from the glacier

Psychological arguments based on failure? Would this all be dismissed with a good day? I suspect this is what keeps some from jumping off of buildings . . .

What is religious? I have the suspicion that what is religious, more often than not, degenerates into mere religiosity. Call it the religious sentiment, if that nomenclature is preferable. Posturing and positions based on feeling a certain psychological what-have-you. Give me your Thomistic deductions, your Protestant exegesis - fill me with historical and scientific imperatives. But as a thought experiment, ask yourselves "why do I believe, deduce, exegize. . . ?" And if the answer is that it is true, ask yourself in what way is it "true"?

If you think about the current conflict in ideas, ideals and arms in the current mideast, a stark contrast shows itself. It is not just a clash of arms, but a clash of culture. We ask why the Americans are in the mideast. "To protect our interests." Why does the Mohammedan lash out against the West? "To protect our ideology." Shouldn't we rather put it as, "to protect our Idol?" Isn't this brand of terrorism - sacrifice? Isn't sacrifice - power? In a war between interest and idol, between concern and passion, between filling gas tanks and filling paradise, there will be a victor. It will be interesting to note how the concern of the West grows when our sacrifice is required -

What is religious has always included the element of a sacrifice. From the pagan idols all across the globe to the Jews of the Old Testament, from Catholicism to Buddhist self-sacrifice - all have contained this element. Frequently it is of that which is - or should be - most dear: children to Moloch, self in Zen, even God in Christianity. Other times it was sacrifice of the conquered, as in the Aztecs, pre-kingdom Israelites and so forth. In this the sacrifice is an element of strength. It also shows an element of strength in animal sacrifice, such as the Greek hecatomb. Psychologically (and purely psychologically) this shows man as a creature who shows power by sacrifice, whether power over the vanquished, over nature, or even over himself by giving that which is most dear.

There is a polemical attitude that seeks to strike discord in communication. Dissecting every sentence, every word, every structure to find fault - this is how these morticians of thought proceed. Avoiding synthesis, they seek to overcome ideas - regardless of the intention of the original author, even intentionally disagreeing with intention. Why? To win. The will to misunderstanding, the will to un-truth as a condition for the will to power.

The 'essence' of truth lies neither in certitude, nor exactitude, and less still in grammatical wordplay. Examine the dictum: existence precedes essence. If by essence, you mean: to be what it is, of course it must be to be what it is. How could it not? Grammatical wordplay from one who would persue vain morality. All truth then, analogical, tautological, equivocal?

What viciousness is hidden in the ideology 'respect for persons'! How wretched is the demos that they demand obeisance to - a mask. Greatness demands that we push beyond this. Seek individuals, primary substance, souls, Da-sein; these may be worthy of respect. As for appearances, personally, I find them very readable.

The role of the disciple is one who has set oneself at the feet of the master. The master's writings are received as pure truth illuminated. If this disciple revere the ancients, he must assume the moderns didn't understand them - at least not like he does. So smugly he kneels at the feet of the masters, content that he knows better. Submission - out of - pride?

One thing that I have always admired about Nietzsche, Pascal et al. is the ability to write an aphorism. There is something I find profoundly interesting in the ability to state something clearly and lucidity, without argument, in a few short words. Others, like myself, have no capacity for brevity, and tend to drone on and on. Brevity, rather, pithiness is the heart of what makes Nietzsche brilliant. Well crafted sentences that are all-to-poingiant should be what people, stylistically, strive for. No one really has the interest to follow Hegelian paragraph-length sentences. I remember when writing my thesis for undergraduate college I came across a 'sentence' that I wrote that was over seventy words long. A stylistic abomination. By the time I came to the end of it, I had forgotten what I meant to say when I started the sentence. Perhaps a six-week-late New Year's resolution is in order: only to write in aphorisms. Hmm. . . this would greatly lessen my output, but perhaps afford me the time to write more often. Well, no one wants to argue anyway. . . we all write online to tell each other how brilliant we are. Maybe I will start today:

Or maybe not. I can't think of anything to say that wouldn't take thirty minutes and five paragraphs to type out...

While reading some pro-Bush somewhat-pseudo-kind-of-quasi-'conservative' drivel on what might be better called "not-so-live slightly revolting", it occurred to me that there are several discrepancies in American policy. One revolter likes to point out that the founding fathers were not liberal elightenment guys. Sure, why not. I'll buy it. But if you want your conservative whatever, we should probably look at the founding fathers and thier complaints. Review, for example, theTownshend Acts. What again, was the point of the taxation that the colonists were so adamantly opposed to? Oh, military "for their own defense" . . . Hmm. . . you can actually read these acts and see how small the taxation really was. Income tax (of the modern variety) is actually quite larger than any of the taxes proposed on goods. Plus, sales taxes and hidden taxes and . . . I digress . . . But what does income tax really pay for? I know. Defense for our own good. [aside, the last link is a little slanted. But scroll down and read all of it, and they show their own bias - especially if you read the part about why the spending varies - in yellow] Thus, if our founding fathers could so object to these unfair levied taxes "for their own defense", why can't we? I guess I would say that being pro-Bush (i.e. - pro-war) is, well, kind of liberal and newfangled. It goes against the ideas of the founding fathers. Thus, I'm not sure how revolutionary one can be, when towing the party line. . . unless being liberal is revolutionary. . .
But lest we take all of this as hate speech, just remember, I don't know what I'm talking about, and never say anything seriously anyway. Plus, there's others who are in line for some good natured vitriol"....