Second Essay. “Guilt,” “Bad Conscience,” And The Like. Have these current genealogists of morals ever allowed themselves to have even the vaguest notion, for instance, that the cardinal moral idea of “ought” originates from the very material idea of “owe”? Or that punishment developed as a retaliation absolutely independently of any preliminary hypothesis of the … Read more
To get rid of bullshit, or at least reduce it, it is useful to give a definition of bullshit. What is the difference between old school bullshit and new school bullshit? It is best to illustrate with examples. Old school bullshit: Our collective mission is to functionalize bilateral solutions for leveraging underutilized human resource portfolio … Read more
In Simulacra and Simulation, Baudrillard produces a theory about cultural materialism. What is the simulacra? It is whatever replaces reality with its representation. The simulacrum is never that which conceals the truth–it is the truth which conceals that there is none. The simulacrum is true. Ecclesiastes Disneyland masks the unreality of modern American society, says … Read more
A great overview of Mimetic Theory, by Wolfgang Palaver. In a systematic careful synthesis of Girard’s thought, Palaver summarizes the mimetic insights that were derived from authors such as Dostoevsky, Shakespeare, Cervantes, Flaubert, and Proust. And finally, he shows the precise stories of the Old and New Testament that confirm Girard’s thesis. What is Girard’s … Read more
The Secret of Long Life Lead a good life. Two things bring life speedily to an end: folly and immorality. Some lose their life because they have not the intelligence to keep it, others because they have not the will. Just as virtue is its own reward, so is vice its own punishment. He who … Read more
In Acting or Refraining, weigh your Luck. More depends on that than on noticing your temperament. If he is a fool who at forty applies to Hippocrates for health, still more is he onewho then first applies to Seneca for wisdom. It is a great piece of skill to know how to guide yourluck even … Read more
Bertrand Russell was part of a generation that was brought up on the saying: ‘Satan finds some mischief for idle hands to do.’ In Praise of Idleness challenges this piece of common wisdom. Since he was a virtuous child, he believed what he was told, and acquired a conscience that made him industrious, even when … Read more
He pondered deeply, like diving into a deep water he let himself sink down to the ground of the sensation, down to the place where the causes lie, because to identify the causes, so it seemed to him, is the very essence of thinking, and by this alone sensations turn into realizations and are not … Read more
And it is solely by risking life that freedom is obtained; only thus is it tried and proved that the essential nature of self-consciousness is not bare existence, is not the merely immediate form in which it at first makes its appearance. . . . The individual, who has not staked his life, may, no … Read more
The Basic Laws of Human Stupidity by Cipolla is a short book is a funny, clever, and simple description of the phenomenon of stupidity. In his book, Italian sociologist Mario Cipolla argues that there is no such thing as a stupid person – and that even the most powerful in society can be stupid. But … Read more