Category: Aphorisms and Observations
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Do Think Twice
Think twice about attacking a man who owns a printing press. (I am alluding to a famous song in the title. Which?)
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The Converse of Pandora’s Box
Unable to contain her curiosity, Pandora opened her box and a multitude of evils escaped into the world. The blogger, unable to contain his curiosity as to the comments he might receive, opens his combox and a multitude of evils _________________. (You finish the sentence.) Related articles Of 'Blind Review' and Pandora's Box Man dies…
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Vehicle and Cross
In this life the body that begins as a vehicle ends as a cross. It carries us until such time as we carry it — and are nailed to it, and expire on it and of it.
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The Eliminative Materialist
The eliminative materialist is a bit like a man who blows his brains out to be rid of a headache. No head, no headache, no problem! Related articles Pascal on Materialism Thinking Meat?
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The Discursive as Distraction
The search for the Real takes us outside ourselves. We may seek the Real in experiences, possessions, distant lands, or other people. These soon enough reveal themselves as distractions. But what about ideas and theories? Are they simply a more lofty sort of distraction? “Travelling is a fool’s paradise” said Emerson. Among lands certainly, but…
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Surface and Depth
We are too superficial to fathom our depth, and too deep to acquiesce comfortably in our superficiality.
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Intellectual Hypertrophy
Weight lifters and body builders in their advanced states of muscular development appear ridiculous to us. All that time and money spent on the grotesque overdevelopment of one's merely physical attributes ___ when in a few short years one will be dust and ashes. But isn't the intellectual equally unbalanced who overdevelops his logical and analytical…
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On Making a Splash
Years ago an acquaintance wrote me about a book he had published which, he said, had "made quite a splash." The metaphor is unfortunately double-edged. When an object hits the water it makes a splash. But only moments later the water returns to its quiescent state as if nothing had happened. So it is…
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Imagination
One can remember having imagined something, but one cannot remember something imaginary.
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Talk is Cheap?
Often it is. But the right word, at the right time, addressed to the right person, spoken from the heart with purity of intent can be priceless.
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Jack and Phil
He doesn't know jack but he thinks he does, which is why he needs phil.
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Preacher and Slacker
There is someone worse than the preacher who falls into hypocrisy, namely, the moral slacker who is not even to the point where hypocrisy is possible.
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Accept Love, Accept Aversion
We must learn to accept people's love, good wishes, and benevolence as gifts without worrying whether we deserve these things or not, and without worrying whether we will ever be in a position to compensate the donors. Similarly, we must learn to accept people's hate and malevolence as a sort of reverse gratuitous donation whether we…
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Body as Temple
The secular too think of the body as a temple, a temple of the ego. Related articles Schopenhauer on Islam, "The Saddest and Poorest Form of Theism" Maverick Tattoos
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Knowledge, Belief, Action: Three Maxims
1. Don't claim to know what you merely believe even on good evidence. 2. Don't claim to believe what you are not prepared to act upon. 3. Don't let insufficient evidence prevent you from believing what you are better off believing in the long run than not believing in the long run. Related articles Knowledge and…