Wednesday 30 October 2019

Religion escapes from Captivity


When you read this written by an unquestionably clever person you wonder what narrow definition of ‘religion’ is at work:

It is against the horizon of these principles that I listened to my students with great interest today as we began discussion of Lucretius’s atomistic metaphysics as outlined in De Rerum Natura.  In order to achieve ataraxia or tranquility and freedom from anxiety, we must overcome our two primary sources of anxiety:  fear produced as a result of religion (I think this is a bad translation, as the concept of religion as a distinct domain of human behavior and practice doesn’t really arise until the 17th century), and fear of death.
(from: larval on religion - Levi Bryant post)

Narrowly enough defined, almost anything, however paradoxical, will have some truth in it. The more you examine it the more exiguous that truth will appear till a climax of evanescence is achieved and in the light of common day it is seen as no more than a commonplace trope or a wikism.

The concept of religion was formed in the 16th and 17th centuries,[31][32] despite the fact that ancient sacred texts like the Bible, the Quran, and others did not have a word or even a concept of religion in the original languages and neither did the people or the cultures in which these sacred texts were written
(from Wikipedia on Religion:
Wikipedia on Religion)

That is wispy like the chocolate bar that is mostly air. Listen up babes, (I had to say that) what were the prophets on about, to what end were the great councils called? Are you in or are you out? Are you a people of God or are you a rabble? Everything does not have to have a ‘meta’ entry to exist. Conditions exceed their boundaries and enable poetry in their escape from captivity.

Sunday 27 October 2019

Swedish 'lycka'


Is the ‘luck of the Swedes’ a rationalisation of envy (cf. Previous post). The migrants want what they have without the history that the Swedes have put into it. One thinks of the golfer who remarked ‘ I’m lucky and the more I practice the luckier I get’. There has been a long process which has culminated in a democracy which gives the most in foreign aid as a percentage of its G.N.I.

Out of the DAC countries, Sweden was the most generous – it was the first to meet the 0.7% target in 1974 – donating 1.1% of its GNI to foreign aid, which works out at about $6.2bn. Next came Luxembourg, at 1.07%, then Norway at 0.99% and Denmark at 0.85%. The UK was fifth, higher than Germany at 0.41%, France at 0.36% and Switzerland at 0.49%. In total the UK spent $19bn on foreign aid last year, compared to $16bn from Germany and $10bn from France.

So they do a lot for the ‘Chadian’ who is working on his luck at home but the ‘Chadian’ who is unskilled and is taken in often ends up S.O. Swede Luck. Just Google ‘migrant problems in Sweden’ to get a general idea of how sudden mass low-skilled immigration creates problems for the host country no matter how well meaning they are. You might say that the final stage of envy namely destroying that which you cannot achieve, has been attained.

Friday 25 October 2019

Those Lucky Old Swedes




When you read this you realise why philosopher kings are such a very bad idea. The deviation towards ‘wokeness’ works like an iron mountain on their nous compass. In their little plane they can’t clear its height. Slightly scathed they emerge from the wreck and in their helpful piping voices continue to explain, explain, explain.



The staggering levels of international inequality would not be so objectionable if the typical Swede had done something to deserve a better life than the typical Chadian, for instance, but the truth, of course, is that Swedes were merely lucky to have been born in Sweden rather than Chad. And given this, what justification could the Swedes have for putting guns at their borders to deter Chadians from trying to move north and take advantage of the preferable social, political and economic environment? In the eyes of cosmopolitan egalitarians, they have none. As Joseph Carens puts it, “Citizenship in Western liberal democracies is the modern equivalent to feudal privilege—an inherited status that greatly enhances one’s life chances. Like feudal birthrights privileges, restrictive citizenship is hard to justify when one thinks about it closely.” (Carens 1987: 252)
(from Immigration entry Stanford Ency. Phil.)

Wednesday 23 October 2019

Noreen Bawn (Blonde Noreen)


While I'm on the subject of emigration here's a repost from 2014:

Emigration and Noreen Bawn

On Crooked Timber they are discussing Joseph Carens' book The Ethics of Immigration . He advocates open borders and the posters are in general anxious to maintain access for all to that country which is a home away from home and a refuge for all requiring no passport. There is no let or hindrance when you turn up in Utopia.

In Ireland we know about emigration. We know that it's not a good thing for all the usual reasons that are given at the departure lounge of airports at Christmas in the now traditional t.v. news segment One imagines the producer saying – 'find some crushed rednecks'. Going abroad for adventure is excellent, being virtually expelled is not. Is it better to receive than to send? Employer groups think that it fosters wage correction, a sum that is always rounded down.

This country is broke yet our social welfare and unemployment benefit is higher than Britain's. We know that sending our young people away by the infliction of dole penury is a stupid waste. The open borders position has a cool anarchic flavour but it's as bad for them as for us. There is an obverse side to the reparation argument which if we agree has merit applies also to those that stuck it out. They are owed too.

Noreen Bawn (Blonde) emigration ballad written by Neil MacBride from Creeslough, Donegal in early 20C.

Two versions running the gamut but avoiding the C&W.


traditional noreen bawn

Baroque funky noreen bawn

Tuesday 22 October 2019

The Emigrant by John Masefield


The Emigrant
by John Masefield


Going by Daly's shanty I heard the boys within
Dancing the Spanish hornpipe to Driscoll's violin,
I heard the sea-boots shaking the rough planks of the floor,
But I was going westward, I hadn't heart for more.

All down the windy village the noise rang in my ears,
Old sea-boots stamping, shuffling, it brought the bitter tears,
The old tune piped and quavered, the lilts came clear and strong,
But I was going westward, I couldn't join the song.

There were the grey stone houses, the night wind blowing keen,
The hill-sides pale with moonlight, the young corn springing green,
The hearth nooks lit and kindly, with dear friends good to see,
But I was going westward, and the ship waited me.

The pathos of the missing syllable in the last line. Your heart drops with it.

Thursday 17 October 2019

Masculine, Feminine and Neuter Gender. Male, Female and Undecided.


It might be useful to try and trace the history of the present muddle about gender. It used, not long ago, to be a term in grammar. There were masculine, feminine, and neuter nouns so called by convention. They might as well have beeen called x, y, and z nouns. Some literal minded people were puzzled by the masculine and feminine appellation. How was ‘patria’ feminine? How is ‘cailin’ (girl) masculine in Irish? Is this early Celtic gender confusion? In other words there was an analogical extension from ‘feminine’ to female. Sex as Vilfredo Pareto often remarks is a very powerful residue.

As with the conventional ascription of gender in nouns the notion of the conventional applied to male and female arose. Each society has its folk ways, roles, duties and so on. True and useful; however to go on from there and to equate gender (masculine/feminine) as convention with sex (male/female) as convention is a category error. Of course it is also true that male and female conventional roles arise out of sexual differences.

So where are we now? Essentially this: I like what is conventionally supposed to be feminine so therefore I am a woman. On the other hand you are the rightful King of France.

Monday 14 October 2019

Sir Roger Scruton FBA, Conservative and Heretic


The faggots are piled around the feet of the heretic and the executioner is about to apply the torch when a messenger rides up. The Grand Inquisitor shrugs as he reads the missive whose red wax captured ribbon flutters like a tiny premonitory flame. He gruffly commands:

- Stay your hand, release him. Roger of Scruton Hall, there has been a change of plan. You are to be raised a knight of the realm and a member of the British Academy. Wealth will be yours and fame. Depart from here, unshriven and recalcitrant.

You would have thought that heresy was a dwindling trade but Sir Roger Scruton FBA has made a go of it. He started early at the age of 24 when in Paris in ‘68 as an onlooker of the student riots. ‘Twerps’. He has not deviated from that judgment since then.

In 1980 he published his book The Meaning of Conservatism and in 2015 Confessions of a Heretic a collection of essays. So what, the young fogy has become an old fogy even if he’s right and he is . Conservatism is as various as the societies in which it is rooted. Because of this when Scruton talks out of the American side of his mouth he utters things which would shock the English cultivar. The generalisations which would assimilate both, miss the point and Scruton is correct when he holds that Conservatism is not discursive but a pre-emptive feeling of distrust of novelty and downright disgust with murderous utopian social engineering schemes.

Here he is on Environmentalism:

Environmentalism has all the hall-marks of a left-wing cause: a class of victims (future generations), an enlightened vanguard who fights for them (the eco-warriors), powerful philistines who exploit them (the capitalists), and endless opportunities to express resentment against the successful, the wealthy and the West. The style too is leftist: the environmentalist is young, dishevelled, socially disreputable, his mind focused on higher things; the opponent is dull, middle aged, smartly dressed and usually American. The cause is designed to recruit the intellectuals, with facts and theories carelessly bandied about, and activism encouraged.
(from Confessions of a Heretic)

That seems to this reader to be reactive malignant Batesonian symmetrical thinking. He corrects towards the complementary after this salute to his constituency and he displays the fairness which is a strength of Conservatism.

However, the cause of the environment is not, in itself, a left-wing cause at all. It is not about ‘liberating’ or empowering the victim, but about safeguarding resources. It is not about ‘progress’ or ‘equality’ but about conservation and equilibrium. Its following may be young and dishevelled; but that is largely because people in suits have failed to realise where their real interests, and their real values, lie. Environmentalists may seem opposed to capitalism, but – if they understood matters correctly – they would be far more opposed to socialism, with its gargantuan, uncorrectable and state-controlled projects, than to the ethos of free enterprise. Indeed, environmentalism is the quintessential conservative cause, the most vivid instance in the world as we know it, of that partnership between the dead, the living and the unborn, which Burke defended as the conservative archetype.

‘Free enterprise’ - the American side of his mouth and with its insinuation of untrammelled, a proven error. I ask myself about Thunbergian doom – Have we been here before? Do you remember the Y2K bug that was to bring massive disruption and queues at the border. Or am I thinking of Brexit? Nothing happened very quickly then and now what? Let’s be prudent. Go green with nuclear power stations and less meat eating and please knock those useless wind farms that deface the land.

Both books are worth reading.



Sunday 6 October 2019

Sri Swami Satchidanandendra Saraswati on Sri Harsha


Was Sri Swami Satchidanandendra Saraswati (Sri SSS) correct when he said that Sri Harsha did not understand the true method of vedanta?(Chap.14:285) Next two question arising from that is (a) what is the true method of vedanta and (b) how did he fail to understand it?

In Chap.3:20 of his Method of Vedanta Sri SSS expresses it thusly:
The Method of False Attribution followed by Retraction underlies other forms of Vedanta Teaching (Adhyaropa/Apavada). It is found throughout the Upanishads, Gita and Brahma Sutras.

What Sri Harsha fails to understand is that the search for truth through dialogue which brings clarification is not served by the stultification of your interlocutors. Even honest error has a perspective which can be corrected. It may even bring focus to an issue by displaying a characteristic misstep. Inquiry has many landing points which are partial and false. They are surpassed by a new vision. This is the process known as sublation.

In fact we are all wrong and ‘nobody knows anything’.

There is one false attribution that is the root cause of all others. It is due to its presence that the other erroneous ideas come into being and work mischief during the time of their existence. So the Upanishads single out this error and call it metaphysical ignorance (avidya). And the knowledge whereby one establishes the true nature of metaphysical reality through negating that error is called enlightenment (vidya).
(Chap.3:22)

Note: adhiropa is the transliteration that I first came across. adhyaropa is now more usual so I will use that in future and it ties in with adhyasa - superimposition

Thursday 3 October 2019

Yellow Vests abú (forever)


Recall:
veist bui(yellow vest)

Well it’s settled. The leasee of the hotel that was going to be presented as a direct provision centre for asylum seekers has withdrawn his contract submission and the project is now scrapped. After trying to tag the protestors with the racist label the minister advised them to ‘step back’. Now they are doing the step back boogie.

They wrought it very cleverly keeping the overt racists quite and allowing those that are against direct provision on humanitarian grounds to seem to be central to the protest. What then was the main unspoken objection to the centre as well as the entirely justified resentment at having your village population increased by 20% without any enhancement of infrastructure and without consultation as a fait accompli. The general sentiment in the country at large is that asylum seekers are for the most part economic migrants without any real claim to refugee status. They can’t even be bothered to make up a good story because they rely on administrative delay to prolong the process and then they will have to be allowed to stay.

At a subconscious level too is the memory of the tragedy of emigration from Ireland. We know that it is not a good thing when the young leave in droves. It should not be encouraged. As well as that the economic migrants are often from the better off segment of their societies who can afford to pay the smugglers large sums of money for their transportation. Why should they be favoured over genuine impoverished refugees that languish in camps? The Norway solution of quick decision on status followed by deportation in the case of rejection seems to be working for them. There direct provision centres are closing down not opening. Here in Ireland there has been a 26% increase in asylum applications this year over that of the whole of last year. Céad míle fáilte!

Tuesday 1 October 2019

Sri Harsha: The Reader over your Shoulder


If the reader over your shoulder is a type of Sri Harsha (12th.C). be very afraid because you are going to be found out. I would defend the right of Sri Harsha to controvert everything and offer no positive teaching of his own unless you regard what he impugned as an limning by way of negative space. His positive thesis may be in a book now lost. In the particular book that I am referring to, the Khandana Khanda the scrutiny of his eagle eye has lit on the Nyaya school often referred to as 'the logicians'. Their programme as stated by Ganganath Jha in his introduction to the translation of the work - KhKh

The things, or categories, whose correct knowledge leads to the attainment of the highest aim of human existence, are (according to the Nyaya), the following sixteen—The Instruments of Right Cognition, the Objects of Right Cognition, Doubt, Motive, Example, Doctrine, Factors of Inference, Hypothetical Reasoning, Demonstrated Truth,. Discussion, Disputation, Wrangling, Fallacious Reason, Perversion, Casuistry and Clinchers. (Gautama’s Sutra 1-1-1). The most important among these are the Instruments of Cognition*and the Objects of Cognition; all the rest are of subordinate importance, being aids to the Instruments-of Cognition.

One of the points at issue is whether it is necessary for fruitful dialogue that both parties should admit the existence of the valid means of knowledge ie. the pramanas. That may not be necessary for in fact for without that, incoherence, inconsistency and self-contradiction could be found in the definitions of the opponent. Reductio ad absurdum can proceed without any commitment to the existence of the means of valid knowledge. Sri Harsha would hold that we can prescind from a committment to the existence of pramanas and still offer therapy to the holder of faulty definitions of experience, memory, perception, and recognition.

Sri Harsha states:
Not at all. We do not say that debate is to be undertaken having admitted that the means of valid knowledge do not exist, but that debate may be undertaken by individuals who are indifferent to the question whether the means of valid knowledge do exist or whether the means of valid knowledge do not exist, and yet carry on just as you do having admitted their existence. Were this not the case, even this fault adduced by you, having misconstrued our viewpoint to be that the means of valid knowledge do not exist, could not be stated.
(trans. by Phyllis Granoff from Philosophy and Argument in Late Vedanta: Sri Harsha's KhKh)