I belong to a world who cares for everyone but not me...
I belong to a state who loves everyone but not me...
I belong to a collection of 8 billion people, none of them seems to care much about me...
Monday, January 19, 2009
The Apathetic World
I belong to a world who cares for everyone but not me...
I belong to a state who loves everyone but not me...
I belong to a collection of 8 billion people, none of them seems to care much about me...
In defense of metaphysics
To be fair and square, let it be clarified that foremost, the title and the content may be seen to embody certain contradictions. First, this is not really to defend metaphysics. (At least, knowing that things don’t match up would make some sense on the one reading this.) And secondly, I might be talking non-sense after all so I deem it not necessary to find a more appropriate title.
It might have been true that the things that we can only speak about are those saying something about the sensible world. It will be much acceptable, since I will be speaking about the thoughts of Wittgenstein in the Tractatus, not to betray his most profound assertions in the text. It then follows that everything written here may also be non-sensical and should also be considered as a ladder, maybe not for the clarification of language and understanding the world but a ladder to express what I have learned from Wittgenstein.
People especially us who are claiming fondness of philosophy tend to say that Wittgenstein, in claiming that he has solved all the problems of philosophy has projected an enormous philosophical arrogance. I stand half on the contrary. It may be true on one hand but false on another.
It has been the common pitfall of people before Wittgenstein to speak about the unutterable: same pitfall which he has employed in order to present to us what really matters in philosophizing, the clarification of language. His arrogance may have headed to a basic utterance of humility on behalf of the entire history of philosophy. The difference is the fact that he is aware that he, through the things he has written, is indeed talking non-sense. Others are proud enough not to claim that. It may be liken to a slap on the face but it is the best of several initiatives to aground philosophy on the threshold of reality, something that most of us have forgotten because of our desire to talk about something that will keep the heads of others spinning out of our mumbling of alienated words until their noses are bleeding to hell.
It is wrong to assume that Wittgenstein’s philosophy is demarcating the mystical. It is just that he just wants to justify the inevitable role of language in mirroring reality, something that most of us forgets not just in the philosophical arena but in our ordinary lives as well. It is just that we cannot actually talk about something transcendental. It is not to forfeit the fact that there are things that are transcendental. (And I think, they are not really things. I mean, you cannot see them hanging around.)
On the first place, it will betray its being transcendental. Secondly, every proposition made about it will ardently be lacking. And in just giving this couple of contradictions, I have violated it’s being transcendental.
It has not always been the case that when one is talking about superficial things, he may be said to be the holder of knowledge. (I just wonder if I can say to some priests that most of the time they are talking non-sense.) Anyway, language itself together with logic is transcendental. Hence, according to Wittgenstein, Language is not capable of explaining why it can picture reality.
At first glance, it may seem that the awkward nature of Wittgenstein’s assertion is the unparalleled recognition of the microcosm in an attempt to ascertain a universal understanding of particular terms. But these, should also be seen in relation to language. “The limit of my language is the limit of my world”(5.6).
The Wittgenstein project seems to target the universality of meaning through propositions mirroring actual state-of-affairs but what is good about it is it doesn’t neglect the importance of the individual. “I am my world” (5.631) AS Wittgenstein will put it. Our visual field determines the limit of what we can actually know.
We may look at Wittgenstein likening him to a flat iron used to set straight the crumpled cloth of philosophy. It was my honest mistake to look at him before like an antagonist killing the thrill of philosophizing. Maybe, I failed to understand him on my first reading. It may be because I myself have that philosophical arrogance that I have looked at him before as someone who crumples down the sacred nature of philosophy. Lately have I realized that, in a way, he is actually building it from the crumbs.
At the end of the Tractatus, Wittgenstein wrote “What we cannot speak of, we must pass over in silence.” My arrogance before taught me to look at as if he just ran out of words to say. It is only this past few days that I realized that it may have been possible that Wittgenstein wants to say a lot of things about the unspeakable but silence is the best way to make everything complete.
It might have been true that the things that we can only speak about are those saying something about the sensible world. It will be much acceptable, since I will be speaking about the thoughts of Wittgenstein in the Tractatus, not to betray his most profound assertions in the text. It then follows that everything written here may also be non-sensical and should also be considered as a ladder, maybe not for the clarification of language and understanding the world but a ladder to express what I have learned from Wittgenstein.
People especially us who are claiming fondness of philosophy tend to say that Wittgenstein, in claiming that he has solved all the problems of philosophy has projected an enormous philosophical arrogance. I stand half on the contrary. It may be true on one hand but false on another.
It has been the common pitfall of people before Wittgenstein to speak about the unutterable: same pitfall which he has employed in order to present to us what really matters in philosophizing, the clarification of language. His arrogance may have headed to a basic utterance of humility on behalf of the entire history of philosophy. The difference is the fact that he is aware that he, through the things he has written, is indeed talking non-sense. Others are proud enough not to claim that. It may be liken to a slap on the face but it is the best of several initiatives to aground philosophy on the threshold of reality, something that most of us have forgotten because of our desire to talk about something that will keep the heads of others spinning out of our mumbling of alienated words until their noses are bleeding to hell.
It is wrong to assume that Wittgenstein’s philosophy is demarcating the mystical. It is just that he just wants to justify the inevitable role of language in mirroring reality, something that most of us forgets not just in the philosophical arena but in our ordinary lives as well. It is just that we cannot actually talk about something transcendental. It is not to forfeit the fact that there are things that are transcendental. (And I think, they are not really things. I mean, you cannot see them hanging around.)
On the first place, it will betray its being transcendental. Secondly, every proposition made about it will ardently be lacking. And in just giving this couple of contradictions, I have violated it’s being transcendental.
It has not always been the case that when one is talking about superficial things, he may be said to be the holder of knowledge. (I just wonder if I can say to some priests that most of the time they are talking non-sense.) Anyway, language itself together with logic is transcendental. Hence, according to Wittgenstein, Language is not capable of explaining why it can picture reality.
At first glance, it may seem that the awkward nature of Wittgenstein’s assertion is the unparalleled recognition of the microcosm in an attempt to ascertain a universal understanding of particular terms. But these, should also be seen in relation to language. “The limit of my language is the limit of my world”(5.6).
The Wittgenstein project seems to target the universality of meaning through propositions mirroring actual state-of-affairs but what is good about it is it doesn’t neglect the importance of the individual. “I am my world” (5.631) AS Wittgenstein will put it. Our visual field determines the limit of what we can actually know.
We may look at Wittgenstein likening him to a flat iron used to set straight the crumpled cloth of philosophy. It was my honest mistake to look at him before like an antagonist killing the thrill of philosophizing. Maybe, I failed to understand him on my first reading. It may be because I myself have that philosophical arrogance that I have looked at him before as someone who crumples down the sacred nature of philosophy. Lately have I realized that, in a way, he is actually building it from the crumbs.
At the end of the Tractatus, Wittgenstein wrote “What we cannot speak of, we must pass over in silence.” My arrogance before taught me to look at as if he just ran out of words to say. It is only this past few days that I realized that it may have been possible that Wittgenstein wants to say a lot of things about the unspeakable but silence is the best way to make everything complete.
Sunday, January 18, 2009
The Apathetic World
Tuesday, January 13, 2009
IRRELIGIOUS BOREDOM
The mass has aged to be a tried and tested formula wherein at every beginning, man should reconcile himself to God: admitting his failures and recounting to himself and to other persons that he is weak. And they say, it is the reenactment of the history of salvation (Have we really been saved? From what?) It goes on with an enormous collection of liturgical prayers compiled in a so-called Sacramentary (indeed, with no variations at all) and ends with such prayers as well after the people received their share of a piece of thinly baked starch (something that is being taken for most of us, Catholics not anymore out of spiritual necessity but a Sunday habitual practice and a pretty cheap exchange for our generosity during the offertory). If people know the real meaning of what they are doing, I doubt.
I have just observed that people inside the Church has been transformed into religious puppets. They stand, sit and kneel when they are asked to and because everybody does exactly the same thing except for the priest who gets much of the exposure (He does most of the talking which are most of the time, because everything he says have no novelty, will let you find yourself in a trance, a blank stare when after which you find that you have not even realized, that the Mass is now about to end). Hence, it is not anymore a blunt thing to say if the religious celebration inside the Church has now become a center of boredom. It is because you already know what will happen. And the priests are now complaining that most of the people are attending Church services only in times of special occasions. It may be because sparks of novelty only arises in such times.
Such boredom is obvious in the way people behave inside the Church, devising acts that shows an unconscious protest: sleeping during the sermon, flirting with their girlfriends, texting while inside the Church, chatting with friends, donating a few bucks and of course, criticizing the priest in each and every way possible.
I am affected by the way I see people going to the church like a sheep seeking the help of a good shepherd and takes home nothing even a piece of what they are looking for. I don’t see the point now why the Church persistently claims that the apparent loss of meaning and identity of the people is brought about by modernity because it is not just the exact case. A Church who cannot even inspire people to be a better individual and seek for their life’s meaning also brought it about. It is the Church who laid the foundations of meaninglessness.
I may say that I’m an almost faithful Catholic. I seldom miss Sunday masses. But I said almost because people like me should see in such liturgical gatherings the importance of our life’s meaning and the importance of other people around us. I suppose, in the long span of time that I have been attending masses not to mention that when I was in the seminary, I am compelled to attend daily masses, it contributed to me a very little grasp of what is really necessary. It is because what matters most is not the host one receives during the communion but the way the individual would see himself after. It should be the heart of every celebration and I’m afraid we are attending a liturgical gathering comparable to a body ran by the mechanistic nature of the roman missal.
I have just observed that people inside the Church has been transformed into religious puppets. They stand, sit and kneel when they are asked to and because everybody does exactly the same thing except for the priest who gets much of the exposure (He does most of the talking which are most of the time, because everything he says have no novelty, will let you find yourself in a trance, a blank stare when after which you find that you have not even realized, that the Mass is now about to end). Hence, it is not anymore a blunt thing to say if the religious celebration inside the Church has now become a center of boredom. It is because you already know what will happen. And the priests are now complaining that most of the people are attending Church services only in times of special occasions. It may be because sparks of novelty only arises in such times.
Such boredom is obvious in the way people behave inside the Church, devising acts that shows an unconscious protest: sleeping during the sermon, flirting with their girlfriends, texting while inside the Church, chatting with friends, donating a few bucks and of course, criticizing the priest in each and every way possible.
I am affected by the way I see people going to the church like a sheep seeking the help of a good shepherd and takes home nothing even a piece of what they are looking for. I don’t see the point now why the Church persistently claims that the apparent loss of meaning and identity of the people is brought about by modernity because it is not just the exact case. A Church who cannot even inspire people to be a better individual and seek for their life’s meaning also brought it about. It is the Church who laid the foundations of meaninglessness.
I may say that I’m an almost faithful Catholic. I seldom miss Sunday masses. But I said almost because people like me should see in such liturgical gatherings the importance of our life’s meaning and the importance of other people around us. I suppose, in the long span of time that I have been attending masses not to mention that when I was in the seminary, I am compelled to attend daily masses, it contributed to me a very little grasp of what is really necessary. It is because what matters most is not the host one receives during the communion but the way the individual would see himself after. It should be the heart of every celebration and I’m afraid we are attending a liturgical gathering comparable to a body ran by the mechanistic nature of the roman missal.
Monday, January 12, 2009
Wasted
I cannot deny I feel wasted...
I cannot even see myself as a trump now but a trash.
I need to gather myself again until finally I'll be alright again...
But for whom?
Maybe, it's for the next person strong enough to crash down again my weak system.
I'm tired.
I want to rest.
I cannot even see myself as a trump now but a trash.
I need to gather myself again until finally I'll be alright again...
But for whom?
Maybe, it's for the next person strong enough to crash down again my weak system.
I'm tired.
I want to rest.
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