a thread for mundane ironists

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9421

[b]Napoleon Bonaparte

To understand the man you have to know what was happening in the world when he was twenty.[/b]

See, back again to dasein.

The future destiny of a child is always the work of the mother.

Obviously, as a misogynist, he didn’t think this all the way through.

All great events hang by a single thread.

Though sometimes a whole bunch of them.

My decision to destroy the authority of the blacks in Haiti is not so much based on considerations of commerce and money, as on the need to block for ever the march of the blacks in the world.

You know, like Trump today.

One should never forbid what one lacks the power to prevent.

Uh, no shit?

When a government is dependent upon bankers for money, they and not the leaders of the government control the situation.

Uh, no shit?

9422

[b]tiny nietzsche

the future is catching up[/b]

Duck!

if you scroll back far enough, I don’t exist

Me? Back to Tue Nov 16, 2010 3:03 pm

visits the dead: “I like what you’ve done with the place”

I know: up or down?

a clean well lighted place for despair

Well lighted anyway.

now that I’m vaccinated, does this mean I have to go outside?

It’s always never nothing, right?

my scars have scars

Then it’s scars all the way down.

9423

[b]Walter Isaacson

…reality has an odd habit of catching up with satire.[/b]

And, no doubt about it, the other way around.

If we want to be more like Leonardo da Vinci, we have to be fearless about changing our minds based on new information. lol

Right, Kids?

A society’s competitive advantage will come not from how well its schools teach the multiplication and periodic tables, but from how well they stimulate imagination and creativity.

:laughing:
Right, Mr. Capitalist?

The best and most innovative products don’t always win…it’s an aesthetic flaw in how the universe worked.

And, for some, a fucking outrage.

Simplicity isn’t just a visual style. It’s not just minimalism or the absence of clutter. It involves digging through the depth of the complexity. To be truly simple, you have to go really deep.

Don’t you just hate “deep” insights like this?
Though, sure, no doubt about it, point taken.

"Talent hits a target that no one else can hit,” wrote the German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer. “Genius hits a target no one else can see.”

Next up: the pinhead’s target.

9424

[b]so sad today

what does “stay strong” mean and do i have to?[/b]

Sadly, her father just died.

what’s the point, yo?

Yo, you tell me.

anxiety or it didn’t happen

On the other hand, only up until the day you die.

i’m not brave i’m just impulsive

Let’s call it brave anyway, okay?

forgot that life is pain and then remembered again

Repeat as necessary.

i’m very no

She means nein of course.

9425

[b]Holly Black

And if I wanted to kill myself, I wouldn’t throw myself off a roof. And if I was going to throw myself off a roof, I would put on some pants before I did it.[/b]

On the other hand, different folks, different strokes.

I am tired of caring, I say. Why should I?
Because they could kill you!
They better, I say to her. Because anything less than that isn’t going to work.

You either grasp this or you don’t.
Or until you do.

Even from the beginning, that was the problem. People liked pretty things. People even liked pretty things that wanted to kill and eat them.

Hmm, anyone like that here?

She looks honestly upset, but then, I’ve learned that I can’t read her. The problem with a really excellent liar is that you have to just assume they’re always lying.

They don’t call them sociopaths for nothing.

Having a heart is terrible, but you need one anyway.

Literally and otherwise.

Watching my back is the perfect opportunity to stick a knife in it.

Yes, there is that of course.

9426

[b]so sad today

when i hear people talk i honestly feel like i’m from another planet[/b]

Imagine me then.

sorry but i hate everything more than you do

Imagine that: apologizing!

we should lose hope together

Your bed or mine.

no of course i don’t know what i want

Okay, as long as you know what you don’t want.

i never know what i’m feeling because i don’t want to

If only there was a way to not need to.

spoiler: existential crisis

Little does she know just how devastating they can be.
Given what we know now.

9427

[b]Laura Dern

Unfortunately, overall, movies are a conglomerate. People buy and sell people in this business, which can get really ugly.[/b]

You know, like everything else in this money-grubbing culture.
Look what they did to the Sundance Channel. Criminal Minds marathons!!

I made a commitment to myself: that I wanted to be an actress, and I wanted to do films that make a difference. Whether it makes someone laugh, or it has a moral to the story - it doesn’t have to be an ethical film, but it has to move people. If it doesn’t excite me, it’s not worth doing - it’s better to work on myself and my own life and wait until another great thing comes along.

My guess: she means it.

Whatever character you play, it gives you the chance to expose another side of yourself that maybe you’ve never felt comfortable with, or never knew about.

You know, like the characters we play here.

There is so much in the world to care about.

For some, almost as much as to not care about.

I’m interested in human nature. That’s why I chose to become an actor. Whatever people are struggling with, the struggle is often where the drama is.

That and the terrible pain and suffering. Off the screen especially.

We like our archetypes and heroes to be what they are at face value. And life doesn’t work out like that.

Face value. What the hell does that even mean?

9428

[b]sad socrates

Even death isn’t funny anymore.[/b]

Well, not counting yours perhaps.

I could change myself but I could also ignore myself.

Or neither one most likely.

The less I know about myself the better.

And then some.

The best way to be happy is to imagine things worse.

Let’s synchronize it, okay?

If you can’t handle me at my tomorrow, you don’t deserve me at my never.

Let’s note those very, very few exceptions.

Nature: why are you depressed?
me: because of you
Nature: oh right, sorry about that

Unless of course it’s actually God.

9429

[b]Emily Dickinson

I am nobody! Who are you? Are you a nobody, too?[/b]

Let’s just say that, like all of us, I’m working on it.

I cannot live with you,
It would be life,
And life is over there
Behind the shelf

Or, here, behind the laptop.

The Truth must dazzle gradually or every man be blind.

Mine, for example.

Forever – is composed of Nows

Of course the dead know better.
Whatever that means.

How strange that nature does not knock, and yet does not intrude!

On the contrary, it can intrude catastrophically.

Old age comes on suddenly, and not gradually as is thought.

Uh, maybe?

9430

[b]Philosophy Tweets

“I have never known so much naive conviction allied to greater intellectual poverty.” Claude Levi-Strauss[/b]

Yo, Sculptor! My brand spanking new Stooge!! :sunglasses:

“I therefore claim to show, not how men think in myths, but how myths operate in men’s minds without their being aware of the fact.” Claude Levi-Strauss

Objectivists I call them.

“Something I learned very early on in my career is that there are a lot of things that you do not have any power over.” Charlize Theron

Not unlike Aileen Wuornos’s career.

“Invention, it must be humbly admitted, does not consist in creating out of void, but out of chaos.” Mary Shelley

The void comes later.

“Nothing contributes so much to tranquilize the mind as a steady purpose - a point on which the soul may fix its intellectual eye.” Mary Shelley

Anyone with a steady purpose here?

“Life is obstinate and clings closest where it is most hated.” Mary Shelley

It would have to be that way, wouldn’t it?

9431

[b]Charlotte Bronte

Crying does not indicate that you are weak. Since birth, it has always been a sign that you are alive.[/b]

Not that you can’t be both of course.

What you want to ignite in others must first burn inside yourself.

Oh, it burns inside me alright.

Better to try all things and find all empty, than to try nothing and leave your life a blank.

All empty? Hmm, better to be blank I’m thinking.

The shadows are as important as the light.

Fuck the light, he thought.

Better to be without logic than without feeling.

Fuck the logic, he thought. Also, fuck the feeling.

There is no happiness like that of being loved by your fellow creatures, and feeling that your presence is an addition to their comfort.

So they tell me.

9432

[b]Philosophy Tweets

“Life is very, very confusing, and so films should be allowed to be, too”. David Lynch[/b]

And, sure, why not: posts.

"The meaning of life is that it stops. " Franz Kafka

Let’s change that.

“From a certain point onward there is no longer any turning back. That is the point that must be reached.” Franz Kafka

You know, if you’re not chickenshit.

“Youth does not require reasons for living, it only needs pretexts.” Jose Ortega y Gasset

Wow, imagine then what the Kids only require.

“Living is a constant process of deciding what we are going to do.” Jose Ortega y Gasset

I know, I know: what if he’s right?!!

“An idea is a putting truth in check-mate.” Jose Ortega y Gasset

Or, as the Kids here say, “King me!”

9433

[b]Philip Seymour Hoffman

Don’t let people treat you like a cigarette, they only use you when they’re bored and step on you when they’re done. Be like drugs, let them die for you.[/b]

Where to go with that, right?

Learning how to die is therefore learning how to live.

Where to go with that, right?

I didn’t go out looking for negative characters; I went out looking for people who have a struggle and a fight to tackle. That’s what interests me.

And, hopefully, before the Devil knows he’s dead.

If you’re a human being walking the earth, you’re weird, you’re strange, you’re psychologically challenged.

I know that I am.

I think you should be serious about what you do because this is it. This is the only life you’ve got.

Well, the only life he had anyway.

Actors are responsible to the people we play. I don’t label or judge. I just play them as honestly and expressively and creatively as I can.

Yo, Truman!

9434

[b]Philosophy Tweets

“Law is born from despair of human nature.” Jose Ortega y Gasset[/b]

And how grim is that?

“Life is a series of collisions with the future; it is not the sum of what we have been, but what we yearn to be.” Jose Ortega y Gasset

And how grim is that?

“A man is what he thinks about all day long.” Ralph Waldo Emerson

And, for some, how grim is that?

“I am I plus my circumstances.” Jose Ortega y Gasset

See, I told you.

“You can easily judge the character of a man by how he treats those who can do nothing for him.” Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

How about your character then?

"Words without experience are meaningless.” Vladimir Nabokov

I know, let’s call them “intellectual contraptions”!

9435

[b]Mark Strand

Poems not only demand patience, they demand a kind of surrender. You must give yourself up to them. This is the real food for a poet: other poems, not meat loaf.[/b]

He wondered if there was the equivalent of that here.

In a field I am the absence of field. That is always the case. Wherever I am, I am what is missing.

He wondered if there was the equivalent of that here.

Usually a life turned into a poem is misrepresented.

Like it could ever not be.

I haven’t met God and I haven’t been to heaven, so I’m skeptical.

Pure poetry, isn’t it?

Poetry is, first and last, language - the rest is filler.

Not unlike all the filler here?

Sometimes he did not know if he slept or just thought about sleep.

No, this is a real thing.

9436

[b]Philosophy Tweets

“We should never allow our fears or the expectations of others to set the frontiers of our destiny.”
Martin Heidegger[/b]

Spot the irony here?

“The more unintelligent a man is, the less mysterious existence seems to him.” Arthur Schopenhauer

Yeah, I’ve noticed that myself.

“Visibility is a trap.” Michel Foucault

See what he means?

“Language and identity are so fundamentally intertwined. You peel back all the layers in terms of what we wear and what we eat and all the things that mark us, and in the end, what we have are our words.” Jhumpa Lahiri

Of course your end might be different.

“If you want to reach a large audience appeal to idiots.” Arthur Schopenhauer

:-"

“The sign of intelligence is the ability to carry opposed thoughts at the same time.” F. Scott Fitzgerald

Me? No problem.

9437

[b]Charles Simic

The highest levels of consciousness are wordless.[/b]

Spot the irony here? Though, sure, by all means, point taken.

The world is beautiful but not sayable. That’s why we need art.

And the occasional philosophy.

He who cannot howl will not find his pack.

So, how am I doing?
I know: packless all the way down to the bone.

'When people ask me how to find happiness in life I tell them, “First learn how to cook”.

You know, after you’ve paid all the bills.

The plain truth is we are going to die. Here I am, a teeny spec surrounded by boundless space and time, arguing with the whole of creation, shaking my fist, sputtering, growing even eloquent at times, and then-poof! I am gone. Swept off once and for all. I think that is very, very funny.

Well, funny and other things perhaps.

Inside my empty bottle I was constructing a lighthouse while all others were making ships.

You tell me.

9438

[b]Philosophy Tweets

“If everyone is thinking alike, then no one is thinking.” Benjamin Franklin[/b]

Yo, Satyr!

“Being a woman is a terribly difficult task, since it consists principally in dealing with men.” Joseph Conrad.

Trust me: men have their own version of this.

“A man’s most open actions have a secret side to them.” Joseph Conrad

Well, I know that mine do.

“The loneliest moment in someone’s life is when they are watching their whole world fall apart, and all they can do is stare blankly.” F. Scott Fitzgerald

Let’s share abysses.

“Man is equally incapable of seeing the nothingness from which he emerges and the infinity in which he is engulfed.” Blaise Pascal

Let’s make a wager regarding which is worse.

“To ridicule philosophy is really to philosophize.” Blaise Pascal

Yo, Fixed Jacob! Dig it!! :sunglasses:

9439

[b]Ernest Cline

Capitalism would inch forward, without my actually having to interact face-to-face with another human being. Which was exactly how I preferred it, thank you.[/b]

Admittedly, he is right about that part.

And I was just there, less than an hour ago, debugging subroutines in my cubicle, when a motherfucking Earth Defense Alliance shuttle suddenly shows up and lands right outside my office building! I figured I must be losing it. Now I’m not sure what to think.

You know, like the Men In Black showing up in the Matrix.

As I stared out at the grim skyline, a bright sliver of the sun peeked over the horizon. Watching it rise, I performed a mental ritual: Whenever I saw the sun, I reminded myself that I was looking at a star. One of over a hundred billion stars in our galaxy. A galaxy that was just one of billions of other galaxies in the observable universe. This helped me keep things in perspective.

You know, going back to an expanation for existence itself.

It felt wonderful. Like being struck by lightning.

Uh, if you know what he means?

It occurred to me then that for the first time in as long as I could remember, I had absolutely no desire to log back into the OASIS.

Or – gasp! – ILP?

At this school, the only real weapons were words, so I’d become skilled at wielding them.

I know, I know: would that it could be like that here.

9440

[b]Philosophy Tweets

“Schools serve the same social functions as prisons and mental institutions–to define, classify, control people.” Michel Foucault[/b]

Capitalist, socialist.
Pick one.

“The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes.” Marcel Proust

Trust me: blind or sighted.

“We die only once, and for such a long time.” Moliere

He ought to know. 348 years now and counting.

“It is not only for what we do that we are held responsible, but also for what we do not do.” Moliere

I know, I know: what if that were actually true?!

"A learned fool is more a fool than an ignorant fool. Moliere

You know what’s coming: youtu.be/g-avaa9a_HU

“When the heroes go off the stage, the clowns come on.” Heinrich Heine

Hmm, ILP in a nutshell?