And one more special message to go,
And then I’m done, then I can go home.
Over the past two years or so I have “blogged” 160 notes on Facebook. Their contents range from trivial mundane matters to the deepest concern for the human condition. This final note is simply a collection of my unfinished and/or unelaborated notes and ideas. These notes have been primarily for my own edification and this will serve as a type of Nachlass, if you will. As for myself, I’ve reached the paradoxical point in the book of life that demands of the student, if the student has ascertained the essence of the teaching, to give the book away and choose to cease reading and begin living.
Free Spirit – In the deepest and most spiritual sense is existential liberation from mundane existence and morality. It is difficult to accept and become at peace with the real idea of your own mortality, but it is almost impossible to accept and become at peace with the real idea of your own existence. To embrace the absurd is to truly exist.
You are not your fucking Facebook! The internet is the death of spirit. Look around you! This is your life, and it’s ending one minute at a time. A thousand questions remain, but I smile and remain still, dancing in the moment and seeking only to live intentionally.
EDIT: I’ve recently had the good fortune of recovering some old essays of which I had thought were forever lost. I had penned them during a great transitional period in my life. If I no longer agree with the contents of these ancient relics, it doesn’t matter. They remain invaluable as part of my spiritual journey, if you will. Therefore, as a postscript, I will upload them and be finished.
Natural Theology and Classical Apologetics
Epistemology and the Metaphysics of the Soul
That which has been is what will be,
That which is done is what will be done,
And there is nothing new under the sun.
Let go, or be dragged.
Sincerely,
Joshua Synon
… … …
Disclaimer: You enter the abyss at your own risk of life. Sanity is not guaranteed to follow.
Edit (5/7/2017): As this entire post was originally a Facebook Note, all of the links included will redirect through Facebook. I can’t be bothered to go through and fix them all.
– Students for Sensible Drug Policy
– American Civil Liberties Union
Click to view my discussions and debates on Christian Forums (2004-2010)
– This 5-6 year time span covers the gradual deterioration of my faith. It appears that I took part in 104 discussion threads with topics ranging from “evolution vs. creation” to “biblical prophecy” and much, much more. You may have to create an account to view this link. Only takes a minute, though. If the link is ever broken you can simply search for all posts by username: JSynon. This is one of my later threads and still makes me laugh when I read it: http://www.christianforums.com/t5724862/.
“Morality is the essence of all philosophy and all conscious actions for that matter. Kant and Sartre were correct in asserting that man acts to define man. Whenever anybody makes a claim to an objective truth or universal moral value they are actually saying: “This is how Isee things. This is how I want things to be!” In this way, all philosophical discourse is indeed merely autobiography and creation of values. Some people would call this a will to power, but call it what you will. Hence, my thesis: For anybody to attempt to invoke absolute moral values or objective truth claims on me is nothing other than a declaration of war against me.It is no longer an argument over what the truth is. The truth is created by the stronger party. It is by understanding this that you begin to understand what is truly meant by “God is dead.” Philosophy itself has died: metaphysics, ethics, and all. Truth and the will to truth are dead. The big lie of the priestly caste (dare I say the weak souls and slavish), the attribution of absolute value to – Truth, God, Form, Noumena, Being, Reality, the Good, the Perfect, the Infinite, the Unconditional and Absolute, the Unknown, the First Cause, ens realissimum– to control strong and healthy souls, will soon end.”
“To base our entire conventional system of time on the life of Jesus of Nazareth: is there a better way to undermine everything this man was?”
“To commit living myth and legend to lifeless script would be to imprison it and sound its death knell. Christ himself refused to compromise his authentic spirit by committing it to lifeless script, but instead he chose to live the very spirit of the Law and the Prophets. It is precisely in this living authenticity whereby Christ became equated with Divinity and the Holy Spirit. For so it is written – the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. Likewise, Buddha is also threefold nature.”
“Will I destroy myself by saving myself? Or will I save myself by destroying myself? Do not confuse spoken language and the written word with your own mind and your own existence. That is, do not believe that language represents reality. The word is not alive. Logic does not exist outside of thought. You are not what you think. The word is dead. Is this not also a significant part of the realization that God is dead? Is it not precisely madness and insanity to truly exist?”
“The faith of a child consists in trusting his parents moral imperatives as for his own good. When the child grows older he may or may not test these imperatives and if he does he will not only learn the reasoning behind them, but he will also surely suffer in some way from the learning. Likewise, it seems that the decadence found toward the end of every age necessitates a renewal of our faith in our collective parents – nature and ancestors. Only then may we again flourish in all our glory.”
“Numbing myself and shutting off my mind,
I walk a mile to work as another.”
– Joshua Synon
“Every belief, every considering something true is necessarily illusion because there is simply no true world.”
– Nietzsche
https://www.youtube.com/user/gbisadler
http://atheism.about.com/od/einsteingodreligion/tp/Einstein-s-Religious-Critiques.htm
http://monthlyreview.org/2009/05/01/why-socialism
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religious_views_of_Albert_Einstein
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Tillich
Numinosity.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistics
Squashed Philosophers – Full Text Index
Spoiler Alert: You Do Not Exist
Psychedelics and religion.
Shamanism.
Native Indians.
Psychonauts.
Entheogens.
Marijuana.
Ayahuasca.
DMT and the pineal gland? (cf. Strassman and Descartes)
Peyote.
Near-death experience.
Panic disorder.
Mystical experience.
Opiates.
Modern “anti-depressants” and benzodiazepines.
Pharmaceutical business and psychiatry.
Why the Buddha does not recommend substances to force enlightenment: Attachment.
Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies
http://listverse.com/2013/03/11/10-reasons-the-war-on-drugs-is-killing-you/
Benzodiazepines: How They Work & How to Withdraw
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporate_personhood
War as business.
The Greek Olympics & the Roman Colosseum.
Monsanto.
http://vulgarmorality.wordpress.com/2011/11/01/the-great-adventure/
Dionysian nature of music.
– Reconsidering Nietzsche: Six Questions for Julian Young
Redeeming Nietzsche – On the Piety of Unbelief by Giles Fraser
Vicious Circle by Pierre Klossowski
http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Author:Friedrich_Nietzsche
http://www.thenietzschechannel.com/quotes/popular-quotes.htm
Nietzschean conspiracy.
– Regarding his insanity.
– Regarding the interpretation of his work.
– Regarding the colloquium at Cerisy.
Dan Gilbert: The Surprising Science of Happiness
“In my personal interpretation of much of the ‘dubstep’ musical genre I hear expression of the consequences of a postmodern, digitally networked age in which “Generation Z” grew up. Never knowing life without the internet, the “online profile” provides their identity, while the ego suffers a bombardment of information (and disinformation) overload. It’s a situation in which humanity is further abstracted away from nature, perhaps more so than ever before, and in which a sense of coherence and purpose are sometimes difficult to ascertain as the world is experienced as fundamentally disordered, if not chaotic.”
– Joshua Synon
Skrillex – Scary Monsters and Nice Sprites
http://tv.yahoo.com/news/best-lex-luthor-quotes-smallville-20110204-162800-761.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Stranger_%28novel%29
Meaning is found in language as representation. What does life or experience itself represent?
Is there something of significance to investigate regarding the very human association of the sound of an alarm clock with feelings of disappointment?
In all seriousness I ask of you: Precisely how autonomous are we?
It is only when we have nothing left to lose that we are free to do anything and have everything to gain.
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/hegel/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Esotericism
Kierkegaard vs. Nietzsche: Discerning the Nature of True Christian Faith
http://www.sorenkierkegaard.org
http://www.philosophicalfragments.com/
http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Author:S%C3%B8ren_Kierkegaard
Nietzsche’s Criticism of the Herd Mentality and Kierkegaard’s Individual
Kierkegaard’s Conception of God
Heaven and Hell as state of mind.
God incarnate, as Logos incarnate, as Form of the Good incarnate, as Tao incarnate?
– Logic was made a man to contrast personality?
– “In the beginning was the Logic, and the Logic was with God, and the Logic was God. And the Logic became flesh and made his dwelling among us.”
“Ever since the dawn of Platonism we have constructed a fairytale world to live in – and we have found ourselves trapped in it. Awakening, Salvation, Redemption, Enlightenment, Faith – whichever label we use – all are the act of letting go of delusions of the mind, attachment to those delusions (despair), abstraction, dualistic mind, in complete surrender to God or Nature or Tao, and – quite literally – waking up to become an authentic individual. Upon waking, all suffering, impermanence, death, despair – all are rendered meaningless as all attachment to abstraction, which is the origin of suffering, are emptied out of our mind and we discover our original face, before we were born.”
– Joshua Synon
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/plato-parmenides/
Presuppositional Christian apologetics (essentially Platonism) and Kierkegaard.
Messiah ideology as hope.
Robert Anton Wilson’s reality tunnels.
Gordon Clark.
Transcendental argument for the existence of God.
Fideism.
Aesthetic – Ethical – Religious.
Thesis – Antithesis – Synthesis.
Mind – Body – Spirit.
Subject – Object – Relation (Consciousness or Experience).
Calvinism – TULIP
Buddhist practice of non-thinking similar to Christian practice of prayer.
That very moment experienced as a profound burden fading away when accepting Christ in faith and the Buddhist experience of Enlightenment as identical feelings in which the whole world is transformed. Freedom and oneness are actualized as nature’s (or God’s) acceptance is realized.
Deism.
Pantheism.
Religion Facts – Just the Facts on Religion
Just the facts on religion? I can’t imagine a greater stupidity. Perhaps,http://www.realapologetics.org/blog/. Or CARM.org. Or LeaderU.com? or …
Country Reports on Human Rights Practices
The Serenity Prayer.
For every ailment under the sun
There is a remedy, or there is none;
If there be one, try to find it;
If there be none, never mind it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/This_too_shall_pass
Jimmy Reid, Alienation
“If Christ spent an anguished night in prayer, if He burst out from the Cross, ‘My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?’ then surely we are also permitted doubt. But we must move on. To choose doubt as a philosophy of life is akin to choosing immobility as a means of transportation.”
“Thank you Lord Vishnu for introducing me to Christ… Thank you for coming in the form of a fish and saving our lives.”
“Which story do you prefer?”
– Life of Pi
“Be the change that you wish to see in the world.”
– Gandhi
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kahlil_Gibran
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agorism
Buddhism is Not What You Think by Steve Hagen
Common Things People Believe About Buddhism That Aren’t True
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nondualism
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Buddhism
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddhism
On Buddhism by Nishitani Keiji
Light of Asia by Sir Edwin Arnold
Nanzan Institute for Religion and Culture
Nirvana Shatakam by Adi Shankara.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satori
“No shepherd and one herd! Everybody wants the same, everybody is the same: whoever feels different goes voluntarily into a madhouse.”
– Nietzsche
What is love? And madness?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_words_for_love
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/foucault/
Religion (institutionalized) as means of control.
Nietzsche’s often overlooked understanding of asceticism and slave morality being necessary for the survival of the priestly caste. Often mislabeled as a nihilist, Nietzsche’s love for mankind is an essential part of his teaching. However, inevitably, the time has come to “philosophize with a hammer.”
Nietzsche’s coined term, “Moraline.”
Is it possible to reject as much of our moral and linguistic tradition as Nietzsche did without following him down the road to insanity? One of the reasons biography is relevant to the answer is that his drift towards madness cannot be separated from the lifelong history of malaise. Fighting against headaches, pain in and around the eyes, stomach pains, vomiting, debility, he was simultaneously cultivating his potential for madness. His friend Franz Overbeck thought he had been ‘living his way towards’ the final breakdown…
There was nothing sudden about his movement into madness. He was only twenty-four when he wrote: ‘What frightens me is not the fearful shape behind the chair but its voice; also not the words but the terrifyingly unarticulated, inhuman tone of that shape. Yes, if only it would speak in a human way.’ By 1880 he was able to prescribe methods of going mad. In Morgenröte (Sunrise) he makes the point that madness – or at least the semblance of it – had been the sine qua non of moral evolution. The men driven to reject tradition and propose new norms had had either to feign madness or to induce it by means of fasting, sexual abstinence, solitude, and ‘concentrating resolutely on nothing except what provokes ecstasy and derangment.’ He appears to have been thinking of himself, St Paul and Plato, who said that ‘from madness Greece derived its greatest benefits.'”
– Ronald Hayman
Daddy issues?
“Dying in general, or dying from drugs, I’ve thought about dying all my life like any normal person. I’ve thought about killing myself for so long because of my stomach thing that I didn’t give a fuck if I was gonna die or not. If i was gonna blow my head off with a gun I may as well take the risk of dying from drugs.”
– Kurt Cobain
“I’d rather be hated for who I am, than loved for who I’m not. Wanting to be someone else is a waste of who you are.”
– Kurt Cobain
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UVwSmG3eYBw (Kurt Cobain Interview Clips)
I’m such a nihilistic jerk half the time. I’m so fucking sarcastic at times and then at other times I’m so vulnerable and so sincere. And that’s pretty much how every song comes out. It’s like a mixture of both of them. And that’s pretty much how most people my age are. They’re sarcastic one minute and then caring the next.
One time I read an interview in his office and I said, “Jesus Christ, this makes me look like such a moody, emotional, depressive person.” And he said, “But you are.” I go, “No I’m not. I like to have fun sometimes.” It’s just, every one thinks of me as like this emotional wreck, this total negative black star. People are constantly accusing me of being in a bad mood and always ask me, “What’s the matter?” And there’s nothing wrong with me at all. I’m not feeling blue at all. It got to the point where I had to look at myself and maybe figure out what people are seeing and I thought, “Maybe I should shave my eyebrows. That might help, ya know.” People ask me that all the time, like even I went out to a club a couple of months ago and this kid just nonchalantly said, just out of the blue, “Geez Kurt, why do you always look like you’re mad?” I said, “I’m not mad. I’m in a perfectly happy mood right now, you asshole.” You know, “What’s wrong? What’s wrong with you? Are you sad?” Ya know, most people think that if I look at them and I don’t smile, that I’m pissed off so I go out of my way to make it look like I’m enjoying myself, ya know. I usually am enjoying myself. I’m hardly ever depressed any more so it’s a lot easier to be able to do that.
Opiates have always made me feel the security that I wanted to feel to where I didn’t hate people as much, ya know. I had a little bit of affection for them or, ya know, at least can see past the superficiality of their personality and think of them as a real person. Maybe they had a fucked up childhood or maybe it’s their environment that’s making them this way. It relieves some of the animosity that I have towards people. And I needed to do that because I was tired of hating people so much, ya know, and being so judgmental towards every one. I know it sounds like I’m almost defending my drug use. It sounds like a lot of denial. I need to go off on a little anti-drug tirade just to put things in better perspective. The last couple of months where I was doing $400 worth every day I was definitely noticing things about my memory and I knew that eventually my health would start getting a lot worse. It’s the truth though. I was healthier and fatter at that time than I am now. I said right out that I don’t regret it and I don’t, but that’s because I used it as a tool. I used it basically as a pain medication to get rid of a pain. That’s the biggest reason why I did it. And in that sense I don’t regret it, but anybody else who’s gonna get addicted to drugs are obviously going to fuck up their lives eventually. If it doesn’t take a year it’ll be next year. It’s so obvious. I mean, I’ve seen it happen with every person to ever get strung out and it’s the typical classic case that drugs are bad for you. They will fuck you up.
– Kurt Cobain
http://kurtcobainssuicidenote.com/kurt_cobains_suicide_note.html
“The thought of suicide is a powerful solace: by means of it one gets through many a bad night.”
– Nietzsche
Some of my undisclosed unique experiences.
– Jury duty.
– Pharmaceuticals.
– Hospitals.
– Local government (City of Wayne v. Skateboarding)
– Criminal underworld.
Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5 update May 2013)
Psychology as moralism.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-psychiatry
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddhism_and_psychology
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Depressive_realism
The psychology of psychics.
Psychology behind “The Secret.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal:Psychology
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humanistic_psychology
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transpersonal_psychology
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychological_projection
Social and cult psychology.
Cult of culture.
Depression and the Limits of Psychiatry
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychology_of_religion
Kumaré. Fake guru. Real experience.
“Fuck psychiatrists. They all have severe mental disorders.”
– Joshua Synon
Applied Phenomenology & Existential Psychotherapy
– http://www.brill.com/journal-phenomenological-psychology
– http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Existential_Psychotherapy
– http://www.saybrook.edu/newexistentialists/
– http://www.existentialpsychology.org/
– http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/evil-deeds/201101/what-is-existential-psychotherapy
– https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Existential_therapy
Related
– http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/husserl/
– http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/phenomenology/
– http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/intentionality/
– Heidegger, Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Rollo May, Viktor Frankl, Irvin Yalom, etc.
Applied Phenomenology – The ability to know what to do while being completely emerged in a situation.
Books by Kirk J. Schneider & Rollo May.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nous
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noema
Philosophy of science.
The Evolving Science of Chiropractic Philosophy
Bio-Energetic Synchronization Technique.
Eulogy for Aaron Swartz by Quinn Norton
http://www.conferencealerts.com/index
STFU, Continental Philosophers
“When the leaders become conscious of mass psychology and take it into their own hands, it ceases to exist in a certain sense. […] Just as little as people believe in the depth of their hearts that the Jews are the devil, do they completely believe in their leader. They do not really identify themselves with him but act this identification, perform their own enthusiasm, and thus participate in their leader’s performance. […] It is probably the suspicion of this fictitiousness of their own ‘group psychology’ which makes fascist crowds so merciless and unapproachable. If they would stop to reason for a second, the whole performance would go to pieces, and they would be left to panic.”
– T. W. Adorno
http://www.gotquestions.org/Buddhist-Christian.html
http://www.jesusneverexisted.com/
– Would it matter if Buddha (literally, “awakened one”) was not an historical figure?
– Would it matter if Jesus (literally, “savior”) was not an historical figure?
Messianic Judaism.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ebionites
http://www.iep.utm.edu/neoplato/
“It rests with every professor of the religion of Jesus to settle within himself to which of the two religions, that of Jesus or that of Paul, he will adhere.”
– Jeremy Bentham, in Not Paul But Jesus
Buddha & Christ
http://www.thezensite.com/non_Zen/Was_Jesus_Buddhist.html
http://shindharmanet.com/passage/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddhism_and_Christianity
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddhist_influences_on_Christianity
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_Buddhism_and_Christianity
http://www.gotquestions.org/Buddhist-Christian.html
http://www.amazon.com/Yeshua-Buddha-Interpretation-Testament-Meaningful/dp/0835605159
http://dyneslines.blogspot.com/2011/06/did-new-testament-rip-off-buddhism.html
Buddha and Kierkegaard.
Kierkegaard as Bodhisattva.
Buddha’s response to Nietzsche.
http://www.urbandharma.org/sitemap.html
Zionism in The Matrix.
http://reason.com/ (Libertarian research organization)
ACLU.org
ADL.org
Anonymous Hacktivist group (http://anonnews.org/)
National news (propaganda) and private interests.
Private sector influence on government.
Authentic journalism.
Political realism.
Realpolitik.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sovereign_citizen_movement
http://www.freedomactivist.net/
http://political-activism.meetup.com/
Not only does the Constitution specifically allow the formation of a Federal Army, it also recognizes the inherent right of the people to form militia. Further, it recognizes that the citizen and his personal armaments are the foundation of the militia. The arming of the militia is not left to the state but to the citizen. However, should the state choose to arm its citizen militia, it is free to do so (bearing in mind the Constitution is not a document limiting the citizen, but rather limiting the power of government). But should the state fail to arm its citizen militia, the right of the people to keep and bear arms becomes the source of the guarantee that the state will not be found defenseless in the presence of a threat to its security. It makes no sense whatsoever to look to the Constitution of the United States or that of any state for permission to form a citizen militia since logically, the power to permit is also the power to deny. If brought to its logical conclusion in this case, government may deny the citizen the right to form a militia. If this were to happen, the state would assert itself as the principle of the contract making the people the agents. Liberty then would depend on the state’s grant of liberty. Such a concept is foreign to American thought…
One other important point needs to be made. Since The Constitution is the limiting document upon the government, the government cannot become greater than the granting power. That is, the servant cannot become greater than its master. Therefore, should the chief executive or the other branch of government or all branches together act to suspend The Constitution under a rule of martial law, all power granted to government would be cancelled and deferred back to the granting power. That is the people. And I’ll conclude with this statement: Martial law shall not be possible in this country as long as the people recognize the bill of rights as inalienable.
– Norman Olson, http://www.potowmack.org/emerappb.html
Privately owned for-profit universities and prisons?
http://www.justice.gov/archive/ndic/ndic-moved.html
http://www.justice.gov/dea/index.shtml
http://www1.assumption.edu/users/lknoles/douglassproslaveryargs.html
The Universe Next Door
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Physiognomy
Bradley Manning and WikiLeaks
“What truly is logic? Who decides reason? My quest has taken me to the physical, the metaphysical, the delusional, and back. I have made the most important discovery of my career – the most important discovery of my life. It is only in the mysterious equations of love that any logic or reasons can be found. I am only here tonight because of you. You are the only reason I am. You are all my reasons. Thank you.”
– John Nash, A Beautiful Mind
http://wikileaks.org/Banking-Blockade.html
http://www.nytimes.com/projects/2011/video/opensecrets/
George Orwell.
Thought police.
Political Language.
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/George_Orwell
Alan Watts.
Cornel West.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_interpretations_of_The_Wonderful_Wizard_of_Oz
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joint_Worldwide_Intelligence_Communications_System
Integral theory.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_United_States_dollar
www.copyright.gov/fls/fl102.html
Democritus & Bertrand Russell.
Stoicism + Platonism = Christendom
Personal Biblical reinterpretation
Acts 17:16-32 (Paul in Athens)
Matthew 27:46 (cf. Psalm 22)
1 Tim. 6:20-21.
1 Peter 3;15.
1 Cor. 1:20-25 (Foolishness of Christ risen)
Gen. 32 (Jacob wrestles God)
http://gnosis.org/welcome.html
Mysticism
– Christian Gnosticism.
– Islamic Sufism.
– Jewish Hasidism and Kabbala.
– Hindu Advaita Vedanta.
– Buddhist Zen and Dzogchen.
Sikhism.
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/boethius/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quietism
José Ortega y Gasset, “Man has no Nature”
Authenticity: An Existential Virtue by MarJorie Grene.
Involution.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meta-ethics
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Value_theory
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_revisionism
Concept of taboo.
History is written by the victors.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conspiracy_theory
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_conspiracy_theories
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phantom_time_hypothesis
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elite_theory
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Illuminatus!_Trilogy
Illuminati. Freemasons. Jesuits.
Unknown agenda behind secret societies.
Beyond secret societies: unknown individuals.
Fiat money in a digital age.
Privately owned Federal Reserve.
Infowars.com – Alex Jones’ disinformation agenda.
CIA use of Facebook.
Admitted/proven CIA conspiracies.
http://info.publicintelligence.net/USArmy-InternmentResettlement.pdf
New World Order.
Banking monopoly.
False flag operations.
Zionism.
“Forcefully spreading tolerance is intolerant.” – and democracy? and freedom?
The political and economic atmosphere of MMORPG Tibia (created in 1997) as a truly unique look at human nature and the political animal.
– Social Darwinism
– EVE Online as social experiment in free market capitalism.
– U.S. as well. Maybe also civilization as planted by aliens on Earth long ago!
Hindu Untouchables.
My philosophy brings the triumphant idea of which all other modes of thought will ultimately perish. It is the great cultivating idea: the races that cannot bear it stand condemned; those who find it the greatest benefit are chosen to rule…
To endure the idea of the recurrence one needs: freedom from morality; new means against the fact of pain ( pain conceived as a tool, as the father of pleasure…); the enjoyment of all kinds of uncertainty, experimentalism, as a counterweight to this extreme fatalism; abolition of the concept of necessity; abolition of the “will”; abolition of “knowledge-in-itself.”
– Nietzsche
What is it to laugh in the face of death?
Objectivism defined as ethics determined by the nature of reality.
Ayn Rand – The Virtue of Selfishness
Eudaimonia.
“Trust me, I’m telling you stories. I can change the story. I am the story.”
– Jeanette Winterson
Western decreasing value of maintaining a large family and the power of the surname (in a practical and non-moral sense). The tried and true way to worldly power is to maintain a large family and invest in a large family inheritance, rather than slaving away at an hourly paid job. To partake in the world community at the highest and most meaningful level. To be present among the elite – the small community of individuals that understand that nothing is true and everything is permitted. The few that truly exist. Perhaps this would be the highest level teaching in a secret society of gods among men.
“What I am describing is not merely a master-race whose task would be to govern, but a race with its own sphere of life, with an excess of force for beauty, courage, culture, manners, right up to the highest spiritual realm; an affirming race which can accord itself every luxury… powerful enough not to need the tyranny of the virtue-imperative, neither parsimonious nor given to pedantry, beyond good and evil; a hothouse for strange and exotic plants.”
– Nietzsche
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meaning_of_life
“The force of mind is only as great as its expression; its depth only as deep as its power to expand and lose itself.”
– Hegel, Phenomenology of Spirit
“The ego refuses to be distressed by the provocations of reality, to let itself be compelled to suffer. It insists that it cannot be affected by the traumas of the external world; it shows, in fact, that such traumas are no more than occasions for it to gain pleasure.”
– Sigmund Freud
“Yesterday we obeyed kings and bent our necks before emperors. But today we kneel only to truth, follow only beauty, and obey only love.” -Kahlil Gibran
“[Man] sacrifices his health in order to make money. Then he sacrifices money to recuperate his health. And then he is so anxious about the future that he does not enjoy the present; the result being that he does not live in the present or the future; he lives as if he is never going to die, and then he dies having never really lived.” -Dalai Lama
INTERPOL
– Intergovernmental organization
– Member States
– United Nations
– New World Order
– Planet Government
http://www.un.org/en/documents/charter/
http://www.un.org/disarmament/ATT/
Economics.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subjective_theory_of_value
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Establishment
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Counter-economics
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transition_economy
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free-market_anarchism
North Korean caste system.
U.S. caste system.
Why TV News is a Waste of Human Effort
http://uncyclopedia.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_peace
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/aristotle-politics/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plato%27s_five_regimes
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anacyclosis
Plato as origin of theism and, ipso facto, indirect cause of modern nihilism.
Platonic zeitgeist still reigns as “science,” in spite of Christianity’s suicide.
The self-overcoming of nihilism explained.
http://www.burningtrue.com/2013/03/insecurity-third-choice.html
Names of the Monotheistic God of Abraham
Islamic Theology / Philosophy
– http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic_philosophy
– al-Ghazali.
– Sufism – The Tale of the Sands.
– Language barriers.
Moses Maimonides.
Forgotten Truth by Huston Smith.
http://dramaofdogma.blogspot.com/2008/03/gift-of-place.html
– “All living is local.”
http://www.musicbysunset.com/Great%20Literature/
Buddhism and transhumanism?
“From the perspective of the subject, death is never experienced, and man is therefore subjectively immortal. Now, from the perspective of the object…”
– Joshua Synon
Schopenhauer.
– The World as Will and Representation
Escapism and technology.
Second Skin documentary.
Call of Duty “Replacer” advertisement.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synchronicity
Pope Benedict XVI resignation and Saint Malachi.
Will as all that exists.
Matter / energy as all that exists.
Relation as all that exists.
Qualia as all that exists.
Crime & Punishment
“From a purely psychological point of view, I really believe that the police aid the criminal in not coming to repent.”
– Kierkegaard
“But thus do I counsel you, my friends: distrust all in whom the impulse to punish is powerful!”
– Nietzsche
Criminal Psychology
– Irreverence of “outside” authority and law.
– Reverence of personal autonomy, integrity, authenticity.
– Proximity to “state of nature.”
– View of law enforcement contemptuous.
– Street ethics (e.g. code of silence).
– Police as rival gang.
There is no empathy in the courtroom. Just arbitrary arbitration.
“Imprisonment is not an appropriate means of promoting correction and rehabilitation.”
– 18 USC § 3582
Four Forms of Human Being
Living intentionally. (will)
Living on purpose. (function)
Living for a reason (idealism).
Living on accident (fatalism).
Everything matters (samsara, conventional life) and nothing matters (sunyata, emptiness behind convention).
Relation to Platonic Forms.
The eternal moment.
Life as “play.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Two_truths_doctrine
Liberation and freedom in this context.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_of_attraction
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_thought
Critique of militant “New Atheism.”
– Richard Dawkins, The God Delusion.
– Sam Harris, The End of Faith.
The Science Delusion by Rupert Sheldrake
The Grand Design – Stephen Hawking.
“The worst readers — the worst readers are those who proceed like plundering soldiers: they pick up a few things they can use, soil and confuse the rest, and blaspheme the whole.”
– Nietzsche
Theosophy.
Anthroposophy.
Apocrypha.
Theology
– http://www.iep.utm.edu/theo-nat/
Decadence of Americans.
Honest Man: The Life of R. Budd Dwyer
“You [white folks] have not only altered and malformed your winged and four-legged cousins; you have done it to yourselves. You have changed men into chairmen of boards, into office workers, into time-clock punchers. You have changed your women into housewives, truly fearful creatures. I was once invited to the house of one. ‘Watch the ashes, don’t smoke, you’ll stain the curtains. Watch the goldfish bowl, don’t lean your head against the wallpaper; your hair may be greasy. Don’t spill liquor on that table: it has a delicate finish. You should have wiped your boots; the floor was just varnished. Don’t don’t don’t’ That is crazy. You live in prisons you have built for yourselves, calling them ‘homes, offices, factories.'”
– John (Fire) Lame Deer and Richard Erdoes, Lame Deer Seeker of Visions.
https://www.youtube.com/user/EgoDiversion
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-domestication
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domestication
“Through domesticating ourselves like cattle, people began civilization.”
– Masahiro Morioka
The Domestication of Animals and of Man (Part 1)
The Domestication of Animals and of Man (Part 2)
The Deoxyribonucleic Hyperdimension
“Much like Ebenezer Scrooge, I realized that what I want more than anything is to live happily ever after. And do you know what the secret to living happily ever after is? Power. Money and power. See, once you have those two things, you can secure everything else — and keep it that way.”
– Lex Luthor
Money as power incarnate.
The will to power.
Power as control.
Money as the sole interest of everything political and/or in the “news.”
Political plight of idealists.
Money as a tool, as a means to an end, not as an end-in-itself.
Desire as the ground of morality.
Value of truth: “I will not deceive, not even myself” as moral prejudice.
Superman and Smallville as exploration of Nietzsche.
Lex Luthor as the real overman.
Or perhaps Clark Kent and Lex Luthor as opposite overmen.
Lex Luthor: Man of Steel (comic).
Clark Kent is Superman’s critique of mankind.
“If you could reason with religious people, there would be no religious people.”
– Gregory House
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/johann-fichte/
CRITIQUE OF SCIENCE
Define Science
– “Progress”.
– Science-in-itself, or science-for-itself.
– What is the ground of science?
– Science as descriptive and not explanatory.
– Science is to outwardness as religion is to inwardness.
– Science as the latest form of ascetic ideal, following Platonism and Christianity.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solipsism
– Problem of Induction.
– Inductive logic (presupposition) as faith.
– Brain-in-a-vat.
– The butterfly dream.
Modern Science
– Roots in Western philosophical tradition.
– Ptolemy and Copernicus.
– Newton.
– Galileo.
– Theoretical physics.
– Einstein’s special and general relativity.
– Quantum mechanics.
Philosophy & Quantum Mysticism
– http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interpretations_of_quantum_mechanics
– Kant’s transcendental idealism = Einstein’s general relativity = Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle?
– http://www.informationphilosopher.com/freedom/history/
– http://philosophynow.org/issues/45/Bohr_and_Kant_and_Zeno
– http://www.friesian.com/space-2.htm
Ontological theory of relativity?
Problem of science and religion?
Mathematics and Theoretical Physics
– Calculus and infinite.
– Cyclical nature of time and space (and the material universe).
– Space and time as a priori experiential “faculties.” (Kant)
– Bending space-time to imagine higher dimensions than three.
– The curvature of the universe encompassing itself.
– Traversing “relatively” vast distances instantly.
– Zero energy universe.
– Computer simulation and higher dimensions.
– Ontological status of purely mathematical objects? Math as solely description of relation?
–http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_unsolved_problems_in_philosophy#Mathematical_objects
– http://www.friesian.com/goedel/chap-2.htm
https://www.youtube.com/user/10thdim
http://www.youtube.com/user/minutephysics
Overcoming Nihilism
– Death of God.
– Science-inspired nihilism.
– Nishitani and Buddha
– Original state (sunyata). (state of nature, original face)
– Domestication of man.
– No nihilism without Plato?
– Technology-inspired nihilism (Heidegger & Nishitani).
– http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/deleuze/
Unknowns
– http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_unsolved_problems
– Why is there something rather than nothing?
– Why is there gravity? (Kantian “faculty?”)
– What is nothing? Empty space?
– Induction problem.
– Ineffability of qualia (cf. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hard_problem_of_consciousness).
Is essential chaos possible?
– Posited as the dualistic opposite of order.
– Determinism and free will.
– Compatiblism.
Evolution/Science and/or Creation/Intelligent Design
– This is a debate that I have long since left behind because of the utter superficiality of both sides and the fact that each side has predispositions necessarily interpreting facts.
– Arguments for and against (irreducible complexity, 2nd law of thermodynamics, carbon-14 dating, etc. – answersingenesis.org, http://www.fixedearth.com/)
– Theistic evolution.
– Instinct and free will.
– Do any animals other than humans intentionally commit suicide (or even have knowledge of impermanence)?
– Why is the origin of written history (Mesopotamia: Sumerians, 4000 BC) such a recent phenomenon?
Is essential randomness possible?
– In computer science.
– In reality.
– Correlation to the possibility of autonomous machines.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dilemma_of_determinism
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultimate_fate_of_the_universe
Logical determinism?
http://crestroyertheory.com/the-theory/
“What I relate is the history of the next two centuries. I describe what is coming, what can no longer come differently: the advent of nihilism… For some time now, our whole European culture has been moving towards a catastrophe, with a tortured tension that is growing from decade to decade: restlessly, violently, headlong like a river that wants to reach the end, that no longer reflects, that is afraid to reflect.”
– Nietzsche
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_science
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antiscience
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antiphilosophy
Buddhism as anti-philosophy.
– Metaphysics and morality as means to an end.
Influential Eastern Minds
Buddha
Dogen
Hakuin
Nishitani
Confucius
Lao Tzu
Zarathustra
– Eckhart Tolle, teaches Buddhism in the West
– http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Eckhart_Tolle
– http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eckhart_Tolle
Meister Eckhart
– Godhead as “God-as-God-is-in-Godself.”
“All Faith is false, all Faith is true: Truth is the shattered mirror strown
In myriad bits; while each believes his little bit the whole to own.”
– Sir Richard Francis Burton
Epicurus.
Al Ma’arri.
Jean Meslier.
Robert Ingersoll.
A message to Islamic terrorists (if there be such a thing) and other world condemners: hatred will never cease by hatred, but by love. The way that leads to the destruction of the corruptions of materialistic society is education, not violence.
Plato’s Philosopher-King.
http://classics.mit.edu/Epictetus/epicench.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Stockdale
Marcus Aurelius’ Meditations Quotes
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/stoicism/
Continue work on https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Nishitani_Keiji
– “All things that are in the world are linked together…” – p. 149 (added to Wikiquote)
http://itsnotwhatyouthink.co.uk/
“You are not what you think you are. You are not what other people think you are. You are what you think other people think you are.”
Vast exploration of philosophical ideas in novel form.
Metaphysics
People cannot see themselves, only Others?
Enlightenment as ability to see oneself?
Spirituality as sustained personality (on a ground of emptiness)?
Karma and rebirth as Sartre’s created Self?
Christian mysticism and Buddhism.
Kensho (seeing essence).
Zen Koans.
The nature of fire.
Idealism – dualism – objectivism – subjectivism – perspectivism – relationism?
Theories of truth.
History of religions and influences on each other.
Two Truths of Buddhism.
Science and religion.
Human existence as knowledge of facts alone, but no experience at all.
Morality
Relationship to religion.
As the true end of life.
Current morality, laws, and customs as seen from the year 3000.
Locking people in cages for non-violent crime is fucked up. But, alas, justice is the advantage of the stronger.
Law purged of moral bias, consisting of only pragmatic concerns – or, political philosophy liberated from moral philosophy. (Realpolitik)
Substance Abuse
Cultural interest in vampire blood lust as substance addiction in real life.
Video games, movies, drugs, etc. as escapism.
Internet effect on younger generations’ social skills.
My Video Game Design & Development
Bing (Pong simulation created in 2003-04 at LTU)
Custom Media Player (created at LTU)
Noxia (RPG Maker)
JSynon 7.6 RPG (Open Tibia Server)
Many other projects using 3D GameStudio (3D fighter, driving simulation, unfinished online FPS, and more)
Other simple projects using C and C++ with DirectX on Windows API (Chess, etc.)
Current project idea: Combine elements of Tibia (polity), EVE (economy), Terraria (player created content), to create an MMORPG with skill based gameplay.
Politics
Social Contract and tacit consent.
State of nature and apocalyptic film (revolution, the walking dead, Lost).
What is “the government?” (individual people; the state is the people).
What is “government?” As verb. As noun.
Public image as necessarily illusory. (Kierkegaard)
And representatives?
Illusion of government / democracy.
Democratic (or oligarchic) republic?
Government as noun does not exist.
Government as verb; politics as the most clever game man has ever invented.
Every form of government that man has experimented.
Political theory.
Ancient Greek polity size.
War provides meaning to life (will to power)?
Military-industrial complex and vested interests.
Police force as largest gang.
Politically correct world domination (i.e. the spread of “democracy and freedom“).
Taxation.
Born, raised, and living in the USA – I am not free to live my life as I see fit. In fact, I feel completely and utterly bound in chains.
Economics and “The Establishment.”
Elitist theory (aristocracy, plutocracy, oligarchy, timocracy, etc).
Conspiracy theories.
Actual corruption.
Capitalist anarchy.
Refusing to participate in the national responsibility of voting: silence is a powerful weapon.
National security – when should we lie to the public?
Ethics
Other as an end-in-itself. (Kant; categorical imperative)
“Virtue ethics” reformed.
Morality as emotion.
Evolution of morality.
A spiritual journey, something akin to “zen & the art of motorcycle maintenance”
(using “My Journey” note as skeleton)
Buddhism as escapism?
Is it possible to break a Buddha mind (i.e. through use of physical or mental torture)?
I am not a noun, but a verb. I am not a being, but a becoming. I am not a relation, but a relating. I am not a will, but a willing. I am not, but I am.
Into the Wild.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subsistence_farming
http://www.ehow.com/how_2125327_get-security-clearance.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophical_anarchism
Alain Badiou’s conception of Truth.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocene_extinction
http://www.thezensite.com/ZenEssays/Philosophical/Putative_Fascism.htm
Contract work for government ideology, persuasive philosophical [propaganda] writing?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Scorpion_and_the_Frog
http://www.modernlibrary.com/top-100/
http://www.planetebook.com/ebooks/The-Great-Gatsby.pdf
http://rense.com/general62/destroy.htm (How to destroy a nation from within)
“Crazed scientists at Duke University Medical Center in North Carolina have wired the brains of two rats to the internet, allowing them to exchange sensory information in real time, even though they were separated by thousands of miles (one rat was in North Carolina, and the other in Brazil). The wired brain implants allowed tactile and motor signals to be sent from one rat to another, creating the first ever brain-to-brain interface. It was repeatedly found that once one rat had learned to complete a task in return for a reward of food, the other rat too now knew how to complete the same task. The behaviour of the lab rats apparently indicated that the communication between them was in both directions. It is not yet clear how the information is coded by the rats’ brains so as to be usable by the other brain. The head of the team, Professor Miguel Nicolelis, predicted that the system could eventually be tried with larger animals and in time extended to humans: “We will have a way to exchange information across millions of people without using keyboards, voice recognition devices or the type of interfaces that we normally use today.” Clearly this would depend on the development of non-invasive techniques to share information between human brains. Professor Christopher James, an expert in neural engineering at Warwick University, noted that it is not yet possible to put information into a brain using just electrodes on the surface of the scalp.”
– Philosophy Now Magazine
“What does ‘outside of the universe’ even mean? Does anything exist outside of qualia? What is thinking, but a recollection of qualia? What stupid questionable questions. Thinking is stupid. I’m gonna go build a house… ON A ROCK!”
– Joshua Synon, signing out…