World Philosophy Day

In 2002, the United Nations established World Philosophy Day on the third Thursday in November. What do you think about that? Why do you think about that? How do you think about that? Do you think? Is it worth thinking about? Or is it all being and nothingness? While that may sound confusing to some and meaningless to others, it fascinates me.

Philosophy comes from the Greek meaning love of wisdom. Many think it wiser to ignore the pedantic musings of how and why we think. Life is for living, not for reflecting. From my first exposure to thought and reasoning, I was hooked like a rockfish nipping at a thumper squid jig.

For me it began with
epistemology. How do we know? We use our senses - sight, sound, touch, smell and taste. But those can be fooled. Echoes and optical illusions are only two examples. Perhaps all our sensuous experiences mislead us. Yes sensuous, not sensual, but that gets into semantics which is more of a linguistic issue. However, linguistics overlaps into logic.

This illustrates what I love about philosophy. The answer is never the answer. A philosophical
discussion's goal is not solution. The goal is more discussion, debate and conjecture. Truly a luxury for the loquacious; a treat for the talkative, an entertainment for the expansive. Metaphysics, ontology, eschatology, ethics, invite all to a dialogue. No wrong answer exists. Though Woody Allen admitted to failing a metaphysics exam for cheating. He looked into the soul of the person next to him.

The horrors of industrialization and war at the dawn of the 20th century opened the philosophical world to nihilism, existentialism, absurdism, et al. My personal introduction to those disciplines corresponded with my exposure to the philosophies of the Far East, Vedanta, Nyaya, Buddhism, Zen, etc. Those opened a world of thought alien to my experience, yet the ideas struck a harmonious chord in my psyche.

This musing is not meant as an introduction to philosophy, but a nod to today as World Philosophy Day. Not matter what you believe, remember that others may share a different view on why we are here. Just some food for thought. As ever - BB

"Compared to your scream/The human dream/Doesn't mean shit to a tree" - Paul Kantner & Grace Slick, Eskimo Blue Day

Epiphany

With All Hallow's Eve past and Thanksgiving approaching, I had an epiphany. No, nothing to do with the holiday commemorating the manifestation of Christ to the Magi. I use the term referring to a sudden revelation or insight.

Throughout my life, I have had several epiphanies, but the latest came closest to a religious experience. The explanation for the latest occurrence requires some background.

Growing up as a Roman Catholic, my bible reading came from the canonical text. I did not experience the King James Version until my teens. This beautifully written bible was impetus to my study of the authorship of the sacred text.

The old testament was written in Hebrew, the new testament in Aramaic, the language spoken by Jesus. Those were translated into Greek. Multiple gospels were written, most learned through oral tradition and transcribed later from memory. As the early church developed its bureaucracy, the need to codify and homogenize the bible grew. Several councils met to determine what to include and what to omit. Greek translated into Latin, translated into other languages aided by the printing press created an amalgam of the holy word.

By the 17th century, King James VI & I...more confusion...the King James of bible renown was VI of England and Ireland becoming James I when Scotland united with the other two creating Great Britain. So when Jimmie six-and-one requested a new translation a multitude of bibles existed. Groups of scholars studied texts in many languages, translated and retranslated them into English over a seven year period to produce the King James Bible.

As I studied the origins of the bible, the Apocrypha and other variatons, a flummoxed fog descended. I could not comprehend people who espoused a literal belief in the bible. Which translation was the actual word of God?

Back to my epiphany. The world gets crazier and crazier each year. I used to chalk it up to my increased grumpiness begat from the aging process. But now I realize why the world seems increasingly insane. The creation story of man in the bible is literal. Despite the abridged history of my personal study of bible translations above, I now believe there were one Adam and one Eve.

We all spring from the same ancestors. Mankind is inbred. Throughout the millennia, repeated procreation among the family of man corrupted our species into a vile, violent breed. Ergo, each and every one of us are genetically impaired. All our attempts at creating a better, more peaceful world has been in vain.

Looking at both the ancient and modern history of this planet, it seems so obvious. As ever - BB

“But I'm Crazy. I swear to God I am.” - J.D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye