Fork me on GitHub
#spirituality-ethics
<
2016-07-01
>
zcaudate00:07:35

3:15: “What was that? … An exhibition?…. We need emotional content. Try again."

zcaudate00:07:50

3:30: “I said emotional content. Not Anger. Try again."

tjg07:07:34

@zcaudate: What you discuss reminds me of something I found useful:

tjg07:07:35

> The idea that alienation is a bad thing is a modernist problem. Most philosophical movements—and, by extension, social movements—actually embrace alienation. You’re trying to achieve a state of alienation. That’s the ideal if you’re a Buddhist or an early Christian, for example; alienation is a sign that you understand something about the reality of the world. > > So perhaps what’s new with modernity is that people feel they shouldn’t be alienated. Colin Campbell wrote a book called The Romantic Ethic and the Spirit of Modern Consumerism [1987], in which he argued that modernity has introduced a genuinely new form of hedonism. Hedonism is no longer just getting the sex, drugs, and rock ’n’ roll or whatever but it’s become a matter of selling new fantasies so that you’re always imagining the thing you want. The object of desire is just an excuse, a pretext, and that’s why you’re always disappointed when you get it. > > Campbell’s argument makes total sense when you first read it. But in fact, again, it’s backward. If you look at history—at, say, medieval theories of desire—it’s utterly assumed that what you desire is— > > MK: God. > > DG: Or courtly love, yes. But whatever it ultimately is, the idea that by seizing the object of your desire you would resolve the issue was actually considered a symptom of melancholia. The fantasies themselves are the realization of desire. So by that logic, what Campbell describes is not a new idea. What’s actually new is the notion that you should be able to resolve desire by attaining the object. Perhaps what’s new is the fact that we think there’s something wrong with alienation, not that we experience it. By most medieval perspectives, our entire civilization is thus really a form of clinical depression. [laughter] https://libcom.org/library/another-world-michelle-kuo-talks-david-graeber

borkdude10:07:22

Today marks my first day as an independent Clojure programmer. It feels good! Despite all the discussion I followed about static/dynamic/NPE Clojure still remains my spirit language 😛

robert-stuttaford10:07:34

congrats, borkdude !

zcaudate11:07:32

congrates mate 😃

zcaudate11:07:58

what does independence mean for you?

zcaudate11:07:13

@tjg: alienation is probably not the best word to describe the state of mind that we're after but I totally get the gist of the critique. In sanskrit, the word sannyas is used to dignify a person who has ‘mastered their senses’ so to speak and it’s about being ’in this world but not of it'. I feel that the modern world is only ‘modern’ because we have reject the past as antiquated… and this is the driving factor towards our downfall.

borkdude11:07:40

@zcaudate: that I can work from home, manage my own time and energy

borkdude11:07:52

@zcaudate: and choose for who I want to work for

dominicm11:07:41

@borkdude: So you've gone freelance, more or less?

borkdude11:07:57

Also it means I have to get an accountant 🙂

dominicm12:07:05

@borkdude: Awesome 🙂. Oh man! A good accountant will save you money, that's the important thing to remember.

tjg12:07:44

Cooool.. I remember you mentioned you did this before? So you don't have to go through all the initial adjustment pains?

borkdude12:07:12

Didn't go this route before. I have written quite some Clojure at my before-last job though

tjg12:07:32

Ah sorry, must've been remembering that.

zcaudate12:07:09

@borkdude: so it’s full time independence/clojure?

zcaudate12:07:03

love it 😃