Yesterday one of my professors compared my ideas to little bits of lace and silk. I took offense at first, although I did not let on to her how offended I was, but later I revalued the comment. What is made of lace and silk I thought? Why Lingerie of course! So, either my prof is incredibly horny and creepy, or I have the sexiest ideas on earth. That's right history department, it is I not J.T. who is bringing sexy back.
Yet, on a more somber note. This is not the first time I've been given this speech by a professor. You know, the old, "you're just an undergrad and you're confusing me therefore you must be an idiot." No bitch, I am an artist and by comparing my ideas to beautiful clothing you are just supporting that idea. I can make people with disgusting bodies feel good about themselves. Yet, everytime I try to articulate these ideas I come up against a wall. Will I continue to come up against this wall and futily destroy myself? Or, should I stand back for a time and wait and then with one great effort level the wall and all that surrounds it? I'd like to see a piece of lace do that...
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Congratulations everyone, we've passes our 20,000 hit mark (and our 2 year anniversary)
Live with conviction and authenticity - there will always be people who berate you- but that doesen't mean your aren't respected.
I understand you're speaking with irony about the lingerie in this post, but what have you leveled lately? The threatening statement, "with one great effort level the wall and all that surrounds it" is one of the most ridiculous and self-delusional ones I've heard you make. I'm just picturing what you're imagining in your mind: You, standing in front of whoever it is that happened to piss you off, telling them what's what, and having their viewpoint crumble before them as they are only able to swallow stupidly as you bring them to face your philosophic art.
No offence meant. I'm just trying to respond to what you're saying.
your favorite anaconda
If it's a rational response you're formulating, perhaps you should renew an appreciation for verb tenses...
The statement was "should I stand back for a time and wait and then with one great effort level the wall and all that surrounds it?".
Your statement "what have you leveled lately?" is a clearly aggressive- or dare I say, an intellectually "threatening statement" that supposes that an act had been committed prior, which contradicts the true account. As evidenced by the aforementioned quotation, the statment was used in not only a questioning and hypothetical manner, but in the future tense.
The ornaments ARE the point.
You can live without the ability to see, feel, touch, taste, smell, or think. But why?
introspective irishman,
Hmm, you're right. I didn't understand what he was talking about. I didn't get that he was speaking hypothetically and about the future. Come on. I know how to read. I get what you were trying to say in your post, but it didn't have anything to do with my point. I know he was talking about something he might do in the future and was pointing out how ridiculous it sounded for him to postulate so 'huffily'. I was just saying that he sounded like a baby having a tantrum. No matter whether he is talking about past, present or future, I was commenting on his attitude. There's no need to condescend to me and tell me to 'renew my appreciation for verb tenses', especially when you proceed to correct me on a peripheral issue that I wasn't even addressing.
I think I get what you were saying about the 'ornaments' as well, but again, what does that have to do with what I said about his attitude? In response of course one or the other of you will come up with some abstract, fluffy (kind of like lace and silk) arguement that sounds great in the philosophical realm of existentialism and synthesis where no one has to be accountable to anything that they say and nothing has to be proven rationally or even make any sense in reality. It's wonderful when your ideas sound great when you pontificate them, but doesn't it make you feel a little empty when you see the hopelessness that they result in when worked out in real life? I want to read something that has ever had any sort of practicality, but of course you'll say that that is not what it's about.
So this is what it comes down to. Philosopher one isn't looking for any kind of absolute truth or meaning. He is just drifting and this blog is a fetterless release of his thoughts where he has been virtually unopposed in his rants. All I see in the comments every once in a while is either you or altruistic duck stroking his ego about how right (or righteous) he is...talk about intellectual masturbation. If he's not looking for anything concrete or practical then why on earth is philosopher one always so vehemently right? Why are people that he encounters in the real world that have different viewpoints so utterly wrong? He's not living consistently with his presuppositions about truth and all those deep concepts. I don't know as much about you introspective irishman, but here's my honest opinion: You two need to get your heads out of your asses.
your favorite anaconda
PS. This is philosopher one's brother...Happy Thanksgiving.
The practical is important, but you can't deny that the foundation of all that we experience practically, is, and must be, not only governed by philosophical reason, but experienced through our personal philosophical bent. To say one is looking for, or has found absolute truth, would be simply to say that you had found a large enough group that had (by one method or another) managed to create identical philosophical- that is, sensual, in the scientific definition- worldviews.
A large enough group that you come to believe that this opinion *is* truth, that this worldview is 'right'.
It should seem obvious that this is impossible.
People are intrinsically different. And when you are talking about creating the nature of a concrete reality, similar doesn't cut it.
Identical *must* exist.
That is why such groups are suspected by those without, of manipulation, control, and manufactured truth. One need only look so far as bountiful to find an easy example. What do *any* other groups with a concrete idea of truth do differently?
We are made immune to these questions only by familiarity.
That's why I feel I must correct your statement about being always "vehemently right".
Right is not the point.
I know it makes no sense, and is full of contradictions, but life always is. It only seems neat and rational when it's twisted to appear so.
If that is how you choose to order your philosophic view, then far be it for me to say otherwise.
I won't reverse and restate your advice to "pull [my] head out of my ass", I'll simply explain that 'right', and 'truth' are not the end-game here.
At least not in the sense that you mean.
Perhaps we *aren't* searching for meaning in the same sense as you [did/are?] perhaps it is hopeless and depressing. perhaps, perhaps...
The point is that we choose to use thought in ways that are experimental, abstract; is it any wonder, then, that they are not "absolute"?
I'm not being very thoughtful at the moment, and for that I apologize. I'm sure this is not very cojent or cohesive, but perhaps that is the point too.
You have defined meaning by adhering to something concrete, and rational.
We search the proverbial ether grasping after pure air.
You can say that is fruitless, and "fetterless", you even go so far as to say it is meaningless.
Perhaps we'll never grasp anything, but is the purpose of the hunt to bag an animal, or is it in the search? Just look to the name.
It seems the real difference is this: you expect to come home with truth, and meaning draped dead and gutted on your shoulders,
We seek the hunt itself.
Can *real* truth be caught by one so limited as we? Stripped of it's skin and mystery, taken from it's home, into ours, it's meat frozen and cooked in small chunks to sustain us?
Personally, I think not.
Wow, that was a really well put together post. I feel like you've actually put into words the philosophic bent from which you guys are coming (these days after shucking off your upbringing). Philosopher one had explained aspects of that to me, and through my own experiences and searches I have seen many parts as well, but that was a good summary of it all; A real, honest opinion of where all of this 'hunting' is coming from. I've told P 1 this before that I have come to understand this angle. I've been told I just don't know how to read or interpret or argue, but really its just that I don't do it from the same angle as either of you. I get your angle and it really makes it almost impossible for us to have an type of discussion. I think dialectic only works among dialectics and since I don't believe in it I might as well be speaking Swahili. We understand each other, but its not going to go anywhere because I have completely different presuppositions (and don't just assume that mine are default because I have done my fair share of searching as well). I'm not as well read in the 'arts' that's for sure, but it's not air that's between my ears.
Everything that you (and P 1) have described to me about how this hunt goes and why the classical approach is bogus makes sense using the thought paths you have described. I can't argue it. The thing is that you have chosen to walk on those paths. Those paths that you're taking in the first place are the ones that I question. I don't have the time nor the energy to try and dispute the details, but I do have the time to pop in here and say things like I have so far to make sure you two aren't just patting each other's backs. Antithesis is a necessity (oh wait, better not use that word with a couple of existentialists - sorry if that's not the definition you have for yourselves, but I have no better -you know what I mean). I really do want to see some progression, not just spiralling (in whichever direction you think is funnest). I don't want this for my own sick pleasure, but because I think you can't have a very fun hunt on a basketball court. You need some trees to make it intersting and since I'm tall and kind of dark skinned, I thought I'd be a tree.
Okay, back to what I was saying. I stand by my point. I want to see progression - to some sort of consistency between all of these ideas and presuppositions and the way that you two live and what comes through in your posts. If P 1 really didn't think that it were about being 'right', then why the ranting? Why say, "...no bitch, I'm an artist..."? That's not consistent with the philosophic belief that "right is not the point...right and truth are not the end game" - that he has expressed as well. I just don't get how even those statements (rather absolute in and of themselves) can be made - they are self-defeating. If you're making a statement that you believe to be normative (as I get the feeling you are doing when I hear "...and MUST be, not only governed..." etc.), how can you not believe in right and truth? No matter the guise you give your statements, they are being expressed as percieved truth. Where is the consistency?
your favorite anaconda
PS. Thanks for the discussion so far! I'm glad that telling you to get your "head out of each others' asses" - I mean "head out of your asses" comment got you to respond to me at length. I know, my insulting demeanor is quite enchanting.
I don't have the will to say anything the previos exchanges. The Irishman, who has obviously overcome his writer's block, has articulated thus far what both of us think. Perhaps I will comment this time. "No matter the guise...they are being expressed as percieved truth." Your answer is in your question. Truth is percieved and that is all I am trying to articulate, my perception, my truth, myself. That is what art is. I have admitted before that thephilosopherone is a misnomer, although a necessary ironic joke at the same time. Philosophy, although this is not a commonly accepted belief, is not a serious endeavor. It is a hilarious utterance of just how completely stupid the universe is. I am not afraid of contradiction, but for some reason you remain terrified. It is terrified people like yourself that cause my ranting, my childish tantrums and my completely inconsistent beliefs and actions. Yes I will victimize myself! All I ask is that enough room be set aside in this world for me to live. It is not a statement of absolute truth to say "...no bitch, I'm an artist", but a desperate cry from a completely trapped animal who merely wants to assert the authority to say, "I am I and I exist", without being consequently crushed by intrusive external forces.
21 Questions
Thank you for gracing me with your presence (and the purple turkey). I chose the words "percieved truth" carefully because I know that that is your view on truth. I apparently believe in absolutes and you in relatives. That's the boiled down bones of it. The reason I used the word percieved was so we could look at the nature of these presuppositions. From your perspective: when people look at the same issue and see something different - truth is changed by that perception. From my perspective: when people look at the same issue and see something different - truth is unchanged, but those people's perception is shown to be skewed to a greater or lesser degree. Just because we are all imperfect, and maybe incapable of understanding even the most simplest of truths to its fullest, doesn't affect whether that truth is an absolute or not, but rather shows us the nature of our mannishness. We are all wearing glasses and no one's vision is perfect, but does that mean that the reality we are looking at is any less constant? What made you decide to say that truth is dead? Why is the universe ridiculous and philosophy a joke? I've heard you say all of those things, but I don't know why they are, aside from your personal decision that they should be.
The more I learn, the more I realize I don't know...especially in our pedantic education system. I think you must have come to that conclusion (I remember you speaking of the epistemological question of whether knowing is actually not knowing or not knowing) at some point too. You responded by calling truth relative and perception king. I've responded...by being terrified? I'm afraid at times, but mostly of snakes coming at me from out of the faucets. Why do you think I'm still terrified? I don't think I'm terrified that I don't have any answers. I actually feel quite content knowing that I don't know most of the big answers. I believe that they're out there. And I do believe they can be known, but I am no longer hung up on them. I'll figure some of it out from now till the end, rationally or irrationally or maybe through a mix of the two (maybe that's what faith is?). I responded in the past by being terrified, but now I've responded by a more passionate search with renewed intellectual integrity. You guys aren't the only ones capable of hunting because of your liberation from classical philosophy.
Why am I so infuriating and how do people like me cause your inconsistency? If you're all about being able to say, "I am I and I exist" then why when you are allowed to express yourself do you have to come down on others because of their differing beliefs when they should have the same right to say, "I am I and I exist" as you? Be honest, you're rather disdainful of some other people's ways of thinking. That is the inconsistency I'm annoyed by. If you're so "crushed" by others being unaccepting of your beliefs then why do you feel justified in tearing into others that have different beliefs than you?
your favorite anaconda
". . . the time comes when, though the pleasure becomes less and less and the craving fiercer and fiercer, and though he knows that joy can never come that way, yet he prefers to joy the mere fondling of unappeasable lust and would not have it taken from him. He'd fight to the death to keep it. He'd like well to be able to scratch; but even when he can scratch no more he'd rather itch than not" (CS Lewis, The Great Divorce)
I mean no explicit condemnation using this quote (regarding its innate reference to an ideal that lands itself in hell), but I feel it worth bringing to the table, even if it betrays an evangelical perspective that may be disregarded before it is even considered.
Why I bring it up is that, within my -perception- (as you would have it) of truth, I feel it betrays your position. Of course, your position demands it has no bearing on discussion, so perhaps the effort is merely for my own conscience.
I mean, your belief/recognition/perception of reality seems to require that in a quest for what is true, one can never find anything that is ever true. If it did, then your idea of the ever-and-only-perceptable truth crumbles - and to uphold your position even then goes far beyond would go beyond my greatest imagination of possibility.
So possibilty then. From what I gather from your statements, it may be possible there is a "truth" out there, but it is not possible for us, limited humanity, to ever grasp this. If this is the case, then how can you make such a claim of truth - you contradict yourself (which may not matter to you). Inevitably, your tracks are covered completely by your perception of perception itself, wherin you are free from ever being right or wrong (or anywhere in between).
I find your metaphor of the hunt an intriguing one. Break it down, it is just a metaphor - but there is truth and purpose that drives all metaphor, perhaps more evidently than anything else. Utilizing metaphor to bring clarity to your ideas contradicts the goal(?) of your perceptions (I cannot bring myself to call them philosophies, and I'm sure you're fine with that), which, as far as I understand it, are an experimental approach to experiencing reality as it plays out in your perceptions. I do understand that whether or not someone understand anything from your metaphor isn't the issue at hand - what I don't understand is why you use the metaphor at all if you find it inevitably to hold no meaning or significance.
Also, it is NOT clearly obvious that a universal truth is impossible, if you allow a moments focus on the discoveries of physics, the consitancies in humanity (as diverse as these consitancies may be), the need for something to hold as truth (even if that is some relavistic, experimental jargon). In fact, it is CLEARLY obvious that we can percieve some notion of truth. It is evident that modernism's efforts fell short, and that the resulting confusion and attempts to grasp some constant to hold onto may paint the world as irrepairably isolated in terms of value and truth. But perhaps, just consider for a moment, we've just got it wrong. Are people who claim to have found truth, in whatever form, all ambiguous in the end? Or is there a mis-perception in each mind that has yet to not percieve, but UNDERSTAND truth.
What is a hunt without a prey? It can never be called a hunt, for the meaning of the term itself involves both hunter and prey - and if one chooses to never capture this prey, then it was never a true hunt to begin with. You may find no classical 'meaning' in the world, and you may not care that your perceptions of the universe are conflicting and misaligned with anything our natural and spiritual world suggest is correct, but for goodness sake.
If you are hunters, you MUST have a prey.
If you will never reach this prey, then not only is your hunt meaningless, but it equivolates to a blind wandering in the darkness with no weapons and no hope - a state which is certainly not equivalent with that of a hunter. Your beliefs make your own metaphors break down from their very weakest application, and that my friends isn't a perception, or a misperception - it's a mistake.
That's my opinion, which I have a small hope will affect any of your minds, though a small hope it does have. May your inconducive perceptions meet reality and vanish as a shadow on a wall - to each, a different image; but when the light is shone, to all made clear
-OneWingedAngel-
Why does a realization that we cannot grasp what we must nonetheless seek bother everyone so much?
Is it not simply fear, then, that makes one simply conclude that you *must* be able to hold onto at least some corner of truth, since, if one could not, we would truly be on our own in this, if not alone.
Why must you make god small enough to see the edge of his cloak, that you might grasp hold of them for dear life?
True enough Jeff, but I want to respond to this one winged angel differently. First of all thanks for your eloquent responce. I have to say though that I was greatly disheartened by it. I think that the main reason for that is your initial comment that I would disregard the evangelical position. This is the problem with the internet. Simply put, I have been completely surrounded and shaped by the evangelical position for my entire life. I know the responces that people such as you and "my favorite anaconda" are giving me. I used to believe the same things. You, one winged angel, are truly one of the most eloquent advocates of that position that I have ever heard, and your comments really are very good, but it just wounds me very deeply to have to continually deal with some of the mental prisons which I am struggling so hard to escape from. I feel as if every Christian misunderstanding of me is like a blow to the stomach. It cripples me and I am back at square one. Thank you for your comments though; they were beautiful to read.
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