"Specialization is for insects." (Robert A. Heinlein)
If so, there is no 'insect' like the hyper-specialized analytic philosopher. (See here for quotation and context.)
The true philosopher is "a spectator of all time and existence," (Plato) and of everything sublunary and superlunary.
Panoptics and synoptics are the optics of the true philosopher. Spinoza the lens-grinder would agree.
I pulled out my scribblings from the summer of '66. Puerile stuff from a half-century ago. Painful in places. But earnest and sincere with a good line here and there. The old man honors the adolescent he was.
I wrote for posterity, though I didn't realize it at the time. And I still do. The posterity of self.
. . . is another man's precision.
There is continence sexual and gustatory. Custody of the eyes and of the heart are forms of continence. Continence should also extend to rebuttals, replies, ripostes, rejoinders, responses, and reactions. Deny yourself the desire for vindication, and getting in the last word. Better retraction than self-serving reaction. The self denied is the ego; the self that denies is the soul.
Humans.
The ultimate Orwellianism is to refer to the terminally benighted as 'woke.'
The erasure of the historical record via alteration of documents, book burning, iconoclasm, shadow-banning, and the like is common to totalitarian systems whether Communist, National Socialist, Fascist, Islamist, or 'woke.'
Hatred of apostates is another similarity between leftists and radical Muslims.
Just as we should not become too familiar with others, we should not become too familiar with ourselves.
Life is a task; the world is a proving ground. First thought, best thought.
People on a low level should not lower themselves further by pretending that they are not.
A former colleague of mine published one lousy book, a teacher of mine, many.
He prayed for the ability to see himself objectively, but then complained that he did not like what he saw.
Among the cardinal virtues, courage is the odd man out. It is almost always prudent to be prudent, temperate, and just, but not often prudent to be courageous.
The less I know of you, the more highly I can think of you.
