The ‘Solway Statement’, revisited

[Santiago Odo]

The Greco-Christian definition of the word intellect and intellectus are, my dear Pam, so many times fuller than those you offered. Diebert has asked questions as to how the ‘restoration’ I refer to should be viewed and in what sense is it a ‘return’ or a ‘back-tracking’ into what was. The reason he poses such a question is because, he too, and he especially, exists in a space outside of the possibility of the *understanding* I attempt to convey. In a thread down in ‘Worldly Affairs’ I spent time drawing pictures in which the blind Gloucester only became capable of *understanding* when his outer eyes had been destroyed. The metaphor, apparently, is just too difficult for some! Too much of a leap I guess. What I want you to understand is that I avail myself of people who seem to lack any capacity to grasp what I am referring to only to be able to further bring home to myself not only that there is a territory in which *understanding* is augmented, but that as the culture moves away, in a grand metaphysical turning-away, it is man’s intellect that suffers. Thus I make a direct reference to *loss* and in a real sense (because I believe in what is real) to the tragedy of *losing connection with our own traditions*. What interests me is what happens in the individual and in the culture where that individual exists when certain modes of knowing are lost and destroyed. Real loss occurs. Real loss is real and the loss has meaning. I would suggest that it requires a special *intellectual understanding* even to grasp this simple declaration.

But let me present more full definition:

• Latin intelligere — inter and legere — to choose between, to discern; Greek nous; German Vernunft, Verstand; French intellect; Italian intelletto.

We start with a general definition and yet it conotes important things. It indicates that *choice* and selection are paramount. The capacity to discern one value from another, and to assign value to, for example, upward or downward change and transformation, require intelligent discernment. I hope it is obvious to you, Pam, that this discernment, and the choosing function (if you will) are in Christian thought tied directly to the activity of the soul. That is, not the mere physical organism and the body, but the soul. And you must (mustn’t you?) surely understand that the ‘soul’ has very unique definitions in a Christian sense. And that it is this ‘soul’ that is the subject of salvation. And in relation to each of these issues, or these *facts*, there is always posited the presence of *invisible intelligence*, and therefor the term ‘intellectus’ also refer to higher dimensions of conscious being.

Further definition:

• The faculty of thought. As understood in Catholic philosophical literature it signifies the higher, spiritual, cognitive power of the soul. It is in this view awakened to action by sense, but transcends the latter in range. Amongst its functions are attention, conception, judgment, reasoning, reflection, and self-consciousness. All these modes of activity exhibit a distinctly suprasensuous element, and reveal a cognitive faculty of a higher order than is required for mere sense-cognitions. In harmony, therefore, with Catholic usage, we reserve the terms intellect, intelligence, and intellectual to this higher power and its operations, although many modern psychologists are wont, with much resulting confusion, to extend the application of these terms so as to include sensuous forms of the cognitive process. By thus restricting the use of these terms, the inaccuracy of such phrases as "animal intelligence" is avoided. Before such language may be legitimately employed, it should be shown that the lower animals are endowed with genuinely rational faculties, fundamentally one in kind with those of man. Catholic philosophers, however they differ on minor points, as a general body have held that intellect is a spiritual faculty depending extrinsically, but not intrinsically, on the bodily organism. The importance of a right theory of intellect is twofold: on account of its bearing on epistemology, or the doctrine of knowledge; and because of its connexion with the question of the spirituality of the soul.

The ‘higher, spiritual, cognitive power of the soul’. I know that you are completely unaware that there is no such definition possible within those metaphysical definitions offered by those who founded GF. I gather that you are really unconcerned that this is so and that in revealing your sense of things, based in whatever it is you base your understanding, that you do not need to consider the definitions offered by DD&K. They are irrelevant to you. But they are not irrelevant to the project I define of attempting to understand how these nihilistic and destructive ideas — these atheistic ideas essentially — are growing in their reach and their capacity to convince. I refer to this as ‘thought-poison’. If you want to understand where I am coming from you will have to make an effort to understand the ideas being communicated, and resist, if possible, the insertion of your primary mystic experience as the sole criterion of consideration and its arbiter.

When the natural capacities of the intelligent animal are contrasted against what is referred to as *awakened* understanding it is there that the *spiritual activity* of divinity is referred to. Thus ‘grace’ is understood to be something that is produced as a result of relation with higher consciousness, intellectus, and of course God. Again, these definitions are not possible within the materialistic and pantheistic metaphysics which comprise the lens through which, as a prime example, David views the world (based in specific descriptions in his writings). I say that certain ideas have come to ‘infect’ a mind that cannot understand the transcendental factor — the reality of a transcendent power — and I tie this to Occidental intellectual processes which rebder the thought itself, the possibility of thinking the thought, impossible. I know that no part of this is important to you, but I am speaking of things that have to do with larger structures and of course with civilization: our civilization, that of the Occident. And I further state that I believe that a *renovation* is necessary. What does that mean? But that is what I have been writing about. Not only for years but more specifically over the last few weeks.

This is important:

• In harmony, therefore, with Catholic usage, we reserve the terms intellect, intelligence, and intellectual to this higher power and its operations, although many modern psychologists are wont, with much resulting confusion, to extend the application of these terms so as to include sensuous forms of the cognitive process.

The ‘higher powers and its operations’, without any doubt possible, refers to upper dimensions of understanding that, in accord (in harmony) with Greco-Christian concepts are awakened within a relationship with divinity. Put another way, one does not attain these ‘higher levels’ of awareness or understanding outside of that relationship. Therefor, we are not speaking of mere animal intelligence when we speak of the higher attainments of Occidental culture, we are speaking of outcomes of a long and historical relationship — a spiritual relationship — with that which is understood to be ‘the transcendent’. And this transcendent is known only through a surrender of the will. The corresponding symbol would be a student submitting himself to a teacher. The student must have some level of higher understanding to sense that such an act is necessary. That is, there must be a *seed* of awareness. And out of this comes a greater awareness of a needed to appeal, as it were, to a higher intelligence.

But an atheist as the term and the notion/idea operates in our present cannot, obviously, do this. I suggest that it is in certain aspects ‘thought-poison’ that has infected his intellectual and discerning faculties. Note: discernment, choice, higher awareness, and also grace. These are ‘supernatural gifts’ within Greco-Christian ideation. But it extends from mere ‘idea’ (though ideas are not small) to the general focus of individuals in constructing culture. Education and paideia for example and a great deal more. To avoid lenthy citations I have often made reference to specific works, such as Werner Jaeger’s ‘Paideia: The Ideals of Greek Culture’. If you want to understand the Occident (I understand that you do not!) one has to really open oneself to that consideration.

In fine the idea of ‘intellectus’ is — I think rather obviously — beyond your ken. Stoned out of your mind on your mysticism, you cannot see nor consider the defined theological concept. Your *mystical transport* (again to refer to Ortega y Gassett) takes you Heaven knows where, but wherever that is, is nowhere I wish to go! Not because I dis-value you or your experience but because my concerns are radically different.

You completely missed the point of the word and only focused on a lower level of it. It is a laden and a complex term that comes to us out of the high intellectual world of Thomism. And I suggest that if we are to consider ‘renovation’ in a genuine sense, we can only do so by recovery of a larger palette, as it were, of transcendent concepts. The concept is a starting point only. These transcendent concept are no longer part of ‘thinkable thought’ and what is making inroads (as thought-poison) against such transcendent concepts must be identified and understood. And what countermands this nihilistic power is the cornerstone of the reconstruction I allude to: for an individual and for a culture. It is found in the transcendent idea and nowhere else.

Intellectus

[Pam Seeback]

Alex, just as you believe I do not understand your desire to restore the male-dominant intellect-steeped theological traditions - read Catholic - I am struck speechless at how ignorant you are as to what I have been attempting to explain to you. Time to end our head-banging discussions.

[Santiago Odo]

I prefer the term Greco-Christian rather than 'Catholic'. But you are completely on the mark! Thank you! Though for you these things have negative connotations for me they are completely positive -- with caveats of course. Men must re-dominate intellect, though I would say reclaim or reestablish themselves in it. We must, imperatively, push out of that realm the feminized intellect. What to do about the general *rebellion of woman* and all that this ramifies is, of course, a difficult but interesting topic of conversation and of study.

And very definitely sound theology -- that is, the extraction out of abstract and mystic revelations a diagram for living of life that can be taught and communicated -- needs to be reconsidered all over again. But in lieu of all recent history and as an open investigation.

Don't be struck dumb by apoplectic seizures! Your personal experiences are valid in their sphere. But if you remain in a closed-off locale, intellectually, and if you fail to come to understand the negative effect of large *metaphysical* shifts which are destructive to man, and if you cannot propose alternatives and participate in rebuilding, you will (IMHO) render your discoveries irrelevant.

[Pam Seeback]

I prefer the term Greco-Christian rather than 'Catholic'. But you are completely on the mark! Thank you! Though for you these things have negative connotations for me they are completely positive -- with caveats of course. Men must re-dominate intellect, though I would say reclaim or reestablish themselves in it. We must, imperatively, push out of that realm the feminized intellect. What to do about the general *rebellion of woman* and all that this ramifies is, of course, a difficult but interesting topic of conversation and of study.

And very definitely sound theology -- that is, the extraction out of abstract and mystic revelations a diagram for living of life that can be taught and communicated -- needs to be reconsidered all over again. But in lieu of all recent history and as an open investigation.

Don't be struck dumb by apoplectic seizures! Your personal experiences are valid in their sphere. But if you remain in a closed-off locale, intellectually, and if you fail to come to understand the negative effect of large *metaphysical* shifts which are destructive to man, and if you cannot propose alternatives and participate in rebuilding, you will (IMHO) render your discoveries irrelevant.

The diagram of living for humanity is intuitively known by every man and woman and is so simple in its logical/divine truth that 'rebuilding' via complex, rhetorical metaphysics, be they mystical or religious or secular are not necessary (or welcome). What is this simple, logical/divine truth? ALL BEINGS ARE CREATED EQUAL. From this one simple truth, all thought and action could flow, but alas, its glorious simplicity is selfishly and fearfully denied again and again. And here you are as men have come since the beginning of time with your zero modification to your specific brand of selfishness and fear mongering...the male Greco-Christian ideal. If you truly want to reveal the face of God, it is has one appearance: ALL BEINGS ARE CREATED EQUAL.

Man's history is littered with his unwillingness to acknowledge that all beings are caused of the same principle and life force. For this reason, history, for me serves one purpose only: to reveal to man the natural consequences of his childish greed, pride, lust and selfishness: violence and suffering.

[Santiago Odo]

The diagram of living for humanity is intuitively known by every man and woman and is so simple in its logical/divine truth that 'rebuilding' via complex, rhetorical metaphysics, be they mystical or religious or secular are not necessary (or welcome). What is this simple, logical/divine truth? ALL BEINGS ARE CREATED EQUAL.

I have been thinkinging of different responses to what you write. It is all very interesting, and can be fit into this thread quite easily. But it is not a simple affair, really. Because it all involves a perspective from which the *vast metaphysical shifts* can be viewed, and in my opinion need to be viewed.

So, there is no doubt at all that the stress on this emotionalized ideas that ‘all men are created equal’ arose. There is no doubt that it arose out of a context of revolutionary idealism (the French Revolution and its antecedents being the source). And there is no doubt that the ideals of the French Revolution came to be as a result of previous causal shifts. And if we trace these things back we can, withouth ascribing moral valuations necessarily, at the very least begin to grasp how dramatically the metaphysics of a people, and the metaphysics of a time, affect how people within an intellectual system view their world. And when I say *view* I mean, essentially, impose upon it. That is, they inflect *the world* with their own derived and as I say their tendentious views, and they assert that *this is the way things are*. De Rerum Natura. To me, this shores up the idea that men exist in *their imagined world*: a vision of the world that is held in the mind. This vision can be communicated and taught.

I know that you, Pam, have no interest in *our intellectual traditions*. The *world of ideas* is an irrelevant territory for you. Your focus is on immediate experience. A mysticism as you yourself describe it. What I find interesting about your assertions is that you couch them in the absolutist sense that you are communicating fundamental truths, truths which are ‘self-evident’. Why cannot people see what you see? Why do they pose such problems for this ‘divine vision’ which you have and which, if only you could get through! is so easy to see? This is intuition and it does not require intellect. Your intuition is divine revelation, according to you, and your relationship to it is religious, essentially.

But I think you already know that I see you speaking from what I call an ‘emotional understanding’. I see your revelations as the ‘transports’ that Ortega y Gassett mentioned, and I notice that you are unable to consider both what he meant and what I mean. And so I notice and mention your *revolutionary intuive blinders* but within a thread that attempts to speak of the Hyper-Liberalism of David and Dan which, to my mind, functions similarly. Remember: David and Dan came out against Kevin’s slight turn to a kind of ‘rightist’ reaction to the Hyper-Liberalisms of the present. And remember that David described *this* (he used the term ‘Breitbart’ as a catch-all) as a movement toward Nazism and Fascism. This is serious definitional business!

You do the same thing of course. This means that you see your vision, that which you derived from a sort of revelation, as reflecting *the will of the cosmos*, and in this way you align your vision of things with a far greater force of *right*. You view is the correct view and if one does not *see* and accept this, one is a regressive Nazi turning backGod’s own hands of time as they move toward the egalitarian and glorious future you envision.

This shows, I suggest, the force of New Metaphysics. But I have not yet made any specific judgments about it. I have only made an effort to take a position above the fray and to attempt to *see* the competing metaphysics. And my greater purpose is only in trying to communicate that we have all come under the sway of vast shifts in ideation and, if we desire to, we can stop, turn around, and examine the causation that has brought us to this point (to these points).

Why would one do this in Our Present? There is a group of reasons and they can all be broached and discussed. And though I have done this (and others have done it too) the most salient angle to view this issue is to understand the DD&K program as a reform movement that took aim at recognizing and arresting motions within culture and history which I call ‘hyper-liberal’ and also ‘liberal-revolutionary’. They put their foot on the brake and said: “Stop! Wake up from hyper-liberal slumber and see greater truths!” and those ‘truths’ were derived from their appreciation for and respect of certain Buddhist ideas, or neo-Buddhist ideas as they must necessarily be understood. There are numerous important elements to their Metaphysical Declarations and I have, of course, attempted to speak about them.

But let us turn back to ‘the intellectual world’, the worldview derived from Occidental and Thomist metaphysics. We do this only to be better positioned to see that which is hard to see: vast metaphysical shifts in ideas and how the kosmos is viewed. Here is Ulysses in Shakesepare’s Troilus and Cressida and an exposition on ‘degree’. (‘Degree’ of course has to do with assignments of hierarchy):

• The heavens themselves, the planets and this centre
  Observe degree, priority and place,
  Insisture, course, proportion, season, form,
  Office and custom, in all line of order;
  And therefore is the glorious planet Sol
  In noble eminence enthroned and sphered
  Amidst the other; whose medicinable eye
  Corrects the ill aspects of planets evil,
  And posts, like the commandment of a king,
  Sans cheque to good and bad: but when the planets
  In evil mixture to disorder wander,
  What plagues and what portents! what mutiny!
  What raging of the sea! shaking of earth!
  Commotion in the winds! frights, changes, horrors,
  Divert and crack, rend and deracinate
  The unity and married calm of states
  Quite from their fixure! O, when degree is shaked,
  Which is the ladder to all high designs,
  Then enterprise is sick! How could communities,
  Degrees in schools and brotherhoods in cities,
  Peaceful commerce from dividable shores,
  The primogenitive and due of birth,
  Prerogative of age, crowns, sceptres, laurels,
  But by degree, stand in authentic place?
  Take but degree away, untune that string,
  And, hark, what discord follows! each thing meets
  In mere oppugnancy: the bounded waters
  Should lift their bosoms higher than the shores
  And make a sop of all this solid globe:
  Strength should be lord of imbecility,
  And the rude son should strike his father dead:
  Force should be right; or rather, right and wrong,
  Between whose endless jar justice resides,
  Should lose their names, and so should justice too.
  Then every thing includes itself in power,
  Power into will, will into appetite;
  And appetite, an universal wolf,
  So doubly seconded with will and power,
  Must make perforce an universal prey,
  And last eat up himself. Great Agamemnon,
  This chaos, when degree is suffocate,
  Follows the choking.

In my view, in order to understand the previous metaphysics — and I then suggest that this is the only way to really understand the present and reigning metaphysics — one has to devote a good deal of time in the company of a ‘master metaphysician’.

Now, it is true as your reaction against this intellectual *world* is essentially a reaction against a masculine world (of idea). The entire intellectual world has been, shall we say, carved out of the void by man’s efforts. Is there a specifically feminine intellect? Is their a worldpicture to be derived from a woman’s view of the kosmos and of ‘reality’? This is a tough question in Our Present because it is essentially a political one. The political question, of course, involves knowledge of the revolutionary social, political and economic processes (the French Revolution for short) and how they have moved and transformed culture. But all of that involves further back-tracking into idea-shifts that start in an earlier time.

The essential ‘war of ideas’, and it is a war, begins in reaction against Scholastic Philosophy. This is not a simple affair! It has to do with

• ”La Recherche de la Vérité, the discovery, according to its lights, of the True Nature of Things. It is in that century [Seventeenth] that we meet once again the true exilaration which inspired Lucretious in his address to Epicurus — the sense of emancipation from inadequate notions, of new contact with reality. It was then, too, that the concepts of ‘truth’ ‘reality’, ‘explanation’ and all the rest were being formed, which have moulded all subsequent thinking [italics mine].”

The amazing geniuses here will, I have no doubt, at the very least grasp what is being communicated (I say this in sheer optimism). The point? Well, there are many points but the main one, and it is an important one, is only to see how shifts in large metaphysical conceptualizations have impinged on life-lived, and to see how revolutionary ideas, like a wheel moving through time, roll with great force into The Present, pick up momentum as they move, and the culminate in efflorescences in our own selves, and in our ‘sense of the world’ and of right and wrong, good and bad, et cetera.

From this one simple truth, all thought and action could flow, but alas, its glorious simplicity is selfishly and fearfully denied again and again. And here you are as men have come since the beginning of time with your zero modification to your specific brand of selfishness and fear mongering...the male Greco-Christian ideal. If you truly want to reveal the face of God, it is has one appearance: ALL BEINGS ARE CREATED EQUAL.

This is essentially feminized Newageism. It is emotion-based and less idea-based. But it is highly moralizing.

Man's history is littered with his unwillingness to acknowledge that all beings are caused of the same principle and life force. For this reason, history, for me serves one purpose only: to reveal to man the natural consequences of his childish greed, pride, lust and selfishness: violence and suffering.

More of the same. And the appeal to an open anti-intellectualism is noted. Also the intrusion of the *politically correct* into the study of history! These sorts of emoted ideas have infected academia and certainly become part of paideia. Howard Zinn in the American classroom, et cetera et cetera.

Thank you, Pam!

[Pam Seeback]

Alex: So, there is no doubt at all that the stress on this emotionalized ideas that ‘all men are created equal’ arose.

I did not say 'all men are created equal', I said 'all beings are created equal', an important difference you ignored.

There is no doubt that it arose out of a context of revolutionary idealism (the French Revolution and its antecedents being the source). And there is no doubt that the ideals of the French Revolution came to be as a result of previous causal shifts. And if we trace these things back we can, withouth ascribing moral valuations necessarily, at the very least begin to grasp how dramatically the metaphysics of a people, and the metaphysics of a time, affect how people within an intellectual system view their world. And when I say *view* I mean, essentially, impose upon it. That is, they inflect *the world* with their own derived and as I say their tendentious views, and they assert that *this is the way things are*. De Rerum Natura. To me, this shores up the idea that men exist in *their imagined world*: a vision of the world that is held in the mind. This vision can be communicated and taught.

Because you failed to address what I actually said in favor of how you wanted it said, you ended up where you usually end up, in the annals of history rather than the vision of the Godhead. Genius is a forum about Ultimate Reality, the Absolute, remember? Worldly Matters is the history hangout.

I know that you, Pam, have no interest in *our intellectual traditions*. The *world of ideas* is an irrelevant territory for you. Your focus is on immediate experience. A mysticism as you yourself describe it. What I find interesting about your assertions is that you couch them in the absolutist sense that you are communicating fundamental truths, truths which are ‘self-evident’. Why cannot people see what you see? Why do they pose such problems for this ‘divine vision’ which you have and which, if only you could get through! is so easy to see? This is intuition and it does not require intellect. Your intuition is divine revelation, according to you, and your relationship to it is religious, essentially.

But some people do see what I see and effortlessly, we speak our vision of A = A. Although I do not call my intuition 'divine', I don't reject that description either. I can communicate using religious terms or not, it depends entirely on the individual with whom I am communicating. I have extended an invitation to you to join me in 'mystical lingo' anytime, you say you can, but so far, my invitation has been shunned.

But I think you already know that I see you speaking from what I call an ‘emotional understanding’. I see your revelations as the ‘transports’ that Ortega y Gassett mentioned, and I notice that you are unable to consider both what he meant and what I mean. And so I notice and mention your *revolutionary intuive blinders* but within a thread that attempts to speak of the Hyper-Liberalism of David and Dan which, to my mind, functions similarly.

You and Ortega y Gassett are wrong. It is not I who has blinders, but you and Ortega y Gassett. I can say until I am blue in the face that what I describe are not 'transports', but just as you misquoted me above, you will continue to declare them to be what you want them to be. Because truth is important to me, I shall once again attempt to put to rest that I do not experience emotional transports when I see and describe the face of God. I assume you have heard the expression "be still and know that I am God?" BE STILL and know that I am God. No emotions, no transports, no flying around, no falling into an abyss, no magic, no alchemy...just stillness of comparative thought. I swear, Alex, if you continue projecting onto me what you have read 'about mystics' I will reach into the computer screen and slap you awake!

Remember: David and Dan came out against Kevin’s slight turn to a kind of ‘rightist’ reaction to the Hyper-Liberalisms of the present. And remember that David described *this* (he used the term ‘Breitbart’ as a catch-all) as a movement toward Nazism and Fascism. This is serious definitional business!

Whatever politics a person clings to, for me, is either an expansion of relativism or a movement toward spirit realization. In the case of David and Kevin in the Solway/Trump thread, for me, there was a whole lot more of the former than the latter.

You do the same thing of course. This means that you see your vision, that which you derived from a sort of revelation, as reflecting *the will of the cosmos*, and in this way you align your vision of things with a far greater force of *right*. You view is the correct view and if one does not *see* and accept this, one is a regressive Nazi turning backGod’s own hands of time as they move toward the egalitarian and glorious future you envision.

The vision of the Absolute is a logical vision. I assume you support and sometimes use logic. The logic of A = A, the nature of the Godhead: God is all there is. God causes all things without ceasing. And because God is all there is and God causes all things without ceasing, it is logical to conclude that God does not, because God cannot, compare or favor one thing over another thing. The desire to do so, instead, belongs to the imagination nature of the human mind, or to use religious terminology, the mind that fell from grace.

This shows, I suggest, the force of New Metaphysics. But I have not yet made any specific judgments about it. I have only made an effort to take a position above the fray and to attempt to *see* the competing metaphysics. And my greater purpose is only in trying to communicate that we have all come under the sway of vast shifts in ideation and, if we desire to, we can stop, turn around, and examine the causation that has brought us to this point (to these points).

But that has been examined in many threads since the conception of this forum. But if you like, I will gladly engage with you into a conversation of how man came to lust after the idea of God instead of direct knowledge of God.

Why would one do this in Our Present? There is a group of reasons and they can all be broached and discussed. And though I have done this (and others have done it too) the most salient angle to view this issue is to understand the DD&K program as a reform movement that took aim at recognizing and arresting motions within culture and history which I call ‘hyper-liberal’ and also ‘liberal-revolutionary’. They put their foot on the brake and said: “Stop! Wake up from hyper-liberal slumber and see greater truths!” and those ‘truths’ were derived from their appreciation for and respect of certain Buddhist ideas, or neo-Buddhist ideas as they must necessarily be understood. There are numerous important elements to their Metaphysical Declarations and I have, of course, attempted to speak about them.

But Buddhist ideas or any religious/philosophical ideas are means, not ends, rafts to the shore, not the shore itself. And yes, they act as acid (to use one of your favorite terms) to relativism, to a history-defined self, so I do understand why you fear such ideas and why you come here to undo what you perceive is a great wrong and why you want to build a defined metaphysic from the ashes left by the pouring of the reasoning-acid. I understand these things, but what I understand that you do not is that from the ashes of the self, a metaphysic cannot be built. I also understand that this absolute declaration that a metaphysic cannot be built from the ashes of relativism has caused you to dig your New Metaphysic heels in even deeper.

Let's get down and dirty here. You have been talking about this New Metaphysic for years ---- please, please, give us this New Metaphysic or even just a small sample if that is all you have.

But let us turn back to ‘the intellectual world’, the worldview derived from Occidental and Thomist metaphysics. We do this only to be better positioned to see that which is hard to see: vast metaphysical shifts in ideas and how the kosmos is viewed. Here is Ulysses in Shakesepare’s Troilus and Cressida and an exposition on ‘degree’. (‘Degree’ of course has to do with assignments of hierarchy):
The heavens themselves, the planets and this centre
Observe degree, priority and place,
Insisture, course, proportion, season, form,
Office and custom, in all line of order;
And therefore is the glorious planet Sol
In noble eminence enthroned and sphered
Amidst the other; whose medicinable eye
Corrects the ill aspects of planets evil,
And posts, like the commandment of a king,
Sans cheque to good and bad: but when the planets
In evil mixture to disorder wander,
What plagues and what portents! what mutiny!
What raging of the sea! shaking of earth!
Commotion in the winds! frights, changes, horrors,
Divert and crack, rend and deracinate
The unity and married calm of states
Quite from their fixure! O, when degree is shaked,
Which is the ladder to all high designs,
Then enterprise is sick! How could communities,
Degrees in schools and brotherhoods in cities,
Peaceful commerce from dividable shores,
The primogenitive and due of birth,
Prerogative of age, crowns, sceptres, laurels,
But by degree, stand in authentic place?
Take but degree away, untune that string,
And, hark, what discord follows! each thing meets
In mere oppugnancy: the bounded waters
Should lift their bosoms higher than the shores
And make a sop of all this solid globe:
Strength should be lord of imbecility,
And the rude son should strike his father dead:
Force should be right; or rather, right and wrong,
Between whose endless jar justice resides,
Should lose their names, and so should justice too.
Then every thing includes itself in power,
Power into will, will into appetite;
And appetite, an universal wolf,
So doubly seconded with will and power,
Must make perforce an universal prey,
And last eat up himself. Great Agamemnon,
This chaos, when degree is suffocate,
Follows the choking.
In my view, in order to understand the previous metaphysics — and I then suggest that this is the only way to really understand the present and reigning metaphysics — one has to devote a good deal of time in the company of a ‘master metaphysician’.

Now, it is true as your reaction against this intellectual *world* is essentially a reaction against a masculine world (of idea). The entire intellectual world has been, shall we say, carved out of the void by man’s efforts. Is there a specifically feminine intellect? Is their a worldpicture to be derived from a woman’s view of the kosmos and of ‘reality’? This is a tough question in Our Present because it is essentially a political one. The political question, of course, involves knowledge of the revolutionary social, political and economic processes (the French Revolution for short) and how they have moved and transformed culture. But all of that involves further back-tracking into idea-shifts that start in an earlier time.

If you want to use the male/female metaphor, as I see it, the male orientation is not toward ideas, but toward truth whereas the female orientation is toward ideas and not truth. I am not saying that the search of truth is void of idea/concepts, but that they arise out of the search for or finding of, truth. I have mentioned the difference between love of ideas and love of truth before, and as you often do when you respond to my posts, you simply overlooked or ignored this reference.

The essential ‘war of ideas’, and it is a war, begins in reaction against Scholastic Philosophy. This is not a simple affair! It has to do with
”La Recherche de la Vérité, the discovery, according to its lights, of the True Nature of Things. It is in that century [Seventeenth] that we meet once again the true exilaration which inspired Lucretious in his address to Epicurus — the sense of emancipation from inadequate notions, of new contact with reality. It was then, too, that the concepts of ‘truth’ ‘reality’, ‘explanation’ and all the rest were being formed, which have moulded all subsequent thinking [italics mine].”
The amazing geniuses here will, I have no doubt, at the very least grasp what is being communicated (I say this in sheer optimism). The point? Well, there are many points but the main one, and it is an important one, is only to see how shifts in large metaphysical conceptualizations have impinged on life-lived, and to see how revolutionary ideas, like a wheel moving through time, roll with great force into The Present, pick up momentum as they move, and the culminate in efflorescences in our own selves, and in our ‘sense of the world’ and of right and wrong, good and bad, et cetera.

Remember when I mentioned the Ten Commandments, another reference you choose to ignore? Isn't all a Christian man who needs to be told how to behave already there in black and white? If there is something missing in the ten most well known 'thou shalts' and 'thou shalt nots', I am open to hearing them.

Pam: From this one simple truth, all thought and action could flow, but alas, its glorious simplicity is selfishly and fearfully denied again and again. And here you are as men have come since the beginning of time with your zero modification to your specific brand of selfishness and fear mongering...the male Greco-Christian ideal. If you truly want to reveal the face of God, it is has one appearance: ALL BEINGS ARE CREATED EQUAL.

Alex: This is essentially feminized Newageism. It is emotion-based and less idea-based. But it is highly moralizing.

I disagree with your premise that A = A is feminine in the sense you mean - emotional - and that it is highly moralizing. A = A is the nature of The Absolute. It is neither moral or immoral to acknowledge and live by Truth. Truth is truth.

Pam: Man's history is littered with his unwillingness to acknowledge that all beings are caused of the same principle and life force. For this reason, history, for me serves one purpose only: to reveal to man the natural consequences of his childish greed, pride, lust and selfishness: violence and suffering.

Alex: More of the same. And the appeal to an open anti-intellectualism is noted. Also the intrusion of the *politically correct* into the study of history! These sorts of emoted ideas have infected academia and certainly become part of paideia. Howard Zinn in the American classroom, et cetera et cetera.

I hope you understand that although I am firmly anti-intellectualism, I am not anti-reasoning. While I see you as being firmly planted in the former and lacking the latter, I see myself as being firmly planted in the latter and lacking the former.

Thank you, Pam!

If this show of gratitude comes from an acknowledgement of our distinct contrasts vis a vis our view of an enlightened world - your words launch mine and vice versa - I return the gratitude - Thank you, Alex!

[Santiago Odo]

Oh God....

Because you failed to address what I actually said in favor of how you wanted it said, you ended up where you usually end up, in the annals of history rather than the vision of the Godhead. Genius is a forum about Ultimate Reality, the Absolute, remember? Worldly Matters is the history hangout.

I suppose this is why your particular manifestation of intellectual neurosis *resonates*, as it were, with that of the founders of GF: the tempting and seductive notion that you have, somehow, laid hands on ‘the Absolute’. And those who do that become *enlightened*. And the *enlightened* turn their efforts to teaching others. And there is no argument against them because, of course, their realizations are both absolute and ‘logical’.

Slightly circular but there you have it . . .

I grant that a person can cobble-together a philosophical/religious position form what elements he or she may choose. I began this thread by making mention of ‘A Culture of Conspiracy: Apocalyptic Visions in Contemporary America’ and to conspiricist cults which have grown in reach and complexity of content. I drew a comparison to DD&K in such a task of ‘cobbling together’ a worldpicture and I refer to this as ‘neo-Buddhism’. And I have mentioned *desperation* in a specific sense to indicate, shall I say, hurried choice or forced choice.

It is not that I failed to address what you say, it is that I can clearly see that you are a potentially 6-cylindered engine operating on only one or two. But you, like the conspiricists, really and truly believe what you preach. Firmly established in your *imagined world* these ideas seem, to you, completely coherent. A=A logical and all the rest. There doesn’t really have to be *logical consistency* but rather strength of convicion.

I do not make the separations you seem to, and perhaps DD&K would have insisted on, in separating out parts of ‘the world’ one from another. If one apprehends a spiritual revelation, and this seems to be an important part of your understanding of things, it is inextricably interconnected with all other parts of life. So, historical evaluation, personal ethics, how one organizes oneself in one’s family, what one does and what one doesn’t do, and also how one pays homage to the transcendental: these are not disconnected. ‘History’ (the study of history) is therefor a necessary and a valid ground for those interpretive efforts that I would describe as intellectual. And of course if I speak of *metaphysical shifts in ideation* I am speaking to Occidental intellectual history.

It is not the stoned mystic that can undertake this work, but rather the serious intellectual. But I do admit that to create such an intellect, to create the conditions that give rise to such a person, is a complex affair. It is in its essence an Occidental process that concerns me, and for this reason our intellectual history, and our civilizational trajectory, are highly relevant and not merely provisional elements.

But I respect the fact that they are not to you, and I understand well why my orientation is understood by you to be regressive. I see your position as being (as I say) an *outcome* of causal processes. And I respect that you understand that you are not responding to any causation at all but get your vision directly from the Cosmic Horse’s Mouth, as it were.

If this show of gratitude comes from an acknowledgement of our distinct contrasts vis a vis our view of an enlightened world - your words launch mine and vice versa - I return the gratitude - Thank you, Alex!

The way I see things is that opposition gives each one an opportunity to clarify their own ideas. So when I say 'Thank you' I mean of course just that. ;-)

[Santiago Odo]

...so I do understand why you fear such ideas and why you come here to undo what you perceive is a great wrong and why you want to build a defined metaphysic from the ashes left by the pouring of the reasoning-acid. I understand these things, but what I understand that you do not is that from the ashes of the self, a metaphysic cannot be built. I also understand that this absolute declaration that a metaphysic cannot be built from the ashes of relativism has caused you to dig your New Metaphysic heels in even deeper.

I do not think it is a question of fear. And it really just happened that I came to GF originally and, in many different ways, was influenced by it and what the Founders set in motion. I have I think carefully explained how and why I think that the choices made give evidence of nihilism, and it became necessary for me to understand not only what it is but what it means.

What I do not think that you understand -- you seem not to and you seem uninterested in the topic -- is in the area of religious and philosophical ideation come to bear on culture, on ethics, and so many other things. I recognize what it is that you value and many times have acknowledged those understandings you have. But you do not seem to understand that GF originally established itself not as a limited, specific and special set of recommendations, but one that established itself as, if you will, a universal cure.

Over the course of a long study and learning curve I came to perceive that it was necessary not to do away with the will and energy and focus that stood behind those who put this platform in motion, but to carry these things forward. It is not the same as 'undoing'. But if there is a 'wrong', yes, I would say that what is recommended here (often) is incompatible with Occidental processes.

In relation to that issue, and unforeseen by me (and I assume by others), there developed really on a world-level a sort of 'idea-rebellion' against the machinations of hyper-liberalism. This is significant. When has such a thing occurred? The election of Trump is superficial. There is a great deal more when one looks into the intellectual underpinnings. For example, through reading (see here for example.

Ok, I understand, you are only interested in mysticism and the modalities of enlightenment. I get it. But unlike you I do not see 'the sage' as having a right to retreat from the world or from concern with life in general. So, I look to those areas where Greco-Christian humanism is explored and defined. I did not arrive at this capriciously or abruptly, but rather through a long period of analysis.

I do not accept your view that the recovery of a sound metaphysics means digging something out of ashes! That is your view. And that declaration follows from your established predicates. The reason you cannot understand what I am on about is, in my view, because you lack sound formation. You are then, in my opinion, a mystic who has becomes severed from her matrix. For this reason, and for other reasons, I choose to devote energy in study of those who may have been touched by mysticism or influenced by revelation, but who orient their 'transports' back toward the human world. True though, I have always had this orientation and, time and time again, have butted heads with members of this forum.

"...this absolute declaration that a metaphysic cannot be built from the ashes of relativism has caused you to dig your New Metaphysic heels in even deeper" is not a coherent declaration in my view. It is knotted in numerous ways. To refer to a *metaphysics* is to use an abbreviation for civilizational or cultural focus. In order to understand the Occident, one must understand its metaphysics. It is not a question of 'building' anything necessarily, or extracting something from the ash-pit, but in recovering ideas and setting ideas into motion. And at this point, I am afraid, I will lose you. You are not interested in paideia. You have no desire to focus yourself in this way. And that, in my view, while perhaps not a loss for you personally, is a loss culturally because your focus veers away from -- I was going to say 'human' -- concerns.

I am far more interested in what was formerly known as The Great Chain of Being. The relatedness, the integral nature, of all things. Therefor, my notion of 'advance' and 'progress' on personal, social, spiritual and all levels, must also connect with and interact with *the world*. And this notion is part-and-parcel of the Occidental traditions I admire.

[Pam Seeback]

Blessings on your journey. :-)

[Santiago Odo]

Oh, yes, my longed for vacation! It is all planned out but toward the end of the Summer. But thanks for your well-wishing!

[Santiago Odo]

Questions directed to the Spider-Moderator that seem to have been left unanswered.

But the real question here is where do you stand within this discussion in relation to the difficult definition required? The task I would set for you would be to offer a paragraph wherein you define your understanding of *proper metaphysics* and then another paragraph where you describe mine. Often, as is obvious, in conversations of this sort people speak from their own predicates and position as if it is a *given*.

Your position, if I understand it, is strictly postmodern. You are a postmodernist. You are completely and absolutely a postmodernist. If I am wrong, please correct me. And please give me some sort of example of how you would describe your sense of 'metaphysics'. (I think you will roundly avoid this and at all cost).

I think I could accept that within your philosophy, Diebert, you have no metaphysical concept and that for you *metaphysics* is an unreal territory. But I would rather that you affirm it one way or the other (though as I say you will definitely and cleverly avoid any coherent answer). But I’ll leave you a space in which you can fit in some of the *10 millions words*:

[ . . .]

One of my points is that when, under force of ‘rationalism’ and ‘pseudo-logic’ one must do away with notions of ‘high metaphysics’ and all that they connote, one shows oneself as *trapped within phenomena*. And when one is trapped within phenomena one is, in my view, in a situation of desperation, and in a desperate situation one has to *cobble together* protections and defenses — elaborate rationalistic constructs I’d imagine — to function as a buffer against the sense of one’s desperation. One of the thrusts in our age, though it is difficult to say where it comes from precisely, is to destroy ‘conceptual pathways’ (to higher metaphysics but really to higher levels of meaning and value). This results in the destruction of intellect which is, according to my view, a construction within man’s living structure, which is to say his soul’s and his spirit’s creations within the manifest world. One might say he has built himself, but I think it as valid to say that he has been helped. That is, a bridge has been built to him as much as he builds to *that*.

This is a larger issue than just how one man arrives at definitions, or avoids the question entirely. In my view the destruction of *conceptual pathways* to higher things is tied to an intellectual decadence, a downward descent, a loss of volition, and a process through which intellect is undermined.

Thus, man cements himself as it were in his own trap. And it is the full force of (pseudo-) reason that he employs as a support and a bolster for the situation he finds himself in. That of course is how *nihilism* arises. And the only means to defeat nihilism, to overcome it, is in . . .

. . . the renovation of Ideas.

[Diebert van Rhijn]

The task I would set for you would be to offer a paragraph wherein you define your understanding of *proper metaphysics* and then another paragraph where you describe mine.

You are just describing this forum to me. At least in its ideal form. Always good to remind ourselves of it!

Your position, if I understand it, is strictly postmodern. You are a postmodernist. You are completely and absolutely a postmodernist. If I am wrong, please correct me.

So far you have not given me any indication that you understand what postmodernism is. Or "postmodern" positions or views inside philosophical contexts. And yet this has been explained by me and way more proficiently by Pye who is a professional educator on the topic. Since you keep on invoking your own definitions of it, further discussion on that topic simply dried up.

And please give me some sort of example of how you would describe your sense of 'metaphysics'.

In my mind, that has been my main activity at this forum. Well apart from unleashing all my hidden anger and shame, of course.

in a desperate situation one has to *cobble together* protections and defenses — elaborate rationalistic constructs I’d imagine — to function as a buffer against the sense of one’s desperation.

You are here describing more or less the existentialist view on the human position (body and soul). If you want to put me inside some philosophical spectrum (as some DSM-5) then I do not object against putting me with the existentialists. It's the nearest classifiable thing that I keep returning to but I am no stranger to any mysticism, nihilism, transcendental perspectives and just not being at all. But those are all way too intangible and transient to embody in any sense, in terms of traditions, names, books and labels. That's all understood.

One of the thrusts in our age, though it is difficult to say where it comes from precisely, is to destroy ‘conceptual pathways’ (to higher metaphysics but really to higher levels of meaning and value). This results in the destruction of intellect which is, according to my view, a construction within man’s living structure, which is to say his soul’s and his spirit’s creations within the manifest world.

And I agree with all that. But I came to see it as part and parcel of the processes of change. There's no guarantee on any particular outcome though. With the sun and the seasons there's at least some trust in the reliability of the cycles. Human thought as a process is way less established in time to have any predictability or guarantee attached to it. Outside mystical visions.

One might say he has built himself, but I think it as valid to say that he has been helped. That is, a bridge has been built to him as much as he builds to *that*.

Invoking the classical religion then, right? It's important to realize one introduces not just theology but also teleological notions with that: a destiny, a reason, a justification of the why. And they are derived from hopes and needs. In the end often to be taken on authority. They are "non-negotiable". And perhaps they have to be.

This is a larger issue than just how one man arrives at definitions, or avoids the question entirely. In my view the destruction of *conceptual pathways* to higher things is tied to an intellectual decadence, a downward descent, a loss of volition, and a process through which intellect is undermined.

But I see nothing new there, looking back over the centuries (assuming that act is even possible for a human being, with or without library). Well some of the scale, the speed, the technology, they are unprecedented. So with what to compare? And is everything going down? Was it that brilliant in the past? We need to be very precise with our indicators here. One could easily construct the argument, with supporting evidence, that the levels of mass idiocy and depravity in past centuries were many times higher than even today. How do we come to fear the opposite so much? Perhaps that old ruling idea of shame and guilt?

[jufa]

Not into 'Solway staement' dialogue with all the political and Trump assumption. However, to speak on metaphysics and ignore it parallel mysticism is a misdirect when religion is applied but not dissected in the same laboratory of supplied answers. So I will just inject here my POV of Metaphysics and Mysticism, to ease my sense of balance.

Metaphysics, I've found, take one no further than the gate of the third eye. It is a philosophical utensil of mind attempting to explain the nature of being by assumptive interpretation. Mysticism is where Christ conscious is revealed but not obtainable when one is dressed in time. The difference between metaphysics and mysticism, in my opinion, is all dying is done in time, and all living is done is Consciousness. This is also, to me, the difference in Christ and Buddha consciousness. Buddha did not get pass the third eye. He could never comprehend the nature of suffering. Buddha settled for His Nirvana which eased His personal suffering by becoming one with the rhythm of the earth, but He died in time without gaining The Holy Grail, as did Sir Galahad, and ascended as Christ with a glorified body.

This is the difference in metaphysics and mysticism, or Buddha and Christ consciousness. One cannot continue upon the quest of Oneness because the mentality of the earth has not been done away. The other, however, reach THE CROWN where all Spirits are One in deeds, projections, intent, purpose, and will. The Crown is The Pearl of Great Price. It is to die as all humans die, but to die with a purified soul, conscious, mind, thoughts, and resurrect from death as the risen Phoenix, or mortality which has been swept up of immortality. The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death. 1 Cor.15:26.

Never give power to anything a person believes is their source of strength - jufa

[Pam Seeback]

jufa: This is also, to me, the difference in Christ and Buddha consciousness. Buddha did not get pass the third eye. He could never comprehend the nature of suffering. Buddha settled for His Nirvana which eased His personal suffering by becoming one with the rhythm of the earth, but He died in time without gaining The Holy Grail, as did Sir Galahad, and ascended as Christ with a glorified body.

Scriptures stating that the Buddha's Nirvana was about becoming one with the rhythm of the earth would be welcome.

[Santiago Odo]

Metaphysics, I've found, take one no further than the gate of the third eye. It is a philosophical utensil of mind attempting to explain the nature of being by assumptive interpretation. Mysticism is where Christ conscious is revealed but not obtainable when one is dressed in time. The difference between metaphysics and mysticism, in my opinion, is all dying is done in time, and all living is done is Consciousness. This is also, to me, the difference in Christ and Buddha consciousness. Buddha did not get pass the third eye. He could never comprehend the nature of suffering. Buddha settled for His Nirvana which eased His personal suffering by becoming one with the rhythm of the earth, but He died in time without gaining The Holy Grail, as did Sir Galahad, and ascended as Christ with a glorified body.

A nice paragraph.

[Santiago Odo]

Santiago challenges: Your position, if I understand it, is strictly postmodern. You are a postmodernist. You are completely and absolutely a postmodernist. If I am wrong, please correct me.

Diebert evades: So far you have not given me any indication that you understand what postmodernism is. Or "postmodern" positions or views inside philosophical contexts. And yet this has been explained by me and way more proficiently by Pye who is a professional educator on the topic. Since you keep on invoking your own definitions of it, further discussion on that topic simply dried up.

I am of the belief that one does not have to *understand* postmodernism in the sense that you imply. One only has to manage to see oneself. Or to put it another way to see what has happened to oneself. When one attempts to (pretend to) an understanding of *it*, one shows oneself mired in it, if you catch my drift.

Postmodern logorrhea as it were.

One aspect of postmodernism is schizophrenia of the mind. And those who *explain* can often sound like they have a screw loose. I admit that you explain it well, that is, not at all, yet eloquently. And yet you are, as I have just demonstrated, completely and absolutely a postmodernist.

See? It's really pretty simple...

If you really understood postmodernism in the sense of that which happened to you, you would have got to the end of it, and would have begun the counter-movement.

Come back, Diebert. There's a glass of milk and two cookies on the table and a gentle fire crackling in the hearth...

[Santiago Odo]

America, it seems, is going bananas. My question is: Is a similar madness also showing itself in other polities?

Funny how America sets the stage in so many areas. America dances the Watusi, you dance the Watusi.

Allow me to demonstrate what I mean.

But is the madness of America going to spin out and infect everyone else? Or, will you remain sane and calm while America noisily implodes?

The best answer gets an all-expense-paid trip to Disney World.

[Pam Seeback]

Metaphysics, I've found, take one no further than the gate of the third eye. It is a philosophical utensil of mind attempting to explain the nature of being by assumptive interpretation. Mysticism is where Christ conscious is revealed but not obtainable when one is dressed in time. The difference between metaphysics and mysticism, in my opinion, is all dying is done in time, and all living is done is Consciousness. This is also, to me, the difference in Christ and Buddha consciousness. Buddha did not get pass the third eye. He could never comprehend the nature of suffering. Buddha settled for His Nirvana which eased His personal suffering by becoming one with the rhythm of the earth, but He died in time without gaining The Holy Grail, as did Sir Galahad, and ascended as Christ with a glorified body.

A nice paragraph.

"NIce" says nothing about the merit of the paragraph in relation to the path one must walk to be unburdened of their "me, mine and ours" except how you feel about what jufa said. I asked jufa for scriptures that gave evidence that the Buddha 'eased his personal suffering by becoming one with the rhythm of the earth' and thus far, none have been produced. As for ascending as Christ did with a glorified body, only one who is of that glorified body can speak with authority as to whether or not such a body is caused. Have you ascended Alex? Jufa?

[jufa]

jufa: This is also, to me, the difference in Christ and Buddha consciousness. Buddha did not get pass the third eye. He could never comprehend the nature of suffering. Buddha settled for His Nirvana which eased His personal suffering by becoming one with the rhythm of the earth, but He died in time without gaining The Holy Grail, as did Sir Galahad, and ascended as Christ with a glorified body.

Scriptures stating that the Buddha's Nirvana was about becoming one with the rhythm of the earth would be welcome.

See no where in the above quote where I was asked to present Scripture as Pam states here:

I asked jufa for scriptures that gave evidence that the Buddha 'eased his personal suffering by becoming one with the rhythm of the earth' and thus far, none have been produced.

I offer no Scripture, however I offer you http://www.pbs.org/thebuddha/enlightenment/ & http://www.pbs.org/thebuddha/death-and-legacy-part-2/

But I also offer you this analysis, that it was not until after the Buddha has sat under the tree and was bombarded with the temptation that He reached down and gather a handful of the earth (emphasis is here on Gautama becoming aligned with Mother Gaia), "But came one second in time!!!" when Gautama awoke and became the Buddha, yet never overcame suffering and struggling as Jesus the Christ.

You are aware of Buddha's life journey from the videos posted on my website you commented upon a while ago.

This documentary for PBS by award-winning filmmaker David Grubin and narrated by Richard Gere, tells the story of the Buddha’s life can be found @ https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/theillu ... p=898#p898

Never give power to anything a person believes is their source of strength - jufa

[Santiago Odo]

My Dearest and Respected Pam:

As for ascending as Christ did with a glorified body, only one who is of that glorified body can speak with authority as to whether or not such a body is caused. Have you ascended Alex? Jufa?

As you well know I tend to keep my nose, and my concerns, rather close to the ground. Think of me like an earth-bound ant-eater!

I have come to appreciate Christianity, and to become, in my way, affiliated with the *internal movement* that I think operates in it (excuse the loquacious way of putting it). But my concerns are social, cultural, civilizational. I am also essentially concerned for *Europe*. I am, I have to admit, also concerned for my own salvation. In the sense that Paul meant it. But I am uncertain what it is. Or exactly what it requires.

In respect to that -- to Europe -- I think that it is essential to hold to Greco-Christianity. To keep the practice alive. But as you and I both know our focuses are veeeeerrryyyy different. I am a sort of cultural activist.

You keep to the High Road. I will continue -- an intellectual busy-body -- sniffing my way to Dover. But I may not ever leave the shore.

::: sad face :::

It's my ant-eater's dharma I guess!

[jufa]

Pam ask:

Have you ascended Alex? Jufa?

Can't speak for Alex, but of course I have ascended and returned with food for the needy the metaphysician cannot comprehend.

Do you Pam, always live the metaphysical life, or that of mysticism, or do you become the mystic who allow the God within you fire you with ITS Presence?

Never give power to anything a person believes is their source of strength - jufa

[Diebert van Rhijn]

I am of the belief that one does not have to *understand* postmodernism in the sense that you imply. One only has to manage to see oneself. Or to put it another way to see what has happened to oneself. When one attempts to (pretend to) an understanding of *it*, one shows oneself mired in it, if you catch my drift.

Well and that's no logorrhea? Only has to manage to see for oneself? And that's it? Well you are the one invoking the term, borrowed from elsewhere. And I think it does need proper understanding before wielding it effectively. Unless a stage and tap dance is all you aspire to. Then again, that could be expected from a quintessential American person, right? :-)

One aspect of postmodernism is schizophrenia of the mind.

Starting with such a defunct definition, then continue trying to squeeze the whole world through that shape and then ending up with a tortured, illogical result, of course that is then caused by the postmodern insane twisted world! Oh, how we keep ourselves to be such the victim, us "pure" ones in the world of the setting sun, casting such long shadows.

If you really understood postmodernism in the sense of that which happened to you, you would have got to the end of it, and would have begun the counter-movement.

Countering by some ressentiment or simply a reactionary status quo ante?

[Diebert van Rhijn]

A variety of interesting reading material I've been reading last weeks, pointing to some of the interesting subjects brought up in the Solway Statement discussion. But generally just giving a glimpse in what I am currently reading. Not endorsing or anything.

Henry Kissinger: ‘We are in a very, very grave period’

“The mistake Nato has made is to think that there is a sort of historic evolution that will march across Eurasia and not to understand that somewhere on that march it will encounter something very different to a Westphalian [western idea of a state] entity. And for Russia this is a challenge to its identity.”

I think Trump may be one of those figures in history who appears from time to time to mark the end of an era and to force it to give up its old pretences. It doesn’t necessarily mean that he knows this, or that he is considering any great alternative. It could just be an accident.”

The Myth of ‘Returning’ to American Greatness (article)
Also the book mentioned there: "Cosmos And History, The Myth Of The Eternal Return" by Mircea Eliade ( see archive org)

"The Progressive Era" by Murray N. Rothbard

In the North, especially in Yankee areas, the form of the new Protestantism was very different. It was aggressively evangelical and postmillennialist, that is, it became each believer's sacred duty to devote his energies to trying to establish a Kingdom of God on Earth, to establishing the perfect society in America and eventually the world, to stamp out sin and "make America holy," as essential preparation for the eventual Second Advent of Jesus Christ.

Science and democracy, exhorted Dewey, marching together, reconstruct religious truth; and with this new truth, religion could help bring about "the spiritual unification of humanity, the realization of the brotherhood of man, all that Christ called the Kingdom of God … on earth."

[Santiago Odo]

Can't speak for Alex, but of course I have ascended and returned with food for the needy the metaphysician cannot comprehend.

Do you Pam, always live the metaphysical life, or that of mysticism, or do you become the mystic who allow the God within you fire you with ITS Presence?

Well, I can speak for Alex, or at least one aspect of him. Alex remains root-bound within *cultural concerns*, books, discourses, the history of ideas, and (recalling former pretences) general barnyard considerations.

He longs to be *fired* but he is, well, soggy material.

::: sigh :::

[Santiago Odo]

A variety of interesting reading material I've been reading last weeks, pointing to some of the interesting subjects brought up in the Solway Statement discussion. But generally just giving a glimpse in what I am currently reading. Not endorsing or anything.

The Rothbard seems interesting, but does it provide enough inspiration to knife Marxists and smash their skulls in? Or, is it more a polite exposé suitable for improving one's cocktail chatter?

Here is a review.