Tag: Philosophy

Plato on drugs? I don’t believe it;I do believe it

PHILOSOPHY_AND_LITERATURE_01

http://becomingintegral.com/2013/09/19/was-plato-on-drugs/t

This is not a book but a blog.It’s really fascinating.not just th above article but for all its other thoughtful

discussions.If you are not a philosopher still many pieces are understandable to the general reader.

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Book review:The society of timid souls by Polly Morland

shades of grey

The book I am reading now is called”, The Society of Timid Souls”  written by Polly Morland.

Here is a very good in depth review of it and a photo of a bull fight

http://www.theguardian.com/books/2013/may/19/timid-souls-polly-morland-review

She is a good writer,mainly in journalism and also she works  making documentaries.The title comes from a Society that existed in New York starting around the time of Pear Harbour.It was for musiciand too timid ti play in public.From that which ended in 1946 she goe on to look at many situations which need courage such as bravery in war,in giving birth,in bull fighting.She is well read and has studied Aristotle,read Beowulf and many other serious  books and writings.Yet it is not a very difficult read.[I like hard books because I read them several times so they last longer.]The  intriguing part so far is about animals and birds which won awards for bravery.. such as pigeons in WW2 and whether an animal can be brave in the true sense.I have read half this book and strongly recommend it as suitable to a wide range of readers and also because it makes reading Aristotle seem normal,not just for scholars and academics

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aristotelian_ethics

You can get Ethics by Aristotle as a free kindle book

You have to pay a little for Nichomacean Ethics and there is more than one translation so look inside before you buy it.I feel amazed by his thinking and wonder  if we’ve gone backwards

We need to trust the world before we can see

tWeeds or flowers I have become interested in virtue and perception.It began when I read  a little Aristotle about virtue being a habit.That was quite recent.Before that for many years I believed virtuous acts would follow from being able to perceive well.But when we are fraught our minds and eyes tighten up and so we perceive only what may be a danger to us.To perceive others well we need to be in a position to trust others and we need to feel secure.How is this possible?From my studies I read that our ability to trust begins with a trusted caregiver in infancy,[See” atttachment and loss “by John Bowlby reference to come] We may be able to become more secure later by good fortune,friendship and love.If not,I seem to get the idea that if we are insecure and nervous we cannot truly perceive others and they may be in the same position.If we are very afraid then virtuous acts may be hard to accomplish. The reason is obvious… when. we are concerned with  mere survival as a person , in that state what we do to others  may be impossible for us to consider.We cannot truly see them and so we cannot act well towards them except by good luck.Or if we are able to tolerate great anxiety,we may see better…. if not we are incapable…. Those whom we cannot see properly we cannot truly consider with feeling  and act on this feeling.We see them partly or mainly in terms of the fearful fantasies in our minds and cannot see them as  other and interesting.When we make a friend online we may feel safer but in fact we are more likely to misperceive them. When we are from a sad a or difficut background it may help greatly if we have some friends who might point out our errors if we trust enough to tell them.Or we may pretend to be hard and tough.Neither leads to virtue.If we trust God it may help but I believe we see God through the lens of our parents.. which is not good…depending on the parents. When we live in fear,we cannot see what is there before us.We cannot let go.We cannot accept grace and love nor give it.We will try to live by will power.Ironically people who are fearful inside can develop a shell of toughness and pride and so are not seen as vulnerable  and/or lovable.Tbey may seem frightening to others. This account may help to explain why politics is the way it is and also  we see that arguing is not persuasive when the other is not able to open up and see things more broadly.Arguing makes us tighten up and see less well.And it can be frightening too though some cultures find it more acceptable than others.

Here are some relevant blogs and articles

This author had a lot to say about perception… http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/obituary-marion-milner-1163951.html   http://susannanelson.wordpress.com/2014/03/02/happy-go-lucky/

http://glimpsejournal.wordpress.com/2014/05/11/the-real-bees-knees-stunning-micro-view-of-the-workers-behind-your-mothers-day-flowers/

Levinas,books etc

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I have received several books now written by or about Levinas.As you guess,they are quite hard so my time is taken up reading.The most hopeful one,The          Cambridge Guide,is not here yet.but I think it will be more understandable than the others to an ignorant person like myself. I am unsure what I’ve done but this  is coming out very much to one side so I shall just say.Hello and continue with my studies.I like this shy lion picture.

PS.Just got the Cambridge Guide and it looks quite approachable.

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Levinas

BionSexual healingvivian-gornick_0hannaarendtsudomenica16ye8TillichMargaretDrabbleBW75wittgensteinMunch-studio-Getty95002154I have got another book by Levinas.I am planning to spend a few days reading and meditating…so i should have much to write about next week.I am very affected by the notion of the meaning of how encounter another and how ethics is the primary essence of philosphy

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Could Wittgenstein well?

Do you think philosophy’s monotonous?

Prefer  an elephant to a  hippopotamus?

Do not feel sad

When joy can be had

From seeing which writes are dichotomous.

A plunesh bull in a kitch
A plunesh bull in a kitch

Is your spelling far wurse than myne?

Are your thoughts far from sublyme?

Could Jacques Derrida spell?

Could Wittgenstein well?

Answering these questions will take up our tyme

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I am really surprised /pleased about the number of people reading here

Drabble

Margaret Drabble when young

When I moved from books to Philosophy I was not expecting a lot of readers but I have had far more than I thought and so I have continued again after I thought I’d stop.So as I have thought before,people do like serious reading  and thinking about thinking.

I shall try to put on more about books too.I am reading the latest Margaret Drabble this week,The pure gold baby.It seems very light reading after Heidegger and co.Which is nice..

I would like to discover an introduction to modern literary crticism as i find it hard to get into.I am unsure if it needs to be so difficult….

.

MargaretDrabbleBW75
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I’m finding Derrida de-structured

wittgensteinMunch-studio-Getty95002154

I’m finding Derrida  de-structured

And Levinas‘ face makes me smile

Who would have conjectured

That one day I’d lecture

On  thoughfullness and all its trials?

I  prefer Kierkegaard to Sartre

Who sometimes makes me feel queer.

Who would have expected

That words would be texted

As men smoked cigarettes and drank beer?

Some people like reading Jane Austen

While others juggle with Wittgensein.

Who would have discarded

The notes in the margins?

How sweetly these words recombine

Munch liked to paint people screaming,
his premonitions  were strong
Who else would have expected
The human destruction
Europe brought to the world before long?

For the bold:Moral relativism

????

If like me you get hooked on philosophy the NYT has many intriguing articles such has this one.

Is it the case that atheism will damage our morals or those of our children?Can you have morals without religion?Ethics may  or may not need a religious base.Now  Bible reading is diminishing  is that leading to trouble?

Quotes tagged as “relativism”  Goodreads
Michel de Montaigne

“When I play with my cat, who knows if I am not a pastime to her more than she is to me?”
― Michel de Montaigne, Apology for Raymond Sebond
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Intellectual perspective

What is humor except crossing a boundary?
I wish I were an ivy growing on your wall
I wish I were a berry
Just about to fall
I wish I were a hazelnut
And you would break a tooth
For my name is Sally
and not, and not,not Ruth
Image
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Philosophy blogs

http://leiterreports.typepad.com/blog/

A little hard but good and worth noting

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Sad news for literature and languages studies

 

In the USA and in the UK  we find fewer people are studying the humanities.Here it is because of the economic climate.. people wish to study “useful” subjects.Literature won’t get you a job,perhaps.It only enables you to live better.Already in schools the study of Greek and Latin has almost gone.

Economics still gets students………. odd considering that economists did not forecast the recession but were up to their necks in mathematical models.Economicis not a science and cannot be.I believe it’s a branch of philosophy in a broad sense.

I admit I did not study what we called “The Arts” at University but most of my friends did.But I read poetry.I liked Auden greatly.I read all the great novels.I read Doris Lessing and Iris Murdoch.I read Evelyn Waugh/I even read Nabokov…. what a writer!And I read Shakespeare Plays.

But with the much higher fees,recession and other worries,fewer students will spend three years studying the humanities.Plumbing or Carpentry are better options

I am thinking of writing some new plays.

A  Fit Plumber’s Nightly Schemes

Witches astir.

Ham to let.

Sing Fear.

Make up for the Mind

A Midsummer Balls Up.

The Emptiest.

Please defreeze me,let me grow.

A man without limits

Much Ado about Hacking.

As you Recycle it.

Julius Seized the Emails.

Fool Us and Squeeze Us.

Twelfth Fright.

Hacked to Death.

The Blaming of the Guru,

Prospero Not.

http://www.debate.org/opinions/are-the-arts-too-elitist

http://theamericanscholar.org/the-decline-of-the-english-department/?key=55705194

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From thinking to thoughtfulness

 

A week or two ago I was thinking about thinking.There is more than one kind of thinking.Some kinds,like rumination, are  often self destructive.Other kinds of thinking can turn one outside of one’s self and can become what I call “thoughtfulness”.And that is a a virtue.It combines awareness and caring towards others with standing back and considering what is best for them and ourselves.

Then there is what we might call ” blind thinking” which is totally self centred like the  chattering voices in our head

I want that red dress,he’s nasty,I am fed up being at work. so long…………all going on underneath our consciousness much of the time.We may be unaware of it but it can affect us and how we act towards others.It’s childish,turned inwards and trivial.Can we stop it? I am thinking about that,,, not brooding.I mean,my mind is open and I hope some new ideas will come to help me understand this blind thinking

How can we see and not be blind in our thinking?How can we be wise?

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Is it Righteous to Be?: Interviews with Emmanuel Lévinas

I am very  pleased to say I have just ordered this after reading some of it on Google Scholar.If you are interested in Philosophy of the last century and in history then I urge you to read it.Because unless you are educated in philosophy it’s easier to get a grasp of his ideas through interviews where he  is answering questions from other people.I like this type of book even when it’s a novelist or a poet or artist.Something attracts me to the idea of interaction between two people

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A review of a book about Levinas’s philosophy

http://owenbynhei.livejournal.com/31259.html

I am still reading about Levinas,You can download an e boook here

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Thoughtfulness:Some reflections

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/thoughtfulnes

I became embroiled in “thinking” but I am more interested in thoughtfulness.To me this is connected to reflection and care.To be a thoughtful person I need to be involved with society.A thinker may remain aloof… and if you are a ruminator or a brooder this will detach you from the world of others too.So there’s a paradox  here about thinking and thought.

The other problem with thinking using logic and reasoning is the question of the premises you use.If they are not sensible,if they are wrong, if they are poor then thinking is entirely vain.And also by a careful choice of  premises or assumptions almost anything can be “proved”

Syllogisms can be useful but really what do they tell you except something you most likely already know

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What is ethics?

From Paul Gordon

 

“In particular, Levinas argued that ethics is responsibility for the other, that this responsibility precedes knowledge and, moreover, has nothing whatsoever to do with reciprocity, that is I do not do something in order to get something in return. Furthermore, Levinas argued, it is this ethical responsibility which constitutes me as a subject, it is the meaning of my subjectivity. Ethics, in the very particular sense that Levinas gives it, is at the heart of psychotherapy,”

Gordon, Paul (2012-12-15). Face to Face (Kindle Locations 585-589). Paul Gordon. Kindle Edition.

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An article about critical thinking

http://www.criticalthinking.org/pages/becoming-a-critic-of-your-thinking/478

The above website is very good,in my view

EXTRACT

Thinking Gets Us Into Trouble Because We Often:
  • jump to conclusions
  • fail to think-through implications
  • lose track of their goal
  • are unrealistic
  • focus on the trivial
  • fail to notice contradictions
  • accept inaccurate information
  • ask vague questions
  • give vague answers
  • ask loaded questions
  • ask irrelevant questions
  • confuse questions of different types
  • answer questions we are not competent to answer
  • come to conclusions based on inaccurate or irrelevant information
  • ignore information that does not support our view
  • make inferences not justified by our experience
  • distort data and state it inaccurately
  • fail to notice the inferences we make
  • come to unreasonable conclusions
  • fail to notice our assumptions
  • often make unjustified assumptions
  • miss key ideas
  • use irrelevant ideas
  • form confused ideas
  • form superficial concepts
  • misuse words
  • ignore relevant viewpoints
  • cannot see issues from points of view other than our own
  • confuse issues of different types
  • are unaware of our prejudices
  • think narrowly
  • think imprecisely
  • think illogically
  • think one-sidedly
  • think simplistically
  • think hypocritically
  • think superficially
  • think ethnocentrically
  • think egocentrically
  • think irrationally
  • do poor problem solving
  • make poor decisions
  • are poor communicators
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Thinking too much or the wrong kind of thinking?

I do not agree that having thoughts,ideas or words in your head  means that you are thinking.You may be obsessing or tormenting yourself….

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Some quotes:

“Five percent of the people think;
ten percent of the people think they think;
and the other eighty-five percent would rather die than think.”
― Thomas A. Edison

THINKING TOO MUCH?

http://www.wikihow.com/Stop-Thinking-Too-Much

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Heidegger did one service: He showed us that thinking is not enough

When we say someone is a great thinker,what do we mean?And can someone be a great thinker about some aspects of life,the world,society,philosophy and a very poor thinker in other aspects?Naturally I am thinking about Heidegger.Greatly admired,influential and a tutor to the likes of Hanna Arendt.

We could say he  did us a service in reminding us that not even a great philosopher is always a good judge of society,politics and new  ideas.Moreover,he must have shut his eyes to the attacks on Jewish people across Germany….How can this be?I hear someone saying,thinking is not enough if it is restricted to what is safe to think about.Character,ethical status,love of humanity seem to be absent from some of our academics and scholars.And  how much more is that likely when our Universities  are run as profit making  businesses where the number of citations you receive is the measure of your work’s worth…. so noone may ever read it yet if you ask all your colleagues,friends and contacts to cite you then success and acclaim await.Meanwhile society crumbles,the poor are punished  and  old made anxious.

Re Hannah Arendt  [ Wikipedia’

Film

In 2012 a German film titled Hannah Arendt was released, directed by Margarethe von Trotta, and with Barbara Sukowa in the role of Arendt. The film concentrates on the Eichmann trial, and the controversy caused by Arendt’s book, which at the time was  WIDELY  MISUNDERSTOOD as defending Eichmann and blaming Jewish leaders for the Shoa/Holocaust

 

 

 

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Thinking about what is called thinking [Heidegger]

I have now got the book “What is called thinking” by Martin Heidegger despite my qualms about his political history.I know he wrote it in German  and hence a translation may  give a different meaning so maybe my thoughts are not sensible….and my first thoughts are………….. it is fascinating title.He is looking at an activity that we humans do.He is asking what it is we do when we say we think.So before I read it  I am putting a few reflections.Thinking means standing back,waiting and reflecting.Often we do things  because our parents did or our friends.Then sometimes we wonder about our life,we pause and try to examine how we are living.Or we could be solving an intellectual problem.Some things like quadratic equations can be solved by a formula.And many people are happy just to perform this rote activity But even though its math,you are not thinking when you do that.And I have an intuition  that we avoid thinking much of the time because we step outside our automatic patterns.I once read an article that says depression comes on us when we face a problem at the unconscious level.The tiredness,slowness and painful feelings make us withdraw and that gives our minds time to reflect.So there must also be unconscious thinking.Maybe  that  other mind  uses images as  in dreams.And we all know that “sleeping” on a problem often produces a solution.Thinking may not be verbal all of the time.And we must have something to think about.We  must be participating in the world of Others.Language comes via others.We are part of a society…at first just a few family members.But our tongue is shared with many people.And when we think in words,those words came before us and go on after us.

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Levinas and Heidegger

I seem to be led between these two philosophers.Levinas was an admirer  and student of Heidegger until the Nazi era.Though Levinas’ wi fe and daughter survived WW2 hidden in a  Monastery,the rest of his family  who were Jews in  Lithuania perished. in the Nazi Camps.This made him rethink his philosophy and led him into putting Ethics in primary place.And the primacy of our awareness of /responsibility the other as our first concern.Indeed that is what makes us human subjects

Perhaps only a Jewish person has the right to talk about Ethics  after the Holocaust.

I put two links below.

and

http://naudengels.blogspot.co.uk/2008/11/it-is-very-understandable-that.html?gclid=CKjUyJGRkboCFTMctAod53QATQ

How Levinas Overcame Heidegger

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What is thinking?

 

A propos of the quote from Doris Lessing,I turn over this question in; my mind.Thinking is not having  sentences or words passing through our conscious mind like,I envy that person who has just been on a cruise/bought a large house;did I lock the door; is my new neighbour gay;why am I here?

I assume people meditate to stop that mental chatter.If you stop it you may  find a painful feeling hiding.

So what is thinking?My mind goes blank.Is it a conversation with onesself or another?

When we have to make a decision,talking it over enables a seeing of different aspects/by one’s self,thinking may be a kind of confrontation .facing some idea,,,,dwelling on it.

It seems so simple but I don’t know what it is.

 

 

I looked up Levinas’s life

I found quite a good  short  account of the main outlines of Levinas’ life and work here.How very ironic he studied with Heidegger.His ideas seem very different from the philosophy I have studied before.I am well read but have only just heard of him when reading about Peter Lomas.I feel he may be very important in this world we now dwell in.I am unsure if I can understand his writing but have ordered a book by colin Davis

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Paul Gordon,author of the article about Peter Lomas: A quote

I use the word sceptical deliberately for this book owes a great deal to the sceptical tradition within philosophy. This position has nothing to do with an extreme posturing found in some self­ styled postmodernist circles that questions whether we can really know anything, whether there is any such thing as truth. (According to some extreme variants there is no objective truth – except, apparently, the statement that there is none.)

Gordon, Paul (2012-12-15). Face to Face (Kindle Locations 85-88). Paul Gordon. Kindle Edition.