Tag: philosophy

The World That No Longer Exists

William Faulkner, in an interview for the Paris Review:

There were many things I could do for two or three days and earn enough money to live on for the rest of the month.

What! Two or three days! I reread the interview perplexed. Just imagining that less than a century ago it was possible to live the month painting houses for two or three days, the smile disappears from my face. Two or three days! And today it is necessary to work even when one does not work. I practice mathematics: how much does a pound of meat cost? I limit my diet, I stick to the essentials: three days a month does not even pay the week! And the worst thing is to see the obvious: there is no choice. It is accepting the energies and the time drained every day for years, decades, to then look back in regret…

Always Acts the Law of the Jungle

To silence dissenting manifestations or, even less, different manifestations is nothing new. But I remain here wondering whether, in this world, there will ever be a reprimand for such aggression. I automatically think of the language, the servant of human vanity. Perhaps some study will come out condemning its movement, proving its harmful character, highlighting its role as an inducer of aggressive action? Probably not. And probably never the average man will be able to bar the hated evolutionary impulse of shutting up, humiliating, submitting, destroying the one he sees as an adversary. Always acts the law of the jungle, and the attack seems the only and best defense… Ao vencedor, as batatas!

The Infamous Is Pleasant in Front of the Cunning

Reading Heidegger, I felt like going out on the street and striking the first human being I met. Exasperating! And very funny the reaction, especially because of my enormous tolerance to what I dislike. Just before Heidegger, I had faced several of the most detestable pages I have ever read without a single violent impulse, without ever feeling the urge to tear up the book and physically assault a fellow man. What is the difference? The difference is that, in Rousseau’s pages, a man incapable of conceiving what would be honor or personal dignity, there was at least sincerity. And more than sincerity: there was style, conciseness, vigor in a prose that is undoubtedly one of the best in the French language. In it, reading the infamous is almost pleasurable. Rousseau knows how to build periods, to chain them, to make the logical progression of thought, and to expose it in a frank way. Heidegger did not. Heidegger hides behind a stupidly abstract language, whose most significant role is to make the banal look important. Heidegger affects methodical accuracy through ridiculous circumlocutions, typical of the one who does not have much to say, and an attentive reading captures the farce. Heidegger fools the reader. But why the comparison? I almost forgot. Rousseau, whose main work could be subtitled “The supreme foundation of demagogy,” whose lines are nothing more than dictating rules and saying how others should behave, still seems to me less vain than the one who, in ostensible linguistic imposture, builds an illegible work in order to impress.

Reflecting on Despair Vaccinates Against Despair

Reflecting on despair vaccinates against despair, reflecting on anguish slows down anguish, disillusionment only is harmful when untimely… and the mind seems to have the arsenal it needs to contain its own impulses. If moved by inertia, vulnerable; if put to work, prepared and resistant. The support it lacks is nothing but the fruit of its own creation. Thus, the idea of self-sufficiency really seems irresistible.