a new understanding of today, time and space.

Peter Kropotkin"]I see nationalism and state as being as temporary as the
notion that once drove human behavior which is the “tribe” that
we once belonged to and then the “city-state” that drove Socrates
and then the small estates that littered the countryside in Medieval
Europe and then the rise of the nation…and then some other format
will rise and replace the nation… I hope for a unity of purpose that arises
when people, not nations, not religions, not social created means that
are only true for a moment and then gone…
[/quote]

[/quote]
Bob: I admire your ideals, I have worked for my own for a while and now, being a pensioner, I reflect on the things that were. I have found that the development I had assumed we were all making, building the world to be a better place, was all illusion. At the best, it was the development that I was making with a few others. It doesn’t mean that we stop, but that we assess what is possible and do that.

Of course, the COVID situation is making a mockery of such idealism. At present it is important to gain control of the spread of the virus and get back to a normal state of affairs. Only then can we begin to communicate one on one, trying to overcome misunderstanding and enmity. The forums of this world, inasmuch as they are anonym, can’t help us unless we do away with the brutality of closed minds. Forums can only help us when our minds are open and we are willing to argue our case in a civilised manner. I have changed my mind many times on ILP due to good arguments made by others - including you. I have had to revise my ideas in the light of verbal attacks, because I noticed that my wording was inappropriate.

As far as the political arguments are concerned, we can’t remain dualistic, but must find common ground in what we want to achieve. There are different ways to achieve that, but the more extreme our demands on others are, the bigger the divide becomes across which we have to communicate. Instead, sticks and stones are thrown and not arguments. Both sides have done their fair share of this and we need to stop. The extremes only cause opposing extremes. The left has been demanding things that a society based on compromise is difficult to accept on the right, and vice-versa. A democracy is built on compromise. We need to know that. We need to be prepared for that and not try to destroy each other."

K: thank you for your kind words… you are actually saying the same thing I am, just
using different words…the only way compromise can occur is with an open mind… and
few around here have an open mind…the problem with most people is they get invested
in their own thinking… they find there own understanding and self worth in
their ism’s and ideologies… we find our self worth in being Americans or in nationalism
or in the ism of religion or in the religion of hate, be it the hate of blacks or jews or women
or other nationalities…we become invested in this thinking…

the right holds their self worth in their ism’s of god, country, guns, (in America anyway)
and to deny that is to deny these people their self worth…

we on the left don’t hold as much to ism’s and ideologies as being a measure of
our self worth… as an example, I have held 3 different and distinct political
stances and a couple of different economic ones and at least 4 different
philosophical stances…I can change my mind without compromising my
own understanding of who I am…my self worth isn’t tied into my
faith in god, country or guns…for I don’t believe in any of these…

I believe in justice/equality (for they are the same thing) and I believe
in freedom and I hold that all people are connected in a basic and fundamental
way… I cannot be unless you are as free as I am…

but that basic understanding means that we act for the greater good…

I wear a mask when I go outside… and why?
because to keep me safe, I must keep you safe and mask do that…

I follow the laws, traffic laws for example, because if I don’t, say
stop at a stop sign, I might hit someone or some car… and I
engage with people in light of the fact that I believe that
justice and equality requires me to engage with people equally…

I hold to the principle that “all men are created equal” and so, with the
notion of “all men are created equal” I stop at stop signs… I allow
people to walk in the crosswalk…I obey the laws because I am
operating under the principle that “all men are created equal”
and to be treated equal requires I follow the laws…

my right to act isn’t above you or below you, I act equally with you…

the statement that “all men are created equally” isn’t just words
on a piece of paper… it is a call to arms…to engage with
all people equally… to engage with justice, for equality is justice…

and within this notion of equality, I reject petty beliefs like
nationalism or bigotry or prejudice or superstitions…

I hold that “all people are created equal” and the way, the only
way to reach this is to expand our notion of being human…
and we do this by seeing such small and limited ideas of tribes,
city-states, nations… as steps to the next step which is
globalism…

you call it idealism, I call it the natural progression of what it
means to be human…and we can achieve the potential of
being human under globalism as we can under nationalism or
Catholicism or any other bias or ism…

we look at other people and we see the differences and instead we should
look at other people and be seeing our similarities…

“if you prick us, do we not bleed? if you tickle us, do we not laugh?
if you poison us, do we not die? if you wrong us, shall we not seek revenge?”

Shakespeare, the Merchant of Venice…

and if you prick human beings, do they not bleed? or if you tickle all of mankind,
do they not laugh? and if you poison human beings, do they not die?
and if you wrong human beings, do they not seek revenge?

“We the people in order to create a more perfect union”…

WE THE PEOPLE…

in seeking justice and equality and freedom isn’t about any “idealism” but
about seeking that which all, ALL human beings desire…

“WE THE PEOPLE” isn’t about American’s or Catholics or the French or
about the haters of Jews or or people whose self worth is found in
their hate of others… “WE THE PEOPLE” is about all of us…

as people, not about nationalities or religions or race or gender or creed
or who we love… it is “WE THE PEOPLE”…

and the only way to hold to “WE THE PEOPLE” is to engage in
globalism…

to accept we are all one…THE PEOPLE… that isn’t idealism,
but in fact, that is reality…

any other ism or ideology is to exclude people and we can no longer
abide by any ism or ideology that exclude others… because
our motto is, “WE THE PEOPLE”… not we can’t accept you because
you love differently then we do or you hold different beliefs then
we do or you pray to a different god then we do… that is excluding…
based upon false and outdated beliefs like nationalism and
religion and hate of others…

“WE THE PEOPLE” rises above nationalism and religions and race
and other exclusion practices…

“WE THE PEOPLE” that become the only judge of
what it means to be human…

all other beliefs pale in comparison to this one basic belief…

because other ism’s and ideologies don’t include all human beings…

they exclude in some manner…

and that is the seeking that we must finally reach…

to push past ism’s and ideologies to push back to the beginning…

we begin as “WE THE PEOPLE” and then formed tribes and cities and cities/states
and nations… and in the end we return to where we began…with the realization,
that we are not Americans or Catholics or homosexuals or women or white or
any other description of human beings…

we finally arrive at the point where we started…

“WE THE PEOPLE”…

Kropotkin

Hi,
I’m not such a prolific writer like you but I understand what you’re saying. I appreciate the spirit with which you bring it across, but I think we have to be open to what others are saying about us. I have long seen myself on the left of the political spectrum, but I have come to realise that we also have our blind spots and fail to see, especially when we lack the overall picture.

In the past, especially here in Germany, the left vote has been split between rivalling parties, which in the 1930’s gave rise to the entrance of the National Socialists and strengthened Conservative parties, although the left, together, would have had a majority. History tells how that went wrong. Another aspect that we have to see is how Marxist policies created a with us or against us conspiracy theory and killed many of their own people, much like the French Revolution did, only on a vastly greater scale.

I still see myself on the left side of the political spectrum, but I am aware of the dark shadow that we all have and try to ignore. The lurking dangers are there, which can lead to chaos and war, suffering, and further poverty, if we are not careful. Of course, the right side of the spectrum has its own shadow and we have also seen that in action. It has, even today, the same methods and we have seen it lurking, waiting for its chance, as a book from Philip Roth described about ten years ago.

This all may be the reason why I have embraced Christianity, which helps me combat the shadow whilst holding on to my ideals and helps me focus on the people in need. Nothing is perfect, but some things are better than others to take on the problems we are facing and the separation we are suffering in western democracies. A liberal society may be the best we can achieve, but it is also tender and needs to be cultivated. At the present I feel that many people are too preoccupied by sub-cultural influences to be concerned with cultivation of society. There are too many people pushed out on the edge who become militant and dangerous. It will take a lot to bring people back together.

America has, of course, its own special way. In Europe we have struggled to understand the social policies for a long time. The poverty and suffering should make people care more, but we sometimes get the feeling that the opposite happens. I think that the biggest problem is that the dialogue concerning social policies has broken down and ideology seems to rule. Without that dialogue and the attempt to bring people together, especially those with common interests, there will be no progress. There is a lot to do.

thank you Bob for your thoughtful post…

let me tell you my goal in what I write…

I am trying, trying to get people to engage in one of philosophy
key maxim… to know thyself…I am trying to get people to wake
up and rethink their own beliefs, hopes, thoughts and what is “meaning”
in their life…

my engagement is not to convert anybody, but to get others to think, to
engage with their own thoughts, to reimagine what it means to be human…

I write so much because I feel the weight of my years pressing upon my soul…

I am older, 61, and I feel the years left to me are growing short and I must
engage while I still can…I can foresee a point where I am unable to engage
as I do today and it, to be honest, frightens me

the frailty of life, the illness and the suffering of old age, the constant
reminder of death lies in my head and heart…I am not afraid of death as
much as finding out I have more to say and because of my age, being unable
to say it… what I fear more then death is the loss of mind, dementia and
Alzheimer’s are far greater fears to me then just mere death…and I so I write…

my own thoughts are not very original but if I can get even one person to
reevaluate who they are and what is their meaning and purpose in life,
then I feel my thoughts and time spent writing them to be worthwhile…

I have never thought of myself as the chosen one, the bringing of the
new idols… I have always thought of myself as more of a John the Baptist,
kind of guy… I just herald the coming one who will bring about the new
philosophy and the construction of the beginning of the new philosophy…

my name and place in history is not today or even tomorrow…
those who will be my champions are probably not even born yet…

I am a posthumous man… think of me as being like Nietzsche…
my fame will arise after I have departed from the scene…

but when will that be has yet to be determined and so I write…

Kropotkin

As the political season winds down and we have our winners and losers,
ummmmm, anyway, it is time to return to philosophical matters…

in our own little world, we have seen the, uh, intensity of beliefs play out
over these last several months and we have seen downright delusions…

but I ask, have we, you and I, learned something over this last political season?

I see this intensity of beliefs and ask myself, why this engagement over the political
and not in the philosophical… you don’t see having this type of engagement over,
say, Hume or Kant or even Heidegger… this type of passion is common in the
political and the religious world, but not in the philosophical world…

now one might suggest that in academia, they have these types of engagements
that we see in our political/religious world… but how many people really engage
in this type of passion in academia? a couple of hundred, tops… whereas our political
engagement or our religious engagement can engage, well, millions of people…

so why does the political or religious engagement hold millions in that engagement
and philosophy might have a couple of hundred, maybe?

I would say it is because philosophy isn’t engaged with the things that really matter
in people’s lives… in philosophy engagement with academia, has reduced the
influence of philosophy to just academia… it doesn’t hold any influence outside
of academia and that is too bad… for I see philosophy being impactful in
everyone’s lives, not just those of us on ILP or engaged in academia…

the questions of existence, “how should I live my life?”, should impact everyone
or the question of “what should I believe in?” should engage in everyone’s life…

and perhaps the deepest question of all, “what values should I/we hold?”

we shouldn’t have to deduce our values from who we voted for in the last election,
we should declare our values, both private and public, straight out and then
engage in some debate within ourselves as to if we are right about the values
we have decided to engage with…

not just deduce our values from our rejection of Trumpism, but as a
platform of values publicly stated and debated both individually and
collectively…in our rejection of Trumpism, we have rejected
the values of racism and hatred and anger and greed, but we never
really announced it out loud… as a mission statement…

"We the people, in order to create a more perfect union, hearby
now and forever, renounce the lower values of racism, hatred, greed,
bigotry, intolerance among other values we have rejected. A nation divided
by such intolerance cannot and will not survive its own bigotry and hatred.

This new “Declaration of Independence” mirrors the old in being a mission
statement that gives us some deeply held principles that we should pledge
our lives upon; principles like tolerance and equality for all, the right to
achieve our goals as we see fit, the right to have equal opportunity under the law
and within the spirit of human cooperation. We, each of us, has the possibilities
of greatness within us and we should be given the chance to reach that greatness,
by means selected by us and within an engagement selected by us.

We reject being classified by the amount of money we might have or the cars we
drive or the number of homes we might have… NO, these baubles do not
answer the question of our greatness that we might hold within us, if we could
only find a means of engagement to reach our greatness.

That we might find our value, our worth in our engagement within principles
of equality, of understanding, of justice. We seek our classification/values in terms
of the worth of our soul, not our pocketbook. We hold that money alone, cannot
tell us our worth, our value as human beings, but we find our value, our worth in
being the best possible human we can be. We find our value and worth in seeking
our own possible greatness. We the people, in order to form a more perfect union,
have come to the realization that we cannot succeed in our current framework
of Capitalism and our pursuit of wealth. Our pursuit must engage us as human beings,
not as economic beings, not as political beings, but as human beings.

This new mission statement of America calls for us to reach our potential
as human beings, as we see fit, not as is expected of us. Our new mission
statement seeks to define people within terms of their soul and their
attempts to reach greatness, not by the baubles of existence.

Our new mission statement seeks to redefine what it means to be human,
to seek out what is great within us, not outside of us.

We can only become who we are if, if we have a new understanding of
what it means to be human. Not as economic beings, not as political beings,
but as human beings.

We hold these truths to be self evident, that all men/human beings are created
equal and that among the truths we seek are, Life, liberty and the pursuit of
Greatness. That to secure these rights, government is instituted among men,
deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.

In our new mission statement, we reject the baubles of existence,
we reject the bigotry and hatred that drive people to deny equality
to other people. We hold that the highest principle of the land is
justice, and justice is just another word for equality.

That I don’t stand apart or separate from my fellow human beings.
I am part of, and equal to my fellow human beings, regardless of
their race, creed, color, sex and who they love.

We the people, stand equal in front of the law and stand equal
in the eyes of each other and of justice.

Kropotkin

there are many here who have their “truths” and they
even want to start a “ministry of their truths”
(personally I find the religious context to be of
particular interest)

anyway, I do hold that there is no such thing as an “objective” truth…
we all have our own private “truths” but that leaves an interesting point…

we don’t have objective 'truths", but we can discover if our own
private “truths” have some value…

so, we have various scientific laws such as gravity and evolution…

these laws are not objective nor are they subjective, they simple
are…now we have our own private “truths” and how can we discover
if our subjective truths have any merit?

for example, my subjective “truth” is that I can fly…
how does one understand this “truth?” in regards to my subjective “truth”?

go to the top of any building and jump off…your subjective “truth”
does not allow one to fly… gravity which is neutral, not objective
nor subjective, it simply is…the checks on our own private “truths” is
the laws of science…

so I can understand my own “truths” in terms of what the science
allows…I cannot suddenly grow wings and fly…for that violates
evolution… which is…evolution limits our possibilities…
science limits our possibilities…regards of what our private “truths”
might be, science simply acts as a limit upon those private “truths”

we cannot be something that science or the laws of science has limited…

we might hold to our own private belief that “I am the smartest man on earth”
but reality limits our possibilities to the point where I might believe I am
the smartest man on earth, but we can assume, no matter who you are, there is
someone smarter living right now…

we are limited by the reality of the situation…even Einstein, was most
likely not the smartest man on earth during his time on earth… the odds are
against it…it is not a question of objective or subjective, it simple is…

so we have our own private beliefs and the laws of science provide us
with some sort of reality check upon our own private beliefs…

Kropotkin

I am deep in my study of Heidegger “Being and Time”…

here are some random thoughts… some from Heidegger and some
a combination of my thought and Heidegger…

Heidegger is big on the concept of disclosure… we can disclose and
we can have things disclosed to us…think about who you are…

I am Kropotkin…I have aspects of my life I haven’t disclosed here…
and yet, I believe I disclose more of my own personal life then just
about anybody here…I believe in being open about one’s life…
I believe in disclosure…and yet there is a personal line I won’t cross…

this leads me to having a private Kropotkin and a public Kropotkin…

when we talk to people… are we showing them the private side of us
or are they getting the public version of who we are…

we have a very well traveled public vision of who we are…
we practice that public persona all the time… at work, we
have a public persona… but we don’t or we rarely ever engage
in our private persona at work… why? because it isn’t “appropriate”…
whatever that means…

this division of private and public selves is important…

if I were to represent human beings, I would pick the god Janus from
Roman mythology…Janus is usually depicted as having two faces looking
at opposite ways, one toward the future and one toward the past…
but in reality, of our two faces, one is looking outward and one is looking
inward… the public self, looking outward and the private self, looking inward…

the public face, the one looking outward is a troubled face…this public
persona is impacted by forces outside of our control…we are impacted by
what Heidegger “the Other”…at work, I have co-workers, supervisors,
managers and various outside venders I have contact with…
I have to keep my outside face, my public face acting in a certain way…

for example, I cannot insult or verbally attack or sexual harass anyone at work…
that is made very clear… and I have to watch and sign off on many video’s
about the appropriate behavior at work… regardless of my inside persona,
I must engage with my public face in a certain manner or I will be fired and possible
face lawsuits… as I like to eat, I do engage in a publicly acceptable fashion…

what my private self feels is not only irrelevant but unimportant…

the company goal is to make profits and I must act in a fashion that
gets the company to its goal of making profits…

the retail company makes a big show, a public show about caring about
customers and that is a lie… it cares about profits… the corporation I work
for doesn’t even care about its employee’s… we are nothing more then cannon fodder
to this company… expendable in every way, shape or form… even though I have
worked there over 13 years… If I die at my check stand, I would be written up for
dereliction of duty and my body pushed outside the front doors and promptly
forgotten… I served my purpose… to make profits and after that, I have
no use…the company has its public self and its private self… and may the two
never meet…

so what of my private self? does that have any value at work? only in regards
to making a profit… it has no other value…so we reach the point of
investigating what is certain existential beliefs that have been held over
the last 150 years… angst, alienation, discontentment…so what is
angst, alienation and discontentment? In reality it involves in some
fashion, the interactions between our public selves, our private self
and the outside world…

I am alienated from work because it doesn’t fulfill any of my needs
outside of paying me money to work there…at work, I have to keep
my private self, my private face, silent and hidden from everyone at work…

work engages in practicing an superficial engagement with me…

what does work promise me? the useless baubles of existence…money,
titles, material goods, possible fame?..the useless vanity of power…
I have some modest power that is allowed to me by my position…

but it can be overruled and quite often is… so what exactly do I get from work?

the worthless baubles of existence… these baubles serve no useful purpose
to my private self… I am not interested in them… I am alienated from work because
outside of a paycheck, which just another bauble, I get no satisfaction of any kind
from my work, my job… for me, work is a waste of time…it only purpose
is to get a paycheck and medical benefits…

in thinking about it, at times we have varying uses of our private self
and our public self…when we are younger, and we are trying to accomplish
things or get things like getting laid or making money or impress people,
we go with our public face far more… as we get older and we care less and
less about those things, we use our public face, our public self less and less…

I am less and less alienated from work because I just don’t care about it
anymore…I use my private face, my private self more and more at work,
because I am not interested in what work has to offer me…I have less
of a need to offer up appearances at work…as long as I don’t steal
or commit the greatest crime in the business world which is insubordination,
I can’t be fired and at this stage, I don’t even care anymore…

so what keeps me from telling everyone to fuck off?

my own personal code of conduct, as it were…I hold that
people deserve to be treated with respect and with dignity…
not because they might be white or men or American’s, but
because they are human beings… and every single human being
has value… …I am not driven my public concerns… I am driven
by my own private values and that is the value of having these
private values…I no longer hold “public relations” values because
they make my public persona look good, I hold certain values
because I believe in these values, regardless of how they look or
are disclosed to the public…because of my age, I no longer care about
my public face or my public appearances… I don’t have to pretend
to hold public values which makes me look “good” or impress people…

so what values do you hold because it looks “better” to the public
you are trying to impress or what values do you hold that you hold because
it works better in the public or private image you are trying to create…

and we all have certain private imagines we are catering to…
and hopefully I can get to this aspect next time, which will be in a
while as I have work over the next several days…

Kropotkin

What’s so new about it?

K: I know to a clueless young one like yourself, it all seems to be nonsense,
but hay, I too was young and dumb, once upon a time, just like
you are now… don’t worry… you will get it at some point,
when you grow up…

Kropotkin

in reading Heidegger, one of his concerns was about “care”…

but in thinking about “care”, I think it goes deeper then that…

“care” is important, but it is a part of something, not the whole of something…

and what is that “whole” of something? I think the answer lies in what
all human beings need… now one might say that all human beings need is
love, but even love is a part of something and so once again, what is the “whole”?

I believe that which unites all human beings is a need for “connection”…

we must feel connected to feel, “human”…

our very first feeling of connection is perhaps the most important one…
the connection we feel with this human being who feeds us and pampers us
and seems to love us… our mom… (as a side note, today is my mom’s
birthday… she is 86) that very first connection helps us learn to
make connections… we also connect with our father and our brothers
and sisters and then other family members…

we feel love is the same as saying, we feel connected…

our feeling connected is feeling connected to physical things, at first anyway,
we feel connected to our toys and our bed and our dog… but
as we grow older, we can connect to less physical things… we can feel
connected to ism’s and ideologies… we can feel connected to the past,
or to the nation or to nationalism or by feelings like empathy and care…

we can feel connect with/by history, psychology, social studies,
economics, biology… for if we look at each of these, we can see
how we are connected to each other…Marx thought our primary
connection was economic… hence his substructure was primarily
economic… (the substructure being the foundation, the basis of
human existence)…

how I view people and how I interact with people, depends upon
my connection with them… with some people, I feel no connection,
hence their existence is a matter of indifference to me…
but with some people, I do feel some sort of connection…
perhaps I feel a connection with certain people because I see
them wearing a hearing aid, as I wear one too, I then feel connected to
them…

I feel a connection to parents, because I too, am a parent…

perhaps I feel a connection to democrats and men and sports fans,
because I am too…to be connected means we feel in some fashion,
they are similar to us…that they view things the same way…
I may feel connected to some sports fan and yet that fan supports
teams I dislike, like perhaps the LA Dodgers or the NY Yankees…
so my level of connection changes within my understanding of
how similar we may or may not be…so our level of connection changes…
we might connect based upon our share love of baseball instead of
a shared love of a certain team, which is a closer level of connection…

let us look at someone like a psychopath… these individuals feel
no connection to other people… we hold that people who are
psychopath is a person suffering from a chronic mental disorder
with abnormal or violent social behavior… people who can’t feel
connections are considered to have a mental disorder…

think about how we find a location of someone in 3 dimensions…

we need to have 6 lines of connections to place anyone location in
space…we can do it in 3 but 6 is a little more specific…

now reverse that to go from the person out… we have lines
of connections from each person going to something…
that something, that connection is what ties a person to
being human… for example, what is the source of our
alienation and discontentment?

the lack of connections we have that allow us to be grounded as human beings…

if I am alienated from society, then I lack connection to that society…
if I am alienated from myself or my family, then I lack connection to
myself or to myself…

and here on ILP, we quite clearly see people alienated from society,
from the government, I point out UR and Observ… as two people
who are alienated from society and that alienation derives from
their lack of connection to the society and state as currently
constructed… the hold a greater connection to the person of
and the beliefs of IQ45… and thus they will lie and cheat
and even threaten physical violence to hold on to their connections…

they have no connections to liberals or what they call “commies” even
though nether one of them could even define a “communist”…
witness they call me a “commie” even though I have quite clearly rejected
the basic fundamental belief that a “commie” would hold…it is not their
ignorance, all thought they are incredible ignorant, it is their basic
inability to connect that defines their political and social beliefs…

I hold to certain beliefs, like cooperation and love and hope and charity,
and I do connect to people based upon these share beliefs…

and I do not connect with people who hold different, what I have called
negative beliefs, like anger, hate, greed, lust…and yet, UR and observ,
hold to these beliefs… these beliefs are their connection to IQ45…

and so, I don’t connect with these two, along with Pedro…

However it is easy, far to easy to vilify those who don’t hold to our
shared connections… which is why it is easy for IQ45 to
vilify those who don’t hold to his convictions… IQ45 practices
racism, misogyny, sexism and him and his ilk practice
bigotry, racism, intolerance and even violence against
those for whom they have no connection to…
women, immigrants, people of color…

even yesterday in DC, the “proud boys” took to the streets and
committed violence against those who didn’t hold to their
beliefs… they means they have no connection to those people…
and violence becomes easy if we don’t feel a connection to people…

ok, next step… next post…

Kropotkin

what are possibilities that can ground us?

for example, we can become grounded, feel a connection to,
the past, the family, work, nation, ism’s like nationalism,
empathy, shared beliefs… each of these can make us feel
grounded to the earth and to each other… that is the value
of connections… we become part of something if we
feel connected…and what if we cannot feel connected to
something? then we are suffering from a mental illness…

so how do we find a cure for what ails America at this time?

we see a divided country and what could cause us to become “undivided”?

by forging a connection to those who hold different beliefs…

we have many different connections between us and UR and Observ
and even padro…

we are first and foremost human beings… but perhaps we have
other connections…as I find it hard to believe that these three are
not white people because it doesn’t make sense for someone to
hold onto beliefs that make yourself a source of attack… so, I must
assume that these three are white… that becomes another source of
connection…I would assume these three are men… again based
upon the idea that we don’t hold ideas that alienated us from ourselves…

I would push the idea of being Americans but Pedro isn’t in fact American,
but I can’t tell about the others… are they really Americans? Because
that would be another source of connection between myself and these two,
UR and Obser…

as I seek connections between us, I wonder, would these three seek connections
to me? I doubt it because each of them holds to ism’s/values of isolation and hate
and fear and anger and greed…it would take much for them to overcome
their childhood indoctrinations… but it does happen…the path to becoming
fully human lies with overcoming our childhood indoctrinations and becoming
who we are, which is to say, becoming what our beliefs are…

the path to becoming human, fully human lies within our overcoming…
we overcome being animal to become animal/human, where most people
exists in, and then some, they overcome their animal/human side
and overcome to become fully human… these human beings are those
who we build statues to and who we hold up to as being exemplary human beings…

it isn’t enough to hold onto our convictions, but we have to outgrow them
and become something more…

I hold that those people who hold to positive beliefs are closer to becoming
fully human then those who hold to negative beliefs…the path for us
lies in us overcoming… I must overcome my positive beliefs and
turn the two into one…we are not about just one set of beliefs…
it is not about being good or evil, or white and black or up and down

our overcoming involves us taking two distinct and separate
beliefs like good and evil and turning them into
two sides of the same coin and then rising above the very notion
of good and evil…for they are the same thing…
good or evil is simple an arbitrary standards… which can be everything
or nothing… in other words, good and evil are simply interpretations…
of what is “good for us” and “what is evil” for us… that is how human beings
understand good and evil as, is it good or evil for us?
and so we define it as such… good and evil is nothing more
then does it help or hinder us in our daily life?

but connections is about whether it helps or hinder us, making
connections is about binding us to each other and to feel
safe and secure about ourselves and our lives…

the more connections we have to the world and to each other,
the safer and stronger we feel about ourselves and our lives…

in those terms, I hold that UR and Obser and Pedro,
feel few connections to the world… hence their great need
to hold onto their fantasy world where IQ45 is reelected…
I have a great many connections to the world, so, I hold
fewer fantasies that these three and hence, I can bear
to lose a couple of my connections and that won’t shake my
world… it won’t cause me to veer into insanity as it
caused UR and Obser and Padro to veer into their fantasy land…
where somehow IQ45 wins the election and we all live happily
ever after…

when IQ45 won in 2016, I was angry but I didn’t lose my
hold on reality… because I had other connections which
tied me into reality…I didn’t have to hold onto fantasies
to keep me sane or to hold my balance… I had other
connections which allowed me to accept the 2016 loss…

and that is my point… holding onto connections is what
keeps us keep tether to reality… what helps us maintain
our sanity and balance in life… I have family and work
connections and connections to the state and other ism’s which allow
me to hold onto the status quo… my study of philosophy is another
method of me maintaining connections to reality… it ties me into
the past and idea’s and people who make up the world of philosophy…
I can hold onto these connections even through the dark times that
is 2020… I hold that the reason UR and Observ and Pedro are
becoming unhinged is because they don’t have the connections
that tie them to reality that I have…

had IQ45 won the election, I wouldn’t have gone off the deep end
as these three have ranting and raving about the “deep state” or
conspiracy theories or “commies” or whatever else these three rant about…

I am more connected to the universe then they are and thus I would have
avoided their insanity…

it is the connections we make that allow us to engage in the past, present
and future…it is the connections we make that allow us to become who
we are and to overcome that who we were…

do you want to grow as a human being?
then increase your connections to life, people, events
and the universe…

that is the path of being human…

Kropotkin

Just got off the phone with my mom, to wish
her a happy birthday, and discovered we had
a death in the family…

a death, any death is sad… and this death is sad…

and there is nothing to do about it but feel sad and so I shall
engage with that sadness…

my world is changed and yet I am going to maintain myself…
and how is that possible?

because I am connected to things, people, places, ideas that allow
me to hold onto my sadness but not plunge me into madness or
hysteria or hatred for anyone or anything… my connections
allow me to feel sadness but not to plunged me into anything else…

I wrote about how these connections allow one to maintain oneself
in life and 20 minutes later, I am confronted with a death that
has shocked me…but I needn’t panic…because
by writings these words, I can come to grip with and
allow my grief to come to terms with itself…

my connections allow me to survive this loss and be sad…

and I know, know that I will be ok… the loss is not going to
damage me or change who I am and what I am trying to overcome…

and for other members of my family, their grief with be greater then
mine and I hope that they to have enough connections to overcome
their loss…

but what of those who don’t have connections to keep them in contact
with the human race? they will face truly tough times… because it is
those connections that allow us to withstand truly sad times that exists
right now…within myself, my family and even within society itself…

we can overcome anything if, if we are truly connected with each other,
our society, our state, our family… extended or connected family that
we all have or we should have…

the path into the future lies within the connections that we make
and that allows to hold serve while we face sadness and grief…
it allows us to face whatever comes with the right emotions that
the event, people and places bring to us, every single day…

today, I am faced with death and I shall overcome those feelings of
sadness and grief with the connections I hold to the universe…
my connections to my family, philosophy, even ILP is just another
connection holding me in place, in peace and in time of troubles…

Kropotkin

_
Sorry to hear of your loss Peter… I truly am.

thank you

Kropotkin

ragged day
unfocused mind
stories told
sadness unfolds

perfect symbol
a circle which is forever
birth and death
and life inbetween

today was a circle
life, death, birth, old age…
appearances by all today
Buddha searched on less…

soon the sun rises
the ache is still sharp
tomorrow, the ache dulls a bit
and soon, the pain recedes…

and someday, this ache will
become the misty past
forgotten but not forgotten
and your face… I can see no more…

It too has been lost
in the yesterdays
where it once held
pain and loss…

and today…
it is just a memory
forgotten and not forgotten
time erases all… even you…

Kropotkin

I really like it, Peter.
and regrets for Your loss.

its been a long day and I am tired, but I must confess
that I engaged in this notion of perspective…

we have lost perspective on what is important and what isn’t…

we have at ILP several members who are engaged in wild conspiracy
theories that have no basis in facts, but that is the point…there are no facts…
just like a belief in god, it goes against logic and rationality…
a belief in god only requires faith as does belief in these insane conspiracy theories…

but more importantly, these beliefs take away our attention from the matters of
existence…birth, life, old age, disease, and finally death… I saw all of this today…
someone died and someone was born, the circle that has existed since the beginning
of time…

I saw old age and disease today… life is fighting a lot of forces determine
to end it…and in this eternal battle between life and death along with old
age and disease, we forget in our daily struggles, these large eternal battles…

we are so focused on the tree, we forget the forest… those focused upon
the conspiracy theories forget that those theories are here today and gone tomorrow…
they have no substance, nothing is there and in the end, they blind us to
the really important matters of existence… the renewal of life in birth
and the return to nothing in death…as I have said before, the perfect
symbol of existence is the circle… there is no beginning and no end…
the births and deaths and pain and heartache and old and disease,
are all there, within that circle…

to focus upon one singular aspect of life, the conspiracy theories for example,
means we miss the continuation of existence that is shown by the circle of
existence… our attention is there when it should be on the far more
meaningful aspect of our existence…not the petty conspiracy theories
or the lies we tell ourselves to pass the day… everything is fake news for
example…unless, unless it confirms our biases of the day… then it is true…

and that takes away from the big picture of existence… our lives
and the births and the old age and the inevitable illness and then death…

these are the matter we should be focusing on, not the petty crap that fills
the newspapers… as if anyone reads the newspapers anymore…

ask yourself, what is truly important?

and if your answer doesn’t include the matters of life and death
and old age and illness and the renewal of existence in birth,
then you are focused on the wrong thing…

reexamine your life and your beliefs and see what is really important…

once you have reexamined those things and reevaluate what is truly important,
then the business of a real, true engagement with who you are can really begin…

you cannot know thyself, one maxim of Socrates that began philosophy
and the other, the unexamined life isn’t worth living… the second maxim
of philosophy…

so do you engage in the two maxims or do you just spend your days
focused upon a single unimportant tree like… conspiracy theories about the
election?

so what is important?

can you even tell anymore?

Kropotkin

K: it is just another attempt to engage with and understand life…
and all I have is words, just mere words which amount to nothing,
“a tale told by an idiot”…

Kropotkin

K: it is just another attempt to engage with and understand life…

And a very nice attempt. =D> Condolences.

K: it is just another attempt to engage with and understand life…

D: And a very nice attempt. =D> Condolences.
[/quote]
K: thank you…

Kropotkin

the real question of philosophy is context…

what is the context of something…

so, I say, I see a gun…

in this situation, context is everything…

do I see this gun on TV or in a movie or I was reading a book, say
the “Maltese Falcon” where guns play a role in the book

I see a gun… so will I shoot someone, will someone be shooting me
or will the gun be used in other ways, to beat someone, to intimidate someone,
to threaten someone?

we can use this lack of context to create meaning that isn’t there…

for example: “Michigan GOP electors barred from Capital building”

this statement looks damning but it lacks context…

and without context, this statement lacks reality…

if this statement had been given context, it would look like
the nothingness that it is…these GOP electors were of course, barred
from the building because they were illegal electors…
they had no legal standing of any kind… and this is how
we use context or lack of context to polarized people into or
out of actions that might be taken…

take this for example: “Liberals preventing Trump from taking actions”
and once again we need context… perhaps the actions that the village
idiot was going to take was to nuke NY or San Francisco… and now the
preventing him from taking actions make sense…

so, when ever faced with a statement, find the context, what does
the statement means within the context given by the statement…

quite often we find that a statement changes meaning once it is given its
correct context…don’t assume every statement has it correct context
already given…modern propaganda begins by removing context and leaving the
statement to stand on its own, when that statement can only mean something
or make sense within context…

“Only republicans love America” is a statement that demands context…for right now
the GOP is hard at work trying to destroy democracy… taking legitimate votes
and casting them out to benefit your candidate is destroying democracy…

so given context, we can see that statement as being wrong…

so give a statement its context and then make some sort of judgement
about the statement…

context about statements give us meaning and value of any statement…

Kropotkin