This is fascinating stuff, thank you for making this. De Sade presents a challenge very similar to the one that I've been developing my philosophy as an answer to.
@@KaneB Amazing presentation of a complicated subject! Sade's pleasure at another's pain is related to schadenfreude-pleasure at another's misfortune. Interestingly, an excess of the hormone oxytocin, usually thought to be the empathy hormone, actually causes schadenfreude! Furthermore, oxytocin causes strong sexual desire, all the way to the sexual act, as well as polygamy (as found with prairie voles). If you're open to some wild speculation, I'd say that Sade was high in oxytocin. He also had as a very strong personality, which indicates being high in dopamine. His high intelligence indicates that he was high in glutamate. Now, here's the really wild speculation: that Sade was infected with the brain parasite T. gondii, which increases oxytocin, dopamine, and glutamate. T. gondii causes depression, suicide, fearfulness, addictions, bipolar, schizophrenia, personality disorders, and seizures. This may seem very out there, but something big has to explain finding pleasure in inflicting pain.
@@joantendler6518 There are many who are sexually attracted to inflicting pain, i find it hard to believe that all those that are "sadists" are infected with the same brain parasite. Ofc, there are those that can modulate that and only do that as a means of making love, with consent and care for the partner. Although i guess you could argue that that is not inflicting actual pain , for some value of pain i guess.
@@joantendler6518 Most of these findings are confusing. If a neurochemical stands in association with such wildly opposing impulses such as empathy and glee (or aren't they?), it's function is probably not that straight-forward.
@@KommentarSpaltenKrieger 40% of American adults are infected with t. gondii, but it's much higher in France. T. gondii seriously affects sexual behavior. This is from a study: "The factor Arousal by violence correlated positively with toxoplasmosis in women (p = 0.014), and factors Arousal by submission and masochism (p = 0.004), Arousal by raping (p = 0.001), and Arousal by sexual bondage (p < 0.0005) correlated positively with toxoplasmosis in men." T. gondii also increases other sexual and aggression hormones, like testosterone, dopamine, AVP, and glutamate, plus it's associated with Asperger's, bipolar, OCD, anxiety, anti-social personality disorder, and depression. T. gondii gets worse, as it causes cataracts and is found with Alzheimer's. So, recognizing it early, so it can be treated, is very important to do.
What I like about de sade is that he was exposing what the elite had been doing for Millennia. If you really pay attention you can only imagine the horrors that still happen today.
The only work by de Sade I have read is 120 Days of Sodom, and I only read half the novel. It's difficult for me to believe de Sade had a deeper moral or philosophical philosophy other than self-gratification and the desire to shock (an artist such as Madonna arguably had deeper philosophical reasons for committing shocking acts in her heyday even though a lot of it was the need for publicity with the need to break down rigid concepts of arbitrary morality arguably being an afterthought). However, I have read enough about de Sade to know he enjoyed both receiving and inflicting pain. I believe he was arrested, or at least an arrest was attempted for poisoning a prostitute he had hired (although the poisoning was accidental). I don't believe he was trying to break down arbitrary concepts of morality as forcing children to have sex and causing unwanted physical pain are not moral acts since they are not consensual (in contrast, someone like Madonna kissing a black Jesus in one of her videos could be argued as an attempt to combat racist attitudes concerning both interracial relationships and false dogmas regarding religion (as Jesus was no doubt a dark-complected and coarse-haired man rather than the blond-haired, blue-eyed, fair-haired depictions we often see). De Sade wasn't writing solely to shock as he actually practiced the acts he wrote about and clearly derived pleasure from writing about his escapades and fantasies. Moral codes are often completely arbitrary (we still have communities believing LGBTQ individuals are "immoral" when their actions do no harm to anyone else as consensual sex acts are in no way immoral, yet we do not believe it is morally reprehensible to earn a living working for a drug company that severely price-gouges and illegally price fixes life-saving medications when no other country allows those actions). The reason I do not think you can project a deeper philosophical message onto de Sade's work is because the only times that this has been accomplished successfully were, arguably, Luis Bunuel's surrealist film L' Age D'Or which focused on sexual mores and the Catholic Church's doctrines (and hypocrisies) regarding sex (we see in the final scene of the film the libertines leaving the castle after having spent months molesting and murdering the men, women, and children they used as sex slaves and surprisingly, one of them is Jesus) and director Pier Paolo Pasolini who made an adaptation of 120 Days (Salo). Pasolini was able to convey a deeper message because he transplanted the actions of the book to fascist Italy. What was, in the book, simply a fantasy about a group of wealthy libertines physically, sexually, and emotionally abusing others for their own sexual gratification became an exploration of the inherent cruelty and evil of fascist regimes, and how wealth and power corrupt absolutely (unfortunately, Pasolini's murder has been attributed to the controversial film when he, only years earlier, directed The Gospel According to St. Matthew which even the Vatican has stated is the best film adaptation of Jesus' life). I will finish 120 Days (despite the fact that it's very hard to argue it as being literature as it is ridiculously repetitive with no deeper philosophical underpinnings), and I am perhaps very wrong, but from what I have read about de Sade and based on reading a fair amount of 120 Days, I feel he wrote for his own sexual gratification rather than from any personal philosophical beliefs (if so, they were an afterthought to his need to self-gratify). If he was writing in an effort to strike a blow to rigid ideas concerning morality, he didn't do a very good job of it although those who have adapted his work since have been much more successful.
@@Enrique-h6g I never said that de sade had any moral upstanding or moral resoning behind his work. All I said that it only help to exposed both the church and thebruling class in their depravity. He himself stated that the very things he was arrested for were already going on among the elite hebhsut had no interest in pretending it wasn't happening. He truly believed he had the right to behave the way he did and he did so by explaining how everyone else did too. He jsut happened to not be apologetic about unlike the rest of his class. He was an aristocrat afterall
@@Enrique-h6g Assuming that is true, none of us, not even the most widely read or respected authors, are any different than him. Gratification through expression is the goal.
Empathy or guilt, when we see someone in pain, are moral constructs, not innate. Sade’s materialist philosophy says morality is not fixed but that it is shaped by the culture around you. If moral values aren’t set in stone, then our reactions to others’ suffering (empathy, indifferent, pleasured) are also learned responses. This means we can unlearn them too. If we expose ourselves to increasingly cruel actions, we become desensitized to those moral reactions. Over time, we can train ourselves to enjoy them, like the way we develop a taste for and learn to appreciate some foods or entertainment. The more we do these things, the better we become at enjoying these kinds of pleasures. For de Sade, the line between pleasure and pain and good and evil is fluid. It’s all about the sensations we choose to develop without moral constraints.
I basically agree with all of De Sade’s metaphysical claims (materialism, no free will, moral antirealism) Ultimately I just have empathy and so I have a negative emotional reaction to the idea of full egoism or sadism. I have a “selfish” preference to act somewhat altruistically, and I prefer for other people to act the same way
@kidneyfailure666One can be empathetic but realize when one is dealing with a monster. While I dislike it, the answer is to merely become a monster slayer in that scenario. Basic morality need not apply to psychopaths or sociopaths if they threaten you or others.
@@sterd1149wdym by "basic morality" I don't think this is even necessarily related to morality here. Like it's just about people taking advantage of others. What I mean is like, even if we assume moral anti-realism. This all still makes sense. We should beware of people who can take advantage of us. About whether they should be punished or not, that's another matter. Should we still hold empathy to them? I mean you could take these questions in a moral moralistic way, like with a focus on "should", or maybe you could take at as from your own perspective relative to your own goals. But in any case this is not what the discussion here was about from what I've gathered.
this was so concise and insightful! even if its a bit of a fad, you ought to consider maybe doing a video that compares the fictional portrayals of de sade w his writings (similar to all those "_______ breaks down _________ scenes/portrayals in movies/TV/popular culture") since so many people insist that he lived the type of life he describes in his books but---as you aptly state at the outset--one of the mysteries and kind of naughty fascinations with him is whether or not that's an accurate or fair assumption to make. was he a criminal? no doubt. but was he really as "dangerous" as we think or was his behavior not at all uncommon in his corner of history??? he is absolutely one of those figures thats written about more than he is actually read. and there are more people that have encountered a fictionalized portrayal of him and his work than actually read his books or learned about his life. anyway i stumbled on this video and am listening/watching a 2nd time and will recommend it. keep up the good work!
I think your first three chapters are a very concise depiction of Sade's views as they appear in a surface level reading of his writings. (Or perhaps, the pornography is the surface, and these ideas are the thickness of the skin). However, I don't think his writing should be taken at face value. It is more than anything a critique of the real society around him, and remains valid as a critique of contemporary society. Both the sexual excitation that many receive from his writing, and moral revulsion of many more, are not MESSAGES, but embodied examples of his critique. They move the discussion from the abstract and rationalized to the visceral and concrete. In doing so, they stimulate the 'good' moral responses and the immoral responses of the reader at the same time. Only by advocating the immoral can Sade make this happen. This doesn't necessarily tell us anything about his own conclusions about morality. His work is performative, not simply analytical. Appeals to his personal history are fraught with peril- the perversions and cruelties of which he was accused in real life are certainly distorted for the gain of those making the accusations, and the actual extent of his cruelties cannot be demonstrated to be any greater than the extended foreplay of modern BDSM practitioners who embrace the "Safe, Sane, and Consensual" mantra. While his literary arc gets more and more extreme, it's difficult to judge whether his actual impulses are in synch, or whether he is practicing a literary extremism to get his point across, which he manifestly failed in his lifetime to do with his less extreme earlier work. Similarly, the issue of whether Sade was or was not a psychopath can't really be answered by what we know about him. The one thing I think we can be sure of is that he sought to expose to the popular mind the cruelties and depravities of, most especially, the ruling class and their institutional minions. It was for this, not his pornographic sensibilities, that Napoleon imprisoned him. He was a danger to the system.
thank you. this was a helpful introduction to Sade's thought. I read your verdict of his books below and am not game to wade through 1200 pages of 18th century porn to mine the philosophy. Do you have any guides to his philosophy you could recommend?
@kidneyfailure666 Ragnar has some interesting thoughts, even though I don't agree with his specific attacks on Judaism and Christianity - if only for the fact that ANY institution exists to promote its interests and cover the weaknesses of its members. While I do think that the creation of -isms and groups has created complacency and weakness in individuals, it has also created entities that are stronger than the sum of their parts, making it impossible for the individual to compete against them. Society has taken over and there is no turning back without relinquishing the significant boons it offers, which is something that most people are unwilling to do.
Sade's arguments for no free will has a correlation to Spinoza claims around necessity and causation in the early modern era. The difference is than anarchistic ideology of Sade and the more conservative value based aesthetic like geometrical (axioms based on geometric necessity) arguments that Spinoza advocates for values grounded in the non ephemeral sensory and so innate and true for ethical construction based on symmetry. Philosophical naturalistic anarchists implies the self is by necessity insignificant because of self as different and alienated from persons and pushing back on authoritarian actors who impose rules for a citizens best interest which may be only for the elite in line with classic Marxism but deviates from means of production class struggle, whilst philosophical naturalistic conservative implies the self is significant due to the self having a relation of empathy and closeness to things like ones books in contrast to Sade who would do price-fixing with another corporation so the book price is overvalued for the humble scholar. There is purported correlations of brain scans with features that predict global political sentiments like the anarchistic brain verses the conservative social brain which explains why Sade and Spinoza diverge in their moral theory.
9:27 “…in both cases, the action that a person takes is ultimately a product of material forces outside of the control of the individual”. I think this formulation is fascinating, because it indicates a dualistic view of the self, despite de Sade’s apparent rejection of the immaterial. If material forces without “you” and within “you” are both out of “your” control, that is to say that both man and his environment, as well as their interaction, are mechanically determined, and thus are not his own, then what is left to conceive of as the individual? I’m not necessarily putting forward a defense of free will, but rather raising questions about the validity of its definition within a materialistic model (if that makes sense). Even if we don’t have “free” will, there is still nothing for us to identify with except our own will, our own bodies, and our own minds, for what else could constitute the concept of “our”. If this isn’t granted, de Sade seems to be arguing that not free will, but selfhood is an illusion.
Yes the ( individual or the self) in the sense that you u have implied has been abolished by some philosophers like Hume, Nietzsche and etc. they posit that the individual has no fixed or absolute identity, thus the self is rather a composite of instincts and conflicting wills which are overcoming and subduing each other one at a time.
Well he was against the death pentalty when it was in the context of his own life, so according to that and his own philosophy, we don’t have to respect him on any level.
@@Moonhart44i disagree. You seem to be imposing a moral axiom that says not to have different rules for oneself than for others but the marquee would deny this. As disgusting as he was he still was consistent.
Usually I go away thinking ‘yes I must read that book’ this time I might just take the video and leave it at that. Can’t even imagine how my Christian wife would look at me… Excellent video as always!
You're not missing much. His books are terrible. They consist of nothing but graphic sex scenes interspersed with expositions of his philosophical views. If you decide to read one, I recommend Justine. It's a manageable length (Juliette is nearly 1200 pages!), and it's a little more interesting than the others because Justine raises objections to the libertine philosophy.
I would think a thoughtful Christina would be interested in a clear presentation of Sade's thought as a useful and honest example of the implications of materialism.
I think my comment was deleted? Anyway, nice discussion; Warman's "The Jewels of Virtue" and Corkhill's "Kant, Sade and the Libertine Enlightenment" might interest you, if haven't read them already. Hope you do more of these in the future.
Thanks for the recommendation! Just to be clear, I haven't deleted any comments on the video. TH-cam often automatically removes comments - and not simply marks them as spam or potentially inappropriate, but removes them entirely. It's extremely annoying.
You know the movie "The Sadness". Its like a zombie virus that makes people act on impulses. Basically it turns people into sadistic, masochists, or they just kill themselves once infected. Now hot take. The movie should have been called 'The Sadeness'. Ahh shitty puns
Klossowski used to compare Sade's self-claimed atheism (and materialism) "des contorsions de défroqué", which I will probably wrongly translate as "grimaces from a defrocked". Do you believe Sade could apply so much energy in desecrating religion and moral without actually believing in it after all?
Sade seems to be an ironic muddle of ideas. He is convinced by science to deny the supernatural, but he still seems to believe in the soul and in God even while denying them. 6:23 "All our ideas owe their origin to physical and material causes that operate upon us independently of our will. ... In the moment when the decision is taken, it is not we who determine it; it is enjoined upon us." Clearly Sade thinks that the world is governed by physical laws that dictate all outcomes, but he writes as though he has a soul in mind. What is the "us" that is being enjoined upon when the physical and material determine "our" decisions? There seem to be two entities that Sade is considering. One entity is the mechanical system that dictates the outcome, and the other is the person's self that has no control and thus bears no blame. Straight-forwardly one might expect that the self is identical to the mechanical system, because Sade insists that the mechanical system is all there is, but in that case we would be dictating our own decisions, as we are the mechanical system that determines our actions, and thus we would be to blame. Instead, it seem that Sade has the idea that we are some sort of soul the is imprisoned by the mechanical system and at the mercy of the mechanical system. Otherwise how can we make sense of Sade's denial of blaming people for their actions? It also seems that Sade denies the existence of God, and yet it seems that Sade has directly inserted nature into the role of God in his mind. It seems that when science convinced him that the supernatural did not exist, he searched for where he should find a replacement authority to worship and blindly obey. For Sade, God is not supernatural, but God is nature, and it is the will of nature that Sade strives to fulfill. Just as a religious person may believe without question that the will of God should be obeyed, Sade seems to take it without question that our natural desires are more important than our socially learned desires. Because Sade chose a god that is cruel and violent and heartless, therefore Sade believes that we should strive to cruelty and violence and heartlessness. Every idea that Sade proposes seems to be filtered through a lens of how it conforms to what is natural, and the word "nature" is mentioned in this video too many times to count. If we reject Sade's worship of nature, then don't his arguments directly fall apart? Why should we care how violent nature may be? Why should we care that some desires are natural while others are socially imposed? If we take seriously the rejection of the soul, then we lose Sade's argument against moral blame because we are once again in control of our actions. We're just mechanical systems that direct our muscles and bones, much like how a thermostat directs a furnace. The mechanisms of a thermostat never operate against the will of the thermostat. The thermostat is nothing but the mechanisms, and if we must talk of a thermostat having a will, then its will is just exactly what the mechanisms direct the thermostat to do. If a thermostat malfunctions and fails to regulate temperature, we do not hold the thermostat blameless; but rather we repair it or replace it because we recognize that a thermostat can be at fault.
"Straight-forwardly one might expect that the self is identical to the mechanical system, because Sade insists that the mechanical system is all there is, but in that case we would be dictating our own decisions, as we are the mechanical system that determines our actions, and thus we would be to blame" Yes, Sade takes it that the self just is the mechanical system. But he would say that we are still not dictating our own decisions, because the mechanical system has no genuine control over what it does. The actions of the mechanical system are fully determined by the previous state of the universe plus the natural laws. Basically, Sade doesn't seem to even recognize compatibilism as an option on the question of free will and responsibility. "It also seems that Sade denies the existence of God, and yet it seems that Sade has directly inserted nature into the role of God in his mind" I agree with this. If anything, this video understates this aspect of Sade's thought. Many of the libertine characters in Sade's novels anthropomorphize nature and talk about nature as if it had a will. But to answer the question, why are our natural desires more important? Well, putting aside Sade's tendency to hint that we have some sort of obligation to comply with what he sees as nature's will, I think he might say something like this: Our natural desires are not "more important". Rather, the point is that cruelty has the potential to bring you greater pleasure than kindness. It is unsurprising that this is the case, because cruelty is a natural drive; it is an impulse that all humans have as this is required for survival in a state of nature. The only reason not to engage in cruelty is that we also have sentiments of sympathy and compassion, but since these are not natural drives, they can be easily overcome.
@@KaneB "The mechanical system has no genuine control over what it does." It seems much work is being done by the word _genuine_ here, but that is a rather nebulous word. Surely Sade would agree that a thermostat controls a furnace, but it seems he would say that its control is not _genuine_ control, but merely the less-than-genuine sort of control that we expect from mechanical systems. What is the difference between these types of control? What would make control genuine, if genuine control were possible? If Sade really holds that people make decisions in a way akin to a thermostat, then Sade should not deny that we have control. Certainly we have control, the same sort of control that a thermostat has, and we can malfunction and be blamed for acting wrongly in just the same way we would recognize a fault in a thermostat. And just as a broken thermostat should be fixed, a malfunctioning human should be scolded, punished, imprisoned, or whatever else is required to repair the human to proper working order. To blame a person is just exactly to acknowledge a malfunction in that person, and there's no apparent reason not to acknowledge a malfunction in a person just as we acknowledge a malfunction in a thermostat. If someone's bad behavior is a consequence of a head injury or something similar, then we blame the head injury for the malfunction, just as we would put the blame on a hammer if a thermostat stopped regulating temperature after being struck by that hammer. If we know the precise fault that is causing the problem, then we blame that fault precisely, yet the fact remains that the fault is now a part of the person, and so it seems that Sade ought to be forced to accept that blaming the fault implies blaming the person.
@@Ansatz66 I mean, to be fair, "genuine control" is my expression of Sade. I don't think he uses those terms. But he takes it that responsibility/free will requires the power to do otherwise, and that given determinism, nothing has the power to do other than what it actually does. That's the sense in which nothing has any genuine control over what it does.
@@Ansatz66 your talk of proper humans presuppose some kind of functionality ascribed to them. Contra thermostat, humans are not designed with some plan, so what will ground standard of assesment of humans? And I think it is clearly seen in the thermostat example that it has no any interests/plans and does its job only under control of humans. Its "actions" are actually actions of total system of room and thermostat and human, which is actually actions of even larger system with boundaries blurred, there's no place for isolated act. Only fluctuations in the system, with no objects and subjects.
I really liked the social contract people and i agree the contract must be between somewhat equal people. It is when the rich and powerful or people in government break and get away with it...that is what I really don't like. Reminds me of a joke. Angry villagers storm lords mansion. Lord: you can't do this! This is my land. Villagers: How did you get this land? Lord: My father gave it to me. Villagers: Where did he get it from? Lord: My grandfather gave it to him. Villagers: where did he get it from? Lord: He took it from a very bad man. Villagers: We are taking it from you.
(Damn do I hate to be the 70th comment on this of all videos) In his 1935 book The Revolutionary Ideas of The Marquis de Sade, anthropologist Geoffrey Gorer argues, among other things, that de Sade's seeming promotion of sadism throughout his work is actually a critical satire of the libertine authors of his day, which, some might be surprised to find out, he had quite an adversarial relationship with in real life. He also argues that de Sade's true positions on society were much more constructive and unprecedentedly ahead of their time. To support these positions, Gorer sites letters and journals from The Marquis, accounts of his work as an ally of the French Revolutionaries, and his novel Aline et Valcour which seems to present an alternative to the exploitative aristocratracys of Europe in the form of the fictional, utopian, and state socialist island nation of Tamoe.
@@ilovethesmelloffire I know De Sade was a pretty fucked up guy, but as far as torturing goes, I only know about the time he tricked a peasant woman into his place to torture her with hot wax and a knife, and as far as children go, I only know of his relationship with his sister in law who he first took an interest in when she was 13 and he was 17. Are you referring to something else he did?
I love Sade, he's like a breath of fresh air, truly a man ahead of his time. Not least because he wasn't afraid to play with shocking ideas. Love or hate his ideas, but you can't dismiss them. He forces the reader to re-evaluate his/her own philosophical axioms. I don't need to want to act in the manner he describes to appreciate that his metaphysics is pretty sound, and he makes some very good points. What actually downed on me while listening to this is that the competing metaphysical proposition that humans are superior and special because they were created by God has shown itself to be just as, if not more, dangerous than any materialistic metaphysics Sade puts forth. We are socially conditioned to think that the special creation claim holds nobility and leads to virtuous behavior, when really it's a recipe for disaster. Kind of how we are socially conditioned to assume that the biblical God is good, despite his atrocious behavior in the Bible, which would put anyone else on trial in Nuremberg.
You should read into 100 years of Sodom by Sade before saying you ‘love him’. He was an absolute foul awful human although one may say he possessed thought provoking ideas
@@eliasbonafe9236 Must have been a freudian slip ;). These moralizing numbskulls always end up having skeletons in their closets, as Sade observes. I have no desire to engage in any of the activities described in 120 days, but I have noticed that the more someone pearl-clutches and moralizes, the more he/she has to hide. Sade himself never engaged in them either. 120 days is the fever dream of an incarcerated man. There are people who do, though, and they tend to be the pillars of society, and they get away with it.
I'm not a trained philosopher and not even very knowledgeable, just someone with interest, so I can't comment something too useful but I'll have to say that I think Sade's arguments don't seem that bad and he actually made me think about my own morality, while I can't really accept being cruel, I have to admit that at least for now I can't find any real counter argument to what he's saying. Also, your channel is great, thanks for it
I have no idea why people are interested in that person, and I don't see much of a connection to Sade there. Anyway, this video wasn't made in response to any particular events. I started writing it in December, stopped working on it for a while, then returned to it about a week ago. (An earlier version of this comment was automatically removed because TH-cam is dumb.)
Marquis de Sade's work could be worse. Can you imagine him writing fanfics about our childhood shows ? I can only imagine what he would write about "Noddy", "Ben 10 classic", "Gormiti", "Code Lyoko", maybe even "Avatar: The last Airbender".
@@KaneB Mainly because I agree with the foundations of a mechanistic, material and deterministic world, and what follows from that according to your interpretation of Sade seems to make sense. I think he takes it to a bit more extreme level than I'm comfortable with though in advocating stuff like eating feces just because it's a taboo. But I do like the idea very much of deriving pleasure from the suffering of others - especially if I think they deserve it - now that I heard "your" argument for it.
So he couldn’t often bring women to genuine orgasm so he instead resorted to inflicting pain which was at least always certain. I think most of us didn’t need the backstory to gather the former.
I'm feeling that Sade would love to the movie aillen. and. Aillens. I think he also loved predator too I think he would like well he would think they were genius I don't know where he would have thought about it's all about the Terminators I think you would like Edward Geiger's of art
The only work by de Sade I have read is 120 Days of Sodom, and I only read half the novel. It's difficult for me to believe de Sade had a deeper moral or philosophical philosophy other than self-gratification and the desire to shock (an artist such as Madonna arguably had deeper philosophical reasons for committing shocking acts in her heyday even though a lot of it was the need for publicity with the need to break down rigid concepts of arbitrary morality arguably being an afterthought). However, I have read enough about de Sade to know he enjoyed both receiving and inflicting pain. I believe he was arrested, or at least an arrest was attempted for poisoning a prostitute he had hired (although the poisoning was accidental). I don't believe he was trying to break down arbitrary concepts of morality as forcing children to have sex and causing unwanted physical pain are not moral acts since they are not consensual (in contrast, someone like Madonna kissing a black Jesus in one of her videos could be argued as an attempt to combat racist attitudes concerning both interracial relationships and false dogmas regarding religion (as Jesus was no doubt a dark-complected and coarse-haired man rather than the blond-haired, blue-eyed, fair-haired depictions we often see). De Sade wasn't writing solely to shock as he actually practiced the acts he wrote about and clearly derived pleasure from writing about his escapades and fantasies. Moral codes are often completely arbitrary (we still have communities believing LGBTQ individuals are "immoral" when their actions do no harm to anyone else as consensual sex acts are in no way immoral, yet we do not believe it is morally reprehensible to earn a living working for a drug company that severely price-gouges and illegally price fixes life-saving medications when no other country allows those actions). The reason I do not think you can project a deeper philosophical message onto de Sade's work is because the only times that this has been accomplished successfully were, arguably, Luis Bunuel's surrealist film L' Age D'Or which focused on sexual mores and the Catholic Church's doctrines (and hypocrisies) regarding sex (we see in the final scene of the film the libertines leaving the castle after having spent months molesting and murdering the men, women, and children they used as sex slaves and surprisingly, one of them is Jesus) and director Pier Paolo Pasolini who made an adaptation of 120 Days (Salo). Pasolini was able to convey a deeper message because he transplanted the actions of the book to fascist Italy. What was, in the book, simply a fantasy about a group of wealthy libertines physically, sexually, and emotionally abusing others for their own sexual gratification became an exploration of the inherent cruelty and evil of fascist regimes, and how wealth and power corrupt absolutely (unfortunately, Pasolini's murder has been attributed to the controversial film when he, only years earlier, directed The Gospel According to St. Matthew which even the Vatican has stated is the best film adaptation of Jesus' life). I will finish 120 Days (despite the fact that it's very hard to argue it as being literature as it is ridiculously repetitive with no deeper philosophical underpinnings), and I am perhaps very wrong, but from what I have read about de Sade and based on reading a fair amount of 120 Days, I feel he wrote for his own sexual gratification rather than from any personal philosophical beliefs (if so, they were an afterthought to his need to self-gratify). If he was writing in an effort to strike a blow to rigid ideas concerning morality, he didn't do a very good job of it although those who have adapted his work since have been much more successful.
Like Stirner in some respect. Where Stirner takes the Hegelian system to its limit through the use of the negative dialectic coupled with parody and philosophical satire, Sade seems to take Kant to his limits through an attempted full-scale immanentization of God and therefore morality, such that the transcendental basis of moral reasoning necessitates nothing less than following the law of nature in its unforgiving barbarism. It’s satire done well-I.e. effectively-because it uses the system to undermine itself with its own blind spots or points of (un)conscious disassociation.
This video explains what Saint Paul meant in the first chapter of his letter to the Roman's. We do not want God's restraint on our actions so we reject God and get the mental confusion that results from denying the Truth. We prefer the idols of our fantasies rather than reality that is beyond our own selfishness. Idols of animals represent our distorted desires.
Wouldn't be much a big fan of science fiction but he would love he would love alien for a couple reasons he would be so fascinated by the idea that creature that they'll have no morality just to reproduce it his main thing a military force was very powerful you know I wish I was a little bit longer and I would like to see what was his approach would have been to something like a shiner like and I think he'd be more into the modern science fiction more dystopian science fiction big fan of diesel pump not diesel pump but a cyberpunk I don't think he would care so much for the diesel pump and steampunk but I think because cyberpunk fits would love cyberpunk more
I agree with him, but if everyone followed that philosophy, there would only be a few hundred thousand people in the world and we would be living in huts with no medicine and superstitious religions. It would be pretty much back to the dark ages. Maybe some people would like that better, I would not.
I agree with his philosophy as a matter of principle. But it's easy to forget how his distortions are shaped by the environment he grew up in. Like Marx privilege makes him lack appreciation and spoils his pallet for effort and merit. His abuse of his principles come down to never needing society's help by not being reliant on it. His claims that nature's course is selfishness comes at the ignorance of our close primates cousins and ancestors who developed the white's in our eyes, and languages through the need to communicate with our family, friends and society. Nature's morality does and doesn't exist as indifference to the actions that take place in it. Causality is created by the actions the universe takes through us, this is the creation of "God" who judges and ensures how our karma is spent. This is how we can live in a solar system that gives way to evolving complex life Vs ending up in part of the universe that seems dead or hostile by our standards.
These people where autistic psychopaths.. When one reads these text it helps to think "it makes sense that a autistic psychopath would reason like this" (note: far from all autistic people are psychopaths)
Marx? Privilege? You're an imbecile. Lack of hard work? A guy whose collected works are 110+ volumes and was the most widely read journalist of his age?
awww he is so transparent. it is only difficult when you try to reconcile contradictions. His 27 years of serving for his own Libertine crimes is a hint to his morality. His boyish blasphemies will not be matched until Dawkins comes along
The Marquis DeSade was obviously a liberal democrat and probably a centristist. If he had been born in our age, he would mingle with democratic aristrocracy and washington democrats. People like Epstein would be his best friends. DeSade essentially followed the same sadistic contract as the leftist democrats and would perhaps enjoy secretly enjoy living in California, although he might not want to live there. His crimes would be considered quant in liberal circles. Of course, this is a speculation based on his violations of social conventions and the societal conventions of his time. Much of what he did back then would be considered acceptable to leftist social democrats. He was a detestable human being.
@jamessanders6483 De Sade was not a liberal in any way, shape or form! He was a real leftist that sided with the most radical elements of the French Revolution. In fact it could be said that he was an early Anarchist. He would have laughed at the Democratic Party. But you know what is truly detestable? The shameful descent into fascism by the Republican Party that you aparently support!
Good video but spends too much time overanalyzing concepts that are pretty much common knowledge, like nihilism or the social contract. This is too much for my ADHD
![ตีสิบเดย์ [FULL] | เปิดใจ "อาจารย์ เบียร์ ฅนตื่นธรรม" นักสนทนาธรรมสายดุดัน!](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/vqaBI_mnoDk/mqdefault.jpg)
Oh great, youtube automatically removed my pinned comment containing the list of page references for the video. FFS. Rather stupidly, I deleted my reference list after posting the comment. Here's my attempt at reconstructing it:
"J" is for Juliette (Wainhouse translation, 1968), "TCN" is for Three Complete Novels (Wainhouse & Seaver translation, 1965), which contains Justine, Philosophy in the Bedroom, and Eugenie de Franval.
3:08 - J 49
6:21 - J 677
8:15 - J 14
10:50 - TCN 238
13:00 - TCN 330
13:31 - TCN 518
13:49 - TCN 283
15:48 - TCN 497
21:04 - J 115
23:06 - TCN 494
24:05 - TCN 645
24:29 - J 418
28:45 - TCN 493
31:39 - J 340
33:37 - TCN 252
33:57 - TCN 606
35:07 - TCN 606
37:08 - TCN 606
37:20 - TCN 252
39:37 - TCN 606
40:05 - TCN 344
44:32 - J 142
45:42 - J 122
46:40 - TCN 283
48:30 - TCN 253
48:45 - TCN 519
49:02 - J 144
50:21 - J 605
50:45 - J 783
53:14 - J 171
55:47 - TCN 609
57:56 - TCN 491
58:56 - J 52
Thanks!
This is fascinating stuff, thank you for making this. De Sade presents a challenge very similar to the one that I've been developing my philosophy as an answer to.
Thanks! Great to hear you appreciate the video
@@KaneB Amazing presentation of a complicated subject! Sade's pleasure at another's pain is related to schadenfreude-pleasure at another's misfortune. Interestingly, an excess of the hormone oxytocin, usually thought to be the empathy hormone, actually causes schadenfreude! Furthermore, oxytocin causes strong sexual desire, all the way to the sexual act, as well as polygamy (as found with prairie voles). If you're open to some wild speculation, I'd say that Sade was high in oxytocin. He also had as a very strong personality, which indicates being high in dopamine. His high intelligence indicates that he was high in glutamate. Now, here's the really wild speculation: that Sade was infected with the brain parasite T. gondii, which increases oxytocin, dopamine, and glutamate. T. gondii causes depression, suicide, fearfulness, addictions, bipolar, schizophrenia, personality disorders, and seizures. This may seem very out there, but something big has to explain finding pleasure in inflicting pain.
@@joantendler6518 There are many who are sexually attracted to inflicting pain, i find it hard to believe that all those that are "sadists" are infected with the same brain parasite.
Ofc, there are those that can modulate that and only do that as a means of making love, with consent and care for the partner. Although i guess you could argue that that is not inflicting actual pain , for some value of pain i guess.
@@joantendler6518 Most of these findings are confusing. If a neurochemical stands in association with such wildly opposing impulses such as empathy and glee (or aren't they?), it's function is probably not that straight-forward.
@@KommentarSpaltenKrieger 40% of American adults are infected with t. gondii, but it's much higher in France. T. gondii seriously affects sexual behavior. This is from a study: "The factor Arousal by violence correlated positively with toxoplasmosis in women (p = 0.014), and factors Arousal by submission and masochism (p = 0.004), Arousal by raping (p = 0.001), and Arousal by sexual bondage (p < 0.0005) correlated positively with toxoplasmosis in men." T. gondii also increases other sexual and aggression hormones, like testosterone, dopamine, AVP, and glutamate, plus it's associated with Asperger's, bipolar, OCD, anxiety, anti-social personality disorder, and depression. T. gondii gets worse, as it causes cataracts and is found with Alzheimer's. So, recognizing it early, so it can be treated, is very important to do.
What I like about de sade is that he was exposing what the elite had been doing for Millennia. If you really pay attention you can only imagine the horrors that still happen today.
The only work by de Sade I have read is 120 Days of Sodom, and I only read half the novel. It's difficult for me to believe de Sade had a deeper moral or philosophical philosophy other than self-gratification and the desire to shock (an artist such as Madonna arguably had deeper philosophical reasons for committing shocking acts in her heyday even though a lot of it was the need for publicity with the need to break down rigid concepts of arbitrary morality arguably being an afterthought). However, I have read enough about de Sade to know he enjoyed both receiving and inflicting pain. I believe he was arrested, or at least an arrest was attempted for poisoning a prostitute he had hired (although the poisoning was accidental).
I don't believe he was trying to break down arbitrary concepts of morality as forcing children to have sex and causing unwanted physical pain are not moral acts since they are not consensual (in contrast, someone like Madonna kissing a black Jesus in one of her videos could be argued as an attempt to combat racist attitudes concerning both interracial relationships and false dogmas regarding religion (as Jesus was no doubt a dark-complected and coarse-haired man rather than the blond-haired, blue-eyed, fair-haired depictions we often see). De Sade wasn't writing solely to shock as he actually practiced the acts he wrote about and clearly derived pleasure from writing about his escapades and fantasies. Moral codes are often completely arbitrary (we still have communities believing LGBTQ individuals are "immoral" when their actions do no harm to anyone else as consensual sex acts are in no way immoral, yet we do not believe it is morally reprehensible to earn a living working for a drug company that severely price-gouges and illegally price fixes life-saving medications when no other country allows those actions).
The reason I do not think you can project a deeper philosophical message onto de Sade's work is because the only times that this has been accomplished successfully were, arguably, Luis Bunuel's surrealist film L' Age D'Or which focused on sexual mores and the Catholic Church's doctrines (and hypocrisies) regarding sex (we see in the final scene of the film the libertines leaving the castle after having spent months molesting and murdering the men, women, and children they used as sex slaves and surprisingly, one of them is Jesus) and director Pier Paolo Pasolini who made an adaptation of 120 Days (Salo). Pasolini was able to convey a deeper message because he transplanted the actions of the book to fascist Italy. What was, in the book, simply a fantasy about a group of wealthy libertines physically, sexually, and emotionally abusing others for their own sexual gratification became an exploration of the inherent cruelty and evil of fascist regimes, and how wealth and power corrupt absolutely (unfortunately, Pasolini's murder has been attributed to the controversial film when he, only years earlier, directed The Gospel According to St. Matthew which even the Vatican has stated is the best film adaptation of Jesus' life).
I will finish 120 Days (despite the fact that it's very hard to argue it as being literature as it is ridiculously repetitive with no deeper philosophical underpinnings), and I am perhaps very wrong, but from what I have read about de Sade and based on reading a fair amount of 120 Days, I feel he wrote for his own sexual gratification rather than from any personal philosophical beliefs (if so, they were an afterthought to his need to self-gratify). If he was writing in an effort to strike a blow to rigid ideas concerning morality, he didn't do a very good job of it although those who have adapted his work since have been much more successful.
@@Enrique-h6g I never said that de sade had any moral upstanding or moral resoning behind his work. All I said that it only help to exposed both the church and thebruling class in their depravity. He himself stated that the very things he was arrested for were already going on among the elite hebhsut had no interest in pretending it wasn't happening. He truly believed he had the right to behave the way he did and he did so by explaining how everyone else did too. He jsut happened to not be apologetic about unlike the rest of his class. He was an aristocrat afterall
It is little wonder that pedophile rings are so common among the elite.
@@Enrique-h6g Assuming that is true, none of us, not even the most widely read or respected authors, are any different than him. Gratification through expression is the goal.
The 120 Days (and Salo, of course) are both incredibly disturbing but power satires of the hypocrisy of evil of those in power.
Empathy or guilt, when we see someone in pain, are moral constructs, not innate. Sade’s materialist philosophy says morality is not fixed but that it is shaped by the culture around you. If moral values aren’t set in stone, then our reactions to others’ suffering (empathy, indifferent, pleasured) are also learned responses. This means we can unlearn them too.
If we expose ourselves to increasingly cruel actions, we become desensitized to those moral reactions. Over time, we can train ourselves to enjoy them, like the way we develop a taste for and learn to appreciate some foods or entertainment. The more we do these things, the better we become at enjoying these kinds of pleasures. For de Sade, the line between pleasure and pain and good and evil is fluid. It’s all about the sensations we choose to develop without moral constraints.
I absolutely loved this. More De Sade content please!
I, too, ABSOLUTELY love hearing about dirty, demonic scum. ;)
@@TheWorldTeacher yes
You would be. sicko
I basically agree with all of De Sade’s metaphysical claims (materialism, no free will, moral antirealism)
Ultimately I just have empathy and so I have a negative emotional reaction to the idea of full egoism or sadism. I have a “selfish” preference to act somewhat altruistically, and I prefer for other people to act the same way
I think camus touches upon it and criticizes De sade in "The Rebel".
Us
@kidneyfailure666One can be empathetic but realize when one is dealing with a monster. While I dislike it, the answer is to merely become a monster slayer in that scenario. Basic morality need not apply to psychopaths or sociopaths if they threaten you or others.
@@sterd1149wdym by "basic morality" I don't think this is even necessarily related to morality here. Like it's just about people taking advantage of others.
What I mean is like, even if we assume moral anti-realism. This all still makes sense. We should beware of people who can take advantage of us.
About whether they should be punished or not, that's another matter. Should we still hold empathy to them? I mean you could take these questions in a moral moralistic way, like with a focus on "should", or maybe you could take at as from your own perspective relative to your own goals. But in any case this is not what the discussion here was about from what I've gathered.
this was so concise and insightful! even if its a bit of a fad, you ought to consider maybe doing a video that compares the fictional portrayals of de sade w his writings (similar to all those "_______ breaks down _________ scenes/portrayals in movies/TV/popular culture") since so many people insist that he lived the type of life he describes in his books but---as you aptly state at the outset--one of the mysteries and kind of naughty fascinations with him is whether or not that's an accurate or fair assumption to make. was he a criminal? no doubt. but was he really as "dangerous" as we think or was his behavior not at all uncommon in his corner of history??? he is absolutely one of those figures thats written about more than he is actually read. and there are more people that have encountered a fictionalized portrayal of him and his work than actually read his books or learned about his life. anyway i stumbled on this video and am listening/watching a 2nd time and will recommend it. keep up the good work!
Well this is a video I never expected...
To see others in a state of surprise strongly irritates the senses and puts the voluptuous atoms more vigorously into circulation ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
@@KaneB lol
I think your first three chapters are a very concise depiction of Sade's views as they appear in a surface level reading of his writings. (Or perhaps, the pornography is the surface, and these ideas are the thickness of the skin). However, I don't think his writing should be taken at face value. It is more than anything a critique of the real society around him, and remains valid as a critique of contemporary society. Both the sexual excitation that many receive from his writing, and moral revulsion of many more, are not MESSAGES, but embodied examples of his critique. They move the discussion from the abstract and rationalized to the visceral and concrete. In doing so, they stimulate the 'good' moral responses and the immoral responses of the reader at the same time. Only by advocating the immoral can Sade make this happen. This doesn't necessarily tell us anything about his own conclusions about morality. His work is performative, not simply analytical. Appeals to his personal history are fraught with peril- the perversions and cruelties of which he was accused in real life are certainly distorted for the gain of those making the accusations, and the actual extent of his cruelties cannot be demonstrated to be any greater than the extended foreplay of modern BDSM practitioners who embrace the "Safe, Sane, and Consensual" mantra. While his literary arc gets more and more extreme, it's difficult to judge whether his actual impulses are in synch, or whether he is practicing a literary extremism to get his point across, which he manifestly failed in his lifetime to do with his less extreme earlier work. Similarly, the issue of whether Sade was or was not a psychopath can't really be answered by what we know about him. The one thing I think we can be sure of is that he sought to expose to the popular mind the cruelties and depravities of, most especially, the ruling class and their institutional minions. It was for this, not his pornographic sensibilities, that Napoleon imprisoned him. He was a danger to the system.
I really love the way you explain things, great video
Based pfp
Thank you very much for this excellent class
Timo Airaksinen has a book "The Philosophy of Marquis de Sade" (Routledge), haven't read so can't comment on it but someone might find it interesting.
Thanks for the recommendation! I haven't read that one either.
thank you. this was a helpful introduction to Sade's thought. I read your verdict of his books below and am not game to wade through 1200 pages of 18th century porn to mine the philosophy. Do you have any guides to his philosophy you could recommend?
@kidneyfailure666 Ragnar has some interesting thoughts, even though I don't agree with his specific attacks on Judaism and Christianity - if only for the fact that ANY institution exists to promote its interests and cover the weaknesses of its members.
While I do think that the creation of -isms and groups has created complacency and weakness in individuals, it has also created entities that are stronger than the sum of their parts, making it impossible for the individual to compete against them. Society has taken over and there is no turning back without relinquishing the significant boons it offers, which is something that most people are unwilling to do.
Sade's arguments for no free will has a correlation to Spinoza claims around necessity and causation in the early modern era. The difference is than anarchistic ideology of Sade and the more conservative value based aesthetic like geometrical (axioms based on geometric necessity) arguments that Spinoza advocates for values grounded in the non ephemeral sensory and so innate and true for ethical construction based on symmetry. Philosophical naturalistic anarchists implies the self is by necessity insignificant because of self as different and alienated from persons and pushing back on authoritarian actors who impose rules for a citizens best interest which may be only for the elite in line with classic Marxism but deviates from means of production class struggle, whilst philosophical naturalistic conservative implies the self is significant due to the self having a relation of empathy and closeness to things like ones books in contrast to Sade who would do price-fixing with another corporation so the book price is overvalued for the humble scholar. There is purported correlations of brain scans with features that predict global political sentiments like the anarchistic brain verses the conservative social brain which explains why Sade and Spinoza diverge in their moral theory.
9:27 “…in both cases, the action that a person takes is ultimately a product of material forces outside of the control of the individual”. I think this formulation is fascinating, because it indicates a dualistic view of the self, despite de Sade’s apparent rejection of the immaterial. If material forces without “you” and within “you” are both out of “your” control, that is to say that both man and his environment, as well as their interaction, are mechanically determined, and thus are not his own, then what is left to conceive of as the individual? I’m not necessarily putting forward a defense of free will, but rather raising questions about the validity of its definition within a materialistic model (if that makes sense). Even if we don’t have “free” will, there is still nothing for us to identify with except our own will, our own bodies, and our own minds, for what else could constitute the concept of “our”. If this isn’t granted, de Sade seems to be arguing that not free will, but selfhood is an illusion.
Exactly
Yes the ( individual or the self) in the sense that you u have implied has been abolished by some philosophers like Hume, Nietzsche and etc. they posit that the individual has no fixed or absolute identity, thus the self is rather a composite of instincts and conflicting wills which are overcoming and subduing each other one at a time.
A guy who actually practiced what he preached. You have to respect that at some level.
Integrity can exist in infinite forms, and yet it is rare
Well he was against the death pentalty when it was in the context of his own life, so according to that and his own philosophy, we don’t have to respect him on any level.
@@Moonhart44 love this so true
@@Moonhart44i disagree. You seem to be imposing a moral axiom that says not to have different rules for oneself than for others but the marquee would deny this. As disgusting as he was he still was consistent.
ugh
Usually I go away thinking ‘yes I must read that book’ this time I might just take the video and leave it at that. Can’t even imagine how my Christian wife would look at me…
Excellent video as always!
You're not missing much. His books are terrible. They consist of nothing but graphic sex scenes interspersed with expositions of his philosophical views. If you decide to read one, I recommend Justine. It's a manageable length (Juliette is nearly 1200 pages!), and it's a little more interesting than the others because Justine raises objections to the libertine philosophy.
Why not read books which can ENLIGHTEN you about life and how to find the true peace and happiness that we all desire?
@@TheWorldTeacher I already am happy.
@@KaneB, in your own words, define “HAPPINESS”. ☝️🤔☝️
I would think a thoughtful Christina would be interested in a clear presentation of Sade's thought as a useful and honest example of the implications of materialism.
I think my comment was deleted? Anyway, nice discussion; Warman's "The Jewels of Virtue" and Corkhill's "Kant, Sade and the Libertine Enlightenment" might interest you, if haven't read them already. Hope you do more of these in the future.
Thanks for the recommendation! Just to be clear, I haven't deleted any comments on the video. TH-cam often automatically removes comments - and not simply marks them as spam or potentially inappropriate, but removes them entirely. It's extremely annoying.
If you comment to much stuff the overlords dont like the AI will just stop showing most of your comments.
I really appreciate this channel
de sade will be an open wound upon the intellect of society untill we openly discuss him in our homes and our halls of learning
You know the movie "The Sadness". Its like a zombie virus that makes people act on impulses. Basically it turns people into sadistic, masochists, or they just kill themselves once infected.
Now hot take. The movie should have been called 'The Sadeness'.
Ahh shitty puns
Klossowski used to compare Sade's self-claimed atheism (and materialism) "des contorsions de défroqué", which I will probably wrongly translate as "grimaces from a defrocked". Do you believe Sade could apply so much energy in desecrating religion and moral without actually believing in it after all?
So sadism comes from marquis de sade?
Sade seems to be an ironic muddle of ideas. He is convinced by science to deny the supernatural, but he still seems to believe in the soul and in God even while denying them.
6:23 "All our ideas owe their origin to physical and material causes that operate upon us independently of our will. ... In the moment when the decision is taken, it is not we who determine it; it is enjoined upon us."
Clearly Sade thinks that the world is governed by physical laws that dictate all outcomes, but he writes as though he has a soul in mind. What is the "us" that is being enjoined upon when the physical and material determine "our" decisions? There seem to be two entities that Sade is considering. One entity is the mechanical system that dictates the outcome, and the other is the person's self that has no control and thus bears no blame. Straight-forwardly one might expect that the self is identical to the mechanical system, because Sade insists that the mechanical system is all there is, but in that case we would be dictating our own decisions, as we are the mechanical system that determines our actions, and thus we would be to blame. Instead, it seem that Sade has the idea that we are some sort of soul the is imprisoned by the mechanical system and at the mercy of the mechanical system. Otherwise how can we make sense of Sade's denial of blaming people for their actions?
It also seems that Sade denies the existence of God, and yet it seems that Sade has directly inserted nature into the role of God in his mind. It seems that when science convinced him that the supernatural did not exist, he searched for where he should find a replacement authority to worship and blindly obey. For Sade, God is not supernatural, but God is nature, and it is the will of nature that Sade strives to fulfill. Just as a religious person may believe without question that the will of God should be obeyed, Sade seems to take it without question that our natural desires are more important than our socially learned desires. Because Sade chose a god that is cruel and violent and heartless, therefore Sade believes that we should strive to cruelty and violence and heartlessness. Every idea that Sade proposes seems to be filtered through a lens of how it conforms to what is natural, and the word "nature" is mentioned in this video too many times to count.
If we reject Sade's worship of nature, then don't his arguments directly fall apart? Why should we care how violent nature may be? Why should we care that some desires are natural while others are socially imposed?
If we take seriously the rejection of the soul, then we lose Sade's argument against moral blame because we are once again in control of our actions. We're just mechanical systems that direct our muscles and bones, much like how a thermostat directs a furnace. The mechanisms of a thermostat never operate against the will of the thermostat. The thermostat is nothing but the mechanisms, and if we must talk of a thermostat having a will, then its will is just exactly what the mechanisms direct the thermostat to do. If a thermostat malfunctions and fails to regulate temperature, we do not hold the thermostat blameless; but rather we repair it or replace it because we recognize that a thermostat can be at fault.
"Straight-forwardly one might expect that the self is identical to the mechanical system, because Sade insists that the mechanical system is all there is, but in that case we would be dictating our own decisions, as we are the mechanical system that determines our actions, and thus we would be to blame"
Yes, Sade takes it that the self just is the mechanical system. But he would say that we are still not dictating our own decisions, because the mechanical system has no genuine control over what it does. The actions of the mechanical system are fully determined by the previous state of the universe plus the natural laws. Basically, Sade doesn't seem to even recognize compatibilism as an option on the question of free will and responsibility.
"It also seems that Sade denies the existence of God, and yet it seems that Sade has directly inserted nature into the role of God in his mind"
I agree with this. If anything, this video understates this aspect of Sade's thought. Many of the libertine characters in Sade's novels anthropomorphize nature and talk about nature as if it had a will. But to answer the question, why are our natural desires more important? Well, putting aside Sade's tendency to hint that we have some sort of obligation to comply with what he sees as nature's will, I think he might say something like this: Our natural desires are not "more important". Rather, the point is that cruelty has the potential to bring you greater pleasure than kindness. It is unsurprising that this is the case, because cruelty is a natural drive; it is an impulse that all humans have as this is required for survival in a state of nature. The only reason not to engage in cruelty is that we also have sentiments of sympathy and compassion, but since these are not natural drives, they can be easily overcome.
@@KaneB "The mechanical system has no genuine control over what it does."
It seems much work is being done by the word _genuine_ here, but that is a rather nebulous word. Surely Sade would agree that a thermostat controls a furnace, but it seems he would say that its control is not _genuine_ control, but merely the less-than-genuine sort of control that we expect from mechanical systems. What is the difference between these types of control? What would make control genuine, if genuine control were possible?
If Sade really holds that people make decisions in a way akin to a thermostat, then Sade should not deny that we have control. Certainly we have control, the same sort of control that a thermostat has, and we can malfunction and be blamed for acting wrongly in just the same way we would recognize a fault in a thermostat. And just as a broken thermostat should be fixed, a malfunctioning human should be scolded, punished, imprisoned, or whatever else is required to repair the human to proper working order. To blame a person is just exactly to acknowledge a malfunction in that person, and there's no apparent reason not to acknowledge a malfunction in a person just as we acknowledge a malfunction in a thermostat.
If someone's bad behavior is a consequence of a head injury or something similar, then we blame the head injury for the malfunction, just as we would put the blame on a hammer if a thermostat stopped regulating temperature after being struck by that hammer. If we know the precise fault that is causing the problem, then we blame that fault precisely, yet the fact remains that the fault is now a part of the person, and so it seems that Sade ought to be forced to accept that blaming the fault implies blaming the person.
@@Ansatz66 I mean, to be fair, "genuine control" is my expression of Sade. I don't think he uses those terms. But he takes it that responsibility/free will requires the power to do otherwise, and that given determinism, nothing has the power to do other than what it actually does. That's the sense in which nothing has any genuine control over what it does.
@@Ansatz66 your talk of proper humans presuppose some kind of functionality ascribed to them. Contra thermostat, humans are not designed with some plan, so what will ground standard of assesment of humans?
And I think it is clearly seen in the thermostat example that it has no any interests/plans and does its job only under control of humans. Its "actions" are actually actions of total system of room and thermostat and human, which is actually actions of even larger system with boundaries blurred, there's no place for isolated act. Only fluctuations in the system, with no objects and subjects.
I really liked the social contract people and i agree the contract must be between somewhat equal people. It is when the rich and powerful or people in government break and get away with it...that is what I really don't like. Reminds me of a joke. Angry villagers storm lords mansion. Lord: you can't do this! This is my land. Villagers: How did you get this land? Lord: My father gave it to me. Villagers: Where did he get it from? Lord: My grandfather gave it to him. Villagers: where did he get it from? Lord: He took it from a very bad man. Villagers: We are taking it from you.
(Damn do I hate to be the 70th comment on this of all videos)
In his 1935 book The Revolutionary Ideas of The Marquis de Sade, anthropologist Geoffrey Gorer argues, among other things, that de Sade's seeming promotion of sadism throughout his work is actually a critical satire of the libertine authors of his day, which, some might be surprised to find out, he had quite an adversarial relationship with in real life. He also argues that de Sade's true positions on society were much more constructive and unprecedentedly ahead of their time. To support these positions, Gorer sites letters and journals from The Marquis, accounts of his work as an ally of the French Revolutionaries, and his novel Aline et Valcour which seems to present an alternative to the exploitative aristocratracys of Europe in the form of the fictional, utopian, and state socialist island nation of Tamoe.
Doesn’t explain why he tortured children
@@ilovethesmelloffire I know De Sade was a pretty fucked up guy, but as far as torturing goes, I only know about the time he tricked a peasant woman into his place to torture her with hot wax and a knife, and as far as children go, I only know of his relationship with his sister in law who he first took an interest in when she was 13 and he was 17. Are you referring to something else he did?
I love Sade, he's like a breath of fresh air, truly a man ahead of his time. Not least because he wasn't afraid to play with shocking ideas. Love or hate his ideas, but you can't dismiss them. He forces the reader to re-evaluate his/her own philosophical axioms. I don't need to want to act in the manner he describes to appreciate that his metaphysics is pretty sound, and he makes some very good points.
What actually downed on me while listening to this is that the competing metaphysical proposition that humans are superior and special because they were created by God has shown itself to be just as, if not more, dangerous than any materialistic metaphysics Sade puts forth. We are socially conditioned to think that the special creation claim holds nobility and leads to virtuous behavior, when really it's a recipe for disaster. Kind of how we are socially conditioned to assume that the biblical God is good, despite his atrocious behavior in the Bible, which would put anyone else on trial in Nuremberg.
a vile man is a breath of fresh air? biblical God is assumed to be good? u need to pick up and study ur bible again.
You should read into 100 years of Sodom by Sade before saying you ‘love him’. He was an absolute foul awful human although one may say he possessed thought provoking ideas
@@mrwetcloth4571 100 years of sodome?
@@mrwetcloth4571 I've read the 120 DAYS of Sodom. What I said above still stands.
@@eliasbonafe9236 Must have been a freudian slip ;). These moralizing numbskulls always end up having skeletons in their closets, as Sade observes. I have no desire to engage in any of the activities described in 120 days, but I have noticed that the more someone pearl-clutches and moralizes, the more he/she has to hide. Sade himself never engaged in them either. 120 days is the fever dream of an incarcerated man. There are people who do, though, and they tend to be the pillars of society, and they get away with it.
His philosophy resembles greatly to his biography! It's funny if you think about it...
Marquis de Sade is a genius
How?
I'm not a trained philosopher and not even very knowledgeable, just someone with interest, so I can't comment something too useful but I'll have to say that I think Sade's arguments don't seem that bad and he actually made me think about my own morality, while I can't really accept being cruel, I have to admit that at least for now I can't find any real counter argument to what he's saying.
Also, your channel is great, thanks for it
oh boy right on time with the Chris Chan drama going on
I have no idea why people are interested in that person, and I don't see much of a connection to Sade there. Anyway, this video wasn't made in response to any particular events. I started writing it in December, stopped working on it for a while, then returned to it about a week ago.
(An earlier version of this comment was automatically removed because TH-cam is dumb.)
I don't hate Chris but people fucked him over. End of story. Also TH-cam can be gay sometimes
@@simonmacconmidhe9489 don't care
He was the OG nihilist.
Jesus, this guy would be a good movie villain.
Go watch the Libertine starring Johnny Depp
To be honest a read Sade most of his book are vulgar juvenile nonsense that wants to be seen as intellectual
Marquis de Sade's work could be worse. Can you imagine him writing fanfics about our childhood shows ? I can only imagine what he would write about "Noddy", "Ben 10 classic", "Gormiti", "Code Lyoko", maybe even "Avatar: The last Airbender".
I'm sure there are people like him doing those kinds of fanfics you're thinking, in the dark corners of the Internet.
I always think of the Marquis as being amoral.
I can't say I was ever virtuous but listening to this made me a little more evil.
Why?
@@KaneB Mainly because I agree with the foundations of a mechanistic, material and deterministic world, and what follows from that according to your interpretation of Sade seems to make sense. I think he takes it to a bit more extreme level than I'm comfortable with though in advocating stuff like eating feces just because it's a taboo. But I do like the idea very much of deriving pleasure from the suffering of others - especially if I think they deserve it - now that I heard "your" argument for it.
@@TheFinntronaut you can't be bad since determinism is the case
@@christopherrussell63 True. Not in an objective sense, but you can be bad from the perspective of a moral arbiter such as society.
@@TheFinntronaut fair enough
At least he was honest.
Thanks!
Thanks for the support! I really appreciate it!
The guy needs five grams in silent darkness
..seriously 😂
Hell yeah!
Hmm, me thinks someone had a fun time in Mexico
lmao
So he couldn’t often bring women to genuine orgasm so he instead resorted to inflicting pain which was at least always certain. I think most of us didn’t need the backstory to gather the former.
21:00 kinda based here ngl
I'm feeling that Sade would love to the movie aillen. and. Aillens. I think he also loved predator too I think he would like well he would think they were genius I don't know where he would have thought about it's all about the Terminators I think you would like Edward Geiger's of art
The only work by de Sade I have read is 120 Days of Sodom, and I only read half the novel. It's difficult for me to believe de Sade had a deeper moral or philosophical philosophy other than self-gratification and the desire to shock (an artist such as Madonna arguably had deeper philosophical reasons for committing shocking acts in her heyday even though a lot of it was the need for publicity with the need to break down rigid concepts of arbitrary morality arguably being an afterthought). However, I have read enough about de Sade to know he enjoyed both receiving and inflicting pain. I believe he was arrested, or at least an arrest was attempted for poisoning a prostitute he had hired (although the poisoning was accidental).
I don't believe he was trying to break down arbitrary concepts of morality as forcing children to have sex and causing unwanted physical pain are not moral acts since they are not consensual (in contrast, someone like Madonna kissing a black Jesus in one of her videos could be argued as an attempt to combat racist attitudes concerning both interracial relationships and false dogmas regarding religion (as Jesus was no doubt a dark-complected and coarse-haired man rather than the blond-haired, blue-eyed, fair-haired depictions we often see). De Sade wasn't writing solely to shock as he actually practiced the acts he wrote about and clearly derived pleasure from writing about his escapades and fantasies. Moral codes are often completely arbitrary (we still have communities believing LGBTQ individuals are "immoral" when their actions do no harm to anyone else as consensual sex acts are in no way immoral, yet we do not believe it is morally reprehensible to earn a living working for a drug company that severely price-gouges and illegally price fixes life-saving medications when no other country allows those actions).
The reason I do not think you can project a deeper philosophical message onto de Sade's work is because the only times that this has been accomplished successfully were, arguably, Luis Bunuel's surrealist film L' Age D'Or which focused on sexual mores and the Catholic Church's doctrines (and hypocrisies) regarding sex (we see in the final scene of the film the libertines leaving the castle after having spent months molesting and murdering the men, women, and children they used as sex slaves and surprisingly, one of them is Jesus) and director Pier Paolo Pasolini who made an adaptation of 120 Days (Salo). Pasolini was able to convey a deeper message because he transplanted the actions of the book to fascist Italy. What was, in the book, simply a fantasy about a group of wealthy libertines physically, sexually, and emotionally abusing others for their own sexual gratification became an exploration of the inherent cruelty and evil of fascist regimes, and how wealth and power corrupt absolutely (unfortunately, Pasolini's murder has been attributed to the controversial film when he, only years earlier, directed The Gospel According to St. Matthew which even the Vatican has stated is the best film adaptation of Jesus' life).
I will finish 120 Days (despite the fact that it's very hard to argue it as being literature as it is ridiculously repetitive with no deeper philosophical underpinnings), and I am perhaps very wrong, but from what I have read about de Sade and based on reading a fair amount of 120 Days, I feel he wrote for his own sexual gratification rather than from any personal philosophical beliefs (if so, they were an afterthought to his need to self-gratify). If he was writing in an effort to strike a blow to rigid ideas concerning morality, he didn't do a very good job of it although those who have adapted his work since have been much more successful.
Cope
My hovercraft is ful of eels
Newtonian mechanics. Did he know Newton?
sade is the greatest kantian to ever exist
Like Stirner in some respect. Where Stirner takes the Hegelian system to its limit through the use of the negative dialectic coupled with parody and philosophical satire, Sade seems to take Kant to his limits through an attempted full-scale immanentization of God and therefore morality, such that the transcendental basis of moral reasoning necessitates nothing less than following the law of nature in its unforgiving barbarism. It’s satire done well-I.e. effectively-because it uses the system to undermine itself with its own blind spots or points of (un)conscious disassociation.
@@absencespodcast what you just said was very fascinating
Sade was clearly influenced by Baron d'Holbach.
This video explains what Saint Paul meant in the first chapter of his letter to the Roman's. We do not want God's restraint on our actions so we reject God and get the mental confusion that results from denying the Truth. We prefer the idols of our fantasies rather than reality that is beyond our own selfishness. Idols of animals represent our distorted desires.
You are like philosophical Simon Roper
👀
Correction: the pyramids were not built by slaves. Look up your Ancient Egyptian history
Wouldn't be much a big fan of science fiction but he would love he would love alien for a couple reasons he would be so fascinated by the idea that creature that they'll have no morality just to reproduce it his main thing a military force was very powerful you know I wish I was a little bit longer and I would like to see what was his approach would have been to something like a shiner like and I think he'd be more into the modern science fiction more dystopian science fiction big fan of diesel pump not diesel pump but a cyberpunk I don't think he would care so much for the diesel pump and steampunk but I think because cyberpunk fits would love cyberpunk more
Are you a philosophy student or graduate?
I agree with him, but if everyone followed that philosophy, there would only be a few hundred thousand people in the world and we would be living in huts with no medicine and superstitious religions. It would be pretty much back to the dark ages. Maybe some people would like that better, I would not.
I agree with his philosophy as a matter of principle. But it's easy to forget how his distortions are shaped by the environment he grew up in. Like Marx privilege makes him lack appreciation and spoils his pallet for effort and merit. His abuse of his principles come down to never needing society's help by not being reliant on it. His claims that nature's course is selfishness comes at the ignorance of our close primates cousins and ancestors who developed the white's in our eyes, and languages through the need to communicate with our family, friends and society.
Nature's morality does and doesn't exist as indifference to the actions that take place in it. Causality is created by the actions the universe takes through us, this is the creation of "God" who judges and ensures how our karma is spent. This is how we can live in a solar system that gives way to evolving complex life Vs ending up in part of the universe that seems dead or hostile by our standards.
These people where autistic psychopaths.. When one reads these text it helps to think "it makes sense that a autistic psychopath would reason like this" (note: far from all autistic people are psychopaths)
Marx? Privilege? You're an imbecile. Lack of hard work? A guy whose collected works are 110+ volumes and was the most widely read journalist of his age?
@@user-vp8fk6yn9zBoth Autism and Psychopathy are brain structures, they cannot coexist by definition.
awww he is so transparent. it is only difficult when you try to reconcile contradictions. His 27 years of serving for his own Libertine crimes is a hint to his morality. His boyish blasphemies will not be matched until Dawkins comes along
I agree with him, his problem now is people torturing him because they don't like him or for their own pleasure. Guess he needs to live in the woods.
Oh, this will be good...
He's, uh, the quintessential logical extreme of hedonism.
L I think Sade would love being a he would love being a vampire he would love the vampire Chronicles of vampire
The Marquis DeSade was obviously a liberal democrat and probably a centristist. If he had been born in our age, he would mingle with democratic aristrocracy and washington democrats. People like Epstein would be his best friends. DeSade essentially followed the same sadistic contract as the leftist democrats and would perhaps enjoy secretly enjoy living in California, although he might not want to live there. His crimes would be considered quant in liberal circles. Of course, this is a speculation based on his violations of social conventions and the societal conventions of his time. Much of what he did back then would be considered acceptable to leftist social democrats. He was a detestable human being.
I bet his books are considered "holy" in the upper wef circles
@jamessanders6483 De Sade was not a liberal in any way, shape or form! He was a real leftist that sided with the most radical elements of the French Revolution. In fact it could be said that he was an early Anarchist. He would have laughed at the Democratic Party.
But you know what is truly detestable? The shameful descent into fascism by the Republican Party that you aparently support!
Good video but spends too much time overanalyzing concepts that are pretty much common knowledge, like nihilism or the social contract. This is too much for my ADHD
I don't spend any time analyzing nihilism in general, and I disagree that social contract theory is common knowledge.