Hipparchia
Primus registratum
thoughts!
Tema eshte nisur ne gjuhen angleze, por mqs eshte nje teme e goditur filozofike dhe prej qenies te shume citimeve nga origjinali, nuk po e mbyllim, por do t'u lutesha qe postimet e metejshme te jene ne gjuhen tone shqipe. Flmnd per mirekuptimin!
What frightens me is the vastness of this world I live in, which I neither comprehend nor think it is possible for anyone to do so in a lifetime (or perhaps even many). Somehow it even seems unwise to pretend that we do so at all. We cannot know everything that is out there, yes, we cannot understand the big picture, the universe as a whole, but, on the other hand, I are not able to understand everything even about parts of it, particulars, no matter how deeply we ponder or examine them.
My fear is connected with the unknown, because we appear to have an inherent sense that whatever we know, we do not fear. Hence the fear of what if foreign and unknown. But if there is a way to deal with this fear of the yet unknown and incomprehensible except by trying to learn (and find out) as much as possible, I do not know. Perhaps communicating the impossibility of this ability to fully know may be a way to lessen the fear, or afford ourselves some solace in our common ignorance, and give ourselves a sense of liberation from the chains of this innate “need to know” that can be the cause of so much suffering to the human mind.
Given where I am now, what would help would be some indication (i.e., higher knowledge being given to me) that the world is not as hopeless as it seems to be. The vainness and absurdity that surround my life cannot be helped by any means whatever I can think of. But perhaps a higher ability to understand what is out there, what is true, what is the case, could help me fear less the unknown. (But what if this, too, is but an illusion! I am afraid that it is…)
I have not previously thought of it being possible to find ways of achieving this higher knowledge of the universe (of the many particulars that make it up and therefore of the whole of it), but my sense is that, if we consider the question analytically, in other words, if we continue to philosophize in both the practical/physical and abstract terms (i.e., continue doing science and philosophy), it seems plausible to think that a better understanding is indefinitely possible. But the question still remains whether this is the way we will always feel about knowledge, namely that it is inadequate…There is so little that has persisted through time unchanged of which I can name the ability to reason, to question the same ideas/issue that unsettle us, all over again…to continually doubt our ability to know anything beyond what is closest to our understanding of the brevity of bodies’ existence (in this form, as a “particular” being, rather than some other form of the earth), but nothing really beyond that. The only things that are proving true to time are the nature of the questions we pose to ourselves, the course of the organization (and disintegration) of societies, rises and falls of civilizations (and “civilizations”), or empires. My vague perception of the course of the history of science tells me that what we call science is what we believe to be the case at the time we develop certain methods of generating understanding, and have the proposed claims pass all the tests or our premises, which would have been based on our then current understanding and established theories.
----------
The thing that unsettles me about Pascal is the seemingly impossible marriage between reason and religion. On the one hand, Pascal’s brilliant lucidity and precise manner of expression rings true to me, or reasonable beyond doubt; his pessimistic thoughts on the human condition; the aspects of our lives, our experiences in general; what we like to do and what we do not; all these and more seem to have been thought out in such correct terms that they made me shed tears of understanding, of profoundly feeling the nature of his thoughts. The world of perception Pascal conveys us is so deep and truthful that it somehow betrays what he has to say about religion and Jesus. Consider, for instance, the argument of the wager. From my understanding of this argument, it feels to me that Pascal’s reason is somehow overcome by his emotion of self-love. His faith in God (or in the unknown?) does not seem genuine, for the very reason for which he gives such an artificial argument…
----------
P: God is a definition of our ignorance.
X: J, That’s a good definition of God.
--------
Memory is necessary for the improvement of the intellect; though not the only one that is so, for it seems that there has to be a capacity—either innate, acquired, or both—that gives the intellect the power to interpret memories of past experiences and understanding. But memory seems necessary in that in order for the intellect to do its job well, the mind has to be able to remember things, and be able to connect them in a logical/sensible fashion that will lead to greater understanding and elasticity of the intellect (or of the power of interpretation?).
---------
Pascal says: “All our dignity consists, then, in thought.”
With all due respect, I am afraid that after expounding to such lengths on the “wretchedness” of humankind, what should be concluded is that “All our absurdity (i.e., the absurdity of our existence), then, consists in thought.”
--------
How is reality connected to love…the “reality of love” is the greatest illusion in the scheme of the actual reality. (I know, this statement calls forth the question: what is the actual reality? if there is one) It is a “temporary madness” (as I believe Ambrose Bierce has claimed in his infamous dictionary), which delights our being but afterwards—once the madness is over--offends our intellect.
The lover not only sees the beloved as he is not, and idealizes him to the limit of the preposterous, but she even makes up knowledge of the beloved. She creates him. The lover acts as if she knows the beloved—and knows him well. Acting somehow produces reality. Therefore the lover creates a reality of which she is the only sharer. (Perhaps, after all, it is possible that the lover has a higher perceptive/understanding ability while she loves…)
The lover’s love for the beloved is a “fictive reality” whose realness is actual only for as long as the lover is entranced and enthralled by the beloved. I tend to compare the process of the beloved falling and being in love with Mr. Wrong with starting to read a novel at a particular given time, whose reality the lover becomes a part of and the hero (or antihero), if increasingly liked, becomes the lover’s beloved. And just like within the reality of the novel, the lover does learn quite a few things about herself and the nature of things while at the same time feeling crushed by the improbability of having the beloved as much as by the impossibility of “marrying” (in the sense of wanting to spend the rest of her days with) an Achilles, or Alcibiades, or Anthony, or Faust, or Bazarov, or Ivan, or Raskolnikov, or Roquentin, or Mersault…or Darl…or…or some other hopeless character, even Gregor Samsa. Just not some kind of fictional Socrates, Descartes, or Russell (our f***ing champions of reason—at least in appearances). NO, thanks.
What interests me about the law are the concepts of right, freedom and justice.
The nature of the government. The extent of its powers, its limitations. The origin of government; its ability to make laws, set rules (beyond the consent of the people), create codes of right/wrong.
How do justice and morality intertwine? Justice and religious faith?
To what extent does religious faith influence politics/diplomacy?
International justice!
***
Yehuda Amichai: “What I will never see again I must love forever.”
Aye!!!
***
Whenever I would cry as a child because my parents would beat me, it was because I could see how it was wrong, unjust…and feeling it made me cry; understanding the truth made me cry…seeing the ugly shape of anger on their faces made me cry.
Crying as an expression of understanding a person, situation, condition, and realizing that you can do nothing to change it, you cannot help it.
***
I can have as much good pot as I want, the best of beers and wines and restaurants and night clubs that San Francisco has to offer….just so, he said. But I CAN’T stand this Harvard MBA’s corporate attitude—even though he does grow orchids on the 14th floor of his SF apartment.
* * *
The feeling of absurdity comes from a realization of your inability to know the nature of things, the why and the how of Nature as a whole and of every its detail/instance.
But feeling that life is absurd seems just as meaningless/nonsensical as feeling that it is (meaningful). Enjoying it and rejoicing in it (thoughtlessly) is the best we should do, and not try or claim to understand it. Tonight I think I can appreciate Camus’ Myth of Sisyphus.
* * *
“When we fall in love it is a revelation.”
“When we are in love we are prophets”
Luke Kirkland (Spinoza? Seminar)
***
What frightens me is the vastness of this world I live in, which I neither comprehend nor think it is possible for anyone to do so in a lifetime (or perhaps even many). Somehow it even seems unwise to pretend that we do so at all. We cannot know everything that is out there, yes, we cannot understand the big picture, the universe as a whole, but, on the other hand, I are not able to understand everything even about parts of it, particulars, no matter how deeply we ponder or examine them.
My fear is connected with the unknown, because we appear to have an inherent sense that whatever we know, we do not fear. Hence the fear of what if foreign and unknown. But if there is a way to deal with this fear of the yet unknown and incomprehensible except by trying to learn (and find out) as much as possible, I do not know. Perhaps communicating the impossibility of this ability to fully know may be a way to lessen the fear, or afford ourselves some solace in our common ignorance, and give ourselves a sense of liberation from the chains of this innate “need to know” that can be the cause of so much suffering to the human mind.
Given where I am now, what would help would be some indication (i.e., higher knowledge being given to me) that the world is not as hopeless as it seems to be. The vainness and absurdity that surround my life cannot be helped by any means whatever I can think of. But perhaps a higher ability to understand what is out there, what is true, what is the case, could help me fear less the unknown. (But what if this, too, is but an illusion! I am afraid that it is…)
I have not previously thought of it being possible to find ways of achieving this higher knowledge of the universe (of the many particulars that make it up and therefore of the whole of it), but my sense is that, if we consider the question analytically, in other words, if we continue to philosophize in both the practical/physical and abstract terms (i.e., continue doing science and philosophy), it seems plausible to think that a better understanding is indefinitely possible. But the question still remains whether this is the way we will always feel about knowledge, namely that it is inadequate…There is so little that has persisted through time unchanged of which I can name the ability to reason, to question the same ideas/issue that unsettle us, all over again…to continually doubt our ability to know anything beyond what is closest to our understanding of the brevity of bodies’ existence (in this form, as a “particular” being, rather than some other form of the earth), but nothing really beyond that. The only things that are proving true to time are the nature of the questions we pose to ourselves, the course of the organization (and disintegration) of societies, rises and falls of civilizations (and “civilizations”), or empires. My vague perception of the course of the history of science tells me that what we call science is what we believe to be the case at the time we develop certain methods of generating understanding, and have the proposed claims pass all the tests or our premises, which would have been based on our then current understanding and established theories.
----------
The thing that unsettles me about Pascal is the seemingly impossible marriage between reason and religion. On the one hand, Pascal’s brilliant lucidity and precise manner of expression rings true to me, or reasonable beyond doubt; his pessimistic thoughts on the human condition; the aspects of our lives, our experiences in general; what we like to do and what we do not; all these and more seem to have been thought out in such correct terms that they made me shed tears of understanding, of profoundly feeling the nature of his thoughts. The world of perception Pascal conveys us is so deep and truthful that it somehow betrays what he has to say about religion and Jesus. Consider, for instance, the argument of the wager. From my understanding of this argument, it feels to me that Pascal’s reason is somehow overcome by his emotion of self-love. His faith in God (or in the unknown?) does not seem genuine, for the very reason for which he gives such an artificial argument…
----------
P: God is a definition of our ignorance.
X: J, That’s a good definition of God.
--------
Memory is necessary for the improvement of the intellect; though not the only one that is so, for it seems that there has to be a capacity—either innate, acquired, or both—that gives the intellect the power to interpret memories of past experiences and understanding. But memory seems necessary in that in order for the intellect to do its job well, the mind has to be able to remember things, and be able to connect them in a logical/sensible fashion that will lead to greater understanding and elasticity of the intellect (or of the power of interpretation?).
---------
Pascal says: “All our dignity consists, then, in thought.”
With all due respect, I am afraid that after expounding to such lengths on the “wretchedness” of humankind, what should be concluded is that “All our absurdity (i.e., the absurdity of our existence), then, consists in thought.”
--------
How is reality connected to love…the “reality of love” is the greatest illusion in the scheme of the actual reality. (I know, this statement calls forth the question: what is the actual reality? if there is one) It is a “temporary madness” (as I believe Ambrose Bierce has claimed in his infamous dictionary), which delights our being but afterwards—once the madness is over--offends our intellect.
The lover not only sees the beloved as he is not, and idealizes him to the limit of the preposterous, but she even makes up knowledge of the beloved. She creates him. The lover acts as if she knows the beloved—and knows him well. Acting somehow produces reality. Therefore the lover creates a reality of which she is the only sharer. (Perhaps, after all, it is possible that the lover has a higher perceptive/understanding ability while she loves…)
The lover’s love for the beloved is a “fictive reality” whose realness is actual only for as long as the lover is entranced and enthralled by the beloved. I tend to compare the process of the beloved falling and being in love with Mr. Wrong with starting to read a novel at a particular given time, whose reality the lover becomes a part of and the hero (or antihero), if increasingly liked, becomes the lover’s beloved. And just like within the reality of the novel, the lover does learn quite a few things about herself and the nature of things while at the same time feeling crushed by the improbability of having the beloved as much as by the impossibility of “marrying” (in the sense of wanting to spend the rest of her days with) an Achilles, or Alcibiades, or Anthony, or Faust, or Bazarov, or Ivan, or Raskolnikov, or Roquentin, or Mersault…or Darl…or…or some other hopeless character, even Gregor Samsa. Just not some kind of fictional Socrates, Descartes, or Russell (our f***ing champions of reason—at least in appearances). NO, thanks.
What interests me about the law are the concepts of right, freedom and justice.
The nature of the government. The extent of its powers, its limitations. The origin of government; its ability to make laws, set rules (beyond the consent of the people), create codes of right/wrong.
How do justice and morality intertwine? Justice and religious faith?
To what extent does religious faith influence politics/diplomacy?
International justice!
***
Yehuda Amichai: “What I will never see again I must love forever.”
Aye!!!
***
Whenever I would cry as a child because my parents would beat me, it was because I could see how it was wrong, unjust…and feeling it made me cry; understanding the truth made me cry…seeing the ugly shape of anger on their faces made me cry.
Crying as an expression of understanding a person, situation, condition, and realizing that you can do nothing to change it, you cannot help it.
***
I can have as much good pot as I want, the best of beers and wines and restaurants and night clubs that San Francisco has to offer….just so, he said. But I CAN’T stand this Harvard MBA’s corporate attitude—even though he does grow orchids on the 14th floor of his SF apartment.
* * *
The feeling of absurdity comes from a realization of your inability to know the nature of things, the why and the how of Nature as a whole and of every its detail/instance.
But feeling that life is absurd seems just as meaningless/nonsensical as feeling that it is (meaningful). Enjoying it and rejoicing in it (thoughtlessly) is the best we should do, and not try or claim to understand it. Tonight I think I can appreciate Camus’ Myth of Sisyphus.
* * *
“When we fall in love it is a revelation.”
“When we are in love we are prophets”
Luke Kirkland (Spinoza? Seminar)
***
