The Religion of Nietzscheism Again
David O'Bedlam
[Note: newsgroups line subtly shifted.]
On Fri, 19 Mar 2004, m. wrote:
[...]
> N rarely contradicts himself. If you see contradictions, you aren't
> reading closely enough.
Yes dear, I know, dear, you're ever so much smarter than I am, dear.
And you went all the way through Graduate School too!
> Look up esotericism. N was a practitioner of the art.
Tell us how you're using "esotericism". Y'mean like Ilyaism? Like
Gnosis and Kabbala and Auras and Astrology? Those "esoteric arts"?
> Better yet, got a copy of BGE hanging around?
No, but *just for YOU* I'll see if Gutenberg has it. Okay, they do.
> Read the "free minds" chapter, paying particular attention to 27, 30 and 40.
This translation has "THE FREE SPIRIT." Same one?
/*
27. It is difficult to be understood, especially when one thinks
and lives gangasrotogati [Footnote: Like the river Ganges:
presto.] among those only who think and live otherwise--namely,
kurmagati [Footnote: Like the tortoise: lento.], or at best
"froglike," mandeikagati [Footnote: Like the frog: staccato.] (I
do everything to be "difficultly understood" myself!)--and one
should be heartily grateful for the good will to some refinement
of interpretation. As regards "the good friends," however, who
are always too easy-going, and think that as friends they have a
right to ease, one does well at the very first to grant them a
play-ground and romping-place for misunderstanding--one can thus
laugh still; or get rid of them altogether, these good friends--
and laugh then also!
*/
So he brags that he doesn't want stupid people to understand him.
So? That's hardly "esoteric", just arrogant. (I've said the same!)
Then:
/*
30. Our deepest insights must--and should--appear as follies, and
under certain circumstances as crimes, when they come
unauthorizedly to the ears of those who are not disposed and
predestined for them. The exoteric and the esoteric, as they were
formerly distinguished by philosophers--among the Indians, as
among the Greeks, Persians, and Mussulmans, in short, wherever
people believed in gradations of rank and NOT in equality and
equal rights--are not so much in contradistinction to one another
in respect to the exoteric class, standing without, and viewing,
estimating, measuring, and judging from the outside, and not from
the inside; the more essential distinction is that the class in
question views things from below upwards--while the esoteric
class views things FROM ABOVE DOWNWARDS. There are heights of the
soul from which tragedy itself no longer appears to operate
tragically; and if all the woe in the world were taken together,
who would dare to decide whether the sight of it would
NECESSARILY seduce and constrain to sympathy, and thus to a
doubling of the woe? . . . That which serves the higher class of
men for nourishment or refreshment, must be almost poison to an
entirely different and lower order of human beings. The virtues
of the common man would perhaps mean vice and weakness in a
philosopher; it might be possible for a highly developed man,
supposing him to degenerate and go to ruin, to acquire qualities
thereby alone, for the sake of which he would have to be honoured
as a saint in the lower world into which he had sunk. There are
books which have an inverse value for the soul and the health
according as the inferior soul and the lower vitality, or the
higher and more powerful, make use of them. In the former case
they are dangerous, disturbing, unsettling books, in the latter
case they are herald-calls which summon the bravest to THEIR
bravery. Books for the general reader are always ill-smelling
books, the odour of paltry people clings to them. Where the
populace eat and drink, and even where they reverence, it is
accustomed to stink. One should not go into churches if one
wishes to breathe PURE air.
*/
There he babbles about how much smarter he is than everybody else.
Then:
/*
40. Everything that is profound loves the mask: the profoundest
things have a hatred even of figure and likeness. Should not the
CONTRARY only be the right disguise for the shame of a God to go
about in? A question worth asking!--it would be strange if some
mystic has not already ventured on the same kind of thing. There
are proceedings of such a delicate nature that it is well to
overwhelm them with coarseness and make them unrecognizable;
there are actions of love and of an extravagant magnanimity after
which nothing can be wiser than to take a stick and thrash the
witness soundly: one thereby obscures his recollection. Many a
one is able to obscure and abuse his own memory, in order at
least to have vengeance on this sole party in the secret: shame
is inventive. They are not the worst things of which one is most
ashamed: there is not only deceit behind a mask--there is so much
goodness in craft. I could imagine that a man with something
costly and fragile to conceal, would roll through life clumsily
and rotundly like an old, green, heavily-hooped wine-cask: the
refinement of his shame requiring it to be so. A man who has
depths in his shame meets his destiny and his delicate decisions
upon paths which few ever reach, and with regard to the existence
of which his nearest and most intimate friends may be ignorant;
his mortal danger conceals itself from their eyes, and equally so
his regained security. Such a hidden nature, which instinctively
employs speech for silence and concealment, and is inexhaustible
in evasion of communication, DESIRES and insists that a mask of
himself shall occupy his place in the hearts and heads of his
friends; and supposing he does not desire it, his eyes will some
day be opened to the fact that there is nevertheless a mask of
him there--and that it is well to be so. Every profound spirit
needs a mask; nay, more, around every profound spirit there
continually grows a mask, owing to the constantly false, that is
to say, SUPERFICIAL interpretation of every word he utters, every
step he takes, every sign of life he manifests.
*/
And there he's doing that "nobody can see the Real Me" thing.
So far I don't see why you've selected these passages. All I see
is a very old teenaged boy bragging that he's ever so much smarter
than everybody else, that his senses and perceptions are so very
much more sensitive, and that he "wear[s] the mask than grins and
lies" even though hoi polloi wouldn't know what they were seeing.
I don't see "esotericsm" in any sense I've heard the word used;
I see a clear pretense of obscurantism. (Note: that's a pun.)
You're welcome to read whatever you want into Ol' Freddy, even to
make a religion of Nietzscheism, if you please; it seems counter
to my understanding of Nietzsche, but then you can be strange.
What I'd like to see you do, in this context, is prove to us (if not
C.J.W.) that Freddy N. was not the evil proto-Nazi C.J.W. says he was.
If you want me to understand your ideas -- or to be able to try to --
send me a copy of your dissertation (if this is what it's about), or
some relevant excerpts therefrom. (I swear I won't badmouth it till
after it hits Amazon.com.)
Luv,
Davey
P.S. Have you "e-met" Associate Professor Silke-Maria Wieneck, a.k.a.
"smw"? She's another chick who's like very into Nietzsche, and she's
even old and tired like me! Maybe you can be her Mentee. (The Old Cow
and the Sea Cow, oh, what a formidable team!)
--
"They hung there dependent from the sky like some heavy metal fruit."
...................................................................
(C) 2004 TheDavid^TM | David, P.O. Box 21403, Louisville, KY 40221
James Whitehead
"David O'Bedlam" <thed...@shell.rawbw.com> wrote in message
news:Pine.LNX.4.58.04...@troll.weezl.org...
philosophical - that the nature of a creative act rather than an
interpretative one is such as this. Maybe he is spilling the beans
regarding creativity and modesty.
I dont think so - he's rather making an assertion about a creative act.
What is the book written for the general reader about? How does this operate
as opposed to a book which maybe needn't be written at all.
Maybe - but maybe - he is asking 'how does the creative act survive the
biological instinct of democracy?'
>
>
> So far I don't see why you've selected these passages. All I see
> is a very old teenaged boy bragging that he's ever so much smarter
> than everybody else, that his senses and perceptions are so very
> much more sensitive, and that he "wear[s] the mask than grins and
> lies" even though hoi polloi wouldn't know what they were seeing.
>
But such a judgement is perhaps what he is also dealing with. How the
artist becomes either humiliated or castrated by her audience. This is
particularly true of the female prostitute who is both (often) castrated and
(always) humiliated.
And "who" is speaking for the hoi polloi - this is touching as it i think
reveals the naivety of Nietzsche - or his honesty, i've never read a more
honest writer - painfully so.
> I don't see "esotericsm" in any sense I've heard the word used;
> I see a clear pretense of obscurantism. (Note: that's a pun.)
>
> You're welcome to read whatever you want into Ol' Freddy, even to
> make a religion of Nietzscheism, if you please; it seems counter
> to my understanding of Nietzsche, but then you can be strange.
>
> What I'd like to see you do, in this context, is prove to us (if not
> C.J.W.) that Freddy N. was not the evil proto-Nazi C.J.W. says he was.
Some 40 or more years after he wrote- i'd argue that the *evil* proto Nazi
condition was that made by the allies post 1919.
But thats not the nice point- the terrible thing to think about is that
Hitler and Napoleon would probably be (one was) heroes of Nietzsche - but
their *evil* attribute is applied by the masses who in fact carried out the
actual acts. Well applied by individuals - who like Hitler need to mobilise
the masses. Now are their masks more artful than those of the artist who
foolishly speaks the truth - or is the artist not living off the masses -
but breathing new pure air. In all humility hasn't the artist got the chance
to be non-human not in denying the masses but favouring the dionysian
nature?
m.
> [Note: newsgroups line subtly shifted.]
>
>
> On Fri, 19 Mar 2004, m. wrote:
> [...]
>
>>Look up esotericism. N was a practitioner of the art.
>
>
> Tell us how you're using "esotericism". Y'mean like Ilyaism? Like
> Gnosis and Kabbala and Auras and Astrology? Those "esoteric arts"?
>
>
esoterocism: a form a writing used by such thinkers as Plato, Descartes
and Bacon that allows philosophers to accommodate public opinion by
containing an exoteric, edifying message, while hiding between the lines
a philosophical teaching intended only for the few.
N is honest about his esotericism. Because the will to truth has become
conscious of itself, we can no longer accept noble lies.
>
>>Better yet, got a copy of BGE hanging around?
>
>
> No, but *just for YOU* I'll see if Gutenberg has it. Okay, they do.
>
>
>
>>Read the "free minds" chapter, paying particular attention to 27, 30 and 40.
>
>
>
>
> /*
>
> 27. It is difficult to be understood, especially when one thinks
> and lives gangasrotogati [Footnote: Like the river Ganges:
> presto.] among those only who think and live otherwise--namely,
> kurmagati [Footnote: Like the tortoise: lento.], or at best
> "froglike," mandeikagati [Footnote: Like the frog: staccato.] (I
> do everything to be "difficultly understood" myself!)--and one
> should be heartily grateful for the good will to some refinement
> of interpretation. As regards "the good friends," however, who
> are always too easy-going, and think that as friends they have a
> right to ease, one does well at the very first to grant them a
> play-ground and romping-place for misunderstanding--one can thus
> laugh still; or get rid of them altogether, these good friends--
> and laugh then also!
>
> */
>
> So he brags that he doesn't want stupid people to understand him.
> So? That's hardly "esoteric", just arrogant. (I've said the same!)
>
if you look at what he translates for you, they are tempos. the previous
aphorisms leading up to this one basically say, "the philosopher is
different because he seeks truth when falsification is the norm, he must
not martyr himself for the truths sake in front of the townspeople, but
instead mask himself, making it possible to descend into the crowd."
in this passage, N says that even if the philosopher tries to
communicate, that doesn't ensure he is understandable because of his
tempo, his presto. in fact, even with good will on the part of
Nietzsche, the reader still has work to do. the reader must take up part
of the burden of sense making, translating sanskrit (for instance).
> Then:
>
> /*
>
> 30. Our deepest insights must--and should--appear as follies, and
> under certain circumstances as crimes, when they come
> unauthorizedly to the ears of those who are not disposed and
> predestined for them. The exoteric and the esoteric, as they were
> formerly distinguished by philosophers--among the Indians, as
> among the Greeks, Persians, and Mussulmans, in short, wherever
> people believed in
the more essential distinction is that the class in
> question views things from below upwards--while the esoteric
> class views things FROM ABOVE DOWNWARDS. T
>
> */
>
> There he babbles about how much smarter he is than everybody else.
>
here he defines esotericism for you.
> Then:
>
> /*
>
> 40.
> */
>
> And there he's doing that "nobody can see the Real Me" thing.
>
>
there is no real me thing. consciousness is not transparent. his point
seems to be that even without the mask, we will simplify and attribute
masks. such is the nature of reading, especially reading a philosopher.
> So far I don't see why you've selected these passages. All I see
> is a very old teenaged boy bragging that he's ever so much smarter
> than everybody else, that his senses and perceptions are so very
> much more sensitive, and that he "wear[s] the mask than grins and
> lies" even though hoi polloi wouldn't know what they were seeing.
>
he is being humble and honest. he is letting the truth slip.
> What I'd like to see you do, in this context, is prove to us (if not
> C.J.W.) that Freddy N. was not the evil proto-Nazi C.J.W. says he was.
>
ignoring for the moment that belief has anything to do with proof, here
are my immediate thoughts:
In "people and fatherlands" N damns the germans for their nationalism
and anti-jewish attitude. He sees proto-nazi attitudes growing in
germany and he wants to put a stop to them and create the "good europeans."
The masters and slaves he discusses in GM are historical reflections on
the creation of "types," ways of life governed by certain values. While
N likes the master type for his lack of a need to play to an audience,
we are slaves. we have become slaves. The slaves basic disposition is
ressentimal, revenge and ill will towards the world. The slave does
harm out of weakness.
for a while the ascetic ideal of the priest allowed man to turn his
ressentiment inward, this enabled man to create a conscience and undergo
self-discipline. This cruelty towards the self, however, comes to lose
its religious meaning over time, and man's ressentiment starts to turn
outward again. This is the state of nihilism as expressed in GM. we are
man of ressentimal.
one thing we inherited from our slave morality forefathers was a
loathing of the "past" because suffering, pangs of conscience, in the
christian moral order, is deemed caused by some sin you committed. if
you suffer, it is your fault. this leads us to a place where we hate all
restraint and all self-discipline, and all mechanism of self-control
--restraint is seen as slavery. Obedience is slavery.
In TSZ, the overman is to be the new meaning of the earth. Yet, if you
read closely, Z becomes the overman when he wills the Eternal Return.
The Eternal return is to be the new value that weighs the world and
forces the overcoming of nihilism.
The overman becomes a reality in TSZ (see EH, the section on TSZ where N
says this).
Furthermore, the will to power isn't some will to POWER, it is a
metaphor for the way the world orders itself within its chaos. Things
overcome themselves, and in people, we feel this when we "will." put
simply, the will to power can be seen most easily in interpretation.
The primary condition of the slave type is that we act out of a lack. We
thereby tend to feel overcoming when we harm others. N invisions a
world were we do out of overabundance, out of gratitude towards the world.
Heidegger, not Nietzsche, is to blame for Nazi ideology. There is no
Nazi ideology within NIetzsche text's, that is, if one attempts to read
him as he tells us he is to be read. And he does indeed do this.
Steve Murgaski
"m." <queen...@smiths.net> wrote in message
news:RGz6c.27$HP...@newsread2.news.atl.earthlink.net...
> esoterocism: a form a writing used by such thinkers as Plato, Descartes
> and Bacon that allows philosophers to accommodate public opinion by
> containing an exoteric, edifying message, while hiding between the lines
> a philosophical teaching intended only for the few.
Interesting idea, but I wouldn't discount the wanking element.
esoterocism: A notion which enables academics to claim that they are among
the chosen few who have managed to interpret the hidden meanings of a text.
Sometimes I read an interpretation and feel that it's helped me to better
understand the original text. But really, when there are hundreds of
thousands of commentaries about Hamlet, it becomes necessary to admit that
the drive to publish SOMETHING is usually a factor. So, authors who make
their writing intentionally obscure are likely to be the darlings of
academia, since they provide so many opportunities to "Illuminate" their
texts.
> N is honest about his esotericism. Because the will to truth has become
> conscious of itself, we can no longer accept noble lies.
How can "The will to truth" become conscious of itself? That looks, to me,
like one of those statements beloved of academics: something which cries out
for interpretation.
> there is no real me thing. consciousness is not transparent. his point
> seems to be that even without the mask, we will simplify and attribute
> masks. such is the nature of reading, especially reading a philosopher.
Is it just me, or do many of the most famous philosophers come around to
arguing, incidentally, that philosophers are special and unique?
A friend of mine says that "Everyone needs their delusions." Well, okay.
But as long as "The will to truth" has "Become conscious of itself," so that
"We can no longer accept noble lies," maybe some humility is in order.
> he is being humble and honest. he is letting the truth slip.
How so? I don't see where you got that from.
For whatever it's worth, reading Nietzsche does disturb me. But it's a very
personal thing. If I tried to explain it in dry, academic language, to be
shared with the world, then the attempt would necessarily be a fake.
m.
> "m." <queen...@smiths.net> wrote in message
> news:RGz6c.27$HP...@newsread2.news.atl.earthlink.net...
>
>>esoterocism: a form a writing used by such thinkers as Plato, Descartes
>>and Bacon that allows philosophers to accommodate public opinion by
>>containing an exoteric, edifying message, while hiding between the lines
>>a philosophical teaching intended only for the few.
>
>
> Interesting idea, but I wouldn't discount the wanking element.
> esoterocism: A notion which enables academics to claim that they are among
> the chosen few who have managed to interpret the hidden meanings of a text.
>
no wanking elements, academics are philosophical laborers not
philosophers. they are "out of the know"
>
>
>>N is honest about his esotericism. Because the will to truth has become
>>conscious of itself, we can no longer accept noble lies.
>
>
> How can "The will to truth" become conscious of itself? That looks, to me,
> like one of those statements beloved of academics: something which cries out
> for interpretation.
>
N wrote BGE and GM on this issue.
>>there is no real me thing. consciousness is not transparent. his point
>>seems to be that even without the mask, we will simplify and attribute
>>masks. such is the nature of reading, especially reading a philosopher.
>
>
> Is it just me, or do many of the most famous philosophers come around to
> arguing, incidentally, that philosophers are special and unique?
>
of course they do. all philosophy is autiobiographical.
besides, he is trying to save philosophy, make her the queen of the
sciences (though his philosophy is more like psychology, but whatever).
>
> For whatever it's worth, reading Nietzsche does disturb me. But it's a very
> personal thing. If I tried to explain it in dry, academic language, to be
> shared with the world, then the attempt would necessarily be a fake.
>
he wants to disturb you.
jonah thomas
> m. wrote:
>>N rarely contradicts himself. If you see contradictions, you aren't
>>reading closely enough.
English (and presumably german) is sufficiently imprecise that you can
talk your way around contradictions.
> Yes dear, I know, dear, you're ever so much smarter than I am, dear.
> And you went all the way through Graduate School too!
>>Look up esotericism. N was a practitioner of the art.
> Tell us how you're using "esotericism". Y'mean like Ilyaism? Like
> Gnosis and Kabbala and Auras and Astrology? Those "esoteric arts"?
Yes, like that. The idea is that there are secret meanings that only
the initiated or the particularly perceptive will see. Jesus
practiced that with his parables.
>>Read the "free minds" chapter, paying particular attention to 27, 30 and 40.
> This translation has "THE FREE SPIRIT." Same one?
> /*
> 27. It is difficult to be understood, especially when one thinks
> and lives gangasrotogati [Footnote: Like the river Ganges:
> presto.] among those only who think and live otherwise--namely,
> kurmagati [Footnote: Like the tortoise: lento.], or at best
> "froglike," mandeikagati [Footnote: Like the frog: staccato.] (I
> do everything to be "difficultly understood" myself!)--and one
> should be heartily grateful for the good will to some refinement
> of interpretation. As regards "the good friends," however, who
> are always too easy-going, and think that as friends they have a
> right to ease, one does well at the very first to grant them a
> play-ground and romping-place for misunderstanding--one can thus
> laugh still; or get rid of them altogether, these good friends--
> and laugh then also!
> */
> So he brags that he doesn't want stupid people to understand him.
> So? That's hardly "esoteric", just arrogant. (I've said the same!)
No, that's what esoteric means. It's more specific than just arrogant
-- you can be arrogant and not mind that stupid people understand you.
Note that he's saying it's fine for people to figure out meanings he
didn't intend when it makes him look good. And note also that he
laughs at people who think they understand him. Whenever you sit back
and think that you understand instead of struggling for more
understanding, you have lost and somewhere, somehow, Nietzsche is
laughing at you. Whenever somebody says "No, that isn't what
Nietzsche means, Nietzsche *really* means *this*" Nietzsche is
laughing at them and he invites you to laugh too.
> Then:
> /*
> */
Yes, but he appears to be saying more than that. People in different
ecological niches necessarily see things differently. Businessmen are
never particularly leftist because it would go against their own
self-interest. Academics can afford to be leftist, though, because
they know it doesn't matter at all what they think.
I'm not clear what he's saying here, but he might be saying that
people who try to understand the whole system -- 'philosophers' is as
good a name as any for them -- need to stand back and look at it from
the outside apart from their own particular places in the system. But
if they speak clearly about their conclusions, people with status will
be upset because they don't speak with an attitude that gives those
people the status they 'deserve'.
> Then:
> /*
> */
And he's saying that it's best that way. Other extreme philosophers
like Heraclitus and Lieh Tzu were willing for stupid people to
misunderstand them. But Nietzsche doesn't want to put up with that,
he wants a mask that makes him look admirable, or at least normal and
harmless, so he doesn't have to put up with the ignominy he'd
otherwise get.
> So far I don't see why you've selected these passages. All I see
> is a very old teenaged boy bragging that he's ever so much smarter
> than everybody else, that his senses and perceptions are so very
> much more sensitive, and that he "wear[s] the mask than grins and
> lies" even though hoi polloi wouldn't know what they were seeing.
> I don't see "esotericsm" in any sense I've heard the word used;
> I see a clear pretense of obscurantism. (Note: that's a pun.)
That's what esotericism *is*.
> You're welcome to read whatever you want into Ol' Freddy, even to
> make a religion of Nietzscheism, if you please; it seems counter
> to my understanding of Nietzsche, but then you can be strange.
He invited people to do that, and some people have gladly accepted the
invitation.
> What I'd like to see you do, in this context, is prove to us (if not
> C.J.W.) that Freddy N. was not the evil proto-Nazi C.J.W. says he was.
It doesn't matter what Nietzsche *was*, what matters is how people
read him for their own use. The nazis read him for their use and
people who dislike nazis read him very differently. He intentionally
wrote so that people could read him however they liked, and he should
be held responsible for that -- to whatever extent responsibility
matters to a man long dead.
jonah thomas
> "David O'Bedlam" <thed...@shell.rawbw.com> wrote
>>There he babbles about how much smarter he is than everybody else.
> I dont think so - he's rather making an assertion about a creative act.
> What is the book written for the general reader about? How does this operate
> as opposed to a book which maybe needn't be written at all.
But his place in the economy was to write books, wasn't it? The
concept of "book that doesn't need to be written" is foreign to
professional writers. The relevant concept is "book that doesn't sell
well enough" or "book that is unpublishable".
jonah thomas
> "m." <queen...@smiths.net> wrote
>>esoterocism: a form a writing used by such thinkers as Plato, Descartes
>>and Bacon that allows philosophers to accommodate public opinion by
>>containing an exoteric, edifying message, while hiding between the lines
>>a philosophical teaching intended only for the few.
> Interesting idea, but I wouldn't discount the wanking element.
> esoterocism: A notion which enables academics to claim that they are among
> the chosen few who have managed to interpret the hidden meanings of a text.
Not just academics. Anybody who gives Nietzsche a sympathetic enough
reading. Read him sympathetically enough and you'll decide that there
are deep truths there if you can only understand them. Then as you
try harder you become more and more convinced. And as you create
meanings that you attribute to him you start to feel smart because you
understand him. Not just academics, anybody who's willing to play
that game.
>>N is honest about his esotericism. Because the will to truth has become
>>conscious of itself, we can no longer accept noble lies.
> How can "The will to truth" become conscious of itself? That looks, to me,
> like one of those statements beloved of academics: something which cries out
> for interpretation.
>>there is no real me thing. consciousness is not transparent. his point
>>seems to be that even without the mask, we will simplify and attribute
>>masks. such is the nature of reading, especially reading a philosopher.
> Is it just me, or do many of the most famous philosophers come around to
> arguing, incidentally, that philosophers are special and unique?
Look at the payoff for reading philosophy. In general, when you sell
something, it works better if people feel they are better and more
special for owning it. "I drive a maserati." "I use BeOS." "I have
BlueTooth installed." "My house is worth a million dollars."
If you learn optics, you can get a job building radar systems for
missiles or anti-radar systems for planes, and you can perhaps make a
living at it. If you learn philosophy you get to feel special. Of
*course* successful philosophy writing includes a solid attempt to get
readers to feel special!
> A friend of mine says that "Everyone needs their delusions." Well, okay.
> But as long as "The will to truth" has "Become conscious of itself," so that
> "We can no longer accept noble lies," maybe some humility is in order.
That would be so if the statement was not a noble lie.
>>he is being humble and honest. he is letting the truth slip.
> How so? I don't see where you got that from.
She read it in.
> For whatever it's worth, reading Nietzsche does disturb me. But it's a very
> personal thing. If I tried to explain it in dry, academic language, to be
> shared with the world, then the attempt would necessarily be a fake.
There's a sufi saying that the presence of counterfeit money implies
the existence of the real thing. The statement itself never made
sense to me -- if all the money you ever saw was counterfeit you
wouldn't see people actually using it. But the metaphor works even
when the straight story doesn't. The presence of fake philosophy
points to the sort of thing that might possibly become real, if you
were to do it for yourself.
ROBBIE
"James Whitehead" <Abx4...@jjh76g7856gh.com> wrote in message
news:c3eaut$591$1...@newsg4.svr.pol.co.uk...
David O'Bedlam
> "m." <queen...@smiths.net> wrote in message:
> > esoterocism: a form a writing used by such thinkers as Plato, Descartes
> > and Bacon that allows philosophers to accommodate public opinion by
> > containing an exoteric, edifying message, while hiding between the lines
> > a philosophical teaching intended only for the few.
[Murgaski]
> Interesting idea, but I wouldn't discount the wanking element.
> esoterocism: A notion which enables academics to claim that they are among
> the chosen few who have managed to interpret the hidden meanings of a text.
BINGO.
[...]
> Is it just me, or do many of the most famous philosophers come around
> to arguing, incidentally, that philosophers are special and unique?
Nope, it ain't just you. And in some cases it's not "incidental" either.
I mean really, there is a surface meaning to Nietzsche. But that's been
written about so often in the past 100 years that our friend "m." would
put her PhD advisor to sleep by writing about THAT, so she gives a New
Interpretation: hence, as we have the Bible Code and the DaVinci code,
"m." purports to decipher the Nietzsche Code.
Which would mean, for one thing, putting the lie to the argument that
Nietzsche is not to blame for the Nazis: how can we be SURE than when
Nietzsche said, e.g., "All poets and writers who are in love with the
superlative want more than they are capable of" he did NOT mean "Kill
all the Jews"?
Once you start going on about how you can't think he really meant what
he said then there's nothing to stop anybody from putting forth her own
interpretation, whether it looks like it has anything to do with the
"surface text" or not. Either we empty Nietzsche's text of meaning and
say that "one interpretation is as good as any other", or we must rely
on our Nietzsche Interpreters to tell us what he "really" meant.
That's no way to treat a philosopher.
Postpomoifically,
TheDavid
delatane
> For whatever it's worth, reading Nietzsche does disturb me. But it's a very
> personal thing. If I tried to explain it in dry, academic language, to be
> shared with the world, then the attempt would necessarily be a fake.
That's pretty esoteric.
D. latane
ObPoem, "Epipsychideon"
David O'Bedlam
> "David O'Bedlam" <thed...@shell.rawbw.com> wrote:
> > On Fri, 19 Mar 2004, m. wrote:
> > /* [begin Nietzsche quote]
Where do you get that from this aphorism? And what is "the biological
instinct of democracy"?
D.
P.S. Y'all habitues of these newsgroups, especially rec.arts.books and
alt.postmodern, may now thank me for revitalizing things yet again.
And if you feel *really* grateful you can SEND ME MONEY.
thed...@shell.rawbw.com has been VERIFIED by PayPal!
http://www.paypal.com
And of course you can see my Wish List at Amazon.com!
eoeo
Steve Murgaski
"delatane" <dela...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:5a8d89ad.04031...@posting.google.com...
> >
> > For whatever it's worth, reading Nietzsche does disturb me. But it's a
very
> > personal thing. If I tried to explain it in dry, academic language, to
be
> > shared with the world, then the attempt would necessarily be a fake.
>
> That's pretty esoteric.
Only if you want it to be. ;-)
I say that there are no hidden meanings in what I wrote. But of course, if
I want them to be *hidden*, then that's just what I *would* say!
I'm always amused by a story about Conrad's "Heart of Darkness." A bunch of
interpreters were apparently reading it as a metaphor for Sigmond Freud's
theories. Kurtz apparently represented the id, and maybe Marlow was the
ego -- I can't remember the particulars. But as people were churning out
scholarly articles about this, Conrad heard about it, and proclaimed that he
knew nothing about Freud, and so Heart of Darkness couldn't have anything to
do with his theories.
So then, the interpreters explained that novelists often subconsciously put
meanings into their writings, without even being aware of it. Conrad wasn't
the best interpreter of his own work, because he wasn't aware of the secret
meanings that he'd put into it.
Steve Murgaski
"eoeo" <Ai...@aol.com> wrote in message
news:387f5aa4.04031...@posting.google.com...
> be a fake superman.
An ersatz ubermensch? Repulsive!
mephisto
> I'm always amused by a story about Conrad's "Heart of Darkness." A bunch of
> interpreters were apparently reading it as a metaphor for Sigmond Freud's
> theories. Kurtz apparently represented the id, and maybe Marlow was the
> ego -- I can't remember the particulars. But as people were churning out
> scholarly articles about this, Conrad heard about it, and proclaimed that he
> knew nothing about Freud, and so Heart of Darkness couldn't have anything to
> do with his theories.
>
> So then, the interpreters explained that novelists often subconsciously put
> meanings into their writings, without even being aware of it. Conrad wasn't
> the best interpreter of his own work, because he wasn't aware of the secret
> meanings that he'd put into it.
Things like Freud give a framework that other things can be interpreted
within. I doubt whoever invented the story of Jack and the Beanstalk
had heard of Freud, but lets see:
Jack is a widow's son.
Jack gets beans and a beanstalk grows at night.
Jack climbs beanstalk and meets evil Giant.
Jack kills evil Giant after stealing his goods.
Can we say Oedipus?
So on one level Jack and the Beanstalk is a story we tell kids and Heart
of Darkness is a novel written by Conrad. On another level they're
fodder for interpretation in the light of theories such as Freud's.
Just because the author didn't mean it doesn't mean it can't be there.
Just because it can be read to be there doesn't mean it is. It's a
circle: we interpret things in order to provide things for others to
interpret - our little bit of immortality.
Lewis Mammel
Steve Murgaski wrote:
> Freud
It seems to me the obvious Freudian idea re Nietzsche is
compensation. Kaufmann describes for us his suffering from
ill health, so it seems apparent that his idea of the ubermensch
and his expressions of contempt for the weak are compensation
for his own lack of physical vitality.
Lew Mammel, Jr.
James Whitehead
"jonah thomas" <j2th...@cavtel.net> wrote in message
news:10G6c.18$j%1.3...@news.uswest.net...
publish ... however I understood he didnt actually publish much and was not
that popular in his lifetime- he self published at least two works to my
knowledge- and maybe possibly more - Thus Spoke Zarathustra originally only
40 copies - "but only seven distributed to friends" - BGE was published at
his expense... so i dont think he counts as a *professional* writer. He
calls Zarathustrra a book for all and a book for none - and that he -had
to- - or did- publish could be seen as a sign of weakness.
The artist as whore is a easy concept to figure - but the artist as
otherwise isnt. Does this artistic act require a second person? The
addition of a second person appears *perhaps* as a biological instinct.
James Whitehead
"ROBBIE" <johnny_...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:c3fc3t$27m1m1$1...@ID-200782.news.uni-berlin.de...
James Whitehead
"David O'Bedlam" <thed...@shell.rawbw.com> wrote in message
news:Pine.LNX.4.58.04...@troll.weezl.org...
anticipates a reader - and here is the relationship which he shares with
what is written is opened up to a third person. Why should he do this and is
it wise to do it - and risk as he says SUPERFICIAL interpretation of every
word he utters,
>
> D.
>
> P.S. Y'all habitues of these newsgroups, especially rec.arts.books and
> alt.postmodern, may now thank me for revitalizing things yet again.
> And if you feel *really* grateful you can SEND ME MONEY.
>
> thed...@shell.rawbw.com has been VERIFIED by PayPal!
> http://www.paypal.com
>
> And of course you can see my Wish List at Amazon.com!
>
James Whitehead
"David O'Bedlam" <thed...@shell.rawbw.com> wrote in message
news:Pine.LNX.4.58.04...@troll.weezl.org...
> Either we empty Nietzsche's text of meaning and
> say that "one interpretation is as good as any other", or we must rely
> on our Nietzsche Interpreters to tell us what he "really" meant.
>
"Either Or" & the law of the excluded middle-
Your car stops and on lifting the hood (see im being very helpful) we find a
screw has become loose in some linkage to the carb - but we only have a pen
knife - now this tool can only be properly used for sharpening our quills -
to use it to tighten the loose screw would allow us to do anything at all
with it - or should this be anything which is possible to do with it? so if
whilst tightening the screw someone attacks one - one could defend oneself
with it - but no! the mugger would argue - "if that then anything" - to
paraphrase - someone?
Someone reckons that the wasps sting evolved from a ovipositor?
James Whitehead
"Lewis Mammel" <l.ma...@worldnet.att.net> wrote in message
news:405BEB55...@worldnet.att.net...
But such a theory can equally explain your reply above - you attribute this
idea of him out of a contempt for Nietzsche's fame and standing, which you
do not have....
smw
Lewis Mammel wrote:
What do you imagine his "idea of the Uebermensch" to be?
Michael S. Morris
Saturday, the 20th of March, 2004
Silke, ever so coyly at Lew:
What do you imagine his "idea of the Uebermensch"
to be?
Well, speaking only personally, what I imagine is that
whatever it is that you, Silke, think his "idea of the
Uebermensch" is, if one were simply to negate that, one
would probably come out about correct on the question.
Mike Morris
(msmo...@netdirect.net)
smw
Michael S. Morris wrote:
ObBook: _The Concept of the Political_
Michael S. Morris
Saturday, the 20th of March, 2004
Silke, ever so coyly at Lew:
What do you imagine his "idea of the Uebermensch"
to be?
I said:
Well, speaking only personally, what I imagine is that
whatever it is that you, Silke, think his "idea of the
Uebermensch" is, if one were simply to negate that, one
would probably come out about correct on the question.
Silke:
ObBook: _The Concept of the Political_
Nah, _How to Read a Book_, by Mortimer J. Adler and
Charles Van Doren.
Mike Morris
(msmo...@netdirect.net)
smw
Michael S. Morris wrote:
Ah, yes, that famous chapter on "how to avoid reading a book and still
convince yourself that you have something to say about it."
Richard Harter
Ah. I gather that Silke hasn't read the book but has convinced
herself that she has something to say about it.
[followups set to rec.arts.books]
Richard Harter, c...@tiac.net
http://home.tiac.net/~cri, http://www.varinoma.com
A university is what a college becomes when the faculty
loses interest in students. - John Ciardi
David O'Bedlam
> Steve Murgaski wrote:
>
> > Freud
Which would also go for "psychiatric patients", too. And then there are
the other parts -- our Nietzsche scholaresses would find them quicker than
I -- where he talks about "mental illness" (or whatever term they used in
1890s Europe) as being evidence of greater intelligence and sensitivity.
--
"I am becalmed, lost to nothing."
------------------------------------------------------------------------
(C) 2004 by 'TheDavid^TM' | David, P.O. Box 21403, Louisville, KY 40221
Jeff Inman
> > esoterocism: a form a writing used by such thinkers as Plato, Descartes
> > and Bacon that allows philosophers to accommodate public opinion by
> > containing an exoteric, edifying message, while hiding between the lines
> > a philosophical teaching intended only for the few.
>
> Interesting idea, but I wouldn't discount the wanking element.
> esoterocism: A notion which enables academics to claim that they are among
> the chosen few who have managed to interpret the hidden meanings of a text.
But that would be exoteric, as it is intended to convey a
specific meaning to others. I think of esotericism as
an idea about where the meaning is. Is it in the text?
That would be exoteric. Is it something that happens in
the process you go through in working with the text?
That's esoteric.
David O'Bedlam
[snips]
> > > > /* [begin Nietzsche quote]
> > > >
> > > > 40. Everything that is profound loves the mask: the profoundest
> > > > things have a hatred even of figure and likeness. [...]
> > > > And there he's doing that "nobody can see the Real Me" thing.
> >
> > > Maybe - but maybe - he is asking 'how does the creative act survive
> > > the biological instinct of democracy?'
> > Where do you get that from this aphorism? And what is "the biological
> > instinct of democracy"?
> Maybe you should pay me for the answer? Firstly he is writing - and in
> that anticipates a reader - and here is the relationship which he shares
> with what is written is opened up to a third person.
Yes: writing and publishing philosophy at his own expense does presuppose
a reader, and testify to his need for one; he had no Usenet in those days.
> Why should he do this and is it wise to do it - and risk as he says
> SUPERFICIAL interpretation of every word he utters,
Yes, I understand that Nietzsche Scholars will think I'm Not Very Bright
and that I'm Reading Superficially, it's the kind of thing that the kind
of people who become Nietzsche Scholars have to say. (It's kind of like
someone whose bought a lot of Gnosticating/Mysticist/Neoplatonical hooey
has to say to someone who points out that monotheism means "the belief
that there is ONE god".)
But I still don't get how your point -- "'maybe - he is asking 'how does
the creative act survive the biological instinct of democracy?'" -- has
much to do with the aphorism [which I snipped for brevity, assuming you
have it right there], and you still ain't told me what you mean by "the
biological instinct of democracy".
[...]
> > And of course you can see my Wish List at Amazon.com!
> >
> What is number one on your wish list?
Amazon has it as "Mingus Ah Um [Bonus Tracks]".
Interestingly, Amazon seems to make it difficult to search for a Wish
List by email address; I just put that in the "Unique Information" box.
If that'll work at all it'll take a while to take.
--
"I am becalmed, lost to nothing."
------------------------------------------------------------------------
(C) 2004 by 'TheDavid^TM' | David, P.O. Box 21403, Louisville, KY 40221
David O'Bedlam
> "David O'Bedlam" <thed...@shell.rawbw.com> wrote in message
> news:Pine.LNX.4.58.04...@troll.weezl.org...
>
> > Either we empty Nietzsche's text of meaning and
> > say that "one interpretation is as good as any other", or we must rely
> > on our Nietzsche Interpreters to tell us what he "really" meant.
>
> "Either Or" & the law of the excluded middle-
Alright, point taken.
D.
--
"I am becalmed, lost to nothing."
------------------------------------------------------------------------
(C) 2004 by 'TheDavid^TM' | David, P.O. Box 21403, Louisville, KY 40221
Jeff Inman
> >
> > > For whatever it's worth, reading Nietzsche does disturb me.
> > > But it's a very
> > > personal thing. If I tried to explain it in dry, academic
> > > language, to be
> > > shared with the world, then the attempt would necessarily be
> > > a fake.
> >
> > That's pretty esoteric.
>
> Only if you want it to be. ;-)
>
> I say that there are no hidden meanings in what I wrote. But of course, if
> I want them to be *hidden*, then that's just what I *would* say!
The hidden meanings are in what you described as being
unable to say.
> I'm always amused by a story about Conrad's "Heart of Darkness." A bunch of
> interpreters were apparently reading it as a metaphor for Sigmond Freud's
> theories. Kurtz apparently represented the id, and maybe Marlow was the
> ego -- I can't remember the particulars. But as people were churning out
> scholarly articles about this, Conrad heard about it, and proclaimed that he
> knew nothing about Freud, and so Heart of Darkness couldn't have anything to
> do with his theories.
>
> So then, the interpreters explained that novelists often subconsciously put
> meanings into their writings, without even being aware of it. Conrad wasn't
> the best interpreter of his own work, because he wasn't aware of the secret
> meanings that he'd put into it.
Better yet, if there are Principles out there, one might construct
something that can be interpreted as an analogy for those principles.
The dynamics of human interactions would make a pretty natural
domain for analogies concerning the internal relations of agents
in our psyches. For that, one just needs to be able to imagine
that our psyches work like societies -- that psychology
recapitulates sociology, and/or vice versa. And that was pretty
natural as far back as Plato's time.
David O'Bedlam
> "Lewis Mammel" <l.ma...@worldnet.att.net> wrote:
> > It seems to me the obvious Freudian idea re Nietzsche is
> > compensation. Kaufmann describes for us his suffering from
> > ill health, so it seems apparent that his idea of the ubermensch
> > and his expressions of contempt for the weak are compensation
> > for his own lack of physical vitality.
> But such a theory can equally explain your reply above - you attribute
> this idea of him out of a contempt for Nietzsche's fame and standing,
> which you do not have....
Yes: Nietzsche has great fame and standing among the kind of people who,
to compensate themselves for their inadequacies, become Nietzsche fans.
(This line leads to an infinite regression. sir.)
smw
Jeff Inman wrote:
> Steve Murgaski wrote:
...
>
>>I'm always amused by a story about Conrad's "Heart of Darkness." A bunch of
>>interpreters were apparently reading it as a metaphor for Sigmond Freud's
>>theories. Kurtz apparently represented the id, and maybe Marlow was the
>>ego -- I can't remember the particulars. But as people were churning out
>>scholarly articles about this, Conrad heard about it, and proclaimed that he
>>knew nothing about Freud, and so Heart of Darkness couldn't have anything to
>>do with his theories.
>>
>>So then, the interpreters explained that novelists often subconsciously put
>>meanings into their writings, without even being aware of it. Conrad wasn't
>>the best interpreter of his own work, because he wasn't aware of the secret
>>meanings that he'd put into it.
So? Why would this possibility even be controversial?
> Better yet, if there are Principles out there, one might construct
> something that can be interpreted as an analogy for those principles.
> The dynamics of human interactions would make a pretty natural
> domain for analogies concerning the internal relations of agents
> in our psyches. For that, one just needs to be able to imagine
> that our psyches work like societies -- that psychology
> recapitulates sociology, and/or vice versa. And that was pretty
> natural as far back as Plato's time.
"What you said-but what you really meant" etc. is a staple in lovers'
spats, as well. And look at our ver own most rabid anti-Freudian, Mike
Morris -- it's his most common move.
David O'Bedlam
> > It seems to me the obvious Freudian idea re Nietzsche is
> > compensation. Kaufmann describes for us his suffering from
> > ill health, so it seems apparent that his idea of the ubermensch
> > and his expressions of contempt for the weak are compensation
> > for his own lack of physical vitality.
> What do you imagine his "idea of the Uebermensch" to be?
He just told you, didn't he? Nietzsche would probably say brilliant
people who aren't sickly and weak in body and mind; in mundane life
however it's turned out to mean "Nietzsche Scholars", who identify
themselves as "Ueber" in trying not to go under.
Mind you, I like a lot of Nietzsche's ideas and phrases, but I just
don't go in for the religious sentiment of modern-day Nietzscheism.
jonah thomas
> Jeff Inman wrote:
>> Steve Murgaski wrote:
> ...
>>> I'm always amused by a story about Conrad's "Heart of Darkness." A
>>> bunch of interpreters were apparently reading it as a metaphor for
>>>Sigmond Freud's theories. Kurtz apparently represented the id, and maybe
>>>Marlow was the ego -- I can't remember the particulars. But as people were
>>>churning out scholarly articles about this, Conrad heard about it, and
>>>proclaimed that he knew nothing about Freud, and so Heart of Darkness
>>>couldn't have anything to do with his theories.
>>> So then, the interpreters explained that novelists often
>>> subconsciously put meanings into their writings, without even being aware
>>>of it. Conrad wasn't the best interpreter of his own work, because he wasn't
>>>aware of the secret meanings that he'd put into it.
> So? Why would this possibility even be controversial?
In some ways it isn't. In a chess game an expert may see things about
his less-skilled opponent's intentions that the opponent not only
wouldn't want him to see but wouldn't notice himself. Similarly a
loan officer may infer things from a short interview that you not only
wouldn't want him to know but that you may never have thought of
directly. And a skilled african tracker might find by close
examination of lion feces not only things the lion has forgotten
eating and indications of his general health but also how thirsty he
is and so on.
However, none of this is communication. When we intend to communicate
a message we can find ways to measure how well the message has been
communicated. When someone draws a conclusion the writer did not
intend and does not himself know about, it is not communication but
something else.
Thus I can decide from my expert status that Silke suffers a deep
unconscious homoerotic attraction to her mother, and suffers deep
unconscious guilt over it, and this entirely explains her stand on
_Schindler's List_; no other analysis is necessary. Silke is not
qualified to argue the point, only experts on Silke's unconscious may
argue it. (Silke *could* however blow the argument out of the water
by explaining that this is not unconscious, that she's been conscious
of her homoerotic attraction to her mother since she was eight and had
regular sex with her mother since age twelve for which she felt
consciously guilty. Suddenly the arguments about unconsciousness
would become obviously bogus. But this is the only way I see that
Silke can use her special status as an expert on Silke. She could
argue that some other set of experts is better -- which leaves her
hostage to the other set of experts.)
It's very convenient to assume that an author is not an expert on his
own works. I remember once I was arguing about Gene Wolfe's book
_Peace_. A literary critic explained that there's an old tradition
that when someone is buried under a tree, and the tree falls over, the
person's ghost roams around for a day. And that's what's happening in
the book, it's entirely about the ghost having its day to roam around.
I could see various things in the book that sort of fit. An old
friend of the narrator had been planting trees for each of her dead
friends and offered to plant one for him. There was a big tree in the
back yard that had just fallen over. But he talked like this was the
one certain meaning! I asked him how he knew and he said that Wolfe
told him. It would have been convenient to say that Wolfe didn't know.
>> Better yet, if there are Principles out there, one might construct
>> something that can be interpreted as an analogy for those principles.
>> The dynamics of human interactions would make a pretty natural
>> domain for analogies concerning the internal relations of agents
>> in our psyches. For that, one just needs to be able to imagine
>> that our psyches work like societies -- that psychology
>> recapitulates sociology, and/or vice versa. And that was pretty
>> natural as far back as Plato's time.
> "What you said-but what you really meant" etc. is a staple in lovers'
> spats, as well. And look at our ver own most rabid anti-Freudian, Mike
> Morris -- it's his most common move.
Also Moggin and sometimes you. This is not a move toward
communication, though. It gives us a few choices.
1. I know what I mean and I know what you mean, but you don't know
what I mean and you don't know what you mean. I'm telling you what
you mean out of the goodness of my heart and because I have nothing
better to do, since I know you won't really understand it when I tell
you any better than you understand anything else.
2. You don't know what you really mean and I don't either, but I can
guess at it at least as well as you can so here goes. Nobody really
understands anything so let's pretend I understand you. That's more
fun than pretending that you understand yourself.
3. I know what you mean and you know what you mean. You know that I
know that you're lying. Why pretend? Just admit that I'm right and
we can go on from there you lying scumbag.
This is not a game that successful psychiatrists play. Nor successful
lovers. Nor successful communicators, with the very occasional
exception of #3.
smw
David O'Bedlam wrote:
> On Sat, 20 Mar 2004, smw wrote to Lew Mammel:
>
>
>>>It seems to me the obvious Freudian idea re Nietzsche is
>>>compensation. Kaufmann describes for us his suffering from
>>>ill health, so it seems apparent that his idea of the ubermensch
>>>and his expressions of contempt for the weak are compensation
>>>for his own lack of physical vitality.
>
>
>>What do you imagine his "idea of the Uebermensch" to be?
>
>
> He just told you, didn't he? Nietzsche would probably say brilliant
> people who aren't sickly and weak in body and mind
Nope. First of all, the Uebermensch does not exist, it's a utopian idea.
Second, it has next to nothing to do with physical health. Man is that
which is suspended between animal and uebermensch; hence, the
Uebermensch is a meta-human, not a mega-human, where meta (N was a
philologist after all) is both the above and beyond and simply the
after, as in meta-physics. You cannot really define the Uebermensch in
terms of the human, since the arrival of the Uebermensch would dispense
with those very categories you need to employ (including "sick," "weak,"
etc.)
In any case, I never quite understood why people make such a big deal
of the term -- it's very marginal in N's oeuvre.
...
> Mind you, I like a lot of Nietzsche's ideas and phrases, but I just
> don't go in for the religious sentiment of modern-day Nietzscheism.
Congratulations. I'm sure there's a gold-star waiting for you somewhere.
m.
>
>
> David O'Bedlam wrote:
>
>> On Sat, 20 Mar 2004, smw wrote to Lew Mammel:
>>
>>
>>>> It seems to me the obvious Freudian idea re Nietzsche is
>>>> compensation. Kaufmann describes for us his suffering from
>>>> ill health, so it seems apparent that his idea of the ubermensch
>>>> and his expressions of contempt for the weak are compensation
>>>> for his own lack of physical vitality.
>>
>>
>>
>>> What do you imagine his "idea of the Uebermensch" to be?
>>
>>
>>
>> He just told you, didn't he? Nietzsche would probably say brilliant
>> people who aren't sickly and weak in body and mind
>
>
> Nope. First of all, the Uebermensch does not exist, it's a utopian idea.
EH, the Overman is the greatest reality (TSZ section). Zarathustra
becomes the Overman.
Lewis Mammel
To me, it's the embodiment of yearning, "the beauty of the
overman came to me as a shadow."
As regards my remark, Nietzsche's own yearning would
be shaped by his desire to escape from his miserable
worldly condition. I don't know if this would really
be compensation, though. I guess it would be to the
extent that he might have found satisfaction in it
that was otherwise denied to him.
I saw Stephen Hawking give a talk once, using his
lap top as he did, and I noticed that in his examples
of astronauts falling into black holes he described with
great relish the rending and crushing of the astronaut's
body in the accomplishment of this event.
Now this is not compensation, but did seem to be an
expression of his frustration with his own body. You
could view the expansive purview of his studies to be
compensation for his confinement, though. "Bounded in
a nutshell and king of infinite space."
Also once, I had a sort of epiphany when I read that
B.F. Skinner, spurned by a woman in his student days,
had branded her initials on his arm using a paper clip.
"Well that explains everything!" thought I.
"Of such mighty consequence it is where these
exhalations fix, and so little from whence they
proceed." - Swift, Digression concerning Madness
Lew Mammel, Jr.
jonah thomas
> Steve Murgaski wrote:
>>I say that there are no hidden meanings in what I wrote. But of course, if
>>I want them to be *hidden*, then that's just what I *would* say!
> The hidden meanings are in what you described as being
> unable to say.
If he couldn't write them, then he didn't hide them.
>>I'm always amused by a story about Conrad's "Heart of Darkness." A bunch of
>>interpreters were apparently reading it as a metaphor for Sigmond Freud's
>>theories. Kurtz apparently represented the id, and maybe Marlow was the
>>ego -- I can't remember the particulars. But as people were churning out
>>scholarly articles about this, Conrad heard about it, and proclaimed that he
>>knew nothing about Freud, and so Heart of Darkness couldn't have anything to
>>do with his theories.
>>So then, the interpreters explained that novelists often subconsciously put
>>meanings into their writings, without even being aware of it. Conrad wasn't
>>the best interpreter of his own work, because he wasn't aware of the secret
>>meanings that he'd put into it.
> Better yet, if there are Principles out there, one might construct
> something that can be interpreted as an analogy for those principles.
> The dynamics of human interactions would make a pretty natural
> domain for analogies concerning the internal relations of agents
> in our psyches. For that, one just needs to be able to imagine
> that our psyches work like societies -- that psychology
> recapitulates sociology, and/or vice versa. And that was pretty
> natural as far back as Plato's time.
But does it make sense? We learn to simulate societies in our heads;
that's a useful skill. Do we work like that internally when we aren't
simulating societies?
I would tend to think not. It appears we can handle a limited number
of chunks in short term memory at once, and if we are thinking like
lots of people at once then we must multitask to do it, using lots of
overhead which would slow us down a whole lot. It would be like the
witches in _Arrow-Od_ who shared one eye among them and had to keep
passing it around. You might be running two dozen personalities at
once but if they only have one short-term memory to share among them
then they're going to stutter a lot.
But maybe that brain model will turn out not to be accurate. Just
because it seems to fit now doesn't mean it's true. So we might be
like societies after all.
David O'Bedlam
>
> But that would be exoteric, as it is intended to convey a
> specific meaning to others. I think of esotericism as
> an idea about where the meaning is. Is it in the text?
> That would be exoteric. Is it something that happens in
> the process you go through in working with the text?
> That's esoteric.
What would Umberto Umberto Eco say?
D.
David O'Bedlam
> David O'Bedlam wrote:
> > On Sat, 20 Mar 2004, smw wrote to Lew Mammel:
> >>>It seems to me the obvious Freudian idea re Nietzsche is
> >>>compensation. Kaufmann describes for us his suffering from
> >>>ill health, so it seems apparent that his idea of the ubermensch
> >>>and his expressions of contempt for the weak are compensation
> >>>for his own lack of physical vitality.
> >
> >>What do you imagine his "idea of the Uebermensch" to be?
> >
> > He just told you, didn't he? Nietzsche would probably say brilliant
> > people who aren't sickly and weak in body and mind
>
> Nope. First of all, the Uebermensch does not exist, it's a utopian idea.
Which has nothing to do with what Nietzsche's idea of the Uebermensch was.
Remember, Nietzsche, or at least his Zarathustra, was was to be a bridge
to the Uebermensch.
So what's your point in saying "it doesn't exist, it's a utopian idea"?
Are you trying to say "it'll never happen, just forget it"?
> Second, it has next to nothing to do with physical health. Man is that
> which is suspended between animal and uebermensch; hence, the
> Uebermensch is a meta-human, not a mega-human, where meta (N was a
> philologist after all) is both the above and beyond and simply the
> after, as in meta-physics.
That's what YOUR reading is. I noticed Nietzsche in several places going
on about PHYSICAL health as a Good Thing, so it figures into MY reading.
> You cannot really define the Uebermensch in terms of the human, since
> the arrival of the Uebermensch would dispense with those very categories
> you need to employ (including "sick," "weak," etc.)
Sure, because the Uebermensch would be strong, healthy, etc.
> In any case, I never quite understood why people make such a big deal
> of the term -- it's very marginal in N's oeuvre.
Or one you don't understand, anyway.
> ...
> > Mind you, I like a lot of Nietzsche's ideas and phrases, but I just
> > don't go in for the religious sentiment of modern-day Nietzscheism.
>
> Congratulations. I'm sure there's a gold-star waiting for you somewhere.
So you demonstrate again you have no sense of humor.
Ned Ludd
>
>> It seems to me the obvious Freudian idea re Nietzsche is
>> compensation. Kaufmann describes for us his suffering from
>> ill health, so it seems apparent that his idea of the ubermensch
>> and his expressions of contempt for the weak are compensation
>> for his own lack of physical vitality.
>
> What do you imagine his "idea of the Uebermensch" to be?
>
Well, he published a list of the things that he considered
'noble'. Would it be too far a stretch to suggest that the
ubermensch should possess these qualities?
> To me, it's the embodiment of yearning, "the beauty of the
> overman came to me as a shadow."
> As regards my remark, Nietzsche's own yearning would
> be shaped by his desire to escape from his miserable
> worldly condition. I don't know if this would really
> be compensation, though. I guess it would be to the
> extent that he might have found satisfaction in it
> that was otherwise denied to him.
>
Yes, his sickness plagued him and infected all his surmises.
> I saw Stephen Hawking give a talk once, using his
> lap top as he did, and I noticed that in his examples
> of astronauts falling into black holes he described with
> great relish the rending and crushing of the astronaut's
> body in the accomplishment of this event.
>
I never buy this. Since all dimensions are contracting
and being warped (compressed) by the field of the black hole,
how would the astronaut even know he was being crushed?
> Now this is not compensation, but did seem to be an
> expression of his frustration with his own body. You
> could view the expansive purview of his studies to be
> compensation for his confinement, though. "Bounded in
> a nutshell and king of infinite space."
> Also once, I had a sort of epiphany when I read that
> B.F. Skinner, spurned by a woman in his student days,
> had branded her initials on his arm using a paper clip.
> "Well that explains everything!" thought I.
> "Of such mighty consequence it is where these
> exhalations fix, and so little from whence they
> proceed." - Swift, Digression concerning Madness
> Lew Mammel, Jr.
>
Confinement and stress almost seem requisite for freedom
and ease.
Ned
P.S. As for the "idea of the Ubermensch", here is what
Nietzsche considered to be 'noble':
What is noble?
- Care for the most external things, in so far as this care forms a
boundary, keeps distant, guards against confusion.
- Apparent frivolity in word, dress, bearing, through which a stoic
severity and self-constraint protects itself against all immodest
inquisitiveness.
- Slowness of gesture, and of glance. There are not too many valuable
things: and these come and wish to come of themselves to the valuable
man. We do not easily admire.
- Endurance of poverty and want, also of sickness.
- Avoidance of petty honors and mistrust of all who praise readily: for
whoever praises believes he understands what he praises: but to
understand - Balzac, that typical man of ambition, has revealed it -
To comprehend is to equalize.
- Our doubt as to the communicability of the heart goes deep; solitude
not as chosen but as given.
- The conviction that one has duties only to one's equals, toward the
others one acts as one thinks best: that justice can be hoped for
(unfortunately not counted on) only among equals.
- An ironic response to the "talented," the belief in a nobility by
birth in moral matters too.
- Always to experience oneself as one who bestows honors, while there
are not many fit to honor one.
- Always disguised: the higher the type, the more a man requires an
incognito. If God existed, he would, merely on grounds of decency,
be obliged to show himself to the world only as a man.
- The ability for otium (leisure), the unconditional conviction that
although a craft in any sense does not dishonor, it certainly takes
away nobility. No "industriousness" in the bourgeois sense, however
well we may know how to honor and reward it, or like those insatiably
cackling artists who act like hens, cackle and lay eggs and cackle
again.
- We protect artists and poets and those who are masters in anything;
but as natures that are of a higher kind than these, who have only
the ability to do something, merely "productive men," we do not
confound ourselves with them.
- Pleasure in forms; taking under protection everything formal, the
conviction that politeness is one of the greatest virtues; mistrust
for letting oneself go in any way, including all freedom of press and
thought, because under them the spirit grows comfortable and doltish
and relaxes its limbs.
- Delight in women, as in a perhaps smaller but more delicate and
ethereal kind of creature. What joy to encounter creatures who have
only dancing, foolishness, and finery in their heads! They have been
the delight of every very tense and profound male soul whose life was
weighed down with great responsibilities.
- Pleasure in princes and priests, because they preserve the belief in
differences in human values even in the valuation of the past, at least
symbolically and on the whole even actually.
- Ability to keep silent: but not a word about that in the presence of
listeners.
- Endurance of protracted enmities: lack of easy reconcilability.
- Disgust for the demagogic, for the "enlightenment," for "being cozy,"
for plebeian familiarity.
- The collection of precious things, the needs of a high and fastidious
soul; to desire to possess nothing in common. One's own books, one's
own landscapes.
- We rebel against experiences, good and bad, and are slow to generalize.
The individual case: how ironic we feel toward the individual case if
it has the bad taste to pose as the rule!
- We love the naive and naive people, but as spectators and higher
natures; we find Faust just as naive as his Gretchen.
- We esteem the good very little, as herd animals: we know that in the
worst, most malignant, hardest men a priceless golden drop of goodness
is often concealed, that outweighs all mere benevolence of milk souls.
- We consider that a man of our kind is not refuted by his vices, nor by
his follies. We know that we are hard to recognize, and that we have
every reason to give ourselves foregrounds.
- Note #943 (1885)
michael
David O'Bedlam wrote:
> On Sat, 20 Mar 2004, smw wrote:
>>Nope. First of all, the Uebermensch does not exist, it's a utopian idea.
>
>
> Which has nothing to do with what Nietzsche's idea of the Uebermensch was.
and you can back up this assertion by...?
> Remember, Nietzsche, or at least his Zarathustra, was was to be a bridge
> to the Uebermensch.
aha... so because a fictional character in a philosophical treatise is
intended as "a bridge" (you think "suspension" or "contract") to the
Overman, said Overman can't be a "utopian idea"? good point...
> So what's your point in saying "it doesn't exist, it's a utopian idea"?
> Are you trying to say "it'll never happen, just forget it?"
say you set yourself the goal of becoming something like "the best of
all possible davids"... say this included your learning to read and to
think and being able to distinguish between narcissistic wanking and
communication" just because you decided these things would be included
in the definition of "the best of all...davids"...
then, say you actually had the strength of spirit and self-discipline to
try to do so... now call this "best of...davids" the Overman...
and voila! presto simplo! even you can see how the overman might be
non-existent, a utopian idea...but a powerful one nevertheless, eh?
think of what it might do... that "honey" of yours might become a real
human, instead of a rubber blowjob doll, for one...
the mind boggles... nietzsche must have been nuts to even think it...
michael
Jeff Inman
>
> Jeff Inman wrote:
> > Steve Murgaski wrote:
>
> >>I say that there are no hidden meanings in what I wrote. But of course, if
> >>I want them to be *hidden*, then that's just what I *would* say!
>
> > The hidden meanings are in what you described as being
> > unable to say.
>
> If he couldn't write them, then he didn't hide them.
I didn't say he hid them, I said they were hidden.
> >>I'm always amused by a story about Conrad's "Heart of Darkness." A bunch of
> >>interpreters were apparently reading it as a metaphor for Sigmond Freud's
> >>theories. Kurtz apparently represented the id, and maybe Marlow was the
> >>ego -- I can't remember the particulars. But as people were churning out
> >>scholarly articles about this, Conrad heard about it, and proclaimed that he
> >>knew nothing about Freud, and so Heart of Darkness couldn't have anything to
> >>do with his theories.
>
> >>So then, the interpreters explained that novelists often subconsciously put
> >>meanings into their writings, without even being aware of it. Conrad wasn't
> >>the best interpreter of his own work, because he wasn't aware of the secret
> >>meanings that he'd put into it.
>
> > Better yet, if there are Principles out there, one might construct
> > something that can be interpreted as an analogy for those principles.
> > The dynamics of human interactions would make a pretty natural
> > domain for analogies concerning the internal relations of agents
> > in our psyches. For that, one just needs to be able to imagine
> > that our psyches work like societies -- that psychology
> > recapitulates sociology, and/or vice versa. And that was pretty
> > natural as far back as Plato's time.
>
> But does it make sense? We learn to simulate societies in our heads;
> that's a useful skill. Do we work like that internally when we aren't
> simulating societies?
I imagined "psychology" covered terrain beyond what we
learn to do in our heads. The societies I'm thinking of
may include some chosen elements, but also work the
mystery of who we are. That that work can be likened
to the working of a society is the first point. Does
it *actually* work that way? Well, what do you mean by
actually?
> I would tend to think not. It appears we can handle a limited number
> of chunks in short term memory at once, and if we are thinking like
> lots of people at once then we must multitask to do it, using lots of
> overhead which would slow us down a whole lot.
Pretty reidiculous logic, sorry to say. Maybe you just
didn't get the metaphor, though. The concept, say, looking
to Plato, is that one might make a metaphor of the way
a person's "soul" is constructed which has analogues in the
way a society is organized. He had it arranged in a sort
of "classical" way, but, duh, you were allowed to do that
in ancient Greece. That's the _Republic_. Revisted in
the _Laws_, but there's a twist there, discussed in these
parts not too long ago, featuring the number 5040.
I take _Zarathustra_ to be a sort of tweak of Plato, on these
grounds. Instead of a heirarchy, with philosophers ruling
indoctrinated laborers, you have a motley of hoboes, wild
animals, zealots, etc, gathered for a party. And they
meet *in* that cave, instead of fighting to get out.
Hahahaha!
> It would be like the
> witches in _Arrow-Od_ who shared one eye among them and had to keep
> passing it around. You might be running two dozen personalities at
> once but if they only have one short-term memory to share among them
> then they're going to stutter a lot.
>
> But maybe that brain model will turn out not to be accurate. Just
> because it seems to fit now doesn't mean it's true. So we might be
> like societies after all.
I don't think you've described much of a brain model. The
society thing has already been mapped more or less "successfully"
to brains without much struggle, including one effort by the
inventor of the Perceptron. As you probably know, the arena is
currently inhabited by concepts like massive parallelism in neurons,
which form layered heirarchies, with various specialized systems.
No problem putting a society onto that.
Jeff
David O'Bedlam
> "Lewis Mammel" <l.ma...@worldnet.att.net> wrote:
> > I saw Stephen Hawking give a talk once, using his
> > lap top as he did, and I noticed that in his examples
> > of astronauts falling into black holes he described with
> > great relish the rending and crushing of the astronaut's
> > body in the accomplishment of this event.
>
> I never buy this. Since all dimensions are contracting
> and being warped (compressed) by the field of the black hole,
> how would the astronaut even know he was being crushed?
Why would he need to know he was being crushed?
David O'Bedlam
> David O'Bedlam wrote:
> > On Sat, 20 Mar 2004, smw wrote:
> >>Nope. First of all, the Uebermensch does not exist, it's a utopian idea.
> > Which has nothing to do with what Nietzsche's idea of the Uebermensch was.
> and you can back up this assertion by...?
Flicking boogers at you. In context, I was answering something Silke said,
which was answering something I said, all of which you cut, said deletia
making making sense of what's left of the exchange impossible without more
cutting, pasting and restoring than anything you say merits.
> > Remember, Nietzsche, or at least his Zarathustra, was to be a bridge
> > to the Uebermensch.
>
> aha... so because a fictional character in a philosophical treatise is
> intended as "a bridge" (you think "suspension" or "contract") to the
> Overman, said Overman can't be a "utopian idea"? good point...
You don't ape Silke very well. Have another booger. The Nietzsche scholars
would know an allusion to "Zarathustra's Prologue" when I whip one out.
[snip a lot of puerile insults covering a wee explanation about setting
oneself an ideal Self to strive toward, fucked if I know how "michael"
got that idea]
> and voila! presto simplo! even you can see how the overman might be
> non-existent, a utopian idea...but a powerful one nevertheless, eh?
Yes, I understand that much. if Silke says that's what she meant then
that's the answer to the question I asked Silke. The real SMW, I mean.
> think of what it might do... that "honey" of yours might become a real
> human, instead of a rubber blowjob doll, for one...
A rubber blowjob doll finished law school. Is she the only one? Assuming
she's not the only one, that explains a lot about United States' laws.
A warning to you: it's not a very good idea piss me off by insulting my
partner. What you would get from that would not please any but the most
masochistic idiots. I am very capable of making any flame war you've ever
seen a tiptoe through the tulips by comparison -- it's my idea of fun.
smw
Same thing, no?
smw
David O'Bedlam wrote:
> On Sat, 20 Mar 2004, smw wrote:
>
>>David O'Bedlam wrote:
>>
>>>On Sat, 20 Mar 2004, smw wrote to Lew Mammel:
>
>
>>>>>It seems to me the obvious Freudian idea re Nietzsche is
>>>>>compensation. Kaufmann describes for us his suffering from
>>>>>ill health, so it seems apparent that his idea of the ubermensch
>>>>>and his expressions of contempt for the weak are compensation
>>>>>for his own lack of physical vitality.
>>>
>>>>What do you imagine his "idea of the Uebermensch" to be?
>>>
>>>He just told you, didn't he? Nietzsche would probably say brilliant
>>>people who aren't sickly and weak in body and mind
>>
>>Nope. First of all, the Uebermensch does not exist, it's a utopian idea.
>
>
> Which has nothing to do with what Nietzsche's idea of the Uebermensch was.
>
> Remember, Nietzsche, or at least his Zarathustra, was was to be a bridge
> to the Uebermensch.
No, "man" is the bridge between animal and uebermensch. Hence, as long
as men are men, there's no uebermensch. Zarathustra, I feel the sudden
urge to point out, is a fictional character.
> So what's your point in saying "it doesn't exist, it's a utopian idea"?
> Are you trying to say "it'll never happen, just forget it"?
No, I'm saying that he's not the blond beast, as folks seem to assume
(not meaning you).
>>Second, it has next to nothing to do with physical health. Man is that
>>which is suspended between animal and uebermensch; hence, the
>>Uebermensch is a meta-human, not a mega-human, where meta (N was a
>>philologist after all) is both the above and beyond and simply the
>>after, as in meta-physics.
>
>
> That's what YOUR reading is. I noticed Nietzsche in several places going
> on about PHYSICAL health as a Good Thing, so it figures into MY reading.
Sure. And he also goes on about illness as a good thing. And about the
switching back and forth as the best thing. Intro to GS.
>>You cannot really define the Uebermensch in terms of the human, since
>>the arrival of the Uebermensch would dispense with those very categories
>>you need to employ (including "sick," "weak," etc.)
>
>
> Sure, because the Uebermensch would be strong, healthy, etc.
A text, please?
>> In any case, I never quite understood why people make such a big deal
>>of the term -- it's very marginal in N's oeuvre.
>
> Or one you don't understand, anyway.
What's the "or" doing in there? Do a web search on the complete oeuvre.
How often does the term come up?
>
>
>>...
>>
>>>Mind you, I like a lot of Nietzsche's ideas and phrases, but I just
>>>don't go in for the religious sentiment of modern-day Nietzscheism.
>>
>>Congratulations. I'm sure there's a gold-star waiting for you somewhere.
>
> So you demonstrate again you have no sense of humor.
"or one you don't understand, anyway."
smw
Ned Ludd wrote:
> "Lewis Mammel" <l.ma...@worldnet.att.net> wrote in message
> news:405CA19A...@worldnet.att.net...
>
>>>It seems to me the obvious Freudian idea re Nietzsche is
>>>compensation. Kaufmann describes for us his suffering from
>>>ill health, so it seems apparent that his idea of the ubermensch
>>>and his expressions of contempt for the weak are compensation
>>>for his own lack of physical vitality.
>>
>>What do you imagine his "idea of the Uebermensch" to be?
>>
>
>
> Well, he published a list of the things that he considered
> 'noble'. Would it be too far a stretch to suggest that the
> ubermensch should possess these qualities?
Yes, absolutely. It's a different discourse altogether.
>
>
>>To me, it's the embodiment of yearning, "the beauty of the
>>overman came to me as a shadow."
>>As regards my remark, Nietzsche's own yearning would
>>be shaped by his desire to escape from his miserable
>>worldly condition. I don't know if this would really
>>be compensation, though. I guess it would be to the
>>extent that he might have found satisfaction in it
>>that was otherwise denied to him.
>>
> Yes, his sickness plagued him and infected all his surmises.
As did his recoveries. Again, GS, intro.
Lewis Mammel
Ned Ludd wrote:
>
> "Lewis Mammel" <l.ma...@worldnet.att.net> wrote in message
> > I saw Stephen Hawking give a talk once, using his
> > lap top as he did, and I noticed that in his examples
> > of astronauts falling into black holes he described with
> > great relish the rending and crushing of the astronaut's
> > body in the accomplishment of this event.
> >
>
> I never buy this. Since all dimensions are contracting
> and being warped (compressed) by the field of the black hole,
> how would the astronaut even know he was being crushed?
You ought to buy it. Your clause, "Since all dimensions are
contracting ..." expresses a misconception of geometrodynamics.
If spacetime were simply a "rubber sheet" which could be stretched
without affecting embedded objects, there wouldn't be any point
to it at all.
The thing that kills the astronaut is tidal forces, and these
are indeed the same forces which tug at the earth and its oceans.
Tidal forces are a locally Newtonian description of the divergence
of nearby free-fall lines. To maintain a rigid object the separate
parts have to be pulled away from their natural line of fall, and
a force is required to do this. In Newtonian terms we say this
force is required to resist the tidal force, and of course it
becomes immense near a black hole.
BTW your list of Nietzschean noble qualities was interesting.
I hadn't known about it.
Lew Mammel, Jr.
jonah thomas
This deserves a followup. Tell us a joke you think is funny, please?
Here's one I like:
Mullah Nasrudin was widely respected for his piety so he was appointed
a judge. But he didn't know much about law.
On his first case the plaintiff spoke so persuasively that Nasrudin
stood up and said, "I believe you're right!".
The court clerk said, "Sit down, sit down, Judge Nasrudin. You have
to listen to the defendant too.". So Nasrudin sat down.
The defendant spoke so eloquently that Nasrudin stood up and said, "I
believe you're right!".
The court clerk said, "Sit down, sit down, Judge Nasrudin. They can't
both be right, now can they?".
Nasrudin sat down and thought briefly. Then he stood up and said, "I
believe you're right!".
Lewis Mammel
This joke is recounted in _Dark Genius_ as a favorite of
Leo Szilard, but of course it's a rabbi and not a mullah,
and it's his wife that rebukes him.
Lew Mammel, Jr.
Steve Murgaski
"Jeff Inman" <jeff...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:405C8226...@earthlink.net...
> Steve Murgaski wrote:
> > "delatane" <dela...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
> > > Steve Murgaski wrote:
> > >
> > > > For whatever it's worth, reading Nietzsche does disturb me.
> > > > But it's a very
> > > > personal thing. If I tried to explain it in dry, academic
> > > > language, to be
> > > > shared with the world, then the attempt would necessarily be
> > > > a fake.
> > >
> > > That's pretty esoteric.
> >
> > Only if you want it to be. ;-)
> >
> > I say that there are no hidden meanings in what I wrote. But of course,
if
> > I want them to be *hidden*, then that's just what I *would* say!
>
> The hidden meanings are in what you described as being
> unable to say.
Oh. So, if I understand your other post, the "hidden meanings" are
_esoteric_, because they're not actually "In the text" (exoteric), but
rather, they come out in the process you go through in understanding the
text.
Did I mention the wanking element in all this?
But, no doubt there's a Freudian interpretation of my use of the word
"Wanking," to describe academic discourse.
I'm fairly certain there would be a more direct way of expressing that idea.
"Psychology recapitulates sociology?"
If you and Mephisto were to argue that stories need to reflect sound
psychological principles in order to become popular and survive, I'd almost
buy it (personally).
Suppose that I can more easily suspend my disbelief, while reading a story,
if the psychology of the characters looks familiar to me -- i.e., if I can
intuitively understand why they behave in the ways they do. This way, you
get a mechanism through which a story should agree with a good psychological
theory, without requiring the author to have any knowledge of said theory.
In this model, what happens is that a lot of stories get produced, but the
ones which are considered "Good" (such as Heart of Darkness) are the ones
that portray psychological traits, through the characters, which large
numbers of people, in a culture, find believable.
If Kurtz is all id, well, everyone has an id (says Freud), so we can relate
to Kurtz, and we like the story.
Same with Jack and the Beanstalk. It reflects some universal psychological
condition, so people can relate to it, and the story survives.
For all I know this is what you were arguing, Jeff, with "Psychology
recapitulates sociology..."
Jonah Thomas
> jonah thomas wrote:
>>Jeff Inman wrote:
>>>Steve Murgaski wrote:
>>>>I say that there are no hidden meanings in what I wrote. But of course, if
>>>>I want them to be *hidden*, then that's just what I *would* say!
>>>The hidden meanings are in what you described as being
>>>unable to say.
>>If he couldn't write them, then he didn't hide them.
> I didn't say he hid them, I said they were hidden.
OK, it's possible to take that tack. In that sense a grain of sand
bears mute record of its history -- if you could only note the
position of each atom and line up all the stress fractures etc, you
would have evidence about the mountain it was once part of, and the
erosion that washed it to the sea, and the wave action that ground it
against other things up to the time you picked it up and began to
study it. But we are finite creatures with little time, and mostly to
us a sand grain is only a little speck of the beach and its hidden
meanings are destined to stay hidden.
You might be able to tell a lot about Steve's cultural background by
his subtle choices of wording and syntax. A specialist in the right
sort of anthropometrics could listen to him say a few dozen sentences
and make a good guess at where he grew up and where he's been since.
It could be said that this is part of the meaning of his words. But
there's a big difference between analysing somebody's words for hidden
meanings that they don't intend to put there, versus listening to
them. And listening is a whole lot more valued by those who talk or
write.
>>>Better yet, if there are Principles out there, one might construct
>>>something that can be interpreted as an analogy for those principles.
>>>The dynamics of human interactions would make a pretty natural
>>>domain for analogies concerning the internal relations of agents
>>>in our psyches. For that, one just needs to be able to imagine
>>>that our psyches work like societies -- that psychology
>>>recapitulates sociology, and/or vice versa. And that was pretty
>>>natural as far back as Plato's time.
>>But does it make sense? We learn to simulate societies in our heads;
>>that's a useful skill. Do we work like that internally when we aren't
>>simulating societies?
> I imagined "psychology" covered terrain beyond what we
> learn to do in our heads. The societies I'm thinking of
> may include some chosen elements, but also work the
> mystery of who we are. That that work can be likened
> to the working of a society is the first point. Does
> it *actually* work that way? Well, what do you mean by
> actually?
I'm starting to get the impression that this is not heading toward a
meaningful conversation. I'd be glad to be wrong about that.
>>I would tend to think not. It appears we can handle a limited number
>>of chunks in short term memory at once, and if we are thinking like
>>lots of people at once then we must multitask to do it, using lots of
>>overhead which would slow us down a whole lot.
> Pretty reidiculous logic, sorry to say. Maybe you just
> didn't get the metaphor, though. The concept, say, looking
> to Plato, is that one might make a metaphor of the way
> a person's "soul" is constructed which has analogues in the
> way a society is organized. He had it arranged in a sort
> of "classical" way, but, duh, you were allowed to do that
> in ancient Greece. That's the _Republic_. Revisted in
> the _Laws_, but there's a twist there, discussed in these
> parts not too long ago, featuring the number 5040.
People make *lots* of metaphors. People compare human societies to
ants and bees. And to plants -- conservatives are more likely to
compare society to a plant that grows and naturally puts the most new
tissue into the most productive use, that needs the dead wood trimmed
back occasionally. And to human minds. And machines. The clockwork
metaphor was used when we didn't have a better machine to compare to.
Now we compare to computers, or better to computer networks. We try
to compare human minds to neural nets, which at best is like comparing
a society to a squad of marines. Sometimes we compare society to a
million monkeys randomly typing. I'll do that now -- if we go on long
enough we will make *every possible* random metaphor comparing
something-or-other to human minds or human societies.
The fact that Plato made a collection of mostly-unworkable metaphors
about human minds and human societies is of mostly historical
interest. He was certainly not the first to do that sort of thing, as
compare the Inana myth which compares the structure of Hell to that of
a queen's bureaucracy.
> I take _Zarathustra_ to be a sort of tweak of Plato, on these
> grounds. Instead of a heirarchy, with philosophers ruling
> indoctrinated laborers, you have a motley of hoboes, wild
> animals, zealots, etc, gathered for a party. And they
> meet *in* that cave, instead of fighting to get out.
> Hahahaha!
That does sound like a good joke.
>>It would be like the
>>witches in _Arrow-Od_ who shared one eye among them and had to keep
>>passing it around. You might be running two dozen personalities at
>>once but if they only have one short-term memory to share among them
>>then they're going to stutter a lot.
>>But maybe that brain model will turn out not to be accurate. Just
>>because it seems to fit now doesn't mean it's true. So we might be
>>like societies after all.
> I don't think you've described much of a brain model.
I didn't describe much of it, but if you're familiar with the concepts
you can reconstruct it easily. There's nothing particularly esoteric
about it except that I hid the meaning by leaving most of it out.
> The
> society thing has already been mapped more or less "successfully"
> to brains without much struggle, including one effort by the
> inventor of the Perceptron. As you probably know, the arena is
> currently inhabited by concepts like massive parallelism in neurons,
> which form layered heirarchies, with various specialized systems.
> No problem putting a society onto that.
We don't know much about how to do that. Get to the key points and
it's all handwaving. If you believe the stuff about short-term
memory, we are pretty limited in our abilities to lay down new
memories. We can deal with a limited number of chunks at once,
perhaps as few as fourteen. Somehow we do comparisons and choose
which new things to remember, and whatever doesn't make it into
long-term memory within half an hour or so won't make it at all --
unless a similar idea gets another chance later. As anyone who has
tried to learn a semester of calculus the night before the test can
tell you, there are strict limits on how many new memories you can
build on each other in a few hours. We have some kind of massive
parallelism in *retrieving* memories, but it looks like we don't have
massive parallelism in *laying down* new memories. And that massive
parallelism in retrieving memories somehow has to go through the
funnel of chunking in short term memory.
Maybe the experiments that give this impression will turn out not to
have the generality I want to give them. But from the last lit search
I did, at that time it looked like the way to bet. And I see no
analogous mechanism in society. It would be fascinating if there was
something analogous in society, though. That would be *far* more
interesting than comparing society or human minds to spreadsheets or
databases, which will be the natural metaphor when enough people get
familiar with spreadsheets and databases. Or maybe Windows OSes.
"Windows doesn't work very well, and it's so complicated nobody
understands it. The more problems a bug causes the more likely it
will be fixed in the next generation, but there are no guarantees.
Each new revision has fancier buggy ways to do the same old things,
and also includes as defaults things that seemed like good new ideas
that somebody else tried to make a living off of. Yes, it's a lot
like a human society."
Steve Murgaski
"jonah thomas" <j2th...@cavtel.net> wrote in message
news:vq07c.12$lM4....@news.uswest.net...
I think your three analogies start off weakly, but get stronger.
For the first one to work, we suppose that the critic is like a grandmaster,
the author like a less skilled oponent, and writing stories is like playing
chess. None of those comparisons look viable to me. For one thing,
grandmasters win pretty consistently at chess, but literary critics aren't
typically famous authors. People have tried to come up with rules (devices,
and such) which writing must obey to make it literature (a "Winning" book),
but that doesn't seem to have worked very well. So, no one's sure if you
win by killing the king, or by killing the queen, or by forcing your oponent
to move his pawn on the far left ahead one square...
Loan officer, mmm. Better, but successful businesses probably have more in
common, on average, than "successful" novels.
I like the lion tracker one.
> However, none of this is communication. When we intend to communicate
> a message we can find ways to measure how well the message has been
> communicated. When someone draws a conclusion the writer did not
> intend and does not himself know about, it is not communication but
> something else.
Yes, that's basically my argument against reading in all this "Hidden
meaning". The pretense that the meanings are _really_ there, in some
objective sense.
> It's very convenient to assume that an author is not an expert on his
> own works.
That too.
Lewis Mammel
I searched on [ mullah nasrudin ] and found that the source
of these stories is a book by Idries Shah, so I got to wondering.
I searched on [ mullah nasrudin provenance ], [ mullah nasrudin phony ],
[ mullah nasrudin fake ], then softening, [ mullah nasrudin doubtful ],
and found an amazon.com review of a more recent book by him,
_The Boy Without a Name_ . The word "doubtful" occurs after the
fact: "...but it is doubtful that this book on its own will make
much sense to children or the adults who read it to them." ...
as the story as summarized is utterly inane.
This doubt creeps backward, however. The review starts out,
"Ostensibly based on a Sufi legend ..."
Lew Mammel, Jr.
Jeff Inman
>
> Jeff Inman wrote:
> > jonah thomas wrote:
> >>Jeff Inman wrote:
> >>>Steve Murgaski wrote:
>
> >>>>I say that there are no hidden meanings in what I wrote. But of course, if
> >>>>I want them to be *hidden*, then that's just what I *would* say!
>
> >>>The hidden meanings are in what you described as being
> >>>unable to say.
>
> >>If he couldn't write them, then he didn't hide them.
>
> > I didn't say he hid them, I said they were hidden.
>
> OK, it's possible to take that tack. In that sense a grain of sand
> bears mute record of its history -- if you could only note the
> position of each atom and line up all the stress fractures etc, you
> would have evidence about the mountain it was once part of, and the
> erosion that washed it to the sea, and the wave action that ground it
> against other things up to the time you picked it up and began to
> study it. But we are finite creatures with little time, and mostly to
> us a sand grain is only a little speck of the beach and its hidden
> meanings are destined to stay hidden.
Well, that's the way things are. If you could be born as
someone else, and live through their lives exactly as them,
you wouldn't have to struggle to approach the question of
what they did with a certain book, at a certain time.
As it is, though, you're stuck wondering. Or you can
call the question intractible and give up. I take it
you understand, though, that there are things that someone
can know and not be able to say.
But, incidentally, I think there is some confusion entered into
your account by quantum physics. Working your way backwards
as you describe is confounded (so I understand it) by
the idea that micro-scale events are underdetermined.
(Or, conversely, their reality is such that the question
of determination is "not even wrong". I had associated that
joke with Feynmann, but Silke quoted it from Nietzsche.)
'Course, maybe you want to hold out with me on the hope for
some Global Hidden Variable thing.
> You might be able to tell a lot about Steve's cultural background by
> his subtle choices of wording and syntax. A specialist in the right
> sort of anthropometrics could listen to him say a few dozen sentences
> and make a good guess at where he grew up and where he's been since.
> It could be said that this is part of the meaning of his words. But
> there's a big difference between analysing somebody's words for hidden
> meanings that they don't intend to put there, versus listening to
> them. And listening is a whole lot more valued by those who talk or
> write.
Steve made the claim that there were things in his reading
that he couldn't convey explicitly. I suspect that, yes,
were he with patient friends, he might be able to convey
some of it. But the notion of esotericism goes beyond that.
The struggle that you do with ideas goes beyond merely moving
pieces on a board. In the course of time, the board changes;
the pieces have different value; the objectives are different.
You go back to the old neighborhood, where they still play
the old way, but the game means something else to you now.
> >>>Better yet, if there are Principles out there, one might construct
> >>>something that can be interpreted as an analogy for those principles.
> >>>The dynamics of human interactions would make a pretty natural
> >>>domain for analogies concerning the internal relations of agents
> >>>in our psyches. For that, one just needs to be able to imagine
> >>>that our psyches work like societies -- that psychology
> >>>recapitulates sociology, and/or vice versa. And that was pretty
> >>>natural as far back as Plato's time.
>
> >>But does it make sense? We learn to simulate societies in our heads;
> >>that's a useful skill. Do we work like that internally when we aren't
> >>simulating societies?
>
> > I imagined "psychology" covered terrain beyond what we
> > learn to do in our heads. The societies I'm thinking of
> > may include some chosen elements, but also work the
> > mystery of who we are. That that work can be likened
> > to the working of a society is the first point. Does
> > it *actually* work that way? Well, what do you mean by
> > actually?
>
> I'm starting to get the impression that this is not heading toward a
> meaningful conversation. I'd be glad to be wrong about that.
Your call.
> >>I would tend to think not. It appears we can handle a limited number
> >>of chunks in short term memory at once, and if we are thinking like
> >>lots of people at once then we must multitask to do it, using lots of
> >>overhead which would slow us down a whole lot.
>
> > Pretty [ridiculous] logic, sorry to say. Maybe you just
> > didn't get the metaphor, though. The concept, say, looking
> > to Plato, is that one might make a metaphor of the way
> > a person's "soul" is constructed which has analogues in the
> > way a society is organized. He had it arranged in a sort
> > of "classical" way, but, duh, you were allowed to do that
> > in ancient Greece. That's the _Republic_. Revisted in
> > the _Laws_, but there's a twist there, discussed in these
> > parts not too long ago, featuring the number 5040.
>
> People make *lots* of metaphors. People compare human societies to
> ants and bees. And to plants -- conservatives are more likely to
> compare society to a plant that grows and naturally puts the most new
> tissue into the most productive use, that needs the dead wood trimmed
> back occasionally. And to human minds. And machines. The clockwork
> metaphor was used when we didn't have a better machine to compare to.
> Now we compare to computers, or better to computer networks. We try
> to compare human minds to neural nets, which at best is like comparing
> a society to a squad of marines. Sometimes we compare society to a
> million monkeys randomly typing.
[ObDilbertCartoon]
Dilbert[handing over a poem]: hey, look, I just wrote a poem
Dogbert: some people think that a roomful of monkeys, typing
randomly, would eventually produce the works of Shakespeare.
Dilbert: yeah, but what about my poem?
Dogbert[handing it back]: three monkeys, fifteen minutes.
> I'll do that now -- if we go on long
> enough we will make *every possible* random metaphor comparing
> something-or-other to human minds or human societies.
>
> The fact that Plato made a collection of mostly-unworkable metaphors
> about human minds and human societies is of mostly historical
> interest.
"Mostly unworkable"? Does that mean something other than
that you don't like them?
> He was certainly not the first to do that sort of thing, as
> compare the Inana myth which compares the structure of Hell to that of
> a queen's bureaucracy.
Um, that sounds like comparing a society to a society,
unless Hell is also understood as an inner world.
Okay, or the Iliad. Amazing how that chaos in the heavens
gradually works out into one ringing harmony. You can't
help making an association with the affairs of the humans
and a sort of collective psyche.
> > I take _Zarathustra_ to be a sort of tweak of Plato, on these
> > grounds. Instead of a heirarchy, with philosophers ruling
> > indoctrinated laborers, you have a motley of hoboes, wild
> > animals, zealots, etc, gathered for a party. And they
> > meet *in* that cave, instead of fighting to get out.
> > Hahahaha!
>
> That does sound like a good joke.
>
> >>It would be like the
> >>witches in _Arrow-Od_ who shared one eye among them and had to keep
> >>passing it around. You might be running two dozen personalities at
> >>once but if they only have one short-term memory to share among them
> >>then they're going to stutter a lot.
>
> >>But maybe that brain model will turn out not to be accurate. Just
> >>because it seems to fit now doesn't mean it's true. So we might be
> >>like societies after all.
>
> > I don't think you've described much of a brain model.
>
> I didn't describe much of it, but if you're familiar with the concepts
> you can reconstruct it easily. There's nothing particularly esoteric
> about it except that I hid the meaning by leaving most of it out.
Well, you're leaning on what I'm claiming to be the secondary
meaning of "esoteric", to which I've been trying to suggest
a more-primary alternative, but I'll work with it.
But I don't really get how you thought your analogy of a single
person as a multitasking operating system, where the tasks
were characters in a metaphorical society was a very apt
reading of the psychology/sociology idea, especially
as you are clearly aware of some of the background (as I expected).
Your image proposed to find a problem with the idea in the
computational demands imposed by the model -- as though memory
had something to do with it -- suggesting that you imagine
the agents we're considering would be things consciously
manipulated to effect their interplay.
Maybe I've misunderstood you. I don't see how a guy who
has assimilated any of that material to which you allude
could miss the mark so badly. We're talking about a metaphor
of mind (or soul or psyche, depending on your taste). Whatever
mind is, there are clearly no computational problems with it
being realized in whatever way it is, because it is in fact
realized exactly like that. The agents in the drama would
be elements whose interaction produces what we've got.
Taking it on to the story about academics reading a model
of mind into "Heart of Darkness" is another step. Whether
Conrad knew of Freudian concepts seems to me utterly
irrelevant to the question of whether HoD makes a good model
for those concepts, unless the academics were making claims
about Conrad's intentions. If they were, well, stupid
academics, but who cares?
I propose that one could fairly say that a social model
could be appealing as a metaphor for a psychological model,
and that an author might well write something that was a
natural for that social model, whether he had heard of the
psychological model, or not.
> > The
> > society thing has already been mapped more or less "successfully"
> > to brains without much struggle, including one effort by the
> > inventor of the Perceptron. As you probably know, the arena is
> > currently inhabited by concepts like massive parallelism in neurons,
> > which form layered heirarchies, with various specialized systems.
> > No problem putting a society onto that.
>
> We don't know much about how to do that. Get to the key points and
> it's all handwaving. If you believe the stuff about short-term
> memory, we are pretty limited in our abilities to lay down new
> memories. We can deal with a limited number of chunks at once,
> perhaps as few as fourteen. Somehow we do comparisons and choose
> which new things to remember, and whatever doesn't make it into
> long-term memory within half an hour or so won't make it at all --
> unless a similar idea gets another chance later. As anyone who has
> tried to learn a semester of calculus the night before the test can
> tell you, there are strict limits on how many new memories you can
> build on each other in a few hours. We have some kind of massive
> parallelism in *retrieving* memories, but it looks like we don't have
> massive parallelism in *laying down* new memories. And that massive
> parallelism in retrieving memories somehow has to go through the
> funnel of chunking in short term memory.
Maybe, but who cares? If you've ever, say, lived in moments
of serious adrenaline, you know that perception there is a
different thing. The "lizard brain" thing is not just a
cute metaphor. Times like that, you *are* a lizard. So,
the question arises: where is that lizard, now? Well,
I don't know. It's a domain for exploration and speculation.
But it's not something that is directly addressed by the
question of how many items we can keep in short term memory.
(You have fourteen? Sheesh, I have about 0.75 Wait,
what was I saying? Oh yeah ...)
So, leaving the reductive brain models behind, how about
getting back to models of mind/psyche/soul. Does it
make sense to cast them in terms of societies? Well,
yes. It does. To me, anyhow. How about you?
> Maybe the experiments that give this impression will turn out not to
> have the generality I want to give them. But from the last lit search
> I did, at that time it looked like the way to bet. And I see no
> analogous mechanism in society.
No short term memory in society? You see no analogue there?
You can't imagine society as an organism? Am I reading
you right?
> It would be fascinating if there was
> something analogous in society, though. That would be *far* more
> interesting than comparing society or human minds to spreadsheets or
> databases, which will be the natural metaphor when enough people get
> familiar with spreadsheets and databases.
Dude, spreadsheets and databases are old. They've already
been assimilated into people's ideas about what mind is.
> Or maybe Windows OSes.
I've been trying to keep this on a friendly note,
and you bring me this.
Jeff
Lewis Mammel
Jeff Inman wrote:
>
> Jonah Thomas wrote:
> (Or, conversely, their reality is such that the question
> of determination is "not even wrong". I had associated that
> joke with Feynmann, but Silke quoted it from Nietzsche.)
Pauli !
Pauli had a stature as judge over all that Feynman ( not "Feynmann" )
never had. He was a "whiz kid" and later "Dean of American Physics"
but never "Judge over all" .
Lew Mammel, Jr.
michael
David O'Bedlam wrote:
> On Sat, 20 Mar 2004, michael wrote:
>
>>David O'Bedlam wrote:
>>
>>>On Sat, 20 Mar 2004, smw wrote:
>>
>
>>>>Nope. First of all, the Uebermensch does not exist, it's a utopian idea.
>>>
>
>>>Which has nothing to do with what Nietzsche's idea of the Uebermensch was.
>>
>
>>and you can back up this assertion by...?
>
>
> Flicking boogers at you. In context, I was answering something Silke said,
> which was answering something I said, all of which you cut, said deletia
> making making sense of what's left of the exchange impossible without more
> cutting, pasting and restoring than anything you say merits.
sorry, booger guy, but no amount of cutting and pasting will change the
simple fact that silke made a non-controversial statement about the
uebermensch not existing and being a utopian idea and you said what you
said, a highly unusual and controversial statement about what N.'s idea
of the uebermensch was... context has nothing to do with it...
what does N. say that makes you so sure that what silke said has nothing
to do with what N.'s idea of the uebermensch was?
flicking boogers, while perhaps highly entertaining to you, does nothing
to substantiate your claim to know what N.'s idea of the uebermensch was...
>>>Remember, Nietzsche, or at least his Zarathustra, was to be a bridge
>>>to the Uebermensch.
here, in your not nonsensical misreading you suggested that this
"bridge" function somehow denied the non-existing, utopian idea nature
of the overman... i tried to point out that your reasoning lacked a
little, to say the least... how did you mean us to understand this
little reminder?
>>aha... so because a fictional character in a philosophical treatise is
>>intended as "a bridge" (you think "suspension" or "contract") to the
>>Overman, said Overman can't be a "utopian idea"? good point...
>
>
> You don't ape Silke very well. Have another booger. The Nietzsche scholars
> would know an allusion to "Zarathustra's Prologue" when I whip one out.
true, i don't... and in spite of my not being a Nietzsche scholar, i did
recognize your misconstrual of the bit in Zarathustra where N. has Z.
say that what is great in man is that "he is a bridge and not an end"...
some of us do just read stuff and work a little on understanding it by
thinking and reading other stuff... wherever did you get the idea that
it's all done with oral sex?
> [snip a lot of puerile insults covering a wee explanation about setting
> oneself an ideal Self to strive toward, fucked if I know how "michael"
> got that idea]
what you snipped was my humble attempt to demonstrate how the
uebermensch might "look" to someone who couldn't seem to grasp what
silke meant when she said what she said... my take on N. emphasizes his
interest in self-overcoming and imagination and values-creation... i
tried to imagine what the overman might do for you as a non-existing,
utopian idea if you were to try to overcome yourself a little...
>
>
>>and voila! presto simplo! even you can see how the overman might be
>>non-existent, a utopian idea...but a powerful one nevertheless, eh?
>
>
> Yes, I understand that much. if Silke says that's what she meant then
> that's the answer to the question I asked Silke. The real SMW, I mean.
if you understand that much, then what was the point of behaving as if
you didn't? and by the way, usenet posts are not usually construed as
private conversations... i've noticed you get all proprietary when
you're building up to another sexist diatribe against smw 'cause she's
smarter than you... strange...
>>think of what it might do... that "honey" of yours might become a real
>>human, instead of a rubber blowjob doll, for one...
>
>
> A rubber blowjob doll finished law school. Is she the only one? Assuming
> she's not the only one, that explains a lot about United States' laws.
>
> A warning to you: it's not a very good idea piss me off by insulting my
> partner. What you would get from that would not please any but the most
> masochistic idiots. I am very capable of making any flame war you've ever
> seen a tiptoe through the tulips by comparison -- it's my idea of fun.
ooh...he sounds like a mean widdow wabbit (impersonating boy george)...
the insult was aimed squarely at you, booger boy, something you'd have
recognized if you were in the habit of reading with some of your brain
in gear...
michael
m.
> On Sat, 20 Mar 2004, smw wrote:
>
>>David O'Bedlam wrote:
>>
>>>On Sat, 20 Mar 2004, smw wrote to Lew Mammel:
>
>
>>>>>It seems to me the obvious Freudian idea re Nietzsche is
>>>>>compensation. Kaufmann describes for us his suffering from
>>>>>ill health, so it seems apparent that his idea of the ubermensch
>>>>>and his expressions of contempt for the weak are compensation
>>>>>for his own lack of physical vitality.
>>>
>>>>What do you imagine his "idea of the Uebermensch" to be?
>>>
>>>He just told you, didn't he? Nietzsche would probably say brilliant
>>>people who aren't sickly and weak in body and mind
>>
>>Nope. First of all, the Uebermensch does not exist, it's a utopian idea.
>
>
> Which has nothing to do with what Nietzsche's idea of the Uebermensch was.
>
> Remember, Nietzsche, or at least his Zarathustra, was was to be a bridge
> to the Uebermensch.
>
> So what's your point in saying "it doesn't exist, it's a utopian idea"?
> Are you trying to say "it'll never happen, just forget it"?
>
>
the overman is the exoteric teaching.
m.
Yes and No because many people seem to think the Ubermensche is the
Goal. It isn't the goal if he has become a reality (even if only in
text). The most Yes saying person exists ---yes in a book--- but this
should give us a clue about N's exoteric teaching.
m.
GS 370. The key ingredient is lack or overabundance.
m.
>
> smw wrote:
>
>>Lewis Mammel wrote:
>>
>>
>>>Steve Murgaski wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>>Freud
>>>
>>>
>>>It seems to me the obvious Freudian idea re Nietzsche is
>>>compensation. Kaufmann describes for us his suffering from
>>>ill health, so it seems apparent that his idea of the ubermensch
>>>and his expressions of contempt for the weak are compensation
>>>for his own lack of physical vitality.
>>
>>What do you imagine his "idea of the Uebermensch" to be?
>
>
> To me, it's the embodiment of yearning, "the beauty of the
> overman came to me as a shadow."
>
the Ubermensche is the most Yes-saying, lIfe affirming being. He IS
overabundance, graciousness and love of the world as it is.
m.
> On Sat, 20 Mar 2004, Lewis Mammel wrote:
>
>
>>Steve Murgaski wrote:
>>
>>
>>>Freud
>
>
>>It seems to me the obvious Freudian idea re Nietzsche is compensation.
>>Kaufmann describes for us his suffering from ill health, so it seems
>>apparent that his idea of the ubermensch and his expressions of contempt
>>for the weak are compensation for his own lack of physical vitality.
>
>
> Which would also go for "psychiatric patients", too. And then there are
> the other parts -- our Nietzsche scholaresses would find them quicker than
> I -- where he talks about "mental illness" (or whatever term they used in
> 1890s Europe) as being evidence of greater intelligence and sensitivity.
suffering from shame is not mental illness. romantic pessimism, i.e.
nihilism is decadence, i.e. a form of illness in which we no longer know
what is good for us. our instincts, drives, etc. misfire and fail to
produce anything.
James Whitehead
"David O'Bedlam" <thed...@shell.rawbw.com> wrote in message
news:2004032009...@shell.rawbw.com...
> On Sat, 20 Mar 2004, James Whitehead wrote:
> [snips]
>
> > > > > /* [begin Nietzsche quote]
> > > > >
> > > > > 40. Everything that is profound loves the mask: the profoundest
> > > > > things have a hatred even of figure and likeness. [...]
>
> > > > > And there he's doing that "nobody can see the Real Me" thing.
> > >
> > > > Maybe - but maybe - he is asking 'how does the creative act survive
> > > > the biological instinct of democracy?'
>
> > > Where do you get that from this aphorism? And what is "the biological
> > > instinct of democracy"?
>
> > Maybe you should pay me for the answer? Firstly he is writing - and in
> > that anticipates a reader - and here is the relationship which he shares
> > with what is written is opened up to a third person.
>
> Yes: writing and publishing philosophy at his own expense does presuppose
> a reader, and testify to his need for one; he had no Usenet in those days.
Publishing at your own expense and then only giving away 7 copies to friends
'presupposes' more than "a reader".
Nietzsche refers - and i wonder why? :-) his scholars to be "learned
cattle". Now what does this mean? - lets take any work of art - and in
front of it such CATTLE will make noises. They will say What it is and what
it isnt. Some 'fuckwit' might even say "its not real you know?" But what
motivates them is the smell of their mothers milk. Re Zarathustra -
"having understood six sentences from it - that is to say really experienced
them - would raise one to a higher level of existence than "modern" men
could attain .... ultimately nobody can get more out of things, including
books, than he already knows... [of readers] my acquaintances include
several guinea pigs ..[german cattle].[he continues ].... When i imagine a
perfect reader, he always turns into a monster of courage and curiosity ...
[as in Zarathustra] to whom alone will he relate his riddle? .... Let
anyone add up the spirit and good nature of all great souls: all of them
together would not be capable of producing even one of Zarathustra's
discourses. The ladder on which he ascends and descends is tremendous; he
has seen further, willed further, been capable further than any other human
being ... here man has been overcome at every moment; the concept of the
'overman' has here become the greatest reality .... Zarathustra experiences
himself as the supreme type of all beings; ......."
>
> > Why should he do this and is it wise to do it - and risk as he says
> > SUPERFICIAL interpretation of every word he utters,
>
> Yes, I understand that Nietzsche Scholars will think I'm Not Very Bright
> and that I'm Reading Superficially, it's the kind of thing that the kind
> of people who become Nietzsche Scholars have to say. (It's kind of like
> someone whose bought a lot of Gnosticating/Mysticist/Neoplatonical hooey
> has to say to someone who points out that monotheism means "the belief
> that there is ONE god".)
But how are Nietzsche scholars reading? And is Nietzsche writing for them?
>
> But I still don't get how your point -- "'maybe - he is asking 'how does
> the creative act survive the biological instinct of democracy?'" -- has
> much to do with the aphorism [which I snipped for brevity, assuming you
> have it right there], and you still ain't told me what you mean by "the
> biological instinct of democracy".
>
AKA "the herd instinct" ? "learned cattle".......
> [...]
>
> > > And of course you can see my Wish List at Amazon.com!
> > >
> > What is number one on your wish list?
>
> Amazon has it as "Mingus Ah Um [Bonus Tracks]".
>
> Interestingly, Amazon seems to make it difficult to search for a Wish
> List by email address; I just put that in the "Unique Information" box.
> If that'll work at all it'll take a while to take.
James Whitehead
"Cesare Borgia" <sm...@ameritech.net> wrote in message
news:9F07c.14029$t16.8...@newssvr28.news.prodigy.com...
>
> In any case, I never quite understood why people make such a big deal
> of the term -- it's very marginal in N's oeuvre.
>
But i shouldn't suppose 'N' means 'Nietzsche' but 'Nelson Riddle' - in which
case - yes you are quite correct.
Michael S. Morris
Sunday, the 21st of March, 2004
Lew:
I saw Stephen Hawking give a talk once, using his
lap top as he did, and I noticed that in his examples
of astronauts falling into black holes he described with
great relish the rending and crushing of the astronaut's
body in the accomplishment of this event.
Ned Ludd:
I never buy this. Since all dimensions are contracting
and being warped (compressed) by the field of the black hole,
how would the astronaut even know he was being crushed?
Usually what is being described in "falling into a black
hole" is the trip from outside to inside the horizon from
the point of view of the astronaut. "All dimensions are contracting
and being warped (compressed)" is simply wrong. You can
think of it exactly like falling to earth, with nothing particularly
magic happening at the black-hole horizon. If you fall to earth,
the effect in question is tidal, which is already present in
the Newtonian treatment of gravity. So, let's say you fall feet
first. Your feet are slightly closer to the center of gravitational
attraction than your head (whether it's earth or a black hole
singularity). So, your feet want to accelerate faster than head.
I.e., your feet-to-head dimension wants to stretch (not compress).
In addition, your sides each are pulled to the gravitational center,
and since those vectors are tilted ever so slightly towards
one another, your sides want to compress. So, the tidal effect is
that you are stretched cap-a-pie and are squished side-to-side and
front-to-back. As to how much stretching and compression you feel
it just depends on the mass of the gravitating center and how
close you are to it. If I recall the numbers correctly, you'd be
ripped apart by the time you reach the horizon of a small
(solar mass) black hole, but one of those supermassive black
holes thought to be in the centers of radio galaxies, you could
fall through the horizon and not feel it (gravitationally). Once
you are through the horizon, though, it means you are dooned to hit
the singularity, and sometime before you get there you should feel
the rending and crushing.
Mike Morris
(msmo...@netdirect.net)
smw
m. wrote:
>>>
>>>
David:
>>> Sure, because the Uebermensch would be strong, healthy, etc.
>>
Silke:
>>
>> A text, please?
>>
M:
> GS 370. The key ingredient is lack or overabundance.
GS 370 is a great passage, but how exactly do you imagine it suggests
that the Uebermensch would be strong and healthy?
smw
m. wrote:
Yup. Hence, he also affirms "weakness," "illness," etc.
m.
>
>
> But how are Nietzsche scholars reading? And is Nietzsche writing for them?
>
Yes, and no. It seems to me that N wanted to produce a bunch of
laborers. So in one sense, he is writing for scholars.
>>But I still don't get how your point -- "'maybe - he is asking 'how does
>>the creative act survive the biological instinct of democracy?'" -- has
>>much to do with the aphorism [which I snipped for brevity, assuming you
>>have it right there], and you still ain't told me what you mean by "the
>>biological instinct of democracy".
>>
>
> AKA "the herd instinct" ? "learned cattle".......
>
right on the money, i thinks.
m.
healthy as in (1) overcoming romantic pessimism and decadence. healthy
as in symbolizing an overabundance of life, i.e. creating values that
are pregnant with a future.
m.
yup, he encompasses everything, but he is "heathy" in doing so.
Michael S. Morris
Sunday, the 21st of March, 2004
Silke:
"What you said-but what you really meant" etc. is a staple
in lovers' spats, as well. And look at our ver own most rabid
anti-Freudian, Mike Morris -- it's his most common move.
I think this isn't even wrong.
Seriously. I don't think that I make quite the move that
you are saying I do here. Nor do I agree that either is
*the thing that I commonly criticize in Nietzsche and
in Freud*.
I see Nietzsche as the great exerciser of philosophical
argument by psychopathology---i.e., "you only believe
and argue for what you say because you have a psychological
need to believe that". He does this obviously and rabidly
with Christian morality, and likewise when treating with
Socrates and ancient philosophical morality, as well as
Anglo-American ideas of Liberal political philosophy. I think
this is revolutionary for its time (and liberating considering
its time), and perhaps I allow space for Jeff's constant insistence
that this is a useful platform for self-exploration. However,
I find something adolescent in it in the fond belief that
"psychology" can be deeper than "reason"---that there is some
metric which says the one is really "deeper" than the other,
and that we *can* get around rational argument to examine
the underpinning psychological needs. I think that is
ultimately a moral relativist's argument, and that the argument
which defeats it is the same argument that Epictetus used
to defeat sophistry two thousand years before, namely that
a moral relativist's argument about basis in psychology of
moral argument is precisely a moral argument itself, equally
as dismissable as being based in psychology as any other
moral argument.
As for Freud, I see him as constructing a theoretical
basis for the notion that the subconscious *underlies*
conscious reason. I think Freud thought he was doing something
analogous to physics, in discovering conservation laws
of psychic energy to explain how the conscious and subconscious
interact. As a physicist, I find that aspect of Freud
silly, if all-pervasive in pop thought. And yes, I do see
that Freud certainly applied these ideas to morality and
that the tendency of the application of these ideas to morality
has been to discredit moral reason as an independent philosophical
endeavour, and to portray it as the manifestation of so much
psychic need.
Now, as to my "standard operating procedure" in argument hereon:
No, I don't think that I tend to psychologize my opponents'
arguments. What I do do is often politicize them. For example,
Silke, I see you as ensconced in an intellectual lineage
with Hegel, Marx, Nietzsche, Freud, Heidegger, Adorno, and
the pomos as determining roughly the historical arc of
that intellectual lineage. It is a highly politicized lineage
with elements from both what I have called Left and what I
have called Right, but it is unified in its criticism of
Enlightenment liberalism. The thing that is so irritating about
it, and about you, is the arrogance---the pretense that *that*
lineage is or even was the cutting edge of philosophy at any
given time in the last two hundred years. It isn't and wasn't---
it was one branch of philosophy and political theory. It itself
splits into Left and Right. And moreover there was vigorous development
in atheistic and theistic Liberalism itself (that is a lineage
almost completely independent of the one sketched), not to mention
a different (or several, would be more accurate) lineages within
Christian thought. God ain't dead, or rather "God is dead" is
a reading of history from within the ghetto of the mind of
only one of these lineages. "Secularization" ain't objective
historical truth---it's an interpretation of history from
within the ghetto of the mind of one of these lineages.
My commonplace accusation that there is something (which
I often decry) behind what you say, is *not* the same
thing as saying "but what you really mean is...". Nor
is either the same as the Nietzschean and Freudian move of
"you only argue out of your psychic need to believe it".
Mike Morris
(msmo...@netdirect.net)
James Whitehead
"smw" <sm...@ameritech.net> wrote in message
news:amh7c.14243$t16.8...@newssvr28.news.prodigy.com...
>
>
> m. wrote:
>
>
> >>>
> >>>
> David:
> >>> Sure, because the Uebermensch would be strong, healthy, etc.
> >>
> Silke:
> >>
> >> A text, please?
"What is good? - All that heightens the feeling of power, the will to power
itself in man. What is bad? - all that proceeds from weakness. What is
happiness? - The feeling that power increases- that a resistance is
overcome."
James Whitehead
distance from them! he stands on them, he lives off them."
smw
m. wrote:
Apart from the fact that we are still missing the reference to the
Uebermensch, this "yes" is also a yes to sickness, weakness, etc. It is
precisely not the privileging of a specific sort of life (say, the blond
beast life) but the yes to all of life. Just as a "no" can be a symptom
both of weakness and of strength, a partial yes will move us no further
towards overcoming. The trick, as the intro suggests, is to move back
and forth between health and illness. Too much health makes you stupid,
too much illness makes you unproductive.
smw
m. wrote:
> smw wrote:
...
>>> the Ubermensche is the most Yes-saying, lIfe affirming being. He IS
>>> overabundance, graciousness and love of the world as it is.
>>
>>
>>
>> Yup. Hence, he also affirms "weakness," "illness," etc.
>>
> yup, he encompasses everything, but he is "heathy" in doing so.
You do realize that a healthy yes to illness undercuts the traditional
dichomoty of healthy/unhealthy.
smw
Michael S. Morris wrote:
>
>
>
> Sunday, the 21st of March, 2004
>
>
> Silke:
>
> "What you said-but what you really meant" etc. is a staple
> in lovers' spats, as well. And look at our ver own most rabid
> anti-Freudian, Mike Morris -- it's his most common move.
>
>
> I think this isn't even wrong.
>
> Seriously. I don't think that I make quite the move that
> you are saying I do here. Nor do I agree that either is
> *the thing that I commonly criticize in Nietzsche and
> in Freud*.
Sure -- you consistently read anything I say, for instance, as a symptom
of "leftist" ideology, no matter whether that reading is even remotely
plausible. I don't see much of a difference with reading everything
somebody else says as a symptom of the repression machine.
../.
> Now, as to my "standard operating procedure" in argument hereon:
> No, I don't think that I tend to psychologize my opponents'
> arguments. What I do do is often politicize them.
Yup. same mo, different terms.
smw
James Whitehead wrote:
Sigh. I meant a text that refers to the Uebermensch.
>
>
Jeff Inman
Okay. Corrected on both points.
m.
it can't but point to Zarathustra.
i agree.
jonah thomas
> I see Nietzsche as the great exerciser of philosophical
> argument by psychopathology---i.e., "you only believe
> and argue for what you say because you have a psychological
> need to believe that". He does this obviously and rabidly
> with Christian morality, and likewise when treating with
> Socrates and ancient philosophical morality, as well as
> Anglo-American ideas of Liberal political philosophy.
That was said very clearly!
So what is the place for this sort of reasoning? Clearly there can be
value in noticing what people get out of believing what they believe.
And clearly it doesn't invalidate their stand that it's in their
interest to take it.
> However,
> I find something adolescent in it in the fond belief that
> "psychology" can be deeper than "reason"---that there is some
> metric which says the one is really "deeper" than the other,
> and that we *can* get around rational argument to examine
> the underpinning psychological needs.
Sure. They're different kinds of thinking with different methods and
different goals.
I keep hoping that the psychological approach might reveal *limits* in
our reasoning. New approaches that don't come naturally to us, that
might lead to new results. But so far I've only seen uselessness from
that. Like, there is reasoning and ethics possible when you're
omniscient that isn't available to people who aren't omniscient, but
so what?
> I think that is
> ultimately a moral relativist's argument, and that the argument
> which defeats it is the same argument that Epictetus used
> to defeat sophistry two thousand years before, namely that
> a moral relativist's argument about basis in psychology of
> moral argument is precisely a moral argument itself, equally
> as dismissable as being based in psychology as any other
> moral argument.
Just because people use psychological arguments in an attempt to
falsely invalidate other people's positions -- because they get a
wrong personal gain from it -- doesn't mean that they're wrong.
Dismissing their stand just because the same logic they use can be
applied to them, is as wrong as accepting their approach in the first
place. The challenge is to find proper uses for the tool, not to
reject it because you see it being used badly.
> Now, as to my "standard operating procedure" in argument hereon:
> No, I don't think that I tend to psychologize my opponents'
> arguments. What I do do is often politicize them.
And the importance of this difference is....
> For example,
> Silke, I see you as ensconced in an intellectual lineage
> with Hegel, Marx, Nietzsche, Freud, Heidegger, Adorno, and
> the pomos as determining roughly the historical arc of
> that intellectual lineage. It is a highly politicized lineage
> with elements from both what I have called Left and what I
> have called Right, but it is unified in its criticism of
> Enlightenment liberalism. The thing that is so irritating about
> it, and about you, is the arrogance---the pretense that *that*
> lineage is or even was the cutting edge of philosophy at any
> given time in the last two hundred years. It isn't and wasn't---
> it was one branch of philosophy and political theory.
Yes, but once a partisan accepts such a thing as the standard to judge
by, isn't it natural for them to be arrogant? We see arrogant
christians who judge everything by their view of christianity,
arrogant jews who judge everything by Rambam, arrogant communists who
judge everything by Marx, and so on. Why not arrogant pomos who judge
everything by Adorno? It's just MOTS and there's no more reason to
get irritated by it than by the fundamentalist christians or the
fundamentalist marxists etc.
> My commonplace accusation that there is something (which
> I often decry) behind what you say, is *not* the same
> thing as saying "but what you really mean is...". Nor
> is either the same as the Nietzschean and Freudian move of
> "you only argue out of your psychic need to believe it".
Are you sure? Don't people tend to choose a branch of philosophy and
political theory out of some psychological need? What you say follows
from the psychological approach, though maybe not vice versa. If
you're starting one link farther down the chain and taking it from
there, I can easily see how people would mistake what you do for
starting one link farther back -- particularly when that's where they
start themselves and the visible difference is that you don't mention
that first link.
Michael S. Morris
Sunday, the 21st of March, 2004
Silke:
"What you said-but what you really meant" etc. is a staple
in lovers' spats, as well. And look at our ver own most rabid
anti-Freudian, Mike Morris -- it's his most common move.
I said:
I think this isn't even wrong.
Seriously. I don't think that I make quite the move that
you are saying I do here. Nor do I agree that either is
*the thing that I commonly criticize in Nietzsche and
in Freud*.
Silke
Sure -- you consistently read anything I say, for instance, as a symptom
of "leftist" ideology, no matter whether that reading is even remotely
plausible.
But, most of what I take issue with you about is
politics, and you are consistently euroleft in that.
It doesn't matter what Bush does or doesn't do, in
fact, since whatever he does it'll get translated
into the imposition of a fascist order on the US
and on the world.
Silke:
I don't see much of a difference with reading everything
somebody else says as a symptom of the repression machine.
A repression machine doesn't exist, isn't scientifically
accessible, has no objective validity. An ideology,
however, is a consistent pattern of political opinion.
Since the charge I make is that you make a consistent
pattern of political opinion, I can't see that this is the
same at all. You could, for example, argue that your opinions
are opposed to the pattern I have accused. You could argue
the pattern is actually correct, and criticism of it is wrong.
Instead, typically, what you do is arrogantly sneer about it
as though anyone who doesn't share your notion that that
lineage is the cutting edge of human thought and has left all
other lineages in the dust is a mindless dweeb who can't read,
where you have clearly redefined "reading" as a process of
interacting with texts in such a manner as to come out
in political agreement with yourself.
I said:
Now, as to my "standard operating procedure" in argument hereon:
No, I don't think that I tend to psychologize my opponents'
arguments. What I do do is often politicize them.
Silke:
Yup. same mo, different terms.
It's a transfinite difference, i.e. a difference in kind.
You can argue with me. You can't argue with psychologization.
Psychologization is a sophisticated sophistry and works on
the audience by a certain pleasure we take in the wordplay and
the showy cleverness.
Mike Morris
(msmo...@netdirect.net)
David O'Bedlam
> David O'Bedlam wrote:
> > Remember, Nietzsche, or at least his Zarathustra, was was to be a
> > bridge to the Uebermensch.
> No, "man" is the bridge between animal and uebermensch. Hence, as long
> as men are men, there's no uebermensch.
Having re-read Zarathustra's prologoue for the first time in 20 years,
I hereby stand corrected: Man is the bridge to the Overman. Zarathustra
was the herald of the Overman, Nietzsche the author behind Zarathustra.
Ol' Freddy was being all *modest* and shit.
> Zarathustra, I feel the sudden urge to point out, is a fictional character.
Yes dear, but one who's commonly taken to be Nietzsche's "sock puppet".
But of course if one takes "TSZ" as fiction and Zarathustra as just some
fictional character then that book doesn't really matter to a discussion
of Nietzsche's ideas; I'm guessing that there are no ideas expressed in
in "TSZ" that are not at least referred to anywhere else in N.'s ouevre
(though if there are I'd expect y'all Nietzsche scholars to correct me),
thus what Nietzsche meant by "TSZ" or anything in it is as irrelevant as
what Dostoevsky meant by _Crime and Punishment_ or Orwell by _1984_ or
Martin Amis by _The Information_. If it's only fiction then we judge it
as fiction, by different standards than those we use for Robinson's
_Islamic Historiography_ (Cambridge University Press, 2003).
So, I feel the sudden urge to point out, by insisting on Zarathustra's
fictionality you've made TSZ not quite fit for a theological discussion
of the type we're having here. So strike that book, and since the word
"Uebermensch" doesn't occur very many times outside of TSZ, strike that
word also. Which leaves us where? Which ideas in Nietzsche's werke, in
whichever way they're expressed, were unique to Nieztsche? (I mean till
and including his own time of course, not what some Frog could come up
with in 1969 that might be Nietzsche _apre le lettre_.)
And by the way, you're invited to call off your "michael" before I must
take a rolled-up "People" to his nose. Anyone who's paid attention would
see that you, Silke, piss me off not because you're smarter than me but
because you *insist* you are (though outside your narrow and essentially
irrelevant "Ivory Tower" speciality you're hard to distinguish from any
other gibbering idiot), and that, contrary to pseudo-feminist victimology,
your apparent sex has fuck all to do with it because most of those Usenet
infestations I've deigned to combat over the years have been at least
ostensibly male. Indeed, the only relation your sex has to those insults
you're blessed to receive have to do with vocabulary: it makes little
sense, for example, to tell *you* that your tiny penis is nevertheless
bigger than your brain (pending a short-arm inspection of course, though
I'd rather take your word for your womanhood if you don't mind). I.e.,
this "michael" guy must be *really* hard up to have a crush on *you*.
(But hey, if he's got eyes full o' soul, whatever, eh?)
So anyway. Which ideas in Nietzsche's werke, in whichever way they're
expressed, were unique to Nieztsche? That is, why speak of Nietzsche?
Since you think you're so much smarter than me, with so little evident
justification given your profession and your concentration in it, I'm
sure you've got some horrid insights on what makes Nietzsche special.
So spit 'em out, toots. Time's a-wastin'.
David O'Bedlam
[...]
> the Ubermensche is the most Yes-saying, lIfe affirming being. He IS
> overabundance, graciousness and love of the world as it is.
But of course, just a fictional character, as Silke pointed out.
Luv,
D.
David O'Bedlam
> > you still ain't told me what you mean by "the biological instinct of
> > democracy".
> AKA "the herd instinct" ? "learned cattle".......
I see, how silly of me to have missed it then. I just hadn't seen it put
*that* way before. (It took me a few minutes to grasp "sheeple" too.)
By the way. I'd always assumed Nietzsche was writing books for the same
reason I post to Usenet. Too bad they had no Usenet in 1885.
Bovinely,
TheDavid
David O'Bedlam
GS 370 isn't in _The Portable Nietzsche_ so you Theology Grrls get this
one all to yourselves. I'm going back to read _Islamic Historiography_
(yes, with one hand -- the other props up my chin).
David O'Bedlam
> Too much health makes you stupid
One problem I don't have.
Sickly,
The
David O'Bedlam
[...]
> You do realize that a healthy yes to illness undercuts the traditional
> dichomoty of healthy/unhealthy.
And you don't realize that "a healthy yes to illness" is an oxymoron.
David O'Bedlam
[...]
> > "What is good? - All that heightens the feeling of power, the will to
> > power itself in man. What is bad? - all that proceeds from weakness.
> > What is happiness? - The feeling that power increases- that a
> > resistance is overcome."
> Sigh. I meant a text that refers to the Uebermensch.
Too bad I'd thought "the Uebermensch" had something to do with and/or in
Nietzsche's philosophy. Assuming I'm correct to understand "mensch" as
"human being" as well as "human male", I'd understood them (the Uebers)
to be the type toward which Nietzsche's thought is straining, a physically
and mentally healthier kind of kine, less afflicted by ressentiment and
beer.
But since according to you the Uebers were *not* central to Nietzsche's
thang then there was nothing he was straining for but myopic self-praise.
James Whitehead
"The problem that I set here is not what shall replace mankind in the order
of living creatures (--man is an end--): but what type of man must be bred,
must be willed, as being the most valuable, the most worthy of life, the
most secure guarantee of the future. "
does this help?
James Whitehead
"David O'Bedlam" <thed...@shell.rawbw.com> wrote in message
news:2004032109...@shell.rawbw.com...
> On Sun, 21 Mar 2004, James Whitehead answered:
>
> > > you still ain't told me what you mean by "the biological instinct of
> > > democracy".
>
> > AKA "the herd instinct" ? "learned cattle".......
>
> I see, how silly of me to have missed it then. I just hadn't seen it put
> *that* way before. (It took me a few minutes to grasp "sheeple" too.)
>
> By the way. I'd always assumed Nietzsche was writing books for the same
> reason I post to Usenet. Too bad they had no Usenet in 1885.
>
I think its just this *grasping* which would annoy- this seeing it as
fiction as well! But i'm in alt.pomo and dont mind the Japanese tourist
approach to culture one jot.
Fly Nietzsche - your guaranteed a return flight - eternally!
I have a wonderful photo of my uncle (who was a batman in the war and
whilst on a reluctant patrol had a german u boat beech itself and surrender
to him) - well this pic taken on his hols in spain, balding , pot belly, and
peeling in the sun - and reading the paper of the same name, surrounded by
germans thinking 'how on earth did we loose?'
Isnt it what drove Viginia Wolf mad!
ROBBIE
"James Whitehead" <Abx4...@jjh76g7856gh.com> wrote in message
news:c3h7vm$nid$2...@news8.svr.pol.co.uk...
> and the way we hide ourselves behind the wall of illusion...
>
> "ROBBIE" <johnny_...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
> news:c3fc3t$27m1m1$1...@ID-200782.news.uni-berlin.de...
> > I wanna tell her that I love her a lot but I gotta getta belly fulla
wine
> >
> >
> > "James Whitehead" <Abx4...@jjh76g7856gh.com> wrote in message
> > news:c3eaut$591$1...@newsg4.svr.pol.co.uk...
> > >
> > > "David O'Bedlam" <thed...@shell.rawbw.com> wrote in message
> > > news:Pine.LNX.4.58.04...@troll.weezl.org...
> > > >
> > > > [Note: newsgroups line subtly shifted.]
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > On Fri, 19 Mar 2004, m. wrote:
> > > > [...]
> > > >
> > > > > N rarely contradicts himself. If you see contradictions, you
aren't
> > > > > reading closely enough.
> > > >
> > > > Yes dear, I know, dear, you're ever so much smarter than I am, dear.
> > > > And you went all the way through Graduate School too!
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > > Look up esotericism. N was a practitioner of the art.
> > > >
> > > > Tell us how you're using "esotericism". Y'mean like Ilyaism? Like
> > > > Gnosis and Kabbala and Auras and Astrology? Those "esoteric arts"?
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > > Better yet, got a copy of BGE hanging around?
> > > >
> > > > No, but *just for YOU* I'll see if Gutenberg has it. Okay, they do.
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > > Read the "free minds" chapter, paying particular attention to 27,
30
> > and
> > > 40.
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > This translation has "THE FREE SPIRIT." Same one?
> > > >
> > > > /*
> > > >
> > > > 27. It is difficult to be understood, especially when one thinks
> > > > and lives gangasrotogati [Footnote: Like the river Ganges:
> > > > presto.] among those only who think and live otherwise--namely,
> > > > kurmagati [Footnote: Like the tortoise: lento.], or at best
> > > > "froglike," mandeikagati [Footnote: Like the frog: staccato.] (I
> > > > do everything to be "difficultly understood" myself!)--and one
> > > > should be heartily grateful for the good will to some refinement
> > > > of interpretation. As regards "the good friends," however, who
> > > > are always too easy-going, and think that as friends they have a
> > > > right to ease, one does well at the very first to grant them a
> > > > play-ground and romping-place for misunderstanding--one can thus
> > > > laugh still; or get rid of them altogether, these good friends--
> > > > and laugh then also!
> > > >
> > > > */
> > > >
> > > > So he brags that he doesn't want stupid people to understand him.
> > > > So? That's hardly "esoteric", just arrogant. (I've said the same!)
> > > >
> > > Maybe so - but maybe also this dialogue represents something else
> > > philosophical - that the nature of a creative act rather than an
> > > interpretative one is such as this. Maybe he is spilling the beans
> > > regarding creativity and modesty.
> > >
> > > > Then:
> > > >
> > > > /*
> > > >
> > > > 30. Our deepest insights must--and should--appear as follies, and
> > > > under certain circumstances as crimes, when they come
> > > > unauthorizedly to the ears of those who are not disposed and
> > > > predestined for them. The exoteric and the esoteric, as they were
> > > > formerly distinguished by philosophers--among the Indians, as
> > > > among the Greeks, Persians, and Mussulmans, in short, wherever
> > > > people believed in gradations of rank and NOT in equality and
> > > > equal rights--are not so much in contradistinction to one another
> > > > in respect to the exoteric class, standing without, and viewing,
> > > > estimating, measuring, and judging from the outside, and not from
> > > > the inside; the more essential distinction is that the class in
> > > > question views things from below upwards--while the esoteric
> > > > class views things FROM ABOVE DOWNWARDS. There are heights of the
> > > > soul from which tragedy itself no longer appears to operate
> > > > tragically; and if all the woe in the world were taken together,
> > > > who would dare to decide whether the sight of it would
> > > > NECESSARILY seduce and constrain to sympathy, and thus to a
> > > > doubling of the woe? . . . That which serves the higher class of
> > > > men for nourishment or refreshment, must be almost poison to an
> > > > entirely different and lower order of human beings. The virtues
> > > > of the common man would perhaps mean vice and weakness in a
> > > > philosopher; it might be possible for a highly developed man,
> > > > supposing him to degenerate and go to ruin, to acquire qualities
> > > > thereby alone, for the sake of which he would have to be honoured
> > > > as a saint in the lower world into which he had sunk. There are
> > > > books which have an inverse value for the soul and the health
> > > > according as the inferior soul and the lower vitality, or the
> > > > higher and more powerful, make use of them. In the former case
> > > > they are dangerous, disturbing, unsettling books, in the latter
> > > > case they are herald-calls which summon the bravest to THEIR
> > > > bravery. Books for the general reader are always ill-smelling
> > > > books, the odour of paltry people clings to them. Where the
> > > > populace eat and drink, and even where they reverence, it is
> > > > accustomed to stink. One should not go into churches if one
> > > > wishes to breathe PURE air.
> > > >
> > > > */
> > > >
> > > > There he babbles about how much smarter he is than everybody else.
> > > >
> > >
> > > I dont think so - he's rather making an assertion about a creative
act.
> > > What is the book written for the general reader about? How does this
> > operate
> > > as opposed to a book which maybe needn't be written at all.
> > >
> > >
> > > > Then:
> > > >
> > > > /*
> > > >
> > > > 40. Everything that is profound loves the mask: the profoundest
> > > > things have a hatred even of figure and likeness. Should not the
> > > > CONTRARY only be the right disguise for the shame of a God to go
> > > > about in? A question worth asking!--it would be strange if some
> > > > mystic has not already ventured on the same kind of thing. There
> > > > are proceedings of such a delicate nature that it is well to
> > > > overwhelm them with coarseness and make them unrecognizable;
> > > > there are actions of love and of an extravagant magnanimity after
> > > > which nothing can be wiser than to take a stick and thrash the
> > > > witness soundly: one thereby obscures his recollection. Many a
> > > > one is able to obscure and abuse his own memory, in order at
> > > > least to have vengeance on this sole party in the secret: shame
> > > > is inventive. They are not the worst things of which one is most
> > > > ashamed: there is not only deceit behind a mask--there is so much
> > > > goodness in craft. I could imagine that a man with something
> > > > costly and fragile to conceal, would roll through life clumsily
> > > > and rotundly like an old, green, heavily-hooped wine-cask: the
> > > > refinement of his shame requiring it to be so. A man who has
> > > > depths in his shame meets his destiny and his delicate decisions
> > > > upon paths which few ever reach, and with regard to the existence
> > > > of which his nearest and most intimate friends may be ignorant;
> > > > his mortal danger conceals itself from their eyes, and equally so
> > > > his regained security. Such a hidden nature, which instinctively
> > > > employs speech for silence and concealment, and is inexhaustible
> > > > in evasion of communication, DESIRES and insists that a mask of
> > > > himself shall occupy his place in the hearts and heads of his
> > > > friends; and supposing he does not desire it, his eyes will some
> > > > day be opened to the fact that there is nevertheless a mask of
> > > > him there--and that it is well to be so. Every profound spirit
> > > > needs a mask; nay, more, around every profound spirit there
> > > > continually grows a mask, owing to the constantly false, that is
> > > > to say, SUPERFICIAL interpretation of every word he utters, every
> > > > step he takes, every sign of life he manifests.
> > > >
> > > > */
> > > >
> > > > And there he's doing that "nobody can see the Real Me" thing.
> > >
> > > Maybe - but maybe - he is asking 'how does the creative act survive
the
> > > biological instinct of democracy?'
> > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > So far I don't see why you've selected these passages. All I see
> > > > is a very old teenaged boy bragging that he's ever so much smarter
> > > > than everybody else, that his senses and perceptions are so very
> > > > much more sensitive, and that he "wear[s] the mask than grins and
> > > > lies" even though hoi polloi wouldn't know what they were seeing.
> > > >
> > > But such a judgement is perhaps what he is also dealing with. How the
> > > artist becomes either humiliated or castrated by her audience. This is
> > > particularly true of the female prostitute who is both (often)
castrated
> > and
> > > (always) humiliated.
> > > And "who" is speaking for the hoi polloi - this is touching as it i
> think
> > > reveals the naivety of Nietzsche - or his honesty, i've never read a
> more
> > > honest writer - painfully so.
> > >
> > > > I don't see "esotericsm" in any sense I've heard the word used;
> > > > I see a clear pretense of obscurantism. (Note: that's a pun.)
> > > >
> > > > You're welcome to read whatever you want into Ol' Freddy, even to
> > > > make a religion of Nietzscheism, if you please; it seems counter
> > > > to my understanding of Nietzsche, but then you can be strange.
> > > >
> > > > What I'd like to see you do, in this context, is prove to us (if not
> > > > C.J.W.) that Freddy N. was not the evil proto-Nazi C.J.W. says he
was.
> > >
> > > Some 40 or more years after he wrote- i'd argue that the *evil* proto
> Nazi
> > > condition was that made by the allies post 1919.
> > > But thats not the nice point- the terrible thing to think about is
that
> > > Hitler and Napoleon would probably be (one was) heroes of Nietzsche -
> but
> > > their *evil* attribute is applied by the masses who in fact carried
out
> > the
> > > actual acts. Well applied by individuals - who like Hitler need to
> > mobilise
> > > the masses. Now are their masks more artful than those of the artist
who
> > > foolishly speaks the truth - or is the artist not living off the
> masses -
> > > but breathing new pure air. In all humility hasn't the artist got the
> > chance
> > > to be non-human not in denying the masses but favouring the dionysian
> > > nature?
> > >
> > > >
> > > > If you want me to understand your ideas -- or to be able to try
to --
> > > > send me a copy of your dissertation (if this is what it's about), or
> > > > some relevant excerpts therefrom. (I swear I won't badmouth it till
> > > > after it hits Amazon.com.)
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > Luv,
> > > > Davey
> > > >
> > > > P.S. Have you "e-met" Associate Professor Silke-Maria Wieneck,
a.k.a.
> > > > "smw"? She's another chick who's like very into Nietzsche, and she's
> > > > even old and tired like me! Maybe you can be her Mentee. (The Old
Cow
> > > > and the Sea Cow, oh, what a formidable team!)
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > --
> > > > "They hung there dependent from the sky like some heavy metal
fruit."
> > > > ...................................................................
> > > > (C) 2004 TheDavid^TM | David, P.O. Box 21403, Louisville, KY 40221
> > >
> > >
> >
> >
>
>
Ned Ludd
> On Sat, 20 Mar 2004, Ned Ludd wrote:
> > "Lewis Mammel" <l.ma...@worldnet.att.net> wrote:
>
> > > I saw Stephen Hawking give a talk once, using his
> > > lap top as he did, and I noticed that in his examples
> > > of astronauts falling into black holes he described with
> > > great relish the rending and crushing of the astronaut's
> > > body in the accomplishment of this event.
> >
> > I never buy this. Since all dimensions are contracting
> > and being warped (compressed) by the field of the black hole,
> > how would the astronaut even know he was being crushed?
>
> Why would he need to know he was being crushed?
>
To make Hawking happy.
Ned
Ned Ludd
"Michael S. Morris" <msmo...@netdirect.net> wrote in message
news:405DA094...@netdirect.net...
>
> Ned Ludd:
> I never buy this. Since all dimensions are contracting
> and being warped (compressed) by the field of the black hole,
> how would the astronaut even know he was being crushed?
>
> Usually what is being described in "falling into a black
> hole" is the trip from outside to inside the horizon from
> the point of view of the astronaut. "All dimensions are contracting
> and being warped (compressed)" is simply wrong. You can
> think of it exactly like falling to earth, with nothing particularly
> magic happening at the black-hole horizon. If you fall to earth,
> the effect in question is tidal, which is already present in
> the Newtonian treatment of gravity. So, let's say you fall feet
> first. Your feet are slightly closer to the center of gravitational
> attraction than your head (whether it's earth or a black hole
> singularity). So, your feet want to accelerate faster than head.
> I.e., your feet-to-head dimension wants to stretch (not compress).
> In addition, your sides each are pulled to the gravitational center,
> and since those vectors are tilted ever so slightly towards
> one another, your sides want to compress. So, the tidal effect is
> that you are stretched cap-a-pie and are squished side-to-side and
> front-to-back. As to how much stretching and compression you feel
> it just depends on the mass of the gravitating center and how
> close you are to it. If I recall the numbers correctly, you'd be
> ripped apart by the time you reach the horizon of a small
> (solar mass) black hole, but one of those supermassive black
> holes thought to be in the centers of radio galaxies, you could
> fall through the horizon and not feel it (gravitationally). Once
> you are through the horizon, though, it means you are dooned to hit
> the singularity, and sometime before you get there you should feel
> the rending and crushing.
>
Still don't buy it. Why don't astronauts notice ANY effect of this
at all when entering Earth's gravity well?
And what makes you think you will EVER "hit the singularity" or ever
reach the center of it. You may just go on forever without reaching
it. (Compressing in all dimensions continually.)
Ned
smw
David O'Bedlam wrote:
...
>
> So anyway. Which ideas in Nietzsche's werke, in whichever way they're
> expressed, were unique to Nieztsche?
None. There are no unique thoughts -- there's only unique constellations.
> That is, why speak of Nietzsche?
> Since you think you're so much smarter than me
I think I've read more Nietzsche than you, and have less of a stake in
him. I have to defend myself neither against Nietzsche nor against Kant
nor against Hegel nor against Plato, all of whom I love, along with many
other theoretical writers, say Bataille, Adorno.
> with so little evident
> justification given your profession and your concentration in it, I'm
> sure you've got some horrid insights on what makes Nietzsche special.
> So spit 'em out, toots. Time's a-wastin'.
Nietzsche is special for the pleasures he gives to those open to those
pleasures. You wasted him by deciding that the adolescent reading --
i.e. the one that gave you pleasure long ago -- was the only possible one.
smw
David O'Bedlam wrote:
> On Sun, 21 Mar 2004, smw wrote:
> [...]
>
>
>>You do realize that a healthy yes to illness undercuts the traditional
>>dichomoty of healthy/unhealthy.
>
>
> And you don't realize that "a healthy yes to illness" is an oxymoron.
True, I don't. Since it isn't. It's merely beyond the capacities of the
pre-uebermensch.
smw
David O'Bedlam wrote:
> On Sun, 21 Mar 2004, smw wrote:
>
>>James Whitehead wrote:
>
> [...]
>
>
>>>"What is good? - All that heightens the feeling of power, the will to
>>>power itself in man. What is bad? - all that proceeds from weakness.
>>>What is happiness? - The feeling that power increases- that a
>>>resistance is overcome."
>
>
>>Sigh. I meant a text that refers to the Uebermensch.
>
>
> Too bad I'd thought "the Uebermensch" had something to do with and/or in
> Nietzsche's philosophy.
For some reason you seem to consider that a valid response to what I said.
> Assuming I'm correct to understand "mensch" as
> "human being" as well as "human male"
Nope -- it's the English "man" that can mean both human being and human
male.
> I'd understood them (the Uebers)
> to be the type toward which Nietzsche's thought is straining, a physically
> and mentally healthier kind of kine, less afflicted by ressentiment and
> beer.
>
> But since according to you the Uebers were *not* central to Nietzsche's
> thang then there was nothing he was straining for but myopic self-praise.
He didn't post is IQ-test results to Usenet, though.