MS, that’s a weird thing to say. This is an internet community where national borders are as easy to traverse as it is to get an email about these virgins on a bus wanting my cock. If only I had a credit card…
Also here in small little Springfield IL there is this annoying guy I know who loves Cioran. At least I believe this is the same Cioran you are talking about, I believe he is quoted saying “man is unacceptable.” If not then nevermind.
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禅 is the romanji for Zazen… Incase you were wondering.
I think its pretty obvious that I am gay for those anti-essentialist eastern traditions. This is because I feel western philosophy has repeatedly made the same mistakes over and over again and for the most part is wrong. Bold claim I know, but that’s how I feel. I blaim Plato and Aristotle for leading western thought astray. If I had a bullet that could travel through time it would be hitting Plato square in the head.
If I were forced to choose a Western Philosopher. That philosopher would, without a doubt, be Pyrrhon of Elis. Prrrho is the founder of western skepticism and his ideas are startlingly similar to Buddhism. His concept of Ataraxia is almost exactly like Zen enlightenment!
Emorgasm wrote :
I apologize if my post offended you in any way, but I was just momentarily chuffed on hearing a familiar name on a world-wide philosophy forum, given that we (as a culture) are virtually unknown to western societies.
Maybe you are right in saying that philosophy transcends national barriers, but it is also true that one must never lose his identity. From a point of view, one may affirm that the most pregnant philosophy is taught by the culture and environment in which one grows. Anyway, forgive my emotional outbreak. Emotion is, indeed, a sign of weakness.
Indeed…
‘Western philosophy’ isn’t a single thing whereby everyone agrees. It is part of the western tradition to criticise that very tradition. Particularly since Kant, or Spinoza, depending on where you see the start of the ‘modern era’.
‘Astray’ from what, exactly?
To choose the eastern because one finds the western to be bunk when it is of course the western that defines the eastern as such (English being a western language) is a piece of almost complete logical folly. However you are one of many who think like this, it’s a sort of bastard popularisation of the work of Said and the rest…
What a butchered paragraph…
Pyrrho. Not the founder of scepticism. Pyrrho reconciled the whole ‘how does one know that one either does or doesn’t know’ that we get from Plato’s/the Socratic dialogues on epistemology. He was working within and established discourse. Not to mention that Pyrrhonian scepticism as described by Sextus Empiricus contain numerous premises that constitute knowledge claims and contradict the conclusions…
I’m not getting at you. I can offer suggestions on these two topics which you may or may not find more appealing that your present views. I have tried not to do this here because you might feel patronised and therefore not respond due to shame…
Amazing person.
After a few days of contemplation further, I feel that there is no such thing as a great philosopher, or a great teacher, the only real teachers are self knowledge, or self seeking, meaning the only teachers is within our own minds, a self cultivating proccess with the help of observance from other people and is put into a debate within our minds.
Then I thought of a philosopher Dissoi Loggoi.
He taught that there are no great teachers, for if they were great, their students or followers would also be great or recognized. Yet, I still come to a disgreement with Dissoi Logoi.
No no, I should appologize, I wasn’t intending it to sound like an attack. I just thought it was peculiar because you rarely see that sort of thing on the internet. In person sure. If I ever met someone in person who has read Sade, Fourier, Loyola by Roland Barthes I would be astonished! But on ILP I would expect a fair share of people are at least passingly familiar with Barthes. That’s all I was getting at. Sorry if I sounded harsh. :lol:
Never read that one by Barthes, but I am somewhat familiar with him…
[quote=“someemofag”]
[size=200]禅[/size][/quote
I’m sorry, I’m sure you meant to write it this way: 孔子
It’s tricky, I know. I get confused sometimes myself. 
That’s fair. I was making a gross generalization by defining two philosophical traditions along cultural and regional lines without taking into context their infinite complexities. I’ll admit to it. However I didn’t feel it was necessary to go into comparative philosophy because I’m sure you know what I meant. However if you didn’t I’ll rephrase my statement, but please let us not quibble over my tiny narratives.
I prefer the eastern anti-essentialist traditions which focus on paradoxical or linguistically meaningless dialogs or questions; over the western foundationalist traditions which are methodically rigid and place far too much importance on reason. The repeated mistake, of which I speak, is that these western traditions attempt to associate philosophical discourse with a “deeper” universal logic and reason. There have been a few independent thinkers in the west who spoke out against this tradition but for the most part it was the dominate mode of thought until just now this the last century.
Even though I appreciate and love the work of the existentialists, post-structuralists, constructivists, post-modernists, etc. I don’t think they are really saying anything new. The eastern cultures have been struggling with these concepts for, hell 3000 plus years! Just read the Tao Te Ching and you’ll see exactly what I mean. In addition to being older they are far less jargon heavy and are not nearly as technical but are more abstract and seem to get the point across much easier.
This technical aspect of current post-modern thinking is what truly makes me prefer those eastern traditions. Simulacrum and Simulations is an absolutely great mind-blowing book and truly one of my favorites. Yet I find it very difficult to express most of those ideas in depth without directly quoting Baudrillard. You don’t get that with a Zen Koan.
Take for example the Tractus by Wittgenstein. At least from my perspective those axiom resembles an overly complicated analytic version of a Koan. Its an attempt to impose logic on that which goes beyond logic, Zen wouldn’t do that. One hand clapping so to speak…
Diversity in Philosophical thought is one right off the top of my head. There is a place for foundationalism and anti-essentialism in philosophy, but the foundationalists following in the coat tails of Plato have tried to crush anti-essential thought wherever it springs up.
Good point, the east doesn’t think of themselves as the east. However, come on man! It’s just a type of shorthand. I know you knew what I meant when I distinguished between eastern and western. Unless of course I am completely as inarticulate as some friends of mine (who are far brighter then, I must admit) would suggest.
Haha, ouch! I must be as inarticulate as I feared then. : )
What!? Fine… It’s a sort of practical skepticism, but it was skepticism and he was the first in the Mediterranean to bring it up. I’m also not advocating skepticism here, just stating that he was the first to talk about it. Besides all that, Sextus Empiricus is also known as one of the greatest skeptics of Athens.
I think you might be confusing the ideas of Pyrrho with Carneadean Pyrrhonism which as I’m sure you know, was for a while anyway, the dominate idea at the “New” Academy. Regrettably I have yet to read the Outlines of Pyrrhonism by Sextus Empiricus in its completion. 
It is only partially available on the internet, this is because of that douche bag R.G. Bury and his shitty 1933 copywrite crap with Cambridge. However I have read his pupil Timon of Phlius’ poetry. In which he expresses skeptical concepts by focusing on paradoxical and linguistically meaningless dialogs, similar to the eastern traditions.
I believe it is safe to say that Pyrrho had a unique type of skepticism towards knowledge and well everything else. It asserted and then reneged on the assertion the moment it was made, quite paradoxical and yet completely accessible. I believe the similarity to eastern thought cannot be a coincidence. He must have been influenced by at the very least Jainism when he went on expedition with Alexander
Please do… I would love to learn as much about this topic as possible.
You seem to be quite familiar with Pyrrho so I would like to ask you… What is your take on Ataraxia and the Zen satori parallel? I feel that Pyrrho and Bodhidharma (or any enlightened master) are talking about the same ideal state.
孔子 is Pinyin Chinese, which I don’t know anything about. 禅 in Romanji is legit. Do a google search on that character and you’ll see what I mean.
I think you missed the point of my joke. Your character is Chan (zen), correct? Whereas mine is Kongzi (Confucius). You see, it is funny because the Ru wrote many essays on how Chan Buddhists were wrong. I make a joke, is funny, yes?
Of course I appreciate the general sense of your comment and all I was really doing was highlighting one of the potential dangers of using such words.
Of course denoting one thing ‘reasonable’ and another ‘unreasonable’ is in itself nothing more than a linguistic crutch, an attempt to gain leverage. It is the attempt to keep the language game within given boundaries, but it always fails. I’ll completely agree if what you mean is that the attempt to put the universal, the aspatiotemporal, into the permanently contingent and spatiotemporal (language, reason, the account) is an endless parlour game which only shows the rules by which the game is being played rather than what the game purports to be showing.
They aren’t. The better ones admit this. There are some traces of deconstruction at least as early as Aristotle’s Rhetoric which is the earliest text of the sort that I’ve read.
I have little trouble reading ‘postmodern’ texts. But I do understand your objections, there are even satirical sites devoted to the invention of postmodern jargon. And then there’s the Sokal experiment, the Cambridge affair, Derrida’s death and all that nonsense…
I, being someone trained in analytical philosophy, appreciate the ‘technical’ aspects of poststructuralism in particular, because if you are going to dismantle something if you do it from the inside out, rather than forever being ‘from the outside in’ as Eastern philosophy is then the ramifications are perhaps altogether more serious.
Of course, but that’s associated with the last point that I made. In the Eastern tradition(s) such language and ideas have been around and discussed without being pushed to the fringes of the discourse whereas in the Western tradition(s) they’ve almost always been on the fringes, trying to find the right ‘revolutionary’ language to move into the mainstream. However if you want a ‘deconstruction in plain language’ then read Norris’s excellent introduction
on amazon here
If you do decide to purchase it (presuming you haven’t read it already) then don’t forget to use the link in ben’s thread so a few groats fall the way of ILP…
I don’t wish to be directly confrontational but I think that you may have misunderstood the text. I found it extremely challenging when I first read it but subsequent readings (as well as exploring the Russell and Frege which precedes it) enabled me to make more sense of it. As with most ‘key’ texts in western philosophy one needs to read other stuff in order to make sense of it. Nietzsche is one exception to this, there are a few others. The later Wittgenstein is much more straightforwardly written, and for the most part much better.
Foundationalism doesn’t necessarily entail the opposite of diversity…
Of course, but one needs to not be lax about using such shorthand when discussing something as particular as philosophical traditions. When talking about where one is going on holiday such shorthand carries few dangerous connotations, when discussing what we seem to be discussing it carries all sorts of problematic implications.
Of course I know roughly what you are on about but the point is that clarity and simplicity of language, where possible, is the aim. This is a principal which is underpinning the topic of the discussion, but not the style. Do you see the relevance of this comment or should I elaborate further?
No, just a whacky speller…
Socrates was a sceptic of sorts, in places…
Of course Plato’s dialogues are all over the shop. There’s so much claim and counter claim that it is very hard to get firm conclusions from them on any issue…
I don’t know anything about that, I had to read it for a course in ancient Greek philosophy so I bought the book. As it is described there are several ‘modes’ or conventional arguments used by the Pyrrhonian sceptic, with the conclusion always being that one should suspend judgement.
I’m not familiar with that. I’ve only read the philosophy, which speaks of my ignorance…
Texts do move faster than people in many cases…
Ataraxia isn’t momentary, it is the ‘aim’ as it were of suspending judgement, satori is some sort of transcendental state which involves all sorts of assumptions and whatnot that the Pyrrhonian wouldn’t condone
I’m not so sure, or at least they go about it in different ways. Of course Pyrrho was, again, a student and as such part of the tradition(s).
You pegged it. I think the eastern traditions of which I speak address such problems in a far more elegant manner.
Postmodern texts are a worth while struggle for me. I am not a trained academic, no money for college, so the innumerable external references and new terminology slow me down. Earlier analytic writers like Russell or Nozik are a breeze comparably. I suppose one could argue that the topics are getting more complicated and since our tradition of philosophy rejects the use aesthetic abstractions it’ll only get denser.
You hit on one of my favorite aspects of this new era of philosophy, the way we must approach it with a sense of irony. One my favorite examples is an essay entitled How to Speak and Write Postmodern I read in this book The Truth about the Truth. It is quite entertaining, if your into this type of humor, and if you I would suggest giving it a read. I also feel it is necessary to parody the work of the postmoderns. I’m not sure you meant when you said something about Derrida’s death, I’m curious to find out. I have created a fake Derrida profile on an online community called MySpace, where in the personal quote section I wrote “Life & Cancer are un-deconstructable binaries.”
Agreed, this is my biggest problem with people like PoR. If you plan to take something to pieces you better know how it’s built first, especially if your goal involves communication with others who are familiar with the technical details. Not to mention that these technicalities are, if you’re that type of person, a lot of fun.
So when I say that the technical aspect makes me prefer the Eastern concepts I am being disingenuous. I spend more time reading western texts, because I find it challenging and fun. But at the end of the day the eastern traditions are still saying the same thing only without all the jargon. So when forced to choose one over the other (which in our globalized world is really impossible) I must choose the more simplistic and straightforward of the two.
True and you got to hand it to these few western philosophers for sticking to their guns. Perhaps both east and west can learn from each other some day and there wont be such a divide in thought.
I understand what you mean, I get this a lot from people who have experience with Wittgenstein. Perhaps I am just imposing correlations where it shouldn’t be, only further reading and contemplation will reveal anything further. When I came to that conclusion I started searching for others who share similar thoughts and I have found only two articles thus far, “Wittgenstein and Zen Buddhism” and “Doing Philosophy and Doing Zen.”
It doesn’t your right. However, historically foundationalist schools have tried to dispose of anything that is contrary to their held assertions.
Nope, I get you and understand fully where you are coming from. In future posts I will try to avoid such errors.
Regarding Satori and Ataraxia and Pyrrhonism I that instead of filling this string up with something completely unrelated to the topic I will write an article for Symposium. Which will probably be sometime before I can afford the time to write, I first have to finish the final touches on that Ãœbermensch article. I’m quite busy. I guess when I get the internet back at my house I will have plenty of time.
I totally missed the joke, quite funny indeed. 
First time here, let’s see how long it takes for me to get banned for a contradictory opinion.
Ptah Hotep said some 2800 - 3100 years ago, (dependent upon whether you wish to enter the contention of dating texts/manuscripts and it’s exactness), “I have no original words, I simply relate the past to my time.” (relative constructs of perceived time as fallacy.)
I prefer Juangztu, he made it clear that humanity, in the largest societal sense, is a waste of effort, and that enlightened thinkers shouldn’t trivialize their journey attempting to teach the unteachable.
Somebody in the top three philosophers thread has asked that how come everybody is so very obsessed with Nietzsche. Reading that was the happiest moment in my cyber life beside seeing liquidangel’s photograph. I am generally optimistic about the future of humanity now. Do not give Fritz up, lovely people, and do not misunderstand him either. I love you all, quoting Shyster.
Egyptians do rock. What text is that from, I’d like to have a gander (given the naming-style I assume that’s what Ptah Hotep was) Anyway . . .
Tsk, tsk. Nothin’ wrong with being a transmitter rather than a creator.
And, actually, while I don’t like most of Zhuangzi (stupid romanization systems always changing on us!!), my favourite philosopher(s) (Xunzi/Hsun Tzu) was heavily influenced by his (their) metaphysics, particularly ‘On Heaven’. Everybody’s favourite N-bomb-ueber-Mensch was also influenced by Zhuangzi (he had access to an early translation), how cool is that?
someemofag,
You mention that you cannot afford college. A community college is not too expensive, and if you do well many universities provide scholarships, and there is also the Pell Grant. Heck, I was far from rich, but attended an expensive, private university that is highly ranked and graduated with only a $3,000 loan for a $30,000 education. It would have been $60,000 if I attended all four years.
There are thousands of other scholarships available, just go to a public library.
Smiles,
aspacia
p.s. ever wonder why I misspell? I just graded essays and do you have any idea regarding the number of spelling errors in these essays. After a while I began wondering, am I wrong?? Is it thier??? Is it loose not lose??? I actually, pulled out a dictionary to check. Geez, talk about fried.
that will not happen…
banning seldom happens and it is for incivility and name calling, not for expressing any opinion…
welcome
-Imp