Waking this morning there is drizzle outside.  Weather extremes are devastating, and I am thankful, the proportion of sunlit days and to those with rain seems normal here so far.  Too much heat and vegetation becomes fuel.  Too much water, and flooding is the consequence.  Technology, or to say it more plainly, the application of  our ingenuity and power, is no guarantee that we will not be overwhelmed by a weather extreme.

On my iphone news feed this morning, I read these words from California’s Governor Newsom, in the San Francisco Chronicle.

“California, folks, is America’s fast-forward,” the governor said.  “What we are experiencing right here is coming to a community all across the United States of America unless we get our act together on climate change.”

To read the entire article, CLICK HERE.

I continue my purpose to explore Twilight Of The Idols, by Friedrich Nietzsche.  Reading Nietzsche is comparable to setting out with Lewis and Clark.  The expedition to explore and survey the uncharted West, departs from St Louis on the Mississippi, piloting river boat barges which are constructed to be a defense against hostile Indian attacks.

Nietzsche consciously wrote for a future time.  He wrote that he was an  untimely, inopportune (unzeitgemäss) philosopher, without expectation of being understood by his own time.  Nietzsche wrote for our time, his words have application for our conditions of life, in my opinion.  Reading Nietzsche, you never know what awaits around the next bend in the river.

I pull on my oar,  the barge-like river boat ponderously moves into the swift moving current…

The first section entitled, Maxims and Arrows,  are numbered aphorisms, insights expressed in a line or two.  These provoked me to self examination…

3. To live alone one must be a beast or a god, says Aristotle. Leaving out the third case: one must be both — a philosopher.

A mistake that I made more than once in my professional life: the assumption that persons are standardized, and that I could train any willing individual to perform any task within my company.  A badly flawed idea…  Human beings are each a “one-off” with a narrowly defined temperament.  Training, no matter how careful, how well conceived — cannot overwrite the inclinations, the vectors of genetics and upbringing which shape the personality.

The implication for philosophy is obvious.  Philosophy is not for everyone.  To be drawn to read philosophical texts, to exercise critical thinking ability is an acquired taste.  Acquired from upbringing perhaps?  Or genetic inheritance?  Would not life be insufferable if everyone were a philosopher?  Certainly waiting-on-tables, hospitality is an art form that I would sorely miss.  Nothing but introspection and poor table service….

18. Whoever does not know how to lay his will into things, at least lays some meaning into them: that means, he has the faith that they already obey a will. (Principle of “faith”.)

This one reminds me of a time that I was nearly disabled by depression.  I knew that my power of action, my effectiveness was severely limited by the blackness, the funk that I felt most of the time.  I had precious little will “to lay into things.”  I also felt/knew that things in general had meaning, meaning which through study, my mind could comprehend.  The insight was enough to grant me faith in the future.  In principle “reality”/the world was amenable to reason, that is, responsive to purposes, which someday I would be able to execute.  By faith I journeyed on, even though I “felt like shit.”

25. Being pleased with oneself protects even against the cold. Has a woman who knew herself to be well dressed ever caught a cold? I am assuming that she was barely dressed.

A lighter note about the influence of attitude, emotional state of mind, upon  physical well being.  I doubt Nietzsche’s observation about a female in alluring evening attire is true — but I understand and approve his point.  How important that a person be pleased with him/her self!  And how difficult of achievement.

---

To end on a note of lightness, I offer this tune by Chris Isaaks, King Without A Castle.  The idea of a king bereft of a castle, the apt theater for a king, a stage from which kingly actions are demonstrated — is ironic, a twist to our expectations.  According to the songwriter, a castle, allowing us to fully exercise the powers of our humanity, is nothing less than another person with whom we learn to love, and to be loved.

Enjoy!

King Without A Castle

By Chris Isaak

Like a king without castle
Like a knight without a home
I call your name but there’s no answer
And I’m left here on my own
Just wondering, wondering
Where did our love go?

Does anybody know?

A man alone he has no future
A man alone he has no friends
There was a time I thought I found her
The one to love me ’til the end
Now I’m wondering, wondering
Where did our love go?

Does anybody know?

I’m Like a king without castle
With a heart condemned to roam
I keep searchin’ ’til I find you
‘Til I do I’ll be alone
Just wondering, wondering
Where did our love go?

Does anybody know?