lev_landau
male, 26 |
graduate student
Philadelphia/London/Sydney / USA/England/Australia
member since 30.11.2004
|
"With Julian, the light went out, and now nothing remains but to let the darkness come, and hope for a new sun and another day, born of time’s mystery and man’s love of light"
Gore Vidal's Julian
Reading Hebert Marcuse's One Dimensional Man
One had to journey through the icy wasteland of abstraction in order to definitively arrive at concrete philosophizing
The foundation of irreligious criticism is this: Man makes religion, religion does not make man. Religion is indeed man's self-consciousness and self-awareness so long as he has not found himself or has already lost himself again. But, man is no abstract being squatting outside the world. Man is the world of man -- state, society. This state and this society produce religion, which is an inverted consciousness of the world, because they are an inverted world. Religion is the general theory of this world, its encyclopaedic compendium, its logic in popular form, its spiritual point d'honneur, it enthusiasm, its moral sanction, its solemn complement, and its universal basis of consolation and justification. It is the fantastic realization of the human essence since the human essence has not acquired any true reality. The struggle against religion is, therefore, indirectly the struggle against that world whose spiritual aroma is religion.
Religious suffering is, at one and the same time, the expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.
The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is the demand for their real happiness. To call on them to give up their illusions about their condition is to call on them to give up a condition that requires illusions. The criticism of religion is, therefore, in embryo, the criticism of that vale of tears of which religion is the halo.
Criticism has plucked the imaginary flowers on the chain not in order that man shall continue to bear that chain without fantasy or consolation, but so that he shall throw off the chain and pluck the living flower. The criticism of religion disillusions man, so that he will think, act, and fashion his reality like a man who has discarded his illusions and regained his senses, so that he will move around himself as his own true Sun. Religion is only the illusory Sun which revolves around man as long as he does not revolve around himself.
It is, therefore, the task of history, once the other-world of truth has vanished, to establish the truth of this world. It is the immediate task of philosophy, which is in the service of history, to unmask self-estrangement in its unholy forms once the holy form of human self-estrangement has been unmasked. Thus, the criticism of Heaven turns into the criticism of Earth, the criticism of religion into the criticism of law, and the criticism of theology into the criticism of politics.
Karl Marx
From the Introduction of Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Rights
Hannah Arendt's lecture: "Power and Violence" at Bard College, December 1968
http://serenity.bard.edu/ bard_rx/ library/ ArendtPart1.mp3
http://serenity.bard.edu/ bard_rx/ library/ ArendtPart2.mp3
(Note: you have to remove all the spaces from the links above to listen )
There is need of a treatment of political motives by the methods of psycho-analysis.In politics, as in private life, men invent myths to rationalize their conduct
There are those that believe in God: the believers, and those that do not beleive in God: the atheists or some agnostics.
They are very fashionable positions to take in the current debate on religion. But there are two more positions that
haven't been mentioned. The first one is "If God exists, it's necessary for us to abolish him", it's a quote from Bakunin's God and the State by the way, it's an inversion of Voltaire famous quote" It's God exists, it's necessary for us to invent him". The second position is mine position and also the one that Pier Paolo Pasolini took.
The New York Times once called Pasolini :"The Atheist Who Was Obsessed with God". It's certainly a good way to describe my belief. I'm An Atheist Who Is Obsessed with God
“There is no royal road to science, and only those who do not dread the fatiguing climb of its steep paths have a chance of gaining its luminous summits”
Karl Marx, Preface to the French edition of Capital, March 18, 1872
The centenary of Hannah Arendt’s birth was on October 14, 2006
Two more years to the centenary of Simon Weil’s birth (February 3, 1909)
Many people have said that they sacrifice themselves out of their love for God, it is pure nonsense. Thousands of men were able to die heroically for Napoleon or Hitler, while Christ in his agony was deserted by his disciples."Supernatural love has no contact with force, moreover it does not protect the soul against the coldness of force, the coldness of steel" The hero wears armor, the saint is naked.
it is by wearing armor that we allow evil to enter since it keeps us out of contact with reality. This law is inexorable: We lessen our own suffering to the extent that we weaken our inner and direct communion with reality.
Twelve more years to the centenary of Rosa Luxemburg’s heroic death (1919-2019)
Major influence until today: Bertrand Russell, Rosa Luxemburg, Voltairine de Cleyre and Simone Weil and Hannah Arendt
In science: Richard Feynman and Carl Sagan
In college: Negative: philosophers and political thinkers like Carl Schmitt, Martin Heidegger (first book about existentialism that i read), Georges Sorel, Machievelli, Leon Trotsky and Lenin (i'm imcreasingly attracted to his ideas), and Leo Strauss (these people are worth studying but in a critical way).
Positive influence: Slavoj Zizek, Antonio Gramsci, Antonio Negri (before his collaboration with Michael Hardt: i'm not a fan of Empire and Multitude), Emma Goldman, Helen Keller, Karl Marx, Michael Bakunin, Nitzesche, Hegel, Jean Paul Sartre, Theodor Adorno, Hannah Arendt, Wilhelm von Humboldt, David Hume, Adam Smith, Spinoza, John Stuart Mill, Kant, Sun Tzu (The Art of War) and Carl von Clausewitz (On War), Eugene Debbs (Collected speech), Wilhelm Reich (The Mass Psychology of Fascism), Rudolf Rocker (my fav: nationalism and culture), Feuerbach, Sinclair Lewis (Elmer Gantry, It can't happen here, The God Seeker and Babbitt), Frantz Fannon (The wretched of the Earth, Black skin white masks, A dying colonialism, Toward the African revolution), Hans Morgenthau, Norman Mailer, Aimé Césaire, Walter Benjamin, Randolph Bourn (The State), Charles Taylor.
Interests:classical music, classic movies (my favorites are Federico Fellini's movies), math, theoretical physics, history, politics, philosophy.
Some "radical" ideas from the past:
To those who do not know mathematics it is difficult to get across a real feeling as to the beauty, the deepest beauty, of nature ... If you want to learn about nature, to appreciate nature, it is necessary to understand the language that she speaks in.
"I thought nature itself was so interesting that I didn't want it distorted (by miracle stories). And so I gradually came to disbelieve the whole religion."
You see, one thing is, I can live with doubt and uncertainty and not knowing. I think it's much more interesting to live not knowing than to have answers which might be wrong. I have approximate answers and possible beliefs and different degrees of uncertainty about different things, but I am not absolutely sure of anything and there are many things I don't know anything about, such as whether it means anything to ask why we're he
God was invented to explain mystery. God is always invented to explain those things that you do not understand. Now, when you finally discover how something works, you get some laws which you're taking away from God; you don't need him anymore. But you need him for the other mysteries. So therefore you leave him to create the universe because we haven't figured that out yet; you need him for understanding those things which you don't believe the laws will explain, such as consiousness, or why you only live to a certain length of time -- life and death -- stuff like that. God is always associated with those things that you do not understand. Therefore I don't think that the laws can be considered to be like God because they have been figured out
By honest I don't mean that you only tell what's true. But you make clear the entire situation. You make clear all the information that is required for somebody else who is intelligent to make up their mind
Richard Feynman
Freedom only for the supporters of the government, only for the members of one party - however numerous they may be - is no freedom at all. Freedom is always and exclusively freedom for the one who thinks differently. Not because of any fanatical concept of "justice" but because all that is instructive, wholesome and purifying in political freedom depends on this essential characteristic, and its effectiveness vanishes when "freedom" becomes a special privilege
Rosa Luxemburg
In regard to the breaking up of that vilest creation of tyranny, the standing army and navy, it is clear that so long as men desire to fight, they will have armed force in one form or another. Our fathers thought they had guarded against a standing army by providing for the voluntary militia. In our day we have lived to see this militia declared part of the regular military force of the United States, and subject to the same demands as the regulars. Within another generation we shall probably see its members in the regular pay of the general government. Since any embodiment of the fighting spirit, any military organization, inevitably follows the same line of centralization, the logic of Anarchism is that the least objectionable form of armed force is that which springs up voluntarily, like the minute men of Massachusetts, and disbands as soon as the occasion which called it into existence is past: that the really desirable thing is that all men--not Americans only--should be at peace; and that to reach this, all peaceful persons should withdraw their support from the army, and require that all who make war shall do so at their own cost and risk; that neither pay nor pensions are to be provided for those who choose to make man-killing a trade.
As to the American tradition of non-meddling, Anarchism asks that it be carried down to the individual himself. It demands no jealous barrier of isolation; it knows that such isolation is undesirable and impossible; but it teaches that by all men's strictly minding their own business, a fluid society, freely adapting itself to mutual needs, wherein all the world shall belong to all men, as much as each has need or desire, will result.
And when Modern Revolution has thus been carried to the heart of the whole world--if it ever shall be, as I hope it will--then may we hope to see a resurrection of that proud spirit of our fathers which put the simple dignity of Man above the gauds of wealth and class, and held that to, be an American was greater than to be a king.
In that day there shall be neither kings nor Americans - only Men ; over the whole earth, Men.
Anarchism & American Traditions
Voltairine de Cleyre
Well, how do they start a war?
Well, one country offends another.
How could one country offend another? You mean there's a mountain over in Germany gets mad at a field over in France?
Well, stupid. One people offends another.
Oh, that's it. I shouldn't be here at all. I don't feel offended.
It don't apply to tramps like you.
Good. Then I can be going home right away...The Kaiser and me...Me and the Kaiser felt just alike about this war. We didn't neither of us want any war, so I'm going home. He's there already.
Somebody must have wanted it. Maybe it was the English. No, I don't want to shoot any Englishman. I never saw one 'til I came up here. And I suppose most of them never saw a German 'til they came up here. No, I'm sure they weren't asked about it.
Well, it must be doing somebody some good.
Not me and the Kaiser.
I think maybe the Kaiser wanted a war.
You leave us out of this.
I don't see that. The Kaiser's got everything he needs.
Well, he never had a war before. Every full-grown Emperor needs one war to make him famous. Why, that's history.
Yeah, Generals too. They need war.
And manufacturers. They get rich.
Nobody wants it in particular. And then all at once, here it is. We didn't want it. The English didn't want it. And here we are fighting.
I'll tell ya how it should all be done. Whenever there's a big war comin' on, you should rope off a big field.
And sell tickets.
Yeah, and, and, on the big day, you should take all the kings and their cabinets and their generals, put them in the center dressed in their underpants and let 'em fight it out with clubs. The best country wins.
All quiet on the Western Front
Erich Maria Remarque
Pity the nation that is full of beliefs and empty of religion
Pity the nation that wears a cloth it does not weave, eats a bread it does not harvest, and drinks a wine that flows not from its own wine-press.
Pity the nation that acclaims the bully as hero, and that deems the glittering conqueror bountiful.
Pity the nation that despises a passion in its dream, yet submit in its awakening.
Pity the nation that raises not in its voice save when it walks in a funeral, boasts not except among it ruins, and will rebel not save when its neck is laid between the sword and block.
Pity the nation whose statesman is a fox, whose philosopher is a juggle, and whose art is the art of patching and mimicking
Pity the nation that welcomes its new ruler with triumpetings, and farewells him with hootings, only to welcome another with trumpetings again
Pity the nation whose sages are dumb with years and whose strong men are yet in the cradle
Pity the nation divided into fragments, each fragment deeming itself a nation
Your thought allows you to believe in the unequal contest of the strong against the weak, and in the tricking of the simple by the subtle ones. My thought creates in me the desire to till the earth with my hoe, and harvest the crops with my sickle, and build my home with stones and mortar, and weave my raiment with woollen and linen threads. Your thought urges you to marry wealth and notability. Mine commends self-reliance. Your thought advocates fame and show. Mine counsels me and implores me to cast aside notoriety and treat it like a grain of sand cast upon the shore of eternity. Your thought instils in your heart arrogance and superiority. Mine plants within me love for peace and the desire for independence. Your thought begets dreams of palaces with furniture of sandalwood studded with jewels, and beds made of twisted silk threads. My thought speaks softly in my ears, “Be clean in body and spirit even if you have nowhere to lay your head.” Your thought makes you aspire to titles and offices. Mine exhorts me to humble service
Your thought is social science, a religious and political dictionary. Mine is simple axiom. Your thought speaks of the beautiful woman, the ugly, the virtuous, the prostitute, the intelligent, and the stupid. Mine sees in every woman a mother, a sister, or a daughter of every man. The subjects of your thought are thieves, criminals, and assassins. Mine declares that thieves are the creatures of monopoly, criminals are the offspring of tyrants, and assassins are akin to the slain. Your thought describes laws, courts, judges, punishments. Mine explains that when man makes a law, he either violates it or obeys it. If there is a basic law, we are all one before it. He who disdains the mean is himself mean. He who vaunts his scorn of the sinful vaunts his disdain of all humanity. Your thought concerns the skilled, the artist, the intellectual, the philosopher, the priest. Mine speaks of the loving and the affectionate, the sincere, the honest, the forthright, the kindly, and the martyr. Your thought advocates Judaism, Brahmanism, Buddhism, Christianity, and Islam. In my thought there is only one universal religion, whose varied paths are but the fingers of the loving hand of the Supreme Being. In your thought there are the rich, the poor, and the beggared. My thought holds that there are no riches but life; that we are all beggars, and no benefactor exists save life herself
According to your thought, the greatness of nations lies in their politics, their parties, their conferences, their alliances and treaties. But mine proclaims that the importance of nations lies in work – work in the field, work in the vineyards, work with the loom, work in the tannery, work in the quarry, work in the timberyard, work in the office and in the press. Your thought holds that the glory of the nations is in their heroes. It sings the praises of Rameses, Alexander, Caesar, Hannibal, and Napoleon. But mine claims that the real heroes are Confucius, Lao-Tse, Socrates, Plato, Abi Taleb, El Gazali, Jalal Ed-din-el Roumy, Copernicus, and Pasteur. Your thought sees power in armies, cannons, battleships, submarines, aeroplanes, and poison gas. But mine asserts that power lies in reason, resolution, and truth. No matter how long the tyrant endures, he will be the loser at the end. Your thought differentiates between pragmatist and idealist, between the part and the whole, between the mystic and materialist. Mine realizes that life is one and its weights, measures and tables do not coincide with your weights, measures and tables. He whom you suppose an idealist may be a practical man
Your thought is interested in ruins and museums, mummies and petrified objects. But mine hovers in the ever-renewed haze and clouds. Your thought is enthroned on skulls. Since you take pride in it, you glorify it too. My thought wanders in the obscure and distant valleys. Your thought trumpets while you dance. Mine prefers the anguish of death to your music and dancing. Your thought is the thought of gossip and false pleasure. Mine is the thought of him who is lost in his own country, of the alien in his own nation, of the solitary among his kinfolk and friends
Khalil Gibran |
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