Wednesday 28 August 2019

Our Own Common Era


It is the unheralded ancestor of every subsequent era system, including the Christian Anno Domini system, our own Common Era, the Jewish Era of Creation, the Islamic Hijrah, the French Revolutionary Era, and so on.

(further down)

All events, however dislocated, were part of a single story, a total history. 

These observations are from an Aeon essay by Paul J. Kosmin of Harvard College who is John L Loeb associate professor of the humanities, specialising in the history of the Ancient Greek world, at Harvard University in Massachusetts. His most recent book is Time and Its Adversaries in the Seleucid Empire(2018)

Are you sitting comfortably; this won’t take long. What do you notice about the group of dating systems mentioned above? Most of the numbers are different except for two: A.D. and C.E. Correct. That leads us to suspect that they may be part of “a single story” as Kosmin says himself. What has caused the break in acronym? Can it be that “our own C.E.” represents ‘under new management’? Fine but shouldn’t this new regime have a starting date? When would it be? Very difficult problem even for a Harvard prof specialising in time. Really hard problem. Let’s just cancel the history of dating instead.

Tuesday 27 August 2019

A French Detective Speaks


"But, in the world of reality, at the very heart of reality, there is always a fixed point, a solid nucleus, about which the facts group themselves in accordance with a logical order”.
(from The Eight Strokes of the Clock by Maurice Leblanc.

And yet as it happens the story that Prince Renine spun was an lie told out of a desire to correct the world of reality and align it with an ideal. Alethtomy? From  ἀλήθεια
cf Wikipedia on the topic:
aletheia

I was a hidden treasure and I wished to be known Allah/hadith

Renine is disclosing a supervening emotional reality or an ideal sublation.
Read it at The Eight Strokes of the Clock

Sunday 25 August 2019

Peter Wessel Zapffe climbs Mount Kailas


Dealing with the absurdism of Peter Wessel Zapffe by the method of retorsion is relatively easy.
maverick philosopher
If our unnecessarily large brains have concocted a farrago of comforting illusions might not this solemn philosophy be just another one of them? However for those who have entered the Zapffian the view from outside is obstructed. The door to that doomy portal closes after you enter it and besides there are many teachings of the traditional wisdom schools that echo the cool pessimism of the view from the mountain top. At the pinnacle near the bench mark will be scratched, Nietzsche was here. Vedanta and Buddhist sages may have added stones to the cairn also. cf.Vedanta and Anti Natalism

Whatever happened? A breach in the very unity of life, a biological paradox, an abomination, an absurdity, an exaggeration of disastrous nature. Life had overshot its target, blowing itself apart. A species had been armed too heavily – by spirit made almighty without, but equally a menace to its own well-being. Its weapon was like a sword without hilt or plate, a two-edged blade cleaving everything; but he who is to wield it must grasp the blade and turn the one edge toward himself.
(from The Last Messiah essay by Peter Wessel Zapffe pub.1933
trans. The Last Messiah )

The symbolic meaning of hollow Mount Kailas and Arunachala, wherein dwell Shiva and deathless sages, is a rebuttal of the ultimacy of the absurd. Saints and rishis have penetrated that adamantine rock through the practice of gnothi seauton (know thyself) and atma vichara (inquiry into the self). Yes, they agree, man cannot know truth but he can realise it. The good as a categorical or utilitarian slogan is otiose but the action of one who embodies the good is a safe template which we can apply to our work.

(general review of Zapffe by Gisle Tangenes: The View from Mount Zapffe)

Wednesday 21 August 2019

Vedanta and Anit-Natalism


Having approached the Teacher in the prescribed manner i.e. with fuel in his hand; he thus addresses him:

Thus in this beginningless world on account of my own actions I have been giving up successive bodies assumed amongst gods, men, animals and the denizens of hell and assuming ever new ones. I have in this way been made to go round and round in the cycle of endless births and deaths as in a Persian wheel by my past actions, and having the course of time obtained the present body. I have got iired of this going round and round in the wheel of transmigration and have come to you, Sir, to put and end to this rotation.
(from Upadesa Sahasri Chap.1 by Shankaracarya)

This sounds arguably very much like prospective anti-natalism. Gratitude for this birth and the meeting with a Teacher is a given that mitigates that. One might also press the point that the doctrine of maya in Vedanta is nihilist. We are, it is held, radically deluded and under a misapprehension of what our true nature is. That is a shallow understanding of maya and a simplistic grasp of the snake/rope analogy. Creation is not free standing and self supporting. It is non-different from Brahman, an indescribable (anirvachanaya) relation, neither identical nor different.




Sunday 18 August 2019

Pareto's Cormanesque Juridical Entities


Pareto was fond of bizarre stories drawn from classical sources which served to illustrate his theories about residues and derivatives. Re a derivative which he calls juridical entities he cites:

Pausanias, Pcriegesis, VI, Elis II, n, 5-7, relates that, at Thasos, one of the rivals of the champion runner, Theagenes, was in the habit of thrashing his statue every night, and that finally to punish the man it fell upon him and crushed him : "The children of the dead man then brought action against the statue for murder, and following one of the Draconian laws, the Thasians threw it into the sea." But a blight oracle declared that it was because the Thasians "had forgotten the greatest of their fellow-citizens." So they fished up the statue and reerected it in its original position.

Pope Formosus was put on trial in 897. Unfortuneately at that point in time he had been dead for eight months:

The Cardinals, the Bishops, and many other Church dignitaries, assembled in Sanhedrin. The Pope's body, wrested from the tomb in which it had been lying for eight months, was clothed in the pontifical robes and seated on a throne in the Council hall. Pope Stephen's attorney arose and turned towards the horrible mummy at its side sat a terrified deacon who had been designated to act as its counsel. [Animals too had their attorneys.] The prosecutor read the charges. Then the living Pope inveighed at the dead Pope in a mad violence: 'Why, ambitious man, didst thou usurp the Apostolic See of Rome, thou who wert Bishop of Porto?' The attorney of Formosus answered in his defence so far as terror did not paralyze
his tongue. The dead Pope was convicted and his punishment fixed.

Saturday 17 August 2019

Iris Murdoch: Muddles and The Mixture as Before


"I do love the way you talk, you're so precise, not like my father. He lives in a sort of rosy haze with Jesus and Mary and Buddha and Shiva and the Fisher King all chasing round and round dressed up as people in Chelsea."

This is Julian the daughter of Baffin the popular novelist of the quasi deep Murdochian sort. The author in the mirror of her characters writes against herself. Bradley Pearson the ever so serious, not many words but true ones, in a review of Baffin’s latest, writes:

Arnold Baffin's new book will delight his many admirers. It is, what readers often and innocently want, "the mixture as before." It tells of a stockbroker who, at the age of fifty, decides to become a monk. His course is thwarted by the sister of his abbot-to-be, an intense lady returned from the East, who attempts to convert the hero to Buddhism. These two indulge in very long discussions of religion. The climax comes when the abbot (a Christ figure he) is killed by an immense bronze crucifix which accidentally (or is it accidentally?) falls upon him while he is celebrating mass.

This is all in The Black Prince by Iris Murdoch which I haven’t finished and mightn’t. It’s the insolence of being too successful, too prolific and not allowing the creative energy to gather itself that irritates. It’s Murdochshire on a warm summer’s day and the general sense of ‘muddle’ that confounds. A favourite word of Oxford philosophy which occurs 16 times in ‘Prince’ ,17 times in The Sacred and Profane Love Machine, 42 times in A Fairly Honourable Defeat. I include muddles, muddler, muddling etc in this count – it’s the concept that counts, you know.

What does it mean? What could it mean? It ought to have an entry in a dictionary of philosophy. Let me attempt a prolegomena to a sense of it.

a mix up, taking something to be that which it is not, a categorical error, a state of affairs as a false framing (not really love), an unwitting masquerade, misapprehension, confusion, mistake, misprision, misplaced soul searching (solution: keep one in every room), stultification by intent ……..

Murdoch in many places is saying ‘Iris put down that pen, take the dogs for a walk, become more chaste and elegant, cut like a hated editor and for God’s sake don’t strain so much'.

‘I for one;, when did people stop saying that, have reverted to reading again Dostoevsky’s The Devils. Now that’s a novel, not a toy.




Wednesday 14 August 2019

Bilimoria on Theodicy


Purushottama bilimoria has a review of the various theodicies in the Hindu tradition.
Towards an Indian Theodicy
theodicy

His remarks on the short sections of Shankaracarya’s commentary on Brahma Sutra Bhasya II.i.34/5 are interesting.
Śaṅkara is adamant that creation is “sāpekṣa,” that is, Brahman is not independent, even though he is the sole material cause of the world. As a matter of fact, he does not have nor can exercise free choice, since he has no control over dispensing the consequences of creatures’ actions, in which he is guided by the “Force of Law” – Karma.

The essence of this view is that when you create a world you create interaction, you create work and therefore causality. Because issuing from the boundless consciousness of Brahman in which there is no border between spirit and matter, interaction on all planes is subject to cause and effect. The explication of Brahman as the material cause of the universe must not be taken to mean that Brahman is itself material. This is made clear by Shankaracarya in his commentary on Tai.Up. (Satyam Jnanam Anantam Brahma). See various posts on this very close analysis –
Tai.Up.
To create a world in which there was no interaction would be incoherent. Bilimoria puts it in a stronger way that might be questioned.
It is clear though that God’s dependence upon the karma of the creatures, seriously delimits, that is, restricts, God’s omnipotence; second, it takes away any element of the hand or even the inscrutability of providence: grace would not be easy to come by in this account

Delimit and dependence seem to suggest the concept of a creation inflicting itself on the creator when in fact the demands of karma are internal to creation. When grace is required it comes from inside the creation via an avatar as the Bhagavad Gita puts it:
.
BG 4.8: To protect the righteous, to annihilate the wicked, and to reestablish the principles of dharma I appear on this earth, age after age

Within the creation the avatar is subject to birth and death and can interact with others to answer their prayers. There is no remote creator dependent on his creation but he must act from within the creation if he is to act in Isvara mode.

Bilimoria stresses again this ‘dependence’ aspect in his consideration of B.S.B. II.i.35:
Be that as it may, the uniqueness of the Hindu idea of the beginninglessness of the universe (in cyclical returns), and God’s dependence on the world (rather than the converse) renders God not as independent and existing outside of, nay prior to, the created world – which marks the idea of God in Judeo-Christian monotheistic doctrines. God is bound by the karmas of the individual creatures even after their selves have been dissolved along with the world.

This is in reference to the beginning-less nature of the Hindu creation which is periodically dissolved and reissued with the karmas of participants continuing on. Before you had the big bang you had the big contraction. And off to work we go.

Friday 9 August 2019

Nisargadatta Maharaj on Personality / Advice to a Seeker


Questioner: Why do you keep on dismissing the person as of no importance? Personality is the primary fact of our existence. It occupies the entire stage.

Maharaj: As long as you do not see that it is mere habit, built on memory, prompted by desire, you will think yourself to be a person – living, feeling , thinking, active, passive, pleased or pained. Question yourself, ask yourself. ‘Is it so?’ And soon you will see your mistake. And it is in the very nature of a mistake to cease to be, when seen.

The Questioner reveals some of his history:

I am an adopted child. My own father I do not know. My mother died when I was born. My foster father, to please my foster mother, who was childless, adopted me – almost by accident. He is a simple man – a truck owner and driver. My mother keeps the house. I am 24 years now. For the last two and a half years I am travelling, restless, seeking. I want to live a good life, a holy life. What am I to do?

Maharaj: Go home, take charge of your father’s business, look after your parents in their old age. Marry the girl who is waiting for you, be loyal, be simple, be humble. Hide your virtue, live silently. The five senses and the three qualities (gunas) are your eight steps in Yoga. And ‘I am’ is the Great Reminder (mahamantra). You can learn from them all you need to know. Be attentive, enquire ceaselessly. That is all.
(from I AM THAT: Talks with Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj )

The ‘I am’ is the focus on consciousness as such and not any particular conformation of it.

Thursday 8 August 2019

A Fairly Honourable Defeat by Iris Murdoch (pub.1970)


Published in 1970 the same year as The Sovereignty of the Good there is a certain ghosting through of the philosophical work in the novel. Julius King refers to the philosophy book that Rupert Foster is writing as ‘High Church Platonism’. Arguably that is what ‘Sovereignty’ is, with Good being God. At two points in the novel the question is asked – why is stealing wrong? Rupert replies at length with the force and clarity which no doubt earned him his first at Oxford where he met Axel and Julius King. Julius also has a go at an elucidation of stealing and its wrongness. In both case it is Tallis Browne who is asking the question.

Are you confused yet? Time to introduce the Dramatis Personae:
Rupert and Hilda Foster, he a senior civil servant, economics department, she a housewife with a multitude of committees to attend to.
Peter their only child, dropping out of Cambridge and gone to live with Tallis Browne a community worker and evening class lecturer.
Tallis Browne is the husband of Morgan, Hilda’s sister, back from America where she has been for the last two years. While there she was the mistress of Julius King. They have parted now.
Simon Foster is the brother of Rupert and the partner of Axel. The latter is a colleague of Rupert’s and an old friend from college days.

Well then, are we sitting comfortably? As the novel opens it is the 20th. Wedding anniversary of Rupert and Hilda. The time seems to be in the early 60’s, Rupert had a good war. I have never been able to quite get the insinuation of that expression. They are drinking champagne in the afternoon and getting a trifle squiffy. The Evening Standard has reported that Julius King is in England after a stint in Dibbins College heading up a military funded lab working on biological warfare. Nerve gas and anthrax resistant to antibiotics. He has given that up because he got bored with it. We are told that he is Jewish and independently wealthy. Julius is the arch manipulator, Mephistophelian meddler and the kingpin of this novel. He makes things happen with an malicious ingenuity which is quite credible given that all the characters other than Tallis Browne are self absorbed and not capable of noticing the damage done or if they have, doing anything about it. In contrast to the ghostly ‘Sovereignty of the Good’ we might subtitle this book ‘The Ebullience of Evil’.

Morgan Browne is an emotional wreck sustaining herself with lots of whiskey and gin. Morgan le Fay is a suggestion from her name, sexually predatory and the disciple of Merlin/Julius. She is a disturber and a creator of variance. Tallis Browne who will not divorce her lives in Notting Hill in utter filth which Murdoch has great fun describing. Have you ever been in a house where you step backwards onto a plastic bag which yields like dead puppies? Morgan visiting Tallis remembers that their previous house in Putney had a similar smell.

Axel and Simon live near to Rupert and Hilda in the posh Barons Court area. The minutiae of this relationship seems a parody of heterosexual marriage with fluttery airheaded Simon and stern sensible strict Axel. The closet is firmly closed to Axel’s colleagues in Whitehall. Even Simon when he first met met Axel did not know that he was ‘queer’. They met in the kouros annex of the National Museum in Athens quite by chance. That was some 3 years previously and the photo of the kouros resides on the left of the mantelpiece. Simon’s fear of the loss of the love of Axel is the lever that Julius uses to make him collude unknowingly with his plan to disturb the cosy relationships in his vicinity. How that is worked is a masterpiece of creative ingenuity of Murdoch’s.

It’s an excellent novel very well sustained with a good serving of evil that is in its way a demonstration of its privative quality. Confidence, faith, trust and love is taken away in a spirit of wilful caprice and when ruin ensues rationalisation follows. Probably one of her best books.

In case you are wondering why stealing is wrong:

Rupert, who had not had a philosophical training for nothing, was never startled by any question, however bizarre, and was ready at once to give it his undivided attention. He reflected now for a while, staring at Tallis. Then he said ‘Of course the concept of stealing is linked to the concept of property. Where there are no property rights there is no wrongful appropriation of the goods of another. In completely primitive situations where there is no society—if any such situations exist or existed—it could be argued that there are no property rights and so no stealing. Also in certain kinds of community, such as a monastery or conceivably a family, there could be mutual voluntary renunciations of property rights, so that within the community stealing would not exist by definition. Though even in these two cases what a man customarily uses such as his clothes or his tools might be thought of as natural property and ergo as deserving of respect. Indeed one might argue that it could never be right under any circumstances, to remove a man’s toothbrush against his will. However, in state and society as we know it, there is no prospect of any universal voluntary surrender of the concept of property, and extremely complicated property rights, extending far beyond the area of clothes and tools, appear to exist and are upheld by law. Doubtless many of these complex arrangements can be argued to be economically and politically necessary to the well-being and continuance of the state, and in a healthy open society the details of these arrangements are properly a matter for continual discussion and adjustment in the light of both expediency and morality. Acceptance of any society, and even a bad society gives its members many benefits, does seem to suggest a certain duty to respect property. In a bad undemocratic society there might of course exist specialized duties to disregard particular alleged property rights, or even to break the law as a matter of protest, though it should be kept in mind that there are always prima facie utilitarian arguments against stealing, in so far as people may be distressed by the removal of their goods. But in a democratic society stealing is surely wrong not only for utilitarian reasons but because property is an important part of a structure generally agreed to be good and whose alteration in detail can be freely sought.’
When Rupert had finished speaking Tallis waited as if there might be something more to come. He looked puzzled. Then he said, ‘Thank you very much, Rupert.’ And to Hilda, ‘Please forgive me, I must go. Don’t bother to see me to the door. Oh how kind of you. Thank you, good-bye, good-bye.’ He went away smiling and waving.
Hilda and Rupert walked back into the drawing room. They picked up their drinks. They stared at each other in complete bafflement.

If they knew that their son Peter was shoplifting with abandon they would be less puzzled.

Julius is asked the same question:
Why is stealing wrong?’
‘It’s just a matter of definition,’ said Julius.
‘How do you mean?’
‘It’s a tautology. “Steal” is a concept with a built-in pejorative significance. So to say that stealing is wrong is simply to say that what is wrong is wrong. It isn’t a meaningful statement. It’s empty.’
‘Oh. But does that mean that stealing isn’t wrong?’
‘You haven’t understood me,’ said Julius. ‘Remarks of that sort aren’t statements at all and can’t be true or false. They are more like cries or pleading. You can say “Please don’t steal” if you want to, so long as you realize that there’s nothing behind it. It’s all just conventions and feelings.’




Sunday 4 August 2019

Wittgenstein's Joke Book



Wittgenstein had the idea of a philosophy book composed entirely of jokes. Here's one for him.


******************
Psychiatrist: You're crazy
Patient: That's outrageous. I want a second opinion.
Psychiatrist: You're crazy.

Miracles: Slow and Fast


Mk : 6, 35-53:
The miracle of the multiplication of the loaves and fishes is followed closely by Jesus walking on the water.

And he got into the boat with them and the wind ceased. And they were utterly astounded, for they did not understand about the loaves, but their hearts were hardened.

In the slowly developing busyness of dividing out the picnic and heeding the cries of ‘what about us over here’, ‘you missed him’ and so on, there is a failure to notice what is wonderful. It would be the last thing that you would consider as a possibility, something in you, call it reality testing, would cry ‘fail’ to that hypothesis. More likely some of these people brought some bread along and seeing everybody eating have taken theirs out feeling that it was safe to do so. Nobody saw what was evident because it was blocked from their consciousness by their inner Hume but Jesus walking on the water was a shock that was impossible to gloss over.