Again, the circle of friends settled in at Barnes & Noble, provoked to consider, to attempt a response to several challenges to conventional thought. Since antiquity, here in Europe and lately in America we have relied upon the assumption that each of us has a defined, stable identity, a “self” which we aim to express. We were challenged to consider the prospect that there is no stable, essential nucleus of self, nothing other than the wash of thought, just my thoughts.  Moreover, if thought, if consciousness projects the identity of each of us, why shouldn’t that be the case for the external world as well? Consider if you will that the world is under construction, a project of the architectonic mind!

I was mesmerized by the comments offered.  The hour and a half of discussion seemed over in a flash, because my interest was so thoroughly captured.

I recalled these questions were a lynch pin, a rotation-of-the axis of philosophy, due to the work of Immanuel Kant in the 18th century.  I recall reading Kant in my college days. Kant made my head hurt.  I am familiar with his work almost entirely through quotations and references by scholars who came later.  Kant wrote that the mind synthesizes “reality,” makes up a world that conforms to our expectations, to the conventions which all of us share.  Twelve categories of understanding, assumptions by which our mind organizes raw experience were identified by Kant.  I have combined several, so my count comes to nine. They are:

• unity
• plurality
• totality
• reality
• limitation/negation
• subsistence
• causality/dependence
• community/relation
• possibility

On occasion a friend makes use of a phrase of which he is fond, his response to the outrageous behavior or words of a politician. He would say, “You can’t make this shit up!”

As a matter of fact, that is exactly what we do!

How about a tune to carry with us through this day?  Sweet Child O’ Mine by Guns N’ Roses.  I love the wild abandon of both the guitar and the lyric.