I was intrigued by these words from Heidegger. You will need to read carefully, and at least twice for his meaning to clarify for your mind. Written in the early years of the 20th century, the words are prescient to our condition a century into the future, the 21st century. By disavowing itself in…
The disclosedness of beings, which lets beings be, sets man free for his “freedom” by first offering to his choice something possible (a being) and by imposing on him something necessary (a being), human caprice does not then have freedom at its disposal. Man does not “possess” freedom as a property. At best, the…
At the end of the year Time Magazine selects a Person Of The Year. This time around Time chose a category of individual: the “guardians” for truth, that is four journalists who persisted in writing, in reporting truth at great cost to themselves, imprisonment and loss of their lives. One of the guardians for…
Ordinary people have to live their lives on an ordinary personal level; there are decencies and betrayals, judgments and perceptions which persist above or below whatever political circumstances exist or whatever social changes come into force. and these are the stuff of the ordinary moral life. ….because the everyday moral worldis a matter of…
Scientific existence possesses its simplicity and aptness in that it relates to beings themselves in a distinctive way and only to them. Science would like to dismiss the nothing with a lordly wave of the hand. –*– Only when the strangeness of beings oppresses us does it arouse and evoke wonder. Only on…
Maturity beckons also, asking us to be larger, more fluid, more elemental, less cornered, less unilateral, a living conversational intuition between the inherited story, the one we are privileged to inhabit and the one, if we are large enough and broad enough, moveable enough and even, here enough, just, astonishingly, about to occur. –excerpt…
There are two more days left in November. Then comes December the darkest month, which is also the coming of Christmas. Christmas is a festival of lights. Darkness and light. This morning I wish that I were a bear having found a warm place to hibernate until spring. But I am not a bear…
Michael: Every time he comes up, he’s got no knife, he’s got no jacket, he’s got no pants, he’s got no boots. All he’s got is that stupid gun he carries around like John Wayne. That ain’t gonna help ya’. Axel: Oh, what the hell, Mike. Give him the boots. Michael: No way. I…
It is snowing outside, a gentle snow, the advance scout of approaching winter. It’s no longer possible to assume that winter will fall within the range of past norms. Will it be a siege of ice, an assault by serial snow storms? Or will the next few months bring warmth, and little precipitation? Either…
Last night was delightfully strange. On Thursday evenings a few of us, using philosophy as an excuse, meet at Taste of Paris Cafe in Mundelein. The purpose is to reflect upon a topical discussion of earlier in the week, while we drink wine or coffee. I never know who will show up or if anyone…
