#Aristotle and Substance

[omegaphilosophia]

The Ontology of Being

The ontology of being is a foundational topic in philosophy, focusing on the study of what it means "to be." It seeks to understand the nature, structure, and categories of existence. Questions about being explore what exists, what it means to exist, and how entities relate to one another within the framework of existence. Central to this inquiry is the differentiation between different modes or dimensions of being, such as material, conceptual, and existential.

Key Concepts:

Existence vs. Essence:

Existence refers to the fact that something is, while essence pertains to what something is.

This distinction is central to existentialist philosophy, as seen in the work of Sartre, who claimed "existence precedes essence."

Substance and Accidents:

Substance refers to what exists independently, while accidents are properties that depend on substances to exist.

This distinction originates from Aristotelian metaphysics.

Ontology and Being-in-the-World:

Heidegger's concept of Dasein (being-there) emphasizes that being is always situated in a specific context, interconnected with others and the world.

Modalities of Being:

Modalities include contingent, necessary, possible, and impossible modes of being, as explored in modal logic and metaphysics.

Categories of Being:

Classical ontology attempts to categorize beings (e.g., physical objects, ideas, emotions).

Modern approaches challenge rigid categories, emphasizing fluidity and relationality.

Relational Ontology:

This perspective sees being as defined by relationships rather than isolated essence.

Key Philosophical Approaches:

Parmenides and Heraclitus:

Parmenides focused on the unity and permanence of being, while Heraclitus emphasized change and becoming.

Aristotle:

Developed categories of being and the idea of potentiality and actuality.

Heidegger:

Reframed ontology through the lens of Dasein and existential questions, distinguishing between beings (Seiende) and Being (Sein).

Contemporary Ontology:

Explores pluralistic and non-essentialist approaches to being, including process philosophy, object-oriented ontology, and phenomenology.

Questions Explored in the Ontology of Being:

What does it mean for something to exist?

Are there different levels or kinds of being?

How does being relate to time, space, and consciousness?

Can being be understood independently of human perception or language?

The ontology of being remains a dynamic field that bridges metaphysics, epistemology, and existential inquiry, engaging with both timeless questions and contemporary challenges.

[the-crumbs-on-my-journal]

okay, sideblog for emo venting for maybe half a degree of anonymity, and like to not flood my main blog with this half coherent rambling.

i feel like i'm not good at being a person. i think immediately in the basic aristotelian terms i'm familiar with. what is a person's function? do i fulfill that function? but i dont mean in a moral sense. i think i am a pretty good person. i have a feeling most people think they are pretty good because they judge themselves by their own standards, and while that does apply to me because i am just another person and because of my awareness of my moral scrupulosity, i also think of how even the people around me emphasize to me the ways they think i am a good person. but i remind myself that i don't mean it in a moral sense. or maybe this is an extension of morality when interpreting aristotelian virtue ethics in this way. i guess i just have a reflex against that because of my established deconstruction against equating ability with morality. this is exactly my argument against my original thesis, for which i haven't even gotten around to explaining my justification, but i think maybe this whole chronologically backwards expository spells out enough of what that would look like, in a forensical way.

i'm not friendly-looking or inviting, i'm not even that comforting. i find it hard to say words of comfort to the people i care about. either i'm not sure i feel them strongly enough to mean anything to other people, or i can't find a way to say them without either miscommunication or making myself vulnerable to psychic attack. i am impatient, and i get snappy when i'm angry. i can see the light at the end of the tunnel now. i make a lot of mistakes even at work, and while i know it's their job to call me out, i feel so overwhelmed with shame after being recognized for my wrongdoings. i'm thinking i haven't fully deconstructed myself from catholicism.

that might be why i followed my thesis statement with evidence that disproves it--i actually believe the opposite, even if i forget that for a moment. my "being a good person" is not a trait that can be measured against criteria. because, which criteria? and why those, how do we know it is those, and not other criteria? and what does it even mean to reach or not reach those criteria? what happens to those people, or what do those people actually accomplish?

and if it is not something that can even be measured, then i don't think it is anything. i don't really buy into this idea of good people and bad people. i have the reflex that some liberal will say "what about hitler?" because in my experience that is the average american's kneejerk version of a litmus test for a moral imperative. but anyway, maybe in a way that actually reinforces this phenomenon rather than challenging or subverting it at all, i check for if i feel like my good faith response to that question would be "yes, this applies to hitler".

as is my nature my mind drags me back to a dreadful conversation in the elective debate club zoom call back in twenty-twenty-covid-nineteen, during which a classmate suggested her argument: hitler was a good leader. i and other classmates immediately tore into her use of "good" and its meaning. anyway, now i'm also thinking: if we all, as good liberal americans in the 21st century, can agree that hitler was a bad person (and i may really be taking this for granted), but apparently we're arguing whether or not he was a good leader, well that seems to mean that the qualities of the ideal leader are in conflict with the qualities of the ideal person. like in sims CAS, certain traits are definitionally opposite each other, so a sim cannot have both traits at the same time. the actual word is mutually exclusive, or a true dichotomy. if ideal leadership is exclusive to ideal personhood, then we must make a judgement as to which ideal to strive for, since, assuming we even are obligated to reaching ideals, and then i remember i actually pride myself on my aspiration toward mediocrity and contentment as opposed to flourishing, although now i'm not sure why exactly, we cannot reach two ideals which are mutually exclusive to each other at the same time, so we could never flourish. and then i'm realizing, i am the problem i need to solve. i need to change myself in order to be rid of my problem, which is things about myself which i can change.

i am in conflict with myself. do i have an obligation to resolve it? well, the conflict is that in one instance i seem to be in support of flourishing--of making a judgement about either pursuing ideal personhood or ideal leadership. in another instance, i seem to be in support of mediocrity--of failing to be convinced that judgements have any meaning or ought to have any impact on actions, when previously i argued vehemently against judging someone as a leader instead of as a person. i think that's it. wait, did i say that i don't think judgements mean anything? that doesn't seem like me, but i think this whole thing started because i don't even know me.

okay, i might be avoiding the question by ruminating in this way, but i don't know for sure because i don't want to spend another second on it. was i ever really ruminating?

it just matters that i want to be here. i can't deny someone else the right to be here if they do or don't measure up to some criteria. criteria i cannot spend enough time deliberating on. criteria that, even if i were passionate about them, wouldn't really mean anything because i alone can't enforce them on others, not that i have an interest in enforcing things upon other people anyway. so i think the whole idea of criteria falls completely apart here. i can't figure them out, and at no cost do i wanna figure them out. so why have them if you spend more time figuring them out than abiding by them? it just matters that i want to be here, so i'm gonna do what it takes to be here even if it gets hard. that's one way to argue myself out of misguided nihilism.

[crumblinggothicarchitecture]

It's Bothering me so much that Taylor Swift is so fake smart-girl coded, I need to say this:

I have a degree in both Philosophy and English Literature....

She used the term Soliloquy wrong in her song by using it to refer to people espousing nonsense while complaining in an echo-chamber about her.

Instead, a soliloquy is the most honest and introspective a character will ever be. Often the character will stand to the front center of the stage and, as if in a dream, speak openly to themselves (and in respect to the audience) lay out the truth, or the agony of whichever conflict haunts the plot. So, anyway she's just plain wrong in her usage of the term.

I am not giving a sanctimonious soliloquy. Miss Taylor Swift, you are wrong, and I am speaking honestly.

She finishes the lyric "sanctimoniously performing soliloquies I'll never see" and I just want to mention that a soliloquy requires an audience... so she does not know what she is talking about by saying that there is no audience for a soliloquy.

Also, for the record, I don't think Taylor Swift knows anything of substance about Aristotle. I, on the other hand, took a three-hour long oral exam over Aristotle's life work while out-of-my-mind-high on Dayquil and pain meds after a surgery. I got an "A", and, somehow, I lived through that, I doubt the validity of Swift's claims to know anything at all about philosophy. Especially, considering how all her songs are about as deep as a puddle.

She's completely lost her credibility.

The woman did not even finish High School in a traditional, well-rounded way. I think she read a handful of Joe's books and now thinks real highly of herself.

Edit: I don't mean to make fun of her for being dumb. I'm frustrated that she's "stepping on my lawn" and making her legion of fans think that she totally knows what she's talking about when it comes to literary references in her work or philosophy. It's obvious that she does not actually understand the concepts she attempts to engage with.

Her only real literary skill is name dropping actually talented writers or philosophers in her songs.

Edit 2: Since some people want to come on this post and tell me that I am being needlessly pedantic about her use of words. Go away. A soliloquy is an ancient literary form, one which transcends cultures and centuries, and I, as a scholar of English Literature, am in the position to say that Swift is speaking about the form incorrectly. She obviously did not even google the form, it's clear she has very little real acquaintance with half the literature concept or authors she names drops.

Sure, soliloquies can be unreliable (Hamlet's "To Be, or not to be" is the most obvious example). However, the fact of the matter is that soliloquy hinges on the Honesty of the character. Swift writing that it's actually the opposite of honesty proves to me that she has no real idea about the literary form.

[togglesbloggle]

Voltaire's Prayer

“I have never made but one prayer to God, a very short one: Oh Lord, make my enemies ridiculous. And God granted it." -Volaire’s letter to Étienne Noël Damilaville, 16 May 1767

I’m inordinately fond of sex, in the political sense.  It’s saved us so often from the worst parts of ourselves.

As far as anti-authoritarian elements of the human experience go, sex is right up there with curiosity and the search for truth- maybe even more so.  When a new tyrant comes to town, shutting down the universities and the libraries is only the second thing they try.  The first thing is to regulate human sexuality to within an inch of its life.  Rules for marriage, rules for courtship, rules for which genitals may touch and where they may touch and when they may touch.  Rules for who and rules for whom.  Rules for which kinds of sex must doom characters in literature, rules for which things may be described as sexy, rules for which things may be described in a sexy way.

Of course they do!  If you’re trying to bind a large polity together under a common ideological narrative, to render people predictable enough to quash dissent and legible enough to exert power through them, the last thing you need is a bunch of folks running around being horny about stuff without permission.  Nature gifted us with a great capacity for reason and community; we have the innate opportunity to learn about ourselves and our neighbors, and to form complex societies based on that understanding.  It was Aristotle who first called us the political animal, and the fruits of that extraordinary capacity will always be within our reach, if only we can come together within a shared understanding.  The invention of the city is the great triumph of our species, and with it we conquer the universe.

But also this extraordinary, reasoning mind has been sculpted from the raw clay of a biology that’s anchored in sexual reproduction, and this ends up being very, very funny.

The problem isn’t so much that the sex instinct exists, per se.  It’s how it’s implemented.  Like most biological forms, the full complement of 86 billion(!) neurons in your brain aren’t encoded in a particular configuration; the brain is much too complex to be described so precisely in the only ~725 megabytes or so of human DNA.  The particular shape of your brain is in there somewhere- the lobes and subregions responsible for vision, memory, cognition, all that- but only up to a point.  The genius and fundamental limitation of genetics is that, below a certain level, the genes instead describe a process for the production and reproduction of specialized cells, and simply constructs them in such a way that they can be relied upon to order themselves as they go.

This is all well and good when we’re talking about kidneys and livers, but the fact that you can encode any kind of specific behavioral instinct in a brain this way is nothing short of a minor miracle.  Think about it!  Spiders don’t have a ‘spider web’ gene, the gene is for ‘proteins that come together in self-assembling electrochemically sensitive gelatin tissue which, when complete, encodes patterns that operate organ systems such as legs and spinnerets in such a way as to reliably create silk webs.’  This is absurdly impressive, and also completely insane.

What I’m getting at is, powerful behavioral instincts in a complex animal aren’t precise instruction manuals by which we pursue evolutionarily advantageous behaviors.  Sex and eros are prior to logic or language, let alone strategy.  Sex is a double-thick electrical wire discharging lightning bolts right through the middle of our cognitive centers, installed in the brain by a surgeon wearing mittens.  It’s an untethered firehose whipping chaotically through the cathedral, unpredictably spraying golden reliquaries with substances unmentionable.  It’s the first and greatest anarchist.

I really can’t overstate my gratitude for this.

Obviously this results in any number of deeply goofy outcomes by way of kinks and odd sexual practices- it gets tangled with pain centers, with random bits of anatomy and proprioception, with our taboos and aversions, with our greatest terrors or our greatest yearnings or just arbitrary stimuli from adolescence, and of course it gets enmeshed so often with our notions of power and submission.  It imbues these things with a fascination and potency out of all proportion with their mundane meanings.  And ultimately, you end up with human pleasures and human values that diverge so far from banal evolutionary imperatives as to be all but unrecognizable.

Even when this process somehow manages to propagate through the brain in such a way as to drive behaviors that are legibly aligned towards some adaptive constraint- e.g. heterosexual mating practices resulting in biological reproduction and careful childrearing- it’s still madness.  Love and sex penetrate deeply across tribal and national and racial boundaries, across economic interests, across battle-lines and enmities.  We become traitors, apostates, emigrants, and artists.  Declare a law, and in short order some hot-headed young people come along to break it in the name of sexual passions you could not possibly have seen coming.  Divide your neighborhood into us and them, and by the time the ink is dry on your proclamation there will be a forbidden relationship across the fence.  There is no social order, no ethical system, no theory of human nature that can entirely withstand contact with the full spectrum of human sexuality, because sex and eros are always going to be exactly as bonkers as the complexity of the human mind and culture will allow, plus a little extra just to be sure.

This isn’t always a delight, of course.  Many prohibitions exist for a very good reason, and the chaos of human sexuality makes no exemptions for true evil.  Some of us end up really, truly victims of this process.  But for all the dangers, the chaos at the root of all this isn’t oriented towards evil.  Chaos just means chaos, essentially arbitrary and hence absurd in character.

And in the grand analysis, we are so lucky to have this thing moving through our communities, this ridiculous madness that guarantees that there will be cracks in every wall and slips exploding cigars in the pockets of the powerful few.  Not in everybody as individuals, of course, and not everybody the same amount; asexuality is certainly one of the outcomes that all this mad gallivanting through our brains can produce.  Sexuality would never be so predictable as to guarantee its own existence, after all.  That’s part of what makes the joke so funny.

But all of us, regardless of sexuality, get to live in a world where the grand anarchy of sex is constantly driving home this lesson that no category is inviolate and no law is perfect.  That we should not and cannot take ourselves too seriously, or forget that we’re animals.  That we don’t exist only for the sake of others, or within their understanding.  That cities are made of cooperation, grace, and forbearance- not conformity or mere compliance.

People sometimes worry about immortality.  In the political sense, I mean.  They worry about eternal dictatorships and unconquerable gerontocracies.  This fear isn’t entirely unjustified; death has often played a role in progress and liberation.  But as long as enough of us are still getting horny without permission, still falling in love in stupid ways, I think we’ll be okay.  Romeo and Juliet don’t have to die at the end to make a difference in the world, as long as they’re brave enough to get weird with it.

[inanaincarneetinsidus]

Purva Ashada, the power to invigorate

In the heart of the Sagittarius, Purva Ashada “the former invincible one” is the 20th nakshatra. Number that reflects the complete, all embracing and triumphant nature of the feminine. 2 is the goddess, the vesica piscis from which emerges the Yoni. 0 is completion, concealment of all endless and infinite possibilities of creation.

The deity of Purva Asada is Apas, goddess of Water, giving the nakshatra another name “Aparajita”.

Apas and Aphrodite have the same root and exist in the same watery context as the latter was born from the cutting of Uranus genitals, in the middle of the foaming ocean.

Purva Ashada as the last Venus ruled nakshatra and the pinnacle of Venusian energy, exposes the refined mysteries of the planet.

Venus comes from the latin Vincire “To bind, To Chain” Venus is the force that binds together. As her power beauty exercise magnetism, pulling in with the power of suggestion.

Venus is a cercle on top of a cross, the cross represents suppliance and being bound to earthly matters (Virgo) while the cercle on the top is harmonization and completion, in this symbolism lies the power of the Goddess as a beautiful woman, she is the one that make Earthly life enjoyable. As Kama Rupa, she is the vehicle of desires and passions. She invades the senses: tasting delicious foods, smelling exotic flowers, touching expensive materials, experiencing her immense charm and beauty that leads to love making which results in the downwards flow of spiritual energy keeping one bound to Earth.

Venus is the force of Attraction and in Purva Ashada, magnetism is at its peak. The handheld fan as one symbol of Purva Ashada perfectly illustrates the seduction that takes place in this asterism, Attraction is always maintained in the exchange by the covering of the face, creating a distance that sustains tension.

It’s in the fiery pit of Sagittarius that lies the watery Purva Ashada, While Apas is the cosmic ocean, her name signifies “yagna karma” which is sacrificial deeds as Sagittarius is the one that burns away the old by first finding the root (mula) before taking the journey to immortality. In Purva ashada, the former invincible one, Venus’s role as the elixir of immortality is evident, she is Aphrodite and Mohini in charge of the preparation of Ambrosia or Amrita, a liquid as Barbara G Walker describes it made up of her period blood and honey.

Opposite to Sagittarius sits Gemini, the first Mercurial sign which is the birth of Alchemy as Hermes is himself the father of the discipline, and the life-giving waters of Purva Ashada under Venus are the most sought-after key to everlasting life contained in the womb.

In Greek mythology, the gods were reliant on the “supernatural red wine” dispensed by Mother Hera in her virgin form as Hebe. Menstrual blood was regarded as the source of life:“Human life is made of a coagulum of period blood” by Aristotle and Pliny called Period blood the ‘material substance of generation’.

Here the shakti of Purva Ashada is revealed to invigorate means to ingest life (vigour), Venus in her pinnacle: Purva Ashada connects to the star in the tarot deck as she is the cosmic woman hydrating the soil with her cosmic waters. As the star she has already reached immortality, sitting in the dark cushion of space sparkling, she allows men who drinks from her to reach her stage of Goddess.

Songs that encapsulate the nature of Venus in Purva Ashada:

- The Chain by Fleetwood Mac with Stevie Nicks who is Purva Ashada moon

-Bootylicious by Destiny's Childs again Stevie Nicks made the riff

-I feel love, Donna Summers

[literaryvein-reblogs]

Another List of Words related to Mythology

to include in your next poem/story

Archē - First principle or origin of things that exist. The Ionian philosophers posited a single element (water, air, fire) as the archē in the belief that everything was reducible to one substance.

Ataraxia - “Without perturbation, calmness.” Describes the Epicurean ideal of happiness: freedom from pain in the body and in the soul.

Cynicism, philosophical - Not a school, but a loosely organized sect. Most famous exponent was Diogenes of Sinope (ca. 400– ca. 325 BCE), who preached that happiness attained by limiting desires to the most basic needs. Ideal of life is attainment of self- sufficiency (autarkeia).

Elysian Fields/ Elysium - Abode of dead heroes and righteous souls. Set in Homer’s Odyssey 4 at the edge of Ocean; in Vergil’s Aeneid 6 it was incorporated into Hades as a separate part. Also equated with the Isles or Isle of the Blest.

Golden Bough - In mythology, a branch with golden leaves needed to gain entrance to the underworld.

Hubris - “Insolence, arrogance.” Used in situations in which a person of humble station insults a superior or, more often, when a mortal commits affrontery against a god.

Nous - “Mind.” Begins and directs the cosmic whirl in the cosmology of Anaxagoras, though not identified with god. For both Plato and Aristotle, the rational part of the soul.

Sophist - Private teachers in Athens in the 5th century BCE. They taught mainly rhetoric and techniques of argument to students preparing for public life; reputed for questioning traditional values, myths, and religious beliefs and for promoting relativism.

Theion, (to) - “The divine”; a quality that belongs to both gods and exceptional mortals.

Theomachia - A battle among the gods.

From "The Anatomy of Myth: The Art of Interpretation from the Presocratics to the Church Fathers" by Michael Herren

More: Words related to Mythology ⚜ Word Lists

[cryptotheism]

do you find it important to distinguish between masculine and feminine energies (e.g. like in tarot decks, some ritual magic, etc) in practice? as a baby occultist im finding that it seems like 'woman' and 'man' are more so symbolic associations corresponding to the archetypal traits of each, and its got me wondering if it might be compelling to take an alternate approach to that kind of imagery. like literally just talking about the subconscious vs. conscious, intuition vs. action, etc in more literal terms when that's what's being discussed fundamentally. but i also know that i don't have the background to fully parse why those associations and energies being labeled in that way is important (or if it even is or just arbitrary), so ...

Okok this is something a lot of people interested in Esotericism hit so ill do my best to explain:

In an Esoteric context, Male and Female quite literally does not refer to gender. It comes from Aristotle, and it refers to what we would now call chemical reactivity.

If two substances don't react together, it's because they're the same Gender. If two substances react to create a third substance, it's because they're opposite Gender.

The point of this being that a binary is an opportunity. Your goal should be to seek out binaries, specifically to transcend them.

[talonabraxas]

Dodecahedron on Sirius Talon Abraxas Ether: The Dodecahedron Light Illuminating the Noosphere

Now, the time has come to bring brightness to man. I am Aether and I declare this to be done. As ordered by the personification of the upper air, Let There Be Light!” — Aether.

For thousands of years, a mysterious luminous substance known as “aether” (or “ether”) was one of the most researched and sought elements in the esoteric worlds of philosophy, alchemy, magic, and science. Many of the world’s greatest thinkers, such as Plato, Aristotle, Descartes, Newton, Einstein, and Tesla, have all written and or debated about its existence.

According to the Ancient Greeks, aether (Greek αἰθήρ, aithēr), also spelled ether, is the fifth element that fills the region of the universe above the terrestrial sphere and is distinct from the other four elements (Platonic Solids), Earth, Water, Air, and Fire.

Its Platonic solid is the dodecahedron.

[jeannereames]

hi, I've been doing some reading up on Cassander and went through your tags as well. I've seen a few mentions of Cassander being more 'frail', some claiming that he was sickly as a child or through his whole life, some mention that he had some chronic illness (I think one claimed it might have been tuberculosis, but we will likely never know). there's also the matter of him apparently never having passed his manhood test of killing a boar on his own so he couldn't recline at dinner around his father even into his adulthood. I suspect that might have played into him not joining Alexander's campaign, maybe even contributed to Antipater not appointing him his successor? (since all the other successors of Alexander were his generals in his Asian conquest, so Cassander would've been at a significant disadvantage) how much do we actually know about this topic? especially from ancient sources? are these observations even right or am I (and the stuff I found on him) completely off? I've not read everything from the ancient stuff since a lot of it isn't translated into a language I'm comfortable reading, so I might be missing something

Kassandros

First, I’ll admit I’m no specialist on Kassandros or his reign. But I’m unaware of Kassandros having any health issues. There are other reasons he didn’t go with Alexander—namely that his father needed him at home, while he acted as regent. The family would have had their own (quite extensive) lands that somebody needed to oversee while Antipatros was busy.

Something we often forget: Alexander took with him only about half the available army/troops, when he left. Antipatros needed the rest to defend the homeland. And while Alexander did send several missions back home to scare up new troops (once while he was in western Asia, another after Gaugamela, yet another from somewhere out in Baktria, and again once he returned from India), this was to raise NEW troops, not necessarily to take troops Antipatros needed, although Antipatros may have recruited and been training them. And while it appears that quite a few sets of brothers/cousins served in ATG’s army, we’re told so very little, we must assume they were probably not the only male members of their families. Fathers, uncles, cousins, younger brothers may well have been back in Macedonia, seeing to the farm/estate.

It doesn’t seem that any of Antipatros’s sons went with ATG, at least not until near the end when young Iolaos showed up and was given the honorary position of “cub bearer.” It wound up being fodder for an invented story that Antipatros, w/ help from Aristotle, poisoned ATG. That was part of the propaganda against Antipatros during the Successor Wars. Supposedly, Iolaos brought the poisoned water in the hollowed-out hoof of a horse because it was the only substance the poison wouldn’t affect. (!?!) This is pretty much nonsense, but it shows how such stories could be deployed in the interest of this or that Successor, or against them.

Anyway, Iolaos was not in line to inherit or even act as Kassandros’s spare, so he could be spared (pun intended) to serve the king. Antipatros had a SHIT-ton of kids, probably from more than one wife, and quite a few were younger than ATG, even though Antipatros himself was older than both Philip and even Parmenion. But the upshot is, I don’t find it that odd for Kassandros not to go with Alexander. We must also note that Antipatros and Parmenion were political antagonists, if not outright enemies. So, with Parmenion and his family in the field with ATG, Antipatros might have preferred to keep his own sons close to his chest lest something “accidentally” (on purpose) happen to them.

The story of Kassandros not killing his boar and so still having to sit up at dinner into his 30s could be later slander from the Successor years. But it IS true that when Antipatros named his own regent/successor, it was the much older Polyperchon, not Kassandros. I’ve seen a few folks try to argue Kassandros simply wasn’t old enough (in his 30s?), but find it unconvincing. He was much older than Alexander when the latter took the throne. Rather, I think it’s evidence that, for whatever reason, Antipatros didn’t believe him capable. Kassandros seems to have viewed it as an insult too, because he got rid of/bribed off Polyperchon ASAP.

I’ll also add that, during the Successor Wars, nobody much seemed to want to ally with him—unlike his father who won the likes of Krateros himself as an ally.

So I suspect he was just a dick (and possibly a coward). I don’t know that there’s any medical reason for anything, or I suspect our sources might have mentioned it, at least when he came to the throne (much as they did with Arrhidaios).

[pinkheart22]

Taylor Swift's Purple Outfit is for "reputation taylors version" heres why:

THIS IS TYRIAN PURPLE - LOOKS LIKE HER OUTFIT COLOR. ITS WORTH ROUGHLY 66,000 ( 6 AS IN TS6 REPUTATION )

TYRIAN PURPLE IS A LOST ANCIENT PIGMENT ( LIKE REPUTATION IS A LOST ALBUM TO HER / SHE LEFT THE SPOTLIGHT DURING REPUTATION AND BASICALLY SHE WAS LOST TO THE PUBLIC EYE ) AND MORE VALUABLE THAN GOLD ( TAYLOR REFERENCES GOLD A LOT IN REPUTATION AND HER SONGS )

( PLUS TYRIAN PURPLE WAS ALSO KNOW TO BE USED TO MAKE A DEEP BLUE COLOR "DEEP BLUE BUT YOU PAINTED ME GOLDEN" - DANCING WITH OUR HANDS TIED

PURPLE IS OFTEN USED IN PLACE OF BLACK IN COMIC BOOKS AND ANIMATIONS( REPUTATION IS THE BLACK HEART ALBUM )

PURPLES VALUE IS EXACTLY HALFWAY BETWEEN RED AND BLUE ( 1989 AND RED ) AND HALF WAY BETWEEN WHITE AND BLACK ( REPUTATION )

EDIT: ON THE ERAS TOUR IT'S RED SET, 1 SPEAK NOW SONG, REPUTATION, THEN 1989. IT'S LITERALLY BETWEEN RED AND 1989

THE COLOR COMPOUND OF TYRIAN PURPLE IS 6.6 ( 6 as in REPUTATION )

THE COLOR SHIFTS OF THE DYE ARE FROM BLUE, YELLOW, ORAGNE, REDDISH PURPLE (PINK) AND GREEN, PURPLE - THE COLORS OF THE 1989 TV SET ON THE ERAS TOUR - + THE PURPLE COLOR GETS MORE INTENSE AS THE CLOTH AGES ( LIKE HOW TAYLOR HAS GOTTEN OLDER / HOW LONG THE ALBUM REPUTATION HAS BEEN LOST PURPLE HAS BECOME MORE VIBRANT) + PURPLE WOULD BE CONSIDERED THE 6TH SET CAUSE THE REST MATCH WITH 1989 TV SONG "SLUT" AQUAMARINE GREEN, TANGERINE NEON LIGHT, 1989 BLUE, FLAMINGO PINK AND SUNRISE BOULEVARD. PURPLE ISNT IN THE SONG.

ARISTOTLE WROTE ABOUT TYRIAN PIRPLE AND HOW IT WAS OBTAINED AND PRODUCED - WE KNOW TAYLOR KNOWS ARISTOTLE - FROM THE SONG SO HIGH SCHOOL

THE SNAIL THAT CREATES TYRIAN PURPLE SECRETS THE SUBSTANCE WHEN ATTACKED BY PREDATORS OR ANTAGONIZED BY HUMANS - THIS WAS WHAT HAPPENED TO TAYLOR DURING THE REPUTATION ERA

REPUTATION ERA USED A LOT OF PURPLE LIKE THE LIGHTS AT POP UPS

AND ON HER ACTUAL REPUTATION TOUR STAGE

AND PURPLE MERCH DURING THE REP ERA - LIKE THIS PURPLE SNAKE RING

EDIT: Tyrian purple was paraded by the most privileged in society for millennia – a symbol of strength, sovereignty and money. Ancient authors are particular about the precise hue that was worthy of the name: a deep reddish-purple, like that of coagulated blood, tinged with black. SOME TYRIAN PURPLES WERE TINGED WITH BLACK!

EDIT: TYRIAN PURPLE AND PURPLE IN GENERAL IS ASSOCIATED WITH ROYALTY AND POWER : REPUTATION RESEMBLES THIS

SHE SITS ON A THRONE IN LOOK WHAT YOU MADE ME DO

THEY TOOK THE CROWN BUT ITS ALRIGHT - CALL IT WHAT YOU WANT

I DON'T LIKE YOUR KINGDOM KEYS THEY ONCE BELONGED TO ME - LOOK WHAT YOU MADE ME DO

AND WE RULE THIS KINGDOM INSIDE MY ROOM -KOMH

KING OF MY HEART, BODY AND SOUL -KOMH

I'M YOUR AMERICAN QUEEN -KOMH

MY CASTLE CRUMBLED OVERNIGHT -CIWYW

DRAMA QUEENS TAKING SWINGS, JOKERS DRESSING UP AS KINGS - CIWYW

ALSO SHE WROTE REPUTATION WHILE WATCHING GAME OF THRONES

S4E2 OF GOT (WHICH CONVENIENTLY 4+2 = 6 ) IS CALLED THE PURPLE WEDDING (SPOILER) - WHERE JOFFREY DIES BY POISON - THE POISON USED TO KILL JOFFREY IS SMUGGLED IN THE DEEP PURPLE AMETHYSTS AND THE KING DRINKS THE WINE - ITS DESCRIBED AS DARK RED THEN PURPLE - LIKE THE TYRIAN PURPLE COLOR ( FUNNILY ENOUGH A CHARACTER NAMED TYRION HANDS JOFFREY THE GOBLET. TYRION LIKE TYRIAN PURPLE )

TAYLOR BASICALLY IS THE KING AND DRANK THE POISON. "SHE CAN'T COME TO THE PHONE RIGHT NOW, CAUSE SHE'S DEAD" BECAUSE OF ALL THE DRAMA THAT WENT DOWN. SHE DRANK THE PURPLE POISON.

SHE'S ALSO WEARING A LION PENDANT ON THE 1989 TV SET ON THE ERAS TOUR. THE EPISODE TITLE OF GAME OF THRONES PURPLE WEDDING IS "THE LION AND THE ROSE"

AND HE WHO MUST NOT BE NAMED SENT HER ROSES.

DO YOU THINK TAYLORS 1989 TV PURPLE SET ON THE ERAS TOUR IS IN REFERENCE TO REPUTATION TAYLORS VERSION - LET ME KNOW :)

PLEASE USE ME AS REFERENCE IF YOU TALK ABOUT THIS THEORY. I WORKED REALLY HARD ON IT. THANK YOU. I WOULD APPRECIATE IT :) XXX

POSTED: AUGUST 4, 2024

@taylorswift @taylornation

[omegaphilosophia]

The Ontology of Things

Ontology, the study of being and existence, seeks to define what it means for something to be. When applied to "things," ontology explores what constitutes an object, how things exist, and what differentiates one entity from another. This question has been central to philosophy, science, and metaphysics for centuries.

1. What Defines a "Thing"?

A "thing" can be a material object, a concept, or even an event.

Classical metaphysics (Aristotle, Kant) often distinguished between substances (independent entities) and properties (qualities that describe substances).

Modern debates question whether "things" exist independently or are merely human-imposed constructs.

2. The Physical and Conceptual Aspects of Things

Realism argues that things exist independently of perception (e.g., a tree exists whether or not we see it).

Nominalism suggests that things are just names we assign to collections of properties, without intrinsic existence.

Process ontology views things not as static objects but as dynamic events in a constant state of becoming.

3. The Boundaries of a Thing

How do we define where one thing ends and another begins?

A chair is clearly a thing, but what about a wave in the ocean? Is it a separate entity, or part of a greater system?

This leads to questions of identity over time—if a thing changes (e.g., a ship that has every plank replaced), is it still the same thing? (See: Ship of Theseus Paradox).

4. Digital and Virtual Things

The modern world introduces virtual objects, such as digital files and cryptocurrencies.

Are these "real things," or do they exist only as information?

Some argue that virtual things have functional reality—they impact the world despite lacking physical substance.

5. Things and Human Perception

Do things have meaning outside of human perception?

The philosophy of phenomenology (Husserl, Heidegger) suggests that things only appear to us through experience.

Some traditions, like Buddhism, argue that all things are interconnected and lack an independent, fixed identity.

Conclusion

The ontology of things reveals deep questions about the nature of reality. Are things defined by their physical existence, their properties, or how we interact with them? As technology advances and the world becomes more digital, the definition of "things" continues to evolve. Understanding their ontology helps us navigate both the material and conceptual landscapes of existence.

[crumblinggothicarchitecture]

I read your fake smart-girl coded Taylor Swift post. Ended up on my feed because it was tagged philosophy. It was long enough that I caught a few words and actually read it. Honestly thought it was satire until I read your answers to other people.

I do not care about TS. But I do care about philosophy. You have a degree in it ? Funny, I have one too. You've read Aristotle ? I did too. But did you read though ? Did you really get into philosophy, and heard what the people you, I'm sure, can quote really well, actually said ? Because what it looks like, is that you got a degree in philosophy, but did not get philosophy at all. What makes me say that ? Your attitude, and that paragraph :

"Also, for the record, I don't think Taylor Swift knows anything of substance about Aristotle. I, on the other hand, took a three-hour long oral exam over Aristotle's life work while out-of-my-mind-high on Dayquil and pain meds after a surgery. I got an "A", and, somehow, I lived through that, I doubt the validity of Swift's claims to know anything at all about philosophy. Especially, considering how all her songs are about as deep as a puddle. "

Sounds like you're here to show off, and to make yourself look like something, without having a clue what it means to have the inclination of a philosopher. Or you know what it means, and you've lost it somewhere along the way.

If you've studied philosophy, and actually took time to read and understand the words of philosophers, you know not one of them would condone your attitude, the way you use their names, the way you're making your arguments. Having an A for an exam on Aristotle does not guarantee that you'll be able to make good arguments for the rest of your life. Nor does it guarantee that you understand his work, or are good at philosophy. It just means that, at one point, on a very specific part of Aristotle's work, you had enough knowledge to be rewarded with a good mark. It stops there. It does not mean anything else. Even if it was for your master's thesis. Sure, you know more than TS about philosophy and she fakes knowledge in her songd, but is showing off your grade and putting yourself as the center point of your argumentation the best way to convey that message ? No. You're trying to put her down by putting yourself above others. To anyone with a sense of philosophy, it just looks like you're a student who never understood the works he/she read, and focused on grades and others' approbation instead.

You care about your degree ? Re-read the books and make use of your ability to understand them. Not as a way to show off, but as a way to lean into the attitude a philosopher might have.

You write posts using philosophy ? Make it palatable to others, and show its uses. Be humble. Same thing for literature. The people whose books you read, they want knowledge to be spread. Studying philosophy should have, at the very least, helped you see that. The degree you got is here to push you to continue doing what all previous philosophers and writers did before you got to read them. Otherwise, your degree serves no purpose, other than satisfying your ego. At least, that's how it looks in that post.

Anyway, it'd just be nicer if you used your degree to show the benefits of philosophy, rather than to stroke your ego. Think about Socrates for a while. He asks questions, he makes simple arguments, he rarely talks about himself, he wants others to learn. That's the idea. Not showing off. Not being an ass to a girl you've never met. But being open for discussion, and make sound arguments, for others as well as yourself. What was the point of you fixating on the misuse of 'soliloquy' ? What did it bring to others ? And your anger towards TS, why ? Why write a whole post about it, shove it in her fans' face, what's the point ? Did anyone get anything positive from that ? And why bring your degrees and grades into the mix ? Anyone can make an informed and sound argument, even without a degree. What did it give you to say all those things ?

Fyi, I was taught philosophy in France. I know people in America and the likes get taught philosophy differently than how its done here. Wouldn't be surprised if there was a cultural difference in the way we understand the discipline. I've got a master's degree in the subject, and six years of study under my belt, if that matters to you. Was top of my class also. And I've lived with a philosophy teacher for eight years, too. In case you try saying I have no place speaking about philosophy the way I do.

There is barely anyone who gives a damn about philosophy. You're one of the few who cared about it enoigh to study it. Make good use of your degree, and don't be an ass to others.

Let me give you a piece of my mind, because, honestly, my dear friend, what are you doing? 

Is this some kind of moral flex in which you prove to be the better person because you’ve never implied that there’s no way a certain person knows anything about Aristotle? You want to seem like the better person, because I took one single cheap-shot at Taylor Swift’s intelligence amid a full literary explanation as to why she is using a specific term wrong? Are you joking? You want to call into question my entire education? Because I said Taylor Swift is not as “deep-thinking” as she claims? Okay, yeah... you’re right I guess that makes my entire education invalid. My bad. I’ll go rip up my degrees.  

First of all, let’s address your arrogance. You write, “Sounds like you are trying to show off, and to make yourself look like something, without having a clue what to means to have an inclination as a philosopher” (para.4) in response to me saying Taylor Swift probably doesn’t know anything about Aristotle. Yeah, obviously that line is a quick jab at Taylor Swift. So, what? Am I writing an essay? No. Am I writing a journal article? No. Am I writing to a conference committee with a submission of my finest work? NOpe. I’m saying that I would bet money that I know more about Aristotle while suffering the effects of surgery-induced delirium. It’s not that deep. It’s not meant to be a deep, philosophical take on the nature of Taylor Swift’s work. I’m throwing a metaphorical tomato at her, while yelling “boooo.” So, what? You say, “Play nice.” No. Taylor Swift is not my student, nor my friend. I, thus, have no obligation to try to teach, guide, or help Taylor Swift understand anything. I’m not her philosophy teacher, and, you know what, I don’t think she cares about philosophy at all. You know why she name-dropped Aristotle? It rhymes with “full-throttle” and “Grand Theft Auto” (Swift “So High School”). I’m laughing at her so-called poetical lyricism. In the same breath, I’m judging her for relegating Aristotle to a cheap throw-away line in a dumb pop-song in which she sings about how her football boyfriend makes her feel like she’s 16 again. It’s so mind-numbing.

I’m sad. It’s not anger that compels me, but sadness and disappointment. I’ve been a fan for nearly 15 years and my original post came from lamentations about outgrowing an artist I once respected.  Granted, I might have been angry while writing that post (sue me about it).  

 I do respect Taylor Swift’s work enough to criticize it, however, do not twist my words to mean that as an attack on her personally. I do not wish harm to other human beings, yet it is worth noting that I talk in many other posts about my disgust towards her immoral actions. Even still, most of my posts about Taylor Swift are linguistic or literary criticisms meant to help me process this absolute let-down of an album. I’m also just practicing my literary criticism abilities (I start Grad School in like 2 months, so I’m trying to keep my skills sharp). It’s all low-stakes.  And, you’re mad at me? You think I’m being mean? Why? You think that I’m “being an ass to a girl [I’ve] never met”? (para. 8). Taylor Swift is not a girl, first of all, she is older than me and I’m a grown woman. She is way richer, and way more powerful too. What is your point? 

Let’s talk about the next line in question: “What is the point of you fixating on the misuse of ‘soliloquy’? What did it bring to others?” I’m fixating on the term soliloquy because Taylor Swift has been using this faux literary/ dark academia aesthetic to sell her records for years now. She’s wears “my coat” (if you catch my meaning). She’s using my real-life study as a way to sell shoddy, sloppy records. I’m going to call that out. Despite her using all the aesthetics of academia, she’s not intelligent enough to even just use the term soliloquy correctly. I noticed it right away, and so did many others. If she can’t even get small details correct about literature, why should I believe that she even knows anything about literature at all? It destroys her creditability. I’ve taught students the term ‘soliloquy” as high school kids. It’s not too much to ask for the biggest pop star in the world, and someone who claims the title of “good” writer, to teach herself what a soliloquy actually is before using it in a song just because it sounds similar to “sanctimonious.” If it’s wrong, she’s just wrong. She could have hired an editor. Now, I won’t go into the context of the line here, too much, but the whole line is her calling her audience a bunch of sanctimonious morons who are talking to themselves. (Is Taylor Swift playing nice enough for you? I wonder....)  

Let’s move on. 

Now, let’s talk about your concept of “inclination of a philosopher.” 

You are correct in saying that often teaching Philosophy varies remarkably from country to country. I was weaned on the analytic philosophy, whereas I believe the French are more continental. (Correct me if I am wrong.) So, the effect of this is that I am obviously quite blunt and fond of Aristotelian logic. Who doesn’t love a good syllogism? A funky little linguistic proof? Yes? Still, I must remind you that I wasn’t really making an argumentative point about actual philosophy in relation to Taylor Swift.  

To the crux of the issue, however, I must say that I was actually showing the inclination of philosophy by correcting the intrinsic flaws of the songs I disliked so much. What is philosophy if not the spirit of seeking truth and wisdom? Critique and analyzing poetical works often tie directly into the philosophical field of aesthetics wherein the goal is true, fruitful, understanding on how literary devices and aesthetic representation actually function. If anything is also in effort of seeking truth, surely, you see that critique and correction is? And asking for better workmanship? I was only mad, because mining Taylor Swift work for aesthetic meaning is like searching for Gold in a parking lot. : (  

Next point: “to anyone with a sense of philosophy, it just looks like you’re a student who never understood the works they read, and focused on grades and others’ approbation instead.” 

First of all, this is rude. You don’t know me. You read my honest, brief anger, that I managed to condense into a couple lines in one single tumblr post, and that gives you the audacity to say I’m a bad student who sought grades above all else? Yeahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh................. Okay, tell me why I spent hours in study rooms and sent countless emails begging for guidance through things I didn’t understand. Tell me why, I’ve stood in front of people and blatantly admitted that I did not understand the readings. Learning takes time, and there is no shame in taking your time. Grades are just letters. What matters is how the strength of what you learn impacts how you act in life. I’ve learned my lessons with all the ferocity of a child falling down a hill and running back up it again. I know my own intentions, and you don’t. I mentioned my "A" in the post really just to lend credibility, through professorial authority (lol), to the fact that I think Taylor Swift is fake smart.

Next: SocRaTeS? You're Joking! What is he doing here?

In an eternal quest for my own understanding, I often returned to Socrates. Did you not see my profile picture? Socrates is my homeboy. If ever I get to choose how to die, I will die like Socrates. Willingly, and with a full-bodied credulity of my own philosophical stances.  

You say, “Think about Socrates for a while. He asks questions, he makes simple arguments.” First, he does not make simple arguments. Is it not a syllogism? He writes full dialectical structures. This is some of the most complex stuff I have ever read. Let’s talk about why: Over the centuries, we’ve come to call it the Socratic method. This method includes discursive questions meant to make people question not only others on their reality but to question the most internal mechanisms of the mind. It asks them to think about why we believe or hold the beliefs that we do. He, famously, likens it to a child's development in the womb. The questions are meant as an external way to engage with mechanistic development of thought itself- thus we untangle the dangerous thread of rhetoric internal to our own rational minds. It’s a type of meta-analysis of the self-more than it a simple game of question and answer. Like children from the womb, according to Socrates, we must develop our rational minds too. And, above all else, the Socratic method seeks truth.  

Socrates would approve of my literary criticism of Taylor Swift, because I am using it to seek a higher truth. And, in some way, I am inversely questioning my own reasons for seeking what I do. I enjoy poems for a reason. I like to ask myself why I like what I do, and what meaning it brings through my unique perspective. (Applied to others as well, I love to hear from others). I critique Taylor Swift not because I hate her, but because I want to engage with the aesthetic qualities of the material world that elevate my ability to empathize, to think, to engage, to feel the world around me. I love art. I love reading, I want people to write with intelligence. You know then, the soul-crushing feeling of realizing an artist is actually bad. She rhymed Aristotle with Grand Thef Auto... Socrates himself would shudder. Socrates would also recognize that aesthetic quality ought to undergo critique and beauty interrelates to moral value. He was of the belief, and I dare say I believe it too, that beauty, aesthetic beauty, can be likened to moral value through the identification of ways in which it reveals the truth of our very souls. To him engaging with aesthetics is one way in which to reach out and connect the metaphysical to the material, in such awe-inspiring ways.

Ever been moved to tears by a painting? I have, but the question is WHY? That is why I critique literature, poetry, art... music. Whatever I can get my hands on really. I really want to find out, WHY? why was I crying in the Art Gallery, right next to the ice cream shop and everything.

 You are perhaps right that I could make more of an effort to explain my points, and also the "moral of the story" or what I hope other people will take away from what I wrote. I’m only ever critical of something if I care enough to either love it or wish it was better so that I could love it. To be honest, I didn't think anyone would read my silly vent post about Taylor Swift, but here we are. I could do better. I usually save my real efforts for my published work, though.

And you, my dearest colleague, are apparently spineless. If your conviction on philosophy is that we must all be kind and precious to each other for fear of causing offense, then I think your career will sink like a rock. Socrates was mean as hell, though not spiteful or malicious. He was mean in the sense of asking people to take a good, long hard look in the mirror. I would ask Taylor Swift to look in the mirror too, but she has a whole song about how she’s not going to do that (Anti-Hero). As you see, I hope that I am not spiteful either. But I do want people to be better and make better art. Socrates would say the same. I say what I say and I mean it. Because I am desperate for something true and beautiful and real. There is no one on earth above reproach. There is no school of philosophy which suggests passivity is tantamount to intelligence. I will not be passive.  

You say: “Make it palatable to others. Be humble” 

How’s this for palatable: No <3. Why diminish myself? Why should I obfuscate and dance around my own hard-won intellectual skill? Why should I dumb it down? It is not egotistical of me to use my own skillset. Does a doctor not save lives? Do they apologize for using their skills? Does a mechanic not do the same? Does the poet not also do the same? What of the critic?  

I can be humble, though. Humility is being self-aware enough to recognize that some might have a skillset more advanced than your own. I seek guidance and consistently challenge myself in academic endeavors. I can recognize the authority others have just as well as I can recognize my own authority. I will not, however, shrink down because you think I’m being too know-it-all-y.  

Humility does not require that I speak only when choking back apologies for the audacity I have to speak. I am not sorry. I spent the last 6 years of my life working on two degrees while working 3 jobs. It was hard. I’m proud of myself. If someone feels upset that I speak about the field of study I have fought to participate in, well, I genuinely don’t know what to tell them. Intellect is not a threat (to most). I would say, “if you have a question, ask it.” I actually am very friendly despite my sharp tongue. I am a teacher to my bones <3 and I love my job.  

Anyway, if I missed any of your points, misrepresented them, or offended you greatly- my inbox is always open. And I love a good, well-structured argument. However, next time can we talk about actual philosophy instead of you just attacking my character, thanks. <3 Obviously, I took offense. I think you meant to offend me though, for whatever reason. Really, I did go back and crack open a few books to write this, double check some things, so thank you.

Did you get your graduate degree in America? Would love to know. I am planning on getting another Master’s after I am done with this first one. I want to study aesthetics ( LOL).  

Ps. Why can’t people show off? I love when people have a talent that they aren’t afraid to share.

[bimboficationblues]

what would you put on a political theory syllabus if you could

like an intro/survey course? so the conventional theory class in Anglo-American poli-phil goes roughly like this: Plato/Aristotle -> Machiavelli (if you fuck nasty) -> Hobbes/Locke/Rousseau -> J.S. Mill -> Marx (sometimes, and only with the disclaimer that this guy needs to lighten up!) -> omission of like 120 years of global thought, including the shifts wrought by two World Wars, postcolonialism, and 1968 -> Rawls. there's usually, but not consistently, some idiosyncratic liberal picks from the various omitted periods/regions based on whatever the academic in question is preoccupied with, or attempts (sometimes sincere, sometimes half-hearted) to add some diversity to the lineup, most typically some form of liberal-leaning writings on feminism or racism or occasionally postcolonialism.

I think this abridged history is like, okay but not great (Charles Mills' Decolonizing Political Philosophy is a great piece on why). it’s produced by a combination of both the discipline's narrow post-Rawls liberal paradigm, and the constraints of intro/survey courses, which aim for breadth rather than depth (which I think is generally reasonable at least on its face), so the trick I would want to pull off is making something that works within the latter constraint while not succumbing to the paradigm.

the question sort of demands interrogating what a theory class is for in the ideal sense, what it uniquely can offer (so, going beyond specific skills that can be developed in other ways, like learning to write, understand, critique, and respond to long-form argument, or the more cynical pipeline-to-labor stuff like credentialing).

I think some main goals would be 1) contextualizing your existence in the world as a political subject, 2) be able to pass an ideological Turing test, i.e. accurately represent the substance of different perspectives and worldviews such that you could "pass" for the authentic thing [so I would include writers/writings that I detest for KYE reasons], 3) increase your autonomy as a political agent and ability to recognize how these various concepts and systems underlie the fabric of our political language and practice and how you can apply them in reality in collaboration with others.

an extension of these goals, imo, is that political thought without a history is dead in the water - this is why I have kind of a hardline opposition to trying to learn political theory mostly through social media and why "leftist theory recs" on here usually drive me absolutely crazy. so any teaching of these readings would probably require a decent level of contextualization.

then there's a question of structure. my intro class was actually pretty enjoyable despite following the pattern described above, as my prof centered the class around different chapters of Plato's Republic, using each chapter as a jumping off point to talk about connections with a more modern political thinker while also incorporating some short fiction of Octavia Butler. cool stuff! I think organizing around theme is edifying. there's tradeoffs to doing chronological vs thematic organization of readings though, which I want to keep in mind

so with all that I think it would look roughly like this (though frankly my reach might be exceeding my grasp), and you could pretty much reorganize the readings to be chronological if you wanted:

"The Political"/Power: I think spending some time on "metapolitics" is important, like what politics is and what the function of political philosophy is. So start with some different perspectives on realism vs. idealism (the Republic, the Melian dialogue, The Prince) and sliding into competing definitions of politics as conflict vs consensus (the Arendt/Fanon and Schmitt/Benjamin "debates")

Authority: Hobbes/Rousseau/Hume on the social contract, the Crito/Thoreau/MLK on civil disobedience, ideally an anarchist of some stripe (would rather include Bakunin or Kropotkin but R.P. Wolff might be the more cohesive move)

Equality/Property: Locke's Second Treatise, Rousseau's Discourse on Inequality, The Communist Manifesto and/or Marx on primitive accumulation as an alternative genealogy of property/money, Nietzsche's Genealogy of Morality as illustrative of a reactionary/aristocratic perspective on equality (you could swap in Aristotle instead for a different take), Fanon in Black Skins White Masks

Justice: Plato, Rawls on distributive justice, Nussbaum on capabilities/global justice, Mills on the racial contract

Freedom: Mill's On Liberty, Marcuse's "Critique of Pure Tolerance," some chapters from Capital V1, "Throwing Like a Girl" by Young (plus maybe some Beauvoir/Wittig). work in Berlin and Pettit's competing ideas of liberty

then maybe end on Foucault writing in a broad mode about subjectivity OR Benjamin's "On the Concept of History" - either would be good for a kind of "call to action" that I like in a politics class

there are some concepts that might warrant their own segment (domination, violence, sovereignty, revolution, security, progress - I waffled on making "property" its own unit), but I'm trying to not go too crazy (and it's possible they could get folded into other concepts as corollaries). I'm also leaving out various authors that I do think merit inclusion (Adorno, Dewey, D&G, Lenin & Mao, Althusser, Davis, various contemporary writers), but I would probably follow the path of my Middle Eastern Politics professor - put supplemental/suggested readings in there for the freaks that like this stuff.

and finally I think the above is more tailored to be an introduction (if a somewhat sweeping one), you could take an alternative tack and construct "contemporary issues in political theory" (e.g. migration/refugees, climate, economic crisis, security state/surveillance) and I think that would also be a rewarding survey

[justforbooks]

‘It’s human conceit to think we’re alone’: life must extend beyond Earth, leading space scientist says

It is imperative humans expand their understanding of space, argues Dame Maggie Aderin-Pocock

Life must exist beyond Earth, a leading space scientist says, adding it is yet another example of human pride to suppose otherwise.

The British space scientist Dame Maggie Aderin-Pocock, who will be giving the Royal Institution Christmas Lectures this year, said that while science had made giant leaps in the understanding of space, including the sheer size of the universe, there was still much to learn – not least whether humans were alone.

“My answer to that, based on the numbers, is no, we can’t be,” said Aderin-Pocock. “It’s that human conceit again that we are so caught up in ourselves that we might think we’re alone.”

It is not the only outstanding question.

“The fact we only know what approximately 6% of the universe is made of at this stage is a bit embarrassing,” she said, noting the vast majority of the universe was made of dark energy and dark matter – mysterious substances people still did not understand.

It is this contrast of startling revelations and unanswered conundrums that Aderin-Pocock is due to unpick in the 2025 Royal Institution Christmas Lectures – a prestigious series of public talks initiated by the chemist and physicist Michael Faraday in 1825.

“It’s that sense of wonder and exploration, and the sense that there’s so much more to discover,” she said, emphasising that scientific progress was not one eureka moment after the next, but a journey in which some theories fell by the wayside while others were taken further.

As Aderin-Pocock noted, the idea that the Earth was at the centre of the universe – championed by the philosopher Aristotle – lasted for centuries before being overturned, while it was the work of Henrietta Swan Leavitt in the 19th century that gave astronomers the means to understand the scale of the universe.

“And then suddenly we realised that we were so much more insignificant than we ever thought,” said Aderin-Pocock, adding that the astronomer Edwin Hubble subsequently showed the universe was expanding, while the eponymous Hubble space telescope later revealed there were about 200bn galaxies out there.

This is a big year for the Royal Institution, marking the bicentenary of three of Faraday’s triumphs: the Christmas Lectures, the discovery of benzene and the Friday Evening Discourses – now given once a month as the Ri Discourses and not always on a Friday.

The organisation is launching a year-long celebration called Discover200 that will feature a candlelit discourse and recreations of past lectures, a new demonstration show and the release of all past filmed series of Christmas Lectures on YouTube. In addition, the Royal Institution is asking people to share their memories of attending the Christmas Lectures and Ri Discourses.

Aderin-Pocock is also hoping to mine the institution’s archives for clips from previous years, including the lectures by the American astronomer Carl Sagan, to explore how understanding of space has changed.

Key among the missions challenging current theories is the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), which was launched on Christmas Day 2021. With its huge 18-segment mirror the telescope acts like a time machine, capturing light from distant galaxies that – because light travels at a finite speed – was produced when the universe was still young.

“One of the things that it’s discovering is that galaxies seem to be bigger than we anticipated in the early universe,” said Aderin-Pocock. The discovery has thrown up a host of questions, including whether the laws of physics are constant and whether dark matter really exists.

For Aderin-Pocock, the JWST is personal: she worked on one of its instruments known as the Near-Infrared Spectrograph.

But the mission is facing budget cuts of up to 20% – and that is before the US Department of Government Efficiency (Doge), overseen by the tech entrepreneur Elon Musk, has finished scrutinising Nasa.

For Aderin-Pocock the role of Musk – who is CEO of the space technology company Space X – in assessing the agency is a conflict of interest.

“It’s an odd stance to take to have Musk looking at this, because you need someone independent, you need someone with distance from this. And to me, ideally, someone from a different arena, so that they aren’t caught up in all the baggage that we carry around when we work in an industry, but bring a new light to it,” she said. “And so the fact that Elon Musk is involved in this seems like a bad idea to me.”

And while Aderin-Pocock is excited that the commercialisation of space –something she labels the “battle of the billionaires” – could hasten her dream of space travel, she said legislation is crucial.

“Sometimes it feels a bit like the wild west where people are doing what they want out there, and without the proper constraints I think we could make a mess again,” she said. “And again, if there is an opportunity to utilise space for the benefit of humanity, let it be for all of humanity.”

Yet, like Musk, she is keen for crewed missions to other planets. “I won’t say it’s our destiny because that sounds a bit weird, but I think it is our future,” she said. “We live on our planet and, I don’t want to sound scary, but planets can be vulnerable.”

Aderin-Pocock notes that an asteroid wiped out the dinosaurs, and while humans are now keeping an eye on space rocks coming close to Earth, they are not the only hazard that could decimate humanity.

“So I think it makes sense to look out there to where we might have other colonies – on the moon, on Mars and then beyond as well,” she said.

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[eternal-echoes]

I finally started Violet Evergarden (I keep thinking it's Violet Evergreen lol). From the little bit of info I've read before watching it, I initially thought she was a robot trying to become human and had the same philosophical premise as Ghost in the Shell. And as an philosopher with Aristotelian leaning, I couldn't accept Ghost in the Shell's take on the mind-body problem that dualism is true (mind and body are separate so the mind is transferable while Aristotle believed in hylermorphism - that the mind and body make up one substance) so I kept postponing watching this but turns out she was a child soldier who just didn't have a will of her own.

I like the concept so far and the animation is really cool. I kinda feel like maybe I'm watching it at the wrong time since I'm still swooning over My Happy Marriage but learning how to live after the war helps me realize not to take what I have for granted.

[geopolicraticus]

The age of the Logician is over. The time of the Mathematician has come.

Fulfilling the Destiny of Mathematics.—What unifies modern science, and what distinguishes modern science from its premodern antecedents, is mathematics. This is the common language of the sciences, the language in which its various laws are expressed, thus the syntax for which the special sciences provide the semantics. Is mathematics, then, the science of science? Or will mathematics someday become the science of science that must develop out of modern science? If mathematical logic is to the science of modern science as Aristotle’s Posterior Analytics was to the science of pre-modern science (as I wrote previously), what will mathematical logic become when, at long last, modern science eventually converges on its telos? Logical reasoning is subordinated to mathematical forms in mathematical logic, which has, moreover, already made the transition from logical calculus to foundational research, becoming, in the process, another specialization and not a grand theoretical umbrella that covers the whole of the sciences. And there is no treatise on mathematics that is the equivalent of what Aristotle’s Posterior Analytics was to ancient thought. Euclid’s Elements was thoroughly in the spirit of the Posterior Analytics, so while it is a classic of mathematical thought, it doesn’t represent a counterpart to the logical tradition. The definitive treatise on mathematics has not yet been written because it cannot be written at the present stage of the development of formal thought. The shift from logic as the science of science to mathematics as the science of science remains unfinished as yet. Mathematics has not yet achieved its telos, and we have no assurance that it can achieve this. Like the modern sciences themselves, which multiply and diverge, mathematics has multiplied and diverged, pouring out its substance like a river emptying into a desert, absorbed into the sands and ultimately feeding underground rivers hidden from sight. We have yet to locate the caverns through which these unseen rivers flow; and mathematics has yet further permutations and macroevolutionary stages to pass through before it fulfills its destiny as a science of science.