions, and somehow that gradually just started fading away. So we'll now open the floor for comments and questions and I think that there's one already from Raj, which says, basically that my own view is that philosophy involves the positive truth about the nature and many of life, morality and death to deny that people practice philosophy so just that they don't care about truth. And it's kind of ask why you think that the word philosophy, the word philosophy that's the word itself matters. Thank you for the question. Yes, so the, the racial taxonomy of humans is a knowledge, a knowledge that speaks. It speaks to the question from Raj. And the racial taxonomy as a knowledge answers the question. Raj's question, non white nations do not. The hierarchical the taxonomy will be gradated non white peoples care less about truth. And as you move down the racial scale, non European peoples care even less depending on where they are in the racial hierarchy that is the knowledge of the 18th century. The racial hierarchy where create, where create was created to sell this false idea basically, and and put Western philosophy at the very top of the hierarchy. Yes, yes, and there is no intuition of the racial taxonomy. And as being false there is no intuition of that. This activity of racial taxonomy just continues it's like a runaway freight train and others add to it and it is elaborated and it is contiguous with 19th century. Without any breaks. Oh, and I'm thinking that racial taxonomy finally loosens its grip. Only after the end of World War two and decolonization. Peter, we have a question from the end. Can you hear me now. Yes, Peter. Thank you very much for that wonderful talk. I was interested in commenting on what you just said that there was no intuition about. There was a problem that came up with this idea of racial taxonomy and the implicit racial hierarchy. And I was wondering how you mean that because usually I feel that there is to a certain degree of knowledge that the that the one self at the top of the of whatever that might be of a racial hierarchy that that there was a certain knowledge that that is not the right thing to do, and that there was great work spent on the fact to justify to be to justify the idea of one self being the ideal human. And I think just to name one example, one can see it that there was that there was a very selective process with regards to other cultures so for example the westernization or the intent of westernization of the Egyptian culture. So there was a good understanding that that seems to be an interesting part of the African culture, but it got de Africanized, and to a certain degree westernized and it got. And there seems to have been a process of appropriating that culture, which to my to my understanding to a certain degree shows that it was very, very arbitrary that my people and me, not only as a white scholar but as a white scholar born in Germany. And really my people who invented a good portion of these ideas that they had a very good understanding especially can't have a fairly good understanding that this is arbitrary, and that it is that it leads us to this strange observation that racism is older than the idea of race, and that the the the race theological ideology was developed to defend a claim of whom the esteemed philosophers of the past knew that it was actually invalid. So that I would be very interested in your comments on that. Thank you. Yes, thank you. So I was in order to adequately address your question I was in my mind focused focusing specifically on the European scholarship on Egypt, Egyptian history. So, I was thinking this possibility. Could European scholars of Egypt have been deliberately or knowingly whitening them, making them into whites. Like, as in thinking in terms of power and self interest in a indirect way in a self interest in a intellectual sense. So the knowingly whitening Egypt, Egyptians, race theologically or whitening Egyptian civilization so the Egyptian knowledge. I think that through that process they understood that they were performing scientific researches. If they understood the Egyptians to be racially white, then that came about through scientific discovery. Is there a case of a European scholar who knowingly as in like with a sensation of with the knowledge of the falsehood of of the claim. Would there be any example of a scholar who, in that sense knowingly whitened the Egyptians, I think they had, and that we could find that they only had scientific reasons for whitening the Egyptians. And that's my, that's my current observation. Bjorn. Thank you Peter. We have a question from Andrea on the chat says, I'm unclear whether you want to say that all history of philosophy is necessarily racist and exclusionary. If not, what would a non racist non exclusionary history of philosophy look like. Excellent. I am willing to pursue a claim that all histories of philosophy are racist and exclusionary. I am willing to pursue that claim. The reasons for that are that the race theology provides the a priori principles for how to write the thing. So the history of philosophy is organized by an origin point. So there has to be an account of the origin point. Okay, there has to be an account of philosophies progressive development. And then there has to be an account of the philosophers who are developing philosophy, this knowledge, right, the knowers who are developing the knowledge. And all those particulars, all those choices in the writing of history philosophy. They have to be determined, they have to be chosen, but the choice is determined as it were by the a priori principles of writing in this genre. We have a coherent account of the history of philosophy as a progress of philosophy by understanding that the subjects are all white, racially, and what that means. I'm going to stop right there because that requires more discussion and feedback but I will stop right there. As to your second question, what would a non racist non exclusionary history of philosophy look like, you know that ought to be actually the question for the entire discussion so that we do practical work. What I'm going to do is, I'm going to anticipate that the question will come up again, and that some large portion of the discussion should be dedicated to that question Andrea. So I'm going to hold off and see if others will pile on in terms of what the discussion should do. I'll be reminding you of that. Perhaps I will be a finer point of discussion before we run. This is a question from Andrew. Yes, thanks so much Professor Park. I am intellectual history is a huge passion of mine so it was a huge pleasure, always to think about philosophical insights from it so thank you. This might deepen Andrea's question I'm not sure but I think I'm wondering about the disentanglement of things so what I mean by that is you give a great example of Kant's hierarchy of race, his theory of race. And then I think that the example I was thinking of was one of the things I always bump up against I suppose is reflecting on. I don't really have an answer that's reflecting on the fact that these ideas are also very entangled within things that are to use your word handy in the contemporary world. And so, for example, Emmanuel Kant's theory of the human being and cosmopolitanism is written into the universal declaration of human rights. Another great example would be how his work on symbolism and figurative thought has been extremely influential in the contemporary development of neuroscience. All these entanglements and our globalized world with a thinker and I'm not saying that vindicates them but it makes me pause and go it's all very messy at which point does one end and another begin. And so I just I just wondered if you had any reflections on that my very confused question, thank you. No I understand the question completely Andrew. And for this, I, my mind refers to the work of Lucy alays. So she too can deliver such a lecture as you heard today, because she knows well, Kant's role in modern scientific racism. And also the consequences of that within her discipline of philosophy. So she writes on Kant's racism. She is a Kant scholar. But she also she also teaches that we ought to continue using Kant. Continue using Kant to do decolonial work, justice work, social justice work. And also on the level of his theoretical insights use them to in the theoretical work by philosophers. Okay, and I will, because I'm referring what she's already thought deeply on, I will stop right there. But, um, baby with the bathwater. Not necessarily. So that's a initial answer for you, Andrew. Thank you. We have a robot. Peter. Good to see you. Two quick things. One is to follow up on Beirn's question. And maybe I misunderstood your answer but I think we can give more details about the whitening of the Egyptians. And without going back to Bernal, who we now know needs to be corrected. But the, you already, I mean, if you look at Volney's ruins, which is what 1796 or 1794. He's very clear, well me that the Egyptians are African. It changes that it's true in 1817. I think it's very hard. There's not been a good study of all the different editions of Volney to my best of my knowledge, but I think it's, that's the earliest I've been able to find it and he's still live then. So it would seem to be an authorized edition, although it gets changed in some of the English translations later and then change back. But the real, I think, point about well what what is the motivation behind this whitening. I think you have to look at Hegel's lectures on the philosophy of history, where he defines the Egyptians in terms of this clash between the Africans and the Caucasians and who he say, you know, the philosophy of history begins with the Caucasians. When he goes to Persia and Egypt comes after that. So there's already something going on with Hegel, although if you, the new edition which of the 1831 lectures which just came out I think it was earlier this year or late last year. So it may be Carl Hegel's own manuscript. There seem to be fewer references to Africa in that. So it may be Carl Hegel is partly responsible here, although there are still references. So that that's that's something I'm sure you want to go away and research yourself. On the issue of what's at stake, you just have to look at Josiah not writing in the United States roughly I think it's somewhere like 1844 I don't remember the exact date. And he says quite explicitly, if the Egyptians were black, then everything that we stand for in the south is ruined. It's very clear that the whole southern way of life, the idea of slavery is at stake with the Egyptians. And so that's what the whitening of the Egyptians mean, and that's why there is this synchrony between Josiah not and George Morton with the study of the skulls. And there's a whole long story I don't want to waste everybody's time on it, but, but so yes that there's something very much at stake there. And I want to, as a second quick question is, I mean, I think what's so impressive about your book is the way you go back and show that it was the challenge to cat, which led the Cantians to have to narrow the history of philosophy. They had they, for those of you who haven't read Peter's book and if you haven't, I'm not sure how you missed it but for those of you who haven't read Peter's book yet. I mean, if I remember correctly, it's a long time since I've read it. Peter is arguing this. Well, people were complaining against Kant that he was just putting together other people's ideas that he wasn't fundamentally an original thinker. So, then the Cantians come along and rewrite the history of philosophy so that it culminates in Kant. And so to that extent, what you're that part of your book shows is in effect. Now, Kant with this narrowing philosophy, so that philosophy is fundamentally Kantian philosophy, which is a problem that those of us who still try to call ourselves philosophers have today, people always still telling me I'm not a philosopher, I'm not a Kantian. In effect, I think there were other problems that philosophy has to deal with. It's not just non Western philosophy, not just African Asia that is being excluded. It's also a lot of, you know, what Bruker would still have thought of as as philosophy in Europe that is being excluded. Now, as you rightly shown in your book. This gets integrated with the racism, which is important for, you know, colonial projects, so the British want to buy into this and so on and so forth. And a certain myths that arise from a kind of inferiority complex of, of Europe. But I just want to you didn't mention this aspect of your book and I just wondering whether is that because you're moving away from that thesis, or did you just think there wasn't time for you to develop that today. Thank you, Robert. I, I follow Robert's history of philosophy research closely. Your commentaries are beautiful. In how you capture. So much of a book that I wrote a while ago. And also, must refresh my mind by by looking at as to your question. I think that the, the role of content the contents in the narrowing of the concept of philosophy through the revision of the history of philosophy. I would still hold that view. So I would still argue that point. I think what I'm doing is, I am extending my inquiry to how much to what extent the revision of the history of philosophy is due to it is an insight that I'm trying to make use of how much to what extent the revision of the history of philosophy is due to the ruling episteme. Okay, so I want to see if there is much more use to be made of who cause tools for understanding 18th century knowledge. So what I think is that my focus could from henceforth, my focus could widen from the Kantian role, the role of the Kantians to something like a general view of a general view of the history of knowledge in this period, it's, I would like to try to do an archaeology of knowledge, either with cause tools or without. Okay, and I think that would be an account that explains the end result by referring to what is going on at the epistemic or archaeological level. Okay, and that's the new work I would like to do. I mean we could, you know, I'd be humming and hawing a lot because it's still not articulate enough. But the part where historical actors do this and write this and coordinate with other historical actors to create results that are such, that's how I, that's my way of doing intellectual history. So I have not moved away from that. I'm just curious about if you have just a mass, a mass of, and a piling of racial taxonomy within European knowledge, what is going to do, what is going to happen to historiography? Okay, historiography, there has to be an account of modern historiography that connects it to this knowledge production and it is, it is massive. I mean it's already, we have plenty, like numerous enlightened philosophers involved in racial taxonomy at the end of the 19th century. I have yet to gather a view of the early 19th century to connect it to Josiah Knot and Morton, but this thing only increases. And how will that change the writing of the history of philosophy and also the historiography of non-European peoples? It could be overwhelming and that's where I'm going and that's the reason for a new trend in my research. Thank you, Robert. Thank you Peter. Thank you, Professor Robert, for your question as well. So we have three hands up. We'll take them before taking the questions. We have about two or so questions in the chat as well. And I'm sure we can meet up with these five before we run out. So let's go ahead with David. I didn't know whether you had called upon me. I just so admire Peter's work. And one question is this for a reflection. Why is it that Europeans and Americans wanted to focus increasingly in the 19th century on Greeks as their predecessors? And there's a text which Peter might add to his collection is to look at Plutarch's Life of Alexander. Where colonialism and racialism feed each other so as to justify imperial conquest. In early United States history, the great founding fathers that we talk about all turned to Rome and Greek inheritance. And one reason for this was it could justify the conquest in genocide, the Navian Americans, because they were foreign to the Greek culture. Going back to Alexander, when Alexander starts going east, his troops were getting enormous booty and wealth from the conquests. But according to Plutarch, he would say, I'm doing this because I'm bringing civilization to Persia, to India. It made no sense. But it was an excuse, as it were, to use racism as a justification for exploitation, colonialism and imperialism. Now, this is just one tiny thread in this complicated story here, you're working on Peter, but I wanted to add that to the mix. Thank you so much. Thank you, David. I would love for my research to extend into further into the colonial context. The revision of modern history. I think there is a direct connection. Okay, and I'm new at this we have other colleagues who are skillful in connecting changes in our knowledge systems with the modern colonial enterprise. Thank you. Thank you very much. And thank you very much for your very important work. I just wanted to comment on this idea, whether history or philosophy itself is fundamentally racist or whether other traditions could be available. And I just wanted to introduce a project. We are a team from the University of Hildesheim in Germany. And for two years we have been involved in a project of reconceptualizing the historiography of philosophy from a global perspective. What we do is gather histories historiographies of philosophy in different languages. What we found out is that in Chinese, in Russian, in Turkish, in Iranian, the Persian, in different languages, if histories of philosophies are written completely differently, who is included, what kind of issues are being discussed. So the history of philosophy, I mean we focus on these European heritage because we are living in this legacy, of course, so that's our history of philosophy that has its own racist past. But if you look at the history of philosophy as a way of creating historiographies of thought from different perspectives of the world and different languages using different concepts and different ways of conceptualizing history, then it looks very different. And also a historiography of the colonial past, spoken and written from the colonized. Such histories of philosophies are produced in Spanish, for instance. They were forced to use their colonized language. So it seems to me, since now the intellectual scene is becoming more and more global, if you will. So these different alternative histories of philosophies are available, it's just that we just don't have access to them, we just, we find people who are who can do research in original languages. But we have, oh thanks, Bjorn. Bjorn was with us like a few months ago in our project and so we invite people who are sort of like-minded and then it's a new project but we are beginning to connect with people so I'm sure we would like to invite you sometime. But anyway, I just wondered if you are optimistic in the sense to look at histories of philosophy, not from English, German, French, but from some other ways of looking at the world. Thank you. Thank you Dr. Ikane. I'm so sorry. Thank you, Yoko. I am not surprised that history of philosophy is written in entirely different ways by historians of philosophy in other languages. It is a problem that because of Euro supremacy, we are still referring to histories of philosophy written in French, German, English. That is the problem. And what the team in Hildesheim is doing is directly addressing the sources, the causes of exclusion and narrowing. I think that the level of one's optimism depends on where one is. What philosophy, the philosophy discipline, how it is in the places where we work and in the U.S., there is reason to be less optimistic. I am supposing that the view from Hildesheim is more optimistic. So then, what I'm saying is that my thought, my references are institutions of philosophy and university and higher education. At some point, someone will and maybe the team in Hildesheim will conceive a problem of addressing the problem of the racism and colonialism of philosophy, of the philosophy discipline by looking at the institutions of philosophy and conceive a project that actually addresses institutions and how to change them. I think there probably is a project out there like that. There has to be because I cannot be the only one who understands that the level of optimism is dependent on whether our institutions can be changed. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Peter. Yes. Thank you very much, Professor Park for this very inspiring lecture. My question adds very well to that of Dr. Yoko. Actually, what I would like to add is from myself, I'm an Ashanti expert and my findings on African people and their philosophies in oral tradition that it seems to me that actually it is like positioning people in hierarchies is something that is also like a human characteristic. So if you start to focus on other philosophies in oral traditions you will find in the way the same thing that if you look at Ashanti on how they discuss the people of the northern hinterland like the people then it's clear that they find themselves that they are on top of the world and in the middle of the map and they created this they have their own way of cartographic tradition and then they are clearly at the center they are also focused on themselves as the ones who are on top of hierarchy so I think it's this is not to take away this entire argument that there's been colonialism and Eurocentrism and that people have been oppressed and therefore traditions are well not in an equal way discussed in European philosophical works but well on the other hand I think if you focus start to focus and start to include as they are now doing in the other time these other traditions then you will find that it's not that people will their focus equally on all the traditions in their own countries another example to finish with is for instance the Bamun people in Cameroon there was a famous king there he was called Nyoya and he created his own entire cryptic oral traditional language and he also was very advanced in map making and the reason he did all this is to conquer and subjugate all the people around him he knew that knowledge was power and the reason he did all this is to be on top of this taxonomic hierarchy so that was my addition to your excellent lecture thank you thank you Louise thank you very much I absorb this commentary it's actually information that will go to use for my reflection somehow I'm reminded of what the historians of race and racism how they handle the fact that in every history we have self-referential systems of knowledge that it is combined with power okay and how the historians of race and racism handle this fact is to be very be very diligent about differentiating differentiating or making particular the modern combination of racism and power with the modern colonial project so therefore setting the parameters of the discussion a result of that is finding out that actually a lot of modern racial ideas have ancient for example ancient Greek and Roman origin for example the climate theory and also the idea of temperament the four humors theory of ancient Greek medical knowledge okay so what they've done is our historians of race and racism have carefully shown that ideas that are used by modern racial theorists are from surprising places in within human history and also human geography but there is something that can be referred to as distinct and its own object of study and that would be the combination of modern colonialism with the racism and so one conclusion from this research is that actually Isaac Benjamin Isaacson argues that the ancient Greeks and Romans did not quite have the racism racist ideas that we have in the modern period so that's one outcome of the research even though they are among the sources drawn from by the modern racial theorists thank you thank you Peter I think the chat goes back to what Andrea asked earlier how can we then work towards producing a non-institutionary and non-racist history of philosophy Peter Hekhani raises that question again Seagal raises something similar to that again so I believe perhaps those would be your last thoughts before we call it a day but I think prior to that Bjorn has a quick question Bjorn please turn on your mic for me I'm sorry I'm sorry I have a very quick question that's regarding to what you just said when you said that there is this strange effect that in Roman and Greek era to a certain degree invented the 18th century but I still think it's very important to draw an immediate line between the Greek and Roman tradition and what has happened in the 18th century I would argue that the understanding of the white person or the European or the Western individual as the superhuman and entitled to dominate other humans has had different forms and that has existed in Roman times in one way and it has existed in the 18th, 19th century in another way but what I think is important to point out that even if racism in opposition to what is often claimed that it was always there has not existed in the form we know today I think before it has invented primarily by German authors the understanding of oneself as the superior one and the other is the inferior other who will only be able to gain importance and value if he replicates the definitive one that is a structure that is indeed a very old structure we probably cannot address it as racism in a modern sense but we can certainly find this kind of superiorism even in the Greek and Roman structures and I think this is one of the reasons this elitist especially in the classical Greek philosophy and Plato and most importantly in Aristotle's politics we can find a clear definition of a superior being by virtue of his superiorness and I intentionally can say his in this case that he is the superior to other people so I think even if we can make this conceptual difference which I agree is very important we have to take into account that in the west probably in other cultural and ultra cultural histories as well but we in the end committed the genocides and the murders and most of the enslavement that we have a long history addressing me and my people thought we deserve to be on the top thank you I have prepared a slide for this question from two of our audience members about non-racist histories of philosophy about decolonizing our philosophy curriculum or philosophy the discipline all around discipline of philosophy I've prepared a slide because it's one can well anticipate the question so I'm going to share the slide and hope that you will be glad to see it okay I say that we already have the tools the decolonial approaches and techniques for a response to the racist and colonial origins and effects of our discipline of philosophy we already have the tools and these tools are as I've listed them here just collected from what philosophers anti-racist philosophers and decolonial philosophers of race are already doing so what I've done is I've just collected these tools from colleagues who are already doing the work of a non-racist philosophy discipline and we're thinking often in terms of the teaching of philosophy in the classroom there are the tools of counter-narrative counter-arguments, alternative perspectives I think we are seeing more African perspectives than earlier in the history of the philosophy discipline for example historicizing philosophy in the sense that I and others do we might draw from Foucault and do genealogy or archaeology of knowledge or as I've shown in a slide at the beginning of my talk make use of the tools of sociology of knowledge also trans-disciplinarity of African and Caribbean philosophers creolizing ontologies the work of our feminist philosophers phenomenology of knowledge what we all can do simply by changing our syllabi is transgressing the cannons of philosophy and shifting the geography of philosophy which is something I've come to think about often and over and over again from my involvement with Caribbean philosophers and Africana philosophers this just means to do philosophy from a different place besides Europe and the concerns and the environments and the needs of philosophy at a different place in Europe I think these are probably approaches and techniques a lot of them are already familiar to us so the work is already underway in terms of my optimism it does not help my optimism that I am a researcher the history of philosophy and also the historiography of philosophy that keeps me looking backward instead of forward but that's just from my research I rather read anti-colonial, anti-racist, anti-colonial philosophers when I'm not doing my research it's been a fascinating lecture and good discussion afterward I mean it's difficult to to touch on in a very detailed way the history of philosophy within two hours as a lecture and as a discussion but the discussion shows how deeply interesting your talk has been and how important your book has been and how important your book has been for many of us and we look forward to your research developments as you explore this archaeology of knowledge that you are now exploring with regards to the researchology in philosophy and philosophy given us the privilege to listen to you this evening and for really enlightening us I believe many of us will be watching this again and taking it little by little by setting those materials this evening and thank you all for always being part of the lecture series the next one is on October 29 and we'll send out the invite as usual and that also promises to be a very interesting discussion as well so we'll draw the curtain here I'll stop recording now