Monday, October 28, 2013

Halloween monsters

How useful is it that one day a year people can discuss that which they endeavor to pretend does not even exist, the rest of the year?

People talk about monsters, but that term merely is another way of distancing the intellect from the reality of our world. The monsters are always carefully placed beyond credibility. 

By monsters I do not merely refer to the reality of starvation and disease on our planet. The monsters are largely  the result of the insistence of the human intellect that things are either this or they are that--- a bifurcation which while useful dealing with the external world, only confuses when it is given the cloak of invincibility. 

People cannot realize their helplessness though that is the only useful step towards defining a path with a solid foundation. They cannot because it would simply produce mass hysteria or lethargy. This effect would destroy the world we live in, without helping anybody. 

Monsters then are the realities we must ignore to survive. Yet throughout history they have been glimpsed, and so we call the briefly and blurrily glimpsed, "monsters" since that label assures us they are phantasms. 

Only a few dare peer over the edge of the cliff of binary reason. And though a "band of brothers" may help you gather your courage, in fact, the leaning forward over the edge, this is solitary. 

The annual event called Halloween exists not to encourage a resolve to pursue reality -- no, it is a chance for a group chant to ward off ----truth. 

Sunday, October 27, 2013

'The Answer is Never the Answer"

Old Derrida joke. But one I think Spinoza either originated or would have approved of. The point is wherever you think you can rest, verbally, in fact, you need to press, to keep questioning, sifting pebbles if nothing else, because, the answer is never "the answer." It can't be, the answer is in words. So you must have missed it.