Xenophanes replaced the concrete poly by an abstract mono...and Western religion, delegating God to the same extramundane world. — GraveItty

I think you make an unwarranted leap. The Greek conception of deity was quite mundane. The gods of the pantheon were in no way "omni-" anything. The conception of the incorporeal "omni" God is a Christian/Islamic concept with it's roots in the Levant. Because Xenophanes and Plato concieved of idealized, metaphysical objects does not mean that this is how the Greeks in general concieved of deity. I also, however, think that Jack is wrong to think that philosophy and religion have "combined origins". I think the motives for each are entirely different, and distinct.

one of the possible derivations, from religare, was to bind or join [...] However the other possible derivation is more straightforward - the Latin 'religio' 'respect for what is sacred, reverence for the gods; conscientiousness, sense of right, moral obligation; fear of the gods; divine service, religious observance; a religion, a faith, a mode of worship, cult; sanctity, holiness' from here. — Wayfarer

:up:
...and this latter set of meanings can only proceed from said Archaic *lego ("to care", "to have regard (for)"), and cannot rationally proceed from ligo ("to bind"), which in any case would not render the correct sense of "binding". Latin ligo meant "to bind" in the literal, physical sense...as with a rope or cord. The Latin word for a figurative "binding" was obligo, from whence obligatio and our English obligation. Surely, the reason that Medieval Christian writers gave the etymology with ligo was to reinforce the notion of the Christian's obligation to "Mother Church". The Church has always been as good at propaganda and (maybe not so much today, but certainly in the "good old days") at employing subtle, pretextual threats of violence as has any modern nation-state.

@Joshs, I just did a bit of research on this etymology of religio, and have made a fascinating discovery in linguist Michiel De Vaan's Etymological Dictionary of Latin, etc. (the Bible for Latin Etymology) It seems that the Proto-Italic verb *lego, and also lego in Early Latin (Preclassical Latin) also had the additional meaning "to care, to regard". This means that Proto-Italic *lego was the product of what is called by some "etymological conflation", with the meanings "to choose/select" and "to collect/gather" coming ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *leǵ- "to select//collect/gather", and the meaning "to care, to regard" coming ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *h₂leg- "to care". From this second sense of Proto-Italic lego ("to care/regard"), was derived a verb *religo ("to observe") which was lost by the time of Classical Latin in favor of Classical religo "to bind fast" (from ligo "to bind"). Also within either Proto-Italic or Early Latin was derived from said *religo ("to care or have regard for repeatedly/to observe"), the abstract noun (indeed our abstract noun) religio, which in fact meant "observance", did pass into Classical Latin, as by so doing it did not displace any other noun with the same spelling.

So...the Oxford people (in an apparently rare instance) do indeed have this wrong, and I had it partially right, though not right enough to render the true picture. The correct etymology for Latin religio appears to be (this probably occurred within Proto-Italic, but possibly within either Archaic or even Early Latin...note that an asterisk indicates a lost word or lost sense of a word by the time of the Classical period):

re ("again/repeatedly") + *legere ("to care/have regard for") > *religare ("to care/have regard for repeatedly", and so "to observe"); and said *religare ("to observe") + -io (suffix forming abstract nouns from verbal stems) > religio ("observance" either in the specific sense of "the practice of repeatedly or regularly observing a custom or ritual", or in the sense of "reverent concern").

Whew...now I'm tuckered out. Cheers!

‘Repeated convergence’ can work for me , not just in the sense of a convergence of individuals, but a convergence of thinking, which is a kind of binding. It captures my idea of religion as a faith ina moral constancy, a coming back repeatedly to a principle of belief. — Joshs

That works semantically, and if it works for you and me, all the better! I am a bit surprised to find that Oxford gives it with ligo/ligare; the OLD is the best Latin-English dictionary available, bar none. Forcellini is better, more comprehensive and exhaustive, but that is all in Latin. My own personal feeling about religio, though, is that it means "that which is selected and done repeatedly (indeed, one could say 'religiously')". Of course, I could always be wrong myself. It is hard to surmise what was in the mind of the original coiner of a lexeme thousands of years after the fact.

Religion has its root in religio, which means binding. — Joshs

Joshs, I think the etymology which you suggest here is incorrect. Medieval Christian writers posited ligo/ligare ("to bind", "to tie") as the constituent verb to religio, but I deny that this makes sense within the Classical or Preclassical Roman context. I think it a false etymology purposely advanced within the context of the Church and it's medieval claims of propriety over the very person of the individual Christian. Of course, Cicero and other Classical grammarians had lego/legere ("to choose", "to select"; "to collect", "to gather") as the verb, which as I noted above, makes great sense within a pre-Christian context, rendering as a meaning for religio "that which is repeatedly chosen" (referring to religious ritual, such as rendering sacrifice to the gods, or seeking direction from the augur), or "repeated convergence", "repeated coming together (as a community)". Note that the stem of lego often undergoes a morphological change when used in the derivation of other lemmas from -leg- to -lig-, depending on how the morphemes which are affixed to it effect it according to the "Latin sound laws": note that while there is no phonetically based morphological shift in ad- + lego > allego ("I admit/enroll/recruit"), there is indeed in con- + lego > colligo ("I assemble/draw together/concentrate/compress"), and in de- + lego > deligo ("I cull/pick or pluck off"). I myself feel absolutely certain that, religio < re- ("again", "repeatedly") + legor/legi (passive voice of lego/legere, and so "to be chosen/selected for doing"...the stem of course remains the same) + -io (creating the abstract result noun). I specifically do not think that religio has anything to do with "binding".

Of course, I only mention it in satisfaction of my obsessive-compulsion to do so (...aaah, that feels better...). :wink:

Yes. As I've said earlier, moral philosophy is for a reason a different branch of philosophy than let's say logic. — ssu

Another example, perhaps less emotionally charged: often, a given species will overpopulate within an environmental preserve, and authorities are then forced to cull the population in order to preserve the biological stability of the particular environment in question. These animals are killed for absolutely no other reason than that, meaning than for the success of the species within that environment. Normally, the purposeless killing of an animal is considered a moral "wrong", but under such particular circumstances it is considered a morally "right" act. In other words, the "mores" in question are not absolute. I would argue that if any moral norm can be shown to be relative within a given hypothetical situation, then all mores must be viewed as relative and non-absolute. Any consideration within moral philosophy that moral norms are absolute is, I suspect, either due to the influence of the affective mind, or an artefact of superstition. Did F. Nietzsche not already deal with these types of questions rather definitively? I will admit to never having spent a great deal of time studying ethics or moral philosophy. Perhaps I am thinking too logically for this topic...the misapplication of such thinking has demonstrated the ability to yield truly horrendous results.

How do philosophers in discussing moral questions reconcile hypotheticals with the realities of our subjective world?

So an easy universal issue is that killing other people is wrong. Huge agreement with that, when we say it like that. — ssu

If you have to "say it like that" for it to appear as an objective truth, then you simply highlight it's inherent subjectivity, do you not?

But how about self-defense? When is it morally right to use lethal force for self defense? — ssu

Not even that. If a situation could be described within which the killing of human beings would be even infinitesimally less "wrong" an act, then the possibility exists of a situation in which it is a "right" act. With that in mind, I will now assume the role of "devil's advocate", and illustrate with an example. If this planet were to become so grossly overpopulated with our species that ecological, biomic collapse ensued, and the only way to prevent utter collapse were to "cull" the human population, would the killing/murder of a human being be slightly less "wrong" an act?

We tend to treat mores as absolutes, when in fact they seem not to be.

haha, I'll just say "most Muslim countries"!
That was just a little mental exercise for me...

now I wonder how many others flags of countries includes a Cross! Or any other religion symbol.My country's flag includes also! — dimosthenis9

Well, off the top of my head: England, the U.K., Australia, New Zealand, Bermuda (???), the Republic of Georgia, Greece, Switzerland, the old Duchy of Savoy (perhaps the modern French department?), Republic of Italy (when charged with the escutcheon of state), the Dominican Republic, ...umm...

I think that if we are to evaluate Mr. Cummins' question adequately, it will be helpful to precisely define "religion" in both it's expansive and particular senses. To that end, an examination of the Latin morphemes comprising this English lemma might be helpful. Therefore:

The etymology of English "religion" and it's various cognates is uncertain for having been lost to history, but is yet reasonably surmised.
English religion < Latin religio, composed of the morphemic elements: re ("again", "repeatedly") + lego ("I choose" or "I gather/bring together", passively "I am chosen" or "I am gathered") or ligo ("I bind", passively "I am bound") + -io (suffix creating either abstract or result nouns). Medieval Christian writers tended to interpret this with ligo, for what seem like obvious reasons, but to my mind this is almost certainly incorrect, and an example of purposeful mis-reinterpretation. Cicero and other ancient grammarians (Cicero, the original 'rennaisance man', wore many hats) had it include lego, an assertion to which I agree, and argue appears most reasonable. This yields: re ("again", "repeatedly") + lego ("I choose" or "I gather/bring together", passively "I am chosen" or "I am gathered") + -io (suffix creating either abstract or result nouns). From this we have a chioce between three semantic options: [re ("repeatedly") + lego ("I choose") + -io (suffix creating abstract nouns)], and alternatively [re ("repeatedly") + lego ("I gather") + -io (suffix creating abstract nouns)], and again alternatively [re ("again", "repeatedly") + legor ("I am chosen", which is lego in the passive sense) + -io (suffix creating result nouns)]. So, this renders to us three related meanings for the word: the meanings of the first is, "I choose repeatedly '-ness'", and so "scrupulousness"/"scrupulosity" (in observance). The meaning of the second is, "repeated gathering" or "repeated convergence" (particularly as a community of people). The meaning of the third, which is probably most suited to our purposes as an expansive definition, is "that which is repeatedly chosen (or done)". Given such a definition, "religion can refer to anything done repeatedly or "religiously", if you will, such as (hopefully) brushing one's teeth. To summate: the aforementioned etymological meanings of Latin religio indicate to us that our religion, our "religions" are by necessity communal and scrupulously ritualistic by definition.

It is easy to see how these three meanings might yield the particular modern definition which I understand to be the sense in which "religion" is used by Jack, to wit: "a particular system of spiritual or metaphysical belief, and the rituals and practices, all scrupulously observed, proper thereto". The way that all this semantic investigation relates to answering the question initially posed by @Jack Cummins, is that it highlights that "religion" need not be theistic, or even "spiritual", to be referred to thusly; it needs only to display scurupulously approached, communal ritualism in the service of metaphysical pursuit, especially in the pursuit and reinforcement of a coherent metaphysical worldview. With this in mind, it seems reasonable to suggest that philosophy, which as has been suggested, involves the application of rational principles and methodologies to the understanding of metaphysical realities, can possibly be translated into a religious framework; philosophy can possibly become religious, and become an integral component of "a religion". In so doing, philosophy would assume an alternate role within the religious context to that enjoyed within the context of theistic religion, to that enjoyed by "divine (particularly scriptural) revelation".

However, philosophy is not religious as it is...as it has ever been practiced; it lacks the necessary communal, ritualistic, and scrupulous elements which define a "religion" as we understand one to be. In order for philosophy to assume such a role within the context of a religion, it would have to be adapted to reflect the three "key elements" of religion, community, scrupulosity, and ritualism, and would have to be expressed in a communal, scrupulous, and ritualistic manner.

Whether philosophy is well suited to assuming such a role is another, different question, probably beyond my own capabilities to discern with my not being a professional philosopher. In order for it to do so, philosophy would have to de subjected to processes of communalizing not and ritualization. Philosophy has always been a rather solitary pursuit...an individual striving for metaphysical comprehension, although various "schools of philosophy" have arisen over the centuries. Philosophy is ever evolving, and advances as one thinker builds and elaborates upon the thought of his predecessors. In this, it opposed religion, which is necessarily a communal endeavor. In addition, philosophy has ever eschewed the trappings of ritual, in direct opposition to the methodology of religion. Philosophy would require much adaptation in order for it to be suitable to the religious context. Is such adaptation possible for the philosophical enterprise? Whether or not the discipline of philosophy might be amenable to the circumscribing and confining structures of scrupulously observed ritual, and/or the communalizing and diluting influences of communal observance, are questions which must be answered by those more steeped in the philosophical tradition than am I.

Enjoy the essay.
— 180 Proof

I didn't. Not a well mind. — Wayfarer

Actually I think that Zappfe essay is a profound expression of the malady of Western culture. — Wayfarer

In a way which avoids diverting this thread too much, I wonder, why? Specifically, does the Zapffe essay represent, or rather indicate such a malady? I had never read Zapffe before reviewing this thread, but have discovered in him a "kindred spirit" (for lack of a better term) of sorts. I had arrived at some similar conclusions independently of the man, and via a different route: that the basic problem facing humankind is, and that the global crises looming on "the horizon" are caused by, what is essentially an evolutionary mishap: the overdevelopment of the frontal brain within one (our) species of mammal, allowing for powerful reasoning, scientific, and abstract thought without there being a proportionate cognitive development allowing for self regulation of those abilities. I (almost) fully expect that homo sapiens will, ultimately, destroy or nearly destroy itself by it's conspicuous inability to regulate it's productive capabilities. I think that J.R. Oppenheimer may have come to this realization in his later life, his innate pacifism intensified by his realization of his personal contribution to a horrible human competence: https://www.bbvaopenmind.com/en/science/physics/oppenheimer-from-the-atomic-bomb-to-pacifism/amp/

I am writing this, having come from a Christian background, but with so much questioning. — Jack Cummins

This is probably true for many of us, certainly for myself.

Is it possible to think about philosophy without any reference to questions posed within religious worldviews? — Jack Cummins

Yes, indeed, if by "religious worldviews" you refer to those religions most familiar to us here in the west. Philosophy in general takes a rationalist approach to various types of questions, and "our" religions, those monotheistic religions which emanated from the Levant between roughly 2000 BCE and 600 CE, are patently anti-rationalist in nature, particularly in their dependence upon divine revelation as the origin of knowledge and wisdom. Even those of the world's religions which are more rationalist in nature, such as Buddhism, yet retain a germ of anti-rationalism which is antithetical to the philosophical approach to life.

...am I wrong in trying to frame philosophy as an alternative to religion? — Jack Cummins

The $50k question. I think yes. Even if a religion were formulated which does not oppose rationalism in any way (a great hope of myself), the foci of philosophy and religion are utterly different. The purpose of philosophy is to provide man with the most helpful/useful way of regarding existential problems and uncertainties. Religion serves other purposes, which have been mentioned above...

Read thusly, the abandonment of religion amounts to the abandonment of any over-arching sense of purpose.
— Wayfarer

Arthur Schopenhauer is a heck of a writer, and that's certainly the correct reading, but I believe he is wrong about this for reasons I already mentioned. Religion may save your soul, but it lacks the power to inoculate people from dread, depression and meaninglessness. — Tom Storm

I rather think, Tom, that this is precisely what our monotheistic creeds purport to do; these are their primary purposes. Your average Evangelical Christian is a person who has wilfully suspended his or her rationality for the feeling of purpose (dissemination of "the gospel") and security (the surety of eternal life with God) which accrues to them from an unthinking acceptance of and commitment to their creed. This type of religion may lack such powers with respect to yourself, but you are undoubtedly a rationalist unwilling to suspend reason in favor of such purposes; to the Christian, these powers of their religion are very real.

There was no "tacit implication" of a particular kind of poetry, only that it be philosophical. — T Clark

Oh, sorry, man, for putting words into your mouth that you never intended to say. I'm trying to give "Poetic" some constructive criticism, so that he can improve his output.

Poetry requires more work than what can just go plop in just a live stream of thoughts arising. — PoeticUniverse

Yeah, this is the nature of my primary "beef" with free verse and so-called "slam poetry".

I was thinking, @PoeticUniverse, of how to describe what a good poet does that others do not, and I think I might have the words to describe it. We all have, upon occasion, intense inner experiences associated with places, events, or situations, which we cannot seem to describe adequately to make another person feel what we have felt, and understand what we have understood. A great poet is able to use language in a manner which recalls such experiences, and makes one think, "yes, I have experienced that, but could never describe it". It is the experience upon reading a poem of finding the expression for something profound that one has experienced but never been able to describe. This experience upon reading a poem tends to give someone the "fifty mile stare", and makes a person feel a need to say "...thank you so much..." to the poet.

I would like, in honor of my favorite season, the season of the natural sentimentalist, to post something about the autumn. Searching, I found this interesting bit from perhaps one of the more interesting characters of poetic history, namely Thomas Chatterton, who despite being remembered as one of the most successful poetry forgers of history, and despite his perennial poverty and untimely death by assumed suicide aged seventeen, was perhaps one of the most skilled poets of the eighteenth century, lauded by Wordsworth, Keats, Shelley,... Though not evident in this excerpt, Chatterton was able, without formal education therein, to successfully forge poems in Middle English (well enough to long fool the "experts"), purportedly Medieval in origin, and attributed to some invented fifteenth century monk named "Rowley".

This piece, written in the English of Chatterton's own eighteenth century, is more reflective than philosophical, as the title suggests, but as an homage to the season, here you have it:

from Elegy

[...]

When golden Autumn, wreathed in riped’d corn,
From purple clusters prest the foamy wine,
Thy genius did his sallow brows adorn,
And made the beauties of the season thine.

Pale rugged Winter bending o’er his tread,
His grizzled hair bedropt with icy dew;
His eyes, a dusky light congeal’d and dead,
His robe, a tinge of bright ethereal blue;

His train a motley’d sanguine sable cloud,
He limps along the russet dreary moor;
Whilst rising whirlwinds, blasting keen and loud,
Roll the white surges to the sounding shore.

A dreary stillness broods o’er all the vale,
The clouded Moon emits a feeble glare;
Joyless I seek the darkling hill and dale,
Where’er I wander Sorrow still is there.

-Thomas Chatterton

Care with the attribution - the quote in my last was from Antony Nickles, not I. It was a thread on much the same topic, but apparently before it's time. — Banno

Haha...this is he "of the perpetually raised brows", rendering the "hairy eyeball".

telling comment. (Of course, 'the real world' is what exists unperceived by the mind, right?) — Wayfarer

Yes, although I tend not to like to use the term "world", which itself suggests subjective experience, to describe it. Usually, I will refer to it as "the universe", or as " objective reality".

Gotta hand it to 'ya, you "damned fool", you come up with some "damned good" thread topics!

There's an, what I like to describe as, arbitrariness to words. There is no logical reason, no rationale, why "water" should refer to H2OH2O. We could use "water" to refer to, as Wittgenstein said, poison or whathaveyou. That's that. — TheMadFool

This is ultimately true, by which I mean objectively true, but words do have an onomatopoeic quality, even if they are not used onomatopoeically, which yet imparts to them a subjective essence. For instance, there is a definite essence, surely subjective in nature, by which I mean that said essence exists as the word is percieved by the human mind, to the English words "teeny-weeny" and "itsy-bitsy", and a rationale for why these words describe smallness, the "slenderness" of the vowels within them producing a feeling of spareness within the mind's eye. Could one possibly concieve of "itsy-bitsy" as referring to the grandiosity of a thing? In like manner, there is a rationale for why the Old Irish word mor describes bigness/largeness/greatness, with it's "thick" vowelization, and so this word can be said to have a subjectively discerned essence, itself. I wouldcontend that words which have an onomatopoeic quality, do so because they have a subjective essence. If you look carefully, you will notice that there is far more onomatopoeia in the word stock of language s than you might initially surmise.

When we philosophize on issues, our aim/objective is to come to some kind of understanding on the true nature of things (essence present as in 2 above) but the problem is that to do that we use language and that throws a spanner in the works (essence missing as in 1 above). — TheMadFool

Indeed, this is what makes mathematics so beautiful. It can create arguments without the intrusion of linguistic uncertainty to cloud meaning, or otherwise bollocks things up.

I can agree to not posting any more lengthy poems — PoeticUniverse

:up:

Amnity asks: What is wrong with it ? Constructive criticism, any ?

Any specifics concerning "But it is not good poetry?" to make your generalization helpful? — PoeticUniverse

Your poetry displays/employs a definite "stream of consciousness" style, whether deliberate or accidental. The problem with that, as I have noted above, is that lyric poetry, which truth be told is the type of poetry that Mr. Clark seems to enjoy and so is the proper, tacitly implied focus of this thread, in order to be "good", is best written with great deliberation and attention to meter and, if applicable, to rhyme. That is to say, it should be the opposite of stream of consciousness writing. The composition of a quality lyric poem is something tremendously difficult to achieve. Trust me, as a great lover of poetry, I have tried mightily, only to be confronted with the realization that I simply do not "have the muse". I can write snippets of good lyric poetry, perhaps put together a decent stanza, but in trying for a finished, coherent whole, cohesiveness always flees away from me. This just makes me appreciate the great poets even more.

There are types of poetry other than yours which employ a stream of consciousness style, such as free verse and slam poetry, and I think that they would both become as readily tiring as have your works...especially slam poetry, as I think Mr. Clark might object to the egregious use of profanity employed. Since this thread is tacitly about lyric poetry, I think that there is a limited tolerance for large contributions of other poetic styles, especially where said contributions are of great length.

Another problem that I discern in your poetry, is that it is just too damned intellectual. Rather, it is intellectual without the needed affect. In the poetical enterprise, intellectualism can be other than a good thing...quite detrimental to the end product, if it is not passed through the sieve of affect. Great poetry, even as it relates profound thoughts, does not do so by thinking, it does so by feeling, if that makes any sense. Great poetry presents the intellect filtered through the affect, with the result that it should make us think as a complement to feeling and this is something powerfully difficult to achieve.

"Things Fall Apart", sounds like a great book to read. — Athena

I highly recommend it, especially as it is brief while being profound. One caveat for the potential female reader: traditional West African cultures, including the Igbo culture depicted by Achebe, were highly male-dominant and patriarchal...dare I say from the "Western" perspective, "male chauvanist verging on misogynistic"? The intended readers of Achebe, who was writing primarily for a West African audience, would have understood that, so the moral of Achebe's story would not have been obscured thereby. For a Westernized audience, though, the depiction of the cultural setting has the potential to shock the sensibilities of some, and so obscure Achebe's thesis. Even with this, though, it is definitely worth the read.

↪PoeticUniverse

When I started this thread, I should have specified that posters should not include more than a limited number of personally written poems. Alas. Because I didn't, you have filled it with, by my count, 18 self-indulgent, poorly written poems. [...] What I fear is that you have dozens more poems hidden away on your computer that you will continue to place here. Please stop. There are plenty of poetry forums out there. Please stop damaging one of my favorite discussions. — T Clark

Change "you have filled it with, by my count, 18 self-indulgent, poorly written poems" to "...18 quite lengthy, self-indulgent, poorly written poems". I don't feel good having to say that, @PoeticUniverse, disliking to critique the opera of another in a way that might be hurtful, but such appears true. I have learned one thing from your contributions, though: that "stream of consciousness" writing is best kept within the realm of prose fiction, and then within the hands of masters such as James Joyce and Virginia Woolf. I think that you should desist in the pace of your contribution...maybe one poem per month, deal?

That is my biggest caveat against evangelical Christianity: all you’ve got to do is “repent” of your sin, which means you can sin all you want to...as long as you repent soon afterwards!... — Leghorn

In defense of this particular point, I will note that the Christian conception of "true repentance" necessarily involves a "turning away" from the particular "sin" in question. For my part, the "biggest caveat" against any flavor of Christianity is the apparent non-existence of "God", and of "gods".

or easy to frustrate, and impatient. :cool: — James Riley

I feel 'ya...I can relate.

..I was really enjoying exchanging thoughts with James Riley until all of a sudden we had a dismisunderstanding that became very unpleasant. — Athena

Yes, I was a bit dismayed by your exchange. "James" is a man of strong feeling, and one must keep that in mind when dialoguing with him, if a continued good relationship is desired, especially if one is a person of equally strong feeling, and somewhat differing opinions, such as myself. You can't be confrontational with James, cause he tends not to shrink from his opinions...you have to know who you can "bully", and you can't "bully" James.

I was told if I want a man in life, I must give up my books. — Athena

I don't think that to be true in any absolute sense, but I will agree that being unopinionated does widen the field somewhat, perhaps substantially. To me, though, an unopinionated person is one of two types: either they are stupid, or they lack the courage of their convictions. To myself, both qualities are "disqualifatory", if you know what I mean. The first, because, from the genetic standpoint, I want my offspring to be "smart in relation", and the second because having a spouse who lacks axiologic ferocity simply poses a danger to my family and lineage. My advice: be true to your own self. Keep your books, and find "that guy".

I think it is natural that we want our children to grow up appreciating the culture and values we teach them. This is very important to Jews, Christians, and others. This is a big issue with ethnically different people. When indigenous peoples' lives are severely disrupted by colonizers, it is very destructive to individuals and the tribe. Well-meaning missionaries destroyed tribes... — Athena

Ha, well said. My absolute favorite novel of all time, despite the relative simplicity of it's prose (I tend to appreciate complex erudition, such as that of George Eliot, which is why I love Cicero so much...he is the unequalled champion of complex erudition) is a slim volume entitled "Things Fall Apart", by a Nigerian author named Chinua Achebe. "Okonkwo", the protagonist of the story, is a favorite tragic hero of myself. The narrative contains a brilliantly exposed statement of the destructivity of cultural imperialism, particularly as an adjunct of "Western" colonialism.

This made me want to ask - do you like "Song of Hiawatha?" Maybe more romantic than sentimental. I don't know if it's a good poem, but I love it. — T Clark

Who can dislike an epic poem which is yet endearing? I first encountered the story of Hiawatha and Minnehaha as a child. It may have lost popularity today, as young people today are more (I want to say "vulgarly jaded", but I'll say...) worldly than they once were, but for a long time that story has entered the American mythos, and was often told to children.

What is it you like about it? Is it the content or do you find the form pleasing? — T Clark

I rather think it is the statement made, and the succinct, parablic way in which it presented. I have always rather liked it, even though I tend towards sentimentality in poetry, and if one is looking for sentiment, Blake is probably not one's first stop.

very nice. I must obtain a volume of the Shropshire lad. Can't say I ever owned one.

Oh my, maybe you rather have a robot that can be programmed, for your child, rather than a human one that might disappoint you. Perhaps a robot for a wife too? — Athena

Eureka! Athena, you are a genius!

No...in actuality, I would prefer they be fully human. My hope, however, would be to find a woman whose beliefs, values, and all that jazz, approximate my own, and then to have very intentional conversations together in deciding what "all that jazz" will (is "officially" too strong a word here?) be for our family. Then, we could try to mold and shape our children accordingly. The underlying principle of this would be to have the latter generation reflect the former, rather than reflecting others in society. There are alot of strange and perplexing concepts out there which I would not want my kids to claim as their own, thus making them the beliefs of my family.

would like to read your Nietzche link but it does not fit on my screen and I do not know how to resolve that problem — Athena

When it comes on screen, simply "squeeze it down" with thumb and forefinger until it fits. Then, start squinting.

The difference in the focus of women's lives compared to the male focus concerns me and I am not sure this difference will be maintained as women leave their homes to have careers or work in factories. The meaning of being a good woman has changed and what might be the ramifications of this change? — Athena

This is good for women, but in some senses bad for families. It is clearly good for the familial bottom-line, but I think the children suffer a loss of an important aspect of their formative years. Worse still, having the child significantly influenced by people, such as day care workers and teachers, who may not share the worldview, belief system, and values of the parents, has the potential of robbing the parents of having the child reflect themselves in favor of reflecting others in society. This I would strenuously avoid at all costs. I want my son to reflect myself and my wife, our worldview, our beliefs, our values and interests, rather than those of the day care worker, know what I mean? Ideally, In my perfect world, I would earn enough money myself, be married to an intelligent and educated woman (at least a master's from a tier two school minimum) who shares my worldview, beliefs, etc., and shares my ideas on education (the "Trivium" all the way, heavy on logic, rhetoric, critical thinking, philosophy as examplary thereof with critical analysis, math, languages/linguistics with Latin & Greek from very early on; computer architecture and programming concepts beginning g6; chem, bio, physics after g8; nix the generally bullshit history, the propagandistic civics and sociology crap, and other garbage which they will pick up simply in becoming well read people), who could home school the children (and perhaps any other neighborhood kids as the parents show interest), and so avoid the shit educational system we have in this country. In that way, we would shape and form the minds (where the mind goes, the body follows) of our children as we see fit, and make them into what we want them to be, without external interference. But, then I awaken, and there is, here is the reality...

We care far too much about ourselves, our rights, our property, to trouble ourselves with others, and resent it when we're made to even indirectly. — Ciceronianus

Very accurately and succinctly said. I am very torn on this issue. I don't like the government compelling private citizens to do anything, but we must provide relief and hope to the less fortunate. I feel that the central problem is that of our culture, which is too individualistic and not communal enough to override basic human nature and the defensive mechanisms of the human mind.

Cicero...he was killed by order of the second triumverate... — Ciceronianus

By order of Antony...the bastard.

In some indigenous communities, the counter-intuitive case of the person giving away the most somehow continued to have the most. A great warrior returns with more buffalo than anyone else and he gives it all away to those who can't hunt. Somehow he keeps stumbling on largess and keeps giving. Broad shoulders, lifting, carrying, working hard for the sake of work, philanthropy in silence, without recognition, doing the right thing when no one is watching, honor, integrity, dignity, community, grace, gratefulness. I *think* those are the old "family values", "community values" we sought. — James Riley

Now you have elucidated precisely, specifically by the provision of contrast, all the things that I resent the nation-state for. The state provides a favorable environment for the fostering of the diametrically opposing values to those which you have stated, and I hate living within that situation. This is why I have trouble in concieving of our country, and probably of any nation state, as a "community". I cannot easily discern precisely why, but the environment naturally created within a nation state appears adverse to fostering the qualities that you have mentioned, as did the tribe and the clan. Certainly, the existence of complex heirarchies, and of money as a store of value play a role in this. In addition, the sense of interdependence which existed in the tribe, but has been replaced in the state by common dependence upon the state plays a significant role in this. I feel certain that there is even more to it than that. Not that I want to romanticize the tribe and the clan, but there seems to myself to have been therein, a certain social cohesion which created an environment of shared responsibility, and which is absent from the context of the state, wherein there is no discernible social cohesion, but rather a "shared isolation" and mutual, universal distrust. Within the state, nobody "does the right thing when no one is watching", because within that context, "it's all about me", and not "all about us". We have derived many benefits from living within the context of the state: medical, lifespan, educational, economic, but I might be willing to give all that up to have the type of communal, shared experience of life enjoyed within the tribe or the clan.

The Plutocracy is speaking and the government is listening. — James Riley

You seem very convinced, James, that the nation is, indeed, a "plutocracy"; I am less so. I'm not prepared to say whether the U.S. is, in fact, a "plutocracy" per se, if there is even a set of discernible qualities indicating such a definition, but I do agree that moneyed interests have a great deal of influence with politicians across the political spectrum. Soros and the Koch brothers are only the beginning. If such people do have as much influence as you suggest, though, whose fault is that? Is it not the fault of we the electorate, who continue to reelect the same politicians that allow themselves to be influenced, and their votes to be bought? We can find fault with the values of the wealthy, but we cannot blame them for seeking to exert themselves in realizing their will. We all want to see our individual wills done, do we not? We should not blame the plutocrat for desiring to exert influence, we should blame the politicians for allowing themselves to be influenced, and vote them out of office. If we as an electorate do not do that, then whose fault is the continuing situation regarding political influence?

In fact, the continuing problem of political influence is one of the problems that I think might be somewhat mitigated by the scheme of distributing social roles among the majority of the citizenry as civic duties, which I posited elsewhere. Another consideration: the larger the organization, the more it tends towards corruption. I think that if we had much smaller nation-states fairly uniformly all over the world, then corruption would be much easier to control. Well, that is only a dream...

Tocqueville foresaw a change, away from family order to bureaucratic order. — Athena

@Athena, this is presented within The Old Regime and the Revolution, no? I would like to look this up, and read about AdT's thoughts on this. Can you easily provide a rough reference?

It does not matter if I miss understand Nietzsche. It matters how his philosophy encouraged Nazi behavior in the past and present...His effect has gone far, far beyond those who read his books. — Athena

That is unfortunately true. The leadership of the Third Reich (who probably never even read Nietzsche) cherry-picked utterly uncontextualized terms and phrases from his writings, and applied them in grotesque ways as suited their own purposes. Nietzsche was a highly analytical and complex thinker who dealt with some of the more difficult questions of the philosophy of mind, and had the misfortune while publishing his thoughts, of being a highly introverted personality which was itself urgently suppressing the effects of a latent mental illness. This has made him an easy mark for characterization as some type of "Proto-Nazi" monster by those who have not bothered to study and come to grips with the meanings presented within his opera. There is a good presentation of Nietzsche's personality online here if you are interested: https://wn.rsarchive.org/Books/GA005/English/RSPI1960/GA005_c01_1.html

never knew of "the Rule Against Perpetuities". or even imagined a dead person had any power after death. That is an interesting subject. I noticed a failure of leaving behind estates and no longer thinking in terms of a man's home being his castle, did play into a weakening the family. — Athena

The weakening of the concept of "perpetuity" both in general and in particular: familial, social, environmental, etc., has definitely weakened the concept of "family", and nearly destroyed the concept of "lineage". Genealogical research has today become no more than an exercise in curiosity. The weakening of perpetuity has also resulted in modern cultures having become "rootless", and in the citizens of modern societies having become absorbed in their "selves" (self-absorbed), as that rootlessness has increased and the importance of place and of extended family have diminished.

... I thought we have a national anthem because we go to war and when we are in a state of war we need to be strongly united and working together. — Athena

National anthems are symbols, just like national flags and any other type of nationalist symbolic device. Their purpose, whether there is war or there is peace and prosperity, they have in common with all similar devices: the psychological, and especially emotional, binding of the individual and his affections to the state, particularly at the expense of other institutions such as the lineage, the tribe, and the ethnicity.

We need to progress, forward, and grow smarter and wiser, not bigger. — James Riley

Yeah, two thumbs up for that one. :up: :up:

I don't see that happening but if we were all we crack ourselves up to be, then we could figure it out. — James Riley

Alas, we are not.

man, you speak with remarkable shrewdness when not imitating a sailor firing the big "F bomb" guns of the main battery. It is very refreshing to read! I don't have time to write much at the moment, but I want to respond to a couple of your comments.

To have a larger population without a larger government would be an interesting trick...The point being, if people want small government they should work toward a small population. If they want responsive government, they need to wrest control back to themselves. — James Riley

Regarding this, I have come to feel that most of our nation-states are just simply too large, in many cases far too large, for them to operate on a reasonably human scale. Generally, our states were founded in one of two ways: according to shared language, with the idea being that the entirety of a linguistic group should comprise a single state, or otherwise by the necessities of colonial administration. This has resulted in a slate of very large states which naturally tend to develop an administrative remoteness from the concept of the individual citizen, leaving only the judiciary to be concerned with individual rights. I don't have any good answers for this, but it seems like a bit of a problem.

That makes a lot of sense. I just think it's never been tried here, and where it has been tried (almost every first world ally we have) it beats the hell out of what we have now. — James Riley

Sure, it's not been fully realized, but we can yet draw some conclusions about the relationship (or the lack thereof) between state brokerage of social function and it's effects on "community" from the tendencies that we have experienced as a society, can we not? From the height of the Industrial Revolution, say roughly 1840, until the present time, we have experienced the government, the "state", gradually increase it's role as the intermediary of social function. This has been absolutely necessary, especially in countering the effects of industrialists' creation of a situation which ignored the humanity of it's human resoure, and of industrialization's causing a static social milieu devoid of any mechanism for social mobility, and of a wealth gap which had the working class living in squalor. The.part played by the state in remedying that economic situation has been necessary and good, and was well executed by the government. However, as the government has picked up more and more function over the years, we have experienced an increasing personal isolation in American society. The individual American seems more isolated now than he was before industrialization, with each of us occupying, both actually and metaphorically, our own little boxes.

This is good and bad, but has been largely good...for at least most of us all have little boxes to occupy! Even so, "community" as I understand that word, seems to neither have been built nor increased. The modern "epidemic" of American homelessness, which has grown alongside increasing social brokerage by the state, testifies to this fact. I have known people from West Africa, for instance, who cannot comprehend how so many people can be homeless in a country like America, where there are so many resources. In their countries, anyone who has no place to live is generally taken in by family, friends or acquaintances...the concept is that people cannot just be left out in the byways without help. This type of idea, of course, is a communal one, a notion of community. The fact that it appears to be absent here in the U.S. seems indicative that there is no sense of "community" here. The suggestion that an increased brokeraging function by government results in society becoming more communal appears, to myself, illusory. Individual communities of people (in the truest, fullest sense of that term) can exist within the nation-state, but I think that despite the fact of the state, rather than because of any action or functioning of the state as the intermediary of social function.

American government has always been a good faith actor throughout our history. We have been blessed, largely because of the Constitution and the structure of our government, with a government which has held the welfare of the populace to be of the foremost importance. But overreach is a potential problem for any actor, whether that actor be a government or an individual. Safeguards against overreach are always desirable. I think that our government has begun to overreach in certain respects of it's functioning, and to do so because of specific reasons. Recently, and going forward, there appear a couple of phenomena which have the power to threaten to make the government derail, and, while yet remaining protective of the society as a whole, jump to a track somewhat less friendly to the individual American. In particular, I fear that individual liberty and individual privacy, which have always been viewed as guaranteed, appear to be vulnerable to subordination to the attainment of certain social goals.

The phenomena of international crime and of international terror has caused the government to seemingly subordinate the civil and privacy rights of the citizenry to the desire for security. In general, I think this a bad development. The concurrent phenomenon of the institutionalization of the "progressive movement" within American liberalism, which institutionalization began in the aftermath of the "counterculture" movements of the 60's, has resulted in an increased willingness to subordinate those same individual civil and privacy rights to the attainment of (generally good) social goals. I am fully in favor of most of those goals, for example of universal healthcare (I don't know how anybody could oppose this from a conceptual standpoint), but not at the expense of my individual liberty or my individual privacy. The recent rapid increases in information technology have served to make my liberty and my privacy much more vulnerable to encroachment than they have been previously, which frightens me. The development of applicable law to safeguard individual liberty and privacy has not kept pace with the developments in information technology, leaving the population vulnerable. The recent Administration plan to have the IRS monitor the bank accounts of individual citizens is anathematic to myself.