Category: Human Predicament
-
Propinquity and Politeness
Treat your family members with the same respect as you would strangers. Unfortunately, propinquity militates against politeness. Conservatives understand that a certain formality in our relations with others, both within and without the family, helps maintain respect. Formality helps keep in check the contempt bred of familiarity.
-
The Optimist and the Art of Life
The optimist is no cosmologist seeking the final truth about the world but a cosmetologist who puts a pretty face on it. He applies cosmetics to the cosmos. He knows the art of life and how to make the most of life, and does not shy away from such life-enhancing illusions as are conducive to…
-
At the Corner of Spirit and Flesh
Bodily lusts exist at the intersection of spirit and flesh. Neither merely bodily nor merely mental, they trouble neither angel nor beast. They trouble man, who is neither.
-
Better ‘Has Been’ than ‘Never Was’
Why, if the present alone is real? The wholly past no longer exists. But this truism, accepted by all who understand English and its verb tenses, is not what the presentist in the philosophy of time maintains. He intends something substantive and non-tautological: what no longer exists does not exist at all, and what does…
-
Socializing and Sociability
An excess of socializing can be be harmful to one's sociability.
-
Distance Permits Idealization
Propinquity diminishes what distance augments. Among friends, mutual respect is better served by distance than by close contact. Distance permits idealization. Is it an unalloyed good? No, inasmuch as idealization typically falsifies. But falsification in a world that runs on appearances can be life-enhancing. One skilled in the art of life knows how to apply…
-
A Reason to Try to ‘Make it’
One reason to try to 'make it' is to come to appreciate, by succeeding, that worldly success is not a worthy final goal of human striving. 'Making it' frees one psychologically and allows one to turn one's attention to worthier matters. He who fails is dogged by a sense of failure whereas he who succeeds…
-
Running as Equalizer?
Kirk Johnson, To the Edge: A Man, Death Valley, and the Mystery of Endurance, Warner 2001, p. 179: Runners, I believe, are the last great Calvinists. We all believe, on some level, that success or failure in a race — and thus in life — is a measure of our moral fiber. Part of that feeling…
-
Pettiness
We are petty in our loves, hates, fears, hopes, interests, desires and aversions. Spirit says to Flesh, "How petty you are! Flesh replies, "You can look down your long nose at human pettiness only so long as I allow you to. A couple of well-placed blows would suffice to reduce you, Noble One, who depend…
-
The Visage of Disillusion
The faces of the elderly, especially those of old men, often betray disillusionment with life: they've seen through it. It's a business that doesn't cover its costs. (Schopenhauer) Women too are among the disillusioned, but they are 'under-represented.' That is because women as a group are more child-like than men as a group. Is that…
-
Jeopardy! The TV Show
Starring Alex Trebek! One observes very bright people displaying their cleverness and mental agility via recall of isolated facts. Meanwhile the horrors of life continue unabated. Now surely there is nothing wrong with some escapist entertainment. Right? The other night the trivia questions were about the First World War. And the clever contestants had all…
-
Truth and Consolation
Nothing is true because it is consoling, but that does not preclude certain truths from being consoling. So one cannot refute a position by showing that some derive consolation from it. Equally, no support for a position is forthcoming from the fact that it thwarts our interests or dashes our hopes.
-
Moral Sickness
Few are indifferent to their physical sickness, but most to their moral, if they are aware of it at all.
-
Where Less is More
Alexander Pope advises that we drink deep of the Pierian spring, for a little learning is a dangerous thing. A little knowledge, like a little learning, is indeed a dangerous thing except in the case of persons, where a lot of knowledge endangers love, respect, and admiration. Propinquity breeds familiarity, and familiarity contempt. Distance preserves…
-
Adapted from Teilhard de Chardin
We are not human beings on a spiritual journey; we are spiritual beings on a human journey.