Limitless and the Unity of Existence

I went to see a pretty awful movie last night. We went to see a horror film and upon arrival learned that it was sold out. Luckily for movie sales.. not lucky for us.. limitless was due to start at the same time so we chose to watch it instead. Awful... don't go and see it BUT the opening credits are INCREDIBLE. As I was watching them, I realized that it made a nice metaphor for neoplatonism. As the opening credits show, all is unity. We surge through life, with many individual differences, experiencing many individual sense impressions, but in reality, all of these difference originates from one infinite unity.

Enjoy. (to view it, click on the link and scroll down to the video within the article.)

The One and the Christian conception of God

I have always been fascinated by the conception of the infinite. Buddhist refer to the infinite as emptiness, Christians as God, and Neoplatonists as the one. All of these terms, attempt to get at a singular conception that dominates the metaphysics of every religion.

While I don't find the One to be problematic for some philosophies, I have noticed that from Christianity's philosophy on the Infinite, the One, or God arises an issue. Like neoplatonists, Christian philosophy argues that all material things emanate or originate from God, whose Being represents all of creation and the cosmos. God is infinite, meaning that every thing finite is of God but God does not just consist of all finite beings. Wikipedia nicely summarizes the implication of this conception of the One, or God: "all finite things have their purpose in it, and ought to flow back to it. But one cannot attach moral attributes to the original Source of Being itself, because these would imply limitation." Christians however, unlike neoplatonists, do attribute moral significance to the "Source of Being." Christians argue God represents certain characteristics: mercy, wisdom, compassion, omnipotence, etc. Conversely, the Christian God does not contain other characteristics: cruelty, dishonesty, malice, wrath, etc. The Christian God also desires certain behavior from finite being: worship, devotion, chastity, selflessness, hospitality to strangers, etc.

By attributing certain desires and characteristics to God, Christian philosophy contradicts its argument that God is the creator of all things, omnipotent, and the eminence of all creation. An infinite God cannot have finite characterisitcs as this would imply a limitation to God's Being. I realize that this issue is widely discussed as the 'problem of evil' and that this is a VERY amateur attempt at dealing with this issue but I think that Neoplatonists philosophy articulates the problem with Christian philosophy quite clearly.

Stoics and my Daddy

WISE OL' DAD

After today’s class and our discussion of stoicism, I couldn’t help but think about my dad. I have always been a pretty emotional person. Commercials make me cry, my temper has a hairpin trigger, and I tend to get emotionally bogged down in the trials of everyday life. When I lived at home with my parents, they would often get frustrated with the constant emotional rollercoaster that were my teen years. Each crisis with my academic or social life would send me into a tailspin of negative emotions and they would inevitably try to get me back on course. Like the Stoics, my father would offer me the advice that should not let other’s control my emotions. He would say, people, events, and circumstances cannot affect your happiness or mood unless you allow them to. This is very similar to the aspects of Stoic philosophy we discussed today. Stoics teach that if you do not concern yourself with the good or bad actions of others and do not allow it to affect your own feelings, you are completely free from worry. By realizing the absolute control an individual has over his or her own emotional state, one may realize that happiness is a choice one makes and a way of life. While I don’t think my dad has been studying stoic philosophy, I can say that from personal experiences following his advice has given me peace in some difficult situations.

Epicurus and Buddha

Buddhist Philosophy shares many of its main principles with Epicurean Philosophy. To begin, all Buddhists believe that individuals are plugged into Dharma Kya, or the true nature of Mind. Individuals are one with the absolute nature of existence and therefore the true nature of our Mind manifests the true nature of the universe. All things are of one whole. Buddha is one with the universe and is embodied to aid humankind in living with nature. A common Buddhist saying explains that we all have "Buddha nature," meaning we can see the true essence of Buddha in each individual being. Like Buddhists, Epicureans believe that all of the universe is one whole and all things in the universe arose from this whole. The nature of the universe is in each individual for both the Epicurean and the Buddhist.

Buddhism is a 99% philosophy and 1% theology. Buddhism is guided by the Noble Truth, which follows as:

1) Life involves suffering

2) there is a reason suffering and this is desire

3) breaking the link between desire and suffering is possible

4) there is a way to end suffering and Buddhism is the way

Like Buddhists, Epicureans argue that through following a certain path or philosophy, one may avoid pain and achieve pleasure. Unlike the Epicureans, however, Buddhists believe that an ascetic life, one based on spiritual pleasure is the way to live the good life. By understanding the nature of desire and rejecting this desire through asceticism, one gains true happiness.

Mortality of the Soul and Past Lives

Discussing Epicurism's teachings on the mortality of the soul made me think about my own past lives. Epicurus argues that the soul is mortal and that when our body dies, our soul dies as well. As a practicing, yet highly skeptical Buddhist this is idea is of particular importance to me. I spent some time traveling through Northern India this summer. While my purpose there was to work in Tibetan refugee camps, I found a lot of time to sit and talk about cosmology to Buddhist nuns and monks. Buddhist believe in reincarnation and that information about our past lives are available to certain skilled monks, who have learned to read charts. I have had my chart read and they were able to give me information about my last three lives. Buddhist believe our past lives have effect on the individuals we are in our present lives. For instance, to verify any reading of a life chart, the monk determines where you birth marks are on the body and looks for confirmation. Without hesitation, an very old monk demanded I remove my shirt so that he could verify the large birth marks I have on my shoulders and back. These birth spots are physical markers of the things we have experienced in our past lives. After verify my marks, he named my past lives from latest to earliest, I was an elephant, a demon in the hell realms, and a Naga. For the monks, this was an exciting reading because it meant I was in the heaven realm as a Naga but for me my past life as an elephant was much more exciting. My Christian family was shocked to hear this as they all know about my life-long devotion to elephants.... Did you know that they have language groups and that an elephant from the Congo cannot talk to an elephant from Mozambique? Did you know that herd members linger over the bodies of their dead for days? Did you know an elephant can map thousands of miles in its head and remember these maps for a lifetime.? .... While i am not convinced, the monk would argue that my affection for elephants is a product my a previous life. The rational part of me is inclined to agree with Epicurus's description of the soul but whether looking into the eyes of elephant or a human, I am inclined to believe there is something universal, essential, and immortal about the souls of all life. Although... I might just be saying this because I like the idea of a previous elephant life.

Old Men and the Honest Truth

As I read an endless list of Diogenes' actions, I was reminded of one of my favorite Internet characters: dear old Dad. I was introduced to Dad after his son started posting his father's little jewels of wisdom on a website called shitmydadsays. Just like Diogenes, Dad blesses those around him with anecdotes like, "He's a politician. It's like being a hooker. You can't be one unless you can pretend to like people while you're fucking them," or "Stop trying so hard. He doesn't like you. Jesus, don't kiss an ass if it's in the process of shitting on you." Both Dad and Diogenes believe that they have mastered the art of living and use interesting tactics and language to get their points across. While their stories have endless comic value, the stories also provide their audience with advice that these individuals have learned over a lifetime of experiences. Old age and the confidence of a lived life seem to provide these men with the willingness to express their feelings on an assortment of topics. Unlike a younger individual, elders have less ties to society and therefore are less willing to submit to the disciplines of normalized behavior. Dad and Diogenes both feel free to express their empirical knowledge because they are more free from the expectations and mores of the communities in which they live. As dad says, "They're offended? Fuck, shit, asshole, shitfuck; they're just words...Fine. Shitfuck isn't a word, but you get my point."

Making a Happy Life

I think the final semester of college is difficult for everyone who experiences. It is not just a hard year because of academic but this final semester poses some difficult decisions to future graduate. I am in this situation right now and have found that I am not the only one facing a quarter- life crisis. This is a time when I am expected to be prepared for an adult life thanks to the training I have received in school. My classes in Middle Eastern politics, however didn't prepare me for the kind of questions I find myself trying to answer. Who am I? What do I want to do with my life? How am i going to feed myself? What makes me happy? What do I need to do to be a good person in this world? Who do I want to spend my life with? How do I want to spend my life? With all of these questions piling up and the pressure mounting, it is easy for me to loose sight of my happiness and give in to the insecurity. After a particularly overwhelming day today, I was surprised to find Aristotle addressing the subject of happiness in tonight's reading. Aristotle argues that we take actions and that these actions must be caused by something and that this cause of all actions is the chief good. Thus if all of our actions are driven by the good, and living well and doing well brings happiness, the chief good must be happiness. Aristotle argues that while different people will argue different definitions of happiness but all argue that living well results in being happy. With this established, Aristotle defines happiness as being self- sufficient because it "makes life desirable and lacking in nothing." In other words, because happiness is enough to make life desirable for an individual, it is the final and most essential good.

These are the two points that made the deepest impression on me: 1) happiness is living a good and virtuous life and 2) that happiness in itself was sufficient to sustain life. In this way Aristotle reminds me of my mom. She has always said you have to make yourself happy, it won't just happen. Aristotle doesn't think someone is just born happy but rather happiness requires determination to live in a certain and once this is achieved, happiness will sustain the individual throughout life. Maybe this is why college students about to graduate feel so much pressure. We are know responsible for our own lives and consequently making our own happiness. Happiness, therefore, is not a gift or a happenstance, but rather a consequence of individual actions. Aristotle's argument makes the individual responsible for his or her own happiness and therefore empowers the individual.

Perserving the soul through communal memory

I found this reading particularly difficult to get through after loosing a friend on Monday night. For the last couple of days, I have been thinking on the subject of death and the consequences of an individual's passing. Therefore it is interesting to contrast my own personal beliefs about death and the soul and that of the Phaedo's soul, which is immortal, reoccurring, and ever existent. Like Socrates I am unsure what comes to an individual after death, but I am sure about what happens in their absence. My community gathered to mourn the passing of my neighbor, Errol. At least a hundred people came to be with one another in our grief and confusion and it got me thinking about how the Phaedo talks about the soul. At the very beginning of the Phaedo something Socrates said really struck me. He argues, "I am cofident in the belief that there truly is such a thing as living again, and that the living spring from the dead, and that the souls of the dead are in existence, and that the good souls have a better portion than the evil." For me, death is the final frontier. Put me in a box or an oven, I won't know the difference because I believe death is the end of each of our individual existences. But after Errol's (or as I call him Scooter's) wake last night, I started to think maybe Socrates has teased out something essential about the souls of the deceased. Last night, I watched the living spring from the dead. In his families sadness, in our sadness as friends, we sprung to life at Errol's death. Even though our emotions are anger, sadness, and despair, they define us as the living. While it is not what Socrates is arguing, I would say that the way death results in emotion, which enlivens the living is a way that "the living spring from the dead." Socrates continues by saying that "the souls of the dead are in existence." This is surely true as even in death, Errol still controls and affects the world of the living. Because the memory of Errol lives within those who knew him, he never resigns to death. Finally, Socrates argues that "good souls have a better portion than evil," and again I must agree with Socrates. Those who were good in life remain longer in the living world. The more individual you touched in your lifetime, the longer your memory will be preserved and cared for. Errol touched many lives and this is why his death brought many mourners. His spirit is alive in us.

I know that I am bastardizing the argument that Socrates is making here but his teachings on death very easily lend themselves to this argument. There is something immortal about the soul and whether it is physical or metaphorical the dead living amongst us. Those that are left behind in the living world give life to the dead through their memories and in this way souls are immortal.

Alcibiades and America

Socrates spends pages outlining all of the activities at which Alcibiades would be useless. To paraphrase:

S: Do you know anything about shoes?

A: No, that’s why we have cobblers.

S: Do you know anything about horses?

A: No, that’s why we have equestrians.

Etc…….

Until finally Socrates is left to ask the final big question: well then Alcibiades, what are you good for? This is an excellent question and one that I don’t feel like we contemplate very often. Other than the occasional existential crises that come maybe after college or around your 50^th birthday, I wonder how much quality time the average person spend developing self- knowledge by questioning one’s strengths and weaknesses. AsI watched the news after reading Alcibiades, I began to think of all of the ways American devalue self- knowledge. I keep hearing politicians say, “the American people want…” as if unaware that they are but one individual. I started to ask the news pundits, “what is your purpose?”

I ask: “Do you gather the news?”

G. Beck: “No, that is why we have journalists.”

I ask: “Because you report on crime, are you an expert in criminal psychology?”

K. Olbermann: “No, that is why we have criminal investigators.”

I ask: “Because you report on war, are you an expert in field tactics?”

W. Blitzer: “No, that is why we have generals.”

Until finally I asked, what is your purpose? So much of my reality is determined by these people whose expertise are looking thin on camera and pronouncing difficult names correctly. Talking heads decide what news we hear, what questions are being asked, how topics are delivered, and in what light to process information, and yet they are experts on nothing of value. Unable to realize their own strengths, people like Glenn Beck and Keith Olbermann “teach” others subjects about which they are uninformed. And then finally, America’s uproar over the innocent Representative from Arizona being shot I think really presents America’s lack of self- knowledge. Appalled by the internal violence that took place last weekend, we have poured over t.vs. and newspapers and yet I rarely see a tear dropped for the many victims of the decade long war America has been raging in Afghanistan and Iraq. Like Alcibiades, America has been long told how rich and noble and beautiful and free it is as a nation and now it seems unable to look within to determine its strengths and faults. This is why our culture cannot tolerate intellectualism; we cannot tolerate finding out what we don’t know.

As an individual it is important to self-question, to assess one’s own knowledge. Hubris, and maybe because it accompanies passion, is an affliction of the young. Maybe this is why America seems so struck with the kind of hubris that Alcibiades exhibits. We are a young nation and need a wise old philosopher to show us the way.