I do think the interview presumes that you know a lot about the Straussian approach. But because I was exposed to this -- Tom Pangle, who Laura Field worked with, was my college advisor at Yale -- I found the discussion fascinating.
I do think there is something "wrong" with a lot of "political philosophy", not just Straussianism, which Field to some extent discusses the book. That is, many of these philosophers seem to assume the primacy of the idea over actual human history and the current real-world situation. There is a belief that you can simply ignore the U..S.'s actual ethnic history and current diversity, and just look at what is written down in documents such as the Federalist Papers or the Declaration of Independence, or the Gettysburg Address. A better political philosophy actually engages with real world history and the real world political situation.
I also found Fukuyama's discussion of "thymos" at the end to be interesting. As an economist, I would agree that many economists do not fullly recognize the desire for recognition and dignity as important to consider in analyzing public policy. It is harder to model and measure.
I do think that some economists have gotten into this -- Sen for example, with his capabilities approach. .And I think some economists who study labor markets, including me, have been willing to talk about the social costs of job loss as going well beyond the material costs.
Some of the economics lit on the economics of happiness also finds that certain aspects of one's life, such as whether one is unemployed, or whether the local unemployment rate is high, have much greater effects in suppressing perceived well-being than would make sense based on their pure dollar effects. You also get different effects if you measure happiness in two different ways: (1) asking people how satisfied they are with their overall lives, or (2) averaging how people are doing at randomly chosen moments and averaging the responses. Approach (1) indicates very high social costs of job loss, but not so much of approach (2). But that is because approach (1) asks peole to evaluate their status as a person, their self-respect, their independence, etc.
I do think the interview presumes that you know a lot about the Straussian approach. But because I was exposed to this -- Tom Pangle, who Laura Field worked with, was my college advisor at Yale -- I found the discussion fascinating.
I do think there is something "wrong" with a lot of "political philosophy", not just Straussianism, which Field to some extent discusses the book. That is, many of these philosophers seem to assume the primacy of the idea over actual human history and the current real-world situation. There is a belief that you can simply ignore the U..S.'s actual ethnic history and current diversity, and just look at what is written down in documents such as the Federalist Papers or the Declaration of Independence, or the Gettysburg Address. A better political philosophy actually engages with real world history and the real world political situation.
I also found Fukuyama's discussion of "thymos" at the end to be interesting. As an economist, I would agree that many economists do not fullly recognize the desire for recognition and dignity as important to consider in analyzing public policy. It is harder to model and measure.
I do think that some economists have gotten into this -- Sen for example, with his capabilities approach. .And I think some economists who study labor markets, including me, have been willing to talk about the social costs of job loss as going well beyond the material costs.
Some of the economics lit on the economics of happiness also finds that certain aspects of one's life, such as whether one is unemployed, or whether the local unemployment rate is high, have much greater effects in suppressing perceived well-being than would make sense based on their pure dollar effects. You also get different effects if you measure happiness in two different ways: (1) asking people how satisfied they are with their overall lives, or (2) averaging how people are doing at randomly chosen moments and averaging the responses. Approach (1) indicates very high social costs of job loss, but not so much of approach (2). But that is because approach (1) asks peole to evaluate their status as a person, their self-respect, their independence, etc.
This is the most unintellible interview I've ever heard you conduct.