This photo was taken the other day, in Germany. Don't you ever just want to get in a buggy and drive through fields of flowers.....................and keep riding.................... take deep breaths, calmness, the sound of the horses........... And, yes....most of you who know me know this is SO not my personality. But, you know? Lately............ maybe I just need a break. I'm TIRED OF POLITICS, I'm TIRED of worrying about Islam, I'm TIRED of LEFTISTS, I'm TIRED of......
ya...easy, girl....clip clop, clip clop......... (now I sound like Monty Python and the Holy Grail). Are we ALL TIRED? or is it just MEEEE?
50 comments:
Indeed. And when the mood strikes us, we hop in our cars and head for the backroads of southern PA hoping to get stuck behind one of these...
You know, FJ? That looks pretty darned GOOD to me right now.
(i've been to Intercourse, PA..saw a lot of this)
Ya, a buggy like that can really interupt-us !! (smile) get it?!!
Something from Harry Woods to cheer you up:
When the red, red robin
Comes bob, bob bobbin' along, along,
There'll be no more sobbing
When he starts throbbing
His own sweet song.
Wake up, wake up, you sleepy head,
Get up, get up, get out of bed,
Cheer up, cheer up the sun is red,
Live, love, laugh and be happy.
What if I've been blue,
Now I'm walking through
Fields of flowers,
Rain may glisten,
But I still listen
For hours and hours.
I'm just a kid again,
Doin' what I did again,
Singing a song,
When the red, red robin
Comes bob, bob bobbin' along.
~ Harry Woods
Submitted by FreeThinke
BE GLAD WE ARE WE ARE WE ARE
From The (London) Times Online
May 11, 2008
AID TRICKLES INTO BURMA BUT DEATH TOLL COULD REACH ONE-MILLION IF DISEASE SETS IN
(Truncated by FT)
AFP in Rangoon
Relief deliveries into cyclone-hit Burma increased today but aid groups said supplies fell far short of the enormous need and that foreign experts were still barred from the country.
A cargo plane chartered by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) carrying 35 tonnes of aid was one of the latest to arrive.
The ICRC said the medical supplies on board were sufficient to treat some 250 trauma patients and provide three months of basic health care for 10,000 people. The plane was also carrying sanitation equipment, including a mobile water-treatment plant to provide drinking water for 10,000 people, it said.
Risks stop US riding roughshod over junta
She said the death toll from the May 3 cyclone could go up to 100,000, a figure also suggested by other aid groups. . .
Cyclone Nargis, which smashed into the rice-growing Irrawaddy Delta region in the country’s south on May 3, left 60,000 people dead or missing, according to an official toll.
The junta, deeply suspicious of the outside world, has refused to let in foreign experts who specialise in getting aid to disaster victims, and said that only the government would be allowed to distribute emergency supplies.
“Clearly our priority is to ensure victims of this terrible disaster access to clean drinking water, shelter, food and health care,” said Pierre-Andre Conod, head of the ICRC’s delegation in Myanmar.
“It’s not true that nothing is happening at all, but not enough is happening,” said Frank Smithuis, Myanmar country manager for MSF. . .
The UN has itself said that a week after Cyclone Nargis hit, only one-quarter of the victims have received any help at all, and it has called the relief effort“a race against time."
Submitted by FreeThinke
wasn't that EDDIE CANTOR? or Ethel Merman??
see, I have NO couth!!!!
Dear Couthless,
EVERYBODY recorded that song at one time or another ...... even Mandy Patinkin, if you would believe.
Susan Hayward sang it herself in I'll Cry Tomorrow, the movie about Lillian Roth.
I don't have any compunctions about dating myself. I;m getting old, and I love it–––NOT.
~ FreeThinke
Oh dear! "Dating myself" looks a little strange now that I read it over.
Reminds me of another song my mother taught me.
I love me, I think I'm grand
I sit in the movies, and I hold my hand. ;-)
FT
I've been taking a break for awhile...politics....et al..is depressing
which is why it's time to buy the RV sell the house and never turn on the TV again
Elbro, seems you and I are feeling quite the same, doesn't it.
sad, but good to feel I'm not alone. xxx
Sorry, but if I weren't a turtle already, you'd have to 'splain it to me...
;-)
FJ, 'splain.
Turtles? High minded people??
Only when it comes to question #4. Sorry, a failed attempt at humour.
Freud Abstracts...
An extract from Schopenhauer's The Word as Will and Idea is presented. In his later works, Freud made several references to the emphasis which Schopenhauer laid on the importance of sexuality. Schopenhauer wrote that the relation of the sexes is really the invisible central point of all action and conduct. It is the cause of war and the end of peace, the basis of what is serious, and the aim of the jest, the inexhaustible source of wit, the key to all allusions, and the meaning of all mysterious hints, or all spoken offers and all stolen glances, the daily meditation of the young, and often also of the old, the hourly thought of the unchaste, and even against their will the constantly recurring imagination of the chaste, the ever-ready material of a joke, just because the profoundest seriousness lies at its foundation. Sexual passion is the most perfect manifestation of the will to live, its most distinctly expressed type; and the origin of the individual in it, and its primacy over all other desires of the natural man, are both in complete agreement with this.
Unlike the 'early Freud', I have an equal regard for both Eros and Thantos. Must be the 'foolish man' in me. ;-)
btw - Am thinking of a word that begins in f and ends in k...
...firetruck. I've a feelin' it wasn't the first answer that came to mind.
I have looked into my soul and seen my enemy, and it is me.
It takes a LOT of Thanatos to instill "high mindedness"... and our civilization no longer has the stomache for it...
Nietzsche, "Genealogy of Morals"
We Germans certainly do not think of ourselves as an especially cruel and hard-hearted people, even less as particularly careless people who live only in the present. But just take a look at our old penal code in order to understand how much trouble it takes on this earth to breed a “People of Thinkers” (by that I mean the European people among whom today we still find a maximum of trust, seriousness, tastelessness, and practicality, and who, with these characteristics, have a right to breed all sorts of European mandarins). These Germans have used terrible means to make themselves a memory in order to attain mastery over their vulgar basic instincts and their brutal crudity: think of the old German punishments, for example, stoning ( — the legend even lets the mill stone fall on the head of the guilty person), breaking on the wheel (the most characteristic invention and specialty of the German genius in the realm of punishment!), impaling on a stake, ripping people apart or stamping them to death with horses (“quartering”), boiling the criminal in oil or wine (still done in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries), the well-loved practice of flaying (“cutting flesh off in strips”), carving flesh out of the chest, and probably covering the offender with honey and leaving him to the flies in the burning sun.
With the help of such images and procedures people finally retained five or six “I will not’s” in the memory, and so far as these precepts were concerned they gave their word in order to live with the advantages of society—and it’s true! With the assistance of this sort of memory people finally came to “reason”! — Ah, reason, seriousness, mastery over emotions, this whole gloomy business called reflection, all these privileges and showpieces of human beings: how expensive they were! How much blood and horror is at the bottom of all “good things”! . . .
In fact, ridding the world of Thanatos has become THE stated goal of the New Left pogrom against the traditional nuclear family.
No, Z, you're not alone.
Six of seven days a week I'd love to climb into that buggy and ride away.
Okay, time for a swim break...
We skipped the light fandango
Turned cartwheels cross the floor
I was feeling kinda seasick
But the crowd called out for more
The room was humming harder
As the ceiling flew away
When we called out for another drink
The waiter brought a tray
And so it was that later
As the miller told his tale
That her face, at first just ghostly,
Turned a whiter shade of pale
She said, there is no reason
And the truth is plain to see.
But I wandered through my playing cards
And would not let her be
One of sixteen vestal virgins
Who were leaving for the coast
And although my eyes were open
They might have just as wellve been closed...
(Unsung verses...)
She said, Im home on shore leave,
Though in truth we were at sea
So I took her by the looking glass
And forced her to agree
Saying, you must be the mermaid
Who took neptune for a ride.
But she smiled at me so sadly
That my anger straightway died
If music be the food of love
Then laughter is its queen
And likewise if behind is in front
Then dirt in truth is clean
My mouth by then like cardboard
Seemed to slip straight through my head
So we crash-dived straightway quickly
And attacked the ocean bed
A shorter politer word sums up your Eros-Thanatos post, Farmer John:
S-E-X!
Thanatos means DEATH, does it not?
Why bring that inevitability into the discussion?
Of course I do not believe in "death" as we usually regard it. A better word would be TRANSFORMATION, or possibly TRANSFIGURATION, as Strauss put it in his magnificent tone poem Der Tod und Verklaerung.
~ FreeThinke
FJ...Marcuse? The world would have been far, far better off without him. Why didn't we see this coming? Why didn't parents wake up soon enough and put their feet down when they realized the expensive educations they were providing their kids were ruining them and society?
FT: you ought to join this conversation (skip the SWIM link, FT..I don't think that's what would interest you, but the Thanatos/Marcuse links/information would...it's one of your favorite themes.>MARXISM, of course)
Farmer John,
If by Thanatos you mean legally-sanctioned, generally accepted barbarism of the type you and Nietzsche so gruesomely describe, then there is no doubt that ridding the world of "Thanatos" (If I take your meaning correctly) is a highly desirable goal.
Such is the aim of CHRIST not MARX. Christ took all such punishments upon HIMSELF, so that we who properly believe in Him might never have to suffer in any such manner ourselves.
Implicit in the bargain, of course, is the corollary that we who believe in a Rule of Love, Truth, Principle and Intelligence (Father, Son and Holy Spirit) as opposed to a Rule of Fear would never practice barbaric atrocities upon our enemies, but rather make every attempt to love and forgive them.
This sometimes means we must willingly take a spear in our chest and die, ourselves, in order to ABSORB and further prevent the SPREAD of evil.
Giving way to violent, retaliative rage as a first resort often leads to wholesale slaughter, waste and destruction.
Nevertheless, I believe in "PEACE THROUGH STRENGTH." If we are fully PREPARED to ANNIHILATE anyone who comes at us with murder, destruction and theft on his mind, it is unlikely that we will have have to USE our superior resources.
The "rub," of course is to MAINTAIN and ENHANCE our superior strength and advantage–––the very thing the "Give Peace a Chance" crowd would have us sacrifice and disown–––the filthy bastards.
Life is a PARADOX. As I've said many times before, POLARITY and a high degree of INNER CONFLICT are necessary components of this most improbable, illogical, often terrifying, sometimes fulfilling Gift from God.
~ FreeThinke
FJ and FT:
http://conservativemovies.blogspot.com/
Check out edge's top film clip. That's what I think ought to happen!
I'll be back... ;-)
If by Thanatos you mean legally-sanctioned, generally accepted barbarism of the type you and Nietzsche so gruesomely describe, then there is no doubt that ridding the world of "Thanatos" (If I take your meaning correctly) is a highly desirable goal.
Once you've achieved a stable "civilized" state you'll get no argument from me.... But before then, the more "lenient" your system of justice is, the more 'uncivilized' parasites you breed... until you reach the point where you're breeding more parasites than civilized men. I think that w/o the "executioner" the state cannot survive (Joseph de Maistre - panegyric to the executioner & Robspierre, "Justification of the Use of Terror").
Such is the aim of CHRIST not MARX. Christ took all such punishments upon HIMSELF, so that we who properly believe in Him might never have to suffer in any such manner ourselves.
Again, no argument here, but the Christians had the advantage of taking over from the barbarous Romans... who had done their "dirty work" of "breaking/ civilizing" the Gauls for them. I'd add that Marx had the advantage to speaking to "doubly broken" Germans, and so used the "guilty conscience" like a secular hammer to shame Christians into following their own avowed standards (In other words, it's Marx's goal to psychologically punish conscientious Christians into acceptance and compliance)
Implicit in the bargain, of course, is the corollary that we who believe in a Rule of Love, Truth, Principle and Intelligence (Father, Son and Holy Spirit) as opposed to a Rule of Fear would never practice barbaric atrocities upon our enemies, but rather make every attempt to love and forgive them.
...but in ALWAYS practicing lenience our enemies never learn how to behave properly, and this drives them underground and mad. Ever watch Caesar Milan (the Dog Whisperer). Proper training cannot be all carrots unless you raise the animal from a pup. The same goes for horses (hippos) and men. Ask Poseidon, Breaker of Horses.
And so in providing a brief/ transitional "training" period, you show more mercy to your enemy than immediately forgiving him outright.
This sometimes means we must willingly take a spear in our chest and die, ourselves, in order to ABSORB and further prevent the SPREAD of evil.
You take the spear. I'd rather live to fight another day. Seriously, Christianity ONLY works when dealing with already "civilized" opponents. Sure, the Brits wouldn't shoot Ghandi, but the Chinese would.
Giving way to violent, retaliative rage as a first resort often leads to wholesale slaughter, waste and destruction.
No argument. But in a minority of circumstances, "Shock and Awe" can have the opposite effect.
Nevertheless, I believe in "PEACE THROUGH STRENGTH." If we are fully PREPARED to ANNIHILATE anyone who comes at us with murder, destruction and theft on his mind, it is unlikely that we will have have to USE our superior resources.
And it is also likely that we will not long retain our superiority unless we 'occasionally" exercise our superior resources and demonstrate a 'will' to ANNIHILATE. Otherwise, a doctrine of nuclear retaliation has no deterrent force.
The "rub," of course is to MAINTAIN and ENHANCE our superior strength and advantage–––the very thing the "Give Peace a Chance" crowd would have us sacrifice and disown–––the filthy bastards.
And how do we do that without exercising it? Use it or lose it, I always say.
Life is a PARADOX. As I've said many times before, POLARITY and a high degree of INNER CONFLICT are necessary components of this most improbable, illogical, often terrifying, sometimes fulfilling Gift from God.
Complete agreement. But the only way one can implant "inner conflict" is by "external means". One must learn to practice the ancient art of 'spannungbogen'. Practicing "self-control" requires an external 'tempering' of the soul not found in a culture that prides itself in "instant gratification" of every pleasureable whim and desire.
The Thanatos of Freud and Marcuse applied to the psyche of the individual... the set of standards used by the SuperEgo to control Ego (re-uptake inhibition) that prevent the individual from even THINKING about having sex with his/ her mother/ father (Oedipal Complex) or eating their own young (cannibalism)... (although abortion sanctions have largely undermined this particular inhibition of late).
In Greek mythology, this is best exemplified by Lycaon.
In other words, when civilized people begin to kill and eat their own young... they will soon be conquered by a more civilized "tribe". In the case of the "West" (abortion), this is the moral challenge being presented by Islam.
A patriarchal culture is challenging Pallas Athena (an armed woman) who has thrown away her spear....
The attack on the "father" by the New Left is an attack on Thanatos in the hope that "love alone" will be passed onto the offspring.
Unfortunately, the breakup of the 'black family' has demonstrated that without a black father, a black child raised by an unwed mother has SIGNIFICANT problems with authority and a complete lack of self-control. And this trend is rapidly spreading in white culture as well. The Moynihan Report has proven extremely prescient...
Americans are becoming less and less "civilized" as the "repressive" societal systems (police force) is getting bigger and bigger....
As Plato stated in "Republic"...
When a democracy which is thirsting for freedom has evil cup-bearers presiding over the feast, and has drunk too deeply of the strong wine of freedom, then, unless her rulers are very amenable and give a plentiful draught, she calls them to account and punishes them, and says that they are cursed oligarchs.
Yes, he replied, a very common occurrence.
Yes, I said; and loyal citizens are insultingly termed by her slaves who hug their chains and men of naught; she would have subjects who are like rulers, and rulers who are like subjects: these are men after her own heart, whom she praises and honours both in private and public. Now, in such a State, can liberty have any limit?
Certainly not.
By degrees the anarchy finds a way into private houses, and ends by getting among the animals and infecting them.
How do you mean?
I mean that the father grows accustomed to descend to the level of his sons and to fear them, and the son is on a level with his father, he having no respect or reverence for either of his parents; and this is his freedom, and the metic (foreigner) is equal with the citizen and the citizen with the metic, and the stranger is quite as good as either.
Yes, he said, that is the way.
And these are not the only evils, I said--there are several lesser ones: In such a state of society the master fears and flatters his scholars, and the scholars despise their masters and tutors; young and old are all alike; and the young man is on a level with the old, and is ready to compete with him in word or deed; and old men condescend to the young and are full of pleasantry and gaiety; they are loth to be thought morose and authoritative, and therefore they adopt the manners of the young.
Quite true, he said.
The last extreme of popular liberty is when the slave bought with money, whether male or female, is just as free as his or her purchaser; nor must I forget to tell of the liberty and equality of the two sexes in relation to each other.
Why not, as Aeschylus says, utter the word which rises to our lips?
That is what I am doing, I replied; and I must add that no one who does not know would believe, how much greater is the liberty which the animals who are under the dominion of man have in a democracy than in any other State: for truly, the she-dogs, as the proverb says, are as good as their she-mistresses, and the horses and asses have a way of marching along with all the rights and dignities of freemen; and they will run at any body who comes in their way if he does not leave the road clear for them: and all things are just ready to burst with liberty.
When I take a country walk, he said, I often experience what you describe. You and I have dreamed the same thing.
And above all, I said, and as the result of all, see how sensitive the citizens become; they chafe impatiently at the least touch of authority, and at length, as you know, they cease to care even for the laws, written or unwritten; they will have no one over them.
Yes, he said, I know it too well.
Such, my friend, I said, is the fair and glorious beginning out of which springs tyranny.
Glorious indeed, he said.
"Every institution eventually perishes as a result of an excess of its' own first principles" -- Lord Acton
Check out edge's top film clip. That's what I think ought to happen!
...and I curse the day gunpowder was invented... it turns men into cowards.
In ancient cultures, it was a mans virtue to be courageous (know when and when not to use force) and a womans virtue to be temperate (know when and when not to use "guile").
Odysseus was an "uncommon" man in that he, alone amongst Greeks, could do BOTH.
Achilles gave "grief" to friends and enemies as a destryer of men. Odysseus was a man of "pain".... but in the receiving thereof, many lessons were "learned"
You "curse the day gunpowder was invented!" Believe it or not, I DO understand your point about courage and how it's far more courageous to resort to fisticuffs (sp?) or wrestle an opponent to the ground, BUT, you do realize that the "farther along"(questionable) societies have become, the farther the weapons are coming from, so to speak. First, it was wrestling, body against body, then duals, from 20 paces, then rifles, then bombs from miles away, now nukes from even MORE miles away....it's like we get less courageous and fight from farther away. Do you see what I'm trying to say? maybe not...!! Not sure I can describe it better.
But, if gunpowder HAS been invented..and, really, that clip from edge showed more than just the power of gunpowder, it should, to ME, the backwards Arab Muslim sword wielding mentality and how the West has overcome that with technology, no?!
As for 'courageous' and 'temperate'.......I long for the days.
Farmer John,
Thank you for your huge offerings and detailed response.
Like the late Bill Buckley I favor a belief that men (and women too, of course) function better and become more creative, productive and content when free of oppressive forms of Government and Authority.
The distinction between "freedom" and "license," however, appears to be lost.
I categorically despise and reject the depraved thinking of The Frankfurt School, Antonio Gramsci and of course, Sigmund Freud. It is these foul influences that have corrupted and fatally weakened our understanding of what it means–––and SHOULD mean–––to be "civilized."
These nefarious influences opened the floodgates to the [ever-too-tempting] notion that unbridled self-indulgence, ruthless selfishness, flamboyant vulgarity, lack of conscience, lack of self-control, lack of consideration and sense of responsibility to others, disloyalty to parents, spouses, children and accepted forms of governance and authority are VIRTUOUS.
Simplistically interpreted, Freud taught that "everything I do that's wrong is someone else's fault."
The Cultural Marxists (Frankfurt School) MEANT to do us harm. Their intentions were obviously to UNDERMINE and ultimately DESTROY Liberty, Capitalism, White Male Authority and Christianity–––not necessarily in that order. I believe that Freud too was motivated more by hatred of the Establishment of his time than by any love for mankind.
And yes, the paradox of which I spoke is evident in the part of Plato's dialogue you quoted. The need to maintain a degree of hierarchical authority, and the importance of parents, teachers and employers working on a higher, respected, and somewhat feared level that is deliberately UNEQUAL with their children, students and employees is vital.
A "pushover" is usually ...... well, PUSHED OVER. Such behavior does NOT inspire the love and loyalty they may be seeking.
It's always hard to find the delicate balance between benevolent authority and tyranny.
Nevertheless, I would insist that "The loosest chain binds the tightest."
~ FreeThinke
Z,
You've just reminded of something my English teacher in Sophomore year of high school wrote on the board.
Up the crag
In the screaming wind
Naked and bleeding
I fought blind.
Then I moved towards
The eye of the sun.
Past the cromlech
I found a gun.
From there I stayed
In the cities of men.
In the home of my love,
I found a pen.
~ Anonymous
The reference to "my love" gives this special meaning.
Do you know what a cromlech is? Few do. Stonehenge is the most famous one in existence, I believe.
FT
CORRECTION
The verse should have read:
From there I strayed not "stayed."
FT
Nevertheless, I would insist that "The loosest chain binds the tightest." I would agree entirely. This is precisely what Kant meant in implementing (and practicing) his universal moral laws... of course, Kant's "chain" was so loose as to choke everyone else around him. It was designed to function only in a universe of 1 (in other words, it was 'perfectly' loose).
Simplistically interpreted, Freud taught that "everything I do that's wrong is someone else's fault."
You and I must have read two completely different people. I think perhaps you interpret Freud FAR TOO SIMPLISTICALLY. Freud HATED America because he felt America lacked respect for tradition and ESPECIALLY authority. And want to know something? I think he was RIGHT!
Freud was a genius. We will not see another like him for centuries.
...but you are also 'partly' right in maintaining that Freud had a "deterministic" outlook (everything someone did had its genesis in experience). I, for one, do not believe he was 'entirely' wrong. And I believe that Freud believed that it was the analyst's job to identify those experiences and create neuronal pathways around them, thus providing a CURE.
Now Gramsci, Marcuse and the Frankfurt School are another matter entirely. They are not only scum, but they are unintelligent scum!
FJ...to "know yourself". I swear that, at my ripe old age, I'm just beginning to wonder about that. Where I've BEEN on that subject, I have no idea. Just too busy?
I agree with you about Freud...I didn't get FT's line, either.
FJ, what do you mean by "I know far too much to trust to men of the low moral character of the day."?
One of my sons "accompanists" had been forced to undergo "shock therapy" as a child. If they could do it to her, there's no reason why they couldn't do it to you or me. And there's no reason why they couldn't do much WORSE.
They already drug us and our kids enough as it is. Ritalin for "behavioural" problems. Countless others for "depression".
Do you know what "depression" is? I do. It's a side effect of "civilization".
Depression has a non-pharmacological cure. But like most "modern" treatments, the "leaf" is no good unless accompanied by a "charm".
For the leaf merely treats the "symptoms" and effects no "cure". Take this from someone who as already undergone two rounds of chemotherapy in his lifetime, and would unlikely survive a third.
Plato, "Charmides"
But I controlled myself, and when he asked me if I knew the cure of the headache, I answered, but with an effort, that I did know.
And what is it? he said.
I replied that it was a kind of leaf, which required to be accompanied by a charm, and if a person would repeat the charm at the same time that he used the cure, he would be made whole; but that without the charm the leaf would be of no avail.
Then I will write out the charm from your dictation, he said.
With my consent? I said, or without my consent?
With your consent, Socrates, he said, laughing.
Very good, I said; and are you quite sure that you know my name?
I ought to know you, he replied, for there is a great deal said about you among my companions; and I remember when I was a child seeing you in company with my cousin Critias.
I am glad to find that you remember me, I said; for I shall now be more at home with you and shall be better able to explain the nature of the charm, about which I felt a difficulty before. For the charm will do more, Charmides, than only cure the headache. I dare say that you have heard eminent physicians say to a patient who comes to them with bad eyes, that they cannot cure his eyes by themselves, but that if his eyes are to be cured, his head must be treated; and then again they say that to think of curing the head alone, and not the rest of the body also, is the height of folly. And arguing in this way they apply their methods to the whole body, and try to treat and heal the whole and the part together. Did you ever observe that this is what they say?
Yes, he said.
And they are right, and you would agree with them?
Yes, he said, certainly I should.
His approving answers reassured me, and I began by degrees to regain confidence, and the vital heat returned. Such, Charmides, I said, is the nature of the charm, which I learned when serving with the army from one of the physicians of the Thracian king Zamolxis, who are said to be so skilful that they can even give immortality. This Thracian told me that in these notions of theirs, which I was just now mentioning, the Greek physicians are quite right as far as they go; but Zamolxis, he added, our king, who is also a god, says further, 'that as you ought not to attempt to cure the eyes without the head, or the head without the body, so neither ought you to attempt to cure the body without the soul; and this,' he said, 'is the reason why the cure of many diseases is unknown to the physicians of Hellas, because they are ignorant of the whole, which ought to be studied also; for the part can never be well unless the whole is well.' For all good and evil, whether in the body or in human nature, originates, as he declared, in the soul, and overflows from thence, as if from the head into the eyes. And therefore if the head and body are to be well, you must begin by curing the soul; that is the first thing. And the cure, my dear youth, has to be effected by the use of certain charms, and these charms are fair words; and by them temperance is implanted in the soul, and where temperance is, there health is speedily imparted, not only to the head, but to the whole body. And he who taught me the cure and the charm at the same time added a special direction: 'Let no one,' he said, 'persuade you to cure the head, until he has first given you his soul to be cured by the charm. For this,' he said, 'is the great error of our day in the treatment of the human body, that physicians separate the soul from the body.' And he added with emphasis, at the same time making me swear to his words, 'Let no one, however rich, or noble, or fair, persuade you to give him the cure, without the charm.' Now I have sworn, and I must keep my oath, and therefore if you will allow me to apply the Thracian charm first to your soul, as the stranger directed, I will afterwards proceed to apply the cure to your head. But if not, I do not know what I am to do with you, my dear Charmides.
Sorry for the FIG burning. Some things are better left unsaid.
Dostoyevski, "Brothers Karamazov"
When the Inquisitor ceased speaking he waited some time for his Prisoner to answer him. His silence weighed down upon him. He saw that the Prisoner had listened intently all the time, looking gently in his face and evidently not wishing to reply. The old man longed for him to say something, however bitter and terrible. But He suddenly approached the old man in silence and softly kissed him on his bloodless aged lips. That was all his answer. The old man shuddered. His lips moved. He went to the door, opened it, and said to Him: 'Go, and come no more... come not at all, never, never!' And he let Him out into the dark alleys of the town. The Prisoner went away."
I don't know what a FIG burning is, but I know i've felt down since I read the part about chemo. I didn't know.
and I can't tell you how I feel about that here. I think you know. You're a good guy, FJ.
Well thanks, Z. I mentioned it merely to illustrate the point that I know what it's like to be given the "leaf" by those w/o knowledge of the proper "charms".
And other than some numbness in my feet and hands, I've been "fine" for two years now. And other than having gained an intimate acquaintance w/Thanatos, I'm all the 'better' for the experience. That which does not kill me makes me stronger (Nietzsche).
I 'rant' against the doctors... when I should 'kiss' them, I know. ;-)
But I do know the causes of depression and ADD and PTSD (amongst other) problems. And the answers are NOT pharmacalogical. The answer lies in applying the right "charms". Something even a primitive "witch doctor" could do (Freud, "Totem and Taboo"). But nobody believes Freud anymore. His theories have been completely discreditted by Popper, et al, as being unfalsifyable and therefore completely "un-scientific".
For of course, we ALL know that "science" has the answers for EVERYTHING *cough-cough* *blink-blink*
I agree with Abraham Lincoln, who was retroactively diagnosed as "a depressive personality" by modern "experts," when he said:
••• A man can be about as happy as he makes up his mind to be. •••
That's a "loose" quote, but he he did say something very like that.
Modern "psychology" is a COP OUT–––a denial of the absolute necessity of taking PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY for one's destiny, and the way one chooses to respond to stimulae.
"Psychiatry" has never provided a "cure" for ANYTHING. It is a poor substitute for proper religious training, proper parenting and the acquisition of consideration for others and self-control.
"Reality Therapy" is another matter. but "the poor little kid and his great big Id" have all-but undone us. The encouragement of extreme egocentrism or narcissism has had a disastrous effect on society.
~ FreeThinke
You know, FT? You have been REALLY blessed if you can say this about depression. I have never suffered from it but I have had exactly TWO 5 minute episodes where I thought I'd never be happy again, that NOTHING mattered, I felt utterly helpless and just plain DONE. Those two times scared me so much and gave me very healthy respect for those who suffer from severe depression.
Having said that, do I think a lot of people just feel they're supposed to be gleeful every single day and, if they're not, resort to Prozac? Sure. I'm sure that's true. Are we pumping with ritalin normal little boys who have high energy levels just so they'll not be bothersome? YOU BET. But, that's in the constant liberal attempt at weakening America, in my opinion.
True depression is debilitating and HORRID and my heart goes out to those who suffer from it.
And I do believe some psychiatry is beneficial, I've seen the effects. BUT, it is SO grossly abused today (the Left again) that it's probably fair to say our society would be far better off if we had hard physical work with which to work off stress, disappointments, etc. Sitting in on our a$$e$ typing our fingers to the bone and getting more and more depressed and anxious from the truth we're reading about our country these days is NOT helpful!
Just keep thanking God we don't suffer from real depression.....when chemicals/drugs work for those patients, we should know then this isn't imaginary. no?
FJ; I'll just say again, you are one heck of a good guy. blessings. z
"Psychiatry" has never provided a "cure" for ANYTHING.
You are mistaken, FT.
Neural processes have become very well known. If I may recommend some reading, Neurophilosophy by Patricia Churchland is a very good basic primer on the current state of knowledge regarding the operation and functioning of the human mind. Ms. Churchland is a '91 MacArthur Genius Grant Prize winner.
Neurochemistry is becoming more and more sophisticated every day. The problem I have with it, is that it does not cure. It "drowns" the patient's brain in chemicals from which it suffers only a "local" deficiency. And there are ways of creating and then strengthening neuronal pathways "around" these local problems. But this requires the patient to think "associated" thoughts and "transfer energy" properly so that axon myelination occurs and energy transference can be made more efficiently.
btw - Lincoln took "mercury" as a cure for his depression. Mercury is VERY destructive to Myelin (and therefore brain functioning). Again, this is medical science practiced at its' worst...
ps - Don't believe a word from the Freud skeptics about him "not curing" his patients... especially the so-called "confession to Fleiss". I read ALL his correspondence w/Fleiss and his words have been both de-constructed and de-contextualized.
A thinker named Sigmund Freud
Whose thoughts can't by me be enjeud
Said, "I've found, I confess,
Mankind's mind is a mess,
And would be better off unempleud.
FT
Post a Comment