Sometime ago – more than 45 years, when food was still plentiful in communist Romania – I heard for the first time that ‘many people dig their graves with their teeth’. I was too young to understand the deeper meaning of this. That sooner or later each of us will meet the consequences of our previous decisions.
15 years ago I read a book written when I was a toddler. Almost 60 years ago. The Social Construction of Reality by Berger and Luckmann.
The fact that propaganda machines give too much power to symbols doesn’t mitigate the fact that some people find that flying the confederate flag is intended as an offense.
For something to become a resource, it has to be identified first. As such…
Coming back to Kissinger, we need first to accept that he is the product of the world before him and one of the factors who continues to shape the current one.
We can learn from him – and coldly assess the present situation in order to avoid past mistakes going forward – or … we can let him win! And follow in his footsteps: Divide et impera, manipulate people into doing things against their own nature, despise everybody who thinks differently than what we consider to be right …
A first glance, it doesn’t make much sense to put an oilman in charge of a COP conference. Nothing more than setting a wolf to guard sheep, right?
On the other hand, shepherd dogs are nothing but ‘converted’ wolves. Wolves who had somehow figured out that it’s more sustainable to live with the humans than in the wild. Former wolves who had somehow figured out that’s far more sustainable – for them, to protect the sheep than to prey on them.
OK, the agent driving the process had been human. But the facts remain. Dogs have evolved from wolves.
What are we waiting for? If the descendants of the wolves had been able to ‘cross over’, why so many reasonable people continue to believe that the ‘Global Warming’ is a hoax? After all, we’re the ones supposed to be reasonable… And the way I see it, it’s unreasonable to believe that burning fossil fuel accumulated during millions of years can be ‘sustainable’. Forget about ‘peak oil’ and ‘peak gas’ and remember how hot the Earth was when the first drop of fossil fuel had been set aside by Mother Nature.
‘Self awareness’ is how we call our ability to observe ourselves while observing others. Humberto Maturana
First and foremost, existence is a concept. Something our forefathers had coined. A mental construct built by talking about it.
Nothing existed before we saw it AND talked about it!
Think about the stars nobody knew about until we used Hubble to peek into the history of the Universe.
Think about the stars which ‘sit’ there and no man will ever see. Or otherwise perceive. Think! Do they, the stars, actually exist?
In the sense that has their being been ‘measured’ into existence by a self aware observer? Has that observation been communicated by the observer to anybody else? Who had confirmed that that observation was anything more than a mere illusion?
You see, both actually – my rantings on your monitor – and figuratively, I don’t need to be told about the existence of the steps I have to climb up and down when I leave my bed each morning. On the other hand, I know that the Amazon exists because I’ve been told about it. Further more, I see for my self the steps in my house but I have a name for them – and I can write about them – because our forefathers had learned to speak. About the world they were discovering around themselves.
My point? We speak things into existence, not into being.
‘How about the things we talk about before we’ve ‘seen’ them? Neptune, the planet, had been ‘calculated’ before ‘seen’ and all mass manufactured things are first discussed and only then launched into production. Which was the exact moment when each of them had started to exist?’
Good question! I’m afraid I have no valid answer. This is a matter which will remain open for further debate! After all, how else to justify our existence? How else to find our own meaning? Other than by talking about it?
“Better to be a dog in times of tranquility than a human in times of chaos.” The true version of the Chinese ‘curse’ too many times translated in English as “May you live in interesting times”
Not so long ago, a presidential candidate told his audience “People… my people are so smart!….And loyal! you know, I could shoot someone on the 5th Avenue and not loose votes!”
As things happened, he was right. His people did vote for him. He, a guy who had previously bragged about ‘grabbing women by the pu$$y’.
Four years later, the People changed their mind. And voted to send him back to Mar-a-lago… He told ‘his’ people the vote had been rigged. The ‘smart ones’ believed Trump to the tune of eventually chasing Vice-president Pence all over the Capitol in an attempt to convince him to ditch the result of the vote. Against all evidence, as certified by all pertinent authorities.
Currently, there is an increasing number of people floating the idea that ‘democracy’ isn’t for everybody. The notion isn’t exactly new – see the ‘debate’ pitting ‘republic’ against ‘democracy’ – but lately its promoters have become even more brazen. They posit that since people are not equally endowed – intellectually, mostly – they should be tested before being allowed to vote. Nothing new under the sun? The whole thing is nothing more than a rehash of the notion put forward by Robert Heinlein in Starship Troopers?
Not exactly! Heinlein proposed that full citizenship – including the right to vote – should be extended exclusively to those willing to put their life on the line. ‘If you want to decide the future, you need to commit yourself to defending the present. With your life, if necessary’. Quite a difference from ‘I’m not OK with how you may vote so I’m going to look for ways to disenfranchise you, under various pretenses.’
The way I see this, we’re confronted by two things. An increasing lack of trust amongst us. And an burgeoning amount of intellectual dishonesty.
“A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.“
As per the United States Constitution, Arms are supposed to be kept and borne with the main goal of protecting the free State. Which State was supposed to be governed by a government “of the people, by the people, for the people“. Nowadays, under the pretext that ‘the government is more often the problem than the solution’, the defenders of the Second Amendment “as it was written” maintain that Arms are necessary so that the people may defend itself against an overbearing government.
Otherwise put, whenever I don’t like the outcome of an election, I need to be able to start a(n) (un)civil war. An attitude born out of a complete distrust in our fellow citizens’ ability to vote ‘right’.
And a simpler version. I don’t trust all my fellow citizens’ ability to vote reasonably but I trust all my fellow citizens enough to let them walk around armed to their teeth. Unconditionally, in some states.
Coming back to Marcus Aurelius’ pronouncement, who is the one smart enough to determine whether those 10 000 actually have no idea about the subject at hand? Not to mention the fact that Marcus Aurelius never actually said it…. Wrote it, more precisely.
And why do I choose to believe this guy Sadler instead of trusting the bloke who had created the meme? Because Sadler makes sense. And because Sadler had put his name forward – remember Heinlein? – instead of cloaking himself in the shadows of the internet.
People act as if the world is as each of them sees it.
The world is as it is. Only nobody knows how… And, probably, never will.
What we act upon, and interfere with, is the world as we see it. Here being the interesting part.
All other living things mostly react to the world. Even our brain uses much – some say ‘most – of its processing power to react rather than act. Our body is able to survive even when our frontal cortex – the portion of the brain where thinking takes place, has been knocked out of action. When we’re fast asleep, drunk, ‘high’, low, in a coma… In fact, an organism doesn’t need to ‘see’, in order to react. To breathe, to eat, to perform bodily functions, to reproduce…
Things become more and more complicated, indeed, as we climb the evolutionary ladder. Complicated for us… who attempt to understand what’s going… not for those living on each of the steps… Things are complicated only for those trying to ‘see’!
It’s easy, for us, to consider that a dung beetle which carries food for its future offspring is acting instinctively. It’s a little bit more complicated when we observe a troop of chimpanzee and notice how deliberately the alpha male leads his ‘subjects’ and the complex social life of the community …
But the difference between how the chimpanzee and the humans interact with reality is wide enough for us, humans, to consider ourselves as having risen ‘above the fray’. As being special enough to deserve a special status!
And what is it which makes us so special? Our ability to speak? To walk on two legs? To write? None of the above!
It’s our ability to ‘see’ the difference between us and the rest of the world!
All other living organisms behave as if they belong to nature. To the reality surrounding them. We humans, behave as if we own reality.
While the rest of the living things react to what’s happening to them – even when they plan ahead – we, humans, deliberately – and presumably in a conscious manner – transform the reality according to what we consider to be our needs.
“And Jesus said unto them, Because of your unbelief: for verily I say unto you, If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye shall say unto this mountain, Remove hence to yonder place; and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible unto you.” Matthew, 17:20
Apparently, the quote above doesn’t make much sense. No matter how much faith one has, telling a mountain to ‘remove to yonder place’ will yield nothing more than a wasted breath.
On the other hand… 2000 years is a lot. Erosion has moved many a mountains in this time… After all, Jesus didn’t say anything about how fast will the mountain remove itself after it had been told to…
OK, jokes aside, nowadays it’s a lot easier for us to remove a (smallish) mountain than it was in those times. We currently use cranes and lorries instead of mere words … but we still wouldn’t start before convincing ourselves that it’s possible. That our goal is within our grasp. At least notionally.
The truth of the matter being that we live now in a better world.
According to our benchmarks. We live longer and have it a lot easier!
But is our world really better? According to other benchmarks… Biodiversity loss, spoiled environment, continued human exploitation…
Let me put it differently. What was the thing which had set apart the abrahamic faith from all other religions? The notion that all people had been made in the image of the creator god. As a consequence of how they’ve been made, they – the people – are not only equal – cast in the same mould, but also harboring a divine spark. The image they share being that of a god, not an ordinary one…
What difference does this make? Democracy, capitalism, free market… all things we consider to be capital to our well being are based on the notion that all people are equal and have to be treated as such. Otherwise why bother with what the other has to say about anything?
I’ll repeat the question. Is our world really better?
Forget about biodiversity, pollution and quality of life. Do we continue to consider our brethren to be equal to us? Do we really hear them out when they speak to us?
How are we to achieve our goal – whatever that might be, if we don’t coordinate our faith? If we don’t hear out what the others have to say about anything?
My previous post was about reification. About the fact that each of us acts according to their faith. According to their belief that the world is as each of us sees it. |How are we going to coordinate our efforts towards a common goal – a better place for all of us to live in, if we don’t hear what each of us has to say about where we’re going?
Allow me to put it bluntly. To cut the .. c…orner. -;).
People act as if the world is as they see it!
Would you get up in the morning if there was no tomorrow?!? So, in reality, it’s faith which keeps the world spinning!
Our world… Earth spins on its own! But our world, the one we live in, is kept together by our faith! By our own conviction that we’ll get up from bed tomorrow. That there’s something worthwhile getting up for.
nicichiarasa 