Friday, September 24, 2010

The Great Dialectical Divide

Isn't it past time we revisitted Aristotle's dualistically postulated and derived fixed Categories? Isn't it time to re-apply Plato's floating dialectical methods and achieve a more wholistic understanding of physics and nature? Divide et impera!
Revisiting the masculine dynamic approach to the dialectics of philosophy. Peace, justice and quietude are no longer the passive objectives. Generation from opposites is what we seek.

19 comments:

  1. I had a very unpleasant....week...and I'm doing my best to deal with it.

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  2. Sorry to hear that. I hope you have a more pleasant weekend. I'll try to stay off your last nerve. ;-)

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  3. a) I don't hate you, but you seem to hate me.
    b) Nobody's ever called me nurse Ratched, and she scares me.
    c) It makes me sad that you think of me like that.
    d) I'm really tired, and quietude and peace are qualities that I need to cultivate.
    e)What qualities do you need to cultivate?

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  4. a) I don't hate you
    b) Sorry, it was meant to be funny
    c) I don't think of you like that most of the time
    d) At your stage in life (child-rearing), it's no wonder
    e) Patience

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  5. Disagreement is not hatred. We don't have to agree on everything. Just because you're a misandronist... ;-)

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  6. ...doesn't mean I have to hide and reject all things masculine.

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  7. Please do NOT hide all things masculine.

    a) Alright. If you say so.
    b) hmm...I'm at war with my inner bitch, by the way. I'm afraid if I embrace her we'll become fast friends. :-)
    c)I'm glad. see b)
    d)Yes, that's part of it, but only part. I stay more mentally exhausted, as if I can't stop thinking. Alas, if only they were highly productive thoughts.
    e)I can help with that. :-)

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  8. the argument, I mean.
    It's old.
    It wears me out.
    It goes nowhere.

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  9. You know very well that I'm not a misandronist.
    at all.
    :-)
    I just don't like to SUBMIT to an abusive, oppressive authority...and throughout history, and certainly my short life, that authority has been mostly men.
    I welcome men who can partner with women, give and take.
    But really? I'm tired of the whole male/female thing.

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  10. I had to laugh....at myself again.

    It's like that situation when you call someone and leave an awkward message because you didn't rehearse what you were going to say, and it sounds totally wrong...and then you panic and consider calling back because you're afraid your friend will make an incorrect implication...but then you worry that calling and leaving another message will look even worse than the first bad message.

    Know what I mean???

    ?

    crickets??

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  11. But yes, I'd be glad to discuss Plato and Aristotle.

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  12. You can keep Aristotle. I like Plato's approach at starting with the "whole" and making conscious decisions about how to "divide" the problem from there, each division requiring a concession to a decision making "priority" (ie - usefulness, practicality, etc.)

    ie - from the Jowett summary of Plato's "Sophist"

    We are agreed, he says, about the name Sophist, but we may not be equally agreed about his nature. Great subjects should be approached through familiar examples, and, considering that he is a creature not easily caught, I think that, before approaching him, we should try our hand upon some more obvious animal, who may be made the subject of logical experiment; shall we say an angler? 'Very good.'

    In the first place, the angler is an artist; and there are two kinds of art,—productive art, which includes husbandry, manufactures, imitations; and acquisitive art, which includes learning, trading, fighting, hunting. The angler's is an acquisitive art, and acquisition may be effected either by exchange or by conquest; in the latter case, either by force or craft. Conquest by craft is called hunting, and of hunting there is one kind which pursues inanimate, and another which pursues animate objects; and animate objects may be either land animals or water animals, and water animals either fly over the water or live in the water. The hunting of the last is called fishing; and of fishing, one kind uses enclosures, catching the fish in nets and baskets, and another kind strikes them either with spears by night or with barbed spears or barbed hooks by day; the barbed spears are impelled from above, the barbed hooks are jerked into the head and lips of the fish, which are then drawn from below upwards. Thus, by a series of divisions, we have arrived at the definition of the angler's art.

    And now by the help of this example we may proceed to bring to light the nature of the Sophist. Like the angler, he is an artist, and the resemblance does not end here. For they are both hunters, and hunters of animals; the one of water, and the other of land animals. But at this point they diverge, the one going to the sea and the rivers, and the other to the rivers of wealth and rich meadow-lands, in which generous youth abide. On land you may hunt tame animals, or you may hunt wild animals. And man is a tame animal, and he may be hunted either by force or persuasion;—either by the pirate, man-stealer, soldier, or by the lawyer, orator, talker. The latter use persuasion, and persuasion is either private or public. Of the private practitioners of the art, some bring gifts to those whom they hunt: these are lovers. And others take hire; and some of these flatter, and in return are fed; others profess to teach virtue and receive a round sum. And who are these last? Tell me who? Have we not unearthed the Sophist?

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  13. Not much of an illustration Speedy. You need to come up w/a better example. ;)

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  14. Maybe not. I haven't even read it yet. I'll have more time tomorrow.

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  15. No, it doesn't really illustrate the point I was trying to make. That's the thing with Plato, he doesn't ever say anything directly... everything theoretical is approached obliquely.

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  16. It's obvious why you like him so. :-)

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  17. I think a good representation was the way he explained dissection of personalities.

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