It is morning and the sun “rises” in the east over the Fox River. Do I correctly understand and render these matters? Consider the possibility that “getting it correct” is to completely miss the point. Is there a correct? How could/would one know? And if you were convinced that your assessment was incorrect what…
I participated in a study group of William Golding’s Lord of the Flies. Did I read the book when in high school or is my memory from college? I am not sure. The book is widely known, a parable of sorts. A group of English boarding school boys is marooned on a nameless South…
Continuing to read from the Zhuangzi. A few verses come as a calming presence when facing circumstances which present a likelihood of a weakened society, more violence, less solicitude for the unfortunate majority without power. I need not say that “power” is shorthand for financial reserves. A government shutdown over the coming weekend… Likely….
More of Zhuangzi. Clearly it is natural to project upon the past our ideals, our concept of an idyllic condition of society, of a way-of-life realized by human beings in contrast to the flawed, and often wrecked behavior that we observe day to day in the present. We “see” outlines of a figure, embellished…
This passage in Zhuangzi reminds me of the famous “Madman” passage in The Gay Science by Nietzsche. An individual, deranged by conventional standards, presents himself in a town square. He insistently, pointedly passes judgment upon the optimism of his countrymen; that the future will, as a matter of course, be the present extended, — …
“When men get together to pit their strength in games of skill, they start off in a light and friendly mood but usually end up in a dark and angry one, and if they go on too long, they start resorting to various underhanded tricks. When men meet at some ceremony to drink, they…
The world today is no theater where actions and feelings are represented and interpreted, but a market on which intimacies are exhibited, sold, consumed. The theater is a site of representation, whereas the market is a site of exhibition. Today theatrical representation is yielding to pornographic exhibition. —The Transparency Society, The Society of Intimacy…
Yesterday I received an email from a friend expressing an opinion that repudiated Quantum Mechanics. For the majority of us this opinion is unremarkable, seeming irrelevant. Quantum Mechanics is a field of esoteric mathematics describing the behavior of invisible forces that constitute material objects. Field effects dance with improvisation, to support the visible superstructure…
My exploration of Zhuangzi continues. I am drawn toward his story telling, his manner of doing philosophy. This 4th century BCE Taoist intellectual responds to several defined schools of thought by writing philosophical fantasy. Philosophical fantasy! Imagine someone rising to his/her feet in a lecture hall at a philosophy conference Q&A session, to describe…
Raining now. Prospect of rain for the rest of the day. Well and good for the trees and shrubs. A good drink is needed before the frost of Fall arrives. Today these words from Ludwig Wittgenstein captured my imagination. But I did not get my picture of the world by satisfying myself of its…
